native californians: the traditions, culture, and survival of california's tribes

Native CaliforNiaNs

traditioNs

Culture

survival of CaliforNia‘s tribes

l aureN HuNziker

compiled and designed by

Native CaliforNiaNs

TradiT ions

Culture

Survival of California‘S TribeS

L auren Hunziker

compiled and designed by

Book Design Copyright © 2011 by Lauren HunzikerDesigned and Published by Lauren HunzikerAcademy of Art University, San Francisco, CA GR 330 OL1: Typography 3: Complex Hierarchy Under the instruction of Carolina de Bartolo, Summer 2011 Bound at Taurus Bookbindery, San Francisco, CAa ll r ights r eserv ed

Printed on Mohawk Loop Antique Vellum 80 lb text in Chalkusing an Epson Stylus Photo 1400 series printer. The typefaces used are Sentinel and Univers.

CONTENTS

Introduction ...........................................05.

First Peoples of California ...................15.

Ice & Migration

Nomadic Hunters of the Ice Age

Settling in California

Land of Plenty

Natural Borders & Microenvironments

Geography

Many Tribes, Many Languages

Village Life .............................................23.

Kinship Groups & Tribelets

Regionaly & Territorial Organization

Leadership & Social Status

Governing System

Money & Crime

Regional Trade

Currency and Commerce

Prperty & Exchange Systems

Kinship & Family Life

Marriage & Child Rearing

Living with the Environment ...............39.

Living Off the Land

Specialized Tools

A Rich Diet

Taking Shelter

Clothing

Basketry

Materials

Making Their Mark

Rituals, Customs & Beliefs .................51.

Religion in Culture

Creation Myths

Sacred Places

Religious Systems

Medicine People

Music in Rituals

Coming-of-Age Rituals

Outside Influences ...............................57.

The Mission Period

The Mexican Period

The Gold Rush

The Killing Begins

Broken Promises

Today & Tomorrow ...............................69.

Cultural Continuity & Change

The Government

The Right to Own Land

Occupation of Alcatrz

Protecting Cultural Resources

Casinos & Gaming

Contemporary Reservation Life

Index .......................................................79.

References .............................................83 .

Perhaps the greatest mistake one could make when considering Native American culture would be to assume that there existed only one such homogeneous culture among the indigenous peoples of North America. Rather, there is an assortment of distinct and diverse cultural aspects that, when bound together, make a whole. The peoples of California before the arrival of Europeans were diverse and adapted to the many different regions of California in ways that made each group unique.

IntroductIon

The “first peoples” of North America are believed to have arrived on the continent as the result of Asiatic migrations over what

is today known as the Bering Strait. Though some recent evidence dis-putes this theory, these peoples are supposed to have traveled over a land bridge that existed during the time of these migrations, between 20,000 and 60,000 years before the present era. The land bridge was most likely caused by glacial activity that lowered ocean levels to such an extent that groups of Stone- Age hunters were able to travel on foot from present-day Russia to what is now Alaska. Once across, these groups split up in a broad fashion spreading throughout the continent and beyond: from Greenland and today’s eastern United States seaboard to the east, to the tip of South America to the south, and extending past the Arctic Circle in the north.

As a generally recognized point of reference, Christopher Columbus’s arrival in the New World begins a natural curiosity by Europeans about this amaz-ing frontier. It is believed that in 1492 there existed a population of between 600,000 and 2 million indigenous peoples living in the areas now known as Canada and the United States.

Since the turn of the 20th century, one tool anthropologists use in their studies is defining culture areas, which are geographic regions where simi-lar cultural traits co-occur. There are 10 commonly defined culture areas for Native Americans. The Arctic is comprised of the northernmost North America and Greenland, while the Subarctic encompasses the Alaskan and Canadian region south of the Arctic, not including the Maritime Provinces.

The Northwest culture area is defined by a narrow strip of Pacific coast-line and islands from the southern border of Alaska to northwest Canada. Roughly all of present-day California and the northern section of Baja California (northern Mexico) make up the aptly named California culture area. The Plateau region lies between the Rocky Mountains and the Pacific Coast mountain system. The Great Basin culture area encompasses almost all of present-day Utah and Nevada, as well as parts of Oregon, Idaho, Wyoming, Colorado, Arizona, Montana, and California.

Defining a culture

9 introduction

The Southwest culture area involves the southwestern United States. Indigenous people living in the grasslands bounded by the Mississippi River, the Rocky Mountains, the present-day provinces of Saskatchewan and Alberta, and parts of Texas are part of the Plains culture area. The Northeast culture area encompasses a wide swath of the United States bounded by the Atlantic Ocean and the Mississippi River, arced from the North Carolina coast northwest to the Ohio River, and back southwest to the Mississippi. Finally, the Southeast culture area is made up of parts or all of several American states—Florida, Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, Tennessee, the Carolinas, Virginia, and Arkansas.

Within each of these areas are several traits that define particularly strong aspects of Native American culture, and chief among them is language. The f luidity in language development is evident throughout each of these groups, as can be seen clearly in the example of peoples living in the Arctic and subarctic. Arctic people, commonly known as Eskimos, consist mainly of two widely dispersed groups: the Inuit and the Yupik. The Inuit possess a common language with many variant dialects, while the Yupik speak no fewer than five different languages. The Aleuts, have one language with two distinct dialects, showing inf luences from Russian fur traders who were common visitors.

It has been estimated that approximately 300 different Native American languages were spoken throughout North America. At one time, there were more languages in use among the peoples of the California culture area than in all of Europe. Major language groups and subgroups have existed through-out the Native American population, among them, Hokan and Uto-Aztecan in the Great Basin and Southwest (e.g., Paiute, Shoshone); Athabaskan in the western subarctic and Southwest (e.g., Navajo, Apache); Algonquian in the eastern Subarctic, Plains, and Northeast (e.g., Cree, Ojibwa, Cheyenne); and Iroquoian in the Northeast and Southeast (e.g., Cherokee, Seneca, Mohawk).

A common assumption might be that although there are many languages, there may have been a common language or two brought over the land bridge many thousands of years ago that, through dispersion, had fragmented into numerous variations of the origin language. However, linguists have found no commonality among the major language groups that support this theory.

Social hierarchies are another defining trait. How people interact with

At one time, there were more languages used among the peoples of the California culture area than in all of Europe.

10 natives californians

each other in social groups speaks to their experience and their values. Native American social groups—immediate kin, extended family, and other members— varied greatly in how they were set up. The overriding causal cir-cumstances were geography and availability of food. In those culture areas where food was relatively scarce, a great deal depended on where animals were located to be hunted for sustenance. In the case of the Arctic, Eskimos were extremely dependent on reindeer for not only food but clothing and tools. Great barren spaces resulted in migratory patterns for reindeer, and the people followed the animals on which their survival depended.

In general, areas with abundant food that was easily obtained had a more complex and stratified social system. Where people remained in the same place, they developed stronger political systems due to their need to share resources. These systems could be depended upon as a foundation for resolv-ing differences between members of the group. The Northwest area is a prime example of this evolution. Salmon and other seafood was plentiful, so the people held a common title to these resources. While elites existed, com-moners were considered full members of the group and were always allowed to speak in public during most group discussions. Even slaves, mostly mem-bers of other groups who had been captured in war, could eventually rise to become full-f ledged members of a tribe. Similar arrangements existed in other areas where food was plentiful, with exceptions. This arrangement is in stark contrast to those culture areas that developed in places where food/water might be scarce. These areas more generally consisted of smaller, migratory bands of people existing in “tribelets,” whose f luidity required more self-reliance and a more decentralized form of political structure.

In the subarctic, the people depended upon reindeer as well. However, in a more forested, brushy area, they were able to herd these animals. This resulted in a social style that could be described as more sedentary and group-defined than that of their migratory neighbors. It’s easy to see where this diversification might cause more of a dependence on, and development of, the self over the group for the Inuit, while the Aleuts and similarly posi-tioned groups would develop stronger patterns of group reliance. People adapt to their surrounding conditions, and all culture areas were affected by their physical place in the world.

Social groups varied greatly how they were structured. The overriding causal circumstances were most often geography and availability of food.

1 1 introduction

To some extent, all Native American culture areas had strong, extended-family bonds that were defined by maternal or paternal lineage, or both. These familial connections tended to result in the formation of bands or clans. These smaller groups came together to form tribes, which, in turn, may have formed strong cohesive bonds with one another for the common good. A prime example of this situation is the Iroquois Confederacy, an alli-ance of five tribes that forestalled European attempts at dominance in North America during the 17th and 18th centuries. All Native American cultures have strong and readily defined similarities to one another in their sense of spirituality and their religious ceremonies. While there existed many dif-ferences in what was celebrated and when, there were a number of common central beliefs that were shared by most cultures, including animism, sha-manism, vision quests, and spirits.

Many ceremonies, therefore, were prescribed and held as “perfect” as they were handed down to people eons ago. Whether it was the Salmon Ceremony in the Northwest, the Green Corn Dance in the Southeast, the False Face Ceremony of the Iroquois, or the Sun Dance Ceremony in the Plains, nature was to be celebrated, thanked, and maybe appeased for the gifts that had been bestowed on a tribe. Shamanism is a system of beliefs and practices designed to facilitate communication with the spirit world. Many objects, ceremonies, songs, and dances are believed to hold sacred properties, and it is the shaman’s responsibility to relay this information to the group mem-bers. A shaman, then, can be seen as a sort of priest or practitioner through whom various spirits let themselves be known to humans.

Shamans as healers, psychopomps (conductors of souls who accompany the dead to the other world), and prophets play an important role in social cohesiveness. The concept of vision quests is essentially an extended and personalized acknowledgement of the overriding belief in all things, all spirits. Almost every culture area has a version of vision quest, in which someone—many times a boy entering puberty—is to walk his own path in the spirit/dream world to help uncover his path in this life. This activity ref lects the strong belief in “soul dualism,” where each person is given two souls, one for the physical world and one for the spirit world, and everyone has a distinct path to follow. All things—including people—are capable of doing good or evil; the vision quest helps one to know what his or her place is in the world. Dreams also were considered portals into the spirit world, and special importance was attached to what was revealed in them.

People adapt to their surrounding conditions, and all culture


The date of the arrival in North America of the initial wave of peoples from whom the American Indians (or Native Americans)

emerged is still a matter of considerable uncertainty. It is relatively certain that they were Asiatic peoples who originated in northeastern Siberia and crossed the Bering Strait (perhaps when it was a land bridge) into Alaska and then gradually dispersed throughout the Americas. The glaciations of the Pleistocene Epoch (1.6 million to 10,000 years ago) coincided with the evolution of modern humans, and ice sheets blocked ingress into North America for extended periods of time. It was only during the interglacial periods that people ventured into this unpopulated land. Some scholars claim an arrival before the last (Wisconsin) glacial advance, about 60,000 years ago. The latest possible date now seems to be 20,000 years ago, with some pioneers filtering in during a recession in the Wisconsin glaciation.

These prehistoric invaders were Stone Age hunters who led a nomadic life, a pattern that many retained until the coming of Europeans. As they worked their way southward from a narrow, ice free corridor in Alaska into the broad expanse of the continent— between what are now Florida and California—the various communities tended to fan out, hunting and foraging in comparative isolation. Until they converged in the narrows of Southern Mexico and the confined spaces of Central America, there was little of the fierce competition or the close interaction among groups that might have stimulated cultural inventiveness.

North AmericAN NAtiVe heritAge

13 introduction

The size of the pre-Columbian aboriginal population of North America remains uncertain, since the widely divergent estimates have been based on inadequate data. The pre-Columbian population of what is now the United States and Canada, with its more widely scattered societies, has been vari-ously estimated at somewhere between 600,000 and 2 million.

By that time, the Indians there had not yet adopted intensive agriculture or an urban way of life, although the cultivation of corn, beans, and squash supplemented hunting and fishing throughout the Mississippi and Ohio river valleys and in the Great Lakes–St. Lawrence river region, as well as along the Gulf of Mexico and Atlantic Coastal Plain. In those areas, semi-sedentary peoples had established villages, and among the Iroquois and the Cherokee, powerful federations of tribes had been formed. Elsewhere, how-ever, on the Great Plains, the Canadian Shield, the northern Appalachians, the Cordilleras, the Great Basin, and the Pacific Coast, hunting, fishing, and gathering constituted the basic economic activity; and, in most instances, extensive territories were needed to feed and support small groups.

The history of the entire aboriginal population of North America after the Spanish conquest has been one of unmitigated tragedy. The combination of susceptibility to Old World diseases, loss of land, and the disruption of cul-tural and economic patterns caused a drastic reduction in numbers and the extinction of many communities. It is only since about 1900 that the popula-tions have begun to rebound.


Comparative studies are an essential com-ponent of all scholarly analyses, whether the topic under study is human society, fine art,

paleontology, or chemistry. The similarities and differences help to organize and direct research programs and exegeses. The comparative study of cul-tures falls largely in the domain of anthropology, which often uses a typology known as the culture area approach to organize comparisons across cul-tures. The culture area approach was delineated at the turn of the 20th century and continued to frame discussions of peoples and cultures into the 21st century. A culture area is a geographic region where certain cultural traits have generally co-occurred. For instance, in North America between the 16th and 19th centuries, the Northwest Coast Native American culture area was characterized by traits such as salmon fishing, woodworking, large villages or towns, and hierarchical social organization.

