structural:scholar_edition
Spanish exploration

In 1519, a Spanish naval expedition along the northeastern coast of Mexico charted the mouths of several rivers including the Rio Grande. In 1536, the Rio Grande appeared for the first time on a map of New Spain produced by a royal Spanish cartographer. In the autumn of 1540, a military expedition of the Viceroyalty of New Spain led by Francisco Vásquez de Coronado, Governor of Nueva Galicia, reached the Tiwa pueblos along the Rio Grande in the future New Mexico. On July 12, 1598, Don Juan de Oñate y Salazar established the New Spain colony of Santa Fe de Nuevo Méjico at the new village of San Juan de los Caballeros adjacent to the Ohkay Owingeh Pueblo at the confluence of the Rio Grande and the Río Chama.