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Mauvilla found?
Andrew Holmes, an archeological field technician for Barry Vittor and Associates in Mobile, says he has mathematical and physical evidence that puts Mauvilla (also spelled Mauvila, Maubila and Mabila) in "the forks" of the Alabama and Tombigbee rivers in southern Clarke County. Holmes said that he relied on information and research by his father, N. H. Holmes Jr., a Mobile architect and archeologist who served on the De Soto Commission in the 1980s. Archeologist Caleb Curren of Pensacola, Fla. also did extensive research and searches for Mauvilla in the '80s and his work was invaluable, too, said the younger Holmes. Southern Clarke County was long promoted as the logical site for the Indian village but the De Soto Commission placed the site farther north, near Cahaba in Dallas County. De Soto, the governor of Cuba, landed in Florida and made a wide-sweeping expedition through what is now the southeastern United States. He went as far north as present-day North Carolina before turning and coming as far south as Mauvilla. He looted villages and intimidated and enslaved the Indians along the way. Andrew Holmes said his father used geometric triangulation formulas to map out possible locations. His calculations relied on a detailed account of the De Soto expedition and the battle by a Spanish officer, Garcilaso, who wrote an account that was published in 1587. Holmes said he took ordinary highway road maps of the area and plotted out his father's calculations that led him to an oval mound in the southern end of the county. The mound is 216 yards by 336 yards with an "east west recessed meandering path" across it. An aerial photo shows the oval with what appears to be a square in the center. Holmes says this fits the written description of Mauvilla. It was a walled town with gates on the east and west sides, a single street and a square in the middle. A preliminary search of the heavily wooded mound found iron nails and other hardware that match the process used by the Spaniards in the 1500s. Holmes and other archeologists and historians believe an excavation of the undisclosed site will settle the matter. The town was burned after the battle so there should be evidence of that. Too, most accounts suggest that thousands of Indians- by some counts, over 10,000- died in the battle as well as a handful of Spaniards. There should be evidence of the intense battle. Holmes said the site is in a flood plane but he thinks Mauvilla may have been constructed by Indian Chief Tascaluza (Tuscaloosa) with a specific intent to lure and kill the invading Spaniards. Holmes said Tascaluza knew of the Spanish being in the southeast as much as 10 years earlier and would have heard of De Soto long before he made it into the area. Mauvilla was a trap, Holmes thinks, although one that backfired on the Indians as they suffered the greatest. After Mauvilla, De Soto, for whatever reason, refused to continue the short distance to the coast where supplies awaited and turned back northward. He wandered into Mississippi and across the Mississippi River. He died and was buried in the Mississippi River and the remnants of his army limped back to the coast and were eventually rescued. They lived to tell fantastic stories of their expedition, including the gigantic battle of Mauvilla. Andrew Holmes said permission must be obtained for a full fledged excavation of the site. An excavation will require funding as well as the support of archeological groups and the state. He said many have shied away from Clarke County as a potential site since the De Soto Commission's decision to move it northward in the 1980s.
But he is confident that Mauvilla is atop the oval mound in the forks of the river of south Clarke County.
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