Apache Culture

The Apache were living in a flexible society of scattered settlements when Juan de Ulibarrí encountered them in 1706. The Jicarilla, Sierra Blanca and Flecas de Palo were "under the leadership of different chiefs." Carlana was head of the second. They told the commander their "head chief was a lame man whom they called Ysdalnisdael." Ulibarrí also called him "Ucase."

The head of the Jicarilla in 1719 was El Coxo, a name that also meant lame. If he was the same man, it suggested an alliance between the western bands under El Coxo.

When Antonio Valverde arrived at his settlement, his two sons told him their father was with the Navajo. One can assume he was pursuing his own military alliance with Athabascan speakers to the west, rather than relying on those to the east.

Ulibarrí had been sent to El Cuartelejo to extricate people who had fled the Reconquest. The most important was Juan Tupatú, son of the interregnum leader. The other headmen weren’t named by him or by Valverde.

When Bourgmont arrived at the eastern Apache settlement in 1724, the twelve villages each had a chief. The head told the Frenchman: "I am heeded and obeyed in all the villages of our tribe. I am the emperor of all the Padoucas, and they go neither to war nor to the Spaniards without my permission. I am like you, my father. I make my people obey me, and when I need a party of my warriors to go to war, to hunt, or to go to the Spaniards, I have only to announce it in my village and notify the other villages."

His exact words have been translated twice, first for maximum rhetorical impact into French, and then into English. Even with that caveat, it sounds like their social organization had become more disciplined with the threats to its security and the increased density of the population.

Still, the man who was never named did not rule alone. He claimed, when he announced a need for action, "all my war chiefs assemble at my dwelling, and we hold a council." While he suggested they automatically supported him, one suspects the councils had more powers. During his first meetings with the French he was accompanied by the twelve chiefs. Only after they had all evaluated Bourgmont, did he meet with him with a smaller number of subordinates.

Beneath them there were small, autonomous units, probably based on economic units, who voluntarily submitted to the chiefs. When Antonio Valverde had met Carlana in 1719, he was told half his people had deserted him for the protection of a headman called Flaco.

The chiefs still needed to earn, then continually justify their positions by success. The Apache were empirical enough to test the utility of everything.

Valverde was following the Ute and Comanche north along the Sangre de Cristo when he came across a house at La Fleca with a cross on the roof. Both the Jicarilla and the Cuartelejo met him with crosses. The chief of the last group told him his men wore "many crosses, medals, and rosaries around their necks" because the Spanish were strong and "no nation that can conquer them."

The Roman Catholic symbols were integrated into the existing Apache set of rituals. When 69 Sierra Blanca warriors under Carlana joined his troops, "they circled the camp on their horses, jubilantly singing and shouting. In the evening these same messengers dances according to their custom, some covered with red and others with white paint."

Bourgmont’s scribe, Philippe de la Renaudiére, did not mention crosses or rosaries, though he did describe how men and women dressed. Perhaps the fact troops commanded by Pedro de Villasur had been defeated by the neighboring Pawnee destroyed the Spaniards’ aura of invincibility.

Five warriors accompanied the El Cuartelejo chief to the general peace conference in Kansa territory. There, after they had all eaten, they "danced and sang for about an hour and a half in the presence of the chiefs of the Missouris, Otos, Iowas, and Kansas and all smoked together."

When Bourgmont arrived at El Cuartelejo, they didn’t great him with a cross and religious procession. Instead, "they spread a bison robe on the ground and place M. de Bourgmont" and others on it. "Fifteen men then bore them to the dwelling of the head chief."

At the final peace conference, when the Apaches formally broke their alliance with the Spanish and transferred it to the French, the chief referred to symbols important to his traditional religion, not to that of the Europeans. He "grabbed a handful of earth and shouted: ‘Now I regard the Spaniards as I do this dirt.’ Turning to M. de Bourgmont, he said: ‘And you, I regard you as the sun’."

Notes: Juan Tupatú was the son of the revolt leaver, Luis Tupatú. Valverde didn’t mention direction the horsemen rode, clockwise or counter clockwise. Thomas said, there was no further mention of Flaco.

Renaudiére, Philippe de la. Journal of the Voyage of Monsieur de Bourgmont, translation in Frank Norall, Bourgmont, 1988. He wrote the men "wear trousers of dressed skin, with the lower part pulled together in the Spanish manner" and tucked into high moccasins. The women wore "robes of dressed skins. Their blouses and skirts have fringe all around, made of the same material."

Thomas, Alfred B. After Coronado, 1935.

Ulibarrí, Juan de. Diary of expedition to El Cuartelejo, 1706, translation in Thomas.

Valverde y Cosío, Antonio. Diary of the campaign against the Ute and Comanche Indians, 1719, translation in Thomas.