Comparative Commensality and the Colonial Consumption of Indigenous Serving Vessels in Early Spanish Florida

Summary

Diverse approaches to commensality influenced the local production and colonial consumption of Indigenous serving vessels. In the Southeast U.S., analysis of vessel form and function indicates that Indigenous commensality tended toward communal-style eating. Those practices contrasted with the individual-style plates, bowls, and cups used by Spanish colonists and Indigenous people in Mexico at the colonial center of New Spain. An ongoing study of ceramics from the West Florida presidios (1698-1763) suggests that a broad perspective on comparative commensality has important implications for explaining the varied colonial consumption of Indigenous ceramics and the appearance of colonoware in Spanish Florida. In this paper, I extend this investigation to the Tristán de Luna settlement (1559-1561), the earliest multi-year European settlement in the continental U.S. This preliminary study provides a glimpse at the early colonial incorporation of Indigenous vessel forms along the Florida frontier within a broad comparative perspective.

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• Society for Historical Archaeology 2025

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Contact(s): Nicole Haddow