What were the Calusa tribe known for?

Known as the “Shell Indians”, the Calusa are considered to be the first shell collectors. Unlike other tribes, the Calusa did not make any items from pottery. Shells were used to make items like jewelry, utensils, and tools.

How long did the Calusa tribe live?

Previous indigenous cultures had lived in the area for thousands of years. At the time of European contact in the 16th and 17th centuries, the historic Calusa were the people of the Caloosahatchee culture….Language.

Calusa
Region	Florida
Extinct	ca. 1800
Language family	unclassified
Language codes

What did the Calusa speak?

Calusa Indian Language (Caloosa) Calusa is an extinct Amerindian language of Florida. No records of the language remain other than a few place names in Florida, so it is unknown which language family Calusa might have belonged to.

What city did the Calusa tribe live in?

Mound Key is believed to have been the capital town of the Calusa. The mounds that they built were made up of shells, bones and pottery. While these mounds were originally thought to simply be a place to discard their trash, research has found that these mounds also served as territory markers and burial memorials.

What did Calusa tribe eat?

The Calusa tribe lived along the Gulf Coat and inner waterways; their homes were built on stilts with roofs made from Palmetto leaves; these homes had no walls. They fished and hunted for their food and would catch things like: mullet, catfish, eels, turtles, deer, conchs, clams, oysters, and crabs.

What kind of houses did the Calusa live in?

stilted huts
And, rather than the traditional tent-like shelters many Native American tribes adopted, the Calusa chose to live in stilted huts with no walls and a roof made of Palmetto leaves on the coast along the inner waterways.

What did the Calusa tribe believe in?

Little is known about Calusa religion. They believed in three superior beings, one controlled the weather, the others ruled the welfare of the tribe and warfare. Each human had three souls, present in his shadow, his reflection in water and in the pupil of his eye.

What kind of food did Calusa eat?

How did the Calusa tribe dress?

They didn’t wear much clothing due to Florida’s warm weather, however Calusa men wore tanned deerskin breechcloths and belts that indicated their position in society, while Calusa women wore woven skirts made from palmetto leaves and spanish moss. The Calusa were one of the few tribes known to be shell collectors.

How did the Calusa live?

The Calusa lived on the coast and along the inner waterways. They built their homes on stilts and wove Palmetto leaves to fashion roofs, but they didn’t construct any walls. The Calusa Indians did not farm like the other Indian tribes in Florida. Instead, they fished for food on the coast, bays, rivers, and waterways.

What type of homes did Calusa live in?

And, rather than the traditional tent-like shelters many Native American tribes adopted, the Calusa chose to live in stilted huts with no walls and a roof made of Palmetto leaves on the coast along the inner waterways.