Acuera

Acuera (Timucua: Acuero?, "Timekeeper") was the name of both an indigenous town and a province or region in central Florida during the 16th and 17th centuries. The indigenous people of Acuera spoke a dialect of the Timucua language. In 1539 the town first encountered Europeans when it was raided by soldiers of Hernando de Soto's expedition. French colonists also knew this town during their brief tenure (1564–1565) in northern Florida. Late in the 16th century, Acuera came under Spanish influence as it expanded its settlements. Two or three Spanish missions were founded in the Acuera province in the 17th century.

Based on distances between indigenous towns reported by Spanish explorers, anthropologists Jerald T. Milanich and Charles Hudson locate the town of Acuera in central Florida near Lake Weir and Lake Griffin, near the headwaters of the Oklawaha River, a tributary of the St. Johns River. A map produced by Jacques le Moyne, who was part of the late 16th-century French attempt to colonize Florida at Fort Caroline, shows a town called Aquouena (Acuera?) east of Eloquale (Ocale), on a tributary of the St. Johns River. The French also recorded a chief named Acquera being a vassal of Chief Utina. The 17th-century Spanish missions of San Luis de Acuera and Santa Lucia de Acuera were reported to be at distances from St. Augustine that are consistent with the missions being located near the Oklawaha River and Lake Weir. In 1836 Lake Weir was identified on an Anglo-American map as "Lake Ware." Milanich and Hudson speculate that "Ware" was derived from "Acuera". Boyer has identified the Hutto/Martin Site, 8MR3447, a little to the north of Lake Weir, as being the site of the 17th-century mission of Santa Lucia de Acuera and the likely site of the town of Acuera recorded in the Ranjel account of the Hernando de Soto entrada. The territory occupied by the Acuera people in historical times was part of the St. Johns culture. It is characterized by the people's creating shell middens from their refuse, and burial mounds for their dead. They made a "chalky" pottery based on the use of freshwater sponge spicules as a temper, sometimes decorated with check-stamping.

"Santa Lucia de Acuera" was one of nine or ten dialects of the Timucua language named by the Franciscan missionary Francisco Pareja in the early 17th century. Pareja regarded the Santa Lucia de Acuera and Tucururu (which may have adjoined Acuera) dialects as the most divergent from what he considered the standard dialect, that of Mocama.

The province of Acuera may have consisted of several small chiefdoms, including Avino, Eloquale, and Acuera. Utiaca may have been under the chief of Avino, while Piliuco, and possibly Mocoso, were towns under the chief of Acuera. Tucuru may have been under Avino, or may have been independent. The caciques (chiefs) of Tucuru and Eloquale visited St. Augustine earlier than the cacica (female chief) of Acuera did. Eloquale, a town on the Oklawaha River, may have been a new location for the town of Ocale, which was near the Withlacoochee River when the de Soto expedition stopped there for two weeks in 1539. Ocale was also referred to as Cale and Etocale by Spanish chroniclers of the de Soto expedition. After the de Soto expedition stayed in 1539 at the town of Mocoso on Tampa Bay, it may have been relocated to the province of Acuera.

Archaeological site data from Wikidata (CC0). Summary from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA).