Pod Insights Stuff You Missed in History Class Estevanico, aka Mustapha al-Azemmour About this episode Estevanico was a translator and guide, and was probably the first person of any race from outside the Americas to enter what’s now Arizona and New Mexico – which happened in 1539.
Transcript 0:00 Speaker 00 This is an iHeart Podcast. Guaranteed Human.
0:04 Speaker 01 A rare disease diagnosis can change your life, but it doesn't have to define your future. In season seven of Untold Stories: Life with a Severe Autoimmune Condition, host Martine Hackett continues the conversation with people living with MG, CIDP, and the broader rare disease community, exploring what comes after diagnosis through stories of hope, progress, and connection. Produced by Ruby Studio in partnership with Argentix. Listen on the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
0:35 Speaker 02 Hey, I'm Niall Rogers. This fall, I'll be driving across the country, meeting some of today's coolest and most fascinating artists. We'll explore the stories before the moments that changed everything. Because every musician remembers the moment where it all began. Experience Before the Moment, a Lincoln original series on the iHeart Radio app, YouTube, or wherever you get your podcasts.
1:07 Speaker 03 Running a small business takes everything you've got. But with Chase for Business, you're not alone. They bring together local support and a broad range of resources to more than 7 million customers. With a deep understanding of your day-to-day needs, they provide products and guidance built to help you thrive. Right now, earn $500 when you open a new Chase Business Complete Checking account for new business checking customers with qualifying activities. Offer expires January 21, 2027. Chase Business Complete Checking has the flexible tools you need to accept payments, make deposits, and manage your finances with confidence. Learn more at chase.com/podcastbizoffer. Chase: Make more of what's yours.
1:52 Speaker 03 Fees may apply to Chase Business Complete Checking accounts. The $500 offer is available for new business checking accounts with qualifying activities through January 21, 2027. Eligibility and qualification requirements must be met. Additional restrictions may apply. Please speak with a business banker for more information. JPMorgan Chase Bank, N.A., Member FDIC.
2:16 Speaker 01 Welcome to Stuff You Missed in History Class, a production of iHeart Radio.
2:27 Speaker 01 Hello and welcome to the podcast. I'm Tracy V. Wilson. And I'm Holly Frey. Since we are going to Morocco in November, I decided to pick an episode about Morocco. I only kind of got there.
2:43 Speaker 01 I chose somebody who's been on my list for a while, who probably was born in Morocco, but this story mainly takes place other places. In the West, he's usually called Estevanico, also spelled Estevanico, because V and B have very similar pronunciations in Castilian Spanish. That, though, is a diminutive form of Esteban, which English speakers usually say more like Estevan.
3:17 Speaker 01 People have used that diminutive for him, which they also would have used for children because he was enslaved. I put the name Estevanico in the title of the episode because that's what he is usually called in the United States and other predominantly English-speaking countries. And I wanted people to be able to find the episode if they were looking for it. But we are not going to call him that. We don't know exactly when or where Esteban was born, or what his name was from birth. Esteban is probably the name that he took or was given when he converted from Islam to Christianity.
4:00 Speaker 01 In Morocco, he is more often known as Mustafa Azimor or Mustafa Al Azimor. Mustafa is an Arabic name. It means chosen, and it's one of the names of the prophet Muhammad. Mustafa also has some phonetic similarities to the way that Esteban is usually pronounced among Arabic speakers, and Azimor is the name in Morocco where he's believed to have been from. So that is where the name that he's usually called in Morocco comes from. Esteban became a translator and a guide and was probably the first person of any race from outside of the Americas to enter what is now Arizona and New Mexico.
4:43 Speaker 01 That happened in 1539, so earlier than a lot of people imagine.
4:51 Speaker 01 Europeans or Africans being in the United States, what is now today at all? Like Tracy just said, we don't know exactly when or where Esteban was born. Really, we know almost nothing about his early life, but there are some pieces that we can put together based on where he lived and what other people wrote about him later. A major source of information is the Relación of Alvar Núñez Cabeza de Vaca, which chronicled a Spanish expedition to Florida that we will be getting to in a bit. And based on the relación and the timeline of that expedition, Esteban was probably born in the very early 1500s. Cabeza de Vaca, which is a title that he inherited,
5:36 Speaker 01 meaning cow's head, describes Esteban as a native of Azamor. But it is possible that he was born somewhere else and then brought to Azamor later on. Azamor is on the coast of Morocco, southwest of Casablanca. Its population in the 16th century was predominantly Amazic, also known as Berber, and also predominantly Muslim. Some translations of the relación and some books about Esteban describe him as Amor, which was a general term for Muslims in Spain and Northern Africa, including Arabs and converts from the Iberian Peninsula. But the word Moro was used in Spanish during Esteban's lifetime, and that's not
6:20 Speaker 01 what Cabeza de Vaca called him. Cabeza de Vaca used the Spanish word for black, along with the word Alarabe, which in this context probably meant that he spoke Arabic. Morocco was a multilingual society, and in addition to Arabic, Esteban likely would have spoken an Amazic language, as well as some Portuguese or Spanish, or even both. Yeah, the fact that some accounts describe him as Amor means that sometimes he's also depicted as having kind of an Arab appearance. But he's pretty consistently described in accounts from the time as black. If he was from Asimor, that gives us some other clues, but also some questions about his early life.
