Existing comment:
Indian badges, about 1662
Passport badges were issued to control Indian entry into English territory.
These medals are engraved "Ye King of Patomeck" (Potomac) and "Ye King of Machotick" (Machodoc). A 1662 act of the assembly ordered "that badges, silver [for chiefs] and copper, with the name of the [Indian] towne graved upon them, be given to all the adjacent tribes" and warned that "if any damage or injury be done" to the settlers by an Indian, his chief would "be answerable for it." |