Tools for a mobile life
Apache families moved with the seasons, so their tools tended to be light, multi-purpose and made from materials close at hand. An item might be carried from camp to camp, repaired, or made again when needed. This article focuses on everyday tools. Hunting and food-gathering methods are described in other articles, such as those on Apache hunting and Apache gathering foods, and the craft arts of baskets, beadwork and pottery are treated separately.
Weapons for hunting
The bow was the main hunting weapon. Bows were made from suitable woods, and strings from sinew or plant fibre. Arrows had shafts of straight stems or wood, fletching of feathers, and points of stone, bone or later metal. Quivers were made from hide. Different groups favoured different materials according to what was available, and descriptions in historical sources are not always specific about which nation is meant. Other implements used by some Apache groups included lances and clubs, and, on the Plains, items associated with bison hunting.
Cutting and scraping
Stone was widely used for cutting and scraping before metal was common. Flaked stone knives and scrapers served in butchering and in preparing hides, and bone and antler tools were used for jobs such as scraping and working leather. Hide work is a craft in itself; the process is described in the article on Apache hide tanning. Sharp-edged tools were also needed for cutting agave hearts, for woodworking and for preparing plant fibres.
Grinding, digging and carrying
Grinding stones are among the most recognisable tools in the Southwest. A hand stone (mano) is used on a flat or shallow stone (metate) to grind seeds, corn and other foods into meal. Archaeologists often find them at sites, and they were important to Apache households that ground corn, mesquite pods, acorns and seeds. Digging sticks, usually pointed hardwood, were used to harvest roots and agave and to plant fields. Baskets were essential carriers and containers, and some were made watertight enough for liquids; see the article on Apache basket makers for the craft itself. Burden baskets, cradleboards and hide bags were used to carry goods and children.
Fire tools, cordage from yucca and other plants, and wooden implements for cooking and serving rounded out the kit. Cooking was done with pits, hot stones and fire, with methods covered under Apache cooking methods.
The shift to metal and new goods
From the Spanish period onward, and with growing trade and conflict in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, Apache people obtained iron and steel knives, awls, kettles, axes and later firearms. Metal cooking vessels replaced or supplemented pottery and baskets in many households. Goods arrived through trade with Pueblo and Hispanic communities, through exchange with other Native nations, and, as in many borderlands societies, through raiding and warfare. The history of early trade is addressed elsewhere under early Apache trade networks.
The adoption of new tools did not erase older knowledge. People used both for generations, choosing what worked best for each task. Cloth, metal and manufactured goods were taken up where convenient, while skills such as basket making and hide work continued, and in many places they do today.
Tools as sources of history
Archaeologists and historians study tools to learn about daily life, but they face limits. Stone tools survive well while wood, hide and fibre often do not, which can skew the picture of what people used. Apache sites are also hard to identify archaeologically because mobile camps left light traces, and scholars continue to debate how to date and interpret them. Oral tradition and community knowledge add information that objects alone cannot provide. Many tools from Apache communities are also held in collections; how they are cared for and who decides about them are covered in the articles on Apache museum collections.
Tools today
Some tools are still made and used for cultural and practical purposes, and some craftspeople teach their skills to younger people. Which tools are made, and who teaches them, depends on the community, so the official websites and cultural programmes of the Apache nations are the best sources for current information.