La Relacion

In class this past week, we have been studying journals of early explorers. I was looking through my notebook and decided to have my post deal with La Relacion.




      In La Relacion, Cabeza wrote how his men and himself became Medicine Men to the Native Americans. The journal relayed the information that to cure the sick, the medicine man was called. The sick gave the medicine man all he had in his possession. The medicine man would cut over the sick person's point of pain, suck on the wound, cauterize it, and blow on the spot to relieve the patient. From the journal, apparently the Natives would withhold food from the Spanish unless they healed the sick. The way the Spanish healed the sick was different from how the Natives healed the sick.
       This certain picture shows Cabeza de Vaca healing a Native American. By the way the journal was written, Cabeza wrote that he and his crew cured the sick their way: making the sign of the cross on the sick, breathing on them, and saying the Lord's Prayer and Ave Maria over the sick. The Spanish would pray to God for the patient's recovery. On the other hand, the Native method was to cut the painful spot, suck on the wound, cauterize it, and blow on the spot. This picture looks as though Cabeza is performing the Native healing method. Cabeza never wrote that he performed his healing the Native way. He said that they did the cross motion and prayed. In the background, one of Cabeza's men is holding a cross. By Cabeza's journal, an actual cross was not present at the healing, just a sign of the cross was done over the patient.
       From La Relacion, I do not think this healing picture is accurate. If a Native American was in place of Cabeza in the picture, the picture would be pretty accurate (the way the sick was healed). By what I read and what I see now, I feel that Cabeza did his way of healing by praying to God instead of cutting open the sick (the picture does not show this view).