Cabeza de Vaca's healing journey

Shipwrecked in 1528, Álvar Núñez Cabeza de Vaca, two other Spaniards and the enslaved Moroccan Estebanico crossed Texas and northern Mexico as healers; by late 1535, at La Junta de los Ríos near today's Presidio, Texas, crowds followed them seeking cures.

1535 CE · 29.56, -104.37 · status: account

The account

Cabeza de Vaca's 'Relación' (1542) describes prayers, breathing on the sick and even a man revived; Native communities passed the travellers on as powerful medicine people.

The sceptical view

The account was written for the Crown and casts the Spaniards as instruments of God; healing claims cannot be checked.

Connections in the atlas

• The Jumano 'Lady in Blue' reports
• The death of Esteban at Hawikuh

Sources

1. Wikipedia: Álvar Núñez Cabeza de Vaca