During an excavation in the 1950s, archaeologists discovered the 
bones of a prehistoric woman in Midland County, Texas, and 
dubbed her "Midland Minnie." Some believed her age to be between 
twenty thousand and thirty-seven thousand years, making her 
remains the oldest ever found in the Western Hemisphere. While 
the accuracy of these dates remains disputed, the find, along 
with countless others, demonstrates the wealth of human history 
that is buried beneath Texas soil.

    By the time the Europeans arrived in Texas in 1528, Native 
Texans included the mound-building Caddos of East Texas; the 
Karankawas and Atakapas who fished the Texas coast; the town-
dwelling Jumanos along the Rio Grande; the hunting-gathering 
Coahuiltecans in South Texas; and the corn-growing Wichitas in 
the Panhandle. All of these native peoples had developed 
structures, traditions, governments, religions, and economies 
enabling them to take advantage of the land's many resources. 
When the Europeans arrived, they brought horses, metal tools and 
weapons, new diseases, and new ideas, all of which began to 
reshape the lives of Texas Indians.

    Over time, Texas became home to horse-mounted, buffalo-
hunting Apaches, Comanches, and Kiowas and a refuge for Puebloan 
Tiguas, Alabama-Coushattas, Kickapoos, and many others. These 
groups traded, shared ideas, fought, and made peace with one 
another as well as with peoples outside of Texas. This book tells
the story of all of these groups, their societies and cultures, and
how they changed over the years.

    Author David La Vere offers a complete chronological and 
cultural history of Texas Indians from twelve thousand years ago 
to the present day. He presents a unique view of their cultural 
history  before and after European arrival, examining Indian 
interactions—both peaceful and violent—with Europeans, Mexicans, 
Texans, and Americans.

    This book is the first full examination of the history of Texas
Indians in more than forty years.

_________________________________________________________

DAVID LA VERE is a professor at the University of North Carolina,
Wilmington. He is the editor of Life among the Texas Indians and
the author of other books on Indian history.


Number Ninety-five: Centennial Series of the Association of 
Former Students, Texas A&M University


What people are saying about this book

“ . . . the current definitive survey of Texas Indians . . .”—H-Net 
Reviews, Summer 2007

"This is a refreshingly candid, frank analysis of native Texans . . . La 
Vere's title is a major contribution to Texas history and will be of 
immense value to teachers, students, scholars, and general readers 
of Texana."—Review of Texas Books, Fall 2006

"La Vere has produced a masterful synthesis of history, archaeology, 
and anthropology that lays out the very complex story of why there 
are so many cowboys and so few Indians in Texas. Written in a lively 
style, it should appeal to a wide, general audience, we hope, who will 
learn much that they did not know before and come to appreciate the 
often tragic fate of Texas's original inhabitants."—The Journal of 
Southern History, August 2006

“. . . La Vere has presented a masterwok of historical scholarship 
which is destined to become the seminal work on the subject of 
the various Indian peoples that once called Texas home. La 
Vere's discussion is Indian history at its finest.”—The Chronicles 
of Oklahoma, Summer 2005

“La Vere has taken a wider range of themes and communities. 
This approach establishes The Texas Indians as the new 
standard on the subject for academics and non-academics 
alike.”—Indian Country Today

“Grounded in solid historical research but also sparkling with 
anthropological insight, La Vere brilliantly succeeds in a 
difficult task—revealing the shared history of Texas Indian 
groups while simultaneously exploring their dizzying cultural 
diversity. Teachers, students, scholars, and the general reader 
of Texana are indebted to David La Vere for this major new
contribution to Texas history.”—Gregg Cantrell, Texas Christian
University