Foreign Influences (1539 - 1730)
This period marks the end of an exclusively native history for Kentucky and the
beginning of one shared with Europeans. During
the mid-1500s, Spaniards appear in the form of
de Soto’s Expedition, which traveled through the
Southeast. Then, over a century later, during
the mid- to late 1600s, the French and the E
nglish appeared sporad
ically along Kentucky’s
extreme western and eastern borders. But there is
no record of European
s visiting or exploring
inside Kentucky’s borders until after the 1730s
. As time passed, however, the European
exploration and settlement zone
that encircled the state drew
closer to native communities.
For about the first 150 years of this period, na
tive peoples living in Kentucky were spared
the effects of direct contact with European
s that their northern, southern, and eastern
contemporaries had already experi
enced. Nevertheless, Kentucky’s
native groups had to contend
with the indirect impacts of th
e foreigners and the challenges t
hose impacts posed to their native
ways of life. These appear to have been experi
enced first within the realm of economics, then, in
the later decades of this period, th
rough disease and cultural disruption.
Native Cultures on the Eve of Recorded History
From the mid-1500s to the mid- to late
1600s, Kentucky’s native groups continued to
pursue their respective hunting-gathering-farmi
ng lifestyles very much like their immediate
ancestors had done. West of the
Falls lived the Caborn-Welborn pe
oples, and east of the Falls,
the Fort Ancient groups.
