COMANCHE

							COMANCHE
APPEARANCE

  • Well Built-muscular
  • Wore headdresses of buffalo over long-braided hair
  • Tattooed, brightly painted
BELIEFS
  • Scalping enemy would doom soul
  • Would not eat food if shadow passed over it
  • Bad luck to boil and broil food over a same fire.
  • Believed in a god
  • Strong moral code of what was right and what was wrong
FOOD
  • Light meal in am, heavy in the pm
  • Ate food raw ( liver flavored w/ gall bladder) warm blood from fresh killed
     animals, milk from utters( curdled milk from fawn)
  • DID NOT EAT fish, wild foul, dogs or coyotes.
  • ATE: rats, skunks, lizards, grasshoppers, decayed meat
  • Gathered plants.
HOUSING
     Lived in tepees

GOVERNMENT
  • Tribe divided into two groups each had its own leaders
  • Had a war and peace chief
  • Council of older men who made important decisions
OTHER FACTS
  • Entered TX between 1700s and 1800s
  • Lived on prairies and plains
  • Hunted on foot until Spanish introduced horse.
  • Would encircle buffalo then kill w/ bows and arrows( tipped w/ iron & steel,
     carried bison-hide shields.
  • Known for horsemanship
  • Fought to protect comancheria
  • Sent to reservations in OK.




KIOWA
APPEARANCE
  • Dark-skinned
  • Cut hair short on right side to show off earring, left side grew long.
  • Decorated body, clothing & horses with metal and silver trinkets
  • Men-deerskin, moccasins, breechcloths
  • Women-high moccasins, deerskin dresses
BELIEFS
   • Annual sun dance in June
   • Ceremonies & festivals for every season
   • Dead buried in high inaccessible places
   • Warrior’s horse & dog killed over grave
   • Women would cut off their hair
Food
   • Hunted buffalo, elk, antelope, deer and horses
   • Did not eat bears, birds and fish
   • Gathered berries
Housing
      Tepees-12 people in one, made out of 20 hides sewn together & fastened around
      20-24 poles-painted, fire in center & beds around entrance faced east.

Government
   • Had an alliance w/Comanches (traveled, hunted together but kept separate camps)
   • Joining tribe was voluntary-agreement between headsman-had to be honest
Other Facts
   • Plains people, from mountain areas of North New Mexico
   • Fought to keep land-were forced onto reservations



Lipan Apache
Appearance
   • Short hair on left side and right side grew longer
   • Feathers and other decorations were tied in their hair
   • Left ear was pierced 6-8 times
   • Men-plucked beards and eyebrows
   • Women-earrings, copper bracelets, animal skins
Beliefs
   • Feared the spirits of the dead-all belongings were placed in grave
   • Relatives moved to another part of the village and didn’t mention their name
        again
   • The Lipan lived in a sacred manner. All aspects of life were revered because they
        were seen as gifts from the Creator, Yusn (Great Mystery).

   •   Balance in the spiritual realm was very important, Purification was achieved
       through sweat lodges, prayer and sacred ritual. Failure to maintain the balance,
       the harmony with the natural world would result in disaster, sickness or even
       death. Shamans were the religious leaders who offered guidance through
       prophecies and healing to the people.
Food
   • Nomads-followed buffalo, hunted with bow and arrow
   • Gardened corn, beans, squash
   • Gathered foods
    •  Dead bison opened up and raw livers and others eaten immediately-intestines
       cooked whole
   • Lean meat dried for jerky
Housing
   • Skin tepees-with sotol poles, bearskins for doors, hole at top or escaping smoke
   • Thatched huts
   • Lived in villages
Government
       Chief
Other Facts
   • Came to Texas by N. Plains through New Mexico into Panhandle
   • North of San Antonio, Edwards Plateau, Hill Country north to the Red River
   • Threat to European settlements
   • One of most powerful tribes
   • Driven from the land by Comanches
   • Buffalo hides used for shelter, clothing, blankets



