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SuperAttainer:
Hernando de Soto
Famous
Spanish Explorer:
Hernando
de Soto
Main
Life Accomplishments:
He
was a Spanish explorer who sailed the Atlantic Ocean and was the first
European to explore Florida and the southeastern US.
Basics:
Born: 1500
in Villanueva de la Serena, Badajoz, Spain
Died: May 21, 1542 (42 years old)
Nationality: Spanish
Religion: Roman Catholic
Fields: Exploration
Main Accomplishments: He discovered Mississipi.
Chronology
of Life Events:
1500
Hernando
De Soto was born at Villanueva de la Serena, Badajoz, Spain
1514
Hernando
De Soto left home on a voyage to the Indies
1519
Hernando
De Soto joins another exploration of discovery to Panama in South America
where he makes his mark as a Captain of the Horse
1524
Hernando
De Soto went on an expedition to Nicaragua, South America, with Francisco
de Cordoba
1525
De
Soto engaged in the profitable slave trade in Nicaragua
1530
Francisco
Pizarro recruited de Soto for his famous expedition to Peru
Jan
1531
Hernando
De Soto sailed with Francisco Pizarro from the port of Panama with 3 ships
and over 200 men
Nov
15 1532
Pizarro
reaches Cajamarca and captures Atahuallpa, the emperor of the Incas.
Thousands of Incas were killed. The fabulous treasure of the Incas was
stolen
Jan
6 1535
Pizarro
founded Lima, Peru which he called Ciudad de los Reyes meaning 'City of
the Kings'
1536
Hernando
De Soto returned to Spain reporting to the King on the explorations of
Pizarro. De Soto brought back his share of the Incas gold - he was a rich
man
1536
Hernando
De Soto set up a household in Seville
1537
De
Soto married Ines de Bobadilla the youngest daughter of Pedrarias Davila
(Davila had been instrumental in the downfall of Vasco Nunez de Balboa in
1519)
1537
Hernando
De Soto was named the titles of Adelantado of Florida and Governor of Cuba
by Charles V and granted the rights to conquer Florida
1537/38
Hernando
De Soto gathered together 950 armed soldiers, priests and 10 ships
Apr
6 1538
The
Hernando De Soto expedition left Sanlucar, Spain for the Americas
1538
The
expedition landed at Santiago de Cuba
1538/39
De
Soto had been given the title Governor of Cuba, he spent some months in
Cuba preparing for the voyage to Florida
May 30 1539
Hernando
De Soto arrived on the west coast of Florida with 1000 soldiers
1538/42
Hernando
De Soto spent four years exploring the area and searching for gold and
silver. His contact with the native indians was always violent and brutal
1542
Hernando
De Soto died of a fever on May 21, 1542. He was buried on the banks of the
Mississippi River
Early
Life:
He
was born in the Extremadura region of Spain, he participated, in his late
teens, in the conquest of Central America at the side of Governor
Pedrarias Dávila. He joined Francisco Pizarro in the early 1530's
conquest of South America, and he became enormously wealthy from his share
of the Incan booty.
In
1539, De Soto launched the largest of the early Spanish colonial
expeditions. A vast undertaking, De Soto's expedition ranged throughout
the southeastern United States searching for gold and a passage to China.
De Soto died in 1542 on the banks of the Mississippi River at present-day
Lake Village, Arkansas. Hernando de Soto was born to parents who were
hidalgos of modest means in Extremadura, a region of poverty and hardship
from which many young people looked for ways to seek their fortune
elsewhere. Two towns—Badajoz and Jerez de los Caballeros—claim to be
his birthplace. All that is known with certainty is that he spent time as
a child at both places and he stipulated in his will that his body be
interred at Jerez de los Caballeros, where other members of his family
were also interred. The age of the Conquerors came on the heels of the
Spanish reconquest of the Iberian penninsula from Islamic forces. Spain
and Portugal were filled with young men begging for a chance to find
military fame after the Moors were defeated. With discovery of new lands
to the West (which seemed at the time to be far east Asia), the whispers
of glory and wealth were too compelling for the poor Extremadurans.
De
Soto sailed to the New World in 1514 with the first Governor of Panama,
Pedrarias Dávila. Brave leadership, unwaivering loyalty, and clever
schemes for the extortion of native villages for their captured chiefs,
became De Soto's hallmark during the Conquest of Central America. He
gained fame as an excellent horseman, fighter, and tactician, but was
(from our modern perspective) notorious for extreme brutality.
During
that time, Juan Ponce de León, who discovered North America, Vasco
Núñez de Balboa, who discovered the Pacific (he called it the
"South Sea" below Panama), and Ferdinand Magellan, who first
sailed that ocean to the Orient, profoundly influenced De Soto's
ambitions.
.
Wife
Background:
Isabel
de Bobadilla, daughter of Pedrarias Dávila and a relative of a confidante
of Queen Isabella.
Father
Background:
Hernando
was the second son of Francisco Mendez de Soto.
Mother
Background:
His mother
was Leonor Arias Tinoco.
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