7:04 Speaker 01 There was a lot of turmoil and instability in Morocco in the 15th and 16th centuries, including multiple changes in ruling dynasties, a plague, and a series of severe droughts. Multiple kingdoms on the Iberian Peninsula had also started to coalesce into modern Spain, and the Reconquista, or the Spanish reconquest of that peninsula from Muslim kingdoms, had ended in 1492. Spain and Portugal both expelled their Jewish and Muslim populations, and that led to large numbers of refugees arriving in Morocco and other parts of northern Africa. Spain and Portugal also tried to establish
7:48 Speaker 01 or take control of ports and trading routes in northern Africa, including Asimor, which had become a tributary of Portuguese King João II in 1486. That's a lot going on. And on top of all of it, northern Africa was also facing ongoing threats and trade disruptions from the Ottoman Empire to the east. In this environment, slave traffickers captured people from Morocco and from farther south in Africa and sold them for profit. And according to 16th-century chronicles and eyewitness accounts, the situation was so dire that people in northern Africa surrendered themselves to Spanish and Portuguese slavers
8:30 Speaker 01 or to merchants who were willing to take them across the Strait of Gibraltar, knowing that the law in Spain and Portugal required slaves to be fed, clothed, and housed, and that the likely alternative in northern Africa was starvation and death. We really don't know whether Estevan was captured or if he was in such a desperate situation that enslavement seemed like his only alternative for survival, or possibly if he entered into something that he thought was going to be more like a temporary indenture rather than permanent enslavement.
9:07 Speaker 01 Regardless, though, by around 1522, he was being enslaved by minor Spanish noble Andreas Dorantes de Caranza. While Dorantes was technically part of the nobility, his family was poor. And in 1527, he joined Panfilo de Narve as his expedition to the Americas with the hopes of gaining fortune and status for himself. King of Spain and Holy Roman Emperor Charles V, known as King Carlos I in Spain, had appointed Narve as governor of Florida, which at the time covered all of what is now the southern U.S., stretching west to what's now Texas. Narve was going there to conquer and colonize it.
9:50 Speaker 01 And he chose Dorantes as captain of his infantry. And when Dorantes joined the expedition, he took Estevan with him. Estevan, at this point, was probably in his mid-20s. If Estevan was Muslim, which does seem likely, given what we know about him, he would have had to convert to Catholicism in order to accompany Dorantes on this expedition. At this time, under Spanish law, only Africans who had converted to Christianity and assimilated to Spanish culture, who were known as Latinos, were allowed to be taken to the Americas and the Caribbean. That policy actually changed right around this time, as Spanish authorities came to
10:33 Speaker 01 believe that Latinos were too independent and too hard to control. So instead, they allowed only Bozales, or Africans who did not speak Spanish and had not converted. The term Bozales also included people who were trafficked directly from Africa to the Caribbean or the Americas without being brought through Spain first. So much about Estevan's life up to this point is completely unclear or the source of speculation, including when he got to Spain, how long he was there before Dorantes joined this expedition, when and under what circumstances he converted to Christianity, and whether he continued to think of himself as Muslim.
11:17 Speaker 01 Muslim afterward. And we don't really know the details of his experience at the beginning of the expedition. At that point, Panfilo de Narvaez, Andreas Dorantes de Saranza, and other Spanish men on board, didn't have much reason to take notice of Estevan, or any other enslaved person who was with them. So for a while after the convoy set sail on June 17, 1527, we know that Estevan was part of the expedition and generally where the convoy was going. But we know almost nothing else. Panfilo de Narvaez already had some experience on these kinds of expeditions. He had been one of the first Spanish people to arrive in Jamaica, and then he was part of Spain's
12:01 Speaker 01 efforts to conquer the island of Cuba. In 1520, he had been dispatched to Mexico to capture Hernán Cortés, who had been charged with treason. Narvaez was supposed to replace Cortés as governor of Mexico, but this campaign was unsuccessful. Cortés defeated Narvaez in battle and imprisoned him for two years, and Narvaez lost an eye. It was only after Narvaez was released after all of this, that he was appointed governor of Florida and tasked with this second expedition, a decision that, with the benefit of historical hindsight, I find questionable.
12:42 Speaker 01 This expedition did not go any better than Narvaez's first one had. As was the case for Spain's other expeditions to the Americas around this time, conquistadors had to fund everything themselves, and they had to recruit their own men. Narvaez was able to raise a fleet of five ships and recruit about 600 men. They set sail on June 17, 1527, with the wives of some of the married men and some enslaved people also on board. But their Atlantic crossing was difficult, as Atlantic crossings generally were in the 16th century. People died along the way, and about 140 men deserted as soon as they arrived at Santo Domingo on the island of Hispaniola in August.
13:27 Speaker 01 From there, the fleet continued on to Cuba. The Spanish did not have a word for hurricane. It comes from the Carib language and it had not made its way into the Romance languages yet. But after they arrived in Cuba, they endured a series of powerful storms. At one point, when the weather seemed clear, Narvaez sent two of his ships to another port to pick up supplies that were waiting for them there. And then another storm blew in, wrecking both of those ships and scattering all the supplies that they had loaded and destroying them. Crews on the remaining ships threatened to mutiny if the fleet tried to leave the waters
14:09 Speaker 01 around Cuba, so they did not depart for the Gulf Coast until February 21st of 1528, at which point they were hit by still more storms along the way. Things did not improve once they started trying to voyage over land, and we will talk about that after we pause for a sponsor break.