The specific number of culture areas delineated for Native America has been somewhat variable because regions are sometimes subdivided or con-joined. The 10 culture areas discussed in this volume are among the most commonly used—the Arctic, the subarctic, the Northeast, the Southeast, the Plains, the Southwest, the Great Basin, California, the Northwest Coast, and the Plateau. Notably, some scholars prefer to combine the Northeast and Southeast into one Eastern Woodlands culture area, or the Plateau and Great Basin into a single Intermontane culture area. Discussion of each cul-ture area considers the location, climate, environment, languages, tribes, and common cultural characteristics of the area before it was heavily colo-nized, found in the entities under consideration help to organize and direct research programs and exegeses. The comparative study of cultures falls largely in the domain of anthropology, which often uses a typology known as the culture area approach to organize comparisons across cultures.

The culture area approach was delineated at the turn of the 20th century and continued to frame discussions of peoples and cultures into the 21st century. A culture area is a geographic region where certain cultural traits have generally co-occurred. For instance, in North America between the 16th and 19th centuries, the Northwest Coast Native American culture area was characterized by traits such as salmon fishing, woodworking, large vil-lages or towns, and hierarchical social organization.

Native americaN culture are as

15 introduction

The California culture area corresponds roughly to the present states of California and northern Baja California. The peoples

living in the California culture area at the time of first European contact in the 16th century were only generally circumscribed by the present state boundaries. Some were culturally intimate with peoples from neighboring areas. For instance, California groups living in the Colorado River val-ley, such as the Mojave and Quechan (Yuma), shared traditions with the Southwest Indians, while those of the Sierra Nevada shared traditions with the Great Basin Indians, and many Northern California groups shared tradi-tions with the Northwest Coast Indians.

The Northwest Coast was the most sharply delimited culture area of native North America. It covered a long narrow arc of Pacific coast and off shore islands from Yakutat Bay in the northeastern Gulf of Alaska south to Cape Mendocino in present-day California. Its eastern limits were the crest of the Coast Ranges from the north down to Puget Sound, the Cascades south to the Columbia River, and the coastal hills of what is now Oregon and north-western California. Although the sea and various mountain ranges provide the region with distinct boundaries to the east, north, and west, the transi-tion from the Northwest Coast to the California culture area is gradual, and some scholars classify the southernmost tribes as California Indians.

California Culture are as

figure i .1 ca l i f or n i a n at i v e c u lt u r e a r e a s

California Indians lived all over the state. This resulted in various culture groups

based on geography, language, and ecology.

Northeast

Northwest

Central

Great Basin

Southern

Colorado River


Most groups retain at least some of the preferences for the religion, food, or other cultural features of their predecessors.

The effects of culture contact are generally characterized under the rubric of accultur-ation, a term encompassing the changes in

artifacts, customs, and beliefs that result from cross-cultural interaction. Voluntary acculturation, often referred to as incorporation or amalgama-tion, involves the free borrowing of traits from another culture. Forced acculturation can also occur, as when one group is conquered by another and must the stronger group’s customs.

Assimilation is the process whereby individuals or groups of differing eth-nicity blend into the dominant culture of a society and may also be either voluntary or forced. In the 19th- and early 20th-century United States, millions of European immigrants became assimilated within two or three generations through means that were for the most part voluntary. Homogenizing factors included attendance at elementary schools (either public or private) and churches, as well as unionization. During the same period, however, the United States and Canada had policies designed to force the assimilation of Native American and First Nations peoples, most nota-bly by mandating that indigenous children attend schools. Assimilation is rarely complete. Most groups retain at least some preference for the religion, food, language rituals or other cultural features of their predecessors.

AcculturAtion & Assimil Ation

California Indians lived all over the state. They lived in different ecologi-cal zones. Some tribes lived near the sea, while others lived near rivers or lakes. There were also tribes that lived in the mountains, valleys, and the desert. Certain natural resources were found throughout the state. Groups from different ecological zones often traded. The Nisenan in the moun-tains traded black oak acorns and sugar-pine nuts for salt, game, fish, roots, grasses, beads, and shells with tribes living near the sea. Tribes living away from the ocean, such as the Cahuilla, traveled to the coast to fish and gather seafood and seaweed.

17 introduction

Native Americans were the first people to live in California, and many still live in the state today. But how did they first get there? During the last Ice Age, thick sheets of ice buried much of present-day North America. A land bridge stretched across the Bering Strait, which now separates Asia from Alaska. Scientists believe that about 40, 000 years ago, people began to move from what is now Asia to present-day North America. They crossed the land bridge and became the first people to reach the North American continent.

1

For professional archaeologists, there is lit-tle or no evidence that can suggest how the first people arrived in California. Perhaps

by sea? Along the coastline? Westward out of the Southwest? Who knows. What archaeologists can say is that several Paleo-Indian sites are firmly established in California; and half are along the coastline. San Diego County claims that largest concentration. While dates remain in dispute on many, there is no doubt that they are at least 10,000-11,000 years old.

Of greater interest, perhaps, is the huge period of time from 8000 B.C. to 1500 A.D., when the continents were not visited by other people. In their treatise on California’s archaeology, the Chartkoffs divide this period into two parts. The first is the Archaic and it is a complex of cultural life ways shared throughout the Western United States for a long time and continued in the Great Basin region right up to the time of Euro-American invasion. The second is the Pacific and it is a complex of distinctive life ways that were well fitted to specific ecological niches and that represent the development of California’s one-hundred-plus distinct tribes.

The Archaic, in California, began at the end of the Paleo-Indian period, about 10,000 years ago, and ended for most people around 4000 years ago. It is distinguished from the Paleo-Indian period by the decline in nomadic big-game hunting that centered around large desert playas and by the rise of a much more systematic and somewhat localized utilization of diverse resources. Typical of the Archaic period is the so-called “Annual Round.” People were neither nomadic nor committed to a single locality; instead, they lived in a seasonal cycle that incorporated a succession of localities and, ultimately, led them back to a wintering haven. They became experts in their natural environments, understanding seasonal diversity and develop-ing specialized tools for foods.

The Pacific period, in California, began around 2000 B.C. This date should be compared with the evolution of tribal cultures in Europe and around the Eastern Mediterranean, in the period from 3000 B.C. to 2300 B.C. In California, language is often a good clue to origins.

First peoples oF CaliFornia

Ice & mIgratIon

19 first peoples of california

About 14,00 years ago, the Ice Age ended. At that time, glaciers began to melt as the climate grew warmer. A land route free of

ice opened up from Alaska southward through western Canada. Groups of people followed this route south to California. Other groups moved into California from the east by crossing the Sierra Nevada mountains. Still, oth-ers entered California from the deserts to the southeast. Most of California’s early peoples arrived between 10,000 and 6000 b.c.e . However, some groups arrived earlier. Archaeologists have found arrowheads dating from about 10,000 to 9000 b.c.e.

These early people found that California was a wonderful place to live. Huge lakes created by the melting glaciers covered vast areas that are now des-ert. The climate was mild, and food was plentiful, so they settled down and stayed. For thousands of years, the native peoples of California usually lived in peace with each other. The land provided enough for everyone. Most tribes were not interested in making war on their neighbors. Fortunately, California’s mountains, deserts, and rugged coast provided them with natu-ral protection. These landforms also kept them from moving to other places, so each tribal group remained more or less in the same location.

Se t tling in California

Archaeologists refer to the first Americans as Paleo-Indians, the ancestors of today’s Native Americans. Paleo-Indians were

nomadic hunters, following herds of wild animals from place to place. Some of the Animals they hunted are now extinct, such as the mastodon and woolly mammoth, a relative of the elephant.

Over thousands of years, groups of Paleo-Indians gradually moved south and east throughout present-day North and South America. Some Archeologists believe that during the Ice Age these people probably did not enter what is now California. These archaeologists say glaciers covering California’s mountain and high valleys might have cut off any approach over land. However, other archaeologists believe that a small number of people may have reached California during the Ice Age. Researchers continue to study and learn about these early people and how they might have migrated to California.

These prehistoric invaders were Stone Age hunters who led a nomadic life, a pattern that many retained until the coming of Europeans. As they worked their way southward from a narrow, ice free corridor in Alaska into the broad expanse of the continent— between what are now Florida and California—the various communities tended to fan out, hunting and forag-ing in comparative isolation.

NOMADIC HUNTERS OF THE ICE AGE


figure 1 .1 nom a dic m igr at ion of t h e f i r s t a m e r ica n s

Many archaeologists believe that the Paleo- Indians came from Asia, across

the Pacific by way of the Bering Sea land bridge. The term glaciation, as seen

on this map, refers to an area of land slowly becoming covered with glaciers.

PACIFIC OCEA N

NORTH A MER ICA

Ice Age Land Mass

Glaciation

Present Borders

Migration Routes

L and of pLent y People moved into California in small groups over thousands of years. These peo-ple hunted animals and gathered plants for

food. Before moving to California, they roamed all the time. They could not stay in one place because it would use up all the food. California, however, was a land of plenty. In California, people could get all they need in one small area. Therefore, each group of hunters and gatherers settled someplace. By 1500, California was like a patchwork of little countries. More than 350,000 people lived here. They were divided into hundreds of groups, speaking many languages. Each group has its own territory.

Archaeologists discovered arrowheads in California thought to be between 11,000 and 12,000 years old. They believed the arrowheads were simi-lar to those found near Folsom and Clovis, New Mexico. Thus the ancient Californians who made the arrowheads are called the Folsom/Clovis people. The arrowheads were found near Clear Lake in Lake County, California and near Tulare Lake in Kings County, California. The arrowheads have a chan-nel cut down the center so that they could be mounted on a wood shaft.


Because its mosaic of microenvironments— including seacoasts, tidewaters, rivers, lakes, redwood forests, valleys, deserts, and

mountains—provided ample sustenance for its many residents, California was one of the most densely populated culture areas of Northern America. The indigenous peoples of this region were considerably more politically stable, sedentary, and conservative and less in conf lict with one another than was generally the case in other parts of North America. Within the culture area, neighboring groups often developed elaborate systems for the exchange of goods and services. In general, the California tribes reached lev-els of cultural and material complexity rarely seen among most hunting and gathering cultures in other parts of the country.

California is a region surrounded by natural barriers. The Sierra Nevada Mountains while it ’s off in the East. The Siskiyou Mountains rise in the North. To the west of California life the Pacific Ocean, and the Mojave Desert is in the South. Within these borders are many small worlds. There are places in California where the snow never melts. There are places where the sun shines almost every day. California has rained–soaked valleys and sun–baked deserts. It has beaches, bays, grasslands, and forests

California’s geomorphic provinces are naturally defined geologic regions that display distinct landscape for landform. Earth scientists recognize eleven provinces in California. Each region displays unique, defining features based on geology, faults, topographic relief and climate. These geomorphic provinces are remarkably diverse. They provide different advantages and disadvantages that the Native Americans learned to use to their advantage and survive.

People moved into California in small groups over thousands of years. These people hunted animals and gathered plants for food. Before moving to California, they roamed all the time. They could not stay in one place because it would use up all the food. California, however, was a land of plenty. In California, people could get all they need in one small area. Therefore, each group of hunters and gatherers settled someplace. By 1500, California was like a patchwork of little countries. More than 350,000 people lived here. They were divided into hundreds of groups, speaking many languages. Each group has its own territory.

Natural Borders & MicroeNviroNMeNts


01. Klamath Mtn. Range.

02. Cascade Range

03. Modoc Plateau

04. Modoc Basin & Range

05. Sierra Nevada

06. Sierra Basin & Range

07. Mojave Desert

08. Colorado Desert

09. Peninsula Range

10. Traverse Range

11. Costal Ranges

figure 1 . 2 ca l i f or n i a’s ge omor p h ic p r ov i nc e s

California natives lived in different ecological zones. Each zone provides

different climate and resources that the tribes had to adapt to.

01. 02. 03.

04 .

05.

06.

07.

08 .09.

10.

11.

GeoGraphy California’s geomorphic provinces are naturally defined geologic regions that dis-play distinct landscape for landform. Earth

scientists recognize eleven provinces in California. Each region displays unique, defining features based on geology, faults, topographic relief and climate. These geomorphic provinces are remarkably diverse. They provide different advantages and disadvantages that the Native Americans learned to use to their advantage and survive.


figure 1 .3 ca l i f or n i a’s m a jor n at i v e l a nguage gr ou p s

Prior to the arrival of the Spaniards in the 1500s, more than 300 different

groups spoke 60 separate languages in more than 100 dialects.

Algonquin

Athapascan

Hokan

Penutian

Uto-Aztecan

Yukian

Prior to the arrival of the Spaniards in the 1500s, more than 300 different groups lived in California. The groups were small in size,

compared to the other peoples of North America. These groups spoke 60 separate languages in more than 100 dialects. All the members of a commu-nity spoke one language. When several villages near each other all spoke the same language, they were considered a tribe. Different groups often could not understand one another because of the myriad of dialects.

Sometimes, Native Americans referred to themselves and other groups based on their location. Along the Klamath River in Northern California, the Karok lived upstream from the Yurok. So the Karok referred to themselves as Karok, meaning “upstream.” They called their neighbors Yurok, meaning “downstream.” In most cases, Californian native peoples do not have names for their tribes. This was because the Native Americans saw themselves as belonging to a family or village, rather than a tribe ruled by the chief. When Europeans arrived in California, they considered all Native Americans who spoke the same language to be members of one tribe.

Many tribes, Many l anguages

Within the six major language groups there were 60 separate languages in more than 100 dialects.

