were divided into several nomadic and closely associated bands, which today mostly are organized as the Northern, Southern, and Ute Mountain Ute Tribes. Hunting and gathering groups of extended families were led by older members by the mid-17th century. Activities, like hunting buffalo and trading, may have been organized by band members. Chiefs led bands when structure was required with the introduction of horses to plan for defense, buffalo hunting, and raiding. Bands came together for tribal activities by the 18th century. Multiple bands of Utes that were classified as Uintahs by the U.S. government when they were relocated to the Ute Indian Tribe of the Uintah and Ouray Reservation. The bands included the San Pitch, Pahvant, Seuvartis, Timpanogos and Cumumba Utes. The Southern Ute Tribes include the Muache, Capote, and the Weeminuche, the latter of which are at Ute Mountain. This is also a half-Shoshone, half-Ute band of Cumumbas who lived above Great Salt Lake, near what is now Ogden, Utah. There are also other half-Ute bands, some of whom migrated seasonally far from their home domain. Relationships with other First Nations The Utes traded with Puebloans of the Rio Grande River valley at annual trade fairs or rescates held in at the Taos, Santa Clara, Pecos and other pueblos. They traded with the Navajo, Havasupai and Hopi peoples for woven blankets. The Utes were close allies with the Jicarilla Apache who shared much of the same territory and intermarried. They also intermarried with Paiute, Bannock and Western Shoshone peoples. There was so much intermarriage with the Paiute, that territorial borders of the Utes and the Southern Paiutes are difficult to ascertain in southeast Utah. Until the Ute acquired horses, any conflict with other tribes was usually defensive. They had generally poor relations with Northern and Eastern Shoshone. Contact with the Spanish The first encounter between the Utes and the Spanish occurred before 1620, perhaps as early as 1581 when they knew about the high quality deerskin produced by the Utes. They traded with the Spanish in the San Luis Valley beginning in the 1670s, in northern New Mexico beginning in the early 1700s, and in Ute villages in what is now western Colorado and eastern Utah. The Utes, the main trading partners of the Spanish residents of New Mexico, were known for their soft, high quality tanned deer skins, or chamois, and they also traded meat, buffalo robes