USA > Arizona > Arizona, prehistoric, aboriginal, pioneer, modern; the nation's youngest commonwealth within a land of ancient culture, Vol. I > Part 7
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coast. Scurvy also was common in Spanish days, on land as well as sea, and has been known in Arizona since its American occupation, as also has cholera.
HERNANDO CORTEZ, THE GREAT CAPTAIN
While Hernando Cortez was absent in Spain, receiving the honors due to a great conqueror and explorer, New Spain was left under the government of Nuño de Guzmán, his bitterest enemy. Enmities such as these were common among the jealous Spaniards, especially where high titles conflicted and where dignities were in question. It was Guzmán who had been named at the head of the royal audencia, upon which was placed the investigation of the charges brought against the Great Captain. The malicious report returned seemed to have had no attention from the government and yet when Cortéz returned to Mexico in July, 1530, he found himself practically devoid of actual authority. Guzmán, seeking also to add new kingdoms to the Spanish crown, in that year had headed north- ward an army of exploration and conquest, comprising several hundred Span- iards, who went at their own expense, and 14,000 Indians. There had come to the City of Mexico more or less definite reports concerning great kingdoms to the northward and particularly that of the Seven Cities, described as even richer than Mexico itself. The expedition worked as far northward as Culiacan, where, probably traveling too far from the seacoast, it became tangled in the gorges of the Sierra Madres and its leader, discouraged, turned back.
Cortéz had started a naval expedition to the northward along the coast of Mexico, into the "Gulf of Cortez," the Gulf of California, also known as the Vermillion Sea. The only record of it seems to come through ecclesiastical sources, and more especially concerning the assignment to each vessel of a Fran- ciscan friar, appointed by Padre Antonio de Citta Rodrigo, Superior of the Province of Mexico, who, though indefinitely, is reported to have sent by land northward at the same time two of his friars, with a guard of a captain and twelve soldiers. It is more or less inferred that these friars were Juan de la Asuncion and Pedro Nadal.
Cortéz, deprived of his administrative authority, still had undisputed rights of discovery and exploration under the crown. October, 1533, at his own expense, he sent northward two vessels, but with little result, for the captain of one, Diego Becerra, was murdered by his sailors on the coast of Jalisco and the leader of the mutineers and twenty other Spaniards were massacred by Indians while on shore.
The Great Captain, after two failures, resolved that he himself would lead an expedition, so with three ships he set out from Chiametla in April, 1535. They found the port where the murderers of Becerra had been killed, on the southeast coast of the peninsula of California. They named the bay Santa Cruz, but it is assumed to be what now is known as La Paz. The visit is important only in that on that occasion the land is supposed to have been formally named by Cortéz "California." This expedition was as much of a failure as its predecessors and Cortéz was not unwilling to return to the City of Mexico when cordially sum- moned thither by the new Viceroy, Antonio de Mendoza.
Not satisfied, Cortéz, in the summer of 1539, sent still another expedition up the coast, commanded by Francisco de Ulloa. One of the ships was lost on the
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coast near Culiacan, but the others continued northward till they reached the head of the gulf.
This practically ended the activities of Cortéz on the western continent. Impoverished by the expenditure on these expeditions of not less than 300,000 pesos and finding no support from the Viceroy for further plans he had made in the same direction, the Great Captain returned to his native land, where he died in 1547.
PRIESTLY PIONEERS OPENED THE WAY
Friar Marco de Niza, a Franciscan, was one of the first Europeans to tread the soil of Arizona, he following closely on the heels of the blackamoor Estevanico. But still leaving the credit with Mother Church, they appear to have had fore- runners. While the expedition of Nuño de Guzmán failed in its purpose of finding rich cities to add jewels to the Spanish crown, it at least penetrated far into northern Mexico and established settlements, some of which have endured unto this day. The mail-clad conquistador, seeking renown and spoil, never journeyed on his Barbary charger faster than a brown-robed Franciscan friar could travel on his own sandaled feet. Fearing nothing but God, defying the devil and all his earthly representatives, considering life as only a means toward achieving an immortal end, contemptuous of torture and even seeking martyrdom, with uplifted cross the friars ever were in the van. Their work seems to have been only incidentally connected with the Spaniards themselves, for the Spaniards were firm in the faith and needed little instruction or little of the services of the priesthood save in the way of an occasional mass or the hearing of confessions. Almost solely the fervor of the pioneer friars was directed in the way of mis- sionary effort to reclaim from the devil the souls of the Gentiles, of the Indians of whatever degree. To this end no effort was too great, no sacrifice too painful.
