Manso Indians

The Manso Indians lived along the Rio Grande near El Paso, Texas from the 16th to the 18th century. Their descendants remain in the area to this day.

Who were they?

The Mansos were semi-nomadic hunter-gatherers who practiced little if any agriculture although farming Indians lived both upstream and downstream from them. They may have been related to the Suma Indians and Jumano Indians who lived nearby. Their language was not recorded but authorities have theorized that they spoke a Uto-Aztecan, Tanoan, or Athabaskan (Apache) language.

History

The first account of the Mansos is from the expedition of Spanish explorer Antonio de Espejo in 1583. Traveling up the Rio Grande River in search of the Pueblo Indians of New Mexico, Espejo encountered a people he called Tampachoas below El Paso. “We found a great number of people living near some lagoons through the midst of which the Rio del Norte [Rio Grande] flows. These people, who must have numbered more than a thousand men and women, and who were settled in their rancherias and grass hunts, came out to receive us…Each one brought us his present of mesquite bean…fish of many kinds, which are very plentiful in these lagoons, and other kinds of food…During the three days and nights we were there they continually performed …dances in their fashion, as well as after the manner of the Mexicans.” ^[1]

However, The Chamuscado and Rodriguez Expedition had passed by the same lagoons in July 1581 and had found them uninhabited.^[2] The inference is that the Manso were nomadic, living only part of the year along the Rio Grande and passing the remainder of the year hunting and gathering food in the surrounding deserts and mountains. They seemed to have ranged westwards from the Rio Grande to Casas Grandes and Janos Mexico.^[3]

Espejo’s Tampachoas were probably the same people who Juan de Onate found in the same area fifteen years later in May 1598 and called Mansos. Onate and his large expedition forded the Rio Grande near Socorro, Texas assisted by 40 ‘’manxo” Indians. Manso, he said, meant “peaceful.” Their name for themselves is unknown.^[4]

In 1630, a Spanish priest described the Mansos as people “who do not have houses, but rather pole structures. Nor do they sow; they do not dress in anything particular; but all are nude and only the women cover themselves from the waist down with deerskins.” In 1663, a Spaniard said of them. “The nation of Manso Indians is so barbarous and uncultivated that all its members go naked and, although the country is very cold, they have no houses in which to dwell, but live under the trees, not even knowing how to till the land for their food.” ^[5] The Mansos were also said to eat fish and meat raw. But they were described somewhat favorably as “a robust people, tall, and with good features, although they take pride in bedaubing themselves with powder of different colors which makes them look very ferocious.”^[6]

The Spanish established a mission among the Mansos but they were of minor concern until the 1680s when the survivors of the Pueblo Revolt in New Mexico took refuge in the new settlement of El Paso. In El Paso the Manso established close relations with the refugee Piro and Tiwa (Tigua) Indians. The stress on the region of supporting the 2,000 Spanish and Indian refugees was doubtless considerable and the Manso soon belied their “peaceful” name.

In 1682, the Governor in El Paso reported that the Manso and the Suma had revolted and attacked Janos. On March 14, 1684, friendly Tiwas and Piros told the governor of a Manso plot to kill all the Spaniards in El Paso. The Manos were “tired of everything having to do with God and with the church, which is why they wanted to do what the Indians of New Mexico had done.” ^[7] The Spanish took prisoners the ringleaders of the plot, which included an Apache and a Quivira Indian (probably a Wichita). Ten of them were executed and later, in November, the Spanish garrison of 60 men plus friendly Indians was used to attack a gathering of hostile Indians who apparently intended to carry out the plot.^[8]

Following the revolt the Manso increasingly melted into the de-tribalized atmosphere of El Paso. Disease and Apache raids decimated their numbers. By 1765, El Paso had 2,469 Spanish inhabitants and only 249 Indians, tribes unspecified.^[9] Nevertheless, the Manso survived as members of the combined Piro-Manso-Tiwa (PMT) tribe. In the 19th century members of the group migrated to the village of Tortugas near Las Cruces, New Mexico and founded the Pueblo of San Juan de Guadalupe.^[10] In 2000, there were 206 people on the tribal rolls of the PMT tribe.^[11]

References

1. ^ Bolton, Herbert Eugene. Spanish Explorations in the Southwest, 1542-1706. New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1916, 175
2. ^ Hammond, George P. and Rey, Agapito. The Rediscovery of New Mexico, 1580-1594. Albuquerque: U of NM Press, 1966, 80
3. ^ ”Foraging Peoples: Chisos and Mansos." http://www.texasbeyondhistory.net/trans-p/peoples/foragers.html, accessed May 11, 2010
4. ^ ”Foraging Peoples: Chisos and Mansos.” http://www.texasbeyondhistory.net/trans-p/peoples/foragers.html, accessed May 9, 2010
5. ^ http://www.texasbeyondhistory.net/trans-p/peoples/foragers.html, accessed May 9, 2010
6. ^ ”Life on the Margin.” http://www.desertusa.com/ind1/ind_new/ind16.html, accessed May 10, 2010
7. ^ Polt, John H. R., ed. “Investigation of the Rebellion of the Manso Indians and their Allies carried out by Domingo Jironza Petriz de Cruzate, Governor of New Mexico…from 15 March to 3 November 1684,” 66. http://escholarship.org/uc/item/02w6f5bs, accessed May 11, 2010
8. ^ Polt, 88, 95-99 http://escholarshrip.org/uc/item/02w6f5bs, accessed May 11, 2010
9. ^ ”Foraging Peoples: Chisos and Mansos” http://www.texasbeyondhistory.net/trans-p/peoples/foragers.html
10. ^ Campbell, Howard. “Tribal synthesis: Piros, Mansos, and Tiwas through history.” Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute, Vol. 12, 2006. 310-302
11. ^ http://www.fourdir.com/piro.htm

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