Monday, May 28, 2012
Learning about the Apache Nation
My shape shifter, Morgan James, in my still untitled WIP is part apache.
The word "apache" comes from the Yuma word for "fighting-men" and from the Zuni word meaning "enemy." The Apache tribe consists of six subtribes: the Western Apache, Chiricahua, Mescalero, Jicarilla, Lipan and Kiowa. Each subtribe is from a different geographial region. They are composed of six regional groups: Western Apache - Coyotero - most of eastern Arizona which include the White Mountain, Cibuecue, San Carlos, and Northern and Southern Tonto bands. It is possible, due to their nomadic nature, that several names were used to identify the same tribe. The Anglo theory is the Apache Indian migrated to the Southwest from Northern Canada in the 1500's. The Apache indian history says it was the other way around, that most of the Athapaskan speaking people migrated to the North and a few stayed in their homeland. In any event, it is generally agreed that about 5,000 Apaches lived in the Southwest at the end of the 1600's.
Apaches belong to the Southern Athapascan linguistic family.
The Apache tribe occupied the mountains and plains of southern Arizona and New Mexico, and also in Mexico.
The primitive dress of the men was deerskin shirt, leggings, and moccasins. They were never without a loin-cloth. A deerskin cap with attractive symbolic ornamentation was worn. The women wore short deerskin skirts and high boot top moccasins.
Chiricahua - southwestern New Mexico, southeastern Arizona, and adjacent Mexican states of Chihuahua and Sonora - The band was the informal political unit, consisting of followers and a headman. They had no formal leader such as a tribal chief, or council, nor a decision making process. The core of the band was a "relative group," predominantly, but not nessarily, kinsmen. Named by the Spanish for the mescal cactus the Apaches used for food, drink, and fiber. The basic shelter of the Chiricahua was the domeshaped wickiup made of brush. Similar the Navajo, they also regarded coyotes, insects, and birds as having been human beings; the human race, then, but following in the tracks of those who have gone before.
Mescalero - Faraon - live east of the Rio Grande in southern New Mexico, with the Pecos River as their eastern border.
Jicarilla - Tinde - southeastern Colorado, northern New Mexico, and northwest Texas - During their zenith in the SouthWest, two divisions of the Jicarilla Apache were known: the Llanero, or "plains people," and the Hoyero, the "mountain people." They roamed from central and eastern Colorado into western Oklahoma, and as far south as Estancia, New Mexico. As a result of their eastern contacts, the Jicarilla adopted certain cultural traits of the Plains Indians, as did the Mescalero who also ranged the eastern plains. From an estimated population of 800 Jicarilla in 1845, the tribe today numbers about 1,800.
The Jicarilla (little basketmakers) are of the Athabascan language group and anthropologists say that these people came from Canada down the eastern flanks of the Rocky Mountains about 1300-1500 AD.
All tribes deny the migration theories and say that they have always been here:
The First People.
Though limited to using dogs as pack animals, the Jicarilla were the most successful raiders. When the Spaniards brought horses once again to North America (the previous horses had been eaten long before) the Jicarilla took full advantage.
They were not recognized as being distinctive from the other southern Athabascans: Chiricahuas, Navajos, Western Apaches, Mescaleros, Kiowa Apaches, and Lipans, until about 1700. Jicarilla are further identified as the plains people (Llaneros), and the mountain-valley people (Olleros) or Hoyero.
Their name for themselves is Tinde. But names that have been or are used by others than themselves are:
Mexican Spanish: Jicarilla, literally "little basket."
Navajo: Be'-xai, or Pex'-ge
Kiowa: Keop-tagui, "mountain Apache."