14:33 Speaker 04 First thought is like, wow, how are we going to do all this?
14:36 Speaker 01 Hey, everybody, it's Tracy from Stuff You Missed in History Class. That's Alan Goya, a planning engineer at AT&T. He's talking about Intuit Dome, home of the Los Angeles Clippers, where every seat, screen, phone, and transaction is connected with AT&T fiber and 5G, defining the fan's experience. And Alan's master plan made it all possible.
14:56 Speaker 04 It was going to rival anything that was already built, and that takes quite a bit of people and different teams to all be on the same page.
15:04 Speaker 01 That includes field services manager Drexel Jones. His team made sure it all came together and held up on game day.
15:11 Speaker 05 Through what Alan's whole crew designed, we connected the event visitors to the world.
15:16 Speaker 01 And after years of hard work and collaboration, it was opening night.
15:20 Speaker 05 To actually see the whole stadium light up and data's flowing is a beautiful thing.
15:24 Speaker 04 What the fans experience is incredible. It gave me a lot of pride.
15:28 Speaker 01 AT&T, connecting fans to what they love. Connecting changes everything. So you're considering getting a home security system, but you want something that fits your space. Well, with ADT Blue, it's easy to customize the system that's right for you and set it up yourself. Just pick the kit and monitoring plan that makes sense for your home. Let's say you're worried about package theft. The ADT Plus app can walk you through setting up a new doorbell camera kit. Once it's installed, ADT Pros can help you keep tabs on it 24/7, or you can manage it yourself from the ADT Plus app. There are no long-term contracts, so you can change your monitoring plan whenever you want. The flexibility doesn't end there. You can add to your system as you need to with things like extra cameras or motion sensors.
16:13 Speaker 01 Some life decisions are hard, but thanks to ADT Blue, you can DIY trusted ADT home security in a snap. Head to ADT.com/BLU to build your system today. And to hear more about home protection and other grown-up topics, check out new episodes of Grown-Up Stuff on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
16:40 Speaker 01 We've all done it, tumble down an internet rabbit hole trying to self-diagnose. And sometimes doing our own research can leave us more anxious than informed. Your feed is packed with wellness trends telling you to cold plunge, protein max, detox, track your sleep. But what's actually real? What's exaggerated? What's just wrong? That's exactly what Health vs. Hype from the American Medical Association and iHeartMedia's Ruby Studio is here to find out. Each episode, Emmy-nominated science communicator Trace Dominguez, who's racked up billions of views across PBS, Discovery Channel, and YouTube, talks to doctors, influencers, and real people trying these trends.
17:23 Speaker 01 Not to cancel them, not to hype them more, but to actually understand them. Because when it comes to your health, who you listen to matters. Start asking better questions and listen to Health vs. Hype on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
17:44 Speaker 01 Guess who's back in the house? The old gays return for season two of Silver Linings, their hit podcast from iHeart's Ruby Studio in partnership with ViiV Healthcare. Just wait until you hear what hosts Robert McMillan and Jesay have in store this time around. They strut back down memory lane, navigating life, love, loss, and everything that shaped them along the way. And as usual, someone just might break into song. From leather bars to bathhouses, dance floors to drag brunch, nothing stays off limits. These are the kinds of insights that can only come from experience. So, listen to your elders, honey, and discover the silver linings you can take with you. All sass, zero filter, and decades of perspective from four friends,
18:27 Speaker 01 proving that queer joy only gets better with age on the podcast that never gets old. Listen to Silver Linings, available on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
18:49 Speaker 01 On April 15th, 1528, Pampilo de Narváez and his expedition arrived on the Gulf Coast of Florida, just north of what is now known as Tampa Bay. Tampa Bay is almost directly north of Havana, Cuba. And in good weather, these ships should have been able to make that crossing in about four days. But it had taken them almost two months due to a series of storms that sort of blew them all over the Gulf of Mexico. And they had to also sail around and try to evade them. Also, at one point, most of the ships got stuck on a sandbar. A lot about this is unclear,
19:30 Speaker 01 but it doesn't seem like the area north of Tampa Bay is where they wanted to be or where they thought they were. Based on what happened after this, it seems like Narvaez might have been aiming for the River of Palms in Mexico, known as the Sodó la Marina River today. That marked the western boundary of Florida, and it was roughly 250 kilometers, or 155 miles, north of an established Spanish settlement. That was Panuco, established by Hernán Cortés in 1522. It would have made sense for Narvaez to want to start off within the territory that he'd been appointed to govern, but also relatively close to an existing Spanish outpost.
20:13 Speaker 01 While this obviously wasn't the first Spanish expedition to arrive in this part of North America, Spanish knowledge of its geography was still really limited. Unlike some other expeditions, they also had no local people with them to help them out. Earlier in the 16th century, Hernán Cortés and cartographer Alonso Álvarez de Pineda had each made maps of the Gulf Coast, which obviously would have been kind of limited, but we don't know whether Narvaez had access to either of them at all, or whether he had any other charts or maps of the area.
