| several days fasting and praying for guidance from their gods. In addition, these natives would conduct numerous meetings with the priests and elders in order to determine the need for violence. Only after agreement was reached within this circle did the Pueblo Indians engage in warfare.
The Pueblo Indian Revolt of 1680 began in the village of Tesuque located near Santa Fe. In the Tesuque village, a group of Indians who were presumed to be converted Christians rushed into the church and viciously attacked the friar while he knelt at the altar. After killing Fray Juan Bautista Pio, the Indians destroyed the church and all of its religious symbols in imitation of the previous destruction of their own religious artifacts by the friars. During the following weeks, the pattern of attacks continued in numerous other villages throughout the New Mexico region.
The brutal revolt was unique in the Pueblo Indian tradition. Besides the extreme violence, the unified efforts of the different Pueblo villages in conducting the revolt was also highly unusual. Prior to the revolt, each of the villages had maintained an unwritten policy of independence from the others. Despite their differences, the common thread in the Pueblo Indian Revolt of 1680 was that all the |