The word Comanche comes from the Ute word for enemy
The Utes, who call themselves Núuchi-u, 'the people', gave Utah its name and once ranged across the Colorado Plateau and Great Basin. The Comanches were their allies before becoming their rivals, and the Ute word for them, kɨmantsi, meaning enemy, is the name history remembers.
Linguists trace the Utes' language to the Numic branch of the Uto-Aztecan family, which probably began near today's Nevada and California border. By about 1000 CE Great Basin foragers spoke Uto-Aztecan tongues, and Southern Numic speakers, including the Utes, seem to have left that homeland first. Ancestral Utes were hunting and gathering in southwestern Colorado and southeastern Utah by 1300, and by the 1600s they held much of Colorado. Their language is closely related to Shoshone.
Life followed the seasons across a vast territory. Some bands stayed close to home; others travelled far to hunt, wintering in sheltered river valleys near present-day Provo and Colorado Springs. Pikes Peak, which one band called Tavakiev or sun mountain, was a sacred ceremonial ground, and the mineral springs at Manitou Springs drew several tribes who shared the waters without conflict. Rock art near what is now Arches National Park shows Utes hunting on horseback beside much older images.
Horses transformed everything. Acquired from neighbouring tribes and in large numbers by 1680, they made the Utes more mobile, formidable hunters of big game and respected mounted warriors, with horse ownership becoming the main mark of status. Unlike the Comanches, who moved onto the Plains, the Utes stayed near their mountains. They became the chief trading partners of Spanish New Mexico, prized for soft tanned deerskins, and were also drawn into raiding and the trade in captives. In 1637 Spanish forces had captured and enslaved 80 Utes.
Pressure mounted after the Mormons arrived in 1847 and gold seekers followed in the 1850s. The Utes defended their lands, but Brigham Young persuaded President Abraham Lincoln to remove Utah's Utes to a reservation in 1864, and Colorado's Utes were forced onto one in 1881. Three federally recognised Ute tribes exist today, and Ute members now help co-manage Bears Ears National Monument, created in 2016.
Source: Ute people
