America: Being the Latest, and Most Accurate Description of the Nevv VVorld: Containing the Original of the Inhabitants, and the Remarkable Voyages Thither. The Conquest of the Vast Empires of Mexico and Peru, and Other Large Provinces and Territories, with the Several European Plantations in Those Parts. Also Their Cities, Fortresses, Towns, Temples, Mountains, and Rivers. Their Habits, Customs, Manners, and Religions. Their Plants, Beasts, Birds, and Serpents. With an Appendix, Containing, BesOgilby, John
History
America: Being the Latest, and Most Accurate Description of the Nevv VVorld: Containing the Original of the Inhabitants, and the Remarkable Voyages Thither. The Conquest of the Vast Empires of Mexico and Peru, and Other Large Provinces and Territories, with the Several European Plantations in Those Parts. Also Their Cities, Fortresses, Towns, Temples, Mountains, and Rivers. Their Habits, Customs, Manners, and Religions. Their Plants, Beasts, Birds, and Serpents. With an Appendix, Containing, Bes
Ogilby, John
America
Their Houses are most of them built of one fashion, onely differing in
length; all of them agree in breadth of twenty Foot: They build after
this manner, they set Peel’d Boughs of Nut-Trees in the ground,
according to the bigness of the place which they intend to build, then
joyning the tops of the Boughs together, they cover the Walls and top
with the Bark of Cypress, Ashen, and Chest-nut-Trees, which are laid one
upon another, the smallest side being turn’d inwards: according to the
bigness of the Houses, several Families, to the number of fifteen dwell
together, every one having his Apartment. Their Fortifications are most
of them built on steep Hills, near Rivers; the access to them is onely
at one place, they are built after this manner: They set great Poles in
the Ground, with Oaken _Pallisadoes_ on each side, cross-ways one
amongst another; between the crosses they set other Trees, to strengthen
the Work: Within this inclos’d they generally build twenty or thirty
Houses, of which some are a hundred and eighty Foot long, and some less,
all of them full of People: In the Summer they pitch Tents along by the
River side to Fish; against Winter they remove into the Woods, to be
near their Game of Hunting, and also Fuel.
[Sidenote: Many Wives.]
[Sidenote: Marriages.]
[Sidenote: Whoring permitted.]
[Sidenote: Strange Marrying.]
[Sidenote: Child-bearing Womens strange actions.]
[Sidenote: Funerals.]
[Sidenote: Mourning over the dead remarkable.]
To take many Women is not customary here, only amongst Military
Officers, who Marry three or four Wives, which so well agree, that there
is never any difference betwixt them; those that are not of Age, never
Marry but with the consent and advice of their Parents: Widows and
unmarry’d Men follow their own opinion and choice; only they take
Cognizance of their Estates and Extraction: The Bridegroom always
presents the Bride; for the least offence, the Man after having soundly
beaten his Wife, turns her out of Doors, and Marries another, insomuch,
that some of them have every year a new Wife: On breach of Marriage, the
Children follow the Mother, from whom they account their Generation:
They account Adultery, if committed under the bare Canopy of Heaven, a
great Sin: Whoring is Licenc’d to single Women, if they receive Money
for it, and no Man scruples to Marry them; nay, those that are Marry’d,
boast how many they have enjoy’d before their Marriage: She that is
inclin’d to Marry, covers her whole body, and sets her self wrapt up in
the middle of the way, where a Batchelor passing by sees her, and makes
up the Match blindfold: When impregnated, they take great care that
their Fruit receives no hindrance nor prejudice: When the time of their
Delivery approaches, (which they know exactly) they go to a Melancholly
place in the Woods, though in the coldest Weather, where they raise up a
Hut of Mats, and bring the Child into the World without any help or
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