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SEPTEMBER 2016
PA R K E R C O U N T Y T O D AY
Phoenix
Transmission
86
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Transmission Shop Since 1983.
1304 Mineral Wells Highway • Weatherford, TX 76086
817-599-7680
Continued from page 83
“[The discovery of the horse in
the 17th century] brought about an
immediate and sweeping change in
the life of the Comanches that was
even more drastic than in the case
of most other Indians,” wrote Ernest
Wallace and E. Adamson Hoebel
in their seminal work on the tribe
The Comanches: Lords of the South
Plains, published in 1952. The horse
might as well have been the Pegasus, because it gave the Comanches
“wings.” They were no longer bipeds
limited by their own physicality but
mounted demigods darting across
the plains and prairies with the wind
in their hair and seemingly limitless
opportunity before them. They called
the horse the “God-dog.” Before they
acquired the horse the Comanches
used dogs as their beasts of burden.
The horse was like a dog on steroids,
a super dog.
Whereas the dog could pull only
relatively light loads — travois carrying meager household appurtenances,
clothing, weapons, food, etc. — the
far larger and incomparably muscular
horse could move much larger loads
over longer distances at greater speed
and were much easier to feed. The
People’s horizons expanded. They
became highly mobile.
Unlike dogs, horses could be
eaten, though this usually occurred
only when game became scarce and
the pangs of hunger necessitated a
change in menu. Though nutritious,
dog meat was taboo.
Wallace and Hoebel wrote: “Dog
meat was regarded as an almost
sacred dish by the Sioux, and to the
Cheyennes ‘a nice fat, boiled puppy
[was] just like a turkey on Thanksgiving to you white people.’ But the
Comanches did not eat dog meat… .”
One explanation offered by
“Medicine Woman,” the authors
wrote, was that once the tribe broke
camp, leaving only a very old woman
and a dog behind. Upon their return
weeks later they found the dog had
eaten most of the woman’s flesh.
Therefore, since the dog would eat
human flesh, the Comanche would
not eat the dog. But most likely there
is a deeper reason for their refusal
to eat dog, something to do with the
“coyote taboo.”
“Dog is Coyote’s cousin, and
Coyote is taboo,” wrote Wallace
and Hoebel. “He is the Trickster of
Comanche and Shoshone mythology — a demigod. Although coyotes