Photos From Set of AHS Tease Season 6 Theme

Thanks to TMZ, we just got some substantial clues to the theme for American Horror Story season six. AHS is filming in Santa Clarita, California, right now, but according to these photos from the set, the intended location of the show will be Roanoke Island off the coast of North Carolina. The big tipoff is the word CROATOAN carved into a tree, which was one of the only clues left behind when a group of colonists vanished from an encampment on the island around 1590. The Lost Colony, as it is called in American myth, was led by an Englishman named John White, who brought around 100 settlers with him to Roanoke Island in 1587. Historical records show that this wasn’t a military excursion, since the group had many women and children. White departed for a supply run back to England, but when he returned three years later everyone had disappeared, leaving behind little more than CROATOAN carved into a fence post and CRO carved into a tree.

Historians and archaeologists speculate that the settlers either migrated to the neighboring Croatoan Island (now called Hatteras), died of pestilence, assimilated into surrounding Native American tribes, or — and this is the version of history we’re suspecting Murphy prefers — were killed by those tribes for being white invaders to the New World. It is true that the Lost Colonists were caught between two conflicting groups, the Secotan and the Chowanoke, but in Murphy’s version, 1590 things are probably going to get a lot more gruesome than some disputes over land mass and waterways. And if AHS: Coven’s use of historical narrative is any kind of precedent, we’re imagining a lot of blood sacrifice. Happy speculating!