Los Ciboleros (New Mexican Buffalo Hunters)
Historical marker location:For centuries Pueblo Indians of present New Mexico trekked to the plains to hunt buffalo to supplement from the Spanish in the 17th century, the annual trips were made more easily and with greater success. By the 19th Century, the Ciboleros (from "Cibolo" -- Spanish for buffalo) became very important, providing food for the growing New Mexican population and hides for the rich Santa Fe-Chihuahua trade. Cibolero expeditions often included as many as 150 people. The daring cazadores (hunters), picturesque in leather jackets and flat straw hats, rode into the herds armed only with lances, killing 8 to 25 bison each in one foray, and depending on the speed, agility, and skill of their horses for safety. Others, including occasional women and children, cut meat into strips for drying and cured the hides for tanning. With their carts laden with fruits of the hunt, the Ciboleros returned to New Mexico and a hero's welcome. The Plains Indians, protecting their hunting grounds, maintained constant warfare against the Ciboleros throughout the 19th century, but the colorful lancers survived until Anglo-American hunters decimated the great buffalo herds in the late 1870s.