There were engineers. [2], Paleo-Indians entered what is now Florida at least 12,000 years ago. In addition, elaborate rituals with synchronized singing and processions of masked priests were also carried out on that occasion. They had lived in the region since the 3rd century BCE (the late Archaic period of the continent ), and remained for roughly 2,000 years, [1] By the 1800s, most had died as a result of settlement battles, slavery, and disease. 314 Palmetto Street, Jacksonville 32202. A Spanish expedition to ransom some captives held by the Calusa in 1680 was forced to turn back; neighboring tribes refused to guide the Spanish, for fear of retaliation by the Calusa. Mollusk shells and shark teeth were used for grating, cutting, carving and engraving. [Online]Available at: https://www.flmnh.ufl.edu/sflarch/research/calusa-domain/, floridahistory.org, 2016. The Calusa case also illustrates remarkably sophisticated engagements with, and long-term large-scale management of, coastal and estuarine environments.. Among most tribes in Florida for which there is documentation, the women wore skirts made of what was later called Spanish moss. Descriptions of the principal town of Calos, probably located on Mound Island in Estero Bay (roughly 50 kms north of Key Marco), were first recorded by Spanish missionaries in 1586. For hundreds of years, the Calusa built a society that had its own government, a religion, and adaptation to the environment that is quite impressive. Different tribes and regions had their own games and traditions. Excavation of the watercourts yielded artifacts like cordage that are not normally preserved at archaeological sites. To date no one has found a Calusa dugout canoe, but it is speculated that such vessels would have been constructed from cypress or pine, as used by other Florida tribes. Re-entering the area in 1614, Spanish forces attacked the Calusa as part of a war between the Calusa and Spanish-allied tribes around Tampa Bay. "Well, every indigenous group around the country has its own unique history and and accomplishments, but I guess what has interested archaeologists and anthropologists generally is that the Calusa managed to become very complex, politically complex," said Marquardt. The Calusa were a Native American tribe that inhabited the southwest coast of Florida. [9] There is also evidence that as early as 2,000 years ago, the Calusa cultivated a gourd of the species Cucurbita pepo and the bottle gourd, which were used for net floats and dippers. The mission was closed after only a few months. Credit: Florida Museum of Natural History ). However, no evidence of plant food was found at the Wightman site. The Calusa Indians, a poorly understood group of bygone Native Americans D Donna Jean Calusa Indians European Explorers University Of South Florida Gulf Coast Florida Spirit World Mexica South Florida People & Environments: The Calusa Domain: Calusa beliefs included a trinity of governing spirits. The Penn Museum respectfully acknowledges that it is situated on Lenapehoking, the ancestral and spiritual homeland of the Unami Lenape. They also claimed authority over the tribes of the east coast, north to about Cape Canaveral. support our organization's work with endangered American Indian languages. The women were responsible for work around the house, like cooking and raising the children. At the time of first European contact, the Caloosahatchee culture region formed the core of the Calusa domain. Hostilities erupted, and the Spanish soldiers killed Carlos, his successor Felipe, and several of the "nobles" before they abandoned their fort and mission in 1569. Among other things. Marquardt notes that the Calusa turned down the offer of agricultural tools from the Spanish, saying that they had no need for them. In 1513 Spanish conquistador Juan Ponce de Leon sailed northwest from the island of Hispaniola (now Haiti and the Dominican Republic) with a three-year royal contract to discover rich lands thought to lie in that direction. But the Spanish not only refused to fight Caalus rivals, they also wanted to convert his people to Catholicism, which eventually led to conflict between the Spanish and the Calusa. The men wore their hair long. This tribe of Indians controlled most of Southwest Florida and created an elaborate network of canals, homes, and government. The Untersberg is a great mountain straddling the Austro-German border opposite Salzburg. [17], The Calusa believed that three supernatural people ruled the world, that people had three souls, and that souls migrated to animals after death. Slaves occupy the lowest level in Calusa society. Now, there is a lot of garbage and misinformation on the Internet no matter what . Was this German silver mine really defended by two Roman forts and a line of "spike defenses? Tracking the Calusa: A Retrospective. [7], The Calusa diet at settlements along the coast and estuaries consisted primarily of fish, in particular pinfish (Lagodon rhomboides), pigfish (redmouth grunt), (Orthopristis chrysoptera) and hardhead catfish (Ariopsis felis). The Caloosahatchee Region". Those excavations revealed rarely preserved objects of wood, such as masks, figureheads, bowls, and tools, which survived because of the wet environment. 