CALUSA

The 'Calusa', sometimes spelled 'Caloosa' or 'Calosa', were a Native American group that lived on the coast and along the inner waterways of Florida's southwest coast. At the time of European contact, the Calusa were the people of the Caloosahatchee culture. Calusa territory reached from Charlotte Harbor to Cape Sable, and may have included the Florida Keys at times. Calusa influence and control also extended over other tribes in southern Florida, including the Mayaimis around Lake Mayaimi (now Lake Okeechobee), and the Tequestas and Jaegas on the southeast coast of the peninsula. Calusa influence may have also extended to the Ais tribe on the central east coast of Florida. ''Calusa'' is pronounced "ka LOOS a". The Calusa tribe is described as warlike.
The Spanish began exploring southwest Florida early in the 16th Century and quickly encountered resistance. The explorer and discoverer of Florida, Juan Ponce de Leon, died of a wound received from a Calusa arrow in 1521. However, the best information about the Calusas comes from the ''Memoir'' of Hernando de Escalante Fontaneda. Fontaneda was shipwrecked on the east coast of Florida, likely in the Keys, about 1550, when he was thirteen years old. Although many others survived the shipwreck, only Fontaneda was spared by the tribe in whose territory he had been shipwrecked. He lived with various tribes in southern Florida for the next seventeen years before being found by a Spanish expedition. Later Pedro Menéndez de Avilés, founder of St. Augustine made contact with the Calusa and struck an uneasy peace with their leader, King Carlos. Menéndez married Carlos' sister, who took the baptismal name Doña Antonia, but his use of her as a hostage in negotiations with her people, as well as his parleying with the Calusa's enemies the Tocobagas, severely damaged Calusa-Spanish relations, and fighting continued into the next century.
The Calusa were not agricultural. Their diet included a lot of seafood. Net sinkers have been found in archeological sites, and shell middens and shell mounds of large size are found throughout Calusa territory. Such mounds can still be seen on Mound Key in Estero Bay, on Dismal Key in the Ten Thousand Islands, near Fort Myers and near Everglades City, Florida. Deer, turtle and other animal bones have also been found in the mounds. Projectile points of stone have been found, as well as tools of bone, shell, and turtle shell. The Calusa built their homes on stilts without any walls and used woven palmetto leaves for the roofs. A number of wooden objects have been found in Calusa archaeological sites, mainly of cypress and pine. Artifacts of wood that have been found include dugout canoes, bowls, both plain and adorned with carvings of animals, masks, plaques, "ornamental standards," and a finely carved deer head. The plaques were often painted.Calusa society had two levels, and possibly a slave class.
Unfortunately by the 1700's the Europeans had brought with them diseases like smallpox, and a great number of the Calusa Indian population was wiped out. When the Spanish arrived in Florida it was estimated that there were 20,000 Calusa in South Florida. By the time the English gained control in 1763, their numbers had been reduced to a few hundred. It is reported that the few survivors followed the Spanish to