Santa Isabel de Utinahica

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Santa Isabel de Utinahica (ca. 1610-ca. 1640) was a 17th century Spanish mission located in what is now Telfair County, Georgia, near Jacksonville. The small mission was a part of a series of missions set up in what was then the northern reaches of the Spanish colony of Spanish Florida, similar to the Spanish Missions in California or Mexico.

Operating for approximately two decades in the early 1600s, the mission was a religious outpost consisting of one Catholic friar sent out to convert and monitor the native people at the edges of the colony. The name Utinahica was taken from the local Native American chiefdom, themselves a part of the Timucua people and ancestors of the current Creek people.

The mission's exact location is not presently known. However, in April 2006 the Fernbank Museum of Natural History and Georgia Department of Natural Resources announced plans to conduct an archeaological excavation where the Ocmulgee and Oconee rivers converge to form the Altamaha River. In the 17th century the Spanish referred to the Altamaha River as the Rio de Santa Isabel, after the mission.

[edit] See also

• Spanish missions in Georgia

[edit] References