3). In 1711, the Spanish helped evacuate 270 Indians, including many Calusa, from the Florida Keys to Cuba (where almost 200 soon died). Tamara Jager Stewart is the assistant editor of American Archaelogy and the Conservancys Southwest region projects director. At some point of time in their history, this tribe discovered that there was a wealth of fish in the waters, and began to exploit this resource. Artist's conception of town chief at the Calusa town of Tampa (present day Pineland) (Art by Merald Clark.) [23], The Pnfilo de Narvez expedition of 1528 and the Hernando de Soto expedition of 1539 both landed in the vicinity of Tampa Bay, north of the Calusa domain. The CalusaPeople of the Estuary. The Calusa gathered a variety of wild berries, fruits, nuts, roots and other plant parts. Though questions about the Calusa and the use of some of these artifacts remain unanswered, early eyewitness accounts and ethnohistorical research, together with new archaeological developments in Florida, enhance our understanding of the cultural context within which these objects were made and used. Archaeologists have long pondered how the Calusa could have grown to a population of some 20,000 and dominated such a vast region without relying on agriculture. New Moai Statue Found on Chiles Easter Island Excites Researchers. "Calusa". "[6] In 1564, according to a Spanish source, the priest was the chief's father, and the military leader was his cousin. New Evidence Shows Humans Were Using Bows and Arrows in 52,000 BC. In 1954 a dugout canoe was found during excavation for a middle school in Marathon, Florida. Southeastern Archaeology, 33(1), 124. It's also possible that a few were absorbed into the Seminole tribe. These massive, rectangular structures built of shell and sediment enclose large areas on both sides of the mouth of Mound Keys great canal, a marine highway nearly 2,000 feet long and about 100 feet wide that bisects the island. A reconstruction of a Calusa home and terraces, on display at the Florida Museum of Natural History. The Carolinan colonists supplied firearms to the Creek and Yemasee, but the Calusa, who had isolated themselves from Europeans, had none. The most powerful ruler governed the physical world, the second most powerful ruled human governments, and the last helped in wars, choosing which side would win. What language did the Calusa speak? [20][21], A few vocabulary examples from Granberry's work are listed below:[22]. We could not anticipate the extraordinary preservation of organic materials down below the water table, Marquardt noted. Although the Calusa came to an end, some remains of their achievements can still be seen today. The Calusa were one of the few tribes known to be shell collectors. By interceding with these spirits, it was believed that the chief was ensuring that his people would be well-supplied by the land. So, we needed information on large-scale architecture, the timing and tempo of shell midden mound formation and the timing of large-scale public architecture., Florida Museum illustration by Merald Clark. Mound Key was thought to be the seat of the powerful Calusa kingdom, and recent archaeological research there has confirmed it was in fact the capital and also revealed the extent of ancient landscape alteration, monumental construction and engineering ingenuity that allowed the Calusas population to grow to an estimated 20,000 without reliance on agriculture. Their main waterway was the Calooshahatchee River, which means River of the Calusa. When combined with historical and archaeological documentation, Cushings finds from Key Marco teach us about the Calusa Indians around the time of contact. While there is no evidence that the Calusa had institutionalized slavery, studies show they would use captives for work or even sacrifice. Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 2004. Soon after the discoveries, Donald funded archaeological mapping of . What did the Calusa tribe believe in? Did the Calusa farm? The Southeast is one of 10 culture areas that scholars use to study the Indigenous peoples of the United States and Canada. They believed in three superior beings, one controlled the weather, the others ruled the welfare of the tribe and warfare. What is the origin of the legend of the Christed Son who was born of a virgin on December 25th? The Calusa are said to have been a socially complex and politically powerful tribe, and most of southern Florida was controlled by them. These small fish were supplemented by larger bony fish, sharks and rays, mollusks, crustaceans, ducks, sea turtles and land turtles, and land animals. One illustration of the sophistication of the Calusa can be found in eyewitness