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Apache History and Archaeology: Uncovering the Tribe's Ancient Past
What archaeology, dating methods and material culture can and cannot show about early Apachean peoples, and why the physical record is thin and still debated.
Origins and Identity
Early History and Archaeology
What evidence says about Apache life before written records.
Apache Apache Apache History and Culture: A Study of the Tribe's Early Years
How early Apachean groups traded hides and meat for corn and cloth with Pueblo peoples, as Spanish observers described it, and what those exchanges meant.
Apache Apache History and Culture: A Study of the Tribe's Early Years
What pottery, basketry, stone and bone tools found at early sites suggest about daily life among Apachean peoples, and why so few objects survive.
Apache History and Culture: A Study of the Tribe's Early Years
How early Apachean hunting, gathering and farming are reconstructed from Spanish accounts and archaeology, and how Plains, mountain and desert groups differed.
Apache History and the Environment: A Turbulent Relationship
Apache peoples had long, detailed knowledge of mountains, deserts and plains. This article looks at environmental change and land loss without the 'turbulent' framing.
The Ancient Apache: Uncovering the Tribe's Early History
The protohistoric period explained, with the earliest Spanish descriptions of the Querechos and Teyas, and why linking them to later Apache nations takes care.
The Ancient Apache: Unveiling the History of the Apache Tribe
The Dismal River archaeological complex of the central Plains, dated to roughly the late 1600s and early 1700s, and its proposed links to Plains and Jicarilla Apache ancestors.
Related topics
More in origins and identity
Apache Origins What scholarship and oral tradition say about Apache beginnings. Migration and Homelands How Apachean peoples came to the Southwest and Plains. Culture and Traditions Shared and distinct ways of life across Apache groups. Heritage Celebrations Powwows, night ceremonies and the many ways Apache communities describe and celebrate their heritage. Diversity and Unity The many distinct Apache nations and the ties between them and their neighbours. Migration Stories Southward migration, settlement and the myths that surround Apache beginnings. Apache Identity Belonging, self-names and media images of Apache people. Origins and Belonging How Apache peoples understand origin, identity and belonging, then and now. Southwest Migration The movement of Apachean ancestors into the Southwest and southern Plains. Western Apache Peoples The White Mountain, San Carlos, Cibecue and Tonto Apache and their homelands in what is now Arizona. Mescalero, Jicarilla, Lipan and Plains Apache The Apache peoples east of the Western Apache, from New Mexico to Texas and Oklahoma. Common Myths and Corrections Widespread mistakes about Apache peoples, and the documented facts.