area, due to the spread of Indian missionaries, but also because Massachusett became the language of literacy, prayer and administration, likely facilitated by its historic use as a regional second language and backed by its use in the translation of the Bible. The Massachusett leaders were also closer to the colonial authorities and thus often chosen to spread official messages, restoring the old power dynamic vis-à-vis other tribes. Life in the Praying towns became a mix of European and Indian customs. The Indians were forced to adopt Puritan habits of modesty, hairstyle, dress, and other cultural norms. They were encouraged to learn European methods of woodworking, carpentry, animal husbandry, and agriculture and Eliot arranged for many Indians to apprentice under settlers to learn these skills. Natick had an independent congregation with a Christian-style church, but the services were conducted in Massachusett with Indian preachers and the parishioners were called by Native drumming. The Praying Indians maintained many aspects of Indigenous culture, such their customary cuisine and foraging and hunting, but melded them with the European culture and Christian religion they were forced to adopt. The mix of religious, cultural, and political control over the Indians was in many ways a precursor to the Indian Reservations that later developed. Humiliation of the Indians The truce that had existed between the English colonists of the Massachusetts Bay and Plymouth colonies and the local Native peoples was tested. The submission of the local chiefs to the respective colonial governments and adoption of Christianity allowed the Indians to seek redress in the colonial legal system and removed one of the prejudices against them. The Praying Indians of Natick were brought to court several times by colonists living in settlement of Dedham who claimed some of the surrounding land, but with Eliot's assistance, most of these attempts failed. Most of the time, however, the Indians failed, as some of the Indian interpreters and chiefs ceded lands to curry favor from the settlers to maintain special privileges, such as the Nipmuc John Wampas, who betrayed the Nipmuc and Massachusett people by selling land to the settlers to which he had no claim, but these sales were upheld in later court challenges. The Pawtucket sachem Wenepoykin, son of Nanepashemet and Squaw Sachem of Mistick, through kinship and family ties laid claim to much of Massachusett territory, and tried several times to petition the courts for lands lost