Indians in Texas
Early man first entered the land we now call Texas during the Ice Age. Nomadic tribes had followed the herds of animals that crossed the Bering Strait in search of food. The earliest evidence indicates that humans were in Texas between 10,000 and 13,000 years ago.
Timeline of Indian Cultures in Texas
Paleo-Indian Period 9200B.C. thru 6000 B.C.
Texas Indians of this period followed and hunted the last of the big mammals of the Ice Age. Paleo-Indians had chopping and scraping tools and they used spears. Artifacts from this period are found across the state but not in great number because of the small number of people and their nomadic ways.
Archaic Period 6000 B.C. thru 500 A.D.
The Texas Indians of this period depended on medium and game animals. They collected edible wild plants, had many stone tools and used plant fibers to weave mats and baskets. These hunting tribes left stories on the walls of rock-shelters or smooth bluffs in the form of pictographs.
Late Prehistoric Period 500 A.D. thru 1500 A.D.
The appearance of the bow and arrow and pottery marked the end of the Archaic Period and the beginning of the Late Prehistoric Period of Texas Indian culture. The earliest arrow points and pottery have been dated to around 150 A.D., but in most parts of Texas the Late Prehistoric Period started around 500 A.D. Crop cultivation was stated in East Texas and along the Rio Grande as this period of Indian culture began.
Late Prehistoric Indian Cultures
The Early CaddosThe Late Prehistoric or Early Caddo Indians of East Texas were mound builders like many of the Native American groups centered around the lower Mississippi Valley. From about 700 A.D. to 1300 A.D., the Early Caddos were a part of a complex agricultural society. They worshiped in large wooden temples built on top of flat-topped earthen mounds. Each temple mound was built in stages, every eighty years or so the temple on top was burned and covered with a new layer of earth. To add a layer, laborers carried load after load of earth in big baskets.
The Jornada MogollonLate Prehistoric people, called the Jornada branch of the Mogollon, settled in villages near what is now El Paso around 600 A.D. First they lived in individual pit-houses, partly below ground dwellings, either round or rectangle that had a ramp leading down to the underground floors. After 1200 A.D., the pit-houses disappeared and above ground adjoining blocks of rooms took their place.
These people grew corn, beans and squash. They had a complex religion similar to the Zuni and Hopi Pueblo Indians of New Mexico today. This is known from the hundreds of masklike images and other symbolic art painted on the rocks of a site call Hueco Tanks State Historical Park near El Paso. By 1400 A.D. these El Paso area farmers had disappered.
Historic Period 1500 A.D. to Present
Native American cultures present in Texas when the first Europeans arrived in the 1500s included the Caddos, Tonkawas, Atakapans, Karankawas, Coahuiltecans, Jumanos and Apaches. Groups of Native Americans that moved into Texas after the first Europeans arrived included Kiowas, Comanches, Wichitas, Wacos, Tawakonis, Cherokees, Alabamas, Coushattas, Kickapoos, Delawares, Shawnees and Tiguas.
The Spanish came to Texas in the 1500s looking for gold and silver. When they did not find any they started catching Indians to be sold as slaves. The Spanish also created missions where they converted the Indians to the Catholic religion and used them as cheap labor for farming and ranching. The French arrived in the mid-1600s, mainly as traders. Many married and settled among the East Texas Caddo Indians.
The Spanish and French brought many things to Texas that changed the Indian culture forever. The Spanish brought along their domesticated horses, which the plains Indians acquired and became superb horsemen. The Comanches were considered the best light cavalry in the world. Trade goods such as cloth and blankets, metal pots, knives and axes, along with guns and gunpowder changed Native American styles of dress, food preparation, hunting and warfare.
The most important and devastating thing brought to Texas by the Europeans were diseases like smallpox, measles, whooping cough and cholera. The Indians had no resistance to these highly contagious diseases and they spread like wildfire from Indian group to Indian group.
The Anglo-Americans were late arrivals to Texas in the 1800s. They came for one thing-land. When the Anglos moved into Texas they either killed or forcibly removed all the Indians so they could take over their lands. By 1875 all of the original Indian groups of Texas had been killed or forced on to reservations in Oklahoma.
For a more extensive study of the Indians of Texas the Handbook of Texas Online is an excellent resource. Also Texas Indians.
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