Numu Tekwapuha Nomneekatu Newsletter
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NUMU TEKWAPUHA NOMENEEKATU NEWSLETTER October 2008 Vol. #11 Issue #4 The Comanche Language & Cultural Preservation Committee 1375 N.E. Cline Road, Elgin OK 73538-3086 www.comanchelanguage.org fax: 1-580-492-5119 e-mail: [email protected] Editor: Barbara Goodin 2008 COMANCHE NATION FAIR We tell children that they must bring one The 2008 Comanche Nation Fair of their parents with them to receive was a success as far as distribution of material, and most people are very our material goes. We gave away understanding. nearly 2000 pieces of language learning Now, if each person that received material to enrolled tribal members. language learning material would make We were there from 2:00 until 8:00 a concerted effort to study the material p.m. Friday, 9:30 a.m. to 8:00 p.m. and learn from it, then we would have Saturday, and from 11:00 a.m. to 9:00 had a VERY successful week-end. p.m. Sunday. It was a long week-end ___________________________ for us that began on Thursday with the opening of the Code Talkers exhibit at CHIEF TEN BEARS= SPEECH the Comanche National Museum in Lawton. (*Comanche Chief Ten Bears (1792- I personally talked to nearly every 1872) was the most influential leader of person that took home some language the great Comanche Nation. He gave material, and they were from all over the the speech below at the signing of the United States. One young man was on Medicine Lodge Treaty in Kansas on his way to Iraq in October, and he October 20, 1867. This Treaty provided wanted to have something to study and that each man, woman and child would learn while he was away from home. I be given a 160 acre allotment in what shook his hand, and felt proud he is one would be known as the Kiowa, of our Comanche warriors. Comanche and Apache (KCA) Like last year, there were a lot of Reservation. After reading this speech new learners out there, of all ages. you will understand why Chief Ten Some folks much older than me Bears was known as the great orator of confessed they had not learned our the Comanche people.) language, and wanted to do so now. We gave away sets of flash cards to all “My heart is filled with joy when I see ages, and that was probably our most you here, as the brooks fill with water popular item, as we ran out Sunday when the snows melt in the spring; and I afternoon. The Comanche Dictionary is feel glad as the ponies do when the always popular, and now that we have a Sounds and Spelling System DVD to go fresh grass starts in the beginning of the along with it, we hope that will make it year. I heard of your coming when I easier for new learners. was many sleeps away, and I made but Because we are funded by the Tribe, few camps before I met you. I knew that we limit our distribution of language you had come to do good to me and to material to enrolled tribal members only. my people. I looked for benefits which would last forever, and so my face prairie, were the wind blew free and shines with joy as I look upon you. My there was nothing to break the light of people have never first drawn a bow or the sun. I was born where there were fired a gun against the whites. There no enclosures and everything drew a has been trouble on the line between free breath. I want to die there and not us, and my young men have danced the within walls. I know every stream and war dance. But it was not begun by us. every wood between the Rio-Grande It was you who sent out the first soldier and the Arkansas. I have hunted and and we who sent out the second. Two lived over that country. I live like my years ago, I came upon this road, fathers before me and like them I lived following the buffalo, that my wives and happily. children might have their cheeks plump When I was at Washington the Great and their bodies warm. But the soldiers Father told me that all the Comanche fired on us, and since that time there land was ours, and that no one should has been a noise like that of a hinder us in living upon it. So, why do thunderstorm, and we have not known you ask us to leave the rivers, and sun, which way to go. So it was upon the and the wind, and live in houses? Do Canadian. Nor have we been made to not ask us to give up the buffalo for the cry once alone. The blue-dressed sheep. The young men have