Historians relinquished the study of conquest trails to archaeologists when Dr. Swanton pronounced that their new science would eventually prove his theory. Their crowning achievement: finding a few DeSoto era artifacts in Tallahassee which, they say, proves DeSoto Wintered there. Florida's Capitol city, its most excavated place, has, thereby, grossly misled others by claiming to be DeSoto's pivotal turning point in Florida; all to an historic loss for millions of Americans.
The internet has ushered in a decentralization of ideology among the sciences. Once the domain of archaeology alone, broader sharing of ideas from other sciences - geography, cartography, astrophysics and sociology - brings with it an emergence of perspective which transcends ancient conquest trail reconstruction. These new scientific tools are available to today's ambitious graduate students.
This paper provides a fresh start at understanding Hernando de Soto's journey and, thereby, his motive for coming here, by applying new tools to historic documentation. 20th Century pockets of power once slowed advances in historic understanding. The internet's mass publication capability allows disinterested publication of ideas counter to the established conquest perception. DES 1/2007