Gulfwestern People Specific Native American Tribes Geographic Region

Gulfwestern People Specific Native American Tribes Geographic Region Inhabited Types of shelter Lifestyle Food Legacy

The Gulfwestern People Coahuiltecans & Karankawas

First things first… One very important fact about this so-called tribe. There is no one "Coahuiltecian" tribe or culture. It never existed. There is a Coahuiltecan group or region in South Texas made up of over a hundred similar Indian cultures. These Natives of the Coahuiltecan region shared very similar ways of living. But they were not one tribe or culture. Like the Coahuiltecans, the Karankawa Indians were several band or maybe even several tribes. We are not sure, because much of the history of the Karankawa is lost.

The Gulfwestern People lived throughout south Texas and in the lagoons and bays along the Gulf Coastal Plains.

Karankawas would seasonally set up large fishing camps and make tools. Coahuiltecans often used thin branches bent to the ground and covered with animal skins or grasses to make huts. Texasbeyondhistory. net and Texasindians. com

These people were known to live off the land eat seasonally. Go days/months with little or no food. fishing and hunted everything from deer to mice. Gathered berries/nuts their favorite foods – the pecan and the prickly pear cactus. Texasbeyondhistory. net

Hunters sometimes “hunted” deer using “surround” fires. Texasbeyondhistory. net With bows and arrow ready, a Karankawas man in a dugout canoe watches for passing fish off the Texas coast.

Meeting the Spanish The Spanish explorer Cabeza de Vaca met the Karankawa group of people and lived with them for many months. When he and his friends went back they wrote The Relacion, an account of their time with the group. He described them as tall (near 6 ft), muscular, the men stark naked, with lower lip and nipples peirced, covered in alligator grease (to fight off mosquitos), happy, and generous. Indigenouspeople. net

An excerpt… “No foods were continuously plentiful, when the harvest was good they gorged at repletion. Unique in their gluttony…they eat locusts, lice, even human flesh…raw meat, bear’s fat…passion for spoiled food…. In spring they might subsist exclusively on oysters, then for a month they ate blackberries. ” The Relacion Cabeza de Vaca

Meeting the French • The French explorer La Salle shipwrecked near Galveston. Texasbeyondhistory. com

What happened to these people? ? • The Karankawa are all gone now. • Disappeared sometime in the early 1800 s. In 1840 only about 100 Karankawas were left. By 1850 they were gone. Probably from disease. • Survivoring Coahuiltecans today are the many Native Texan Hispanic families in South Texas & probably has Coahuiltecan blood in the family. • The culture and languages these people spoke are completely gone now. Texasindians. com