Prior to the first English settlement on Roanoke Island, Philip Amadas and Arthur Barlowe explored the area on behalf of Raleigh, who had received an English charter to establish a colony a month earlier. During their expedition, Barlowe took detailed notes relating to conflicts and rivalries between different groups of Native Americans. In one account, Wingina explained his own tribal history, in relation to a neighboring tribe at the mouth of the Neuse River, the Neusiok, referred to as the "Neiosioke" by Barlowe. According to Wingina, the Secotans endured years of warfare with the Neiosioke, and "some years earlier," he met with the Neiosioke king, in an effort to ensure a "permanent coexistence." The two leaders arranged a feast between the two groups. An unspecified number of Secotan men and 30 women attended a feast in the town of Neiosioke. The Neiosioke ambushed the Secotans at the feast, and by the time fighting ended, the Neiosioke had "slewn them every one, reserving the women and children only." In conveying this "inter-tribal" history to Barlowe, Wingina saw an opportunity to advance the interest of the Secotans. Wingina and his people attempted on several occasions to convince the English to join them in devising a surprise attack against the Neiosioke. The Englishmen, uncertain of "whether their perswasion be to the ende they may be revenged of their enemies, or for the love they beare to us," declined to help the Secotans wage war against their rivals. Instead, the English established a trusting relationship with the Secotans, exemplified by the willingness of two Secotan chiefs, Manteo and Wanchese, to accompany Amadas and Barlowe back to England. Wingina was decapitated by one of Raleigh's men, Edward Nugent, in the summer of 1586.
Legacy
Raleigh's 1584 expedition recorded the name of the regional king and reported to Queen Elizabeth I that he ruled over a land known as Wingandacoa. She was probably influenced by this report to modify the name of the colony to "Virginia", in part alluding to her status as the "Virgin Queen." It is the oldest surviving English place-name in the United States not wholly borrowed from a Native American word, and the fourth oldest surviving English place name, though it is Latin in form. However, on Raleigh's subsequent voyage to the area, he recorded that Wingandacoa, the Carolina Algonquian word the English had heard upon his first arrival in 1584, means "What good clothes you wear!" and was not the native name of Wingina's country.
