Alvar Nunez Cabeza de Vaca (1490-1558) was a Spanish explorer of the New World and one of the four survivors of Panfilo de Narvaez's 1527 expedition to Florida.
Biography[]
Alvar Nunez Cabeza de Vaca was born in Jerez de la Frontera, Extremadura, Castile in 1490, and he came from a hidalgo family of minor nobility. In 1511, he enlisted in the Spanish Army, and he served with distinction in the Italian Wars. In 1527, he served as treasurer and marshal of Panfilo de Narvaez's expedition to Florida, but only he, Alonso del Castillo Maldonado, Andres Dorantes de Carranza, and Estevanico survived the 300-man expedition. He was left behind by the other members of the expedition due to his illness, and he became a faith healer and anthropologist among the many Native American tribes which he encountered. He returned to Spain in 1537, and he wrote an account of his experiences in 1542. In 1540, he became adelantado of Argentina, where he served as captain and general of New Andalusia. He worked to build up the population, where settlement had declined due to poor administration, and he was later blamed for the failure of the settlement and sent to Spain for trial in 1545. Although his sentence was later commuted, he never returned to the Americas, and he died in Seville in 1558.