Los Sobrevivientes de La Florida


 PART II.

 CHARACTERISTICS OF THE SURVIVORS


 1. Geographical Origins

 The best documented biographical information for the Florida
survivors is their places of birth; 240 of a total of 257 survivors
have been located. All those known are listed in the right hand
column in Appendix I, according to the country or the Spanish
province in which they were born. The Spanish provinces have
been abbreviated as follows: AR = Aragon; AN = Andalucia; CN
= Castilla la Nueva; CV = Castilla la Vieja; EX = Extremadura;
GL = Galicia; LN = Leon; VZ = Vizcaya.

 In his list of the Florida survivors Hernandez de Biedma
indicated, in most cases, the town, city or Spanish province in
which they were born. Under a heading, foreigners and those from
the mountains, he listed other survivors, indicating after some of
their names, whether they were from the mountains, Galicia,
Portugal, and in the case of only one survivor, from Aragon. It is
quite possible that what he meant by "From the Mountains," were
persons from the kingdom of Aragon. However, in order to be as
specific as possible, the one man from Aragon, the Portuguese, the
Galicians and one Frenchman, are entered here under their
corresponding places of origin. Those of unknown origin but
appearing under the indicated heading, are listed as foreigners.

 All the survivors whose places of birth are known have been
listed individually in Appendix I and grouped by province or
country of origin in Table 3. The percentage of Extremadurans is
prominent; 99 out of 240, or 41 percent. This should not be
surprising, however, since de Soto, who was from Jerez in the
same region, actively recruited, not only within its confines but
across the border in Portugal. The fact that earlier, Extremadurans
had shared the immense wealth from the conquest of the Inca


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