Reconstructing a Spanish Mission: San Luis de Talimali

Bonnie G. McEwan and John H. Hann

Reprinted from the OAH Magazine of History
14 (Summer 2000). ISSN 0882-228X
Copyright (c) 2000, Organization of American Historians
 

San Luis was among the first missions to be established when the formal Franciscan effort began in Apalachee in 1633. The mission moved to its present site in 1656 at the request of Spanish military authorities, who placed a blockhouse and small garrison there (1). Recognized as the western capital of La Florida, San Luis was home to a Spanish deputy-governor and one of Apalachee's most powerful chiefs. With the development of ranching beginning in the 1670s, San Luis also became the site of Florida's only sizeable European community beyond St. Augustine.

The State of Florida purchased San Luis in 1983, and initiated a full-time program of archaeological and historical research. It is now the most thoroughly investigated mission in Spanish Florida. Ten years ago, after amassing a considerable amount of painstaking research, we reached a critical juncture and had to determine the scope and form our future endeavors would take. Beyond scholarly publications and presentations, we wanted to exploit the potential of San Luis as an instrument of public education. Museum professionals proposed that we take full advantage of our outdoor setting and develop a living history program, a suggestion which is currently being implemented. The immediacy and nonabstract nature of reconstructions, combined with the sights, sounds, and smells of the past brought to life, will engage visitors of all ages and from all walks of life in the learning process.

The first phase of reconstruction at San Luis required the combined talents of archaeologists and historians. For archaeologists, buildings represent extremely complex artifacts that combine an infinite number of attributes. The interpretation of archaeologically defined structures becomes increasingly complicated in a pluralistic community, such as San Luis, with European planners and a native labor force. From a historical perspective, there was more to be learned about Indian buildings in Spanish documents than there was about European structures. No doubt Spaniards took their own architecture for granted.

Council houses served as the center of political, social, and ritual life for the Indians, and as the site where native rulers met every day to discuss community affairs. Each morning after the village leaders had discussed the day's business, the chief ordered the brewing of cacina, a stimulant tea. The chief was the first to drink in this ceremonial use, then passed it to the rest of the leaders and warriors who drank from the same vessel, one after the other (2).

The council house also served as a stage for other important activities such as preparations for war, celebration of successful warriors' feats, and the display of scalps taken in battle. It also was a lodge for soldiers and other visitors to a village, and the site for prescribed rituals associated with tribal ball games. In the broadest sense, the village council house symbolized the bond of community. It was primarily the property of the chief and a symbol of the leader's authority that held a people together, counteracting divisive forces resulting from the village's dispersed settlement patterns.

Cuba's Bishop Díaz Vara Calderón noted in 1675 that the village council house was called the great lodge, made of wood, round in form, covered with thatch, and built with a very large opening or skylight in the center of the roof (3). There was a direct correlation between a village's population and the size of its council house; some held between two thousand and three thousand people. Enclosed benches or "niches" circled the wall and functioned as seats and beds. Special elevated benches were reserved for community leaders, and the one belonging to the principal chief was the highest and the best. The remaining undesignated seats were occupied by the common people and visitors. At the center of the council house was a large hearth where the cacina was brewed.

Archaeological investigations of the council house at San Luis were initiated in 1985 and continued intermittently through 1998. The excavations revealed a structure located on the central plaza of the mission that conformed closely to the ethnohistoric descriptions. It was a circular thatch building measuring over 120 feet in diameter, making it the largest historic period Indian structure identified to date in the Southeast (4). The council house at San Luis had eight massive support posts and two concentric rows of benches under which corncob-filled smudge pits smoldered to provide insect control. A large hearth was identified in the center of the council house from which our project ethnobotanist, Margaret Scarry, identified seeds from Ilex vomitoria, or yaupon holly, used to prepare cacina.

Materials recovered inside the council house included projectile points, thousands of Indian pottery shards, and debitage (lithic debris from flintknapping). A small number of European artifacts was found, but it is impossible to discern if these were items used by natives or by Spaniards who also frequented the council house. As a whole, the assemblage suggests that traditional native activities, such as flintknapping, hide preparation, and brewing cacina, continued throughout the mission period and that the European presence at San Luis had little influence on the architecture or functioning of the native council house.