20:50 Speaker 01 Even with all of that in mind, though, Narvaez was nowhere near the River of Palms or Panuco. He was on the opposite side of the Gulf of Mexico, more than 1,000 miles away from that. He was also very wary of the indigenous peoples living there. His purpose was to explore and colonize, which would mean at some point, he would have to conquer or ally with the region's indigenous peoples. But he also knew that Juan Ponce de León had been attacked on his expeditions to Florida, and had died after Kaluza defenders shot him with an arrow in 1521.
21:30 Speaker 01 So especially since many of Narvaez's men were exhausted and sick, he wanted to be cautious. They spotted a village near the coast, which probably belonged to the Toko Baga, and sent a small party to try to negotiate with them. Narvaez's men were given some fish, which seemed like a gesture of goodwill, but the Toko Baga seemed to have seen them as a threat. They fled during the night and apparently spread the word about the new arrivals. And so for a few days, it didn't seem like there were many indigenous people around. This probably gave Narvaez the impression that the indigenous peoples in the area would not be particularly dangerous.
22:12 Speaker 01 And then not long after that, somebody pulled up a gold object in a fishing net. So Narvaez thought that he was facing an indigenous population that would be easy to pacify, and now an abandoned village that his expedition could occupy, and a nearby source of gold. Gold was one of the reasons for Spain's efforts to colonize the Americas. So Narvaez thought he had gotten things off to a very good start now. None of that lasted. Narvaez already had a reputation for cruelty and brutality against indigenous peoples. Friar Bartolome de la Casas, who is sometimes described as one of the first European advocates for the rights and protections of indigenous peoples,
22:56 Speaker 01 had previously denounced Narvaez's treatment toward the indigenous peoples of Cuba, including a massacre carried out by Narvaez's men during the conquest of the island. When the Tocobaga resumed contact with the Spanish and objected to their insistence that the land belong to Spain, Narvaez had their leader's nose cut off and had the party's war dogs attack his mother. And it turned out there also wasn't any gold nearby. The piece that they found in a fishing net may have even been something that washed up from a Spanish shipwreck, which was also probably true of other pieces of gold that they came across from time to time. The Tocobaga eventually convinced Narvaez that they did not have any gold,
23:41 Speaker 01 but they told him that another tribe, the Apolache, did. Apolache territory was north of where the Tocobaga lived. Narvaez decided that he should split up his company to investigate. He would send the boats ahead while he and about 300 men continued on foot through Apolache territory.
24:01 Speaker 01 He thought that the River of Palms was not too far away and that they could all rendezvous there. As they journeyed north, Narvaez and his party on land faced difficult, inhospitable, swampy terrain. Many of them got malaria, something that may have been introduced to the Americas by Europeans and the enslaved Africans that they brought with them. And it turned out the Tokabaga had been strategic in sending Narvaez to the Apalachii. The Apalachii were armed with longbows that were capable of piercing the leather cloth and chainmail armor that most of his men wore. The Apalachii developed tactics that were particularly effective against Narvaez's
24:43 Speaker 01 force, including ambushes and removing their arrowheads when shooting at soldiers wearing chainmail. So the arrow shafts would break against the rings and drive long splinters of wood into the soldiers' bodies. Yeah, I think there's kind of an imagined image of the conquistador wearing full-plate armor, and that is not what overwhelmingly these guys were in. And what they were in was easily piercable by these longbows. Since Narvaez had sent his ships on ahead, the company had no easy way to escape from the Apalachii, and they also had no way to send for any kind of supplies or reinforcements.
25:26 Speaker 01 Meanwhile, they were all so off course that they never made that rendezvous. The ships looked for Narvaez and his party for about a year before they started running low on food and supplies, and they ultimately left. After a summer that was full of extreme heat, illnesses, deaths, and very effective attacks by the Apalachii, Narvaez decided their best means of escape would be to build boats and go westward along the coast. Over the span of about six weeks, they killed their horses, eating their meat and using their hides to make things like water skins and their manes and tails to make rope.
26:07 Speaker 01 The men melted down their armor to make nails and they made sails from their clothing. The resulting boats were more like rafts with slightly built up sides and a tiller. They were powered by sails and oars. They were also barely big enough to hold all of the men that needed to get onto each one of them. So, once somebody got aboard, there was nowhere to move once they had taken a place. They still were not sure how far they needed to go to get to territory that Spain was actually occupying, but they thought that they had traveled roughly 700 miles or 1,125 kilometers over land since they had arrived in Florida.
26:51 Speaker 01 There have been innumerable attempts to trace the journey of all of this over the centuries. And there's a lot of disagreement in all of the various maps. But they had probably gone closer to 250 miles or 400 kilometers. It is hard to know the distances for sure. They were measuring things in leagues and they were also estimating a distance that had involved a lot of backtracking and detours because of the terrain. They set sail aboard these rafts on September 22nd, 1528. They were mostly able to stay out of range of the Appalachians' bows,
27:30 Speaker 01 but now they were facing seasickness, dehydration, starvation, and the unrelenting sun. They did manage to go in the right direction, skirting along the coast. But when they reached the outflow of the Mississippi River, the force of the current scattered the rafts and pushed them out to sea. They regrouped, but as they approached what is now known as Galveston Island, a storm swamped or capsized most of the rafts. At some point during all of this, Narvaez's raft was blown out to sea and he almost certainly drowned or died of exposure or dehydration. He's presumed to have died at that point. By some means.
