We all know the simplified version of the story of Columbus ?discovering? the Americas - his ship ran aground on the Eastern coast of the United States, he and the crew encountered the locals, and spontaneously awakened a universal awareness of an entire hemisphere. In reality, a number of seasoned explorers went ashore in a variety of locations over a period of time - each claiming areas in the name of their country of origin. This was also the case with the eastern peninsula that is now the state of Florida. What's unique about its story is that the explorer who found it was not looking for a land to claim in the name of his king, but rather he was searching for a mythical, life-restoring spring.
The legend of the Fountain of Youth is based upon the idea that somewhere, someplace, there is a well with restorative properties, that will bring youth to whoever drinks from it. It has been written about for thousands of years, in mythologies that reach all across the Eurasian continent. Notions of the fountain showed up in the writings of Herodotus, who thought it might have been in the land of the Ethiopians. Medieval fantasy stories mentioned the Fountain as being somewhere in India, and the concept even reached the indigenous tribes living in the Caribbean islands.
This last point became particularly important during the Age of Exploration, when European explorers had landed on the Islands and were setting foot on the Western Hemisphere for the very first time. The local tribes spoke of a mythical land called Bimini and its magical waters, which the Spanish colonialists may have taken to heart. At the same time, explorer Juan Ponce de Leon was tasked with finding Bimini; in 1513 he discovered the peninsula of Florida when he sailed northwest of the islands.
The two different chronologies became linked to one another, and as the stories morphed over time, it became a widespread notion that Pounce de Leon was after the Fountain of Youth. It seems preposterous in the modern age, when satellites have mapped every part of the Earth. However, there were no such maps in the 16th century; being an explorer meant that you could find land that none of your fellow countrymen had ever set foot on before.. A lot depended on plain old luck. In fact, the location of the mythical Bimini was not Florida, but probably the lands of the Maya civilization in the Yucatan Peninsula--in other words, totally the opposite direction.
Finding the Fountain of Youth is a recurring myth that surrounds Pounce de Leon. Writers who recounted the colonial activity in the Americas inflated the rumor into a wild conjecture, spurred by political interests and subtle jabs--like the suggestion that Leon was seeking the restorative cure for impotence, or witnessed elderly Indigenous tribesmen wade into the waters and emerge as vital young men again.
Much less mythical of course is the actual discovery of Florida. If Ponce de Leon was interested in discovering a Fountain of Youth, he never wrote about it in his journals, and it wasn't until after his demise that the legend became associated with him. Interestingly, there are some people that still derive profit from the myth. The city of St. At the spot where Ponce de Leon is thought to have landed, is the Fountain of Youth Archeological Park, which is in Augustine. Despite the lack of scientific evidence for any curative properties, tourists still flock to the spot each year and drink the water, hoping to feel a little zip in their step. It is an erroneous, but romantic, aspect of the history of the Sunshine State.
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