Three 450th Committees!

The 450th anniversary of the founding of St. Augustine in 1565 is coming up along with the 500th anniversary of discover of Florida in 2015 and 2013 respectively. I noticed that in an editorial in yesterday's the St. Augustine Record that there were three Committees dedicated to this historic commemoration.


The State of Florida and City of St. Augustine official has the, St.Augustine 450th Commemoration Steering Committee and there is also a local 450 Community Corps which has lots of ideas, and finally the Federal government has a St. Augustine 450th Commemoration Commission in the works.

Given the nature of current funding realities I'm not expecting much in spite of some of the ambitious plans, like building a replica ship, that have been put forth. Like the Jamestown 400th celebration I suspect we'll see a bit of a mash-up of events and projects without a real focused objective, especially since the City hired one of the Jamestown organizers as a consultant. A number of us from Florida had planned to join in the festivities in Virgina, going so far as to travel in 2006 for training at the State's Jamestown Settlement. I found the staff at the Fort to be wonderful. Like most reenactors I've picked up interpretive skills through osmosis rather than any formal training, I found Jamestown's classes eye-opening. But it was also clear that circumstances beyond their control; security concerns, crowd control, construction and simply not being in charge of the overall celebration, we couldn't get a straight answer about exactly what we would be able to do, and quite a bit of what we couldn't not do, less than a few months out from the event and concluded that it wasn't going to worth the expense and effort. I'm not sorry that I went to the training and from what I've heard from those who did attend the 400th Landing Day they had a good time, then again I was spared the horror of Ba-Baaah and the Windigo.

Coming up even sooner than St. Augustine's 450th is Florida's quincentennial. In due course several years ago a law was passed creating a Discovery of Florida Quincentennial Commemoration Act which required a commission to produce "An initial draft of the [master]plan by May 2009... with the completed master plan submitted to such officials by May 2010. needless to say, no funding was apparently ever appropriated nor near as I can tell anyone ever appointed to said commission. In 2008 the Act was repealed. with the suggestion that a CSO, citizen support organization be established to "raise funds as well as assist the commission in other matters as deemed necessary." serve to raise funds as well. The only thing that I've found the State of Florida doing for its Quincentennial thus far is the Viva Florida website. Though I must say that I find it rather ironic that most of the photos is the "multimedia" section are from a De Soto Winter Encampment event several years ago, an annual event that was discontinued last year do to lack of, pretty minimal, funding.

Of course the c.1990's Christopher Columbus Quincentenary Jubilee Commission which was generally considered a fiasco.

Christopher Columbus Quincentenary Jubilee statement of Richard C. Stiener, Director, Office of Special Investigations, ...


I hope that a more modest success is in the offing for the St. Augustine 450 & Florida 500 anniversaries.

In the News: De Soto Archaeology & A Burning Ship

A couple of news stories regarding an archaeological dig in northern Tennessee cropped up today. No De Soto artifacts have been found or are likely to for that matter, but it is an an area along Hudson's proposed route and its nice to see the conquistador mentioned.



Nolichucky Conquistadors
Johnson City Press
Conquistadors probably carried the Spanish flag through Northeast Tennessee 400 years ago...



Signs Of Explorer desoto Sought Along Nolichucky
Greeneville Sun
In the summer of 1540, a party of Spanish conquistadors led by Hernando de Soto was exploring what centuries later was to become the ...

In other more spectacular news a replica 17th C. Dutch Ship burned in the Netherlands.

Fire guts replica of 17th-century tall ship
The Associated Press

AMSTERDAM — Fire consumed a replica of the 17th-century flagship of the Dutch East India Company in the northern Netherlands on Thursday...

Check out the photos:
http://www.ajc.com/multimedia/dynamic/00226/NETHERLANDS_SHIP_BU_226863c.jpg
http://www.ajc.com/multimedia/dynamic/00226/NETHERLANDS_SHIP_BU_226862c.jpg
http://www.ajc.com/multimedia/dynamic/00226/NETHERLANDS_SHIP_BU_226899c.jpg

I suppose they would come in handy as reference material to anyone doing a Cortes ship burning or Drake's Fire Ships.

Didn't stay up for Appalachia

Didn't stay up for Appalachia last night. I'll catch it at some other point I'm sure In the news:
Statue of de Luna to be unveiled, dedicated in downtown Pensacola.

The Appalachians

I noticed the PBS series The Appalachians a few months ago when "De Soto" and "Charles Hudson" popped up in a couple of news stories. It looks like the series has finally made it to southwest Florida. I'm not expecting much, I recall one review saying that the first episode ran like a filmed Earth Science textbook. Apparently shot on a very low budget, so likely stockfootage conquistadors at best, still I may try to stay up late and check it out.


The Appalachians (WUSF TV : 16.1)
Tuesday, July 28, 2009 12:00 PM
A three-part history of the region begins with the 17th-century immigration of European explorers and traders; the American revolution; and religious revivals in the 18th and early 19th centuries.

One worrisome note, the original series is listed as four parts, and likely they dropped the first episode altogether or recut it without any conquistador stuff.

The Luna Papers

After another frustrating research afternoon I bring to your attention Priestly's Luna Papers on Line. Unfortunately, its another PDF scan job, which is better than nothing, for a long out of print book; but oh to have an easy text search.

In any event:



Author: Priestley, Herbert Ingram, 1875-1944.

Title: The Luna papers: documents relating to the expedition of Don Tristán de Luna y Arellano for the conquest of La Florida in 1559-1561: Volume I

Publication date: 1928 Collection: Florida Heritage Collection

table of contents (PDF)

Author: Priestley, Herbert Ingram, 1875-1944.

Title: The Luna papers: documents relating to the expedition of Don Tristán de Luna y Arellano for the conquest of La Florida in 1559-1561: Volume II

Publication date: 1928
Collection: Florida Heritage Collection

table of contents (PDF)

Ponce de Leon Clothing Part 2

Okay, so this "trousers" thing is bugging me. It is the 21st centurty, let's try Google Books! I find an online version, in Spanish, of Historia de las Indias By Bartolomé de las Casas c.1875. I try searching unique words and names near the passage in question,"naborías" and "Bobadilla" for example. I find some hits but nothing is matching, even with my limited Spanish skills, something is amiss. I know this section of the book is only a few pages past Book Two in the Collard translation (which is an admittedly abridged version of the original three volume work, but also, as near as I can tell the only published English translation at all!) so I check the table of contents and the mystery is solved, on page one - "Libro Tercio", it is the only the third volume. Further checking reveals that as of this date its also the only volume that Google has scanned and posted. Alas, I'll have to try for interlibrary loan.

Ponce de Leon Era Clothing

I'm currently rereading my copy of History of the Indies looking for items of PdL interest and came across this passage, both describing how a proper Castilian should be dressed and how, in fact they were, on Hispanola in the early 16th C.

“And it was a laughing matter to see the Spaniards’ presumption, vanity and air of authority when they had not even a linen shirt to their names, nor cape, coat or trousers but wore only cotton shirt over another shirt from Castile if they had it; it not, they wore their cotton shirt over bare legs and instead of boots they had sandals and leggings."

p.80 History of the Indies Bartolome de las Casas. Collard, Andrée M. trans. & ed. Harper Torch Books, New York, New York 1971


[trousers?I’d like to read this passage in the original Spanish …I’ve seen criticism of this translator, but it’s the only version I can find-I have a feeling that I may need to find a Spanish copy and try for a literal word for word translation]