Comanches: The History of a People [Paperback]

T.R. Fehrenbach (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 8, 2003

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 re-creates 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.

Editorial Reviews

Review

“For a complete history of the Comanches, this book probably has no equal.” –Dee Brown, author of Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee

“This is a very good book. Like virtually all good books about the American Indian, it tells a tragic story, but unlike many of them, it tells it well. The author has mastered an extensive and complex subject: he is flexible, well-organized, and sensitive.” –Larry McMurtry

“Fehrenbach is a highly interpretive and original writer, whose work rests on solid scholarship. His book ranges grandly across the disciplines from folklore to anthropology to history.” –Southwestern Historical Quarterly

From the Back Cover

“For a complete history of the Comanches, this book probably has no equal.” –Dee Brown, author of Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee

“This is a very good book. Like virtually all good books about the American Indian, it tells a tragic story, but unlike many of them, it tells it well. The author has mastered an extensive and complex subject: he is flexible, well-organized, and sensitive.” –Larry McMurtry

“Fehrenbach is a highly interpretive and original writer, whose work rests on solid scholarship. His book ranges grandly across the disciplines from folklore to anthropology to history.” –Southwestern Historical Quarterly

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 592 pages
• Publisher: Anchor (April 8, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1400030498
• ISBN-13: 978-1400030491
• Product Dimensions: 5.1 x 1.2 x 8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (31 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #42,646 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #63 in Books > History > Americas > Native American

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

59 of 62 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Comanches -- The Destruction of a People, April 21, 2000

By A Customer

This review is from: Comanches (Paperback)

An excellent book!

In this book, Mr. Fehrenbach provides a valuable service in this day and age when he describes, unflinchingly, the utter savagery employed by Indian tribes' particular brand of "warfare" - not warfare at all really but more of a rite of passage for males in the band. A rite in which the systematic rape, mutilation and gruesome torture of one's helpless captives was considered perfectly acceptable - and not limited to only white men, women and children either - other enemy Indian tribes were just as imperiled. He also pulls no punches with regard to the reciprocating treachery, hatred and savagery employed Europeans settlers. But, more important than anything that could be construed as fault-finding, he highlights the underlying cultural ethos that were at work when describing the clash of cultures that occurred between red men and white and brings home the inevitableness of this clash and the hopelessness of accommodating the Indian's way of life amid the title wave of immigration and settlement that occurred throughout the 19th century.

This book should be required reading in all our Colleges and Universities.

39 of 42 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars WD in Texas, October 2, 2001

By A Customer

This review is from: Comanches (Paperback)

An outstanding work of narrative history. Fehrenbach occasionally refers to works he has cited but most often presses forward with the story uninterrupted by footnotes. A bibliography is included following the text.
This is a wide-ranging look at the Comanche spanning their first known origins and their ethnic, cultural, and environmental evolution into the ultimate horse Indians. The tribe's history is set in the context of the history of the land they occupied. First, Fehrenbach lays out the Spanish conquest of northern Mexico, and the imperial policies that governed their frontier, and delineates how those policies and practices fostered the advance of Comanches as a horse culture built on raiding and marauding. Then with the demise of the Spanish as a power, he juxtaposes the Comanche against the advancing Anglo-Texan population. Not only does this paint a complete picture of the Comanche, it provides an overview of the history of the region and great insight into the differing approaches to empire among the Spanish, French, and Anglos and the results those policies produced on the ground. Not dull stuff at all the way he tells it.
Fehrenbach's writing style is fluid and transparent, designed to tell the story not to draw undue attention to himself as a writer. He has a novelitst's sense of pace and drama that never allows the story to bog down. He also has an eye for character and detail that deftly draws together the telling elements that make his vignettes poignant and memorable. Most of all, however, he formulates deductive historical insights that pinpoint the causative factors shaping the direction of history. And all this in a text as readable as a finely crafted novel.

30 of 33 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Early Texans at their very best., November 15, 1999

By 

Edward E. Rudder ([e-mail]) (Boerne, Texas, USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Comanches (Paperback)

This book describes the history and destruction of the Commanche people in a manner that makes the book hard to put down. More importantly the story of the interactions of the Commanche people, the Spaniards, Mexicans, Texans, and Americans are portrayed in the fairest manner possible. There are no good guys, no bad guys, just people doing what they had to do to survive. Fehrenbach's insight into the Commanche ethos allows one to understand why European based cultures had to fear them, hate them, and at the same time respect them and actually feel proud that such a people existed. At the same time I have become more proud of my Texan ancestors whether they be White, Indian, or Mexican. I now understand why the Commanche people and the American or Texan peoples could not have coexisted. Tragically, one had to be exterminated.