Editing Comanche (section)

===Formation===
[[File:Uto-Aztecan map.svg|thumb|Pre-contact distribution of [[Uto-Aztecan languages]]]]
The Proto-Comanche movement to the Plains was part of the larger phenomenon known as the "Shoshonean Expansion" in which that language family spread across the Great Basin and across the mountains into Wyoming. The Kotsoteka ("Bison Eaters") were probably among the first. Other groups followed. Contact with the Shoshones of Wyoming was maintained until the 1830s when it was broken by the advancing Cheyennes and Arapahoes.

After the [[Pueblo Revolt]] of 1680, various Plains peoples acquired horses, but it was probably some time before they were very numerous. As late as 1725, Comanches were described as using large dogs rather than horses to carry their bison-hide "campaign tents".<ref name="Kavanagh 66">Kavanagh 66</ref>

Horses became a key element in the emergence of a distinctive Comanche culture. They were of such strategic importance that some scholars suggested that the Comanche broke away from the Shoshone and moved south to search for additional sources of horses among the settlers of [[New Spain]] to the south (rather than search for new herds of buffalo). The Comanche have the longest documented existence as horse-mounted Plains peoples; they had horses when the Cheyenne still lived in earth lodges.<ref>Kavanagh 7</ref>

The Comanche supplied horses and mules to all comers. As early as 1795, Comanche were selling horses to Anglo-American traders.<ref name="Kavanagh 63">Kavanagh 63</ref> and by the mid-19th century, Comanche-supplied horses were flowing into St. Louis via other Indian middlemen (Seminole, Osage, Shawnee).<ref>Kavanagh 380</ref>

Their original [[Pre-modern human migration|migration]] took them to the southern [[Great Plains]], into a sweep of territory extending from the [[Arkansas River]] to central Texas. The earliest references to them in the Spanish records date from 1706, when reports reached Santa Fe that Utes and Comanches were about to attack.<ref name="Kavanagh 63"/> In the Comanche advance, the Apaches were driven off the Plains. By the end of the 18th century, the struggle between Comanche and Apache had assumed legendary proportions; in 1784, in recounting the history of the southern Plains, <!-- Coahuila y --> Texas Governor [[Domingo Cabello y Robles]] recorded that some 60 years earlier (i.e., ''circa'' 1724), the Apache had been routed from the Southern Plains in a nine-day battle at La Gran Sierra del Fierro, the "Great Mountain of Iron", somewhere northwest of Texas. but no other record, documentary or legendary, of such a fight has been found.<ref name="Kavanagh 66"/>

They were formidable warriors, who developed strategies for using traditional weapons for fighting on horseback. Warfare was a major part of Comanche life. Their raids into Mexico traditionally took place during the full moon, when they could see to ride at night. This led to the term "Comanche Moon", during which the Comanche raided for horses, captives, and weapons.<ref>Wallace and Hoebel</ref> Comanche raids, especially in the 1840s, reached hundreds of miles deep into Mexico, devastating northern parts of the country.<ref>Kavanagh (1996)</ref>