Part 2 - Introduction

Throughout the remainder of this book, the study of the dress and adornment of the Southeast Indians will be developed chronologically along with detailed studies of how various European groups influenced the changes that occurred.

The evolutionary character of dress is extremely important. All too often years and even centuries of dress are lumped together as if they represented only one point in time. Samuel Drake in 1841 expressed this point of view very succinctly.

"The reader, however, should be reminded that a general history of a people at one period will not exactly apply to them at another. This observation is not only true with regard to their political and civil history, but also in regard to the manners and customs of the same nations: These facts are true, both as they regard people called civilized, as well as those called savage."1

Unfortunately, in the Southeast, the only archeological evidence that has remained in any applicable quantity is that of non-perishable specimens. A few specimens of ancient weaving2 as well as plaited sandals3 have been found in caves in Kentucky, some textile fragments in Ohio, Indiana, and Alabama4; and, also, pottery decorated with woven fabric imprints.5 Fortunately, there exists fragments of decorated conch shells, some of which depict articles of dress. In juxtaposition, from the mezo-American area, we have a wealth of material that depicts those early Indians and describes their accomplishments and life styles hieroglyphically. Through analysis of these hieroglyphs, as well as through early Spanish journals and specimens found in the burial sites, their clothing, customs, and mores can be ascertained.

The chapters in this section of the book are organized according to major political and historical changes that culturally affected the Indians of the Southeast. Chapters one, two, three, and four will cover the major Spanish, French, and English explorers of the sixteenth and very early seventeenth century. A separate chapter will be devoted to each nationality since each had a different impact on the Indians of the Southeast.

Late fifteenth century and sixteenth century reporting of the New World was done in the confines of European traditions.

"They saw the islands and mainland of the western ocean, therefore, largely through transference, through the exchange of verbal and visual images from an Old World context to a New....Until the second decade of the sixteenth century, and residually after that, it was regarded as an extension of the Old World,....6

"The images of the Old World were still being only adapted: men saw in the New the Old, altered but not fundamentally changed."7

The New World appeared pictorially as early as circa 1500. The Munich woodcuts (circa 1505) of Brazilian Indians appear to be a stylized forerunner of later works depicting the various Indian groupings of the Americas. All of these were portrayed within the context and confines of the European milieu and often rendered by artists who had never set foot in the New World; instead, they designed their work around pictures, sketches, or oral descriptions of the New World. To these original works, they added embellishments of their own choosing.

The land called "Florida" was one of the last areas in the Americas to be discovered by the Spanish. It was almost a limitless geographical area comprising the Eastern portion of North America.8

For the purposes of this study, the western boundary of the Southeast will be the Sabine River which became part of the border of the present state of Texas. The dress and adornment of the tribes to the west of the river that Cabeza de Vaca and De Soto met will not be discussed because they are not directly relevant to this study and are only considered marginally related to the Southeastern area under consideration.

As other nationalities explored and settled the eastern coastal areas and made inroads into the interior, they began to divide the land and claim it for their country and king. But in the early sixteenth century, Florida, geographically, spanned an almost limitless portion of the North American Continent.

Even before "Florida" was officially claimed for Spain, Spanish sailors had been shipwrecked off the "Florida" peninsula since Columbus had first visited the outer islands in his famous voyage of 1492.

It has been speculated that the peninsula Indians obtained gold and silver, not necessarily from other Indian tribes, but from Spanish shipwrecks. Part of the assumption is based on testimony given by the Indians to the French in the early sixteenth century and also by the fact that these Indians had only one name for all metals and did not differentiate linguistically between copper (which was traded from Indian tribes that lived in the interior) and gold and silver.9 However, since trade was common among all the Indian tribes, it is possible that precious metals were traded prior to any European infiltration although little gold, according to Swanton, was found North of Florida; some of the gold found was ornamented with Central American patterns.10

The supposition that the Indians had contact with White men, probably Spanish, prior to 1510 and Ponce de León's visit11 is strengthened by the fact that the Indians greeted Ponce de León with hostility and that Ponce de León's party met a man among the Indians who understood Spanish.

It is also believed, by some scholars, that Norsemen and the Welch12 had been exploring and even settling on the North American Continent for many centuries.

By the time the Spanish began to explore the mainland of North America, the Indian population and, hence, their civilization had already started to decline. The Europeans not only brought their ideas and desires, but also, their diseases for which the Indians had no immunity.

"Epidemics of lethal pathogens began to spread widely through the Native American population no later than A.D. 1520...."13

These epidemics resulted in a change in population demographics and were the start toward Native deculturalization.

The changes that came with the advent of the European to the Indian culture of the Southeast make it almost impossible to know exactly how the Indians lived, interacted, and dressed prior to the historic period.14

Before the dress of the North American Indians inhabiting the Southeast can be described and, then, adequately understood, certain terms and conditions relating to the creation of garments need to be understood.

The Indians, in general, determined the type of material used to make their coverings by climate and accessibility. They used animal hides, both with and without the fur, natural fibers of various widths, like silk grass, Spanish moss, palmetto leaves etc., which they joined together without modifying their general form. They also created fibers through spinning, like those made from the inner bark of the mulberry tree and the hair from various animals, as well as incorporated feathers into their garments made with spun fibers.

The various methods to create garments including the process of tanning skins, spinning, and "weaving," with all its variations, will be discussed fully later in the text.

Since few pieces of fabric, themselves, have been found and the majority of information in this area is from pottery shards that were imprinted with fabrics, one can only speculate whether the Indians wove in the strict sense of the word or mostly twined.

It is known, from old narratives, that the Indians of the Southeast created garters, straps, belts, etc. from natural fibers that they plaited together or finger wove into narrow bands of cloth.

Throughout early texts, the explorers referred to finely woven garments. These explorers were describing the outcome of a process not the specific type of technique used to create the process.  


1. Drake, Biography and History of the Indian of North America from Its First Discovery, p. 363.

2. William H. Holmes, "Prehistoric Textile Fabrics of The United States, derived from Impressions on Pottery," BAE Annual #3, p. 403.

3. Ibid., pp. 417-418.

4. Dockstader, Weaving Arts of the American Indian, p. 172.

5. Holmes, "Prehistoric Textile Art of Eastern United States," BAE Annual Report 13, pp. 37 and following.

6. Quinn, Explorers and Colonies, p. 71.

7. Ibid., p. 72.

8. Woodbury Lowery in The Spanish Settlements within The United States, in discussing the territory called "Florida" stated that its "boundaries boundaries stretched to the confines of Labrador or shrank to the restricted dimensions of the peninsula, according to the nationality of the patron in whose interest the exploration was made." Page 123.

9.  Quinn, Explorers and Colonies, p. 280.

10. Swanton, The Indians of the Southeastern United States, BAE 137, p. 35.

11. Ibid., p. 35.

12. "It is probable that America had a noble Welsh explorer on her soil in 1170, over three hundred years before Columbus!" p. 8 of Pugh's book, Brave His Soul.

13. Dobyns, Their Number Become Thinned, p. 8.

14. The historic period is understood to mean that period for which the Europeans have a written record.