Dictionary:

Kiowa

  (kī'ə-wô', -wä', -wā')

1. 1. A Native American people formerly inhabiting the southern Great Plains, with a present-day population in southwest Oklahoma. The Kiowa migrated onto the plains in the late 17th century from an earlier territory in western Montana.
   2. A member of this people.
2. The Tanoan language of the Kiowa.

For more information on Kiowa, visit Britannica.com.

Classified in the Uto-Aztecan language family, Kiowa is remotely linked to the Tanoan languages of the Eastern Pueblos. This suggests divergence and prehistoric northward migrations to the mountainous Yellowstone River region of western Montana, the ancestral lands of the pre-contact hunting-and-gathering Kiowa.

Migrations and Alliances to the Mid-Nineteenth Century

Leaving their homelands in the late seventeenth century in search of horses, the Kiowa and an affiliated group of Plains Apache migrated southeastward, befriending the Crow, reaching the Black Hills (in present-day South Dakota) around 1775, and then establishing trading relations with the Mandan and Arikara before the Lakota and Cheyenne drove them south to the Arkansas River. At the time of the first direct contact with whites in the late eighteenth century, the Kiowa had relocated to the Southwestern Plains. They numbered barely two thousand individuals and were compelled to form an alliance with the more numerous Comanche between 1790 and 1806. Like the Comanche, the Kiowa fashioned a lucrative equestrian raiding economy in the lands of mild winters and ample grazing that were within striking distance of Spanish settlements in Colorado, New Mexico, Texas, and northern Mexico. The Kiowa, Comanche, and Plains Apache (KCA Indians) coalition fought common northern enemies, particularly the Lakota, Cheyenne, and Pawnee. By 1840, additional intertribal alliances had been forged with the Osage, Lakota, and Cheyenne.

By the mid-nineteenth century, the KCA Indians dominated the Southwestern Plains: the Kiowa and Plains Apache inhabited the northern region adjacent to the Arkansas River in present-day west-central Kansas, and the Comanche controlled the Staked Plains region of the Texas Panhandle. Intertribal raiding parties skirmished with Ute, Navajo, and Pawnee enemies, and plundered Mexican and Texan settlements for livestock and captives.

Decline and Dependency

KCA hegemony, however, waned after the Civil War. Squeezed between rapidly expanding Euro-American settlements in Texas, Colorado, and Kansas, the Kiowa and Comanche signed the Little Arkansas Treaty of 1865, forfeiting lands in Kansas and New Mexico. In 1867, provisions of the Medicine Lodge Treaty reserved almost three million acres for the group; the lands encompassed the Wichita Mountains in southwestern Oklahoma. Residing exclusively within the confines of the KCA Reservation proved difficult, however, and raiding sorties into Texas inevitably provoked military responses from the U.S. Army. These conflicts culminated in the Red River War of 1874 and 1875, after which the Kiowa and their allies were forced to reside permanently on their reserve.

KCA subsistence changed after 1879 with the extinction of the Southern Plains bison herds, rendering the Indians totally dependent on rations and beef issues provided by the Kiowa Agency. Subsequent efforts to transform the Kiowa into farmers and ranchers failed, and hunger often resulted from inadequate government assistance. Leasing reservation grasslands to Texas cattlemen starting in 1886 brought temporary solace until the September 1892 arrival of the Jerome Commissioners (David H. Jerome, former governor of Michigan; Warren G. Sayre of Indiana; and Alfred M. Wilson of Arkansas), who forced the KCA Indians into agreeing to take individual 160-acre allotments and sell surplus reservation lands to white settlers. The Kiowa protested this fraudulent agreement because it violated the terms of the Medicine Lodge Treaty. Their protest reached all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court, but lost in Lone Wolf v. Hitchcock (1903). Ironically, the decision came seventeen months after the "opening" by lottery of the 2.8 million–acre KCA Reservation to settlement on 6 August 1901. Inhabiting clusters of allotments north of the Wichita Mountains, early twentieth-century Kiowa meagerly survived on subsistence hunting and fishing and per capita interest payments for former reservation lands; some even worked as manual laborers on their own allotments, leased to non-Indian farmers.

Kinship System

Nineteenth-century Kiowa kinship typified what anthropologists call Hawaiian systems that distinguish relatives by sex and generation; with exceptions, the Kiowa grouped kin into generation sets of grandparents, parents, siblings, and children. Cousins are still reckoned as "brothers" and "sisters." Indicative of Hawaiian kinship systems, the Kiowa acknowledged bilateral descent and formed kindreds, extended family groups usually led by the oldest brother. Pre-reservation Kiowa society consisted of from approximately ten to twenty kindreds representing the prominent, or ondedw (rich) Kiowa families, along with ondegup'a (second best), kwwn (poor), and dapom (worthless) families. Marriage alliances were based on wealth in horses, materials, and the reputation and war accomplishments of family leaders. Postnupital residence patterns preferred the wealthier of the two families. Leaders of each prominent kindred, or band, were called topadok'i (main chief), derived from the Kiowa word topadoga (band).

