Seven Cities of Gold (myth)

The Seven Cities of Gold is a myth that led to several expeditions by adventurers and conquistadors in the 16th century. It also featured in several works of popular culture.

Origins of myth

In the 16th century, the Spanish in New Spain (now Mexico) began to hear rumours of "Seven Cities of Gold" called "Cíbola" located across the desert, hundreds of miles to the north. The stories may have their root in an earlier Portuguese legend about seven cities founded on the island of Antillia by a Catholic expedition in the 8th century. The latter Spanish tales were largely caused by reports given by the four shipwrecked survivors of the failed Narváez expedition, which included Álvar Núñez Cabeza de Vaca and an African slave named Esteban Dorantes, or Estevanico. Eventually returning to New Spain, the adventurers said they had heard stories from natives about cities with great and limitless riches. However, when conquistador Francisco Vázquez de Coronado finally arrived at Cíbola in 1540, he discovered that the stories were lies and that there were in fact no treasures as the friar had described — only adobe pueblos.

While among the pueblos, Coronado heard an additional rumor from a native he called "the Turk" that there was a city with plenty of gold called Quivira located on the other side of the great plains. However, when at last he reached this place (variously conjectured to be in modern Kansas, Nebraska or Missouri), he found little more than straw-thatched villages.

Seven Cities of Gold in popular culture

• The 1982 cartoon-serial The Mysterious Cities of Gold is heavily based on the legend.
• The 1984 video game The Seven Cities of Gold, dramatizing the Spanish conquest of the Americas, takes its name from this legend.
• The historical novel Texas by James A. Michener begins with a search for the seven cities.
• In the skit "Temporarily Humboldt County" from the classic Firesign Theatre comedy album "Waiting for the Electrician or Someone Like Him", a conquistidor asks a native American, "What about the seven cities of gold, Phoenix, Tucson, Las Vegas.....?"
• In the Disney animated series Duck Tales, the pilot episodes, "Tresure of the Golden Sun," revolved around an expedition to the search for the lost City of Gold.
• The 1954 Uncle Scrooge Comic "The Seven Cities of Cibola" (Uncle Scrooge #7), by Carl Barks, centered on an expedition to the legendary cities.
• In Civilization Revolution for the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, and the Nintendo DS, players can find the Seven Cities of Gold. The player who finds the Seven Cities of Gold receives 200 to 350 gold pieces, depending on the era, to spend on building cities, military units, settlers (people that found new cities), or roads.
• The movie sequel National Treasure: Book of Secrets mentions the Seven Cities of Cibola as its treasure.
• In the comic book Zagor, there was an episode about seven cities of gold which were abandoned remnants of an ancient, highly-developed civilization.
• In Stephen King's The Stand, Las Vegas is believed to be Cibola by Trashcan Man who calls it "Seven-In-One".
• The novel The King's Fifth by Scott O'Dell, tells the story of one such (fictional) expedition through the eyes of a teenage cartographer.
• "Seven Cities of Gold" is the special ability of Spanish nation in Civilization V.

See also

• El Dorado
• City of the Caesars (Ciudad de los Césares)
• Sierra del Plata
• Shambhala
• Shangri-La
• Xanadu