Calusa in the context of "Mound Key Archaeological State Park"

The Everglades is a natural region of flooded grasslands in the southern portion of the U.S. state of Florida, comprising the southern half of a large drainage basin within the Neotropical realm. The system begins near Orlando with the Kissimmee River, which discharges into the vast but shallow Lake Okeechobee. Water leaving the lake in the wet season forms a slow-moving river 60 miles (97 km) wide and over 100 miles (160 km) long, flowing southward across a limestone shelf to Florida Bay at the southern end of the state. The Everglades experiences a wide range of weather patterns, from frequent flooding in the wet season to drought in the dry season. Throughout the 20th century, the Everglades suffered significant loss of habitat and environmental degradation.

Human habitation in the southern portion of the Florida peninsula dates to 15,000 years ago. Before European colonization, the region was dominated by the native Calusa and Tequesta tribes. With Spanish colonization, both tribes declined gradually during the following two centuries. The Seminole, formed from mostly Creek people who had been warring to the North, assimilated other peoples and created a new culture after being forced from northern Florida into the Everglades during the Seminole Wars of the early 19th century. After adapting to the region, they were able to resist removal by the United States Army.

The Calusa language is an unclassified language of southern Florida, United States that was spoken by the Calusa people.

The Caloosahatchee culture is an archaeological culture on the Gulf coast of Southwest Florida.

The Caloosahatchee culture region lasted from 500 BCE to 1750, and has been divided into five periods based on ceramic styles. Its territory consisted of the coast from what is now southern Sarasota County through all of Charlotte and Lee counties to the northern edge of Collier County, approximately 40 kilometres (25 mi) north of Marco Island, and about 90 kilometres (56 mi) inland from the coast. The area from Charlotte Harbor to the Ten Thousand Islands has been informally called the Calusa region. At the time of first European contact, the Caloosahatchee culture region formed the core of the Calusa domain.

The Eastern Woodlands is a cultural region of the Indigenous people of North America. The Eastern Woodlands extended roughly from the Atlantic Ocean to the eastern Great Plains, and from the Great Lakes region to the Gulf of Mexico, which is now part of the Eastern United States and Canada. The Plains Indians culture area is to the west; the Subarctic area to the north. The Indigenous people of the Eastern Woodlands spoke languages belonging to several language groups, including Algonquian, Iroquoian, Muskogean, and Siouan, as well as apparently isolated languages such as Calusa, Chitimacha, Natchez, Timucua, Tunica and Yuchi. Many of these languages are still spoken today.