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Until Europeans arrived in the Americas and brought horses with them, Plains Indians hunted buffalo on foot.
For transporting their belongings, they used dogs. That’s why some Plains Indians refer to the time before Europeans as the Dog Days. In the 1500s and 1600s, Spanish soldiers and settlers brought horses to the Southwest. Over the next few hundred years, some of these horses escaped, became wild, multiplied, and spread throughout the Plains. By the late 1600s, Plains Indians were beginning to tame these wild horses. They used them to hunt buffalo, or they traded them. By making it easier for Plains Indians to get food, the horse created an age of prosperity for these people. Some call it their golden age.
