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The Spanish missions in Georgia comprised a series of religious outposts established by Spanish Catholics in order to spread the Christian doctrine among the Guale and various Timucua peoples in what is now southeastern Georgia.
Beginning in the second half of the 16th century, the Kingdom of Spain established a number of missions throughout Spanish Florida in order to convert the Native Americans to Christianity, to facilitate control of the area, and to prevent its colonization by other countries, in particular, England and France. [1] Spanish Florida originally included much of what is now the Southeastern United States, although Spain never exercised long-term effective control over more than the northern part of what is now the state of Florida from present-day St. Augustine to the area around Tallahassee, [2] southeastern Georgia, and some coastal settlements, such as Pensacola, Florida. A few short-lived missions were established in other locations, including Mission Santa Elena in present-day South Carolina, [3] around the Florida peninsula, and in the interior of Georgia and Alabama. [4]
This table includes doctrinas, missions that normally had one or more resident missionaries, but does not include visitas, which never had a resident missionary, and had less substantial church buildings where services were conducted by visiting missionaries.
Mission Name | Location | Province or Region | Documentation of when missions were active is incomplete. Years listed in this column may not represent either the earliest or the latest year in which a mission was in use.}} | References |
---|---|---|---|---|
Espogache [a] [b] | Guale | 1605–? | [5] | |
Guale [a] | 31.62534, -81.17348 [6] | Guale | 1568–1570 | [7] |
Nuestra Señora de Guadalupe de Tolomato [b] [c] | Guale | 1587–1597, 1605–? | [8] | |
Ospo or Talapo [a] | Guale | 1595–1606 | [9] | |
San Augustín de Urihica | Northern Utina | 1630-1657 | [10] | |
San Buenaventura de Guadalquini (moved to St. Johns River as Santa Cruz de Guadalquini) | 31.13393, -81.39363 [11] | Guale/Mocama | 1606-1684 | [12] |
San Diego de Satuache | 31.89, -81.20083 | Guale | 1616–1675 | [13] |
San Felipe de Alabe [d] | Guale | 1616–1655 | [14] | |
San Felipe (on Cumberland Island) | Mocama | 1675–1678 | [15] | |
San Joseph de Sapala or San José de Zapala ( Sapelo Island) | 31.51544, -81.24218 [16] | Guale | 1616–1684 | [17] |
San Lorenzo de Ibihica | Ibi | 1612–1630 | [18] | |
San Pedro de Atulteca or San Felipe de Athulteca [e] | Guale | 1616–1695 | [19] | |
San Pedro de Mocama (Cumberland Island) | 30.75415, -81.47263 [20] [21] | Mocama | 1587–1655(?) | [22] |
San Pedro y San Pablo de Puturiba(to) | Guale | 1597(?)–1604(?) | [23] | |
Santa Catalina de Guale (St. Catherines Island, Sapelo Island and Amelia Island, in succession) | 31.62534, -81.17348 [6] (on St. Catherines Island) | Guale | 1595–1597, 1602–1702 | [24] |
Santa Clara de Tupiqui (Sapelo River) | Guale | 1595–1597 | [25] | |
Santa Cruz de Cachipile | 30.66337, -83.20622 | Arapaha | 1655–1657 | [27] |
Santa Isabel de Utinahica | Unknown [f] | 1616 | [28] | |
Santa María de los Angeles de Arapaha | Arapaha | 1630–1657 | [29] | |
Santiago de Oconi (near the Okefenokee Swamp) | Oconi | Early 16th century - 1655 | [30] | |
Santo Domingo de Asao [g] or Santo Domingo de Talaje [h] | 31.36433, -81.41751 [31] (on the mainland) | Guale | 1595(?)–1680s | [32] |
Tupiqui [a] [b] | Guale | 1569–1570 | [7] |
San Juan del Puerto was a Spanish Franciscan mission founded before 1587 on Fort George Island, near the mouth of the St. Johns River in what is now Jacksonville, Florida. It was founded to serve the Saturiwa, a Timucua tribe who lived around the mouth of the St. Johns. It was organized by separating them into nine smaller villages. It has an important place in the study of the Timucua, as the place where Francisco Pareja undertook his work on the Timucua language.
