A man stands to the front, his face half-left, his feet well apart, the back of his right hand resting on his right hip. He is wearing a single apron-skirt of fringed deerskin and a grayish (puma?) tail which hangs down at the back and is seen between his legs from the thighs almost to the ankles. His hair is worn short at the sides leaving a central roach and is caught up at the back. Two feathers are stuck in his hair by his left ear and one is visible by his right, while a tall feather stands upright from his forehead. From his right ear protrudes what seems to be a bone ornament, and from his left hangs an ornament which appears to consist of a stone (or bead) enclosed by a strip of yellowish metal from which depend three small metal balls; one ball may also be seen above the stone. Around his neck he wears a long six-string necklace of blue or near black pearls or beads of even size, and two bracelets of the same materials are worn round his right wrist. He is elaborately painted in reddish-brown and white on the face, neck, chest, upper arms and calves. Around the neck the painting simulates a necklace from which hang three circular plaques with double outlines, the lowest of these having a central boss. Round the nipples and on the shoulders are similar circular designs, from the latter of which stripes are carried down to the forearm. He is armed with a strung bow somewhat taller than himself which he holds upright in his left hand. On his left wrist is a folded band or wrist-guard of skin, secured with a button, while from his left side projects a basketry quiver inside which the tips of arrows are visible. This is supported by a string or thong probably suggested by the line on his left shoulder.
Inscribed in dark brown ink, in the upper left-hand corner, "The manner of their attire and | painting themselues when | they goe to their generall | huntings, or at theire Solemne feasts."
John White (c 1540-1593) was an English artist & early pioneer of English efforts to settle North America. He was among those who sailed with Richard Grenville to the shore of present-day North Carolina in 1585, acting as artist & mapmaker to the expedition. During his time at Roanoke Island he made a number of watercolor sketches of the surrounding landscape & the native Algonkin peoples. White had been commissioned to "draw to life" the inhabitants of the New World & their surroundings. During White's time at Roanoke Island, he completed numerous watercolor drawings of the surrounding landscape & native peoples. These works are significant as they are the most informative illustrations of a Native American society of the Eastern seaboard. They represent the sole-surviving visual record of the native inhabitants of America encountered by England's first settlers.
