Discover the rare and fragile "Wickiup" shelters that reveal the ways the Ute people lived and traveled across Colorado from prehistory to the present day.
A special moment, and a special place in my life was in 1981 in the sweat lodge of Red Ute-a remarkable and spiritually powerful man. He would callin the eagle-3 or 4 times.the eagle would then come each time. Life-changing for me. There was much more, as a result of his presence.He also located a sacred site-near the base of the Sangre De Christo mountains, where 3 underground rivers converged. Dousing was a familiar tool for him. A 600 year old site he told me. He held great wisdom, and was willing to share it with us. Remarkable man. remarkable and historically peace-loving people, worthy of great honor and respect. Thank you Ute nation. I will never forget.
Dousing works, don't ask me how but it does. I used to work at an old cemetery and we needed to douse sometimes to find where to dig as to not disturb grave sites that could be there that weren't documented correctly
I love this! So lucky to have actually visited one site. But it’s so far away from water I can’t understand why that spot. It does have excellent pasture, piñon tree harvesting and mule deer migration. All good reasons but no water. Thanks for sharing!
I love this video. Finally something that explains these structures I've seen out hiking in various parts of Colorado. Also, I wish the word "Indian" wasn't used as extensively in this video as it was. This is the Ute Nation or Ute People. They aren't Indians. Indians live on the other side of the planet - in India. Thank you RMPBS for bringing wonderful content like this to the open internet. The more I learn about my State's past the more respectful I get of the people whom walked this land before us modernites.
Also, the removal of indigenous people off their homelands was a horrible atrocity in our history. Tribes are still dealing with the effects from it, and are still having their land and water rights taken away. The amount of inhumanity that occurred in the past, and now, is indescribable. Through history, tribal relations have always been complex; however, the amount of absolute destruction by the Spanish, and particularly, by Europeans to the Native Americans was enormous. There was absolutely no excuse for it. We cannot "right the wrong" that has happened. However, we can acknowledge the truth behind past experiences, we can try to learn from the past. That is how we honor the past.
Although some of the structures are ancient many found today are newly made! Who keeps making them, could be a answer many of you are not ready to believe or comprehend!
The forest people are always watching and may have copied what they have seen. I don't believe the Utes are the ones leaving structures in the woods where huge newly fallen trees are placed in various formations, some would require many men or even machinery to place them as they are. Are Utes building current structures? These archeologists are researching sites that are very old. The structures being found now are new. Some look very much like Ute structures but most do not.
I found a few near lake george, specifically the terryall wildlife area. I've also felt the presence of being watched when camping in these isolated areas. Is it bigfoot, the spirts of past humans, or just a fluke.
You could do 2hours on this subject and have my attention every minute. Fascinating. People attempt to attribute these to big foot shelters not the remnants of peoples habitat meant to fall into the earth when left behind. Education ends ignorance.
In relation to the wickiups, we come upon a lot in the mountains of Colorado. Many of them are not associated with the Utes, and are instead associated with hippies and modern influences. There are different lines of evidence that are reviewed before recording them as being of Native American origin. When I come across one, I look at the size, I look at how disintegrated the wood is, what level of collapse is occurring, what other material culture is around, what are the natural or modern manmade physical features surrounding it? Is it near a road? What is the viewshed? Are their axe marks on the branches? How much deposition of soil and pine duff is within the wickiup? Does it look recently disturbed? Are there any arborglyphs? Is there any organic material/dark sediment or deflation of soil within the wickiup or just outside of it? There is a lot that goes into it.
Well said! Any wickiup that you find, based upon chronology, would have to be from the 1920's back! Therefore,, the supporting branches would all be a minimum of 120 years old, to possibly 150 years old at a minimum!!! The further west you go, the older the age range of the archaeology!!!!!
I remember finding these structures in the 1980’s in the mountains of Colorado. At the time I didn’t know who made these, I thought maybe some hippies made them. The structures were not very big.