The Yamasees were a multiethnic confederation of Native Americans who lived in the coastal region of present-day northern coastal Georgia near the Savannah River and later in northeastern Florida. The Yamasees engaged in revolts and wars with other native groups and Europeans living in North America, specifically from Florida to North Carolina.
The Potano tribe lived in north-central Florida at the time of first European contact. Their territory included what is now Alachua County, the northern half of Marion County and the western part of Putnam County. This territory corresponds to that of the Alachua culture, which lasted from about 700 until 1700. The Potano were among the many tribes of the Timucua people, and spoke a dialect of the Timucua language.
Utinahica was a town that was the site of a Spanish mission, Santa Isabel de Utinahica. It may have been the chief town of a Timucua tribe and chiefdom in the 17th century, but Hann says there is not enough known about it to be sure. The name means "lord's village". Utinahica, was called a "province" in one Spanish report. It was 30 leagues east of Arapaha, and 50 leagues northeast of the town of Tarihica in the Northern Utina Province. It was at or near where the Oconee and Ocmulgee rivers join to form the Altamaha River. The people of Utinahica apparently practiced a regional variant of the Lamar regional culture, unusual for a Timucuan-speaking people. Worth identifies the province of Utinahica with archaeological sites, including the Lind Landing site, Coffee Bluff site, and Bloodroot site, that have yielded artifacts of the Square Ground Lamar culture from before the 15th century until the middle of the 17th century. The Square Ground Lamar culture is otherwise associated with sites occupied by speakers of Muskogean languages. Archaeological sites identified with all other known Timucuan-speakers, with the possible exception of Guadalquini, do not have affinities with the Square Ground Lamar culture.
Guale was a historic Native American chiefdom of Mississippian culture peoples located along the coast of present-day Georgia and the Sea Islands. Spanish Florida established its Roman Catholic missionary system in the chiefdom in the late 16th century.
The Mocama were a Native American people who lived in the coastal areas of what are now northern Florida and southeastern Georgia. A Timucua group, they spoke the dialect known as Mocama, the best-attested dialect of the Timucua language. Their heartland extended from about the Altamaha River in Georgia to south of the mouth of the St. John's River, covering the Sea Islands and the inland waterways, Intracoastal. and much of present-day Jacksonville. At the time of contact with Europeans, there were two major chiefdoms among the Mocama, the Saturiwa and the Tacatacuru, each of which evidently had authority over multiple villages. The Saturiwa controlled chiefdoms stretching to modern day St. Augustine, but the native peoples of these chiefdoms have been identified by Pareja as speaking Agua Salada, which may have been a distinct dialect.
Beginning in the second half of the 16th century, the Kingdom of Spain established missions in Spanish Florida in order to convert the indigenous tribes to Roman Catholicism, to facilitate control of the area, and to obstruct regional colonization by Protestants, particularly, those from England and France. Spanish Florida originally included much of what is now the Southeastern United States, although Spain never exercised long-term effective control over more than the northern part of what is now the State of Florida from present-day St. Augustine to the area around Tallahassee, southeastern Georgia, and some coastal settlements, such as Pensacola, Florida. A few short-lived missions were established in other locations, including Mission Santa Elena in present-day South Carolina, around the Florida peninsula, and in the interior of Georgia and Alabama.
Apalachicola Province was a group or association of towns located along the lower part of the Chattahoochee River in present-day Alabama and Georgia. The Spanish so called it because they perceived it as a political entity under the leadership of the town of Apalacicola. It is believed that before the 17th century, the residents of all the Apalachicola towns spoke the Hitchiti language, although other towns whose people spoke the Muscogee language relocated among the Apalachicolas along the Chattahoochee River in the middle- to later- 17th century. All of the Apalachicola towns moved to central Georgia at the end of the 17th century, where the English called them "Ochese Creek Indians". They moved back to the Chattahoochee River after 1715, with the English then calling them "Lower Creeks", while the Spanish called them "Ochese".
San Lorenzo de Ibihica was a Spanish Franciscan mission built in the early 17th century in the southeast of the present-day U.S. state of Georgia. It was part of Spain's effort to colonize the region of Spanish Florida and convert the Timucua to Catholicism. It served the Ibi people, also known as the Yui or Ibihica, a Timucua group of the area.
Mission San Pedro de Mocama was a Spanish colonial Franciscan mission on Cumberland Island, on the coast of the present-day U.S. state of Georgia, from the late 16th century through the mid-17th century. It was built to serve the Tacatacuru, a Mocama Timucua people.
