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Article: Apache Wars
- Article from:
- Dictionary of American History
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CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 2003 The Gale Group Inc. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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APACHE WARS
APACHE WARS.
When Spaniards entered New Mexico in 1598 they unwittingly claimed a region in flux. The mysterious disappearance of the Anasazi culture in the twelfth century (see Ancestral Pueblo) had left communities of pueblo-dwellers scattered across the Rio Grande Valley and northern Arizona. The vanished Hohokams had disbanded by 1500 a.d., survived only by the agricultural Piman-speaking peoples in scattered rancherias. The Athapascan-speaking Apaches had only recently emerged from the Rocky Mountains, pushed from behind by the numerous Comanches.
Forced by the Comanches into present-day Oklahoma, Texas, New Mexico, and Arizona, the Apaches alternately attacked and ...