In January, 1538, two Franciscans, Juan de la Asuncion (Juan de Olmeda ?) and Pedro Nadal, were sent into the northern settlements, it is said by direct commission from the Viceroy. It was probable that they were not the only priests of the northern settlements who went about that time on trips of exploration, seeking Indian converts beyond the pale of the settlements, but the average mis- sionary friar was a poor press agent. It was recorded that the two friars trav- eled across the deserts to the northwest a matter of 600 leagues (about 1,560 miles) from some unspecified point, probably the City of Mexico, and found a large river, which they could not cross. There Padre Nadal, who was noted as "muy inteligente en las matematicas," determined the latitude to be 35 deg. north. This would indicate arrival at a point on the Colorado River not far from Needles. There seems to have been a belief, however, among Spanish commentators that the Colorado was struck at a point not far from Ymma, really in latitude abont 32 deg. 30 min., and that the friar's instruments were in error. De Niza stated that the Gulf coast curved to the westward at 35 deg., an error of 3 deg. at least.
There was additional data on the same subject to the effect that Friar Marco de Niza the following year arrived at the same river, which was called the Rio de las Balsas. the River of Rafts, on account of the manner in which the Indians ferried it. The stream was determined to have been the Rio Colorado, the latitude 34 deg. 30 min., and the Indians the Alquedunes. The latitude given must be rejected as an initial proposition. The Indians who crossed the river
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on balsas may have been Cocopahs or Yumas, who lived in the district below the present town of Yuma, a locality still known as Algodones. To this day these Indians cross the Colorado by swimming, pushing their effects ahead of them on miniature rafts, and the women even ferry their babies across in earthen ollas.
About 1540, one of the rivers crossed by the Coronado expedition was called by Jaramillo "El Rio de las Balsas," for rafts would appear to have been neces- sary for the ferriage of the goods of at least one section. This must have been the Gila, far above its jnnetion with the Salt, only a tributary of the latter flow- ing across the trail to Cibola. Assuredly, de Niza never saw the Colorado, unless on some unrecorded trip. There might be some value in this connection in the fact that the Salt in an early period was known as "Rio de la Asuncion."
Doubt has been cast upon the authenticity of this discovery claim, which is based upon a paragraph in the Cronica Serafica of Arricivita, issued in 1792 from the College of Queretaro. In some other relations of the same period there appears to have been a jumbling of this trip and that of de Niza. The name of the priest Juan de la Asuncion cannot be found by Bandelier in any of the records of the period. Yet a narrative by Captain Mange, the companion of Padre Kino, tells that in 1538 Padre Marco dispatched Friar Juan de la Asuncion and a lay brother on something of the same journey that de Niza later took him- self. This is considered in the works of Cones and Bandelier, the former, prob- ably with the full assent of the careful Fred W. Hodge, concluding that while there may have been such a journey at the time mentioned, there is no definite assurance that the river reached was the lower Colorado. More likely it was the Gila. A larger northern river of which the natives told could readily have been the Salado, or Salt, had the Colorado not been indicated by the detail that it was a ten days' journey beyond and that by it lived numerous people in walled pueblos.
JOURNEYINGS OF FRIAR MARCO DE NIZA
Cabeza de Vaca was passed on by Guzmán, then in authority in Nueva Galicia, to the City of Mexico, where Don Antonio de Mendoza for more than a year had represented the might of the King over New Spain. The story of the journey, with its hearsay evidence of rich lands beyond, seemed to confirm the Indian fairy tales already heard and there was muel excitement throughout Mexico. Mendoza promptly planned an expedition to force into the northern country, but, true to his reputation as a careful leader, he first determined upon sending out a scouting party.
There is extant a brief report made by Mendoza to the King. In this is told how he had sent two Franciscan friars (De Niza and Honoratus?) "to discover the end of this firm land which stretches to the north, and because their journey fell ont to greater purpose than was looked for, I would declare the whole inatter from the beginning : I desired to know the end of this province of Nueva España, because it is so great a country and that we have yet no knowledge thereof." He told of the departure of Guzmán from Mexico with 400 horsemen and 14,000 Indian footmen, "the best men and the best furnished ever seen in those parts." and how "the greater part of them were consumed in the enterprise and could not enter nor discover more than already was discovered. Guzmán at divers times sent forth captains and horsemen, who sped no better than he had done. Likewise
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the Marquis del Valle Hernando Cortez had sent a captain with two ships to discover the coast, which two ships and the captain perished. After that he sent again two other ships, one of which was divided from her consort and the master, and certain mariners slew the captain and usurped over the ship."
With some circumlocution, though with little attention to what might have appeared to have been grave detail, the Viceroy told how knowledge of the west coast had been gained by marine excursions, generally with disaster to the par- ticipants, it being said of Cortéz, "Although he had ships and the country very near him abounding with victual, yet could he never find means to conquer it, but rather it seemed that God miraculously did hide it from him; and so he returned home without achieving aught else of moment."
