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Hernando de Soto, the Spanish conquistador, is legendary in the
United States today: counties, cars, caverns, shopping malls and
bridges all bear his name. This work explains the historical
importance of his expedition, a journey that began at Tampa Bay in
1539 and ended in Arkansas in 1543. De Soto's explorations, the
first European penetration of eastern North America, preceded a
demographic disaster for the aboriginal peoples in the region. Old
World diseases, perhaps introduced by the de Soto expedition and
certainly by other Europeans in the 16th and 17th centuries, killed
many thousands of Indians. By the middle of the 18th century only a
few remained alive. The de Soto narratives provide the first
European account of many of these Indian societies as they were at
the time of European contact. This work interprets these and other
16th-century accounts in the light of new archaeological
information, resulting in a more comprehensive view of the native
peoples. Matching de Soto's camps to sites where artifacts from the
de Soto era have been found, the authors reconstruct his route in
Florida and at the same time clarify questions about the social
geography and political relationships of the Florida Indians. They
link names once known only from documents (for example, the Uzita,
who occupied territory at the de Soto landing site, and the
Aguacaleyquen of north peninsular Florida) to actual archaeological
remains and sites.
Between 1539 and 1542 Hernando de Soto led a small army on a
desperate journey of exploration across the Southeast. His path has
been one of history's most intriguing mysteries. With ""Knights of
Spain, Warriors of the Sun"", Charles Hudson offers a solution to
the question. ""Where did De Soto go?"" Blending archaeology,
history and geography, this book offers a clearly written narrative
that unfolds against the exotic backdrop of a now extinct
landscape.
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