Cabeza de Vaca and the Sixteenth-Century Copper Trade in Northern Mexico

Abstract

Descriptions of Indians in northern Mexico with copper artifacts occur in the sixteenth-century expedition reports of Cabeza de Vaca, Francisco Ibarra, and Father Rodríguez. The phrasing of Cabeza de Vaca's account indicates that both copper bells and plates were excavated from abandoned villages and then traded widely. Statements given in all three journals point to the site of Paquimé, or Casas Grandes, in Chihuahua as the most probable source. Since Casas Grandes was deserted in the sixteenth century, it is suggested that the copper objects found among the Indians in northern Mexico by Cabeza de Vaca, Ibarra, and Rodríguez were looted from Casas Grandes rather than obtained by trade from west Mexico or Mesoamerica.