Comanches

The History of a People

By: T. R. Fehrenbach

Narrated by: Jonathan Yen

Authoritative and immediate, this is the classic account of the most powerful of the American Indian tribes. T. R. Fehrenbach traces the Comanches' rise to power, from their prehistoric origins to their domination of the high plains for more than a century until their demise in the face of Anglo-American expansion.

Master horseback riders who lived in teepees and hunted bison, the Comanches were stunning orators, disciplined warriors, and the finest makers of arrows. They lived by a strict legal code and worshipped within a cosmology of magic. As he portrays the Comanche lifestyle, Fehrenbach recreates their doomed battle against European encroachment. While they destroyed the Spanish dream of colonizing North America and blocked the French advance into the Southwest, the Comanches ultimately fell before the Texas Rangers and the U.S. Army in the great raids and battles of the mid-nineteenth century. This is a classic American story, vividly and poignantly told.

©1974 T.R. Fehrenbach (P)2024 Tantor

excellent

To many know to little of America's true history. Great book. Sad on many levels.

Interesting and disturbing slice of American history

While popular history highlights the racial prejudices and shortcomings of the white settlers, Comanches provides a history revealing that not all the savages were noble. Conflict was inevitable and coexistence without compromise by the Amerindians was not possible. It is a world of many injustices, but I enjoyed learning about the settlement of the southwest and accompanying conflict it created.

TEXAS ADOPTED COMANCHE SPIRIT

To defeat the Comanche Texas Rangers inhabited the spirit of their aggressive opponents. I have long been impressed with the Texas Rangers history. Not until I listened to the history of the Comanche did I realize that they were the first Texas Rangers! By their ferocity and quick action they repelled all threats. Apaches ran from the Comanches but to all others they were known as enemies.
When the Texas Rangers were involved in the war with Mexico they were called THE DEVIL TEXANOS. SAME TACTICS AS COMANCHES rolled back Mexican resistance. The Mexican army was not afraid of the American army! No one wanted to fight Comanches or Texas Rangers for the same reasons.

the raw truth of people that were brutal but free.

this book gives an unflinching view of the Comanches. It goes into detail about their culture and their battles to preserve their land yet doesn't shy away from the horrendous nature of their raids against white settlers, which resulted in the slaughter of women and children. This book doesn't shy away from the beauty and brutality of the Comanche.

Eye opening read for American

Highly recommend for Americans looking to get better rooted with their position in this country. After a dozen books on the progression of Spain into America, this is my first tribe specific book moving into amerindian history. Though perhaps slightly dated to contemporary audiences sensitive to “savage” and “barbarian”, this book felt both authoritative and sensitive to the various peoples involved in this history. I was unaware of how long and grotesquely brutal the fight was between the Num (Comanche) and western peoples or how such an ancient people (mountain Shoshone) could be so inherently transformed by new world animals (horses) into this new “Comanche” plains culture. This book went a long way into showing how what we now understand as static and inevitable history was at their contemporary time fluid and contestable. Contrary to the image of perpetually victimized and marginalized American tribes we have today, this book shows how formidable, terrifying and unbeatable these amerindians were to Spanish, Mexicans and Americans for centuries. The story becomes much more a clash of cultures than of an inevitable domination of a weaker people by some superior culture. It resurrects Agency (both redeeming and damning) for a group of unique people that has subsequently been catalogued as vanquished people with little choice in how history proceeded. These were ferocious fighters and proud people who could not exist inside the vision European settlers had for the future of this land, and so eventually demanded the complete extermination of buffalo and removal of all Indians to reservations.

It also provides essential context for understanding how América continued to progress into the present. An exemplary quote that I felt offered a very useful puzzle piece for understanding race relations of the last century can be found in part 4, chapter 1: “Unlike the Spanish, the British-Americans were not accustomed to accepted hierarchies and legal caste or class distinctions, and this democracy actually worked ferociously against inferior peoples and cultures. Under Spanish law an Indio or negro could be enslaved while still retaining his essential humanity and certain rights before society. A people who insisted on equal, inalienable rights for all citizens, however could only subordinate non-citizens by making them into animals. Negro slaves were chattels, like livestock, under Anglo-American law. The Indians became, in effect, trespassing vermin on American soil. By the early nineteenth century, such policies had hardened into accepted law.” This type of insight can be found throughout this book for a range of topics.

Highly recommend. There is much more to say, but you will find it yourself in the book. Solid voice work also 👍

So intense

Very well narrated. A vey different and descriptive account of all the brutality and the quest for survival by the American Indian.

Story of more than just Comanches

The book started out slow but did get more interesting later. The here was a lot about all Native tribes not just Comanches. For those wanting a good story about how the Native Americans lived it is a good reference.

In Depth

It's great. It has more depth on the subject than just about anything out there.

History without bias

This was a long listen. The author and the narrator did a good job of presenting history without editorializing their own opinion. I learned many things that I did not know about both sides of the struggle for existence. Among human beings. This book is probably too long for a young people to read.. Historical events that take place over several hundred years cannot be covered adequately in a short two hour TV program. I would like to see this taught, however, in our schools.

Explains both sides

Fehrenbach tells it like it was. He explains it in great detail, warts and all. There was no way the amerindians and the settlers could exist together.