2 4 natives californians

Often, Native Americans simply referred to themselves as “the people.” When Europeans heard Native Americans calling themselves pomo or washo—words that mean “people”—they began referring to those native Americans and members of the Pomo or Washo tribes. The Spaniards often used Spanish words for tribal names, based on the location of particular native peoples. For example, a Costanos (Costanoan people) means “coast–dwellers,” and Serranos means “mountain–dwellers.”

It has been estimated that approximately 300 different Native American languages were spoken throughout North America. At one time, there were more languages in use among the peoples of the California culture area than in all of Europe. Major language groups and subgroups have existed through-out the Native American population, among them, Hokan and Uto-Aztecan in the Great Basin and Southwest (e.g., Paiute, Shoshone); Athabaskan in the western subarctic and Southwest (e.g., Navajo, Apache); Algonquian in the eastern Subarctic, Plains, and Northeast (e.g., Cree, Ojibwa, Cheyenne); and Iroquoian in the Northeast and Southeast (e.g., Cherokee, Seneca, Mohawk).

A common assumption might be that although there are many languages, there may have been a common language or two brought over the land bridge many thousands of years ago that, through dispersion, had fragmented into numerous variations of the origin language. However, linguists have found no commonality among the major language groups that support this theory.

figure 1 .4 l a r ge s t ca l i f or n i a t r i b e s , l a nguage gr ou p s a n d l o cat ion

t r i b e

Cahuilla

Chumash

Hupa

Maidu

Miwok

Modoc

Mojave

Pomo

Yokut

Yuma

Yurok

l a nguage

Uto-Aztecan

Hokan

Athapascan

Penutian

Penutian

Penutian

Hokan

Hokan

Penutian

Hokan

Algonquian

lo c at ion

Southern

Southern coast

Northern coast

Northeast

Central

Northern

Southwestern

Northern coast

Central

Southern

Northern coast


In most of California the tribelets established permanent villages that they occupied all year, although small groups routinely left for periods of a few days or weeks to hunt or collect food. In areas with sparse resources, people often lived in semi-nomadic bands of 20 to 30 individuals, gathering together in larger groups only temporarily for such activities as large game hunts and nut harvests. As a rule, riverine and coastal peoples enjoyed a more settled life than those living in the deserts and foothills.

2

Kinship groups & tribele ts

Vill age life

Prior to the arrival of the Spaniards in the 1500s, California’s native peoples lived in small villages. Each community usu-

ally consisted of about 50 to 100 people. Some tribes such as the Maidu and Miwok communities had several hundred people. The community was actu-ally a large, extended family called a kinship group.

Each band of people lived in a village group. A village group was made up of one or more large, main villages surrounded by a cluster of small villages. Although people of most village groups had similar ways of life, there were still important differences among them. For example, the bands that lived in the southern region had different customs than the bands that lived in the northern region. Once a band formed a village within its territory, the band rarely changed its location unless resources became scarce.

Some bands lived along the coast, whereas others lived further inland. Most bands had both coastal and inland territories, however. Territories were large and included specific fishing, hunting, and gathering spots. Territorial boundaries were respected by all the bands. People were careful not to trespass on one another’s territories. Some bands, however, granted their neighbors permission to hunt animals or gather foods and materials from their territories in exchange for trade items.

In most of California the tribelets established permanent villages that they occupied all year, although small groups routinely left for periods of a few days or weeks to hunt or collect food. In areas with sparse economic resources, people often lived in semi-nomadic bands of 20 to 30 individuals, gathering together in larger groups only temporarily for such activities as antelope drives and piñon nut harvests. As a rule, riverine and coastal peo-ples enjoyed a more settled life than those living in the desert and foothills.

27 vill age life

figure 2 .1 ca l i f or n i a’s t r i b a l gr ou p s

California's bountiful resources and varied landscape allowed the early

nomads to settle into groups that adapted to their surroundings.

ac h u m aw i

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n. va l l e y yok u t s

s . va l l e y yok u t s

ow e n s va l l e y pa i t u e

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c oa sta l

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wa s hoe

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w i yot

nong ot l

m at t ol e

s i n k yon e

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wa i l a k i

k i ta n e m u k

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c h u m a s h

s a l i na n

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c a h u i l l a

k u m e ya ay

s ou t h. pa i t u e

nor . pa i t u e w e st e r n mono

f o ot h i l l yok u t s

t u b at u l a b a

w e st.s ho s hon e

qu e c h a n

h a lc h i dhom a

mo jav e

c h e m e h u e v i

nor . pa i t u e

y u k i


The northern region included the Modoc, Achumawi, and Atsugewi tribes. The western portion of this territory was rich in acorn and Salmon. Further to the East, the climate changes from mountainous to a high desert type of topography. Here food resources were grass seeds, tuber berries along with rabbit and deer. Volcanic mountains in the Western portion of their territory supplied the valuable trade commodity obsidian.

The central region includes: Bear River, Mattale, Lassick, Nogatl, Wintun, Yana, Yahi, Maidu, Wintun, Sinkyone, Wailaki, Kato, Yuki, Pomo, Lake Miwok, Wappo, Coast Miwok, Interior Miwok, Wappo, Coast Miwok, Interior Miwok, Monache, Yokuts, Costanoan, Esselen, Salinan and Tubatulabal tribes.Vast differences exists between the coastal peoples, nearby moun-tain range territories, from those living in the vast central valleys and on the slopes of the Sierra Nevada. Nevertheless, all of these tribes enjoyed an abundance of acorn and salmon that could be readily obtained in the water-ways north of Monterey Bay. Deer, elk, antelope and rabbit were available elsewhere in vast quantities.

Southern California presents a varied and somewhat unique region of the state. Beginning in the north, tribes found in this area are the Chumash, Alliklik, Kitanemuk, Serrano, Gabrielino Luiseno Cahuilla, and the Kumeyaay. The landmass and climate varied considerably from the wind-swept offshore channel Islands that were principally inhabited by Chumash speaking peoples. Communication with their mainland neighbors was by large and graceful planked canoes powered by double paddle ores. These vessels were called "Tomols" and manufactured by a secretive guild of craftsmen. They could carry hundreds of pounds of trade goods and up to a dozen passengers. Like their northern neighbors, the Tactic speaking peo-ples of San Nicholas and Santa Catalina Islands built planked canoes and actively traded rich marine resources with mainland villages and tribes. Shoreline communities enjoyed the rich animal and faunal life of ocean, bays and wetlands environments. Interior tribes like the Serrano, Luiseno, Cahuilla, and Kumeyaay shared an environment rich in Sonoran life zone.

Villages varied in size from poor desert communities with villages of as little as 100 people to the teaming Chumash villages with over a thousand inhab-itants. Conical homes of arroweed, tule or croton were common, while whale bone structures could be found on the coast and nearby Channel Islands. Interior groups manufactured clay storage vessels sometimes decorated with paint. Baskets were everywhere manufactured with unique designs.

Before European contact, California's native poeples had separated into about 57 separate tribal groups.

29 vill age life

Each of the many tribes in the California culture area had distinct linguistic, social, and cultural traditions. Except for the

Colorado River peoples (Mojave and Quechan) and perhaps some Chumash groups, California peoples avoided centralized governmental structures at the tribal level. Instead, each tribe consisted of several independent geopolitical units, or tribelets. These were tightly organized polities that nonetheless recognized cultural connections to the other polities within the tribe; they were perhaps most analogous to the many independent bands of Sioux. Tribelets generally ranged in size from about a hundred to a few thousand people, depending on the richness of locally available resources; tribelet territories ranged in size from about 50 to 1,000 square miles (130 to 2,600 square km).

Within some tribelets all the people lived in one principal village, from which some of them ranged for short periods of time to collect food, hunt, or visit other tribelets for ritual or economic purposes. In other tribelets there was a principal village to which people living in smaller settlements trav-eled for ritual, social, economic, and political occasions. A third variation involved two or more large villages, each with various satellite settlements.

Regional & TeRRiToRial oRganiZ aTion

figure 2 . 2 t y p e s of t r i b a l t e r r i t ory or g a n i z at ion

01. Individual tribelets within a territory.

02. Principal village with short- range hunter-gatherer groups.

03. Multiple principal villages with satellite settlements.

01.

03.

02.

Tribal Territory

Principal Village

Tribelet

Hunter-Gatherer Groups


In such systems, a designated “capital” village would be the residence of the principal chief as well as the setting for major rituals and political and eco-nomic negotiations. In house societies the key social and productive unit was a f lexible group of a few dozen to 100 or more people who considered themselves to be related (sometimes only distantly), who were co-resident in houses or estates for at least part of the year, and who held common title to important resources; in the Northwest those resources included sites for fishing, berry picking, hunting, and habitation.

House groups also held a variety of less-tangible privileges, including the exclusive use of particular names, songs, dances, and, especially in the north, totemic representations or crests. Within a house group, each mem-ber had a social rank that was valued according to the individual’s degree of relatedness to a founding ancestor. Although social stratification in Northwest Coast communities is frequently described as including three divisions—chief ly elites, commoners, and slaves or war captives—each per-son in fact had a particular hereditary status that placed him within the group as though he occupied one step on a long staircase of statuses, with the eldest of the senior line on the highest step and the most remotely related at the bottom. Strictly speaking, each person was in a class by himself.

California peoples avoided centralized government structures at the tribal level. Instead, each tribe consisted of several independent tribelets.

figure 2 .3 t r i b e a n d t e r r i t ory s i z e

Tribelets generally ranged in size from about a hundred to a few thousand

people, depending on the richness of locally available resources; tribelet

territories ranged in size from about 50 to 1,000 square miles

5,000

(sq. mi. )

Territory Size

Trib

ele

t S

ize

(pe

op

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100

1,00050

31 vill age life

Within their communities, chiefs were the major decision makers and the final authority, although they typically worked with the aid of a council.

California tribes, unlike many other Native American groups, were governed by a head-man rather than a chief. There were a few

exceptions, such as the Mojave and Yuma, in the southeast. These two tribes were ruled by warrior chiefs. These chiefs needed to be brave and skill-ful fighters. While most California tribes were friendly with each other, these two tribes often fought with other groups. Therefore, the chiefs were expected to be strong leaders, and everyone had to obey them.

For those groups that engaged in centralized forms of organization, the role of chief, or tribelet leader, was generally an inherited position. In some groups, such as the Pomo, women were eligible for chief ly office. Typically the chief was an economic administrator whose work ranged from general admonitions to specific directions for particular tasks, such as indicating where food was available and how many people it would require to collect it. Such leaders redistributed the economic resources of the community and, through donations from its members, maintained resources from which emergency needs could be met.

Within their communities, chiefs were the major decision makers and the final authority, although they typically worked with the aid of a council of elders, heads of extended families, ritualists, assistant chiefs, and shamans. In some areas the chief functioned as a priest, maintaining the ceremonial house and ritual objects. The chief was generally a conspicuous person, being wealthier than the average individual, more elaborately dressed, and often displaying symbols of office. Chiefs’ families formed a superstratum of the community elites, especially among those tribelets that organized themselves through lineages.

As chiefs led in the political sphere of traditional native California life, sha-mans led in the sphere in which spiritual and physical health intertwined. The vocation of shaman was open to women and men. Shamans enjoyed a status somewhat similar to that of chief. They defined and described the world of the sacred and regulated the fortune of souls before and after death, mediating between the mundane and sacred worlds. Most tribelets in California had one or more shamans, who were active in political life, work-ing with leaders and placing their powers at the disposal of the community.

LE ADERSHIP & SOCIAL STATUS


Alongside chiefs and shamans were ritualists—dancers, singers, fire ten-ders, and others—who were carefully trained in their crafts and who functioned intimately within the political, economic, and religious spheres of their communities. These men and women acquired considerable respect and often wealth because of their skills. In effect, they were members of the power elite. When performing, ritualists were usually costumed in head-dresses, dance skirts, wands, jewelry, and other regalia.

figure 2 .4 t r i b a l l e a de r s h i p h i e r a r c h y

As chiefs led in the political sphere of traditional native California life,

shamans led in the sphere in which spiritual and physical health intertwined.

c h i e f

s h a m a n s h a m a n

e l de r s

a s s i sta n t c h i e f s

da nc e r s , s i nge r s , f i r e t e n de r s , a n d ot h e r s

h e a d s of fa m i l i e s

c ou nci l

r i t ua l i st s

33 vill age life

Money was used for other things besides buying and selling. When one person com-mitted a crime against another, a third

person was hired to settle the conf lict. The guilty person agreed to pay a cer-tain amount of money or goods. A fine for charged for every type of crime. Even for serious crimes the punishment was usually only a fine.

Mone y and criMe

Most tribes had a simple governing system. Each member the tribe obeyed the laws of his or her own village. However, these laws were

not always the same as the laws of other villages of the same tribe. The laws were not written but were based on tradition.

Other tribes regarded the headman, the leader of the largest or wealthi-est family, and the most powerful person in the village. The headman was respected by all, but he did not have much control over the group. He had no power to make new laws or change ancient traditions. Nor could he punish anyone. If he gave direct orders the people might or might not obey.

The headman had a high place in the society because of his status. It was generally an inherited mission. He had many items such as animal skins, obsidian knives, and shells. These were used as money. As a leader, the headman organized hunting and fishing activities, gave advice when asked, settled arguments, and gave extra food to villagers in need.

