# The Pima Indians/Sociology/Intertribal relations

Family Organization - Social Organization - Intertribal Relations Alliances · Warfare
SOCIOLOGY
Intertribal Relations
ALLIANCES
The relations of the Pimas to their neighbors had a profound influence upon their social organization and general cultural development. They held possession of the best agricultural lands in their section of the Southwest, and were compelled to fight for the privilege. Their alliance with the Maricopas entailed a long and sanguinary struggle with the Yumas, which resulted in what Bancroft has termed "the almost total annihilation" of the latter tribe. From the Maricopas they received, however, efficient aid against their principal enemy, the Apaches. Thus the Pimas learned the advantages of confederation, and there is reason to believe that their culture, based on a thrifty system of agriculture, in time might have surpassed that of the Hohokam. The Yavapais were sometimes hostile, but do not appear to have been very formidable opponents. In the Annals there are references to a few tribes of minor importance that it is almost impossible to identify from their Pima names, but they were always allied with either the Yumas or the Apaches. Aside from the Maricopas, the tribes friendly to the Pimas were their congeners, the Papagos and Kwahadkʽs and the Sobaipuris of the Santa Cruz and San Pedro valleys.
WARFARE
Raids
A better understanding of the division of labor prevailing among these people may be had by studying the conditions imposed upon them by the presence of the aggressive Apaches. The men may be forgiven for allowing the women to perform certain tasks in the cultivation of the crops that are usually considered the portion of the stronger sex when it is learned that this plan was necessary in order to maintain pickets constantly for long periods, and that an armed guard was the sole guaranty of safety to the villages. Every three ​or four days small parties of five or ten would come to steal live stock or to kill any individual that might have gone some little distance from the villages. Larger war parties came once or twice a month, though longer periods sometimes elapsed without a visit from the Apaches. Chief Antonio declares that the Apaches formerly lived farther away from the Pimas, and hence their raids were less frequent than they were during the middle portion of the last century. At all events the activity of the enemy became sufficient to cause the abandonment of the outlying villages east of the present agency of Sacaton and the concentration of the tribe into seven villages upon the Gila plain. On stormy winter nights, when the noise of the elements might afford cover for the approach of the enemy, sentinels were posted about the camps. These men were accustomed to build little shelters of brush and leave smoldering fires in them, then conceal themselves in the darkness near by and watch for marauders that might attempt to steal toward the light. In this way the main trails were guarded, and the coyote-like curs at the houses afforded additional security from surprise. They supposed that the Apaches always guarded their own camps.
When a chief "felt in his heart" that he would like to avenge his people for some particularly flagrant outrage, or that he desired the honors that reward the successful warrior, he went from settlement to settlement making an appeal for followers by repeating conventional speeches of magic character. The arrangements for the campaign were speedily made. The preparation of the roasted meal for pinole required much less time than the ceremonies necessary to secure the requisite amount of magic power to insure victory. The extra supplies of food were carried, before the introduction of the horse, by one or more women. These women were chosen from those who had recently lost kinsmen in battle and they were invariably accompanied by a male relative. At night the party was surrounded by pickets, who came in to report at intervals. During the evening a set speech was repeated by a man whose office it was to keep appropriate speeches in memory. These were arranged in order, as "first night," "second night," etc., and were "adapted" for the occasion, though based upon the supposed speeches of the gods at the time of the creation. The valor of the party was roused by the recital of deeds performed, but the primary object was to compel the attention of supernatural beings and secure magic power that would not only enable them to overcome but would also attack the magic power of the enemy. Then, of course, if the magic power of the enemy were defeated, the Pimas could easily overpower the Apaches. After the speech the warriors sang the magic war songs, a’-atän nyuĭ, while the ​makai, or magician, swung an owl feather over them. At the close of the songs he foretold the number of the enemy that would be killed. Thus they fared forth, carrying a little roasted meal and a small but shapely basket bowl from which to eat it, provided with a little tobacco for the ceremonial smokes that wafted their individual prayers to the Sun god. A portion of each band was armed with bows and arrows; the former of the elastic mulberry wood from the same mountains in which the enemy found refuge, the latter of the straight-stemmed arrow bush, whose tufted tips waved in billowy masses on the Pimerían lowlands. When a comrade fell in battle his bow was broken and his arrow shafts were snapped and left upon the spot. Oftentimes the body of a man killed in battle was burned, though this method of disposal of the body was never employed at the villages. It may have been a survival from the time when the Pimas lived on the Colorado or it may have been recently adopted from the Maricopas, who habitually cremate their dead. On the homeward journey no fires were allowed for cooking or warmth, though with due precautions they might be built on the outward trail. Another portion of the war party was provided with circular shields of rawhide and short but heavy clubs of mesquite and ironwood. Their appeal to the God of War was expressed by the sun symbols that decorated the shields, and the latter were kept swiftly rotating upon the supple forearms of their bearers as the advance was made for hand-to-hand conflict. The frequent use of the figure, "like predatory animals or birds of prey," in the ceremonial speeches imbued all with the spirit of agility and fierceness that manifested itself in the leaps from side to side and the speed of their onward rush. Crouching low, springing quickly with whirling shield that concealed the body, in feather headdress and battle colors, they must have presented a terrifying spectacle. Their courage can not be questioned, and in some conflicts, of which there is independent white testimony, they killed several hundred warriors. But these were rare occasions, and their raids usually terminated with the loss of a man or two and the destruction of an Apache camp, with perhaps a half dozen of the enemy killed and a child taken prisoner.
