ABSTRACT
In 1590, two years after its original quarto publication, Thomas Harriot’s A Briefe and True Report of the New Found Land of Virginia received a second lavish printing complete with twenty-eight engravings of the Southeastern Algonquin. Although the text has recently gained notoriety as a prime example of early modern ethnography, critics have sometimes overlooked its main purpose: to drum up investment in the colonial venture. The fi rst half of the book is in fact nothing more than an inventory of the abundant “marchantable commodities” of the New World that await only the hand of an intrepid entrepreneur to be converted into a handsome profi t. Chapter 3, titled “Of commodities for building and other necessary uses,” turns out to be a list of various trees species native to the Eastern seaboard accompanied by a detailed description of their numerous commercial applications.
