Jicarilla Apache, one of several loosely organized autonomous bands of the Eastern Apache, refers to the members of the Jicarilla Apache Nation currently living in New Mexico and speaking a Southern Athabaskan language. The term jicarilla comes from Mexican Spanish meaning "little basket", referring to the small sealed baskets they used as drinking vessels. To neighboring Apache bands, such as the Mescalero and Lipan, they were known as Kinya-Inde.
Young Jicarilla Apache boy, 2009
Southwestern Defense System before the Civil War. Source:National Park Service
Cenotaph marking where the body of a killed dragoon was found
Portrait of a Jicarilla man, 1904
The Apache are several Southern Athabaskan languageāspeaking peoples of the Southwest, the Southern Plains and Northern Mexico. They are linguistically related to the Navajo. They migrated from the Athabascan homelands in the north into the Southwest between 1000 and 1500 CE.
Kathy Kitcheyan, chairwoman of the San Carlos Apache
Essa-queta, Plains Apache chief
Young Jicarilla Apache boy, New Mexico, 2009
A Western Apache woman from the San Carlos group