Mescaleros Apache Indians (Spanish: `mescal people,’ from their custom of eating mescal). An Apache tribe which formed a part of the Faraones and Vaqueros of different periods of the Spanish history of the southwest. Their principal range was between the Rio Grande and the Pecos in New Mexico, but it extended also into the Staked plains and southward into Coahuila, Mexico.
They were never regarded as so warlike as the Apache of Arizona, otherwise they were generally similar. Mooney 1 records the following divisions:
- Nataina
- Tuetinini
- Tsihlinainde
- Guhlkainde
- Tahuunde
These bands intermarry, and each had its chief and suhchief. The Guhlkainde are apparently identical with the “Cuelcajenne” of Orozco y Berra and others, who classed them as a division of the Llaneros; the “Natages” are probably the same as the Nataina rather than the Lipan or the Kiowa Apache, while the Tsihlinainde seem to be identifiable with the “Chilpaines.” In addition Orozco y Berra gives the Lipillanes as a Llanero division.
The Mescaleros are now (1905) on a reservation of 474,240 acres in southern New Mexico, set apart for them in 1873. Population 460 in 1905, including about a score of Lipan, q. v.
- Mooney, field notes, B. A. E., 1897[↩]
