Calusa

In the 1500s the Calusa still controlled much of the southwest of Florida. They defended their lands against other peoples including European explorers. The Spaniards knew them as fierce. The Calooshahatchee River, with its mouth on the southwest coast of Florida, was theirs.


They lived mostly along the inland waterways and developed them for transportation and food production. The sea was also a source of food for them. They left middens of seashells large enough to compete in size with their mounds and other earthworks. They trapped fish and caught them on hooks and in nets..


The Calusa had a strong influence on the tribes around them. That influences may have stemmed  from their wide trading activities more than from their fierceness.  They typically used dugouts of 15' in length for use at sea and along inland waterways. They also built and used larger vessels. They visited Cuba regularly and probably sailed farther into the Gulf and the Caribbean.


Their homes were built on platforms on pilings over the water. The were attractively roofed with palmetto leaves. It is said that some of their 'houses' might have been large enough to hold 2ooo persons.


They were excellent wood workers and some of their remaining wood carvings has been called examples of artful sculpting.


Please add to our information about the Calusa and please help me to correct errors I have made here.

Intimations of an Ancient Heartland

Long before the Seven Nations Confederation of First Peoples was a Seven Hundred Tribes and Chiefdoms system. It lasted for an amazingly peaceful thousand years. There is much I don't know about this system and I hope that you will tell me more.

I believe that in the minds of elders of peoples like the Algonquin, Arkansas, Blood, Calusa, Choctaw, Chickasaw, Creek, Delaware, Huron, Illinois, Iroquois, Kickapoo, Menominee, Miami, Mohawk, Natchez, Onondaga, Osage, Ottawa, Owasca, Pawnee, Pottawatomie, Seminole, Shawnee, Seneca, Whyandotte, and many others there is a memory of those times. Dances and chants of atlatl, mega-fauna, travels, and revered ancestors may relate to those times.
Tell me more. Let's share.

The kept strong for long; before the time of corn. The time is long, but the blood is the same. Perhaps what kept them strong was: a trade and commerce as holy and sacred as it was competitive; an ongoing dialogue and interaction which was  respectful even when carried on in sign language; a highly varied diet of fresh nutritious food including gardens of produce largely unknown to us now and usually lots of hickory nuts;
an avoidance of monoculture; a well developed appreciation of art, craft, and beauty shown in many ways(they loved their pan pipes and sometimes covered them in copper or even silver); a love of wood and water which lead those people to use them and benefit from them well. They had been great hunters who had so long appreciated the atlatl that it had become part of their spiritual life. They lived a life that was the imperfect life of all men, but one that made them strong, and happier than most.

Some of the source of their strength and happiness can be found in the oldest songs and dances, and in the old stories.

There was an excellent trail for them, they especially like the fresh water of lakes and rivers, but knew the salt waters too. The wetlands were  source of wealth for them.

For, perhaps, 10,000 years of ups and downs they thrived through the changes on the land.
Many of of the present cities, states, rivers, streams, and lakes carry their names through time. Let's know them better. I would know them better. We live among them still.

Let's share what we know, imagine, suspect, and believe of them. The more we know of them the better are our chances to live long and prosper.