1676 (MDCLXXVI) was a leap year starting on Wednesday of the Gregorian calendar and a leap year starting on Saturday of the Julian calendar, the 1676th year of the Common Era (CE) and Anno Domini (AD) designations, the 676th year of the 2nd millennium, the 76th year of the 17th century, and the 7th year of the 1670s decade. As of the start of 1676, the Gregorian calendar was 10 days ahead of the Julian calendar, which remained in localized use until 1923.
John Eliot was a Puritan missionary to the American Indians who some called "the apostle to the Indians" and the founder of Roxbury Latin School in the Massachusetts Bay Colony in 1645. In 1660 he completed the enormous task of translating the Eliot Indian Bible into the Massachusett Indian language, producing more than two thousand completed copies.
Metacomet, also known as Pometacom, Metacom, and by his adopted English name King Philip, was sachem to the Wampanoag people and the second son of the sachem Massasoit. His older brother Wamsutta briefly became sachem after their father's death in 1661. However, Wamsutta also died shortly thereafter and Metacom became sachem in 1662.
King Philip's War was an armed conflict in 1675–1676 between a group of indigenous peoples of the Northeastern Woodlands against the English New England Colonies and their indigenous allies. The war is named for Metacom, the Pokanoket chief and sachem of the Wampanoag who adopted the English name Philip because of the friendly relations between his father Massasoit and the Plymouth Colony. The war continued in the most northern reaches of New England until the signing of the Treaty of Casco Bay on April 12, 1678.
Mary Rowlandson, née White, later Mary Talcott, was a colonial American woman who was captured by Native Americans in 1676 during King Philip's War and held for 11 weeks before being ransomed. In 1682, six years after her ordeal, The Sovereignty and Goodness of God: Being a Narrative of the Captivity and Restoration of Mrs. Mary Rowlandson was published. This text is considered a formative American work in the literary genre of captivity narratives. It went through four printings in 1682 and garnered readership both in the New England colonies and in England, leading some to consider it the first American "bestseller".
The Massachusett were a Native American tribe from the region in and around present-day Greater Boston in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. The name comes from the Massachusett language term for "At the Great Hill," referring to the Blue Hills overlooking Boston Harbor from the south.
Monoco was a 17th-century Nashaway sachem (chief), known among the New England Puritans as One-eyed John.
Praying Indian is a 17th-century term referring to Native Americans of New England, New York, Ontario, and Quebec who converted to Christianity either voluntarily or involuntarily. Many groups are referred to by the term, but it is more commonly used for tribes that were organized into villages. The villages were known as praying towns and were established by missionaries such as the Puritan leader John Eliot and Jesuit missionaries who established the St. Regis and Kahnawake and the missions among the Huron in western Ontario.
The Nipmuc or Nipmuck people are an Indigenous people of the Northeastern Woodlands, who historically spoke an Eastern Algonquian language, probably the Loup language. Their historic territory Nippenet, meaning 'the freshwater pond place', is in central Massachusetts and nearby parts of Connecticut and Rhode Island.
John Sassamon, also known as Wussausmon, was a Massachusett man who lived in New England during the colonial era. He converted to Christianity and became a praying Indian, helping to serve as an interpreter to New England colonists. In January 1675, Sassamon was ambushed and assassinated. A mixed jury of colonists and Indian elders convicted and executed three Wampanoag men for his murder. These events helped spark the conflict known as King Philip's War, in which the New England Colonies defeated the Wampanoag and ended armed resistance by the Native Americans of southeastern New England.
Waban was a Native American of the Nipmuc group and was thought to be the first Native American convert to Christianity in Massachusetts.
Mount Grace, 1,617 feet (493 m), is a prominent monadnock located in north central Massachusetts in the town of Warwick, approximately two miles south of the New Hampshire border. The mountain is rugged and largely wooded, but a firetower on the summit provides expansive views of the surrounding rural countryside. Little Mount Grace, 1,226 feet (374 m), is the southern summit of the mountain. Mount Grace supports a predominantly northern hardwood forest as well as stands of red spruce near its summit.
The Chaubunagungamaug Reservation refers to the small parcel of land located in the town of Thompson, Connecticut, close to the border with the town of Webster, Massachusetts, and within the bounds of Lake Chaubunagungamaug to the east and the French River to the west. The reservation is used by the descendants of the Nipmuck Indians of the previous reservation, c. 1682–1869, that existed in the same area, who now identify as the Webster/Dudley Band of the Chaubunagungamaug Nipmuck.
The Nashaway were a tribe of Algonquian Indians inhabiting the upstream portions of the Nashua River valley in what is now the northern half of Worcester County, Massachusetts, mainly in the vicinity of Sterling, Lancaster and other towns near Mount Wachusett, as well as southern New Hampshire. The meaning of Nashaway is "between," an adverbial form derived from "nashau" meaning "someone is between/in the middle" = adverbial suffix "we" Gustafson, Holly (2000), "A Grammar of the Nipmuc Language," University of Manitoba.</ref>
John Hoar was a militia leader & Indian liaison in colonial Massachusetts during King Philip's War. He is best known for securing the release of Mary Rowlandson from Nipmuc captivity at Redemption Rock. The event was depicted in the best-selling book The Sovereignty and Goodness of God: Being a Narrative of the Captivity and Restoration of Mrs. Mary Rowlandson.
The Sudbury Fight was a battle of King Philip's War, fought in what is today Sudbury and Wayland, Massachusetts, when approximately five hundred Wampanoag, Nipmuc, and Narragansett Native Americans raided the frontier settlement of Sudbury in Massachusetts Bay Colony. Disparate companies of English militiamen from nearby settlements marched to the town's defense, two of which were drawn into Native ambushes and suffered heavy losses. The battle was the last major Native American victory in King Philip's War before their final defeat in southern New England in August 1676.
The Lancaster Raid was the first in a series of five planned raids on English colonial towns during the winter of 1675-1676 as part of King Philip's War. Metacom, known by English colonists as King Philip, was a Wampanoag sachem who led and organized Wampanoag warriors during the war. Teaming up with Nipmuc and Narragansett warriors, the Wampanoag successfully raided the town of Lancaster, securing provisions and prisoners to help them carry on into their winter offensive.
A Narrative of the Captivity and Restoration of Mrs. Mary Rowlandson is a 1682 memoir written by Mary (White) Rowlandson, a married English colonist and mother who was captured in 1675 in an attack by Native Americans during King Philip's War. She was held by them for ransom for 11 weeks and 5 days. Six years after being released, her account of the ordeal was published, which is considered a formative example of the literary genre of captivity narratives. It is also considered one of America's first bestsellers, and four editions were printed in 1682 when it was first published.
The Eliot Indian Bible was the first translation of the Christian Bible into an indigenous American language, as well as the first Bible published in British North America. It was prepared by English Puritan missionary John Eliot by translating the Geneva Bible into the Massachusett language. Printed in Cambridge, Massachusetts, the work first appeared in 1661 with only the New Testament. An edition including all 66 books of both the Old and New Testaments was printed in 1663.
The Praying Indians of Natick were a community of Indigenous Christian converts, known as Praying Indians, in the town of Natick, Massachusetts, one of many Praying Towns. They were also known as Natick Indians.