Notable among band leaders, Dohasan "Little Bluff" was the undisputed principal Kiowa chief from 1833 until his death in early 1866, after which leadership presumably passed to Guipago, "Lone Wolf," although Tene-angopte, "Kicking Bird," and Set-t'ainte, "White Bear," led rival factions until the Kiowa surrendered in May 1875. Afterward, the topadok'i were relegated to serving as "beef chiefs" responsible for the distribution of meat to their families. The allotment period further eroded traditional leadership as former bands settled into various enclaves largely in later Kiowa and Caddo counties in Oklahoma, where approximately one-half of the nearly ten thousand Kiowa live.

Belief Systems

Traditional Kiowa belief systems centered around dw_dw_ (power), a spirit force that permeated the universe, and was present in all natural entities inhabited by spirits or souls. Young men fasted in the Wichita Mountains and other elevated areas seeking dw_dw_ from the spirit world. Those fortunate enough to receive power visions became either great warriors or curers who painted their power symbols on war shields, and often formed shield societies. Besides personal medicine bundles associated with individual dw_dw_, tribal bundles included the talyida-i (boy medicine) or Ten Medicines, whose keepers were civil servants who settled domestic disputes and prayed for the well-being of the people, and the Taime, or Sun Dance icon central to the renewal ceremony that united the people socially and spiritually. The Sun Dance had collapsed by 1890 because of the extinction of the Southern Plains bison herds and government pressures. The Ghost Dance movement of 1890–1891 and 1894–1916 and the advent of the peyote religion after 1870 filled the spiritual void following the collapse of the horse and buffalo culture. At the end of the twentieth century, most Kiowa attended Baptist and Methodist churches and Native American Church peyote ceremonies.

The Kiowa still venerate warfare, as indicated by the many twentieth-century Kiowa combat veterans, and by the number who continue to serve in the U.S. armed forces. Notable Kiowa include N. Scott Momaday, awarded the Pulitzer Prize in fiction for 1969, and Everette Rhoads, former U.S. assistant surgeon general.

Bibliography

Mishkin, Bernard. Rank and Warfare among the Plains Indians. 1940. Reprint. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1992.

Mooney, James. Calendar History of the Kiowa Indians. 1895–1896. Reprint. Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1979.

Richardson, Jane. Law and Status among the Kiowa Indians. Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1940.

This article is about the tribe. For the town, see Kiowa, Colorado.

Kiowa
Total population
12,000[1]
Regions with significant populations
United States (Oklahoma)
Language(s)
English, Kiowa
Religion(s)
Traditional
Related ethnic groups
other Tanoan peoples

The Kiowa are a nation of Native Americans who lived mostly in north Texas, Oklahoma and eastern New Mexico at the time of the arrival of Europeans. Today the Kiowa Tribe is federally recognized, with about 12,000 members living in southwestern Oklahoma.

History of the Kiowa Nation

Original Southern Plains territory of the Kiowa Nation

According to historic accounts the Kiowa resided in the northern basin of the Missouri River where the migrating Crow Nation first met them in the Pryor Mountains, then the Kiowa migrated easterly to the Black Hills around 1650. Pushed southward by the invading Cheyennes and Sioux who were being pushed out of their lands in the great lakes regions by the Ojibwa tribes, the Kiowa moved down the Platte River basin to the Arkansas River area. There they fought with the Comanches, who already occupied the land.

In the early spring of 1790, at the place that would become Las Vegas, New Mexico, a Kiowa party lead by war leader Guikate made an offer of peace to a Comanche party while both were visiting the home of a friend of both tribes. This led to a later meeting between Guikate and the head chief of the Nokoni Comanches. The two groups made an alliance to share the same hunting grounds, and entered into a mutual defense pact. From that time on, the Comanches and Kiowa hunted, traveled, and made war together. An additional group, the Plains Apache (also called Kiowa-Apache), affiliated with the Kiowa at this time.

The Kiowa lived a typical Plains Indian lifestyle. Mostly nomadic, they survived on buffalo meat and gathered vegetables, lived in lodges, and depended on their horses for hunting and military uses. From their hunting grounds south of the Arkansas River the Kiowa were notorious for long-distance raids as far west as the Grand Canyon region, south into Mexico and Central America, and north into Canada.

Famous Kiowa leaders were Dohasan (Tauhawsin, BIA), Over-Hanging Butte, alias Little Mountain, alias Little Bluff; Guipahgah (Old Chief Lonewolf), alias Guibayhawgu (Rescued From Wolves); sub-leaders Satanta and Satank. In 1871 Satanta and Big Tree were accused, arrested, transported and confined at Fort Richardson, Texas, after being convicted by a "cowboy jury" in Jacksboro, Texas for participating in the Warren Wagon Train Raid. During the transport to Fort Richardson, Texas, old Satank was shot in an escape attempt by accompaning cavalry troops near Fort Sill, Indian Territory.

