“Newly rich in horses and knowledge of the Spanish borderlands, in 1720 the Comanches headed east onto the Great Plains of the Southwest, where immense horse herds could be sustained on the seemingly infinite grasslands...
In their effort to monopolize the horse and bison trade and eliminate trade competition – especially for the food sources they relied on – the Comanches went to war against their main competitor on the southern plains: the Apache.”
This is a good thread and I have not read all posts but the Comanches did adopt a “horse culture” along with the Sioux and other Plains Indians.
An Apache would just as soon have eaten the horse as ride it to a Comanche the horse was a sign of wealth and a chance for a great bride/woman.
The Comanche pushed the Apache into the badlands of far Southwest Texas, South New Mexico and South Arizona.
They ruled (fair to say) much of the Southwest until the end of the US Civil War and repeating weapons came on the scene.
The Apache were tough but could not compete with the horse culture.
I could spend all night on this topic but will stop and have supper.
I find it amusing and frustrating that so many people believe evil whites drove the saintly, peaceful tribes out of their homelands. But what WE thought were their homelands were often places they had invaded just 100 years earlier because the tribes fought and captured and displaced each other.
No one epitomizes more than the native Americans the fact that the strong take over from the weak.