Mendoza then told how he had in his company Andres Dorantes, one of the survivors of the Narvaez expedition, whom he employed with forty or fifty horse- men to search out the secret of these parts, "and having provided all things necessary for his journey and spent much money in that behalf the matter was broken off, I wot not how, and that enterprise was given over."
But there yet remained the Moor, called the negro, Estevan, who was sent northward with the new Governor of Nueva Galicia, Francisco Vasquez de Coronado, to the city of San Miguel of Culiacan, the last province subdued by the Spaniards toward that quarter, being 200 leagues distant from the City of Mexico. The Spanish league was equivalent to 2.62 English miles. With Coro- nado also went Marco de Niza, Franciscan Vice Commissioner General, and his companion friar, "because they had been long traveled and exercised in those parts and had great experience in the affairs of the Indies and were men of good life and conscience, for whom I obtained leave of their superiors."
From Culiacan, according to Mendoza, a number of Indians were sent north- ward to spread words of peace among the tribesmen who had been driven into the hills by fear of the Spaniards. About 400 Indians were gathered at Culiacan, where they were assured of safety for themselves and people and where they were fed and were taught to make the sign of the cross and to learn the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, "and they were greatly besought to learn the same." They then departed for their homes, presumably in what is now Sonora. This action was taken especially in order to make easier the way of farther exploration.
Friar Marco de Niza and his companion, with the negro and other slaves and Indians, went forward soon thereafter. Still later the same route was taken with some force by Governor Coronado, who penetrated as far as the Valle de los Corazónes (Valley of the Hearts), 120 leagues distant from Culiacan (about the present location of Ures), where he found great scarcity of victuals and the moun- tains so craggy he could find no way to pass forward, and so was forced to return home to San Miguel. Thereupon the Viceroy was moved to remark, "So that as well on closing of the entrance, as in not being able to find the way, it seemeth unto all men that God would shut up the gate to all those which by strength of human force have gone about to attempt this enterprise and hath revealed it to a poor and barefooted friar. And so the friar began to enter the land, who, because he found his entrance was so well prepared, was very well received."
The narrative of the friar, made in accordance with instructions given him by the Viceroy, has been preserved, a most wondrous document, showing that
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either the northern country has changed much since those days or that the rev- erend traveler dreamed dreams.
The chronicle of the journey starts with the departure from San Miguel on Friday, March 7, 1539, in company with Friar Honoratas and Estevan, who for the purpose had been bought by the Viceroy from Andres Dorantes, and certain free Indians and many other Indians of Petatlan and Cuchillo. At Petatlan he lost his reverend companion, who was forced by sickness to remain behind, a circumstance much to be deplored, historically. The journey was continued, "as the Holy Ghost would lead me, without any merit of mine," generally paral- leling the coast. Mention was made of the coming of Indians from an island "only half a league by sea," which may have been as far north as Tiburon. Then was traversed a desert of four days' journey, thereafter finding new Indi- ans, who had had no knowledge of Christians, "who told me that four or five days journey, at the foot of the mountains, there were many towns with people who were clad in cotton and that had round, green stones hanging at their nos- trils and at their ears and who had certain thin plates of gold wherewith they scraped off their sweat, and that the walls of their temples was covered therewith and that they do use it in all their household vessels."
Though his instruction was to not leave the coast, after three days further travel he noted arrival at "a town of reasonable bigness," called Vacupa, forty leagues distant from the sea, a place where there was great store of good victual. Thence he sent certain Indians to the sea by three several ways to return with Indians of the sea coast that he might receive information from them. Another way he sent Estevan, commanding him to go directly northward fifty or three- score leagues "to see if by that way I might learn news of any notable thing which we sought to discover." Estevan, lacking in education, was to send back news by Indians in the shape of crosses. "A small cross of one handful long would signify but a mean thing. If he were to find a country greater and better than Nueva España he should send a great cross." Four days thereafter, came back a cross as tall as a man, with spoken word that Niza should forthwith come, for Estevan had found people who gave him information of a very mighty prov- ince, which was called Cíbola, where there were seveu great cities all under one lord, "the houses whereof are made of lime and stone and are very great and the least of them of one loft abovehead." A northern Indian sustained the story and told that in the gates of the principal houses turquoise was set, cunningly wrought.
The messengers sent westward returned on Easter Day, bringing with them two inhabitants from the sea coast and islands, which were said to be inhabited by people who wore shells of pearls on their foreheads and had great pearls and much gold. The islands were four-and-thirty in number, lying close together, with traffic conducted by rafts.