In some tribes, such as the Yurok, the headman was often a spiritual and political leader. He supervised traditional ceremonies and served as a healer. In the larger villages of Central California, especially in the south, the headman had a council to help him govern. The council usually consisted of village elders, who were often adult relatives of the headman. The vil-lage medicine person might also be a member of the council. In the Yokut of Central California, the medicine person received his or her powers through dreams. A Yokut medicine person often tried to cure someone by sucking out diseases or draining blood from person.

Miwok women shared the food-gathering duties with men, but played no role in the tribal leadership.

GOVERNING SYSTEM


Sometimes, the headmen of two villages have to meet and settle arguments between the two groups. These arguments could be

over access to a group of acorn trees or hunting and fishing lands. Other problems sometimes came up. A member of one tribe might have insulted someone, stolen something from a member of the other tribe, or perhaps even committed murder. Arguments were usually settled peacefully. But on rare occasions, the two tribes went to war and a fierce battle took place. Often, both sides agreed to a symbolic battle instead. Few people got hurt in such events. The men of both tribes would toss stones at each other and shout insults. Then the two headmen would agree on a peace settlement.

When Pe aceful PeoPle Went to War

35 vill age life

The Dentalium shell, a seashell shaped like a tooth, was the favorite type of money among the coastal tribes.

Native Americans in California traded or bought the things they wanted or needed. Products—skins, furs, and woven baskets—

were bartered or offered in trade. Native Americans also bought things they wanted by paying with money. The native peoples of California did not have metal coins or paper money. The most common form of money used was made of sea shells. But only special kind of shells were accepted as money. In order to be valuable, the “money” could not be too easy to get. The shells were strong on pieces of string. The more shells on the strain the higher its value. The “money” was born on their clothing, necklaces, and headbands.

In Central California, the most common type of money was in the form of small, f lat, round discs made of clamshells. The disks, each about the size of a nickel, were strung like beads. Clamshells were common, so clamshell money was not worth as much as Dentalium shells.

CURRENCY & COMMERCE

Native Americans often traded or bartered one item for another. The Yurok traded dried fish, salty seaweed, and shells with the Hupa

in exchange for nuts, seeds, and deerskins. Most Native Americans stayed close to home and traded with members of their own or neighboring villages. Others traveled much farther, making their living by trade.

Some tribes such as the Chumash, who lived on the southern coast of California, often trading with the Mojave, who lived in the desert far to the east. The trading network was established during the early days of Native American settlement to carry guns between the coast and inland. The Chumash also trained with the Yokut, who lived in the foothills of the Sierra Nevada. The Chumash offered shell jewelry, animal skins, deer antlers, knives, bows and arrows, and baskets for trade. In return, they got clay pot-tery and red dye from the Mojave and melons, tobacco, herbs, salt, and black dye from the Yokut. The Yana and Atsugewi, near volcanic Mount Lassen, traded obsidian tools and arrow points in exchange for blankets and acorns with Native Americans farther south.

Regional tRade


Traditional concepts of property tended to vary in degree rather than kind in native California. In general, larger groups such

as clans and villages owned the land and protected it against infringement from other groups. Individuals, lineages, and extended families usually did not own land but instead exercised exclusive use rights to certain food col-lecting, fishing, and hunting areas within the communal territory. Either groups or individuals might own areas where resources such as medicinal plants or obsidian, a form of volcanic glass used to make very sharp tools, were unevenly distributed over the landscape. Particular articles could be acquired by manufacture, inheritance, purchase, or gift.

Goods and foodstuffs were distributed through reciprocal exchange between kin and through large trading fairs, which were often ritualized. Both operated similarly in that they served as redistribution and banking system for easily spoiled food; a group with surplus edibles would exchange them for durable goods (such as shells) that could be used in the future to acquire fresh food in return.

Most California groups included professional traders who traveled long dis-tances among the many tribes. Goods from as far away as Arizona and New Mexico could be found among California’s coastal peoples. Generally, shells from the coastal areas were valued and exchanged for products of the inland areas, such as obsidian. Medicines, manufactured goods such as baskets, and other objects were also common items of exchange.

ProPert y & e xchange systems

37 vill age life

While groups in the northern province tended to be matrilineal—passing status, property, and education through the mater-

nal line—those in the other three provinces were generally patrilineal. Marriages were usually arranged by parents, who openly wished to see their children rise (or at least not fall) in status. As with up-marrying slaves, members of the middle classes of a group could marry up if they had dis-tinguished themselves in some way. The children of these marriages would inherit the status of the higher-ranking spouse. If the spouse of lower rank was not distinguished in some way, the children would accrue the lower sta-tus; as this was generally seen as an undesirable outcome, such matches occurred relatively rarely.

An interesting aspect of Northwest Coast culture was the emphasis on teaching children etiquette, moral standards, and other traditions of social import. Every society has processes by which children are taught the behavior proper to their future roles, but often such teaching is not an overt or deliberate process. On the Northwest Coast, however, particularly northward of the Columbia River, children were instructed formally. This instruction began at an age when children were still in their cradles or tod-dling, and all elder relatives, particularly grandparents, participated in it.

Lessons were often delivered gently and humorously through the telling and retelling of folktales. Trickster tales recounting Raven’s exploits were especially entertaining, as his troubles were so obviously the result of his dissolute, lazy, gluttonous, and lecherous personality. Children born to high status were given formal instruction throughout childhood and ado-lescence. They had to learn not only routine etiquette but also the lengthy traditions by which the rank and privileges of their particular group were validated, including rituals, songs, and formulaic prayers.

Changes in status were generally marked by public ceremonies. Formal rit-uals were considered necessary at each of two or three critical stages in a person’s lifetime—birth, a girl’s attainment of puberty (there were no boys’ puberty rites in the area), and death— because at those times the partici-pants in these events might be especially vulnerable or so filled with power that they could inadvertently harm others. A newborn infant was believed to be in danger of harm by supernatural beings; the infant’s parents were simultaneously in danger and potentially dangerous.

Kinship & family l ife


Mystic forms of vulnerability and volatility also accrued to girls at puberty, to the close kin of a deceased person, and to those who prepared and disposed of the dead. Such perils were avoided by isolating the persons involved—either within a boarded-off cubicle in the house or in a simple structure out in the woods—and by limiting their diet to old dried fish and water. At the conclusion of the isolation period, a formal purification ritual was per-formed. The intensity of the restrictions varied considerably, not only in different parts of the coast but even within individual houses. Often the pubescent daughter of a chief, for example, was secluded for many months, whereas her low-ranking house sister might have to observe only a few days.

Over most of the coast there was a very great fear of the dead. A body was usu-ally removed from the house through some makeshift aperture other than the door and disposed of as rapidly as possible. An exception occurred in the northern province, where bodies of chiefs were placed in state for several days while clan dirges were sung. Disposal of the dead varied. In the north-ern province, cremation was practiced. In the Wakashan and part of the Coast Salish areas, large wooden coffins were suspended from the branches of tall trees or placed in rock shelters. Other Coast Salish deposited their dead in canoes set up on stakes. In Southwestern Oregon and Northwest California, interment in the ground was preferred.

Changes in status were generally marked by public ceremonies and rituals.

39 vill age life

Because of its implications for long-term economic and social bonds and obliga-tions, marriage was almost always a matter

arranged by the families of the prospective bride and groom. Generally, the families exchanged goods at the time of the marriage, with the bulk of goods coming from the husband’s family. In most cases the wife took up resi-dence with the husband’s family and was taught the ways of the group by her mother- and sisters-in-law.

Adults of childbearing age were generally responsible for providing food for the group; the generation senior to them—their parents, aunts, and uncles— were typically responsible for raising the children of the community. Learning was a continuous process in which older persons instructed chil-dren through elaborate tales containing lessons concerning behavior and values. Constant supervision, provided by adults, older siblings, and other relatives, reminded younger children about how things should be done.

The educational process became more intense and dramatic during rites of passage, when individuals attained new status and responsibility. The female puberty ritual, for example, generally included a time of isolation, because girls were considered especially empowered (and therefore poten-tially dangerous on a spiritual level) at menarche. Depending on the tribe, this ritual varied in length from several days to several weeks. During this time, an older woman would care for the girl and instruct her in her role as an adult. Initiation ceremonies for boys were less common and, when carried out, were usually less formal, involving instruction in male occupations and behavior, and predictions regarding the boy’s future religious, economic, or political career.

Adult education could be heavily institutionalized. Young Chumash men, for instance, purchased apprenticeships from guild like associations of profes-sional artisans. Young Pomo men were also charged a fee to be trained as apprentices by recognized professional craftsmen, albeit without the inter-vention of a craft association.

Leaders and specialists continued their training on a less-formal level throughout their lifetimes. A person destined to become chief received instruction from others (such as elders, ritualists, and shamans) and con-tinued to receive such counsel after assumption of office.

Marriage & child re aring

Marriage was almost always a matter arranged by the families of the prospective bride and groom.


41 vill age life

California has many different environments, probably more than any other part of North America. From forest-covered mountains to rocky beaches, fertile valleys to sparse deserts. In order to survive in the region, native peoples had to learn how to adapt these various environments. They used all possible resources provided by nature for food, shelter, and clothing and very little was wasted.

3

L iv ing off the L and

LIVING WITH THE ENVIRONMENT

California presents three principal eth-nological divisions. First, in the extreme northwest of the state, bordering on the

Pacific Ocean and Oregon, is a small area whose native culture is fundamen-tally isolated to an unusual degree. Second, in the region commonly known as Southern California, that is to say the territory south of Tehachapi pass in the interior and of Point Conception on the coast, there is some diversity of ethnological conditions, but the area as a whole is quite distinctly marked off from the remainder of the state. Third, there is the remaining two-thirds of the state, an area which has been called, in an ethnological sense, and in distinction from the Northwestern and Southern areas, the Central region. This central region consists of what is ordinarily known as Northern California and Central California.

Whatever the origins of these people, as they settled into California’s unique ecological regions, they began to utilize resources in quite different ways. Archaic life was largely hand-to-mouth and provided little surplus; people of the Pacific period began to develop food sources that could provide sur-pluses. More to the point, they began to develop ways of processing and preserving food resources that did occur in sufficient quantity to be put away for later consumption. These resources might be harvested in rela-tively short periods of time, but they could be harvested and processed in sufficient quantity that the resulting supply of food would last the year.

For most of California, the acorn and salmon were crucial to this cul-tural complex; they were nourishing, plentiful staple foods. Where acorns and salmon were not available, they were replaced by pine nuts, mesquite beans, or rabbits. The importance of the development of staple foods lies in the fact that it allowed people of the Pacific period to settle. This promoted coalescence into tribes and tribelets, identification with localities, and development of a strong cultural relationship between context and custom.

4 3 liv ing with the environment

California’s native peoples were mostly hunters and gatherers. Variety in their diets matched the variety in environments. Although Native Americans could not choose from as many products as in a modern super-market, at least 500 different foods were available. The main food in the native diet was the acorn. It was nutritious, and it was readily available in most parts of California. A single, large oak tree was capable of producing up to 1000 pounds of acorns a year. Native American women harvested the acorns and sorted them in large baskets.

The only Native Americans to develop the farming and irrigation of crops were the Mojave and Yuma in the desert along the Colorado River. Acorns and other foods found easily elsewhere were unavailable in the desert. They planted beans, pumpkins, watermelons, wheat, cantaloupes, and a kind of corn called maize.

The Hupa, Yurok, Karok, Shasta, Tolowa, Wiyot, and Wailaki peoples of Northwestern California adapted well to their rainy environment. They lived in settlements along the river banks and along the Pacific coast. They ate mostly salmon and other fish, mussels and other shellfish, acorns, elk and deer. The Shasta mixed dry, powdered berries with meal to sweeten it. They also stored pine nuts for the winter.

At least 500 different foods were naturally available in California to hunt or gather.

figure 3 .1 f o od ava i l a b i l i t y a n d r e s p on s e s

In areas with abundant food tribes were more likely to settle into permanent

villages. In contrast, areas with food scarcity were more nomadic or, in the

case of the Mojave, developed agriculture.

Need for Agriculture

Fo

od

Ava

ilab

ility

Nomadic Behavior

Fo

od

Ava

ilab

ility


Rivers and streams provided plenty of trout, salmon, and other fish

In Northeastern California, the Modoc, Achumawi, and Atsugewi people ate salmon, deer, rabbits, grass seeds, roots, and water lily seeds. The val-leys, hills, and Central California coast were home to the Miwok, Costanoan, Pomo, and Esselen peoples.

In the mountains and valleys where then Maidu, Wintun, Yokut, Yana, and Monache people. The diet of these groups consisted of salmon, acorns, deer, elk, antelope, rabbits, and birds. In addition to salmon and acorns, the Pomo and Costanoan ate mussels and other shellfish. The Maidu also ate eel, grasshoppers, caterpillars, and the eggs of yellow jackets.

In the high desert country east of the Sierra Nevada, lakes such as Mono Lake were too alkaline to support fish. So the Mono Paiute people ate kut-savi, the larva of a f ly, found on the shores of Mono Lake. Kutsavi was rich in protein. The diet of the Chemehuevi, Panamint Shoshone (also called Koso), Kawaiisu, and Serrano peoples of the deserts of Southern California included cactus fruit, seeds, f lowers, and piñon pine nuts. They also ate liz-ards, squirrels, skunks, porcupines, , rabbits, and mountain sheep.

4 5 liv ing with the environment

In those days, California has many oak trees, which have nuts: a court. Acorns became the most important food of the California

Indian. They took the place of corn and other grains. People who didn’t have acorns got them through trade. Hardly anyone became a farmer.

