Archaeologists search for state's first Spanish settlement
Six years before Spanish explorers landed at St. Augustine, Don Tristan de Luna y Arellano founded Florida's initial European settlement at present-day Pensacola in 1559. Two years later the Spanish settlement was gone, besieged by a hurricane and other problems.
Centuries have erased all traces of the land settlement, but 14 years ago divers found one of the sunken ships.
As the 450th anniversary approaches of de Luna's ill-fated voyage to the city that touts itself as "America's First Settlement," unearthing de Luna artifacts and solving the mystery of the original settlement's exact location remains an obsession for professional and amateur archaeologists alike.
IHT has another article on an Etruscan find here.