The "mouth" of the Altamaha is close to what is now Darien, Georgia.
Posted on 02/22/2014 3:38:46 AM PST by Makana
In an announcement likely to rewrite the book on early colonization of the New World, two researchers have proposed a location for the oldest fortified settlement ever found in North America.
They believe that the legendary Fort Caroline, a long-sought fort built by the French in 1564, is located near the mouth of the Altamaha River in southeast Georgia.
(Excerpt) Read more at sciencedaily.com ...
This could be trouble.
Old stuff ping
Cool post, I hope the archaeology freepers show up to flesh this out.
Looks like it....they found some sort of structure from a collection of different maps and references of the era. They have not, as yet, excavated it.
In 1565, Spanish soldiers under Pedro Menéndez marched into Fort Caroline and slaughtered some 143 men and women who were living there at the time.
Some fort, eh?
I am not sure why. This discovery won’t change the date of the settlement at Plymouth and it won’t change the fact that it wasn’t the first in North America.
... then there’s still time to pave over it and put a gas station at that site???
This puzzled me, but now I get it.
“”In 1565, Spanish soldiers under Pedro Menéndez marched into Fort Caroline and slaughtered some 143 men and women who were living there at the time.””
Maybe....but I’d make it a Home Depot...that way there’d be a place for the illegals to hang out and stump for day labor jobs....better for the economy...
Come now everyone by now knows that Leif Erickson founded Minnesota long before Columbus, the Pilgrims and the French. Ft. Caroline will not change the facts about Plymouth.
Plymouth Bay is the only surviving colony settlement. Were they wanting to settle further south. What ever happened to the other colony settlement they were heading to. There was another settlement too Jamestown, which would have preceded Plymouth, but it did not survive.
visited Jamestown a few years ago. fascinating. i’m guessing the difference was mosquitos as thats what took them out. being north of here had an advantage
"This map serves as a 'Rosetta Stone' since it provides a common, known geographical point on all early maps of 'French Florida,'" he said. The Rosetta Stone was an inscribed rock found by the French in Egypt that allowed the translation of ancient hieroglyphics into modern languages.
Using the known GPS coordinates derived from the English map, Crowe was able to propose the location of dozens of Indian villages that up until now have eluded scholars and archaeologists.
Wait.... our schools have now gotten so bad that the author actually needed to explain what the Rosetta Stone is?
I was being sarcastic! Nothing will stop these people from organizing a parade.
Fort located near the mouth of the Altamaha River?
Satellite imagery shows a unrealistic place to build a fort.
This is another encounter South of St.Augustine.
If they slaughtered 150 young men and women who created and owned the place, then it must have been for a good reason.
Key to this story vs your comments, “first fortified” as in number one........none before it.
Jamestown was established in 1607 what was then the Virginia colony and it most assuredly did survive, if only barely. It remained the capital of the Virginia colony until 1699, when the capital moved a bit up the river to Williamsburg.
Jamestown thus predates Plymouth by some 13 years as the oldest permanent English-speaking colony in North America.
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