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Medicine in colonial days
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All the World is Human
When Cabeza de Vaca came to the "New World" he was just one of over 300 conquistadores led by Panphilo de Narvaez. They sailed to the New World and landed in Flordia. Struggling to find their way through the swamps and wetlands, their problems only increased when they were killed one-by-one by the Native American tribes (the Seminole tribes). Hoping to save their lives after running out of food, the conquistadores went back to the sea. However when they arrived they saw that their ships and commrades had assumed that they were dead and left to sail back to Spain. The surviving conquistadores then built barges to sail down the coastline, thinking that Mexico was just one or two leagues away. Alvar Nunez Cabeza de Vaca was one of the barges captains led by Narvaez. Soon tempers flared and Narvaez and a few of the barges set sail across
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There were many different tribes that he met between the Brazos and San Antionio rivers known today as Coahuiltecans. Life was still bad for Cabeza de Vaca but better than with the Karankawas, the people acted kinder towards him and they gave him food. So, he stayed with them and traded for them. He was trying to find a place for himself in their tribes, like we do today in our towns societies and day-to-day lives. He learned what it meant to be conqured, he got to feel what it was like when he was a conquistador and forced others to be slaves to them. Cabeza de Vaca watched their shamans using Peyote in their healing and ceremonies (like hunting ceremonies). He also did simple procedures like cutting out arrows from men who had been in fights, cauterizing wounds, and things like that. He eventually became seen as a type of shaman/medicine man as well. But, he was still a slave, and was beaten if he was caught trying to escape or run from them. He became increasingly more desperate to see his homeland
Cabeza de Vaca survived by using intelligent strategies that kept him alive just barely. Cabeza used his great communication skills for survival. He was also an amazing healer. Another reason is he had amazing talent with navigation. Overall, Cabeza was a strategist, and he was very smart.
From a proud Conquistador, to a castaway, a slave and trader, and then medicine man, Cabeza de Vaca was the first European to explore much of the southern coast of Texas. Cabeza was a 37 year old military veteran in 1527 when he left on the Narvaez Expedition to find gold and colonize the Gulf Coast. He was the expedition’s treasurer. Cabeza de Vaca was enslaved by Indians in 1528 when one of the rafts the crew made crashed on present day Galveston island, he then escaped in 1530 and joined/was enslaved by another tribe called the Charrucos until his escape with 3 other survivors in 1534. He then walked to Mexico City. Cabeza survived this ordeal because of the incredible patience he had, his skills of diplomacy and goodwill, and his amazing wilderness survival skills.
Karankawa gave them food and shelter. Cabeza de Vaca gave us the first recorded accounts of
In "The Narrative of Cabeza de Vaca", Alvar Nunez Cabeza de Vaca’s fight for survival, while being deprived of the basic necessities of life, proves there is a change in him from the beginning of the narrative to the end. This transformation, though, affected multiple aspects of de Vaca, including his motives, character, and perspective of civilization. Cabeza de Vaca’s experience is crucial to the history of America, as well as Spain, because it was one of the first accounts that revealed a certain equilibrium between the mighty and superior Spaniard and the Indian, once the Spaniard was stripped of his noble stature. The idea of nakedness is consistent throughout the narrative and conveys the tribulations he experienced and a sort of balance between him and the Indians. The original intentions of conquering and populating the area between Florida and a northern part of Mexico quickly shifted Cabeza de Vaca’s focus to the need to survive. His encounter with different Indian tribes and ability to get along with them (no matter what the means), and then prosper as a medicine man, shows that through his beliefs in Christian faith, and in himself, he turned the failure into an unexpected success.
Approximately three hundred and thirty-four years ago, there took place an uncommon and captivating story of American Indian History. This historical story was called the Pueblo Revolt, and it included the defeat of the dominant European Spaniards. The Spaniards were defeated by an assortment of Native American tribes that were not able to communicate in the same language. The Pueblo Native Americans resided in the area that is now considered northern New Mexico. This area remained combined with the territory of Spain for about eighty-five years. There were Spanish conquistadors guarded the superior area of Rio Grande. They forced Spanish regulations and brutality upon the Pueblo Indians.
Adventures In The Unknown Interior of America, a narrative by Cabeza De Vaca, contains many pieces of information that are applicable to present day society and the culture that has been created. The values of today’s moral code and the moral code of those who lived in the fifteen-hundreds, whether or not they knew Spain as their mother country or America to be the only country, have similar qualities. Not only has moral code contained similar values but it also contains comparable accommodation to different cultures living among one another.
