The North American Indian, Vol. 1Curtis, Edward S.
History
The North American Indian, Vol. 1
Curtis, Edward S.
Indians of North America
The mountain fastness of the Apache in Arizona permitted easiest approach
from the south and the west for all who wished to seek peace or revenge.
The Apache-Mohave, living as Apache in close affiliation, were on the
western border of this stronghold, whence they made raids upon several
other Yuman groups, north, west, and south, in company with the Apache.
They were also the first to be attacked by enemies waging offensive
warfare, hence any name by which they designated themselves might readily
have been transmitted to the whole Apache group. Early Spanish
missionaries alluded to the Apache-Mohave as true Apache.
Contradistinguished from the Apache proper, the Apache-Mohave are called
Yavapai and Yavapĕh by their congeners of the Colorado river, a term that
has been employed by early writers, misled through the close association
of the Apache-Mohave with the Apache, to designate also the latter people.
It is further evident that the term Apache came to be applied to this
great division of the Athapascan family indirectly, as its component
tribes are not known by that name in any of the Indian languages of the
Southwest, and there is no evidence of its being of other than Indian
origin.
[Illustration: At The Ford - Apache]
At The Ford - Apache
_From Copyright Photograph 1903 by E.S. Curtis_
Since known to history, the many bands of Apache have occupied the
mountains and plains of southern Arizona and New Mexico, northern Sonora
and Chihuahua, and western Texas—an area greater than that of the states
of New York, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Connecticut, Massachusetts,
Vermont, Maine, Ohio, North Carolina, South Carolina, and West Virginia.
They were always known as "wild" Indians, and indeed their early warfare
with all neighboring tribes, as well as their recent persistent hostility
toward our Government, which precipitated a "war of extermination," bear
out the appropriateness of the designation. An admission of fear of
anything is hard to elicit from the weakest of Indian tribes, but all who
lived within raiding distance of the Apache, save the Navaho, their
Athapascan cousins, freely admit that for generations before their
subjugation the Apache were constantly held in mortal terror.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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