The_Mimbres_River_-_Flickr_-_aspidoscelis

The Mimbreños were a sub-tribe of

Apache The Apache ( ) are several Southern Athabaskan language-speaking peoples of the Southwestern United States, Southwest, the Southern Plains and Northern Mexico. They are linguistically related to the Navajo. They migrated from the Athabascan ho ...

, Native Americans, who were based in

New Mexico New Mexico is a state in the Southwestern United States, Southwestern region of the United States. It is one of the Mountain States of the southern Rocky Mountains, sharing the Four Corners region with Utah, Colorado, and Arizona. It also ...

. Their territory included the narrow valley of the

Mimbres River The Mimbres is a river in southwestern New Mexico. Course The Mimbres forms from snowpack and runoff on the southwestern slopes of the Aldo Leopold Wilderness in the Black Range at in Grant County. The river ends in the Guzmán Basin, a s ...

to the

Rio Grande The Rio Grande ( or ) in the United States or the Río Bravo (del Norte) in Mexico (), also known as Tó Ba'áadi in Navajo language, Navajo, is one of the principal rivers (along with the Colorado River) in the Southwestern United States a ...

into the

Mimbres Mountains The Black Range (also called the Devil's Mountains or Sierra Diablo) is an igneous mountain range running north–south in Sierra, Grant, and Catron counties in southwest New Mexico, in the Southwestern United States. Description The range's ...

and the

Cook's Range The Cookes Range (Cooke's Range, Cooks Range or Cook's Range) is a small, 17-mi (27 km) long mountain range in northern Luna County, New Mexico, which extends slightly north into southeastern Grant County. The range is a southern continua ...

. The band in the Mimbres valley is known as the Tchihende band. Mimbres Apache merged into the

Chiricahua Apache Chiricahua ( ) is a band of Apache Native Americans. Based in the Southern Plains and Southwestern United States, the Chiricahua historically shared a common area, language, customs, and intertwined family relations with their fellow Apaches. ...

, and today many of their descendants are enrolled with the

Fort Sill Apache The Fort Sill Apache Tribe of Oklahoma is the federally recognized Native American tribe of Chiricahua Warm Springs Apache in Oklahoma. Government The Fort Sill Apache Tribe is headquartered in Apache, Oklahoma. Tribal member enrollment, which ...

in Oklahoma. They should not be confused with the

Mimbres culture The Mogollon culture ( ) is a pre-historic archaeological culture of Native American peoples from Southern New Mexico and Arizona, Northern Sonora and Chihuahua, and Western Texas. The northern part of this region is Oasisamerica, while the sout ...

, a precontact

Ancestral Pueblo people The Ancestral Puebloans, also known as Ancestral Pueblo peoples or the Basketmaker-Pueblo culture, were an ancient Native American culture of Pueblo peoples spanning the present-day Four Corners region of the United States, comprising southe ...

Civic works

The Mimbreños developed an

irrigation Irrigation (also referred to as watering of plants) is the practice of applying controlled amounts of water to land to help grow crops, landscape plants, and lawns. Irrigation has been a key aspect of agriculture for over 5,000 years and has bee ...

system in the Mimbres Valley which made it possible for the band to stay in one place.Ackerly, Neal W. (1997). Mimbreno and Gileno Apache Irrigation Systems, 1853-1859. The Kiva (Tucson, Ariz.), 62(4), 349-63. This was different from nomadic Apache groups; however, the irrigation system ultimately failed.

Notable Mimbreños

Mangas Coloradas Mangas Coloradas or Mangus-Colorado (La-choy Ko-kun-noste, alias "Red Sleeves"), or Dasoda-hae (c. 1793 – January 18, 1863) was an Apache tribal chief and a member of the Mimbreño (Tchihende) division of the Central Apaches, whose homela ...

, 19th-century chief *

Victorio Victorio (Bidu-ya, Beduiat; ca. 1825–October 14, 1880) was a warrior and chief of the Warm Springs band of the Tchihendeh (or Chihenne, often called Mimbreño) division of the central Apaches in what is now the American states of Texas ...

(ca. 1824–1880), chief

References

Apache tribes Athabaskan peoples Native American history of New Mexico {{NorthAm-native-stub