Indigenous American communities existed in what is now known as the state of Florida for over 10,000 years. However, the recorded history of Florida begins with the 16th-century conquest of the land by the Spanish. Spain ceded Florida to Great Britain in 1763 to regain Cuba and the Philippines, which Great Britain seized during the French and Indian War. After the American Revolutionary War, the Treaty of Paris returned Florida to Spain. Spain encouraged settlement by people from Spain, America, and Native tribes by offering land grants. The Spanish government granted land to Indigenous Americans as a buffer against the United States.

Florida is home to the first settlement by freed and escaped Black Americans. In 1693, Charles II of Spain issued a decree freeing all slaves who escaped from British North America to Florida and accepted Catholicism. Spanish authorities preferred to compensate enslavers when they petitioned for the return of slaves rather than compel the Black Floridians to return to enslavement. The Black and Native communities in Florida collaborated, but were mostly separate, though some intermarried. The Indigenous Americans were originally from several tribes, but referred to themselves collectively as “Seminole,” a Creek word that means “separatist.