Besides acorns, people ate almost everything they could hunt, fish, or gather. They ate wild fruits, cactuses, bulrushes—a tall plant, and its roots. Salmon, elk, and rabbits were also popular. Abalone, earthworms, grasshoppers, and turtles all were eaten by some group in California.

Before anyone could eat the acorns, a bitter chemical called tannin had to be removed. Using a f lat stone, women ground the acorn into f lour. They then rinsed the f lour several times with hot water, often in a finely-weaved basket, which removed that tannin. The f lour was then made into a thick porridge by mixing it with water in a watertight cooking basket. The mix-ture was then cooked by dropping hot stones onto it. The resulting acorn mush, something like hot cereal, was usually eaten plain, but sometimes honey or berries were added to sweeten it. Sometimes acorn f lour was made into a f lat piece of bread and baked in the fire.

A rich die t

Traditional subsistence in native California centered on hunting, fishing, and collect-ing wild plant foods. Typically, men hunted

and fished while women and children collected plant foods and small game. Hunting and fishing equipment such as bows and arrows, throwing sticks, fishing gear, snares, and traps were made by men; women made nets, bas-kets, as well as clothing and cooking utensils.

Food resources varied across the landscape. Shellfish, deep-sea fish, surf fish, acorns, and game were the main subsistence staples for coastal peoples. Groups living in the foothills and valleys relied on acorns, the shoots and seeds of weedy plants and tule (a type of reed), game, fish, and waterfowl. Desert-dwellers sought piñon nuts, mesquite fruit, and game (especially antelope and rabbit) and engaged in some agriculture.

Native Californians developed a variety of specialized technological devices to help them maximize the productivity of the region’s diverse environ-ments. The Chumash of southern coastal California made seaworthy plank canoes from which they hunted large sea mammals. Peoples living on bays and lakes used tule rafts, while riverine groups had f lat-bottom dugouts made by hollowing out large logs. Traditional food-preservation techniques included drying, and the leaching of those foods, notably acorns, that were high in acid content.

Specialized toolS


NORT H w E sT

acorns, berries, deer, elk,

mussels, pine nuts, salmon

C OA sT

abalone, deer, mussels,

salmon, seaweed

NORT H E A sT

deer, grass seeds, pine

nuts, rabbits, roots, salmon

gR E AT b A s I N

cactus fruit, insects, kutsavi, lizards,

mountain sheep, rabbits, seeds

C E N T R A l vA l l E y

antelope, acorns, birds, deer,

elk, pine nuts, rabbits, salmon

dE s E RT

beans, cactus fruit, insects,

maize, rabbits, squash

figure 3 . 2 r e gion a l s ta p l e f o od s

Food resources varied across the landscape. California’s native peoples were mostly

hunters and gatherers. Variety in their diets matched the variety in environments.

47 liv ing with the environment

California has a wide variety of climates—from cold, rainy winters in the north to hot, dry summers in the south. The desert have

extremely hot summers. As a result, Native Americans developed practical types of housing that matched their lifestyles and could be made with the available materials. Traditional house types varied from permanent, care-fully constructed homes occupied for generations to the most temporary types of structures. Dwellings could be wood-framed (Northern California), earth-covered (various areas), semi subterranean (Sacramento area), or made of brush (desert areas) or thatched palm (Southern California). Communal and ceremonial buildings were found throughout the region and were often large enough to hold the several hundred people who could be expected to attend rituals or festivals. Houses ranged in size from 5 or 6 feet (almost 2 meters) in diameter to apartment-style buildings in which several families lived together in adjoining units.

In places such as northwestern California, food was available through-out the year for gathering and storing. As a result, people lived in the same houses year-round. In other places, the land was less productive. To find food, the village group would have to move to other parts of their territory at different times of the year. In summer and fall, the gathered seats in acorns in the hills. Because they were on the move they built temporary houses—light, brush–covered shelters, open at the sides and held up by four poles.

Yurok and Hupa houses in the northwest were rectangular, wooden struc-tures. The walls and roof were made of redwood or cedar wood planks. Native Americans set a fire at the base of a redwood or cedar tree to knock it down. They then split the tree into planks, or boards, with an elk horn wedge. The Shasta people lived east of the Yurok and Hupa. Winters there were colder than along the coast. So for extra warmth, the Shasta built their houses in a deep hole in the ground. A wooden plank roof was placed over it. The Yuki, Pomo, and Miwok to the south, and groups in the Sacramento Valley to the East built cone-shaped houses made of slabs of bark. Its cone shape made the tepee easy to fold and transport. Native American tribes would often trans-port the tepee by dragging it behind a horse. They also built wood–frame houses that were thatched with grass and earth.

In Central California, people built brush shelters while traveling to gather food.

Taking shelTer


In the northeast, the Modoc had underground, earth–covered brush houses. The Achumawi had an underground bark house that was entered from the roof. The Washo, in the Lake Tahoe area of the Sierra Nevada, built dome shaped houses thatched with tule, leaves, or bark. In the deserts of Southern California, houses were often nothing more than simple shelters from the sun. The Cahuilla built square or oblong houses with mat roofs and walls plastered with mud. Mojave houses consisted of a frame of poles, thatched and covered with sand.

Native American dwellings in California varied in size from very small to homes large enough to sleep several families. There were also two special types of California Native American structures that—the roundhouse and the sweat house. The roundhouses of the Maidu, Miwok, and other Central California people were used for religious ceremonies. Sweat houses were domed shaped or cone shaped, and usually covered with earth. The houses were mainly for men, except on special occasions when women were allowed inside. A fire was built inside, and since there was no hole for smoke to escape, it became hot and smoky. Men gathered and the evenings, and often slept there, away from their families.

figure 3 .3 di f f e r e n t s t y l e s of hou s e s

Native Americans developed practical types of housing that matched

their lifestyles and could be made with the available materials.

hou s e t y pe m at e r i a l s lo c at ion c h a r act e r i st ic s

tepee

plank house

pit house

tree branch poles

covered in bark

north coast

central valley

cone shape

portable

redwood or cedar planks northwest

northeast

could fit multiple families

tree branh poles

coveres in reeds

central coast

great basin

semisubterranean


Native American women in California make baskets for every purpose and occasion. There were five-foot-tall baskets for storing

acorns, baskets for carrying firewood, baskets to track animals, baskets to carry infants, and gift baskets. They were even basketry items of clothing, such as hats, belts, and sandals.

There were two basic basket-making techniques. There was a form of weav-ing called twining, and a stitched form known as coiling. Native American mothers taught basket weaving designs their daughters. Therefore, the designs of each family group remained pretty much the same from gener-ation to generation. The baskets were made from various plant fibers. The fibers could be colored red, yellow, and black using plant dies from black-berries, sunf lowers, buttercups, elderberries, and the indigo bush. Pomo women were considered to be the best basket makers in California. They wove brightly colored birds feathers into their tightly woven baskets. Their baskets became highly prized items of trade, and are still made today.

When the native people of California wore depended on the season and weather. In warm weather, the men wore very little—

a strip of animal skin wrapped around their hips—or nothing at all. The women wore two–piece fringed skirts made of animal skin and plant fibers and a tightly woven, round cap on their head. Men and women decorated their faces and bodies with painted designs and tattoos. When the wore bead and shell necklaces, and hairbands and belts made of birds feathers. The men wore necklaces of bird beaks, animal teeth, or shells.

Native Americans usually went barefoot. But they were deerskin moccasins on hunting and food gathering trips. Native people in the southern deserts wore open sandals made of woven yucca fibers to protect their feet against burning sand. In the Sierra Nevada, the Modoc and Maidu used wooden snowshoes. To keep warm in winter, the Modoc wore leggings made of woven tule fibers. The Costanoan wore a rabbit-skin coat during the day and used it as a blanket at night. As protection against cold or wet weather, most native peoples used deerskin blanket as capes.

Clothing

Baske try


Working in the materials natural to their respective homelands, the various Native American cultures produced art that

ref lected their environment. Those peoples living in heavily forested regions, for example, inevitably became gifted sculptors in wood; those for whom clay was a major resource became skillful potters; and those living in the grass-lands became fine basket weavers. There is virtually no natural medium that has not been explored and mastered by the Indian: jade, turquoise, shell, metals, stone, milkweed fibre, birch bark, porcupine quills, deer hair, llama dung, sea lion whiskers— all were used by the artist to lend colour or texture to the finished product.

In many instances, such materials became desired commodities in them-selves, to be traded over great distances, for certain objects were not regarded as “official” unless they were manufactured from a prescribed material. A substitute could not be tolerated, especially when the materials were to be used for religious purposes. Often, in such cases, the materials achieved a standard value within the economy, with ready acceptance as a medium of exchange wherever they were in vogue.

The relationship between material and design in art was quite different from that in the Western tradition. The Western painter usually imposed a design on the artificially limited surface of a f lat, rectangular canvas; and the sculptor, following predetermined spatial arrangements, imposed a shape on his material. On the other hand, the Indian painter and sculptor were less likely to force their materials to conform to a preconceived design. They tended instead to adapt their design to the natural outlines of their materials, which often happened to be a complete and therefore irregular buffalo hide, a tree branch, or a stone. This naturalism is one of the most pleasing aspects of Indian art and often demonstrates the artist’s remark-able ability to incorporate the natural form into his composition.

materials


Petroglyphs and pictographs appear on the walls of remote canyons and caves in many parts of California. Petroglyphs are

carvings in rock, and pictographs are paintings on rock. The oldest petro-glyphs are at least 3,000 years old. Pictographs are more recent, dating from about 500 c.e. Most of these ancient works of art are found in the Southern California lands of the Chumash and Panamint Shoshone peoples.

Archeologists do not know the true purpose of this ancient rock art, but they believe that it is the work of medicine people who wished to convey certain messages. The red, brown, black, and white designs of the pictographs are of geometrical shapes such as triangles and circles, as well as of animals, peo-ple, the sun, and stars. It is possible that the drawing of animals was meant as hunting “magic,” to bring good luck to the hunt. By dating the petroglyphs, archaeologists learned that California native peoples began using the bow and arrow around 300 c.e . That is when the bow and arrow first appeared in petroglyphs. Earlier petroglyphs included carvings of the atlatl, the throw-ing stick that these early peoples used for hunting.

Making their Mark


The origins of some rituals, customs, and spiritual beliefs of California’s native peoples is lost in time. The Native Americans, just like all other peoples in the world, sought the meaning of life and an understanding of the world. For thousands of years, these spiritual beliefs have been passed down from one generation to the next. Many are still practiced today and are experiencing a revival.

4

Religion in cultuRe

RITUALS, CUSTOMS & BELIEFS

Native California’s traditional religious institutions were intensely and intimately associated with its political, economic,

social, and legal systems. Frequently the priests, shamans, and ritualists in a community organized themselves around one of two religious systems: the Kuksu in the north and the Toloache in the south. Both involved the formal indoctrination of initiates and—potentially, depending upon the individ-ual—a series of subsequent status promotions within the religious society; these processes could literally occupy initiates, members, and mentors throughout their lifetimes. Members of these religious societies exercised considerable economic, political, and social inf luence.

In the Kuksu religion (common among the Pomo, Yuki, Maidu, and Wintun), colorful and dramatic costumes and equipment were used during ritual impersonations of specific spirit beings. Within the Toloache religion (as among the Luiseño and Diegueño), initiates performed while drinking a hal-lucinogenic decoction made of the jimsonweed plant (Datura meteloides); the drug put them in a trance and provided them with supernatural knowl-edge about their future lives and roles as members of the sacred societies.

Religions on the Colorado River differed slightly because they were not con-cerned with developing formal organizations and recruitment procedures. Individuals received religious information through dreams, and members recited long narrative texts, explaining the creation of the world, the travel of culture heroes, and the adventures of historic figures.

In the northwestern part of the culture area, there was another type of infor-mally structured religious system. Its rituals concerned world renewal (as in the white-deerskin dance) and involved the recitation of myths that were privately owned—that is, for which the prerogative of recitation belonged to only a few individuals. One communal need served by these ceremonies was the reification (or, sometimes, restructuring) of relationships. The display of costumes and valuable possessions (such as white deerskins or delicately chipped obsidian blades) reaffirmed social ranking, and the success of the ritual reaffirmed the orderly relationship of humanity to the supernatural.

55 rituals, customs & beliefs

Three important religious systems, among the native peoples of California—World Renewal in northwestern California, Kuksu

in Central California, and Toloache farther south. Each religion has its own secrets traditional beliefs, ceremonies, and rituals. All Native American groups believed in the Creator—a supreme being who created the world.

Some believe that the Creator was an animal. The Yokut believed the coy-ote created human beings. Others believe the Creator had a humanlike form. The Maidu called the Creator “Earth Maker.” The Cahto people in Northern California called the Creator “Thunder God.” Creation stories explained how the world came to be.

All Native American groups believed that everything in the world has a spirit. Animals, birds, plants, mountains, winds, and water each contain-ing a spirit that can talk. However, Native Americans believed most humans could not understand the spirit languages.

Cre ation My ths

California Indians have religious respect for the areas where they lived. They believed that they had always lived in that place.

Usually, they believed that one special spot in their area was sacred. Some myths say their ancestors rose out of the earth at this “place of power.”

In many of these sacred places, rock art can be found. Pictures and symbols have been carved into or painted onto the rocks. Much of this rock art is hun-dreds of years old, and yet the colors are still bright. California has more rock art than any other region in the United States.

