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the tribes followed the seasonal grazing and migration of the bison the plains indians lived in tipis because they were easily disassembled and allowed the nomadic life of following game the spanish explorer francisco vásquez de coronado was the first european to describe the plains indian culture he encountered villages and cities of the plains village cultures while searching for a reputedly wealthy land called quivira in 1541 coronado came across the querechos in the texas panhandle the querechos were the people later called apache according to the spaniards the querechos lived in tents made of the tanned skins of the cows bison they dry the flesh in the sun cutting it thin like a leaf and when dry they grind it like meal to keep it and make a sort of sea soup of it to eat they season it with fat which they always try to secure when they kill a cow they empty a large gut and fill it with blood and carry this around the neck to drink when they are thirsty 5 coronado described many common features of plains indians culture skin tepees travois pulled by dogs plains indian sign language and staple foods such as jerky and pemmican siouan language speakers may have originated in the lower mississippi river region they were agriculturalists and may have been part of the mound builder civilization during the 9th 12th centuries wars with the ojibwe and cree peoples pushed the lakota teton sioux west onto the great plains in the mid to late 17th century 6 the shoshone originated in the western great basin and spread north and east into present day idaho and wyoming by 1500 some eastern shoshone had crossed the rocky mountains into the great plains after 1750 warfare and pressure from the blackfoot crow lakota cheyenne and arapaho pushed eastern shoshone south and westward some of them migrated as far south as texas emerging as the comanche by 1700 7 european explorers and hunters and later settlers brought diseases against which the indians had no resistance between a half and two thirds of the plains indians are thought to have died of smallpox by the time of the louisiana purchase 8 the 1837 great plains smallpox epidemic spread across the great plains killing many thousands between 1837 and 1840 in the end it is estimated that two thirds of the blackfoot population died along with half of the assiniboines and arikaras a third of the crows and a quarter of the pawnees 9 horses edit spread of the horse the black line defines the distribution of the bison the plains indians historically lived without horses which went extinct in the americas 15 000 13 000 years ago 10 however the reintroduction of the horse in the 16th century had a profound impact on the culture of the great plains when horses were obtained the plains tribes rapidly integrated them into their daily lives people in the southwest began to acquire horses in the 16th century by trading or stealing them from spanish colonists in new mexico as horse culture moved northward the comanche were among the first to commit to a fully mounted nomadic lifestyle this occurred by the 1730s when they had acquired enough horses to put all their people on horseback 11 the horse enabled the plains indians to gain their subsistence with relative ease from the seemingly limitless bison herds riders were able to travel faster and farther in search of bison herds and to transport more goods thus making it possible to enjoy a richer material environment than their pedestrian ancestors for the plains peoples the horse became an item of prestige as well as utility they were extravagantly fond of their horses and the lifestyle they permitted the first spanish conqueror to bring horses to the new world was hernán cortés in 1519 however cortés only brought about sixteen horses with his expedition coronado brought 558 horses with him on his 1539 1542 expedition at the time the indians of these regions had never seen a horse only two of coronado s horses were mares so he was highly unlikely to have been the source of the horses that plains indians later adopted as the cornerstone of their culture 12 429 in 1592 however juan de oñate brought 7 000 head of livestock with him when he came north to establish a colony in new mexico his horse herd included mares as well as stallions stump horn of the cheyenne and his family with a horse and travois c 1871 1907 pueblo indians learned about horses by working for spanish colonists the spanish attempted to keep knowledge of riding away from native people but nonetheless they learned and some fled their servitude to their spanish employers and took horses with them some horses were obtained through trade in spite of prohibitions against it other horses escaped captivity for a feral existence and were captured by native people in all cases the horse was adopted into their culture and herds multiplied by 1659 the navajo from northwestern new mexico were raiding the spanish colonies to steal horses by 1664 the apache were trading captives from other tribes to the spanish for horses the real beginning of the horse culture of the plains began with the pueblo revolt of 1680 in new mexico and the capture of thousands of horses and other livestock they traded many horses north to the plains indians 12 429 431 in 1683 a spanish expedition into texas found horses among native people in 1690 a few horses were found by the spanish among the indians living at the mouth of the colorado river of texas and the caddo of eastern texas had a sizeable number 13 12 432 the french explorer claude charles du tisne found 300 horses among the wichita on the verdigris river in 1719 but they were still not plentiful another frenchman bourgmont could only buy seven at a high price from the kaw in 1724 indicating that horses were still scarce among tribes in kansas while the distribution of horses proceeded slowly northward on the great plains it moved more rapidly through the rocky mountains and the great basin the shoshone in wyoming had horses by about 1700 and the blackfoot people the most northerly of the large plains tribes acquired horses in the 1730s 12 429 437 by 1770 plains horse culture was established consisting of mounted bison hunting nomads from saskatchewan and alberta southward nearly to the rio grande soon afterward pressure from europeans and euro americans on all sides and european diseases caused its decline this painting by alfred jacob miller portrays plains indians chasing buffalo over a small cliff 14 the walters art museum it was the comanche coming to the attention of the spanish in new mexico in 1706 who first realized the potential of the horse as nomads hunters and pastoralists well supplied with horses they swept most of the mixed economy apaches from the plains and by the 1730s were dominant in the great plains south of the arkansas river 15 3 4 835 836 the success of the comanche encouraged other indian tribes to adopt a similar lifestyle the southern plains indians acquired vast numbers of horses by the 19th century comanche and kiowa families owned an average of 35 horses and mules each and only six or seven were necessary for transport and war the horses extracted a toll on the environment as well as required labor to care for the herd formerly egalitarian societies became more divided by wealth with a negative impact on the role of women the richest men would have several wives and captives who would help manage their possessions especially horses 16 the