We used to make little “wikiups” as kids when we played in the woods, pine barrens, of Eastern Long Island. We had one camouflaged so as to serve as a look-out tower over the roads and paths leaving to our land. We had another to spy on a neighbor lady who used to harass us for playing. I hope nobody finds the remains and tries to sell them as Native culture!
Wow! I'm from Lake Ronkonkoma, Long Island. I know those pine barrens too! The very BEST spring water is under those pine barrens! I used to work in Riverhead, and Calverton, Long Island at the Grumman aircraft factory, plant 6 ! If you care to, please get back to me, I'd love to know where about's you used to live! Thanks very much!!! Sonny (Sal).
@@newmoon54 I grew up in Ridge, Rocky Point, and Miller Place. Graduated from Port Jeff, class of 1972, second to last year before they built Rocky Point HS. My mother and two brothers also graduated from Port. My father and an uncle were in the Navy, but worked supervising civilian contractors, my Dad at Brookhaven Lab and my uncle Lou MacDonald at Grumman, some of the time in Bethpage, but later, in Calverton. Sorry, he’s been gone over 30 years now, so I’ve no idea what building. I know he was a test pilot and did fly out of Calverton. We moved around a lot with Dad in the Navy. Two brothers and one sister are still living. Myself, I’m retired from teaching and live in Northern Maine above Greenville/Millinocket area. Long Island has become far too built up for my taste, plus the cost of living??? Through the roof.
There could’ve been people camping and scouting for wood to burn in their campfire, happened upon a Wikiup that had fallen to the ground, and not knowing any better picked up the wood and burnt it!
I put one up around my shelter when in the back country to keep critters from approaching my 6, fire pit a few feet in front of the East facing door. I don't complete the shelter, just take downed wood and make a palisade.
If the Ute don't want artifacts collected on tribal lands, O.K. Elsewhere people, especially land owners, are going to deal with the land as they wish. Making a collection as well as taking pictures is about the best you can do if you don't want the items to be scattered to the four winds.
What about the Wickiups that show up at high elevations, miles from any road, trail or park. The original & best Wickiup builders are Sasquatch!🦍👣 Theres some beautiful Wikiups on Colorado Bigfoot channel.
Any wickiup that you find, based upon chronology, would have to be from the 1920's back! Therefore,, the supporting branches would all be a minimum of 120 years old, to possibly 150 years old at a minimum!!! The further west you go, the older the age range of the archaeology!!!!!
Not conquered at all. We still exist, speak our languages, and are connected to the land. To conquer is to break spirit, and no such thing can be done to us. Colonized land, not conquered people. Inin totlahui ihuan tinemizqueh nochipa ✊🏽🌎
I've noticed that modern ancestors of Native Americans tend to claim they are environmentally minded. But archaeology has proven different. To understand each tribe, you have to go back hundreds of years before the European culture influenced them. A good example of "cultural contamination" is the horse.
Archaeology has not proven different. Where did you come up with that notion? Indigenous populations lived off the land, their culture, their prayer, their economic systems were completely dependent on the land. Therefore, they absolutely had to manage it right. There was not much room for error. Also, the horse is not a "contaminant" to indigenous cultures. It was a resource that yes, Europeans brought over, however, they were welcomed additions to pre-existing ways of life on the Great Plains. Tribes also absorbed new technology from one another as well. This isn't cultural contamination, it's development (not "progress," but development).
They're depressed, oppressed to this day....that's the legacy white people gave them and continue to give them. Look at Standing Rock. That's a lot of cultural contamination right there. We're ruining their land. They tell us to back off, and we do it even more. That's the issue we should be worried about, these days. It's hard to care about the planet when you don't want to live. If we gave them a better way of life, if we helped them instead of kept shoving them away from success, we'd get to see them rise again. Right now they're striving to live with the life we left them with. We should be ashamed, honestly.
