Power Thesaurus. 1969. elegant thesaurus http://www.powerthesaurus.org/elegant/synonyms (accessed April 12, 2017).
Providence Plantations refers to the mainland portion of the state, which included Williams's Providence Plantation and Samuel Gortonâs Shawomet Purchase (1642), which was renamed Warwick Plantation. Rhode Island referred to Aquidneck Island, on which the settlements of Portsmouth (1638) and Newport (1639) were established.
The Charter of 1663, which established Rhode Islandâs sovereignty, bound Rhode Island together with the northern mainland towns of Warwick and Providence (the Providence Plantations), forming the colony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, a designation used decades before the first African slaves arrived in 1696.