The Indian Wars

After 1840 the Kiowas, with their former enemies the Cheyennes, as well as their allies the Comanches and the Apaches, fought and raided the Eastern natives then moving into the Indian Territory. The United States military intervened, and in the Treaty of Medicine Lodge of 1867 the Kiowa agreed to settle on a reservation in southwestern Oklahoma. Some bands of Kiowas remained at large until 1875 (see Palo Duro Canyon).

On August 6, 1901 Kiowa land in Oklahoma was opened for white settlement, effectively dissolving the contiguous reservation. While each Kiowa head of household was allotted 160 acres (320,000 m²), the only land remaining in Kiowa tribal ownership today is what was the scattered parcels of 'grass land' which had been leased to the white settlers for grazing before the reservation was opened for settlement.they very good people huted lived long long

Kiowa art

Guipago, a Kiowa Chief

Kiowa artists are well known for a pictographic art form that is now referred to as "Plains Indian ledger art", and its contribution to the development of contemporary Native American art. The earliest of these Kiowa artists were those held in captivity by the US Army at Fort Marion in St. Augustine, Florida at the conclusion of the Southern Plains Indian war. Traditionally the artist's medium for their pictographic images were natural objects and animal skins, but for the Kiowa in captivity the lined pages of the white man's record keeping books became a popular substitute, thus the name "ledger art".

Twentieth century Kiowa artists include the Kiowa Five, a group of artists whom studied at the University of Oklahoma. The "Five" referred to are the male members of the group. The pictographic art form known as "ledger art" was an Indian art form which had historically been dominated by the male members of the plains culture. However, the "Five" actually had a sixth member, a woman named Lois Smokey. Another prolific and significant pre-Kiowa Five artisan during the early twentieth century was Silverhorn. Well known Kiowa artists of the later twentieth century include Bobby Hill (White Buffalo), Robert Redbird, Roland N. Whitehorse, and T. C. Cannon. The pictographic art of contemporary and traditional artist Sherman Chaddlesone has revived the ledger art form that was absent in most of the art of the Second Generation Modernists that had developed since Silverhorn and the Kiowa Five. Chaddlesone studied under Native American masters Allan Houser and Fritz Scholder and is considered a versatile and widely respected artist.

The influence of Kiowa art and the revival of the plains ledger art is also illustrated in the early work of Cherokee-Creek female artist Virginia Stroud and Spokane artist George Flett. While Stroud is of Cherokee-Creek descent, she was raised by a Kiowa family and the traditions of that culture, and the influence of the Kiowa tradition is evident in her early pictographic images.

Kiowa author N. Scott Momaday won the 1969 Pulitzer Prize for his novel House Made of Dawn. Other Kiowa authors include playwright Hanay Geiogamah, poet and film maker Gus Palmer, Jr., Alyce Sadongei, and Tocakut.

Kiowa music is often noted for its hymns that were traditionally accompanied by dance or played on the flute. Traditional performers include Cornel Pewewardy and Phillip "Yogi" Bread. Modern Kiowa musicians such as Tom Mauchahty-Ware.

References

Footnotes

Other works consulted

• Boyd, Maurice (1983). Kiowa Voices: Myths, Legends and Folktales. Texas Christian University Press. ISBN 0-912646-76-4
• Corwin, Hugh (1958). The Kiowa Indians, their history and life stories.
• Hoig, Stan (2000). The Kiowas and the Legend of Kicking Bird. Boulder: The University Press of Colorado. ISBN 0-87081-564-4
• Mishkin, Bernard (1988). Rank and Warfare Among The Plains Indians. AMS Press. ISBN 0-404-62903-2
• Richardson, Jane (1988). Law & Status Among the Kiowa Indians (American Ethnological Society Monographs; No 1). AMS Press. ISBN 0-404-62901-6
• Nye, Colonel W.S. (1983). Carbine and Lance: The Story of Old Fort Sill. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press. ISBN 0-8061-1856-3
• Momaday, N. Scott (1977). The Way to Rainy Mountain. University of New Mexico Press. ISBN 0-8263-0436-2

See also

• Kiowa County

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• Kiowa language

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• Commanche

External links

• Kiowa Comanche Apache Indian Territory Project
• Kiowa Collection: Selections from the Papers of Hugh Lenox Scott
• Photographs of Kiowa Indians hosted by the Portal to Texas History
• The Handbook of Texas Online: Kiowa Indians
• Sketch of a Chief of the Kiowas from A pictorial history of Texas, from the earliest visits of European adventurers, to AD 1879, hosted by the Portal to Texas History.
• Kiowa ledger drawing in the Smithsonian.
• The Kiowa Five.
• "Kiowa Indians". Catholic Encyclopedia. (1913). New York: Robert Appleton Company. 

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