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California Indians
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The Indians of California are among the
least known groups of natives of North America.
Those along the coast south of San Francisco were
brought under Spanish missionary influence in the latter part of the
18th and the beginning of the 19th centuries. Some tribes, however,
were not known even by name until after the discovery of gold and
the settlement of the country in 1849 and subsequently. The
Californians were among the least warlike tribes of the continent
and offered but little resistance, and that always ineffectual, to
the seizure of their territory by the whites. |
Comparatively few of them are now on reservations. The majority live
as squatters on the land of white owners or of the Government, or in
some cases on land allotted them by the government or even bought by
themselves from white owners. Their number has decreased very
rapidly and is now probably about 15,000, as compared with perhaps
150,000 before the arrival of the whites.
Physically, the California Indians, like other tribes
of the Pacific coast, are rather shorter than the majority of those
in eastern North America. In many cases they incline to be stout.
Along the coast, and especially in the south, they are unusually
dark. The most southern tribes approximate those of the Colorado
River in physical type and are tall and short-headed. The native
population of California was broken up into a great number of small
groups. These were often somewhat unsettled in habitation, but
always within very limited territories, and were never nomadic. The
dialects of almost all of these groups were different and belonged
to as many its 21 distinct linguistic families, being a fourth of
the total number found in all North America, and, as compared with
the area of the state, so large that California must probably be
regarded as the region of the greatest aboriginal linguistic
diversity in the world. Three larger stocks have found their way
into California: the Athapascan in the north and the Shoshonean and
Yuman in the south. The remainder are all small and purely
Californian.
This diversity is accompanied by a corresponding
stability of population. While there have undoubtedly been shifting
of tribes within the state, they do not appear to have extended very
far territorially. The Indians themselves in no part of the state
except the extreme south have any tradition of migrations and
uniformly believe themselves to have originated at the spot where
they live. The groups in which they live are very loose, being
defined and held together by language and the topography of the
country much more than by any political or social organization;
distinct tribes, as they occur in many other parts of America, do
not really exist. The small village is the most common unit of
organization among these people.
Culturally, the California Indians are probably as
simple and rude as any large group of Indians in North America.
Their arts (excepting that of basket making, which they possessed in
a high form ) were undeveloped; pottery was practically unknown, and
in the greater part of the state the carving or working of wood was
carried on only to a limited extent. Houses were often of grass,
tule, or brush, or of bark, sometimes covered with earth. Only in
the north west part of the state were small houses of planks in use.
In this region, as well as on the Santa Barbara Islands, wooden
canoes were also made, but over the greater part of the state a raft
of tules was the only means of navigation. Agriculture was, nowhere
practiced. Deer and small game were hunted, and there was
considerable fishing; but the bulk of the food was vegetable. The
main reliance was placed on numerous varieties of acorns, and next
to these, on seeds, especially of grasses and herbs. Roots and
berries were less used.
Both totemism and a true gentile organization were
totally lacking in all parts of the state. The mythology of the
Californians was characterized by unusually well developed and
consistent creation myths, and by the complete lack not only of
migration but of ancestor traditions. Their ceremonies were numerous
and elaborate as compared with the prevailing simplicity of life,
but they lacked almost totally the rigid ritualism and extensive
symbolism that pervade the ceremonies of most of America. One set of
ceremonies was usually connected with a secret religious society;
another, often spectacular, was held in remembrance of the dead.
With constant differences from group to group, these
characteristics held with a general underlying uniformity over the
greater part of California. In the extreme north west portion of the
state, however, a somewhat more highly developed and specialized
culture existed, which showed in several respects similarities to
that of the North Pacific coast, as is indicated by a greater
advance in technology, a social organization largely upon a property
basis, and a system of mythology that is suggestive of those farther
north. The Santa Barbara islanders, now extinct, appear also to have
been considerably specialized from the great body of Californian
tribes, both in their arts and their mode of life. The Indians of
southern California, finally, especially those of the interior,
living under geographic conditions very different from those of the
main portion of the state, resemble in certain respects of culture
the Indians of Arizona and New Mexico. See
Mission Indians and the articles
on the individual linguistic families noted on the accompanying map.
Handbook of American Indians (1906) ~ Frederick W. Hodge |
Additional Mission Resources
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historical value only and are not the
opinions of the Webmasters of the site.
Handbook
of American Indians, 1906
Indian Missions of the
United StatesFree
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