The Timucua were a Native American people who lived in Northeast and North Central Florida and southeast Georgia. They were the largest indigenous group in that area and consisted of about 35 chiefdoms, many leading thousands of people. The various groups of Timucua spoke several dialects of the Timucua language. At the time of European contact, Timucuan speakers occupied about 19,200 square miles (50,000 km2) in the present-day states of Florida and Georgia, with an estimated population of 200,000. Milanich notes that the population density calculated from those figures, 10.4 per square mile (4.0/km2) is close to the population densities calculated by other authors for the Bahamas and for Hispaniola at the time of first European contact. The territory occupied by Timucua speakers stretched from the Altamaha River and Cumberland Island in present-day Georgia as far south as Lake George in central Florida, and from the Atlantic Ocean west to the Aucilla River in the Florida Panhandle, though it reached the Gulf of Mexico at no more than a couple of points.
Tacatacuru was a Timucua chiefdom located on Cumberland Island in what is now the U.S. state of Georgia in the 16th and 17th centuries. It was one of two chiefdoms of the Timucua subgroup known as the Mocama, who spoke the Mocama dialect of Timucuan and lived in the coastal areas of southeastern Georgia and northern Florida.
The Ibi, also known as the Yui or Ibihica, were a Timucua chiefdom in the present-day U.S. state of Georgia during the 16th and 17th centuries. They lived in southeastern Georgia, about 50 miles from the coast. Like their neighbors, the Icafui tribe, they spoke a dialect of the Timucua language called Itafi.
San Buenaventura de Guadalquini or San Buenaventura de Boadalquivi was a Spanish mission located on St. Simon's Island, Georgia, United States from between 1597 and 1609 until 1684, when pirates burned the mission and its town. The mission moved to the north side of the St. Johns River near its mouth, in present day Duval County, Florida under the name of Santa Cruz de Guadalquini or Santa Cruz y San Buenaventura de Guadalquini for a few years before merging with the mission San Juan del Puerto.
Juanillo was a chief of the Native American Tolomato people in the Guale chiefdom, in what is now the US state of Georgia. In September 1597, Juanillo led the so-called Gualean Revolt, or Juanillo's Revolt, against the cultural oppression of the indigenous population in Florida by the Spanish authorities and the Franciscan missionaries. This was the first and longest-lasting Guale rebellion in La Florida, and ended with the execution of Juanillo by a group of Native American allies of the Spanish, led by Chief Asao.
Nuestra Señora de Guadalupe de Tolomato was a Spanish Catholic mission founded in 1595 in what is now the state of Georgia, located north of the lands of the southernmost Native American Guale chiefdom, Asao-Talaxe.
Ocute, later known as Altamaha or La Tama and sometimes known conventionally as the Oconee province, was a Native American paramount chiefdom in the Piedmont region of the U.S. state of Georgia in the 16th and 17th centuries. Centered in the Oconee River valley, the main chiefdom of Ocute held sway over the nearby chiefdoms of Altamaha, Cofaqui, and possibly others.
Sabacola was a Native American tribal town in what is now the Southeastern United States of America during the 17th, 18th, and early 19th centuries. Usually regarded as belonging to Apalachicola Province, Sabacola had poorly understood connections to the Apalachee people. Although usually described as speaking the Hitchiti language, at least one source stated that the Sabacola spoke another, unidentified language. The town moved to several locations along the Chattahoochee River, sometimes with more than one town including Sabacola in its name at the same time. The town of Sabacola moved to the Ocmulgee River area of central Georgia for about 25 years, before returning to the Chattahoochee River. Sabacola was the only Apalachicola town to have a mission established by the Spanish. The Apalachicola towns, including Sabacola, evolved into the Lower Towns of the Muscogee Confederacy.
The Oconi or Ocone were a Timucua people that spoke a dialect of the Timucua language. They lived in a chiefdom on the margin of or in the Okefenokee Swamp in southeastern Georgia. The Oconi first appeared in Spanish records in 1602, but a mission was not established until at least a decade later, with the first record of a mission in 1630. The Spanish twice attempted to relocate the Oconi people to other missions, in 1645 and 1655. The Oconi disappeared from Spanish records after 1655.