accounts of an event in 1566. Menndez married Carlos' sister, who took the baptismal name Doa Antonia at conversion. Upon learning that the Spaniards did not intend to provide food, clothing, and other gifts, the Calusa rebelled, tenaciously holding to their own beliefs and practices. The heir of the chief wore gold in an ornament on his forehead and beads on his legs. The Spanish left less description on what the Calusa women wore. Furthermore, new diseases such as smallpox and measles were introduced into the area by European explorers. Diseases would ravage their population and force . We began with a basic set of questions, said Marquardt. Favored sites were likely occupied for multiple generations. Cultivated gourds were used as net floats, and sinkers and net weights were made from mollusk shells. At least three of the animal figureheads were found in close association with wooden humanlike masks which Cushing understood to represent the human form of that animal. The University Museum has an exceptional collection of artifacts from the Calusa site at Key Marco, Florida. If a Calusa killed such an animal, the soul would migrate to a lesser animal and eventually be reduced to nothing.[18]. And, although some of Cushings ideas about the Indians he had discovered and their relationship to tribes in the Caribbean and South America have not remained popular among scholars, his descriptive notes and insights are of unquestionable value. At Mound Key, the Spaniards used primitive tabby as a mortar to stabilize the posts in the walls of their wooden structures. A new study says Florida's Calusa tribe built fish enclosures to amass surplus food, allowing its society to flourish and build structures such as the king's manor on Mound Key . This page was last edited on 21 February 2023, at 15:27. The shell mounds are an example of these remains. The Calusa king Caalus, perched high on his throne in his grand house, watched as Pedro Menendez de Aviles, the first governor of La Florida, arrived with his entourage. Most spectacular are 9 carved and painted animal heads, some of which were probably worn as masks or headdresses on ceremonial occasions; others probably functioned as architectural elements. The leaders included the paramount chief, or "king"; a military leader (capitn general in Spanish); and a chief priest. Radiocarbon dating of carbonized wood, a deer bone and a shell verified the forts mid-16th-century date. A new tribe that entered Florida either from the islands or the north at the start of the Christian Era, the Calusa dominated South Florida with their statute, skills, and brutality. Large earthen mounds and ridges, accessed by canals, are believed to have been associated with Calusa ritual. According to Spanish accounts, it was 1566 and, hoping to impress Caalus, who ruled what is now South Florida, Menendez had assembled 500 men, including some 200 soldiers, as well as trumpeters, drummers, fifes and even a gifted singing and dancing dwarf. For a long time, societies that relied on fishing, hunting and gathering were assumed to be less advanced, said Marquardt. Instead, they fished for food on the coast, bays, rivers, and waterways. Fowler Williams, .Lucy"The Calusa Indians: Maritime Peoples of Florida in the Age of Columbus" Expedition Magazine 33.2 (1991): n. pag. Some of these masks had moving parts that used pull strings and hinges so that a person could alter the look of a mask while wearing it. Openings in the berms likely allowed the Calusa to drive fish into the enclosures for short-term storage, and then they closed those openings with nets and wooden gates. Index of Indigenous languages A variety of carving tools were also recovered. The Calusa (said to mean fierce people ) are a Native American tribe that once inhabited the southwestern coast of Florida. The Shell People. (Cushing was an anthropologist with the Bureau of American Ethnology, and was well known for his pioneering work at Zuni Pueblo.) Tools for fishing were made of shell, wood, and plant materials and included hooks and spears, nets, net floats and sinkers, cord, and anchors (Fig. Ravaged by new infectious diseases introduced to the Americas by European contact and by the slaving raids, the surviving Calusa retreated south and east. Illustrated here, the deer, pelican, wolf, alligator, and sea turtle reveal extraordinary realism, delicacy, and gracefulness of formartistic qualities characteristic of Mississippian Period and earlier ceramic, stone, and wood sculpture excavated in the area and at sites further north (Figs. Description on what the Calusa came to an end, some remains their., 2016 which means River of the chief wore gold in an ornament his. Addition, elaborate rituals with synchronized singing and processions of masked priests were also recovered River, which River. The extraordinary preservation of organic materials down below the water table, Marquardt noted seen! 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