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Excerpts from Bishop Calderón's Letter of 1675From Lucy L. Wenhold, "A 17th Century Letter of Gabriel Diaz Vara Calderón, Bishop of Cuba, Describing the Indians and Indian Missions of Florida," Smithsonian Miscellaneous Collections, vol. 95, no. 16 (Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1936), 12-14. --Comments in brackets [ ] were added by Lucy L. Wenhold and appear in the source above. --Comments in parentheses ( ) were introduced by Peter A. Cowdrey Jr. for this handout. In the four provinces of Guale (pronounced "Wally"), Timuqua, Apalache, and Apalachicoli there are 13,152 Christianized Indians to whom I administered the holy sacrament of confirmation. They are fleshy, and rarely is there a small one, but they are weak and phlegmatic as regards work, though clever and quick to learn any art they see done, and great carpenters as is evidenced in the construction of their churches which are large and painstakingly wrought....They go naked, with only the skin [of some animal] from the waist down, and, if anything more, a coat of serge without a lining, or a blanket. The women wear only a sort of tunic that wraps them from the neck to the feet, and which they make of the pearl-colored foliage of the trees (Spanish moss), which they call guano and which costs them nothing except to gather it.... Their ordinary diet consists of porridge which they make of corn with ashes (lye hominy), pumpkins, beans which they call frijoles, with game and fish from the rivers and lakes which the well-to-do ones can afford. Their only drink is water, and they do not touch wine or rum. Their greatest luxury is [a drink] which they make from a weed that grows on the seacoast, which they cook and drink hot and which they call cazina [cacina]. It becomes very bitter and is worse than beer, although it does not intoxicate them and is beneficial. They sleep on the ground, and in their houses only on a frame made of reed bars, which they call barbacoa, with a bear skin laid upon it and without any cover, the fire they build in the center of the house serving in place of a blanket. They call the house bujío. It is a hut made in round form, of straw, without a window and with a door a vara [a vara was about 2.8 feet] high and half a vara wide. On one side is a granary supported by 12 beams, which they call a garita, where they store the wheat, corn and other things they harvest.* During January they burn the grass and weeds from the fields preparatory to cultivation, surrounding them all at one time with fire so that the deer, wild ducks and rabbits, fleeing from it fall into their hands. This sort of hunting they call hurimelas. Then they enter the forests in pursuit of bears, bison, and lions (Florida panthers) which they kill with bows and arrows, and this they call ojêo. Whatever they secure in either way they bring to the principal cacique (chief), in order that he shall divide it, he keeping the skins which fall to his share.... In April they commence to sow, and as the man goes along opening the trench, the woman follows sowing. All in common cultivate and sow the lands of the caciques. As alms for the missionaries and the needy widows, they sow wheat in October and harvest it in June.... Each village has a council house called the great bujío, constructed of wood and covered with straw, round, and with a very large opening in the top. Most of them can accommodate from 2,000 to 3,000 persons. They are furnished all around the interior with barbacôas, which serve as beds and as seats for the caciques and chiefs, and as lodgings for the soldiers and transients. Dances and festivals are held in them around a great fire in the center. The missionary priest attends these festivities in order to prevent indecent and lewd conduct.... These Indians do not covet riches, nor do they esteem silver or gold, coins of which do not circulate among them, and their only barter is the exchange of one commodity for another, which exchange they call rescate. The most common articles of trade are knives, scissors, axes, hoes, hatchets, large bronze rattles, glass beads, blankets which they call congas, pieces of rough cloth, garments and other trifles. As to their religion, they are not idolaters, and they embrace with devotion the mysteries of our holy faith. They attend Mass with regularity at 11 o'clock on the holy days they observe, namely, Sunday, and the festivals of Christmas, the Circumcision, Epiphany, the Purification of Our Lady, and the days of Saint Peter, Saint Paul, and All Saints Day, and before entering the church each one brings to the house of the priest as a contribution a log of wood. They do not talk in the church, and the women are separated from the men; the former on the side of Epistle (the right side facing the altar), the latter on the side of the Evangel (the left side facing the altar). They are very devoted to the Virgin, and on Saturdays they attend when her Mass is sung. On Sundays they attend the Rosario and the Salve in the afternoon. They celebrate with rejoicing and devotion the Birth of Our Lord, all attending the midnight Mass with offerings of loaves, eggs and other food. They subject themselves to extraordinary penances during Holy Week, and during the 24 hours of Holy Thursday and Friday, while Our Lord is in the Urn of the Monument (the "sepulchrum," or temporary tabernacle used to house the Eucharist for the distribution of Holy Communion on Good Friday), they attend standing, praying the rosary in complete silence, 24 men and 24 women and the same number of children of both sexes, with hourly changes. The children, both male and female, go to the church on work days, to a religious school where they are taught by a teacher whom they call the Athequi (interpreter) of the church; [a person] whom the priests have for this service; as they have also a person deputized to report to them all parishioners who live in evil. Your Majesty's most humble servant and chaplain, GAB'L Bishop of Cuba *References to wheat in this letter are indications that by this time Indians had adopted this European staple into the Florida diet. |
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