Mayaca people
Mayaca was the name used by the Spanish to refer to a Native American tribe in central Florida, to the principal village of that tribe and to the chief of that village in the 1560s. The Mayacas occupied an area in the upper St. Johns River valley just to the south of Lake George. According to Hernando de Escalante Fontaneda, the Mayaca language was related to that of the Ais, a tribe living along the Atlantic coast of Florida to the southeast of the Mayacas. The Mayacas were hunter-fisher-gatherers, and were not known to practice agriculture to any significant extent, unlike their neighbors to the north, the Utina, or Agua Dulce (Freshwater) Timucua. (In general, agriculture had not been adopted by tribes living south of the Timucua at the time of first contact with European people.) The Mayaca shared a ceramics tradition (the St. Johns culture) with the Freshwater Timucua, rather than the Ais (the Indian River culture).[1]
History
The Spanish first encountered the Mayaca in 1566 while attempting to ransom some Frenchmen held by the Indians. Several villages near the Atlantic coast were reported to owe allegiance to Mayaca. At that time Mayaca appears to have been allied with the Mocama, or Agua Salada Timucua chief Saturiwa against the Agua Dulce (Freshwater) Timucua. In 1567 the Mayaca joined with the Saturiwa and the Potano, another Timucua people, against the Agua Dulce, which was defeated with Spanish aid.[2]
Spanish
Related tribes
Jororo
The Jororo or Hororo lived just to the south of the Mayaca. They first appear in the Spanish records in the 1680s, and spoke the Mayaca language. Like the Mayaca, the Jororo were hunter-fisher-gatherers. Their land was very wet, full of lakes and "brambles", and subject to frequent flooding. Hann suggests that the name of the mission at Jizime or Atissime or Atisme indicates that Jororo territory extended in the valley of the Kissimmee River.[4]
Others
Mayajuaca, Macoya and Mayrra are mentioned by early Spanish and French sources, and were probably located in the St. Johns River valley and associated with Mayaca. Macoya may in fact be a variant form of Mayaca.[5]
Notes
- ^ Hann 2003:52
- ISBN 0-8130-1424-7.
- ^ Hann 2003:58-9, 69, 92
- ^ Hann 2003:92
- ^ Hann 2003:62, 64
References
- Hann, John H. (1993). "The Mayaca and Jororo and Missions to Them", in McEwan, Bonnie G. ed. The Spanish Missions of La Florida. University Press of Florida. ISBN 0-8130-1232-5.
- Hann, John H. (2003). Indians of Central and South Florida: 1513-1763. University Press of Florida. ISBN 0-8130-2645-8