
Caddos lived in settlements of several hundred people. Since their arrival in present day Texas more than 1,200 years ago, Caddos built large village complexes, created elaborately designed ceramics, and traded in networks that spanned thousands of miles. In 1858, the few remaining Karankawas were living near Rio Grande City when a group of men led by Juan Nepomuceno Cortina attacked and killed them all, decimating the tribe. Comanche attacks, disease, and conflicts with European-Americans all took a heavy toll on the tribe and their numbers began to decline sharply. While Karankawas withstood initial contact with the Spanish, their fortunes changed in the early 1800s. Within just four years, the Spanish relocated the mission elsewhere to serve other tribes. When Franciscan priests built Mission Nuestra Señora del Espíritu Santo de Zúñiga at Matagorda Bay, the nearby Karankawas refused to relocate there or accept the priests’ teachings. When the Spanish began establishing a presence in Karankawa territory in the 1700s Karankawas resisted the Spaniards’ efforts to convert them to Christianity and confine them to missions.

Louis, in 1688, leaving no survivors except for the children, who were adopted into the tribe. After several hostile acts on both sides, Karankawas attacked La Salle’s settlement, Fort St. However, after La Salle's men stole a canoe from the Karankawa, relations soured and the two groups fought against each other frequently. Karankawas initially greeted René Robert Cavelier, Sieur de La Salle, and the members of his expedition when they arrived in Matagorda Bay in 1685. While the Karankawa fed and sheltered Cabeza de Vaca and his companions, the tribe responded very differently to the French and Spanish colonizers who arrived later.

Their meeting was the first documented encounter between American Indians and Europeans in present day Texas. Karankawas were the first people Spanish explorer Álvar Núñez Cabeza de Vaca met when he washed up on the Texas shore near Galveston Island in 1528.