Sacred Pl aceS


Once a year, the World Renewal groups held ceremonies honoring the Creator, so that the Creator would once again fill the oak trees and acorns and the rivers with Stan. Native

Americans of different tribes and several villages would gather at a host vil-lage for ceremonies that often lasted two weeks. World Renewal religious practices, overseeing a medicine person, involves the performance of spe-cial songs and dances. Usually only the men took part in the rituals, while the women watched.

Hupa and Karok dancers were decorated costumes, such as skins from the rare white albino deer. White deer dancers also carried poles, around which they draped deer skins. The Hupa and Karok her for these ritual dances to prevent famine and natural disasters and to ensure that there were enough natural resources. In a ritual called the Jumping Dance, dancers indicated the crouching and leaping movements of animals. World Renewal ceremo-nies were social events as well. Families got to know people of other villages. Men gathered in the sweat house and competed in athletic events. Wealthy families display their possessions.

Animism is the belief that souls or spirits exist not only in humans, but in animals, rocks, trees, winds—essentially all natural phenomena. Specific animals had certain defined characteristics; some tribes even believed that animals existed before humankind and established on Earth the various rules and guidelines that humans were meant to follow.

Most groups also held to the belief that there was a “Great Spirit,” a main deity that was recognized as the overseer of life on Earth. Whether known as Kitchi-Manitou, as the Algonquian speaking peoples of North America knew this Great Spirit, or by another appellation, the master deity existed in the physical and spirit worlds, along with the tricksters, heroes, monsters, giants, and spirits that made up many a Native American’s world view.

The Pomo, Maidu, Costanoan, and Miwok of Central California practiced Kuksu. Kuksu was the name of a Pomo spirit. Like the World Renewal Creator, Kuksu renewed the plants and animals that gave life to the believ-ers. Kuksu villages took turns hosting yearly, week–long Kuksu ceremonies. But Kuksu dances and costumes were different from the World Renewal cer-emonies. Robes and feather headdresses were worn, and they danced in the village roundhouse. The dancers pretended to be Kuksu and other spirits through their movements. Boys took part in secrets initiation their monies, where the medicine percent would teach the customs of adulthood.

Religious systems


Most ceremonies involved dancing and music. Singing usually took the form of chanting in time to hand clapping and foot

stomping. Simple musical instruments were used, especially rattles. One rattle was made by fastening to turtle shells together, with pebbles or cherry pits inside. Another rattle, like the one shown here, was made by tying several dry dear hooves to a stick. Yet another was made by putting peb-bles inside dry insect cocoons tied to a stick. A clapper rattle , used by the Maidu, was made by half–splitting a stick and wrapping it so the two halves clapped or rattled together. A foot–drum was used by the Indians of Central California. A f lat wooden plank or a large hollowed–out log was set over a hole in the f loor of the roundhouse. It was sounded by a man pounding on it in the rhythm with his heels while dancing. Indians also used a wooden whistle at ceremony. Its shrill sounds were so piercing that it was easily heard above the chanting and drumming.

Music in rituals

Some native peoples believed the jimsonweed was a plant of the gods and not to be touched.

Southern California peoples such as the Yokut, Luiseño, and Cahuilla believed in Toloache. Toloache is Spanish for “jimsonweed,” a desert plant with white bell–like f lowers. During a tribal initiation, always drink a mix-ture of water and juice and jimsonweed root.

They would then fall asleep for many hours. The plant caused them to dream or have a vision. The vision gave the boys a kind of power, making them breaker or stronger. When they awoke, the medicine person and the village elders made a stand he takes on the ground, using our and bands of differ-ent colors. The designs they created showed up things from nature such as wolves, snakes, spiders, the sun, the moon, and the stars. The medicine per-son used the painting to teach the boys about the natural and spirit world. At the end of the lesson, the painting was destroyed. The use of supernatural power to control events or transform reality was basic to every California group. Generally magic was used in attempts to control the weather, increase the harvest of crops, and foretell the future. Magic or sorcery was deemed not only the cause of sickness and death, but also the principal means of cur-ing many diseases. Its practices were also considered to be ways to protect oneself, to punish wrongdoers, and to satisfy personal ends.


When Native American boys and girls reached the age at which they became young adults, they took part in coming–of–age rit-

uals. The various tribes marked this event in different ways. But the purpose of this ritual was the same for each group. It was meant to give the young per-son strength to deal with the hardships of life.

Boy of the Luiseño people of Southern California underwent a particu-larly difficult test. At the age of eighteen, a boy had to lie in a hit and allow ants to crawl over him. He could not f linch or show pain. In this way, native Americans immediate the boy gains power to overcome harm from arrows. Girls of Southern California tribes came of age earlier than boys, often being married at age fifteen. So when she turned thirteen or fourteen, a world took part in a “roasting” ritual. The girl had to lie face down in a pit of sand for four days and three nights. It was thought that this would make her strong enough to endure childbearing and other hardships.

Coming-of-age rituals

The medicine person in most California tribes was, along with the headman or chief, the most powerful person in the vil-

lage. This person’s main job was to heal the sick. Medicine people were also religious leaders and gave the headman or chief advice on many matters. In California, native people also relied on the medicine person for such tasks as predicting weather and naming children. Many people have special abili-ties. Some could predict the future. A medicine person might be called upon to make it rain. Some people believe that medicine people could turn into a bear and kill their enemies. Nobody knew the limits of a medicine person’s power, but people believe that power could be used for both good and evil.

A innocent person have to go through many years of training. A child usually began training after having a dream about a spiritual being. This being then became the young person’s guardian spirit. An experienced medicine person taught the young person methods of healing and special rituals. A medi-cine person often used herbs to cure diseases or injuries such as rattlesnake bites. Once the students develop skills, he or she would be recognized in and initiation down on pass included fasting and a special dance.

Medicine PeoPle

Unlike most other tribes, most Hupa Yurok, and Karok medicine people were women.


The native people of California lived at peace in their own world for thousands of years following their traditional ways of life. But the arrival of Europeans would prove to be a catastrophe for the California native peoples. For the most part, they were entirely unaware of the landing of Christopher Columbus in 1492. Fifty years later, in 1542, Juan Rodrieguez Cabrillo sailed along California's coast and investigated San Deigo Bay. Thirty-seven years later, Francis Drake explored portions of the northern coastline. Little in these first contacts was traumatic and few native people were affected; but. California's isolation was about to end.

5

The mission period

Outside influences

In 1942, Christopher Columbus brought news of a new land back to Europe. The Spaniards, who had paid for Columbus’s

exploration, quickly colonized the Caribbean and parts of South America. In 1542, Juan Cabrillo sailed north from New Spain—which is now Mexico—in surgical. Reaching the coast of presence–day Southern California, he encountered the Chumash. Cabrillo thus became the first European to see California’s native peoples. In 1602, the Spanish explorer Sebastian Vizcaino mapped the California coast. Europeans did not visit again when the next 167 years. Then, in 1769, Father Junípero Serra and a few other Franciscan padres traveled north from New Spain to what is now San Diego and established a mission there. Spain encouraged the building of mis-sions and forts in California. Spain wanted to convert the native people to Christianity, as well as take over their territory. The Franciscan padres a eventually built 21 missions. The string of missions along the California coast went as far north as Sonoma, near San Francisco.

When the missions were built, the natives in nearby villages usually wel-comed the Spaniards in friendship. The padres encouraged the naked people to live at the missions. They were drawn to the missions in hopes of conduct-ing trade. The Native Americans entered the missions willingly, at first. But once there, they were forced to work with the Spaniards for very little in return. They grew products such as wheat, olives, and grapes. The men were also trained in tile making, carpentry, leatherwork, blacksmithing, and masonry. The women worked at spinning and weaving yarn, making cloth-ing, and baking bread.

The Native Americans received religious training from the padres and were baptized as Catholics. They were forced to give up many of their traditional customs. They had to learn Spanish and stop using their native languages. Austin native peoples, different villages lived in the same mission. The padres named the roof according to the mission to which they belong, such as Diegueños at Mission San Diego and Gabrieliños at Mission San Gabriel.

61 outside influences

Life was rough for the native people living in the missions. They were not used to long hours of labor. Even worse, they were not free to leave Native Americans who did not okay or tried to escape were severely punished. Sometimes they were even killed to serve as a warning to others. Native Americans faced other problems at the missions, too. The missions were dirty and overcrowded. The native people were not used to different foods. Worst of all, they caught European diseases brought by the Spaniards. Many died from measles, smallpox, and other diseases.

The mode of Spanish settlement was simple and followed the same essen-tial lines in each location. A cross was erected; mass was celebrated; and attempts were made to contact the local Indians. As labor and resources were organized, permanent buildings were constructed. These always included a fortress, or presidio, and a mission complex, including a church, residencies, and work areas. Eventually, these were joined by a small civil complex, or colony. Indians were invited to create a village next to the mis-sion complex, though unmarried Indian women and children were usually forced to live inside the mission in chaste seclusion.

The Spanish attitude toward indigenous people was to recognize them as human beings living in a natural relationship with their environs, rather like the animals of the forests. From a cultural point of view, generally speaking, they recognized no tendency toward civilization among these people and, instead, viewed them as entirely uncivilized. They responded by viewing themselves as “bringing the gifts of civilization” to these peo-ple, though later analysts have questioned whether such gifts were needed. From a Spanish theological standpoint, indigenous people were pagans who were desperately in need of conversion to Christianity for the salva-tion of their souls. This conversion was a high priority and was implemented through baptism, instruction in Catholic rituals, moral education, incor-poration into the mission community, and enforcement of strict discipline. “Enforcement” included incarceration, public humiliation, f logging, and even capital punishment.

The Spanish Missionaries saw themselves as “bringing the gifts of civilization” to the natives.


From an economic and political standpoint, indigenous people represented the lowest possible class of people in Spanish feudal society and were eas-ily folded into the feudal system which the missionaries carried with them into Alta California. Under this system, only the highest classes of Spanish society actually owned land, had rights, and made decisions. It was expected that all others would sort themselves out into subordinate classes which, if they exercised power or autonomy, possessed importance only relative to each other. Of these classes, those who found themselves at the lowest levels were destined to work hardest and were expected to give up most of the product of their labors for the enrichment of the system as a whole. It was inherent to the Spanish view of life and society, in other words, that the Indian, once brought within the gifts of Spanish civilization, would occupy the lowest rung of social order and, thereupon, would perform the necessary labors of brick making, timber cutting, building construction, farm mainte-nance, and domestic service.

Later rationalizations of the mission era would look back upon it fondly as a period of education for the Indians, bringing them agriculture and mod-ern trades as well as the gift of Catholic salvation. What a strange shock it must have been for the Native Californians who lived along the coast, from San Diego to San Francisco Bay, to experience these revelations of European civilization. Having lived thousands of years without interference, Native Californians found themselves intruded upon by numbers of strangely clothed people who brought with them remarkably powerful weapons as well as domesticated animals, never before seen --- horses, oxen, cows, pigs, etc. These newcomers behaved as though the land was theirs and asserted their right to dictate events. They urged Native people to adopt their gods and rit-uals; and they encouraged them to adopt European agriculture and animal husbandry. If an Indian accepted what the Fathers called “baptism,” he or she was forced to leave the family village and kinship relations and to live within the mission complex. The Indian experiencing “missionization” was commanded in many ways, not just to work, but also to forsake all elements of the Indian’s natural culture, from diet to dress to behavior.


The Spanish were neither understanding nor forgiving of “infractions” against their rules and laws; the Indian who carried natural behavior into the Spanish world quickly learned how violent a disciplinarian the Spanish could be. Native Americans staged revolts over the years at some of the mis-sions. In 1775, about 600 Diegueño people burned the Mission San Diego and killed a padre. In 1824, about 2000 Native Americans attacked Mission La Purisma. That same year, Native Americans burned the mission at Santa Barbara. But despite these attempts, the Native Americans were unable to overthrow the mission system.

By the end of the mission era, the Spanish had clearly established missions, military strongholds, and small civilian colonies. They had exercised a sub-stantial inf luence over all indigenous people from San Diego to north of the San Francisco Bay and from the coast inland even into the western sides of the Central Valley. Those Indians who had been baptized and who had lived within the mission world for any significant period had acquired knowledge of European agriculture, animal husbandry, and construction techniques. They had been molded into a primitive but significant labor force. These same people had been thoroughly instructed in Christian life and ritual, and every attempt had been made to force their conformity to Christian moral practices. They had been given Spanish names and Spanish clothing; substantial attempts had been made to destroy their indigenous cultures, break their family and village ties, and especially end the spiritual connec-tion with tribal shamans. In most of this the Spanish had been successful, though at incredible cost of lives. Indians learned well and adopted attrac-tive aspects of Spanish material culture, as it was practical to do so.

The Spanish had exercised a substantial influence over all native people from San Diego to north of the San Francisco and from the coast inland to the western Central Valley.


Meanwhile, in 1821, Mexico had won its independence from Spain. In 1834, the Spanish government ordered the California

missions to be torn down. From then on, each mission chapel would simply become a local Catholic church. With the ending of the mission system, each adult male Native American living in a mission was to receive 33 acres of mission lands. Unfortunately, many Native Americans were not told about these rights. Most of the land went to wealthy rancheria owners.

The mission Native Americans had few options. They could work for the rancheria owners or work in the nearby towns where cheap labor was in demand. Wherever they decided to work, they were treated no better than apes. Some went back to England, far from white people’s towns and ranche-rias near the coast. They try to live again in the tradition of their ancestors. They join existing Native American communities or form new ones. But as the years went by, European communities grew larger, and soon, the diffi-cult situation of the nation peoples would become even worse.