The head chief, Antonio Azul, thus described to the author the circumstances of his first campaign: With 30 friendly Apaches from the San Xavier settlement, 200 Papagos, and about 500 Pimas he went up the Gila a distance of about 50 miles and encountered the enemy in the rough country around Riverside. The Apaches tied the bushes together to prevent the mounted warriors from getting ​through, so that the Pimas fought on foot. Without the advantage of surprise the ardor of the latter soon cooled, and being of divided opinion as to the advisability of pursuit, they permitted the enemy to escape with a loss of but 6. Then this by no means inconsiderable body of warriors marched bravely home again. Further accounts of more sanguinary struggles are given in The Narrative, in the present paper, page 38.
Three Pima women known to Sikaʽtcu went out on the mesa to gather cactus fruit. Another woman was asked to accompany them, but at first she refused to go because she had had a bed dream. After the others had started she set out to follow them and ran into a trap set for them at the hills south of the villages, The four captives were forced to walk naked before their enemies. Two were soon killed by the wayside. That night two Apaches were detailed to watch the other two women, These men relaxed their vigilance toward morning, whereupon the captives gathered all the bows and arrows of the party and threw them over the cliff. They also tried to strangle their captors and partially succeeded. They then made their escape. One of these brave women is yet living.
It was customary for the Pimas to attack the Apaches at night or at the earliest dawn. This required careful scouting during the preceding day in order to locate the position of the enemy, who were always at least equally alert and wary, without betraying their own presence.
On one of their raids toward the east a war party came upon a young Apache and his wife in the Sierra Tortilla. The man escaped, but the woman, named Hitalu’ĭ, was captured and brought to the villages, where she was questioned through Lâ’lâlĭ, an Apache woman who had been captured in childhood. The chief asked about the attack that had recently been made upon a party of Pimas at Ta-a’tû-kam. She replied, "I shall tell you the truth about that. I shall never take my life to my people again. I am here to my death." She was soon led to the open ground east of the Double buttes, where a death dance was held with the captive in the center of a group of old women, for it was not dangerous for them to touch the Apache. Outside the old women the other members of the community danced until at length the victim was killed by an old man who stepped upon her throat. The body was tied to a pole in an upright position and left as a warning to Apache prowlers.
These raids were not infrequent, but they could hope to reap no better reward for their efforts than revenge for past injuries, whereas the Apaches were spurred on to constantly renewed attacks for the sake of the plunder that they might secure. Thus the feral pauper preyed upon the sedentary toiler, but paid dearly in blood for his occasional prize of grain or live stock. The effect upon the two tribes ​of so strenuous a life was beginning to manifest itself in an interesting manner at the time of the intervention of the Americans. The Spaniards and Mexicans had shown their utter incapacity to cope with the Apaches, and their presence in Sonora was rather an aid to the enemy than otherwise. The Pimas were compelled to fight their own battles. In doing so they learned the advantage of concentrating their fields. They perfected a system of attack, appointed runners for bringing in assistance, and organized a fairly satisfactory method of defense. They never used smoke signals except to announce the victory of an incoming war party. They kept themselves constantly in fit condition by their campaigns, and even engaged in sham battles for the practice. These have been held within the last decade at the lower villages on the reservation. Their daily duties were ordered with reference to the possibility of attack. Their arts were modified by the perpetual menace. Their myths were developed and their religion tinged by the same stress. In short, the Pimas were building up a war cult that in time might have led them from the lethargic state in which the natural environment tended to fix them.