The same can be said of the chief's house, which was identified directly adjacent to the council house. Also located on the central plaza, this dwelling was a circular thatch structure measuring seventy feet in diameter (more than half the size of the council house and approximately three times the size of commoners' houses). It had a single row of benches along the inside wall and a large central hearth. As with the council house, artifacts from this elite Apalachee dwelling included some European materials such as pottery, a badly-repaired flintlock mechanism, and glass beads, but the vast majority of the artifacts were native in origin. Perhaps the most interesting find was the large number of quartz crystal beads and pendants. Quartz crystal was highly prized by southeastern Indians who believed it held special properties such as portending the future and ensuring luck in hunting, and the concentration of these items at the chief's house may reflect the dual political and spiritual role of native leaders. Interestingly, there is no written account of this prominent residence at San Luis, unless the statement describing native leader Matheo Chuba being reprimanded by the deputy governor, Antonio Matheos, refers to the archaeologically documented chief's house: "[he went] to his lodge and plaza crying, and that the Spaniards who lived around the said plaza, had consoled him" (5). Spanish residences have been found on the central plaza at San Luis, lending further credence to this possibility.

Other than the council house, the single most important structure during mission times was the church. However, as noted above, documentation has remarkably little to say about most European buildings, including churches. Alonso de Jesús described them as follows, "the temples are of timbers, built with as much perfection as those of the Spaniards and well decorated and adorned with the ornaments" purchased with funds provided by the Crown (6). Bishop Calderón observed that the Indians were "great carpenters as is evidenced in the construction of their wooden churches which are large and painstakingly wrought" (7). Documents reveal only that a church at San Luis was built, that it had plank walls, and that its roof was thatched. However, archaeology has provided a detailed image of the mission church and physical evidence of native religious conversion.

The church was a large, rectangular building, oriented on an east-west axis, measuring 110 feet long by 50 feet wide. Nails were recovered in a nonrandom pattern around the perimeter of the structure, indicating that it had plank walls, and the highly regular spacing of posts revealed that the church had a large nave that was divided into a series of bays. A dripline (puddling that is often identifiable by archaeologists) revealed the extent of the roof overhang. The base of the limestone baptismal font was found inside the entrance on the left or Gospel side of the church, revealing where the baptistry was located. A wooden railing separated the sanctuary from the nave, and a raised clay platform indicated where the altar once stood. Archaeological evidence revealed two rooms on either side of the altar, a sacristy and counter sacristy, which were partitioned with whitewashed wattle and daub walls. Thousands of olive jar (amphora) fragments were recovered near the sacristy, where wine and water used at Mass were stored.

The cemetery was found beneath the floor of the church. More than nine hundred individuals are believed to be buried in the cemetery, all of them Native Americans. They were interred in a Christian manner with their bodies aligned parallel to the long axis of the church. Their hands were folded on their chests in reference to the cross, and seven of the interments were coffin burials, which were very rare during the seventeenth century. These burials are a powerful expression of the impact of Catholicism on the Apalachee. Despite well-established pre-contact native burial traditions and rituals, these Apalachee chose to be buried in the mission church in an almost wholly Christian fashion.

Few archaeologists and historians have their research scrutinized by preservationists, architects, structural engineers, art historians, and a broad range of other professionals. A very talented and enthusiastic interdisciplinary team of experts was formed to undertake the reconstruction of Mission San Luis, and we have been involved in a fascinating learning experience ever since.

The Apalachee structures presented the most perplexing design problems. There had long been a popular image of these native structures as having gently sloped roofs formed by rafters that rested on wallposts and extended beyond the building perimeter. However, there were no driplines evident at either the council house or the chief's house. Furthermore, architects and structural engineers determined that the outermost row of posts could not have supported the rafters, which would have weighed about one thousand pounds each. This suggested that the rafters must have rested directly on the ground surface and formed both the roof and walls. The reformulated design, with its steeper roof, changed our idea of the overall appearance of the buildings.

Subsequent research has reinforced this interpretation. Ethnographic analogy (in this case, a general comparative approach) suggests that most cultures using thatch construction have roof slopes around fifty degrees. At this steep angle rain and snow fall off much more quickly, making the roof last longer. And, as we learned from our crew of Native American and Zulu thatchers, the sharp angle makes thatching easier since workers stand upright most of the day, similar to being on a ladder. The revised design is also more logical since it provides additional interior space beyond the outer row of posts. Many smudge pits were located near these posts and would have been a fire hazard so close to thatch walls.

The completed Apalachee reconstructions conform very closely to general ethnohistoric descriptions of their structures, such as the following by Alonso de Jesús in 1630: "Theirs are [made] with precision and formed with round logs because of the many and very strong winds; with no nails, covered with palm fronds; built so well that they last for many years, because, in being spherical, their shape forms a pyramidal figure. And thus the water flows down without penetrating the straw, which is placed all around and thickly" (8).