milder winters of the southern plains favored a pastoral economy by the indians 17 on the northeastern plains of canada the indians were less favored with families owning fewer horses remaining more dependent upon dogs for transporting goods and hunting bison on foot the scarcity of horses in the north encouraged raiding and warfare in competition for the relatively small number of horses that survived the severe winters 18 the lakota also called teton sioux enjoyed the happy medium between north and south and became a dominant plains tribe by the mid 19th century they had relatively small horse herds thus having less impact on their ecosystem at the same time they occupied the heart of prime bison range which was also an excellent region for furs which could be sold to french and american traders for goods such as guns the lakota became a highly powerful plains tribe 19 slaughter of the bison edit this map of the extermination of bison to 1889 is based on william temple hornaday s late nineteenth century research by the 19th century the typical year of the lakota and other northern nomads was a communal buffalo hunt as early in spring as their horses had recovered from the rigors of the winter in june and july the scattered bands of the tribes gathered together into large encampments which included ceremonies such as the sun dance these gatherings afforded leaders to meet to make political decisions plan movements arbitrate disputes and organize and launch raiding expeditions or war parties in the fall people would split up into smaller bands to facilitate hunting to procure meat for the long winter between the fall hunt and the onset of winter was a time when lakota warriors could undertake raiding and warfare with the coming of winter snows the lakota settled into winter camps where activities of the season ceremonies and dances as well as trying to ensure adequate winter feed for their horses 20 on the southern plains with their milder winters the fall and winter was often the raiding season beginning in the 1830s the comanche and their allies often raided for horses and other goods deep into mexico sometimes venturing 1 000 miles 1 600 km south from their homes near the red river in texas and oklahoma 21 the u s federal government and local governments promoted bison hunting for various reasons to allow ranchers to range their cattle without competition from other bovines and to starve and weaken the plains indian population to pressure them to remain on reservations 22 23 the bison herds formed the basis of the economies of the plains tribes without bison they were forced to move onto reservations or starve 22 bison were slaughtered for their skins with the rest of the animal left behind to decay on the ground after the animals rotted their bones were collected and shipped back east in large quantities 24 a pile of bison skulls in the 1870s the railroad industry also wanted bison herds culled or eliminated herds of bison on tracks could damage locomotives when the trains failed to stop in time herds often took shelter in the artificial cuts formed by the grade of the track winding through hills and mountains in harsh winter conditions as a result bison herds could delay a train for days citation needed the slaughter of the bison had substantial adverse impacts on the native american people who relied on them these impacts were both immediate and persistent by the early 20th century bison nations had greater child mortality and unemployment compared to indian nations that were never reliant on the bison by the late 20th century income per capita was 25 lower for bison nations whereas people in bison hunting communities were once among the tallest people in the world generations born after the slaughter of the bison had lost all their height advantage 25 as the great herds began to wane proposals to protect the bison were discussed buffalo bill cody among others spoke in favor of protecting the bison because he saw that the pressure on the species was too great but these were discouraged since it was recognized that the plains indians often at war with the united states depended on bison for their way of life in 1874 president ulysses s grant pocket vetoed a federal bill to protect the dwindling bison herds in 1875 general philip sheridan pleaded to a joint session of congress to slaughter the herds to deprive the plains indians of their source of food 26 this meant that the bison were hunted almost to extinction during the 19th century and were reduced to a few hundred by the early 1900s indian wars edit main article american indian wars the ghost dance ritual which the lakota believed would reunite the living with spirits of the dead cause the white invaders to vanish and bring peace prosperity and unity to indian peoples throughout the region armed conflicts intensified in the late 19th century between native american nations on the plains and the u s government through what were called generally the indian wars 27 notable conflicts in this period include the dakota war great sioux war snake war and colorado war comanche power peaked in the 1840s when they conducted large scale raids hundreds of miles into mexico proper while also warring against the anglo americans and tejanos who had settled in independent texas expressing the frontier anti indian sentiment theodore roosevelt believed the indians were destined to vanish under the pressure of white civilization stating in an 1886 lecture i don t go so far as to think that the only good indians are dead indians but i believe nine out of ten are and i shouldn t like to inquire too closely into the case of the tenth 28 among the most notable events during the wars was the wounded knee massacre in 1890 29 in the years leading up to it the u s government had continued to seize lakota lands a ghost dance ritual on the northern lakota reservation at wounded knee south dakota led to the u s army s attempt to subdue the lakota the dance was part of a religious movement founded by the northern paiute spiritual leader wovoka that told of the return of the messiah to relieve the suffering of native americans and promised that if they would live righteous lives and perform the ghost dance properly the european american colonists would vanish the bison would return and the living and the dead would be reunited in an edenic world 29 on december 29 at wounded knee gunfire erupted and u s soldiers killed up to 300 indians mostly old men women and children 29 material culture edit agriculture and plant foods edit further information agriculture on the prehistoric great plains the wichita were an agrarian southern plains tribe who historically lived in beehive shaped houses thatched with grass surrounded by extensive maize fields they were skilled farmers who traded agricultural products with the nomadic tribes in exchange for meat and hides the semi sedentary village dwelling plains indians depended upon agriculture for a large share of their livelihood particularly those who lived in the eastern parts of the great plains which had more precipitation than the western side corn was the dominant crop followed by squash and beans tobacco sunflower plums and other plants were also cultivated or gathered in the wild 30 31 among the wild crops gathered the most important were probably berries to flavor pemmican and the prairie turnip the first indisputable evidence of maize cultivation on the great plains is about 900 ad 32 the earliest farmers the s...