28:10 Speaker 01 Only about 80 sailors finally made landfall on an island near modern Galveston. It might have been Galveston Island, it might have been a neighboring island. They nicknamed this La de Malajado, or the Island of Misfortune. At first, the survivors got some assistance from the Karankawa people. But the Spanish survivors apparently lost the Karankawa's sympathies after some of them turned to cannibalism over the winter. That winter was obviously difficult. By April of 1529, there were only 15 survivors left from the 300 or so men who had started the trek to the River of Palms overland.
28:55 Speaker 01 One of those men was Estevan, and another was his enslaver, Andres Dorantes de Saranza. These survivors made various attempts to continue on to Spanish-controlled territory, but none of them got very far. Then, in the summer of 1529, they and other survivors started to be captured and enslaved, some by the Karankawa and some by other indigenous tribes in the areas. Over the next few years, some of the expedition survivors died. Others essentially assimilated into the tribes that had captured them. There were various escape attempts, and at first, none of them was successful.
29:35 Speaker 01 The Spanish captives and Estevan rarely saw each other, and for a while, they did not really have any way to communicate. According to Cabeza de Vaca's account, he eventually convinced his captors to let him work as a trader. And that allowed him to travel to some extent and gave him a way to relay messages to the others. The only time they were all in the same place at the same time was when multiple tribes came together for the prickly pear harvest. Estevan, Andres Dorantes de Saranza, Alonso de Castillo Maldonado, and Alvar Núñez Cabeza de Vaca
30:14 Speaker 01 had various contact with one another in 1532, and they planned to meet during the prickly pear harvest in 1533. That meeting did happen, but they were not able to escape. They tried again in 1534, and this time they were successful. And that was largely thanks to Estevan. We said earlier, he was already multilingual before being enslaved in Morocco. He had learned more languages during his time in North America, including learning shared trading languages and a trading sign language. He was able to negotiate safe passage and shelter with a trader
30:55 Speaker 01 that Cabeza de Vaca's Relation describes as being from the Avivare tribe. That is not a tribe that is mentioned outside of this document. So we do not know exactly how to identify these people today. But it is possible that this is something that Estevan and the other survivors had started planning during that prickly pear harvest in 1533 and had been working on for a year until they did it. There are a lot more references to Estevan in the Relation after this point. And we will get into that after we pause for a sponsor break.
31:36 Speaker 01 We've all done it, tumble down an internet rabbit hole trying to self diagnose. And sometimes doing our own research can leave us more anxious than informed. Your feed is packed with wellness trends telling you to cold plunge, protein max, detox, track your sleep. But what's actually real? What's exaggerated? What's just wrong? That's exactly what Health vs. Hype from the American Medical Association and iHeart Media's Ruby Studio is here to find out. Each episode, Emmy nominated science communicator Trace Dominguez, who's racked up billions of views across PBS, Discovery Channel, and YouTube, talks to doctors, influencers, and real people trying these trends.
32:18 Speaker 01 Not to cancel them, not to hype them more, but to actually understand them. Because when it comes to your health, who you listen to matters. Start asking better questions and listen to Health vs. Hype on the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
32:39 Speaker 01 Guess who's back in the house? The old gays return for season two of Silver Linings, their hit podcast from iHeart's Ruby Studio in partnership with ViiV Healthcare. Just wait until you hear what hosts Robert McMillan and Jesay have in store this time around. They strut back down memory lane navigating life, love, loss, and everything that shaped them along the way. And as usual, someone just might break into song. From leather bars to bathhouses, dance floors to drag brunch, nothing stays off limits. These are the kinds of insights that can only come from experience. So listen to your elders, honey, and discover the silver linings you can take with you. All sass, zero filter, and decades of perspective from four friends
33:23 Speaker 01 proving that queer joy only gets better with age on the podcast that never gets old. Listen to Silver Linings, available on the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
33:38 Speaker 06 Okay, chicken nugget fans, I've got huge news. The new Burger King Chicken Nuggets just dropped, and they are the crispiest, the juiciest, and the tastiest chicken nuggets ever at Burger King. Burger King heard that a lot of you didn't like the old chicken nuggets, so they got to work and reinvented them. To go along with the new chicken nuggets, a lot of the sauces were reinvented too, because better chicken nuggets deserve better sauces. We're talking new buffalo sauce, honey mustard, sweet and sour, and even a whole new option too, the new special savory sauce, which is only available for a limited time at participating US restaurants. I mean, you need to taste it all for yourself.
34:21 Speaker 06 This new chicken nugget, reinvented based on real feedback, is made with 100% white meat chicken and is now better than ever. You gotta try the new Burger King Chicken Nuggets and sauces today.
34:34 Speaker 01 For any small business owner, there's a moment when you realize the next hire could be the difference between staying busy and actually growing. The challenge is finding the right person without wasting time sorting through candidates who aren't the right fit. That's where Indeed Sponsored Jobs comes in. When workplace chaos hits and you need someone who can step in and make a difference, this is a job for Sponsored Jobs. It helps put your job in front of candidates who match the criteria that matter most to you, whether that's skills, experience, certifications, or location. And you're certainly not alone in using Indeed. Join the 3.3 million employers worldwide that use Indeed to connect with quality talent that fits their needs. That's millions of businesses turning to Indeed
35:16 Speaker 01 to help solve hiring challenges and find people who can help drive results. Spend less time searching and more time actually interviewing candidates who check all your boxes. Less stress, less time, more results. Get your $75 sponsored job credit today at indeed.com/podcast. Terms and conditions apply. Hiring now, then this is a job for Indeed Sponsored Jobs.
