Our institution in the lower Rio Grande Valley of Texas sits on the ancestral land of the Karankawa, Tāp Pīlam Coahuiltecan, Ndé Kónitsąąíí Gokíyaa (Lipan Apache), Carrizo/Comecrudo, and Rayados/Borrados. We acknowledge and pay respect to their Elders and their past, present, and future peoples, cultures, languages, and communities.
This research guide aims to help students interested on researching the Coahuiltecan peoples of South Texas. Provided are a secondary sources and published research held by the UTRGV Special Collections and Archives in physical and digital repositories. Primary sources on Coahuiltecan people are not available via our institution but information has been provided for accessing external resources.
We strongly recommend visiting the website for the Tap Pilam Coahuiltecan Nation.
Native Land is an app to help map Indigenous territories, treaties, and languages.
IMPORTANT: UTRGV Special Collections and Archives recognizes Native American Sovereignty and seeks to accurately and respectfully honor and represent the heritage, history, and culture of indigenous people using their preferred terminology. Therefore, our staff welcome suggestions for restorative efforts to improve description and representation.
Coahuiltecans were one of the indigenous groups that occupied the Rio Grande delta area of South Texas. Unlike most native groups, there is no set example of Coahuiltecan culture. This is because the Coahuiltecans are actually multiple native groups placed into a larger group which was labeled the Coahuiltecans after the Mexican state of Coahuila. Most sources on this list can provide examples of what types of food were eaten, how they obtained food, how they would move, and even how they would fight. What sources will lack is the ability to describe the distinct cultural identities of the groups that made up the Coahuiltecans.
At one time there were over 200 bands of Coahuiltecan people living on the South Texas plan. They were nomadic, hunter-gathers, who lived off what the land had to offer, including plants, nuts, berries, fish, reptiles, and large and small game (rabbits, birds, javelinas, bison, and deer). It is also believed the Coahuiltecan processed mesquite tree bean bods into meal or flour by grinding them on metate, or a flat stone surface. They hunted game with bows/arrows and throwing sticks and fished using nets and spears.
The Bexar Archives are described on the Briscoe Center for American History website as “the official Spanish documents that preserve the political, military, economic, and social life of the Spanish province of Texas and the Mexican state of Coahuila y Texas. Both in their volume and breadth of subject matter, the Bexar Archives are an important source for the history of Hispanic Texas up to 1836.” Included with these documents of the past of Spanish Texas are the interactions between the Spanish settlers and the indigenous peoples of Texas. These sources are useful for getting a sense of how the Spanish settlers interacted with natives, what they thought about them, and overall how they treated them. The Bexar Archives contents can be viewed translated or in their original form online or through the UTRGV Special Collections and Archives microfilm collection.
The Indigenous Cultures Institute was founded in 2006 by members of the Miakan/Garza Band, one of the over six hundred bands that resided in Texas and northeastern Mexico when the Spaniards first arrived. The site provides access to a wealth of programs and resources, including the Coahuiltecan language, Nakum Journal, sacred sites, performances, and more.
Texas Beyond History (TBH) is a public education service of the Texas Archeological Research Laboratory at the University of Texas at Austin, in partnership with the Department of Anthropology at Texas State University and these 15 partners. Begun in 2001, it interprets and shares the results of archeological and historical research on the cultural heritage of Texas with the citizens of Texas and the world.
A project of The University of Texas at Arlington Center for Greater Southwestern Studies and UTA Libraries that seeks to map sites of conflict between Native Americans and Euro-Americans in Texas from the creation of the First Mexican Republic to the outbreak of the U.S.-Mexico War (1821-1846)
IndigenousMexico.org is a culmination of decades of research by John P. Schmal, a historian, genealogist, and lecturer. He specializes in the genealogical research and Indigenous history of several Mexican states, especially Chihuahua, Nayarit Zacatecas, Jalisco and Guanajuato. He is also the author of several books
William Bennett is a former student assistant at Special Collections & Archives. He is currently pursuing a Bachelor of Arts degree in mass communication at UTRGV with minors in history and anthropology. William hopes to pursue a career in either broadcast or print journalism in the future, but he still has an interest in history. During his time with Special Collections & Archives, William collaborated and assisted with the creation of several exhibits and events and compiled resources for research guides.
The research guides compiled by UTRGV staff and students are intended to assist patrons who are embarking upon new research endeavors. Our goal is to expand their knowledge of the types of resources available on a given topic, including books, archival materials, and websites. In so doing, our compilers have taken care to include collections, digital items, and resources that may be accessed not only through UTRGV but also via other institutions, repositories, and websites.
We wholeheartedly respect the research interests of others. Therefore, please contact us if you wish to submit a resource for consideration, or if you have a question about or an issue with a specific cited resource.
An assessment of the archeological resources of Padre Island National Seashore, Texa by
eBook available
The Indians of Texas: From Prehistoric to Modern Times (eBook) by
"Newcomb's book is likely to remain the best general work on Texas Indians for a long time." -- American Antiquity "The Indians of Texas, by W. W. Newcomb, Jr., is an excellent and long-needed survey of the ethnography of the Indian tribes who resided within the present limits of Texas since the beginning of the historic period.... The book is the most comprehensive. scholarly, and authoritative account covering all the Indians of Texas, and is an invaluable and indispensable reference for students of Texas history, for anthropologists, and for lovers of Indian lore." -- Ethnohistory "Dr. Newcomb writes persuasively and with economy, and he has used his material very well indeed.... his presentation makes good reading of what might have been a book only for the specialists." -- Saturday Review
Indians of the Rio Grande Delta by
Certain to become a standard reference in its field, Indians of the Rio Grande Delta is the first single-volume source on these little-known peoples. Working from innumerable primary documents in various Texan and Mexican archives, Martin Salinas has compiled data on more than six dozen named groups that inhabited the area in the sixteenth through the eighteenth centuries. Depending on available information, he reconstructs something of their history, geographical range and migrations, demography, language, and culture. He also offers general information on various unnamed groups of Indians, on the lifeways of the indigenous peoples, and on the relations between the Indian groups and the colonial Spanish missions in the region.
Linguistic material from the tribes of southern Texas and northeastern Mexico by
Resource is also available online from the Smithsonian: https://repository.si.edu/bitstream/handle/10088/15429/bulletin1271940smit.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y
Native American Peoples of South Texas by
Preface: "More than 120 years ago, Frederick Jackson Turner
commented on the closing of the American frontier as a defining
characteristic of America. Today, “parts unknown” and “terra
incognita” are not terms we normally associate with our
knowledge of the modern United States. Over these six score
years, the country has been mapped by geographers, its natural
resources have been documented by geologists, and its Native
peoples, both prehistoric and historic have been studied by
anthropologists, archaeologists, and historians. Yet, in some
corners of the country, our knowledge of these aspects of our past
is slim to nonexistent, a tabula rasa. The interior of deep south
Texas-Hidalgo, Starr, and Zapata Counties- is one such region. "
This link opens in a new windowExplore the links below:
Maximize your time and effort. Let our staff assist you with finding and accessing resources online.
We also invite you to schedule an appointment to meet one-on-one with a member of our Special Collections & Archives staff. Schedule an on-campus research visit or choose to meet online (video chat).