His wilderness skills, his success as a healer, and his respect for the Native Americans helped him survive the dangerous journey. He might have these three expertise however the major skill needed is his respect for the Native Americans. That is the most important because he gained their trust. By gaining their trust they gave him food, water, and supplies which are needed to live. This question is still important because of all the difficulties Cabeza de Vaca went
In 1539 Hernando de Soto and five hundred adventurers began on a journey of exploration that would take 4 years and would travel through 10 states in the southeast United States. His goal was to discover a source of wealth, preferably gold, and around his mines establish a settlement. During his travels through La Florida he encountered numerous groups of native peoples, making friends of some and enemies of others. His expedition was not the first in La Florida; however, it was the most extensive. In its aftermath, thousands of Indians would die by disease that the Spaniards brought from the Old World. De Soto would initially be remembered as a great explorer but, would be later viewed as a destroyer of native culture. However, in truth de Soto was neither a hero or a villain but rather an adventurer.
Cabeza de Vaca stories is a conversion narrative, which the conversion is the between Cabeza de Vaca 's thoughts of the Native Americans. In the beginning of Castaways, Cabeza de Vaca did not interact with the natives as much as he does later in his story. In chapter three of his book, Castaways, he says that the Indians and his group, Spaniards did not get along. Once his group reached Florida he states:
Once named the friendliest city in the world, Puerto Vallarta in my eyes continues to carry that reputation. The people who live there are what make this place so special; it is my most desired place to travel to. Puerto Vallarta, Mexico sits along the coast of Banderas Bay in the Pacific Ocean. Along with having exotic scenery, they are known for having an exceptional variety of food. With the dark frigid winter creeping up on us, my head wanders to memories of missed friends and 90 degree temperatures.
When they found the “new world” is too weak to resist the invasion of European, they started to establish the colony in America. Bartolomé de Las Casas used to be a priest who explored America on Hispaniola and Cuba. But after he witnessed the colonists enslave and mistreat Indians, he changed his mind and start to protect the Indians. He free his Indian slaves in 1514, and start to against Spanish mistreat them (Foner, p.7). After that, he made the effort to liberate the Indian slaves, and he had backed to Spain several times want to make the King reduce the heavy labor of Indians. Finally, Spain published New Laws in 1542, which indicate that Indians no longer be enslaved (Foner, p.7).
The Black Legend and White Legend: Relationship Between the Spanish and Indians in the New World
Powerful storms, unquenchable thirst and near death starvation had minimized the expedition to roughly eighty frail survivors when a deadly hurricane dumped Cabeza de Vaca and his companions on the Gulf coast near what is now Galveston, Texas. They attempted to repair the rafts, using what remained of their own clothes to plug holes, but they lost the rafts to a large wave and the harsh environment. As the number of survivors dwindled quickly they were enslaved for a couple years by several American Indian tribes of the northern Gulf Coast. These included the Hans and the Capoques, and tribes called the Karankawa and Coahuitecan. He found himself, for the first time in his life, in the company of a band of hunters and gathers. Most of the Indians Cabeza de Vaca had come across from the east of the Mississippi were chiefdom-based farmers, from whom the Spanish treasurer and his comrades had stolen food from countless times. The Indians lived on Galveston Island or Isla de Malhado (Island of Misfortune) as it was called by Cabeza de Vaca. He chose the name because after one more attempt at escape from the treacherous island, the raft sank and they had no other choice but to spend the winter on the island. (pbs.org) (texasbeyondhistory.net) (wikipedia.com)
... hardships he must face. Differing from other Spanish explorers Cabeza does not use violence as a means of spreading his word and eventually gains utter respect from the Indians he interacts with and even the respect of Indians that he has never met. Toward the end of the sixteenth century, Spanish explorers spread a wave of bloodshed and disease through the New World killing almost all of the natives indigenous to the land. Cabeza de Vaca stands apart from his counterparts in the fact that he used peace and kindness to win the hearts of the natives and successfully converted the Indians he met into Christians.
On November 19, 1493 Ponce de Leon was one of the first Europeans to see the small island of Borinquen, the Indian name for Puerto Rico. Ponce de Leon sailed to Puerto Rico in 1506 with two hundred men to the island and found out that it had rich gold deposits. He enslaved the natives, and forced them to mine gold for him. Ponce de Leon left Puerto Rico and returned again in 1508 this time he brought with him only fifty men. On this voyage his ship went through a terrible storm that caused him to run onto the rocks on two occasions. The crew was forced to throw over much of their supplies in order to keep the ship from sinking. After Ponce de Leon finally arrived in Puerto Rico he became the governor of the island. This caused him to become very wealthy, and the most powerful man on the island, who only received orders from the kind himself!