This blog is intended to supplement a course offering for the Spring 2009 semester at the University of Iowa, The History of the Great Plains. Each book we read in the class will be shared on the blog, whereupon students and other participants can post questions or comments about the work or other related issues. The instructor is Dennis Kuhnel.
Thursday, February 5, 2009
Sorry for the delayed inter tribal wars post, I was having some technical posting difficulty, but here it is:
Inter-tribal Wars
Thesis-" Comanche Empire took advantage of European technologies, goods, and hospitality to expand their Empire to be able to indirectly impose their authority upon rival tribes as a consequence of their power and lifestyle.
"As many Euro-Americans saw it, negotiating with Comanches often meant yielding to their demands or risking a clash with a broad Comanche-led intertribal coalition." pg. 179
"What the Comanches did not do was to reciprocate Spain's generosity. Their recompense was the absence of violence......The peace lasted only as long as gift distributions did... As the gift distributions dwindled, Comanches resumed attacks, raiding and extorting tribute across the colony from the San Saba River to the Rio Grande." pg.184
"Comanche violence was fueled by the gifts, goods, and guns that flowed into Comancheria from the United States. Spanish officials came to believe that it was American markets and American machinations that alienated Comanches from Spainiards and formented the violence in Texas." p.188
Caption: Ryan Cox, Chris Riggins, Julie Landis, and Mirri Glasson-Darling run into a Comanche warrior on the great plains while reading The Comanche Empire.
Thesis: Comanche exceptionalism is evident by their sphere of influence and their ability to adapt to ever changing circumstances that led to their domination of their geographical area and all those residing in it. The Comanche language was becoming the dominant language of the plains and the Comanche were able to do most of their trading and diplomatic talks in their own language. "So too does the ascendancy of the Comanche language denote a larger truth: having yielded unparalleled economic, political, and cultural influence, the Comanches were re-creating the midcontinent in their own image." pg 171
Spaniards had been trying for some time to become an ally of the Comanche, but all that resulted was a one way relationship. Comanche had worked out a situation in which they received giftings regularly, or else they would raid and take what they wanted. "What Comanches did not do was reciprocate Spain's generosity. Their recompense was the absense of violence...The peace lasted only as long as gift distributions did." pg 184 "...Comanches would step up and cut back riading in the province inn line with the availability of gifts. Under the ever-present possibility of violence, offerings of diplomatic presents became fixed tribute payments to protect the exposed colony[Texas]." pg 184
"In June 1825, a party of 330 Comanche men, women, and children rode into the capital[San Antonia] and leisurely looted the town for six days." pg. 196 There was absolutely no resistance in this case. The Comanche had the ability to loot and raid without opposition.
Cattail mat-covered house, Duren Ward Photographic Collection, State Historical Society of Iowa, Iowa City
Hi.
I received this email on a listserv. I am posting it because I think it maybe of interest to some of you.
Hello! You are receiving this e-mail because you have been or are currently enrolled in a Museum Studies course. We are in the process of updating our files, so if you are pursuing the Museum Studies Certificate, or if you would like to apply for the program, please contact me with your name and anticipated graduation date. If you do not contact me, I will assume that you are not involved with the certificate program. Additionally, I have heard of a new internship opportunity for this semester (Spring 09) with the Office of the State Archaeologist, so please let me know if you would like more information regarding that opportunity. Best, Melissa Assistant to the Director for Special Programs University of Iowa Museum of Art 1840 SA 1375 Highway 1 West Iowa City, IA 52242 319.335.0482
On page 7 to 8, you can read a description of the Pawnee Morning Star Ceremony, one of the many reasons this work is controversial.
The anthropologist Weltfish's work, The Lost Universe, describes the human sacrifice of the young female captive this way:
"The procession was timed so that she would be left alone on the scaffold at the moment the morning star rose. When the morning star appeared, two men came from the east with flaming brands and touched her lightly in the arm pits and groins. Four other men then touched her with war clubs. The man who had captured her then ran forward with the bow from the Skull bundle and a sacred arrow and shot her through the heart while another man struck her on the head with the war club from the Morning Star bundle. The officiating priest then opened her breast with a flint knife and smeared his face with the blood while her captor caught the falling blood on dried meat. All the male members of the tribe then pressed forward and shot arrows into the body. They then circled the scaffold four times and dispersed."
Note how the description by Brooks is different. What does this discrepency tell us about the reliability of the sources we read on American Indian culture and life? Does Pekka in The Comanche Empire seem to sensationalize certain aspects of Indian culture at times or not? What do you think?
Picture: Between Edgemont, South Dakota and Mule Creek Junction, Wyoming.
Folks.
Make sure that you are up on your reading for Thursday. We have only two more days of discussing The Comanche Empire, so we need to make them count. On Thursday, among other things, for review we will do a chapter-by-chapter breakdown of the book. I would suggest that you reread the introductions and conclusions to each chapter in the book in preparation for this exercise.
The book we will begin reading after The Comance Empire is Grassland: The History, Biology, Politics and Promise of the American Prairie. It is a much different work than The Comanche Empire, I am hoping it will be a nice change of pace. I am just sharing this factoid because I am guessing some of you may want to get ahead with your reading.
The Comanche ideas of diplomacy depended on their present circumstances and needs. They routinely changed their diplomatic stances from region to region and day to day. The Comanche's diplomacy was based on self interest and made ties to other tribes and nations only as long as said relationships were beneficial to them.