For the mission Indians, who had actually made the transition to Spanish Catholic culture and who had lost connections with tribal villages and indigenous ways, it was a disaster; return to a natural indigenous life way was rarely successful. There was little left but to become feudal laborers in colonial villages and on Mexican ranchos. It is estimated that 15,000 of the 53,600 baptized Indians remained alive and in this precarious condition in 1836. In spite of the fact that Mexicanization of California proceeded slowly, it was a very damaging period to California Indians. The rapid decline of Indian populations along the coast led the missionaries to seek neophytes from increasingly distant regions of the interior.

After secularization, the economy of California was entirely based on the Mexican ranchos, which employed a system of peonage imported from Mexico. It was a particularly harsh form of feudalism, without the veneer of a righteous mission of Christian conversion and bordering on slavery. Indians living close to Mexican occupation found that their natural environ-ment had been so far degraded that their only survival option was laboring in the ranchos. But their wages were carefully maintained at survival’s mini-mum, only, and there was no prospect of bettering themselves. They were often paid much of their wage in alcohol, at week’s end, which kept them immobilized until they had to return at the week’s beginning.

The Me xican period

In spite of the fact that Mexicanization of California proceeded slowly, it was a very damaging period to the California native peoples..


Throughout the last decade of Mexican rule, an ever wider population of California’s indigenous people were being incorporated into this sphere, while coastal people, who had suffered under the missions for decades, were beginning to disappear entirely. The distribution of land into ranchos was pressing eastward from El Camino Real across the coastal mountains and into the Central Valley. Settlements were being established in the Delta region as far northeast as Sacramento. This meant that military expeditions to acquire neophytes and, later, military expeditions to acquire labor-ers were penetrating increasingly into the tribal territories of not only the Central Valley but also those of the western Sierran foothills.

The Indians were not just affected by the kidnaping and abuse of their peo-ple; but were rapidly being deprived of their natural food supply, as Hispaños, Europeans, and Americans crowded into the area, threatening natural plants and game animals. Indians retaliated periodically for the abuses. But they were forced to adapt their own food seeking activities also and this had an even more major impact on their relations with Whites. As Indians sought food by raiding cattle from the ranchos, small bands of Mexican mili-tary and volunteers raided Indian villages with savage vengeance. Without any doubt, cause and effect became entirely lost in this situation, and every-one had a “righteous claim” for doing violence against the others.

It is estimated that about 6% of the population decline during this period stemmed from military encounters; but much more stemmed from the con-tinuing inf lux of European diseases. Smallpox first appeared in 1833 and produced major epidemics among the Pomo, Wappo, and Wintun in 1838, the Miwok in 1844, and the Pomos again in 1850. An unknown disease among the Wintun, Maidu, Miwok, and Yokuts in 1833 wiped out 4500 people, 10% of their populations. In all, diseases are estimated as causing 60% of the population decline to the end of the Mexican period, and California indig-enous population had fallen to a total of only 150,000 people.

The Indians were not just affected by the kidnaping and abuse but were rapidly being deprived of their natural food supply, settlers crowded into the area


When he attempted to file a treaty, Sutter was told that “the United States government did not recognize the right of Indians to lease, sell, or rent their lands.”

In January 1848, gold was discovered at Sutter’s Mill, near present-day Sacramento. Soon after, thousands of prospectors

came to the gold fields of California, hoping to get rich. Groups of Native Americans live in the hills of the gold country. In 1848, half the people look-ing for gold were Native Americans, hired by the owners of rancherias. But the large number of newcomers in the area eventually led to problems. Many of the newcomers had no respect for the rights of the meeting people. The gold miners trespassed on native hunting grounds, killing animals, chop-ping down trees, and filling salmon streams with silt. The main food sources of Native Americans were soon destroyed. Sutter and Marshall moved rap-idly to secure their claim on the gold-bearing territories and they did this by attempting to negotiate a treaty with the local Indians, the Nisenan Maidu. This was one of the first treaties attempted with Indians in California. However, when Sutter filed this treaty with the new American military gov-ernment, in Monterey, he was told that “the United States government did not recognize the right of Indians to lease, sell, or rent their lands.”

By the time that California had become a state, in September 1850, the rush for gold had brought hundreds of thousands of people into the territory and California Indians, for the first time ever, had become a minority. Also, for the first time ever, the entire population of Indians was threatened. This was no infiltration from the Pacific Coast inland; it was a pervasive, aggres-sive appropriation of the entire territory and all of its resources. As easy gold strikes were depleted, people turned to farming, ranching, or logging.

The intruding population of gold-seeking miners was hostile toward the Indians, except where they could secure Indian labor for their mines. The wave of Gold-Rush immigration brought the usual burden of European diseases, to which the indigenous population had no immunity, but it also brought environmental degradation on an unprecedented scale. Rivers that had provided a clear entry to spawning salmon from eternity were becoming so choked with debris that the salmon were dying off without reproduction. Ranching and lumber operations soon added to the degradation. The envi-ronmental impact on the state was overwhelming.

The gold rush


Spanish missionaries had not treated the Native Americans as equals, and people now f looding into California did not show

any respect towards the natives. Before long, the killing began. In 1849, five men were missing from a mining camp. The Native Americans were blamed, even though there was no evidence. A gang of white men entered a Native American village and killed about 100 people. This and other violent acts, as the Native Americans to leave for other parts of California. But the violence continued whenever they encountered white people. Later that year, U.S. soldiers attacked a Pomo village at Clear Lake, killing 135 Pomo.

In 1851, California governor John McDougall announced that “a war of extermination will continue to be waged between the races until the Indian race becomes extinct.” Following this, settlers offered bounties for the scalps or heads of Native Americans. By 1860, gangs had killed more than 4000 natives. The killing continued for more than 10 years. During this time, many more Native Americans died from disease and starvation. If a Native American dared to steal a horse or some food, his whole family was often killed. Gangs of whites rode through California, kidnapping Native American children and young women to sell as indentured servants.

The k ill ing begins


figure 5 .1 de c l i n e of n at i v e p op u l at ion

The native population suffered dramatic losses after the arrival of the

Spanish, followed by the Mexican invasion, and the Gold Rush.

And estimated 3000 to 4000 Native American children were taken from their families in this way. Often, their parents were killed. The California law that the allies this form of slavery was not repealed until 1863. While the pre-mission population of 310,000 indigenous people had dropped to 200,000 during the mission period and dropped to 150,000 or fewer by the end of the Mexican period, it plummeted to less than 30,000 in the twenty years of Gold-Rush California, to 1870. Meanwhile, the population of non-indigenous people, still a minority in 1848, had shot to 700,000 by 1870. In the aftermath, many California tribes were declared extinct and almost none had successfully preserved their cultural ways of life. For most, even the retention of a cultural memory, for traditional purposes and social order, was close to impossible. (Recall that these were oral histories, completely dependent upon survival of old masters and training of young people.)

1770—

310,000

350,000+

240,000

150,000

100,00

700,00+

50,000

25,000

1830 1845

th

e g

ol

d r

us

h

th

e m

iss

ion p

er

iod

pr

e-c

on

ta

ct

th

e m

ex

ica

n p

er

iod

140 y r s

1855 1910

80+% decr ease

11,000


After California joins the Union in 1850, the federal government became involved in the new state’s affairs. The government wanted

to bring order to the region and make use of its resources. Three commis-sioners were sent to California to study the situation and make appraisals. They learned that most white citizens wanted all Native Americans out of California. But there was no place to send them.

The commissioners’ first priority was to end the conf lict between the peo-ple in California. They negotiated 18 treaties with various groups of Native Americans. The Native Americans gave up all claim to the territories, agree-ing to recognize U.S. government ownership of California. They promised not to attack U.S. citizens. In return, the commissioners promised that about 7.5 million acres, a small portion of the state, would be set aside or Native Americans to use. They also promised to provide food, clothing, live-stock, and tools, as well as help from teachers, farmers, and others. However, in June 1852, the U.S. Senate rejected the commissioners’ agreements with the native peoples. California’s Native Americans became landless, with no rights of citizenship or protection under the law. The government set up 25,000–acre farms and land no one else wanted. Native Americans were moved to farms where the soil was poor, there was little water, and there were few animals for them to hunt.

Not surprisingly, the farms failed. Native Americans were not given tools and training as had been promised. Many starved. Eventually, many people left the farms. The government then set up reservations. Native Americans were unhappy when they were moved to a place far from their homeland. One tribe, the Hupa, fought for five years to remain on their land. Finally, eight teams exceed four, they were given a reservation on their homelands in the Hoopa Valley. However, other native Americans work less fortunate. In April 1870, the Modoc return to their homelands in northeastern California. The resulting war with the U.S. Army ended with the Modoc’s defeat in 1873. This was the last major battle between white settlers and California’s Native Americans. During the late 1800s, the conditions on the remaining reserva-tions were terrible. Many suffered from poverty, disease, and lack of food. In addition, reservation officials discouraged Native Americans from keeping their traditions and culture. Many Native Americans left. They struggled to survive by taking low-paying jobs in agriculture, ranching, or mining. Land ownership was not possible for most.

Broken promises

Native Americans were moved to farms that no one else wanted where the soil was poor, there was little water, and there were few animals for them to hunt.


For many years the American Indians of the United States were perceived as vanishing peoples, unfortunate, inevitable victims of Western civilization’s march toward perfection. Today this sense of their teetering on the brink of cultural or physical extinction has largely disappeared. In fact, many members of U.S. Indian tribes and Canada’s First Nations actively engage in cultural nurturing and revitalization, including new emphasis on tribal government, identification of stable sources for group economic well-being, and encouragement of the use of indigenous languages. There is also increased concern about the preservation of sacred sites and the repatriation of sacred objects.

6

CULTURAL CONTINUIT Y & CHANGE

Today & Tomorrow

Together, these and other events caused the native population to collapse to such an extent—from a pre-contact high of perhaps

275,000 to perhaps 15,000 in the closing decades of the 19th century— that some have described the period as genocidal. After a period of intense over-sight during the late 19th and early 20th centuries, the U.S. government terminated most of its federal obligations to native Californians in 1955. Indigenous rancherias, or reservations, have become relatively autonomous in the period since. Each rancheria has an elected body of officials, usually known as a business committee or tribal council, which acts as a liaison between the tribal community and such outside interests as the U.S. Bureau of Indian Affairs, business corporations desiring the purchase or lease of reservation lands, public utilities seeking rights-of-way across lands, and other entities having some form of business with the group. Typically, the council also hears intratribal grievances and participates in planning eco-nomic and social development programs.

By the early 21st century, many California Indians were not readily dis-tinguishable from other people residing in California in terms of external factors such as clothing, housing, transportation, or education. However, indigenous attitudes, rituals, and other aspects of traditional culture remained vibrant throughout the state. Many native Californians choose to live in rural areas and reside on reservations; others choose to live in urban or suburban areas; and still others live part of the year on a reservation and spend the rest of the year in a city or suburb.

Throughout California one finds indigenous ceremonial structures, the continued use and manufacture of ritual materials, and the use of tradi-tional foods. Many art forms, especially basket weaving, continue to be passed from one generation to another, and many native languages, though spoken less and less as first languages, are maintained as part of an overall interest in indigenous heritage. Some rancherias have cultural centers and museums that help to preserve their cultures and languages, and in some school districts classes in native languages and cultures are being offered to both children and adults.

73 today & tomorrow

Traditional culture is less obvious in the major population centers of the state, which now range along the coast and the Central Valley from San Francisco and Oakland south to San Diego. Native culture has not ceased in urban areas but rather has become an important part of a larger tapestry of urban cultural diversity. Growing at a faster rate than the general popula-tion, California’s indigenous population is the highest in the United States; early 21st century estimates indicated some 630,000 individuals of indig-enous descent residing there. Two California cities are among the 10 U.S. cities with the largest resident populations of Native North Americans.

Not all Native Americans living in California are California Indians, and the growth of this population is a relatively recent phenomenon. People from throughout North America, including indigenous individuals, gravitated to the state in large numbers during World War II in order to work in the bur-geoning defense industries of that era. A second wave of native migration to California occurred in the 1950s, during an aggressive indigenous reloca-tion program carried out by the U.S. Bureau of Indian Affairs.

There are 107 federally-recognized tribes and 95 federal reservations in California.

AK

18 .9%

OK

11.3%

NM

10.9%

SD

9.4%

MT CA

7.5%

1%

figure 6 .1 t op f i v e s tat e s w t h h igh e s t p e r c e n tage n at i v e p op u l at ion

California ranks 15th in the list of highest American Indian and Alaska Native

population by percentage for that state with 1% (687,400 ) of 35,893,799.


CA

687,400

398,200

248,300 234 ,200207,400

OK TX AZ NM

figure 6 . 2 t op f i v e s tat e s w i t h h igh e s t t o ta l n at i v e p op u l at ion

California has the largest American Indian and Alaska Native population.

According to the Census, 687,400 Native Americans live in the Golden State.

However well-intended, the Bureau of Indian Affairs’ coordination of the relocation plan—which had been designed to move native individuals and families from job-poor reservations to employment- rich urban areas—was often ineptly carried out and frequently abandoned families once they had relocated. As predominantly rural people finding themselves in unfamiliar urban areas with little of the interfamilial social and economic support to which they were accustomed, many newly urban Native Americans sought each other out and developed independent service and support organizations in the cities. As a result of these migrations, the unique cultural patterns of the many tribes now represented in California are apparent throughout the state, and there is also a strong pantribal ethos that has fostered citywide and statewide recreational, educational, and political groups.