35:46 Speaker 01 Esteban, Andreas, Doranzas de Saranza, Alonso del Castillo, Maldonado, and Alvar Núñez Cabeza de Vaca are sometimes described as the four ragged castaways. When they had first set sail from Spain in 1527, they had been on radically different social strata. Esteban was black and enslaved, while Cabeza de Vaca was the second-in-command of Penfio de Navarrez's expedition. Cabeza de Vaca's relación makes it clear that at the start of the voyage, he was a typical conquistador. He was going to the Americas hoping for fortune
36:27 Speaker 01 and glory, and he was also viewing the Spanish as superior to Africans and indigenous peoples. But by the time they escaped from their indigenous captors in 1534, things were much different. Cabeza de Vaca had been through the experience of being enslaved himself. He had also been given shelter and care by people of multiple indigenous nations, while also being enslaved and forced to work for some of those same peoples. He had started to realize that the indigenous peoples they were encountering were not one monolithic group of, from the Spanish Catholic mindset, pagans and barbarians. He had contact with at least 20 different indigenous tribes and nations during his
37:10 Speaker 01 journey around the Gulf and into Mexico, and each one was its own people. He also developed a deeper religious faith during his time in captivity and the journey that followed. His relation followed that progression and became a document not just of their journey, but also of the land they traveled through and the peoples they encountered, with far more empathy toward indigenous people at the end of the account than at the beginning. Yeah, I'm not suggesting that he suddenly became a perfect person, but he definitely started seeing other non-Spanish Catholic people as more human than before.
37:51 Speaker 01 It would be a stretch to say that the three Spanish men ever saw Esteban as their equal, but when they escaped from their captors, it was immediately obvious that his knowledge and skills were going to be critical to their survival. They still had hundreds of miles they needed to travel through unfamiliar territory. His facility with languages meant that he could negotiate passage through these territories of multiple different tribes and trade on the group's behalf. In general, Esteban also seemed to be just more at home with the indigenous peoples than the Spanish men were.
38:32 Speaker 01 For example, on their first night with the Avavari tribe, he joined in their dancing while the others just watched. The people that they encountered often seemed more willing to negotiate with him than with the others. Various articles about the Four ragged castaways described them as smoothing their passage through Native Territories by pretending to be faith healers or medicine men. But pretending is kind of an oversimplification. Details on this are very fuzzy, and the primary sources recounting this voyage are contradictory. But at some point, an indigenous person was sick or injured.
39:12 Speaker 01 Cabeza de Vaca or one of the other men prayed over them, using Christian prayers and making the sign of the cross. At some points, they may have also used some kind of other treatments, either something that would have been used among Spanish conquistadors, or something that they had seen indigenous people do. Over time, it seems like Cabeza de Vaca thought they really were healing these people, or really that God was healing them through them. This was something he had to be really careful in how he described, given that they were not priests, and this was the kind of thing that the Spanish Inquisition would not look favorably on at all if they ever managed to make it back home.
39:56 Speaker 01 Eventually, somebody, either one of this foursome or someone indigenous, started calling them the children of the sun, or the sons of the sun. The four ragged castaways continued west and south for months, and over time, they built up an indigenous following. It's not always clear how much of this alleged faith healing Estevan did, because contemporary accounts sometimes call him "Durantes," being the name of his enslaver. But over time, as they acquired a large group of indigenous followers, it seems like the three Spanish men used Estevan as an intermediary between themselves and that group. This was both because he was the one who best knew their languages, and because doing
40:40 Speaker 01 so gave them an air of mystery that helped maintain this idea that they were healers with divine powers. In the spring of 1536, more than eight years after Narvaez's expedition first arrived on the Gulf Coast of Florida, the four ragged castaways ran into a group of Spanish slavers in Nueva Galicia, confirming that they were finally back in territory that was actively being occupied by Spain.
41:10 Speaker 01 They made their way from there to Mexico City. While in Mexico City, Estevan met Juan Garrido, known as the Black Conquistador, who had been born in the Kingdom of Congo and had been part of multiple Spanish expeditions in the Caribbean and the Americas at this point. Once all four men had recovered from having made this incredibly arduous journey, the three Spanish men, but not Estevan, were questioned about what they had been through. They made the territory they had traveled through sound wealthier than it actually was, fueling rumors of the Seven Cities of Cibola, much later also called the Seven Cities of Gold. So Antonia de Mendoza, viceroy of New Spain, wanted them to travel north again,
41:55 Speaker 01 back in the direction they had just come from, to look for this wealth and to claim it for Spain. He also wanted them to gather information for Francisco Vasquez de Coronado, who was planning an expedition as well. Understandably, Andres Durantes, Alonso de Castillo Maldonado, and Alvar Nunez Cabeza de Vaca all said, "No, thank you." Durantes did discuss doing this with the viceroy, but ultimately declined that offer. Castillo got married to a rich widow, and Cabeza de Vaca went to Spain. He was hoping that he would be named governor of Florida, and then he could come back and he could succeed where Pamphia de Narvaez had failed.