Quotes :
"Comanches' power complex was much more than a military creation; it was also, and indeed primarily, a political constrcution. Their colonization of the southern plains was a military enterprise built on astute and pragmatic diplomacy. As they swept across the southern pains, Comanches forged a series of strategic alliances, which buttressed their own strength while leaving their competitors variously defenseless and divided....They sustained their long-standing union with the Utes for decades, only to detach themselves from the alliance in the 1750's when the collapse of Apache resistance on the Llano Estacado turned Utes from useful allies into rivals." p. 65
"Like most empires, the Comanche empire had many faces. Viewed from the north and east, it was an empire of commerce and diplomacy, an expanding transnational nexus that radiated prestige and power, absorbed foreign ethnicities into its multicultural fold, and brought neighboring societies into its sphere as allies and dependents. Viewed from the Southwest and Mexico, however, the Comanches showed a different kind of face. Here their empire brushed directly against Euro-colonial frontiers, and its tactics were often grounded in violence and exploitation." p. 181
"What the Comanches did not do was to reciprocate Spain's generosity. Their recompense was the absence of violence. Holding a pronounced power advantage over Texas, they seem to have placed the spaniards in an ambiguous social space where they were not quite friends nor outright enemies" p. 184
Kathryn Young, Brittany Thornton, Julia Field, Jason Jared
Thesis Statement: The Spanish originally believe that they are masters of the Comanches, but as time, violence, and economic matters show, the Comanches mastered the Spanish.
Spain tries to set up colonies in the southwest, and believe that they will have little trouble with the natives. "Such optimism was not unwarranted. France's expulsion ended French contraband trade and political scheming on the souther plains, giving Spain more sway over the region and its Native inhabitants. Moreover, New Mexio was now western Comanches' only reliable source of European goods, and Spanish policy makers had a reason to expect dependence to translate into compliance...in Spanish designs, the Comanches were masters of the southern plains and the Spanish were masters of the Comanches (p70)."
As time goes by, there are several cultural clashes between the two nations, many resulting in escalating violence. "In the Comanche worldview, gifts, trade, and kinship were inexorably linked....Spaniards, in contrast, made a clear distinction between social and economic ties (p40-1)." Diplomacy only goes so far, and the Comanches begin raiding and attacking, which puts a significant strain on the Spanish empire. "By the late 1770s, New Mexio began disintegrating under the weight of Comanche violence...communities dispersed...large sections of New Mexico were left desolate (p76)."
Eventually, the Spanish recognize that their defenses are no match for the Comanche raiding parties, and start settling villages at the outer edge of their territory, hoping the Comanches will raid those places, and not focus on important centers, like Mexico City. This finally shows that the Comanches had indeed mastered the Spanish, and the Spanish were forced into a permanently defensive position.
The Discovery Channel series, Planet Earth, has a specific episode dedicated to the Plains as a
biosphere. It is disappointing that more of the episode is not shot in North America, but it is still
interesting for comparative purposes. Below is the episode's blurb:
"
GREAT PLAINS A quarter of the earth's surface is covered with grass, and the world's plains are home to massive herds of animals. This episode traverses the grasslands of Mongolia and the flooding plains of Papua New Guinea, and finds great gatherings of creatures, such as East Africa's wildebeest and clusters of rare grazers like Mongolian gazelles."
You can watch it by following the links below, or by acquiring a DVD copy.
As reported earlier in class, Comanches based their commerce around horses. They would raid other communities in the south west region of their territory stealing horses and salves and in return sell/trade the horses/slaves to other communities where the horse population was small and flourished on this system. The following quote exemplifies the importance of horses in their "empire".
Page 85- “The stealing and selling of horses was central to this dynamic of simultaneous exchange and exploitation.”
Page 39- "In exchange for captives, Taosenos supplied Comanches with crucial necessities for their newly conceived plains life- carbohydrates, horse, metal tools, and guns. ?Comanches responded by quelling their raids everywhere in New Mexico, giving the colony a much needed respite from violence."
The Comanches would often trade/sell these horses during fairs. At these fairs Comanches would often peacefully trade with other native communities/groups for essentials that were needed to make their nomadic life styles easier. The next quote shows the detail of various goods traded during a fair.
Page 127- “In addition to bulk provisions, Comanches obtained from the fairs a wide variety of luxuries and manufactured goods- raw sugar, cigarettes, scissors, soap, mirrors, saddlebags, hatchets, war axes, lances, knives, scarlet cloth, serapes, woolens, cloaks, indigo, and vermilion”
Comanches didn't only trade with other native allies but also European allies as well. Trade was important for the Comanche survival and other placed trade first of Comanche agenda. Comanches would become partners with anyone as long as they were getting what they wanted. European technology often caught the eye of Comanche leaders. It began with Spanish goods but quickly evolved into a main source of trading with Americans, British, and French. The subsequent quote shows the willingness and openness of Comanche leaders to trade for the goods needed to grow economically and for overall wealth.
Page 148- “The practical matter of trade, however, was foremost in the Comanche agenda, and the chief promptly moved to explain how Comanches’ desire for European technology created ready markets for American goods: “ we are in want of Merchandize and Shall be Always glad to trade with you on friendly terms… You have everything we want.””
Our group feels that this thesis describes Comanche goals and the process used to create what is arguably known as "The Comanche Empire".
The Comanche created a successful commercial empire relying heavily on diplomacy and strategic violence’s, and through these mechanisms, the Comanches’ forced their enemies to maintain trading fairs for their economic survival and overall material wealth.