The tale from the north was so much greater than that from the west that the friar with his Indians followed on the trail of Estevan, from whom he received still another great cross, with words to hasten him forward. Cíbola he was told was more than thirty days journey and beyond the Seven Cities there were three other kingdoms called Marata, Acus and Tontonteac. He passed through the country of Indians called the Pintados (Painted Ones), possibly Pimas, where he took possession, according to his instruction, in the name of the King of Spain. He found respectable treatment and entertainment and the people presented him
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"wild beasts, such as conies and quailes, maize nuts of pine trees and all in great abundance." He was told that in Tontonteac the people of that country "had garments of gray woolen cloth such as he wore, taken from certain little beasts about twice the bigness of the spaniels that had aceompanied Estevan."
Provided by the natives with ample sustenance, he passed across another desert of four-days travel, where the glories of Cibola were magnified and where he was told that the people of that land used ladders to climb into the upper stories of their buildings. After a five-day journey to a valley inhabited by goodly people, well watered and like a garden, he found a refugee from Cíbola, "a white man of good complexion, of greater capacity than the inhabi- tants of this valley or than those which I had left behind me," and from him secured amplified details, one feature being "that all inhabitants of the City of Cíbola lie upon beds raised a good height from the ground, with quilts and canopies over them." An additional wonder was the description of a skin seen, of a beast said to have but one horn upon his forehead and "this horn bendeth toward his breast and that out of the same goeth a point right forward wherein he hath so mueh great strength that it will break anything, however strong it be, if he run against it and that there are great store of these beasts in that country." Word again came from Estevan that the further he went the more he learned of the greatness of the country and that "he had never found the Indians in any lie."
Estevan by this time seemed to have picked up about 300 natives. The friar took only thirty of the principal Indians with him and with these entered into a wilderness on May 9. He had traveled twelve days when there was encountered one of Estevan's Indians, son of the chief man of de Niza's party, who told of disaster. Estevan had sent before him to Cíbola, in token of amity, "his great mace made of a gourd . . . which gourd has a string of bells upon it and two feathers, one white and another red, in token that he demanded safe conduct and that he came peaceably." This token was'cast to the ground by the lord of the city, who warned the messengers to get them packing with speed, or else suffer death. But Estevan, not daunted, went on, to be captured, robbed and shut within a great house which stood without the city, where he was given neither meat nor drink. The next morning the woeful Indian messenger saw him running away, with people following and slaying certain of the Indians which had been in his company. The news cast great distress upon the friar's party. He told, "I thought this heavy and bad news would cost me my life. Neither did I fear so much the loss of my own life as that I should not be able to return to give information of the greatness of that country where our Lord God might be glorified." So he bribed his party with goods that he carried and went on fur- ther another day's journey, when they met still more bloody and wounded Indians of the party that had been with Estevan.
CIBOLA VIEWED BY DE NIZA FROM AFAR
In the agitation that followed confirmation of the first reports of the death of their kinsmen, the Indians would have put de Niza to death, but he divided among them his last remaining stores and finally persuaded two of the chiefs to go with him till they came within sight of Cíbola, "which is situate on a plain at the foot of a round hill and maketh show to be a fair city and is better situated
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than any I have seen in these parts. The houses are builded in order, according as the Indians told me, all made of stone, with divers stories and flat roofs, as far as I could discern from a mountain whither I ascended to view the city. The people here seem white, they wear apparel and lie in beds; their weapons are bows; they have emeralds and other jewels, although they esteem none so much as turquoises, wherewith they adorn the walls of their porches and their houses and their apparel and vessels, and they use them instead of money through all the country. Their apparel is of cotton and ox hides and this is their most com- mendable and honorable apparel. They use vessels of gold and silver, for they have no other metal, whereof there is greater use and more abundance than in Peru, and they buy the same for turquoise in the province of the Pintados, where there are said to be mines of great abundance. Of other kingdoms I could not obtain so particular instruction. Divers times I was tempted to go thither, because I knew I could but hazard my life and that I had offered unto God the first day that I began my journey. In the end I began to be afraid, considering in what danger I should put myself, and that if I should die the knowledge of this country should be lost, which in my judgment is the greatest and the best that hitherto has been discovered. When I told the chief men what a goodly city Cíbola seemed unto me, they answered me that it was the least of the Seven Cities and that Tontonteac is the greatest and best of them all, because it hath so many houses and people and there is no end of them. Having seen the disposition and the situation of the place, I thought good to name that country El Nuevo Reyno de San Francisco (The New Kingdom of Saint Francis), in which place I made a great heap of stones by the help of the Indians and on the top thereof I set a small slender cross, because I wanted means to make a greater." And thus he took possession of the country in the name of the Viceroy and Emperor and in- cluded the kingdoms of Tontonteac, Acus and Marata.
The return journey was made with all speed, until he could tell his tale to Governor Coronado, who was temporarily absent from San Miguel, but was found at Campostela, in Jalisco.
It might be well at this point to briefly state that these first of the Seven Cities of Cíbola were nothing more than the Zuñi villages, just across the Arizona line in eastern New Mexico, south of the latter-day town of Gallup.
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