heard talk soldiers and the Utes came from out of of this, and it has made them sad and the night when it was dark and still, and angry. Do not speak of it more. I love for camp-fires they lit our lodges. to carry out the talk I get from the Great Instead of hunting game they killed my Father. When I get goods and presents, braves, and the warriors of the tribe cut I and my people feel glad, since it shows short their hair for the dead. that he holds us in his eye. So it was in Texas. They made If the Texans had kept out of my sorrow come in our camps, and we went country, there might have been peace. out like the buffalo bulls when the cows But that which you now say we must live are attacked. When we found them we in, is too small. The Texans have taken killed them, and their scalps hang in our away the places where the grass grew lodges. The Comanches are not weak the thickest and the timber was the best. and blind, like the pups of a dog when Had we kept that, we might have done seven sleeps old. They are strong and the things you ask. But it is too late. far-sighted, like grown horses. We took The whites have the country we loved, their road and we went on it. The white and we only wish to wander on the women cried and our women laughed. prairie until we die. Any good thing you But there are things which you have say to me shall not be forgotten. I shall said to me which I do not like. They carry it as near to my heart as my were not sweet like sugar, but bitter like children, and it shall be as often on my gourds. You said that you wanted to put tongue as the name of the Great Spirit. us upon a reservation, to build us I want no blood upon my land to stain houses and make us medicine lodges. I the grass. I want it all clear and pure, do not want them. I was born upon the and I wish it so that all who go through 2 among my people may find peace when Meat); they come in and leave it when they go Kowa (Stinking Tobacco Box); out.” Soko (Old Man); The Comanche leaders who signed THE TREATY OF 1846 the Medicine Lodge Treaty were: AT COUNCIL SPRINGS Parry-wah-say-men, or Ten Bears; Council Springs was located in Tep-pe-navon, or Painted Lips; Robinson County, Texas, near the To-sa-in, or Silver Brooch; Brazos River. The following Cear-chi-neka, or Standing Feather; Comanches signed (made “their mark”) Ho-we-ar, or Gap in the Woods; that Treaty: Tir-ha-yah-guahip, or Horse Back; Pah-ha-u-ca (Amorous Man); Es-a-nanaca, or Wolf’s Name; Mo-pe-chu-co-pe (Old Owl); Ah-te-es-ta, or Little Horn; Cush-un-a-rah-ah (Ravisher); Pooh-yah-to-yeh-be, or Iron Mountain; Ka-bah-ha-moo (Won’t Smoke); Sad-dy-yo, or Dog Fat. O-ka-art-su (Rope Cutter); The names of the men were written as Moo-ra-que-top (Nasty Mule); they appeared on the Treaty, not as we Ta-bup-pue-ta (The Winner); would write them in our official spelling Kai-tai tah (Little); system. They signed the document by Kai-he-na-mou-rah (Blind Man); making “their mark.” Ho-chu-cah (Bird’s House); ___________________________ Pah-moo-wah-tah (No Tobacco); Mon-ne-con-nah-heh (Ring); OTHER TREATY SIGNERS Po-che-na-qua-heip (Buffalo Hump); The Treaty of 1835 was signed at Santa Anna; Camp Holmes, near the Canadian River Sa-ba-heit (Small Wolf); in the Muscogee Nation. The Quarah-ha-heit (Small Wolf); Comanches who signed, or “made their Ka-nah-mak-ka (Nearly Dead); mark” were: Ish-a-me-a-qui (Traveling Wolf); Ishacoly (The Wolf); Mo-he-ka (Polecat); Qyeenashano (War Eagle); A-ka-chu-a-ta (No Horn); Tabaqueena (Big Eagle); Ka-he-ha-bo-ne (Blind Man); Pohowetowshah (Brass Man); Ma-war-ra (The Lost); Shabbakasha (Roving Wolf); Ke-wid-da-wip-pa (Tall Woman); Neraquassi (Yellow Horse); Pa-na-che (Mistletoe). Toshapappy (White Hare); Pahohsareya (Broken Arm); THE TREATY OF 1853 Pahkah (Man Who Draws Bow); AT FORT ATKINSON Witsitony (He Who Sucks Quick); The Comanches signing this Treaty Leahwiddikah (One Who Stirs Up were listed with other information: Water); Wulea-boo (Shaved Head) Chief Esharotsiki (Sleeping Wolf); Comanche; Pahtrisula (Dog); Wa-ya-ba-tos-a (White Eagle) band Ettah (Gun); Chief; Tennowikah (Boy Who Was Soon A Hai-nick-seu (The Crow) band Chief; Man); Paro-sa-wa-no (Ten Sticks band Chief; Kumaquai (Woman Who Cuts Buffalo Wa-ra-kon-alta (Poor Coyote Wolf) band Chief; 3 Ka-na-re-tah (One That Rides The the Comanche Nation Games.