ZIPKIYAH, ZIPKOHETA, ZEPKO-EETE (Big Bow)
c1830-c1900

In the latter half of the ninetenth century, Big Bow was known as one of the most outspoken anti-Anglo war chiefs of the Kiowas. Although little is known of his lineage and childhood, he earned a reputation as an astute warrior on the Central Plains in forays against the Navajos and the Utes. Along with Big Tree, Satank, Satanta, and Lone Wolf, Big Bow made the early settlers of Kansas, Oklahoma, and Texas pay dearly for their incursions into the Kiowa homeland. A missionary, Thomas Battey, estimated that Big Bow scalped and killed more white people than any other Kiowa in the last half of the nineteenth century.

During the winter of 1851-1852, Chief Big Bow stole a very pretty woman who's husband was away on the warpath, and took her to his own camp. On nearing his father's tipi, he hid the woman in the trees and went into the tipi to eat some food before going on. His father knew what he had done, held him and prevented him from returning to the woman waiting outside. Exposed to the extreme cold, her feet froze.

In 1867, when the leaders of the Plains tribes negotiated the Medicine Lodge Treaty, Big Bow refused to sign. He did not want to give up the traditional Kiowa life of roaming the Plains. Accordingly, he kept his people sequestered in the backcountry, emerging only for special visits and raids.

During the summer of 1869, Big Bow went with a large war party to Ute country to avenge the death of Set-daya'ite in 1868. He returned with a war bonnett of the Ute he killed in the mountains at the head of the Arkansas in Colorado.

In 1871, the U.S. Army mounted a spirited campaign to subdue the Kiowas and keep them on their lands near Anadarko, Oklahoma. Zepko-eette (Big Bow) was in the raid in Texas in 1871, where the 7 men were killed and Satank, Satanta and Big Tree were arrested and imprisoned.

By 1874, Big Bow was the only major Kiowa chief that had not been forced onto the reservation. Pressured by the government, Kicking Bird located Big Bow and told him that his cause was hopeless and that the best strategy for survival was surrender. Big Bow took Kicking Bird's message back to his people, and after much discussion, they agreed to settle on the reservation. They returned in February, 1875.

The U.S. government granted Big Bow and his band amnesty. Subsequently, he served Commendably as a sergeant in the Indian Scouts for a few years. He lived peacefully on the Reservation for twenty-five years until his death in 1900.