ESTEVANICO (?-1539). Estevanico, also known as Estevan, Esteban, Estebanico, 
Black Stephen, and Stephen the Moor, was a native of Azamor, on the Atlantic 
shore of Morocco. In Spain before 1527 he became the personal slave of 
Andrés Dorantes de Carranza.qv Though Estevanico is usually referred to as a 
Negro or African black, a Spaniard, Diego de Guzmán, who saw him in Sinaloa 
in 1536, described him as "brown." Estevanico accompanied his master as a 
member of the Narváez expedition, which landed in mid-April 1528 near what 
is now called Tampa Bay. Narváez, after a futile attempt at marching along 
the Gulf Coast, elected to slaughter the horses and to build five makeshift 
barges. The boat containing Estevanico was placed under the joint command of 
Dorantes and Alonso Castillo Maldonado.qv After a month at sea, the craft 
was wrecked on or near western Galveston Island. On foot Estevanico, 
Dorantes, and Castillo reached Matagorda Bay, the only survivors to do so. 
Their continued safety among hostile coastal Indians hinged on the success 
of faith healing, first introduced to them by Castillo Maldonado. After six 
years of precarious existence, a fourth survivor, Álvar Núñez Cabeza de 
Vaca,qv joined them. Subsequently, the castaways escaped to the interior of 
Texas.

Estevanico was the first African-born slave to traverse Texas. In the 
company of his master, he traveled a west-by-northwest route from the site 
of San Antonio to that of Pecos. In March 1536 the four survivors were 
reunited with their countrymen north of Culiacán in Nueva Galicia, where 
Dorantes sold Estevanico to Viceroy Antonio de Mendoza. The viceroy assigned 
the slave to a Franciscan, Fray Marcos de Niza.qv Niza had been ordered to 
Nueva Galicia, where he was to leave Culiacán in early March of 1539. On 
March 21, 1539, he and Estevanico arrived at the Río Mayo in what is now 
Sonora. There Estevanico, restless over the slow progress of the friar and 
his support party, was sent ahead as an advance scout. Separated by several 
days' travel from Niza, Esteban approached Cíbola, thought today to be the 
pueblo of Hawikuh, and announced his intentions to make peace and heal the 
sick. He told the villagers that he had been sent by white men who would 
soon arrive and instruct them in divine matters. The village elders, 
suspicious of his claims that he came from a land of white men because he 
was dark, and resentful of his demands for turquoise and women, killed him 
when he attempted to enter the village. Hawikuh, the southernmost of the 
seven pueblos known as the Seven Cities of Cíbola,qv was located fifteen 
miles southwest of the site of present Zuni, New Mexico.

BIBLIOGRAPHY: Carolyn Arrington, Black Explorer in Spanish Texas: Estevanico 
(Austin: Eakin Press, 1986). Stephen Clissold, The Seven Cities of Cíbola 
(London: Eyre and Spottiswood, 1961). Cyclone Covey, trans. and ed., Cabeza 
de Vaca's Adventures in the Unknown Interior of America (New York: Collier, 
1961; rpt., Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1983). Harbert 
Davenport, ed., "`The Expedition of Pánfilo de Narváez,' by Gonzalo 
Fernández Oviedo y Valdez," Southwestern Historical Quarterly 27-28 (October 
1923-October 1924).

Donald E. Chipman


  The following, adapted from the Chicago Manual of Style, 15th edition, is 
the preferred citation for this article.


  Handbook of Texas Online, s.v. "," 
http://www.tsha.utexas.edu/handbook/online/articles/EE/fes8.html (accessed 
November 14, 2006).


----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Robert C Leavitt" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Tuesday, November 14, 2006 9:44 PM
Subject: Re: Mystery of Va.'s First Slaves Is Unlocked 400 Years Later


I'm dealing strictly from memory here, but . . . about1536 Francisco 
Coronado entered what is now the US from Mexico, looking for Cibola. As a 
scout he had "Black Stephan". He crossed the border into what is now Arizona 
(?) (New Mexico?) and got as far as northern Oklahoma/Southern Kansas before 
giving up. Stephan was described as a "Moor" which would exclude him from 
the list of 300 or so "Spaniards." My memory fails, however, to tell me if 
he was actually a slave, as opposed to, lets say, a military captive. It 
does tell me that Stephan didn't make the return trip, but not just where he 
was killed. As for non-black slaves, Coronado started out with 1000 Indians, 
among whom would have been many who would now be described as slaves, 
although legally in 1536 they were probably not actually classed as 
"enslaved" but more probably as "subjected." But if it walks like a duck . . 
.

RCL