Seventeenth-century deeds from Maine serve as a case study for the ethnohistorical potential of deed research. These transactions provide insights into native land tenure and tribal boundaries, two aspects of Maine Indians rarely noted by seventeenth-century observers. Deeds also shed light on Anglo-Indian relations. Maine Indians were not cheated of their lands in a fraudulent "deed game." Instead, land sales were predominantly legitimate transactions between parties who generally understood the terms and implications of the sale.