MARYLAND AT A GLANCE

HISTORICAL CHRONOLOGY

c. 10,000 B.C. First humans arrived by this date in the land that would become Maryland.

c. 1,500 B.C. Oysters became an important food resource.

c. 1,000 B.C. Native-American introduction of pottery.

c. 800 A.D. Native-American introduction of domesticated plants; bow and arrow came into use.

c. 1200. Permanent Native-American villages established.

1498. John Cabot sailed along Eastern Shore off present-day Worcester County.

1524. Giovanni da Verrazano passed mouth of Chesapeake Bay.

1572. Pedro Menendez de Aviles, Spanish governor of Florida, explored Chesapeake Bay.

"Close Encounters of the First Kind, 1585-1767":
meetings of Native Americans and European explorers and settlers.