Title: Piro Tribe of New Mexico & Texas – Legends of America
Headings: Piro Tribe of New Mexico & Texas
Piro Tribe of New Mexico & Texas
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Content: In 1630, the Piro were estimated to have numbered 6,000 people but were being seriously harassed by the Apache. The 14 villages along the Rio Grande occupied by the Piro in 1630 were reduced to only four, half a century later. Abo Mission and Kiva by the National Park Service
The area occupied by the Piro of the Salinas extended from the Pueblo of Abo southeast to and including the pueblo of Tabira, commonly called “ Gran Quivira ,” a distance of about 25 miles. The habitat of the eastern Piro was even more desert in character than that of the eastern Tigua, which bounded it on the north, for the Arroyo de Abo, on which Abo pueblo was situated. The first actual missions among the Piro pueblos of the Salinas were established in 1629 by Francisco de Acevedo at Abo and Tabira, and probably also at a place called Tenabo, but before the massive-walled churches and monasteries were completed, the village dwellers of both the Salinas and the Rio Grande suffered so seriously from the depredations of the Apache, that their villages were deserted before the Pueblo Revolt of 1680. The ruins of these early missions are now protected by Salinas Pueblo Missions National Monument near Mountainair, New Mexico. Mission at Ysleta del Sur Pueblo, Texas by Kathy Weiser-Alexander
The Piro people did not revolt against the Spanish in the uprising and consequently, when Governor Antonio de Otermin retreated from Santa Fe to the area of present-day El Paso, Texas, many of the Piro people followed, while others scattered and joined other Pueblo groups. Soon, new villages were established by the Spanish for the refugees in present-day Texas, including Ysleta Sur in El Paso, Mission Nuestra Señora de la Limpia Concepción, in Socorro, and another in San Elizario. None of the Piro pueblos was ever resettled by the original inhabitants. By the mid-1800s, many of the Native Americans living in the El Paso area began to migrate back to New Mexico, settling in the present-day Las Cruces area.