Alvar Nuñez Cabeza de Vaca, an early explorer and first historian of Texas, was born in 1490 in Jerez de la Frontera, in Andalusia, Spain a province in the south of Spain near Cadiz.
In early 1527, Cabeza de Vaca departed Spain as a part of a royal expedition to occupy the mainland of North America. As treasurer, he was one of the chief officers on the Narváez expedition. The Narváez expedition is an expedition based on a famous conquistador Narváez was also included on the expedition. Within several months of their landing near Tampa Bay, Florida on April 15, 1528 the expedition included a party of 600 men.
As the navigators were unsure of their location, Cabeza de Vaca thought it prudent to keep the land and sea forces together. …show more content…
He became a trader, which allowed him freedom to travel among the tribes. Cabeza de Vaca comprehended his survival and journey in religious terms, in that he claimed to have been guided by God to learn to heal the sick. He gained such notoriety as a faith healer that he and his companions gathered a large following of natives who regarded them as "children of the sun", endowed with the power to both heal and destroy. Many natives accompanied the men across what is now the American Southwest and Northern Mexico.
After finally reaching the colonized lands of New Spain where he encountered fellow Spaniards near modern-day Culiacán, Cabeza de Vaca went on to Mexico City. From there he sailed back to Europe in 1537.
Numerous researchers have struggled to trace the exact route travelled by Cabeza de Vaca. As he did not begin writing his chronicle until back in Spain, he had to rely on memory. Cabeza de Vaca was uncertain of the route he traversed. Historians realize that his account has numerous errors in chronology and geography, but many have tried to put together pieces of the puzzle to discern his paths.
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