After 450 years of searching, the exact route of Hernando de Soto through the southeastern United States remains the South’s foremost historical mystery. Despite the work of professional and amateur archaeologists and historians, and a national commission, several alternate routes still have defenders. Even with a large army, De Soto left very little physical evidence along the route and did not record accurate latitude and mileage measurements. A major study in the search for his route appeared in the 1939 United States De Soto Commission report, which presented an official route intended to combine the best features of the various hypotheses developed at that time. Since then, extensive archaeological work has been done, including the study of over 300 Indian sites in Alabama alone. The route now enjoying the widest acceptance is that of Dr. Charles Hudson of the University of Georgia and his associates. Most scholars in Alabama agree with that route from where it enters northeastern Alabama near Piedmont, down the Coosa River Valley, and into the Montgomery-Selma area. From there, some believe De Soto went south to the forks of the Alabama-Tombigbee rivers, a route tending to follow that of the 1939 United States Commission; other scholars think he may have gone west from Selma, while Hudson argues that he went northwest. Only further archaeological exploration is likely to settle the question definitively.