42:38 Speaker 01 That did not work out for him, though, because by the time he got back to Spain, Hernando de Soto had been authorized to conquer Florida. Cabeza de Vaca became governor of some of Spain's territory in South America. Instead, he obviously has a whole story beyond this that we are not getting into. Estevan, though, may not have had a choice. He had not exactly been treated as a free man during that journey across what's now Texas in northern Mexico. But over time, he had been treated less and less like a slave. It is not fully clear whether he was considered to be enslaved or free after their arrival in Mexico City.
43:18 Speaker 01 But from this point, documents were more likely to reference him as Estevan than Estevanico. And when he was tasked with accompanying Franciscan friar Marcos de Niza on an expedition north, he was given explicit instructions to follow Marcos's orders. Those kinds of instructions would not have seemed necessary if he was enslaved. At the same time, it seems as though Dorantes's approval was needed for Estevan to go on this expedition, something that would not have been necessary if he was free. So there's some conflict here. Apparently, Dorantes originally refused, and then he agreed to letting Estevan go
43:58 Speaker 01 on this travel only after having irritated the viceroy by refusing to go on this expedition himself. It seems like he was kind of trying to smooth things over. Friar Marcos's expedition departed on March 7, 1539. It consisted of Marcos, another Franciscan friar, Estevan, and about 100 enslaved indigenous people who had been promised their freedom in exchange for their participation. Estevan's role was similar to what he had done before. He was working as a scout, a guide, and a translator and negotiator with all the indigenous tribes they would encounter. A couple of weeks after they left Mexico City, Marcos sent Estevan to scout ahead.
44:42 Speaker 01 Estevan was to update Marcos on his progress by sending a runner back with a cross, with the size of the cross corresponding to the value of what he had found. This sounds like a wild way to communicate, but it is what it is. Some sources conclude that this was because Estevan and the others with him could not read or write. But as we talked about in our recent episode on ballpoint pens, writing on this kind of expedition would have actually been incredibly cumbersome. Yeah, we need you to keep up with an inkwell, quills, your paper might get wet or fall apart. Although Estevan was supposed to wait after sending word back to Marcos, he kept on pushing ahead.
45:26 Speaker 01 First, though, he would make arrangements for Marcos and the rest of the party to be fed and provisioned and care for at each of the settlements he came to. Marcos kept struggling to catch up as Estevan kept sending back a series of crosses, each one bigger than the last. Finally, in May of 1539, a runner reached Marcos and told him that Estevan was dead. According to Friar Marcos, Estevan and many of his party were killed by the Zuni outside the city of Cibola, which Estevan had managed to reach. It's believed that Estevan was somewhere in what is now Arizona, but there is debate over exactly where. Marcos never made it to that location himself.
46:09 Speaker 01 Yeah, there's a lot of discussion of exactly which pueblo might have been being described as the city of Cibola. There are no eyewitness accounts of Estevan's death, and accounts from later on in the 16th century are wildly contradictory, including contradicting what Marcos wrote down, which was pretty straightforward. Francisco Vasquez de Coronado claimed that Estevan had a reputation for inappropriate relationships with indigenous women, and the Zuni had killed him after he had demanded women and turquoise from them. Coronado said this when he was about to face charges over his own behavior with indigenous
46:51 Speaker 01 people, so there's some speculation that he said this to try to distract from what he was being accused of. Hernando de Aragon claimed that the Zuni's killed Esteban because they did not want him to reveal their location to the Spanish. Zuni anthropologist Edmund J. Ladd, writing in the 20th century, concluded that the Zuni had probably heard about the expedition through indigenous trade networks and that they just did not trust the Spanish. According to Zuni tradition, Estevan had sent a gourd rattle decorated with red and white feathers to the Zuni leader to introduce himself. The Zuni leader recognized this rattle and became angry, and he ordered Estevan not
47:36 Speaker 01 to enter the town. When Estevan approached anyway, they killed him. While all of the 16th century accounts and most modern historians agree that Estevan was killed by Puebloan peoples in the spring of 1539, there are a few modern historians that propose something else entirely, which is that Estevan worked with one of the Puebloan peoples to fake his own death, and then he escaped from enslavement by the Spanish. There isn't really concrete support for this, but it is an interesting idea. Today, the Panfilo de Navia's expedition is known primarily for its spectacular failure
48:19 Speaker 01 and the long journey of its four survivors. That then paved the way for Coronado's expeditions into what is now the American Southwest. There has been less focus on Estevan until much more recently. One possible connection to Estevan that continues in Pueblo culture today is a catzina, or a spirit being, who is depicted as having black skin. I don't want to get into a ton of detail about this because this is sacred Puebloan cultural knowledge. Some sources have described this catzina straightforwardly as a representation of Estevan, although others note that there were catzinas depicted with black skin before he had contact with any
