Arthur Barlowe (1550 – 1620) was one of two British captains, who, under the direction of Sir Walter Raleigh, left England in 1584 to find land in North America to claim for Queen Elizabeth and England.  His account survives in a letter written to Raleigh as a report on their journey. It is one of the earliest detailed English commercial reports written from direct observation about any place in North America^[1] and has been called "one of the clearest contemporary pictures of the contact of Europeans with North American Indians."

Barlowe departed England with two ships on April 27, sailing down to the Canary Islands and then on to the West Indies, where they stopped briefly for food and water before sailing north along the eastern coast of Florida. After eleven days they came to shallow water and smelled "so sweet, and so strong a smell, as if we had been in the midst of some delicate garden," indicating that land was nearby. Two days later (July 4), they saw the coast and continued to sail for 120 miles until they could find an entrance or river going in from the sea. They finally landed on the outer banks of what is now the Pamlico Sound of North Carolina. Barlowe described the land as a place where "in all the world the like abundance is not to be found...." He and his crew were met by a large group of the Secotan tribe, led by their king's brother Granganemeo Their king Wingina was unable to be there because of a leg wound sustained during a battle with a neighboring tribe. Several of the natives accompanied them as they sailed north to Roanoke island. There they found a Secotan village, where, according to Barlowe, they were treated with great hospitality and generosity. Barlowe described the people of the village as "gentle, loving and faithful, void of all guile and treason, and such as live after the manner of the golden age."

The discovery of Roanoke Island and the coast of North Carolina led to the establishment of the Roanoke Colony. This colony at Roanoke Island would later be known as the "Lost Colony," whose members are presumed to have either starved to death or been incorporated into one of the local native American Indian populations.

 

The term Golden Age comes from Greek mythology, particularly from Hesiod and is part of the description of temporal decline of the state of peoples through five ages, Gold being the first and the one during which the Golden Race of humanity lived. After the end of the first age was the Silver, then the Bronze after this the Heroic age, with the fifth and current age being Iron.

By extension, "Golden Age" denotes a period of primordial peace, harmony, stability, and prosperity. During this age, peace and harmony prevailed in that people did not have to work to feed themselves for the earth provided food in abundance. They lived to a very old age with a youthful appearance, eventually dying peacefully, with spirits living on as "guardians

European pastoral literary tradition often depicted nymphs and shepherds as living a life of rustic innocence and peace, set in Arcadia, a region of Greece that was the abode and center of worship of their deity, goat-footed Pan who dwelt among them.^.