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Home , Caddo, Coahuiltecan, Tawakoni, Washita River

Indians: Southeastern and Gulf Cultures

The Caddoes

The were primarily villagers and religious leadership and decision- farmers, and their culture had a class making influence between villages system as part of their social and leading important rites, such as structure. They lived in grass houses harvest and naming rights. The around fifteen feet tall and twenty to Caddoes ruled with a well organized fifty feet in diameter, framed with government system. poles in a domed or conical shape and The Caddo had early contact with covered with grass thatch. Their Spanish Conquistadores under territory included communities of Hernando de Soto in 1541. The isolated farms, small villages and Caddo people traded fur, guns, some larger villages. horses, and other items to Caddo Chief, from a Pictorial The Caddo people developed a Europeans and other Indians, and . successful agricultural economy based developed new trade and economic on growing , beans, networks. The economic trade watermelons, pumpkins, figs, , between the Caddo groups and and squash. By about A.D. 1300 most Europeans sped up the process of Caddoan groups were consuming the Caddo people adopting the large amounts of maize, and this plant cultural traits and social patterns of was clearly the most important food the Europeans. source for them time. They also By the early 1840s, all Caddo groups supplemented their diet by hunting, had moved to the Brazos River area and deer was their most important to escape colonization efforts. They game animal. The Caddoes were also excellent fishermen, using trotlines, a remained there until they were fishing line loaded with baited hooks placed on the Brazos Indian across streams. Being close to the Reservation in 1855, and then in plains they acquired horses sometime 1859 the were removed to in the 17th century. the Washita River in by the superintendent of Indian Interestingly, Caddos’ traced their affairs in Texas. During the American descent through the maternal line Civil War, the Caddo abandoned the rather than the paternal. The xinesi reservation and moved to southern inherited a position of spiritual and eastern but return to leadership, the caddi, the inherited their reservation by 1867. By 1874 position of principal headman of a community. The xinesi were the Caddo reservation’s boundaries responsible for communication with were defined and the separate the supreme god and meditation. Caddo tribes unified. While caddi ayo were responsible for Texas Indians: Southeastern and Gulf Cultures

The

Little is known of the tribes, who Coahuiltecans, although more retreated northward, with some than two hundred autonomous moving to the east and west. bands are considered as the These groups, in turn, displaced Coahuiltec based on similarities other Indians. in their languages. They settled in the lowlands of northeastern The Indians also suffered from and southern Texas. such European diseases as During the Spanish colonial and . The period many of these natives Coahuiltecan retreat to the north were displaced from their meet the migrating , and traditional territories by as a result the Coahuiltecans Spaniards advancing from the were further disbursed, some to south and Apaches retreating the ‘safety’ of the Spanish from the north. The Spanish missions. By the 1800s most simply referred to them all as a Coahuiltecan Indians had ceased nación. The Coahuiltecan area to exist as a cultural unit. was one of the poorest regions of Indian North America and the Indian groups that occupied it became extinct at an early date. Hunting and gathering prevailed in the region, with some Indian agriculture existing in southern Tamaulipas. For large game animals, deer and buffalo were widely available. Additional game included the peccary, armadillo, rabbits, rats and mice, various birds, and numerous species of snakes, lizards, frogs, and snails. Fish were found in streams, and both fish and shellfish were harvested from the salt waters of the Gulf. As the Spaniards advanced they displaced the various Texas Indians: Southeastern and Gulf Cultures

The Karankawas

It is thought that their name means breechcloths or nothing at all. They “people walking in the water.” They painted and tattooed their bodies, were a coastal tribe, located along and also pierced the nipples of each the Gulf of Mexico in present-day breast and the lower lip with small southern Texas. They are classified pieces of cane. Women also painted as gulf culture Indians, and they and tattooed their bodies and wore occupied arid homelands with areas skirts of Spanish moss or animal extending into the swampy country skin that reached to the knees. of present-day . They The Karankawas participated in inhabited the Gulf Coast of Texas competitive games demonstrating from Galveston Bay south-westward weapons skills and physical to Corpus Christi Bay. prowess. Wrestling was very The Karankawa language is virtually popular. Warfare was a fact of life unknown as only about 100 words for the Karankawas, and evidence of that language have been indicates that the tribe practiced a preserved. They were nomadic ceremonial cannibalism that hunter-gatherers, and built small involved eating the flesh of their villages of one or several families enemies. This was a common and traveled to acquire food. The custom among Texas tribes, Karankawas lived in small wood and involving eating pieces of dead or brush dwellings which could be dying enemies as the ultimate moved when they needed to revenge or as a magical means of relocate every few weeks. They capturing the enemy's warrior spirit. supplemented their diet with This knowledge of the Karankawas Shellfish, wild fowl, turtles, and comes from Cabeza de Vaca, a plants. The men hunted for small survivor of the ill fated Pánfilo de game and used dugout canoes to travel in coastal or interior waters. Narváez expedition of 1528. He was The chief weapon of the tribe for shipwrecked and spent several both hunting and warfare, was the years among the Karankawa. long bow and arrow. Bows were Eventually he escaped and made of red cedar and reached published and account of his from the eye or chin level to the foot adventures. of the person using it. Karankawas were known for their distinctive physical appearance. The men, described as tall and muscular, wore deerskin Texas Indians: Culture

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The Wichitas

The Wichitas separated from other center. For buffalo hunts they Caddo people early in their history used the traditional plains Indian and migrated onto the southern skin tipis. Men hunted Buffalo plains. Their named stands for twice a year after they acquired “raccoon eyed” derived from their horses. They also hunted deer, practice of tattooing and face elk, rabbit, antelope and bear. painting. They have also been Women grew corn, beans, called Black Pawnee as well as by squash, and tobacco. the names of related tribes among Wichita Village, from Exploration of the While not the most warlike of them: the Kichai, , Red River, 1852 Indian tribes, a band of Wichitas Tawehash, Waco, and Yscani. accompanied the in These tribes merged with the Wichita in the 19th century and the attack on the Spanish San sometimes are referred to as the Sabá Mission in 1758, and their Wichita Confederacy. The Wichita Red River villages withstood a are classified as part of the Great retaliatory Spanish attack. Plains Culture. They came to However by 1810 they were in occupy territory in what now is part decline and abandoned many of of Kansas, , and Texas. their villages. They were still located along the Wichita and They acquired horses sometime in Brazos rivers in the 1850s. The the 1700s, and as typical of plains established a Indians they used them to hunt Wichita reservation in Indian buffalo and support their nomadic lifestyle. Like other Territory (Oklahoma). They left for they used skin Tipis on the trail. Kansas during the Civil War but Unlike many Plains Indians the returned in 1867 and formally Wichita had a mixed economy of ceded all their non-reservation nomadic wanderings and farming. land in 1872 in exchange for a For most of the year they stayed in 743,000-acre reservation along permanent villages constructed of the Washita River. conical grass houses. Wichita influence on Texas is The Wichita ancestral descent was found in the name of a river, a matriarchal. Their villages were county, and the city of Wichita usually situated near rivers, with Falls. round thatched houses 15-30 feet in diameter and built upon a pole framework. Typically they had two doors, and a smoke hole in the