 The term pocosin, with its varied spellings, was a term used by the area's inhabitants to describe a low, marshy, woody place covered by water in the winter, but dry in the summer.These Native Americans were Algonquians, a tribal group affiliated through the Powhatan Confederacy, and were defensive to the early colonizers.A petition to have the name of the parish and river changed was an attempt to rid the language of all vestiges of Indian terms.