The social geography of South Florida during the Spanish colonial era

Worth, John E. (author)

71st Annual Meeting of the Society for American Archaeology, San Juan, Puerto Rico, 30 April 2006

April 30, 2006

Between the 1513 and 1760, the indigenous societies of South Florida were subjected to increasingly forceful external pressures which eventually led to cultural extinction. Nevertheless, perhaps more effectively than any other region of greater Spanish Florida, the Calusa and their neighbors mounted a conscious and proactive resistance to these colonial forces, preserving many elements of their traditional culture while simultaneously dooming themselves to eventual destruction and exile. Synthetic review of available ethnohistorical and archaeological data throughout this period provides important insights regarding the social geography of this unique nonagricultural region sandwiched between the agricultural peoples of northern Florida and Cuba.

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