Mary Rowlandson

Mary Rowlandson was an English colonist captured during King Philip’s War in 1676. Her account of captivity and release became one of colonial New England’s best-known narratives.

The Sovereignty and Goodness of God: Mary Rowlandson’s 1682 narrative recounting her captivity during King Philip’s War and interpreting it through Puritan providence. This published account turns her captivity into the enduring work associated with her name.
Captivity narrative: A first-person account of capture, confinement, and return, often shaped by religious or political interpretation. Rowlandson’s book established a prominent early American example of this genre.
Massachusetts Bay Colony: An English Puritan colony established in New England in 1630. Rowlandson’s community and religious world belonged to this colonial society.
Puritanism: A Protestant movement seeking to reform the Church of England and shape communities around strict religious discipline. Puritan belief supplies the narrative’s central language of sin, trial, and providence.
Lancaster, Massachusetts: A Massachusetts town attacked by Native forces in February 1676 during King Philip’s War. The attack on Lancaster began Rowlandson’s captivity.
Puritan providentialism: A Puritan belief that events, including suffering, reveal God’s purposes and judgments. Rowlandson interprets hardship and survival as signs of divine providence.
Wampanoag Confederacy: A network of Indigenous communities in southeastern New England led during the war by Metacom. Wampanoag resistance shaped the conflict in which Rowlandson was captured.
Colonialism in the Americas: The expansion of European rule and settlement across the Americas and its effects on Indigenous peoples. The conflict underlying Rowlandson’s captivity arose from colonial expansion and Indigenous resistance.
King Philip’s War: A 1675–1678 conflict between English colonists and Native nations in southern New England. The war explains the military setting of Rowlandson’s capture and ransom.
First-person narrative: A narrative told by a speaker who recounts events from personal experience. The account presents captivity through Rowlandson’s retrospective voice.

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