ABSTRACT
Introduction The rim of the Gulf of Mexico is a maritime environment to which Native Americans adapted in a variety of ways, a rich environment that sets it apart from the interior Eastern Woodlands to the north. Domesticates from Mesoamerica and South America led to food production and complex societies in some areas. Chiefdoms developed without agriculture in areas where natural resources were exceptionally rich. Wide water or desert gaps in the long Circum-Gulf rim restricted long-distance travel and trade between the Eastern Woodlands, Mesoamerica, and Cuba, yet there were similarities imposed by the Gulf environments (White and Weinstein 2008). The cultures of the Gulf region were among the first to be devastated by warfare, disease, and enslavement following the settlement of Cuba by Spanish colonists, the Cortés expedition to Mexico (1519), and the de Soto expedition (1539-1543) into the Southeast.