Karankawa
Appearance
   • Men-strong, tall, muscular
   • Wore no clothes
   • Brightly painted bodies
   • Pierced lip and chest and then put in short stalks of sugar cane
   • Women wore deerskin skirts
Beliefs
   • Unknown
   • As a kid growing up in Texas, about the only thing I learned about the Karankawa
        in school was that they were cannibals. Cabeza de Vaca's diary indicates that they
        found the survival-oriented cannibalism of the Spaniards abhorrent - even grounds
        for capital punishment - but Fray Gaspar Jose de Solis describes a three day (and
        night) ritual called the "mitote".
   • "The dance is carried on in this fashion. They drive a stake into the ground at the
        place where they are going to hold the mitote. They then kindle a huge fire and
        bind to the stake the victim whom they are to make dance or whom they are going
        to sacrifice. All of them gather together, and as soon as the discordant notes of
        the caymán are heard they begin to dance and to jump about the fire, making a
        great number of gestures and terrible grimaces and uttering sad, unnatural cries.
        Dancing and leaping and with sharp knives in their hands, they draw near to the
        victim, cut off a piece of his flesh, come to the fire and half roast it, and, within
        sight of the victim himself devour it most ravenously. Thus they continue cutting
        him to pieces and dismembering him, until, finally, they have cut away all of the
        flesh and he dies. They cut off the skull and, with the hair still clinging to it, place
        it on a stick so as to carry it in triumph during the dance. They do not throw away
        the bones, but pass them around, and whoever happens to get one sucks it until
       nothing of it is left. They act in like manner toward the religious and toward the
       Spaniards whenever they capture them. Sometimes they hang the victim by the
       feet and beneath them start a fire, and after the body is roasted they devour it.
       Other times they cut stakes, about an inch in thickness, from the pitch-pine, which
       grows so plentifully in these parts; they stick these stakes to the victim and then
       set fire to him, and as soon as he is half roasted they eat him. Some, instead of
       using knives to cut up their victim, tear him apart with their teeth and devour
       him."
Food
   • Mostly fished: fish, porpoises, turtles, clams, oysters, underwater plants
   • Made dugout canoes
   • Hunted small game: with long bows of cedar
   • Gathered wild fruits and berries
   • Ate alligators
Housing
   • Wooden huts
   • tepees
Government
   • Family worked together to make necessary tools, pottery jars, bowls, wove
       baskets
   • Children treated with special care
Other Facts
   • Lived along Gulf Coast; on islands between Galveston & Corpus Christi Bay
   • Noted for being runner, hunters, & swimmers
   • Fierce and relentless
   • Cannibals-Cabeza de Vaca
   • Alligator grease for insect repellant
   • Disappeared by 1800-converted




Coahuiltecan
Appearance
   • Breech cloth
   • Scraggly
   • Women to dress up would wear Spanish Moss
Beliefs
   • Shamans-Religious ceremonies
   • Made medicine out of plants, herbs, & berries
   • Cared for the sick
   • Held celebrations for boys & girls when they became adults
Food
   • Gathered and dried cactus, mesquite, prickly pear
   • Hunted w/ bows and arrows: deer, javelina, bison
   • Ate worms, lizards, spiders
   • Add dirt for flavor
   • Rotting wood and deer dung
   • Fish w/ maggots and flies
Housing
   • Mesquite trees bent over and covered with mud, skins & brush
   • Temporary shelters
Government
   • All were equal and shared food
   • Women took care of cave
   • Men hunted
   • Old and disabled had other jobs
Other Facts
   • Lived in South Texas Plain
   • Nomads
   • Could run down a deer
   • Killed women and girl captives




Jumano and Tigua
 Appearance
   • unknown
Beliefs
        unknown
Food
   • Farmed- used irrigation
   • Crops-squash, corn, beans, other vegetables
   • Prickly pear, mesquite beans and edible cactus
   • Hunted for small game
Housing
   • Lived in sides of cliffs
   • Individual homes, made of adobe, flat roofs
   • Cool in summer, warm in winter
   • Lasted for years due to dry climate
Government
        unknown
Other Facts
   • Traveled and traded
   • Unclear Spanish reports
   • Disappeared into Mexico or joined other Indian tribes in Texas
Caddo
Appearance
   • Tattoos on face
   • Bound babies to boards resulting in long skinny heads
   • Leather clothing
   • Dyes for clothes
Beliefs
   • Head priest Chesoni
   • Kept temple fire from which all other fires were lit
Food
   • Had very Fertile soil
   • Crops-squash, beans, melons, pumpkins, figs, plums & sunflower
   • 2 crops a year/ 2 years of seed
   • Gathered fruits & berries hunted deer, bear, buffalo
   • Trout line
   • Men-cleared the land
   • Women- planted crops
Housing
   • Permanent settlements
   • Domelike houses 50’ diameter
   • Twigs & mud covered w/ grass
   • 7 to 15 houses along river
   • Inside-colored rugs, buffalo hides on beds, baskets & jars
Government
   • Chiefs-handled war and peace
   • Men & women held powerful positions
Other Facts
   • Remained in Texas until 1850
   • Warfare and diseases killed them off (smallpox)
   • Tormented captives
   • Shed tears easily at every occasion
   • Warlike
   • Moved to Oklahoma




Tonkawa
Appearance
   • Wore clothing for protection
   • Men-breechcloth &moccasins
   • Women-short deerskin skirt
   • Male torso-painted & tattooed
   • Earrings and necklaces
   • Warriors-feather & horn headdresses
   • Paint himself & horse w/ red, yellow & black.
   • Unique facial designs (not copied)
Beliefs
   • Respected wolves and coyotes
   • Cannibalism
Food
   • Hunters-buffalo (not many) also deer, rabbits, turtles, snakes, rats, skunks, dogs,
        horses, rattlesnakes, fish, oysters
   • Carried bows, dipped dart heads in mistletoe juice
Housing
        Animal Skin houses
Government
   • Not one tribe but group of tribes
   • Had both civil and military leaders
Other Facts
   • Lived in Central Texas, SE edge of Edwards Plateau
   • In constant warfare
   • Almost disappeared by arrival of Spanish




Wichita
Appearance
        Tattoos of unusual designs
Beliefs
        Afraid of bodies of water
Food
   • Crops-squash, corn & beans
   • Hunted buffalo
Housing
   • Domelike homes made of grass and reed
   • Live in villages
Government
        Women held positions of authority
Other Facts
   • Around Dallas/Fort Worth area
   • Defended land
   • Anglo settlers forced them out