The Yojuane were a people who lived in Texas in the 16th, 17th and 18th centuries. They were closely associated with the

Jumano Jumanos were a tribe or several tribes, who inhabited a large area of western Texas, New Mexico, and northern Mexico, especially near the Junta de los Rios region with its large settled Indigenous population. They lived in the Big Bend area in ...

and may have also been related to the

Tonkawa The Tonkawa are a Native American tribe indigenous to present-day Oklahoma. Their Tonkawa language, now extinct, is a linguistic isolate. Today, Tonkawa people are enrolled in the federally recognized Tonkawa Tribe of Indians of Oklahoma. ...

. They have no connection to the

Yowani The Yowani were a historical group of Choctaw people who lived in Texas. Yowani was also the name of a preremoval Choctaw village. When this area became part of the United States under the Louisiana Purchase in 1803, many of the resident Indian ...

in Texas, a Choctaw band.

Etymology

It has been proposed on little evidence that the tribe got its name because one of its members when asked who they were replied "yo Juan".

Language

Many scholars starting with Herbert E. Bolton have held the view that the Yojuane spoke the

Tonkawa language The Tonkawa language was spoken in Oklahoma, Texas, and New Mexico by the Tonkawa people. A language isolate, with no known related languages, ''Tonkawa'' has not had L1 (first language) speakers since the mid 1900s. Most Tonkawa people now on ...

or a language related to it. However Gary Anderson argues that the Yojuane spoke the same language or a related language to the

Jumano Indians Jumanos were a tribe or several tribes, who inhabited a large area of western Texas, New Mexico, and northern Mexico, especially near the Junta de los Rios region with its large settled Indigenous population. They lived in the Big Bend area in th ...

and that this was a

Uto-Aztecan Uto-Aztecan, Uto-Aztekan or (rarely in English) Uto-Nahuatl is a family of indigenous languages of the Americas, consisting of over thirty languages. Uto-Aztecan languages are found almost entirely in the Western United States and Mexico. The na ...

language, largely based on the ability of

Nahuatl Nahuatl (; ), Aztec, or Mexicano is a language or, by some definitions, a group of languages of the Uto-Aztecan language family. Varieties of Nahuatl are spoken by about Nahua peoples, most of whom live mainly in Central Mexico and have smaller ...

speakers to converse with the Jumano and Yojuane when they first met as part of the Spanish expeditions.

History

The Yojuane were first mentioned by Spanish chroniclers about 1690. At this time they were led by a man named Cantana who had been on occasion to

Nueva Vizcaya, New Spain Nueva Vizcaya (''New Biscay'', eu, Bizkai Berria) was the first province in the north of New Spain to be explored and settled by the Spanish. It consisted mostly of the area which is today the states of Chihuahua and Durango and the southwest of ...

, essentially modern Chihuahua. Cantana was closely connected with the Jumano of

La Junta de los Rios Presidio is a city in Presidio County, Texas, United States. It is situated on the Rio Grande (''Río Bravo del Norte'') River, on the opposite side of the U.S.–Mexico border from Ojinaga, Chihuahua. The name originates from Spanish and means ...

although it is less clear where his people lived at the time. According to Gary Anderson the Yojuane numbered about 1000 at this time. However these included the Cholemes and Cabezas, peoples who seemed to be distinct. Also associated with the Yojuane were the

Simonos The Simono were an indigenous people who lived in what is now part of the Mexican state of Nuevo Leon and the U.S. state of Texas from at least the 16th century in the 18th century. In the late 1580s or maybe slightly earlier the pressure of the S ...

and Tusonibis or Tosonibis who had recently fled from

Nuevo Leon Nuevo is the Spanish word for "new". It may refer to: * Nuevo, California, a town in the state of California * Nuevo (band), featuring singer and musician Peter Godwin * Nuevo (Bayamón), a settlement in Puerto Rico * "Nuevo", Spanish-language vers ...

to join the Yojuane due to the Spanish incursion into that area. In 1709 when

Isidro de Espinosa Isidro Félix de Espinosa (1679–1755) was a Franciscan missionary from New Spain who participated in several expeditionary missions throughout the province of Tejas (modern Texas). He was the president of the missionaries from the College of S ...

met a hunting party of Yojuane the Simonos and Tusonibis were still distinct groups but also hunting with the part. In the 1740s the Yojuane along with their allies the

Deadoses The Deadose were a Native American Tribe in present-day Texas closely associated with the Jumano, Yojuane, Bidai and other groups living in the Rancheria Grande of the Brazos River in eastern Texas in the early 18th century. Like other groups ...

Mayeye The Mayeye were a Tonkawa language–speaking Native American people, who once lived in southeastern Texas. Coastal Mayeyes likely were absorbed into Karankawa communities. Inland Mayeyes likely joined larger Tonkawa communities. Name Their nam ...

s and

Ervipiames The Ervipiame or Hierbipiame were a Native people of modern Coahuila and Texas. Beginning in the 16th century Spanish settlement in what is today Northern Mexico and the accompanying diseases and slave raiding to supply ranches and mines with Nativ ...

asked for Franciscan missions to be established for them. They later moved into missions along the San Gabriel River, moving south and west of the Rancheria Grande. In March 1749 there were only 74 Yojuane people counted at the Mission San Francisco Xavier along the San Gabriel River, but there may have been others who were not in the mission. In 1759 a Yojuane camp was attacked by an expedition of Spaniards and Apaches, with by some accounts a third of the population killed, another third escaping and a third taken as captives. Other sources suggest that 55 Yojuanes were killed and 149, all women and children, were taken captive. Many of the captives died of small pox while those who survived were made into slaves. (See

Battle of the Twin Villages The Battle of the Two Villages was a Spanish attack on Taovaya villages in Texas and Oklahoma by a Spanish army in 1759. The Spanish were defeated by the Taovaya and other Wichita tribes with assistance from the Comanche. Background The Sa ...

) Among these was a boy who was sold to a Spanish soldier who gave the child the name Miguel Perez. Perez became a Hispanicized Indian of San Antonio but he continued to maintain contact with the Yojuanes. In 1786 Perez was recruited to convince the Yojuanes and their Tonkawa allies to go to war with the

Lipan Apache Lipan Apache are a band of Apache, a Southern Athabaskan Indigenous people, who have lived in the Southwest and Southern Plains for centuries. At the time of European and African contact, they lived in New Mexico, Colorado, Oklahoma, Texas, and ...

. Perez was able to convince the Yojuane such a war was advisable, and they joined with the

Tawakoni The Tawakoni (also Tahuacano and Tehuacana) are a Southern Plains Native American tribe, closely related to the Wichitas. They historically spoke a Wichita language of the Caddoan language family. Currently, they are enrolled in the Wichita and ...

Iscanis The Wichita people or Kitikiti'sh are a confederation of Southern Plains Native American tribes. Historically they spoke the Wichita language and Kichai language, both Caddoan languages. They are indigenous to Oklahoma, Texas, and Kansas. T ...

, and Flechazos in attacking the Apaches.John, ''Storms Brewed'', p. 699

Notes

Sources

*Anderson, Gary Clayton. ''The Indian Southwest, 1580-1830: Ethnogenesis and Reinvention''. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1999. *Barr, Juliana. ''Peace Came in the Form of a Woman: Indians and Spaniards in the Texas Borderlands''. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2007. *John, Elizabeth. ''Storms Brewed in Other Men's Worlds: The Confrontation of Indians, Spanish and French in the Southwest, 1540-1795''. College Station: Texas A&M University Press, 1975. {{authority control Native American tribes in Texas