Lustration
There was no law among the Pimas observed with greater strictness than that which required purification and expiation for the deed that was at the same time the most lauded—the killing of an enemy. For sixteen days the warrior fasted in seclusion and observed meanwhile a number of tabus. This long period of retirement immediately after a battle greatly diminished the value of the Pimas as scouts and allies for the United States troops operating against the Apaches. The bravery of the Pimas was praised by all army officers having any experience with them, but Captain Bourke and others have complained of their unreliability, due solely to their rigid observance of this religious law.
Attended by an old man, the warrior who had to expiate the crime of blood guilt retired to the groves along the river bottom at some distance from the villages or wandered about the adjoining hills. During the period of sixteen days he was not allowed to touch his head with his fingers or his hair would turn white. If he touched his face it would become wrinkled. He kept a stick to scratch his head with, and at the end of every four days this stick was buried at the root and ​on the west side of a cat's claw tree and a new stick was made of greasewood, arrow bush, or any other convenient shrub. He then bathed in the river, no matter how cold the temperature. The feast of victory which his friends were observing in the meantime at the villages lasted eight days. At the end of that time, or when his period of retirement was half completed, the warrior might go to his home to get a fetish made from the hair of the Apache whom he had killed. The hair was wrapped in eagle down and tied with a cotton string and kept in a long medicine basket. He drank no water for the first two days and fasted for the first four. After that time he was supplied with pinole by his attendant, who also instructed him as to his future conduct, telling him that he must henceforth stand back until all others were served when partaking of food and drink. If he was a married man his wife was not allowed to eat salt during his retirement, else she would suffer from the owl disease which causes stiff limbs. The explanation offered for the observance of this law of lustration is that if it is not obeyed the warrior's limbs will become stiffened or paralyzed.
Dance in Celebration of Victory
Upon the return of a victorious war party the emotions of those who had remained at home in anxious waiting and those who had returned rejoicing were given vent in vigorous shouting and dancing. It is interesting to observe that the abandonment of these occasions was not wholly approved by the leaders, as is shown by the invariable formula that closed every war speech that was delivered while the party was on the campaign: "You may think this over, my relatives. The taking of life brings serious thoughts of the waste; the celebration of victory may become unpleasantly riotous." Throughout the ceremonies the women of the tribe play a prominent part, particularly in mourning for relatives if any have fallen victims to the attacks of the Apaches.
The dance was held on the low rounded hill near the Double buttes (see pl. XLI, a), or on a hill near the railway siding called Sacaton, or upon some alkali flat which the deposits of the rainy season leave as level and the sun bakes nearly as hard as a flour. Sometimes the dance was held on any open ground about the villages. Four basket drums were beaten in the center, while either four or ten singers formed a close circle around them. Within a larger circle numerous appointed dancers stamped and swayed their bodies, moving ever in a sinistral circuit. Sometimes the crowd danced within the circle of selected dancers, in which case they danced as individuals without holding hands; but usually they remained outside the circle. Outside the circle of spectators twenty men and two or more young women, ​according to the number of female relatives of those killed in battle kept running. In addition to these forty horsemen also circled from left to right about the whole gathering.
* ↑ Garcés relates in his Diary that the "Yabipais Tejua," [Yavapais] have in some way remained enemies of the Pimas and Cocomaricopas Gileños." Coues', On the Trail of a Spanish Pioneer, II, 449.
* ↑ "The Pimas, though not an aggressive, are a brave and warlike race. They are the dread of the Apache, who always avoids them." Sylvester Mowry in S. Ex. Doc. 11, pt. 1, 587, 35th Cong., 1st sess., 1858.
* ↑ "In battle the Indians ant not quiet fora moment, but, with constantly bended knees, leap rapidly trom side to side, waving their shield and its long streamers, for the purpose of dazzling the eyes of their adversaries. Apaches are said to oil their joints before going to battle, in order to make them supple." Whipple, Ewbank, and Turner. Report upon the Indian Tribes, in Pacific Railroad Reports, III 30.
* ↑ "All savages have to undergo certain ceremonies of lustration after returning from the war-path where any of the enemy have been killed. With the Apaches these are baths in the sweat-lodge, accompanied with singing and other rites. With the Pimas and Maricopas these ceremonies are more elaborato, and necessitate a seclusion from tho rest of the tribe for many days, fasting, bathing, and singing. The Apache 'bunches' all his religious duties at these times, and defers his bathing until he gets home, but the Pima and Maricopa are more punctilious, and resort to the rites of religion the moment a single one, either of their own numbers or of the enemy, has been laid low." John G. Bourke, On the Border with Crook, New York, 1891, 203.