In the early 21st century, California’s Native American coalitions were con-tinuing to merge political and educational activism. With organizations such as the American Indian Historical Society and the California Indian Education Association, they are examining, criticizing, and providing new teaching materials for teachers who work with indigenous children and for the state curriculum as it regards Native American life, history, and culture.

75 today & tomorrow

California native Americans have also been waging a struggle to be paid for the lands that had been lost to white settlers dur-

ing the 1800s. In the 1920s, the Mission Indian Federation, the California Indian Brotherhood, and the California Indian Rights Association sued the federal government for not ratifying 18 treaties of 1852. That legal bat-tle took 16 years to reach an end. The native Americans of California were awarded $17 million. However, $12 million was subtracted to pay for ser-vices the federal government had provided to the Native Americans over the years. The native Americans really won only $5 million for—about $150 to each of 36,000 Native Americans whose names had been approved.

In 1946, Congress created the Indian Claims Commission. California Native Americans filed several additional lawsuits. In 1963, and Native Americans agreed to a settlement of $29.1 alien. In 1972, the government approved giv-ing $700 per person to 69,000 Native Americans. The cash awards could not even begin to make up for all that was lost, but at least the government had been forced to accept responsibility for past wrongs.

The governmenT


In the early part of the 1900s, various orga-nizations were formed to try to right the wrongs that had been done to California’s

native peoples. Early efforts focused on improving educational opportu-nities for native American children. The struggle to get back rights and lands also began. One important goal was achieved in 1924, when all Native Americans born in the United States were granted citizenship. California’s Native Americans had the right to vote and to hold elected office.

Federal government policy regarding land for nature Americans was often contradictory. On the one hand, the government wanted to get rid of all responsibility for native Americans by giving back some land. The Dawes Act of 1887 forced parts of reservation lands to go to private families. On the other hand, the government eventually wanted to “civilize” the Native Americans. The reservation was a place where help could be given in the form of housing, education, and medical benefits. The Indian Reorganization Act of 1934 and did further distribution of reservation lands. The government encouraged members of tribes to come together again as a group. Congress provided additional lands for California Native Americans, but only if they would adopt the government style of the United States. By 1950, the federal government has set up 117 Native American communities. These reserva-tions and rancherias varied from an acre plot in Strawberry Valley within Yuba County, to the 116,000 acre Hoopa Reservation in Humboldt County.

The righT To own l and

On November 20, 1969, about 300 Native American activists occupied Alcatraz, the former federal prison in San Francisco

Bay. The activists called themselves Indians of All Tribes and had come to protest the federal government’s efforts to move Native Americans to the nation’s cities. They said that both places were dirty, had poor health care and educational programs, rocky soil, no fresh water, no oil or min-eral rights, no transportation system, no industry, and high unemployment. Alcatraz remained native American land until June 11, 1971, when federal marshals removed the last 15 Native Americans from the island.

Citing an 1868 treaty allowing them to claim any “unoccupied government land.” Although the protestors occupied Alcatraz only for a period of hours, their concerns were later pursued by others. In 1969 a group of approximately 100 individuals calling themselves “Indians of all Tribes” occupied Alcatraz again, this time staying until 1971. The purposes of the occupations were to publicize Indian demands for self-determination, to force negotiations for a Native American cultural center, museum, and university, and to gain (or, in the occupiers’ view, to regain) legal title to the island.

OccupatiOn Of alcatra z

77 today & tomorrow

California tribes that remained on their tra-ditional lands have been the most successful at preserving their Native American tradi-

tions. In many parts of California, Native Americans continue to preserve their culture. The history of a people remains a part of who the people are. By speaking their native languages and performing their traditional ceremo-nies, they keep their culture alive and move forward as a people.

Federal, state or local laws usually require a project’s environmental impact to be assessed. The parties proposing the project must attempt to find ways to avoid or mitigate environmental damage before they can pro-ceed. These requirements apply to projects on public land, and they often apply to projects on private property. Archaeological and cultural resources are considered a part of the environment. The Native American Heritage Commission maintains an inventory of sites in California that are impor-tant to Native Americans, and reviews environmental impact documents to protect these sites from damage or destruction.

Native American cultural resources can be divided into four categories:

nati v e a mer ica n sk eleta l r em a ins a nd gr av e-r el ated a rtifacts:Different types of burials may occur in one geographic area inhabited by the same tribal group, especially if it was inhabited over an extended period of time. There is no way to generalize about the burial practices of California Native Americans; the possibility of discovering remains and methods for preventing or minimizing disturbance of burials must be evaluated.

tr a ditiona l cultur a l sites:Such as villages, campsites, gathering and harvesting areas,quarries, tool manufacturing areas, rock painting and carving areas, and burial grounds.

r eligious or spir itua l sites:Traditional locations for events or rites with spiritual significance. A danceground, a place for gathering traditional medicine items, or a place for an Indian doctor or shaman to gather strength might be a spiritual site. It could be a prominent peak, a rock formation, a quiet glen, or a cave.

a rtifacts:Cultural remains left by past peoples. Artifacts often found in California may be made of fish or animal bone, shells of sea animals, stone or wood.

Protecting cultural resources

By speaking native languages and performing traditional ceremonies, California tribes keep their culture alive.


The gambling business a huge new source of income for Native American tribes. The value of the business in many places has

increased because customers lose several billion dollars a year at the casi-nos. And what the customer loses, the tribe gains. Although the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act of 1988 recognized that tribes have the right to control anything, tribes are required to negotiate with the state how some types of gaming are handled. Most tribes not want any state control, because reservations are supposed to be beyond the control of state laws. Each feder-ally recognized Native American tribe functions as an independent nation within the territory of the United States.

On September 10, the day after Governor Gray Davis and 58 California tribes signed a tribal/state compact, the legislature, in an overwhelming display of bipartisan support, passed a constitutional amendment on Indian gam-ing. The legality of casino gambling on the state's Indian reservations had always been more about politics than the law. The people overwhelmingly supported the right of tribes to engage in gambling on their own lands, as a means of economic development. Now this public policy question was again before the voters of the state. The overwhelming majority of state voters supported the tribe's right to operate gaming on their own lands. The tribes had clearly won the public relations war over Indian casinos.

Casinos & gaming

79 today & tomorrow

Contemporary Reservation life in its 150 year history, has never been a pleasant or secure existence. From beginning to

end, reservations were plagued by Euro-American miners, loggers, cattle-men, and settlers who ignored reservation boundaries and profited from the impotence of the Bureau of Indian Affairs or anyone else to defend the reservations’ sanctity. The fact of the matter is that, when non-allotted lands were sold to Whites, the Whites were usually already de facto resi-dents. Beyond that, reservation land was usually poor land; in California, the official policy of Federal and State officials was to place Indians on the poorest and least desirable land available. With their cultures under outra-geous attacks, under assimilationist policies, and without much basis for reconstructing any effective economy, most reservations sank into hope-less poverty. Alcoholism, lack of medical care, lack of educational facilities, crime, and suicide have often held sway.

Of course, non-reservation life is as important as reservation life, through-out the United States, but it is especially important in California since reservations came very late to California. Non-reservation Indians tended to remain in rural areas of the State but have increasingly migrated into the large urban centers. One of the biggest problems, here, is cultural isolation and lack of adequate support.

Contemporary reservation l ife

USA

2,475,956

CA

687,400 27.8 %

figure 6 .3 p e r c e n t of n at i v e a m e r ica n s r e s i di ng i n ca l i f or n i a

Out of the 2,475,956 US citizens who identify as American Indian and

Alaska Native, 687,400 (27.8%) live in California.


The question today, more than a century after California Indian populations reached their lowest level, is whether anything has happened to change the situation of their livelihood. And the answer is that many changes have occurred, though their situation often remains tense. While advocates of assimilation remain, the movement was significantly displaced, in the early part of this century, and there is a remarkable renaissance of Native American cultures, today. Some tribes have made huge strides in breaking into modern economic strategies and are investing in long-term tribal insti-tutions for health care, education, and economic investment. Perhaps most remarkable of all, tribes are going into court and winning cases. (See, for instance, the Native American Rights Fund.) One of the most remarkable instances thus far was the litigation for and ultimate return of spiritually significant Blue Lake to the people of the pueblo at Taos.

How have these changes come about? One of the first factors and, ulti-mately, one of the most important nationally was rising unification of Native American tribes. By their very nature, the tribes had always been small, separate, and sometimes mutually competitive, even hostile. The common Euro-American strategy was to keep them divided and, thus, overwhelm them. The greatest American military disasters of the late 19th Century occurred when Indians achieved a higher degree of unification and mutual commitment. Californians, on the other hand, were never in the position of uniting in war and their tribes tended to be even more strongly entrenched in ecological niches of the state. While Native Americans from widely divergent backgrounds began to work together, in the beginning of the 20th Century, Californians have been somewhat slower in doing this.

81 today & tomorrow

INDEX

AAcorns 39, 40, 53Alcatraz 73Achumawi 24Atsugewi 24

BBaskets 32, 46Berries 40, 46

C Cahuilla 13, 24, 45, 54Casino 75 Chemehuevi 24, 41 Chilula 24 Chimariko 24 Chumash 21, 24, 36, 57Clothing 46 Cocopah 24 Costanoan 25, 53Creation Myth 52 Cupeno 24

DDeer..42, 53Dentalium 32Diegueno 24

EElk 42Esselen 24

FFood 7, 23, 42

GGabrielino 24Geography 7, 12, 19Gold Rush 64Government Tribal 26 United States of America 64, 67, 72 Mexican 62

HHalchidhoma 24Housing 44, 69, Pit House 45 Plank House 45 Tepee 45Hupa 24

IIce Age 15

JJuaneno 24Junipero Serra 57

KKarok 20, 24, 40, 53 Kashaya 24 Kato 24 Kawaiisu 24 Kitanemuk 24 Klamath 19, 24 Konkow 24

83 index

LLanguage 6, 20, 69 Groups 20Lassik 24Luiseno 24

MMaterials 23, 45, 48Maidu 23, 51, 63 Mattole 24Medicine People 55Mexican 62, 66Microenvironment 18Migration 5, 15, 16Mission 57, 68 Miwok 23, 30, 63 Modoc 24, 41, 46, 67 Mojave 18, 24, 28 Mono 24, 41

NNisenan 24 Nomlaki 24 Nongatl 24

OOholone 24

PPaiute Northern 24 Southern 24Paleo-Indian 15Panamint 24, 41 Patwin 24Petroglyph 49Pictograph 49Population 5, 21, 63, 70, 76 Pomo 21, 24, 51, 53, 63

QQuechan 24 RReligion 13, 51Reservation 67, 71, 76Ritual 13, 29, 34, 51 Music in 54 Coming-of-Age 55SSacred Places 52Salinan 24Salmon 7, 11, 39, 41, 43 Serrano 21, 24, 41 Shasta 24, 40, 44Shelter 44 Shoshone 6, 21, 24, 40, 49 Sinkyone 24Sutter 64 TTataviam 24 Tolowa 24Trade 6, 13, 25, 32, 42, 46 Tubatulabal 24

WWailaki 24Wappo 24Washoe 21, 24, 45Whilkut 24Wintu 24Wiyot 24

YYana 24Yokut 31, 24, 30, 52, 54, 63Yuki 24Yurok 20, 24, 30, 42, 44, 55


i.1 California Native Culture Areas, pg .121.1 Nomadic Migration of the First Americans, pg .161.2 California's Geomorphic Provinces, pg .191.3 California's Major Native Language Groups, pg .201.4 Largest California Tribes, Language Group and Location, pg .212.1 California's Tribal Groups, pg .242.2 Types of Tribal Territory Organization, pg .262.3 Tribe Territory and Size, pg .272.4 Tribal Leadership Hierarchy, pg .293.1 Food Availability and Responses, pg .403.2 Regional Staple Foods, pg .433.3 Different Styles of Houses, pg .455.1 Decline of Native Population, pg .666.1 Top 5 States with Highest Percentage Native Population, pg .706.2 Top 5 States with Highest Total Native Population, pg .716.3 Percentage of Native Americans residing inCalifornia, pg .76

f igures inde x

85 index

references

Native American Culture Kuiper, Kathleen New York, NY: Britannica Educational Pub. in association with Rosen Educational Services, 2011

California Native Peoples Feinstein, Stephen Chicago: Heinemann Library, 2003

California Indians Ansary, Mir Tamim Chicago, Ill.: Heinemann Library, 2000

"Historical Sketch of the California Indians" Beckman, Tad California Indian History. http://mojavedesert.net/california-indian-history/index.html

Life of the California Coast Nations Aloian, Molly, and Bobbie Kalman. New York: Crabtree Pub. Co., 2005

California Indian Country: The Land & The People Eargle, Dolan San Francisco, CA: Trees Co. Press, 1992

87 credits

Native CaliforNiaNs

the original inhabitants of what we now know as the state of California were a unique and diverse people, distinct in almost every way from the native populations in the rest of North america. California's varied landscape and abundant resources provided many different advantages and obstacles that the native people learned to utilize and survive through. this book offers a comprehensive look at the regional traditions, cultures, languages, and survival skills of the California tribes, their history, and the continued survival of today's native population.

native californians: the traditions, culture, and survival of california's tribes

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