84 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY Hull. 73 
Olocalpa. 
Sulopacaquos. 
Tamufa. 
Ymunapa. 
The chief of each Guale town bore the title of mico, a circumstance 
which, as has been shown, has important bearings in classifying the 
people in the Muskhogean linguistic group. It appears also that 
there was a head mico or "mico mayor" for the whole Guale prov- 
ince. In 1596 a chief whom the Spaniards called Don Juan laid 
claim to the title of head mico of Guale. There is some confusion 
regarding him, for the text seems to identify him with a Timucua 
chief. However, this claim elicited from the Spanish Crown a 
request for an explanation of the term, to which Governor Mendez 
de Canco replied : 
In regard to your majesty's instructions to report about the pretension of the cacique 
Don Juan to become head mico, and to explain what that title or dignity is, he informs 
me himself that the title of head mico means a kind of king of the land, recognized 
and respected as such by all the caciques in their towns, and whenever he visits 
one of them, they all turn out to receive him and feast him, and every year they pay 
him a certain tribute of pearls and other articles made of shells according to the land. 
Guale was thus a kind of confederacy with a head chief, more 
closely centralized in that particular than the Creek confederacy. 
It does not appear from the Spanish records whether the position 
of head mico was hereditary or elective, but the latter is indicated. 
When the Spaniards first came to Guale the head mico seems to have 
lived in Tolomato, and mention is made of one Don Juanillo, "whose 
turn it was to be head mico of that province." 1 The friars are said to 
have brought on the massacre of 1597 by depriving him of this office, 
but they appear to have conferred it upon one of the same town. 2 
There were, however, three or four chiefs of particular estimation, 
which are spoken of sometimes as lords of different parts of the 
country, and when the Spaniards organized a native army to punish 
those who had killed the friars, it was placed in charge of the chief 
of Asao, who was head of the southern group of towns. In the nar- 
rative which tells of a visit made to the missions in 1606 by the 
Bishop of Cuba, Don Diego, chief of Talaxe and Asao, is represented 
as overlord or "head mico" of the entire province. 
Gualdape may perhaps be a form of Guale and the information 
obtained regarding the people there by the Ayllon colonists appli- 
cable rather to the Guale Indians than the Cusabo. 2 In the narra- 
tives of the French Huguenot colony of 1562, as we have seen, 
Guale appears as Ouade and a neighboring town or tribe is mentioned 
called Couexis. 3 All that the French have to tell us about these 
1 One Spanish document registers the primacy of Tolomatoin these words: "La lengua de Guale de erne 
es mico y cabexja Tolomato." 
2 See p. 41. 
3 See p. 50. 
