c. 1600

Patuxet (in present-day Massachusetts)

1622

possibly Cape Cod, Massachusetts

Wampanoag translator and guide

Portrait: Squanto. Reproduced by permission of The Granger Collection Ltd.

"Squanto continued with them and was their interpreter, and as a special instrument sent of God for their good beyond their expectation."

Plymouth Colony governor William Bradford.

Squanto, also known as Tasquantum (or Tisquantum), was a major seventeenth-century Native American figure. He is remembered as the interpreter, guide, and agricultural advisor who shepherded the English settlers of Plymouth Colony through their unstable early existence in the New World (a European term for North America and South America). Squanto was overshadowed, however, by the Pokanoket chief Massasoit (see entry), who is famous for establishing a peace treaty with the Pilgrims in 1621. Controversy surrounds Squanto's life because of his attempts to undermine Massasoit's authority. Squanto is nevertheless considered to be the person who did more than anyone...