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- 130521-01 Tigua Pueblo Turquoise and Coral Set in Sterling Silver Bracelet
130521-01 Tigua Pueblo Turquoise and Coral Set in Sterling Silver Bracelet
On the back, there is an etched name "Tigua." With 1 turquoise stone setting (high-grade, natural stone with great polish), one coral setting (Mediterranean coral), Sterling Silver leaves ornamentation.
4 3/4" long x 2" wide x 1" gap to slide wrist through.
71.3g 2.29ozt
This is the only piece of jewelry that we have seen with an identification of Tigua.
On the back, there is an etched name "Tigua." With 1 turquoise stone setting (high-grade, natural stone with great polish),
one coral setting (Mediterranean coral), Sterling Silver leaves ornamentation.
4 3/4" long x 2" wide x 1" gap to slide wrist through.
The Tigua are the only Puebloan tribe still in Texas. The Pueblos are a number of different Indian tribes who lived in the southwest. The southwest includes far west Texas, New Mexico, Arizona with bits of southern Colorado and Utah. All these different Puebloan tribes shared similar ways of living, even though they spoke different languages and had slightly different cultures. Other Puebloan tribes in Texas include the long gone prehistoric Pueblos along the Canadian River in the Texas Panhandle and probably the Jumano.
The Tigua called their ancestral home Pueblo Gran Quivera. Gran Quivera was north of El Paso in the Manzano Mountains southeast of Albuquerque. Manzano means Apple in Spanish so these are the Mountains of the apple. Gran Quivera was started about A D 800. By 1300 it was one of the largest Pueblos.
The Spanish explorer Coronado was the first European to see Gran Quivera in 1539. The Spanish called Gran Quivera "Pueblo de los Humanas", which means "city of the humans".
In the 1600s more Spanish came and founded missions and settlements in New Mexico around Gran Quivera. With the Spanish came diseases and epidemics that killed many of the Pueblo Indians including the Tigua of Gran Quivera. The Spanish also would take Pueblo Indians to act as slaves in their settlements.
In the 1670s there was a bad drought that lasted several years. Food was in short supply. The population of Gran Quivera dwindled and got smaller and smaller. By 1675 they were desperate so they left. They went south to the Rio Grande River near modern El Paso. They settled there and started farming. Some of the Tigua went north to live with their close relatives at Isleta Pueblo. The Isleta Puebloans spoke Tiwa like the Tigua. Gran Quivera was left abandoned. The ruins are still there and are protected by the National Park Service.