Cotuit Village

Cotuit is a semi-peninsular coastal buffer between Osterville and Mashpee whose Wampanoag name derived from “place of the council.” This smallest village — including five square miles with 12 miles of coastline surrounded on three sides by water — was part of a 1648 land purchase negotiated by Plymouth Colony’s Myles Standish. Primarily residential Cotuit lies on Nantucket Sound and Cotuit Bay. Its several smaller beaches such as Ropes, Riley’s, Loop and Oregon Beaches. Interestingly, this land purchase was consummated in exchange for “one great brass kettle seven spans in wideness round about, and one broad hoe,” a fun fact memorialized in the popular Kettle-Ho, a village restaurant and tavern. Many are familiar with delicious Cotuit oysters, which are farmed here. The village contains stately homes, historic architecture, Cotuit Center for the Arts and Cahoon Museum. Cotuit’s northwestern edge is called Santuit, a small hamlet at the junction of Main Street and Routes 28 and 130.