49:02 Speaker 01 Puebloan peoples. There is also a saying among some Puebloan peoples, as reported by Dr. Joe Sando of James Pueblo, that, quote, "The first white man our people saw was a black man." That is Estevan. Do you have listener mail? I have listener mail. It is from Heather. Heather wrote, "Hello, Holly and Tracy. I started writing this email before I even finished listening to the behind the scenes episode on Beatrice Kenner and Mildred Smith. Side note, shout out to those ladies for all the great work they did to make that time of the month more bearable. I wanted to write to share that I had similar memories and feelings when I read, 'Are You There, God? It's Me, Margaret.' I'm a few years younger than you ladies, and I probably read
49:47 Speaker 01 the book around my late elementary years, maybe going into middle school, which would have been very late 1980s, early 1990s. The copy I read also had references to the belted pads, and by that time, I felt like the adhesive ones were pretty ubiquitous, and I also had my mother explain the belts to me." It made me feel like the book was out of date and silly and I never really wanted to read Judy Blume anymore. As an adult, I feel bad about that because obviously Judy Blume is amazing. I also find it pretty funny that just the day before this episode came out, my son, who is 16, had his girlfriend over to our house. It's his first girlfriend and she needed a tampon. I was outside and she made him text me that she needed one, which I found hilarious. Everybody just needs to get over any squeamishness about
50:32 Speaker 01 periods. They are everywhere. Ha, ha, ha. As pet tax. I'm attaching a picture of my dogs, Nellie and Malcolm. Nellie is red and white and is an 11-year-old Welsh Springer Spaniel. This is a different breed than the English Springer that most people know. Most people think she's a Brittany or a Cocker, but to me, she's just a precious angel baby. Malcolm is an eight-year-old black and white English Springer Spaniel, the Springer breed that most people know. He's not the smartest boy, but he would literally die for me and that's all I could ever ask for. Thanks for reading this email. Have a wonderful day. Heather, thank you so much for this email. Heather, thank you for these very cute dog pictures. They look like they are sitting in a kitchen very patiently, but also eagerly awaiting a treat.
51:17 Speaker 01 Hmm. Um, I love this story about getting a text about needing a tampon and it reminded me a story of a story that has been passed to me from my mother, uh, which is that my mom was, uh, one of five, four girls and a boy. And their neighbors across the street, also five children, four boys and a girl. So the joke was that each of the moms would just count every night. And as, as long as they each had five children, everything was okay. Um, so one day my mom was helping her mom, uh, unload the groceries that had just been brought in and one of the boys from across the street was there helping. He was
52:01 Speaker 01 passing the things to my mom from inside the bag and then was like, that's it. I'm done. Bye. And my mom was like, there's obviously something in that bag still. And he was like, nope, nothing left in this bag. Nothing at all. Bye. And, uh, mom went and being a household that contained, um, you know, a, a, a mother and four sisters.
52:28 Speaker 01 It was an industrial sized box of pads.
52:34 Speaker 01 And I don't know, that story makes me laugh every time I think of it. Thank you so much again, Heather, for this email and the dog pictures. If you would like to send us a note, we're at [email protected] . And you can also subscribe to our show on the iHeartRadio app and anywhere else you like to get your podcasts.
53:00 Speaker 01 Stuff You Missed in History Class is a production of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.
53:14 Speaker 01 A rare disease diagnosis can change your life, but it doesn't have to define your future. In season seven of Untold Stories: Life with a Severe Autoimmune Condition, host Martine Hackett continues the conversation with people living with MG, CIDP, and the broader rare disease community, exploring what comes after diagnosis through stories of hope, progress, and connection. Produced by Ruby Studio in partnership with Argenx, listen on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. You ever show up late to the game and your friends already saved your seat, your drink, even a plate? That's looking out. That's having your back. And that's exactly what AT&T does with the AT&T Guarantee.
53:55 Speaker 01 They know staying connected matters, so they actually guarantee a network that comes through when it counts. AT&T has connectivity you can depend on, or they'll proactively make it right, just like that friend who takes care of things before you even ask. AT&T: Connecting Changes Everything. Terms and conditions apply. Visit att.com/guarantee for details.
54:18 Speaker 06 Cash Flow Crunch on deck. Small business line of credit gives your business immediate access to funds, up to $200,000, right when you need it. Cover seasonal dips, manage payroll, restock inventory, or tackle unexpected expenses without missing a beat. With flexible draws, transparent pricing, and control over repayment, get funded quickly and quickly.
54:38 Speaker 02 Apply today at ondeck.com. Funds could be available as soon as tomorrow. Depending on certain loan attributes, your business loan may be issued by OnDeck or Celtic Bank. OnDeck does not lend in North Dakota. All loans and amounts subject to lender approval.
54:48 Speaker 06 Hey, this is Mario Lopez from All Mario Lopez Daily Podcast. Buy smart, drive for less and trade for more. That's Toyota affordability. And it starts with a great deal on an all-wheel drive Camry, Corolla Cross, or a Corolla sedan with the latest features in tech. Or test drive a spacious Grand Highlander or adventure-ready RAV4. And with so many hybrid models available, you can enjoy longer trips without all the stops. While Toyota's legendary resale value means you could get more at traded. So get a great deal today and great value tomorrow. Shop toyota.com for deals and details. Toyota, let's go places.
55:25 Speaker 00 This is an iHeart Podcast. Guaranteed human.
Previous SYMHC Classics: Prison Breaks Next Buck v. Bell Page updated November 1, 2026 · transcript and summary are machine-generated