Pre-european Native Americans

At the time of Cabeza de Vaca's journey in North America, the area and its indigenous peoples were relatively unknown to European explorers. American Indians, as the native peoples came to be called, lived in separate tribes with different languages and dialects of common languages as well.

The total population of the Indians in the whole of the future United States at this time is unknown, though in Florida alone it is believed there were about 100,000 native peoples before European contact. The highest concentration of native peoples could be found in the Pacific Northwest, along the Mississippi River, and in the basin of the Alleghenies where timber was readily accessible. There were also significant settlements along the Rio Grande River in New Mexico and Arizona as well as parts of the northeast. Southern Texas, California, and much of northern Mexico were only sparsely populated because...