The church reconstruction was less challenging since Spanish colonial architecture is well documented from extant buildings in Spanish America, and has been thoroughly researched in St. Augustine (9). However, there were unexpected findings with this structure, and one, in particular, that may have important implications for other mission researchers. Beyond indicating its immense size and configuration, measurements of the church revealed little at the time of archaeological fieldwork. However, preservation architect Herschel Shepard converted our archaeological (metric) measurements into Spanish varas (2.8 feet or 32 inches) and found that each structural increment, such as the size of various bays, translated into whole varas. He further discovered that the regular spacing found throughout the building conformed to a European proportional system often referred to as the sectio aurea ("golden section" or "golden rectangle"), which was a prominent feature of Gothic and Renaissance architecture in Europe. It is unknown at this time if the use of this system is unique to San Luis, or whether it was followed at other missions in Spanish Florida.

The ongoing reconstructions at Mission San Luis are providing an invaluable experience for the public as well as other scholars. It is experimental archaeology on a monumental scale from which we have gained a greater understanding of the cultural and material order of the Florida missions. The reconstruction of these public buildings has, first and foremost, changed the common perception that the Florida missions were primitive hinterland outposts. The sheer size and architectural sophistication of these structures inspires awe and has prompted most visitors (particularly the research community) to remark that they will never think about Florida mission settlements in the same way.

It is also striking that both European and Apalachee architectural traditions at San Luis remained intact and unchanged from precontact times. As such, the reconstructions serve as powerful metaphors of social and political life at the mission. As the most visible symbol of Christianity in the province, the Franciscan church at San Luis reflects one of the most profound social transformations experienced by the native population. Apalachee residents observed the Christian calendar, religious events, and rites of passage including marriage, baptism, and burial in the mission church. Directly across the central plaza from the church, and even more prominent, are the Apalachee council house and chief's house. As the structures most closely associated with Apalachee leaders, these massive buildings are an expression of the power of San Luis's chief and the importance of San Luis as a village. They also reflect the fact that many native political and social institutions continued throughout the mission period and were never supplanted by their Spanish counterparts. Unlike some missions in the Southwest where churches were built directly over native kivas, the organizing principles that shaped the cultural and physical landscape of San Luis appear to be a general resistance to change, along with considerable compromise and accommodation. q

1. John H. Hann, Apalachee: The Land between the Rivers (Gainesville: University of Florida Press, 1988), 194-97.

2. Suzanne Lussagnet, ed., Les Français en Amérique Pendant la Deuxième, Moitié du XVIe Siècle, 2 vol. (Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 1953-1958), 2:46, 212-13.

3. Lucy L. Wenhold, trans., "A Seventeenth-Century Letter of Gabriel Díaz Vara Calderón, Bishop of Cuba, Describing the Indians and Indian Missions of Florida," Smithsonian Miscellaneous Collections 95, no. 16 (Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution, 1936), 13.

4. John H. Hann and Bonnie G. McEwan, The Apalachee Indians and Mission San Luis (Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 1998), 75-78.

5. Hann, Apalachee, 206.

6. John H. Hann, trans., "1630 Memorial of Fray Francisco Alonso de Jesús on Spanish Florida's Missions and Natives," The Americas 50 (July 1993): 101.

7. Wenhold, trans., "A Seventeenth-Century Letter," 12.

8. John H. Hann, trans., "1630 Memorial of Fray Francisco Alonso de Jesús on Spanish Florida's Missions and Natives," The Americas 50, no. 1 (July 1993): 85-105. The quoted passage is on pp. 93-94 of the article.

9. Albert Manucy, The Houses of St. Augustine: Notes on the Architecture from 1565 to 1821 (St. Augustine: The St. Augustine Historical Society, 1978); and Sixteenth-Century St. Augustine: The People and Their Homes (Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 1997).

Research, interpretation, and reconstruction projects are periodically updated on our web site: <http://www.flheritage.com/sanluis/>.

Bonnie G. McEwan, director of archaeology at Mission San Luis, has conducted research in the Southeast, California, Spain, and the Caribbean. She is editor of The Spanish Missions of La Florida (1993), Indians of the Greater Southeast (2000), and with John H. Hann, Apalachee Indians and Mission San Luis (1998).

John H. Hann is the research historian at Mission San Luis and is a leading scholar on the missions of Spanish Florida. He is author of Apalachee: The Land Between the Rivers (1988); Missions to the Calusa (1991); History of the Tumucua Indians and Missions (1996); and with Bonnie G. McEwan, Apalachee Indians and Mission San Luis (1998).