Last Updated on October 18, 2013 by Dennis
Machapunga Indians (‘bad dust’; from matchi ‘bad’, pungo ‘dust’ (Heckewelder), or perhaps ‘much dust,’ from massa ‘great’, in allusion to the sandy soil of the district). An Algonquian tribe formerly living in Hyde county, north east North Carolina. In 1701 they numbered only about 30 warriors, or perhaps 100 souls, and lived in a single village called Mattamuskeet. They took part in the Tuscarora War of 1711-12 and at its conclusion the remnant, together with the Coree, were settled on a tract on Mattamuskeet lake, where the two tribes occupied one village.