Comanche History

Comanche History

Forming a part of the Eastern Shoshone linguistic group in southeastern Wyoming who moved on to the buffalo Plains around 1500 AD (based on glottochronological estimations), proto-Comanche groups split off and moved south some time before 1700 AD. The Shoshone migration to the Great Plains was apparently triggered by the Little Ice Age, which allowed bison herds to grow in population. It is not clear why the proto-Comanches broke away from the main Plains Shoshones and migrated south. That move may have been inspired as much by the desire for Spanish horses released by the Pueblo Revolt of 1680 as by pressures from other groups drawn to the Plains by the changing environment.

The earliest known use of the term "Comanche" comes in 1706, when Comanches were reported to be preparing to attack far outlying Pueblo settlements in southern Colorado. The fact that the group was plainly referred to as "Comanches" in this report suggests that the residents, whether Pueblo or Spaniard, already knew the ethnonym (group name) by 1706 if not before.

There were fewer than 8,000 Comanches in 1870. At the low point in 1920, the census listed fewer than 1,500. Comanche tribal enrollment now numbers 15,191 with approximately 7,763 members residing in the Lawton-Ft Sill and surrounding areas of Southwest Oklahoma. Of the three million acres (12,000 km²) promised the Comanche, Kiowa and Kiowa Apache by treaty in 1867, only 235,000 acres (951 km²) have remained in native hands. Of this, 4,400 acres (18 km²) are owned by the tribe itself.