Wampanoag people
Wampanoag people have lived in the area of Aquinnah, Massachusetts, for millennia. Traditionally, they fished, grew crops, and hunted whales. English people began settling in the region in large numbers by the 17th and 18th centuries, encroaching on Wampanoag lands. Over time the Wampanoag were dispossessed of their lands. Some intermarried with English colonists and later European-American generations. As the Wampanoag had a matrilineal kinship system, they considered all children born to their women to be Wampanoag. They carried on their culture this way. Descent and inheritance passed through the women's lines.