Collection: Directories and Documents > Tanis Thorne Native Californian & Nisenan Collection

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Title: Chumash Inter-Village Economic Exchange Collection Type: Directories and Documents Collection Name: Tanis Thorne Native Californian & Nisenan Collection # of Pages: 16 Download PDF: User Login Required Download OCR Text: User Login Required

Date Scanned: 2024-09-03 22:07:26 OCR Software Version #: tesseract 5.4.1 Item Sourced From: PDF First Created: 2025-03-17 03:11:56 Last Updated: 2025-03-17 03:11:56

Original Held At: Searls Historical Library Location: 161 Nevada City Hwy, Nevada City, CA 95959

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304 NATIVE CALIFOR and surmounted with plumage. Their ordinary height is three hands, and they place them in the cleanest, most highly embellished place they can find, whither they go frequently to worship them and offer their food and whatever they have (Priestley 1937: 32-33). Harrington’s informant Juan de Jesus Justo gave the followi information concerning shrines: At helo? (Mescalitan Island) there was a place for throwing things. Justo never saw it but heard there was a big square enclosure 35 feet or more square, made by tying bundles of feathers to tops of poles so stood three feet high. Poles were near together placed upright in the ground. Old men sat in their and made beads. They were very venerated. Not all know very much. They were like interpreters, interpreting for god. Tiquxgo — place of Sherman’s slaughter house in Sycamore Canyon, Santa Barbara. It is a small arroyo above the sisters’ house near the mountain. Indians had a shrine for throwing things at that place. Tilgo?y — Tucker’s Grove, at the first arroyo crossed in going from Cieneguitas to Goleta. Indians used to throw things there. Another means of removing materials from circulation was to. trade them to other groups as described in the following section. It can be noted that the Chumashan groups were usually trad ng beads and other durable goods in return for items which could be. consumed. Font, in his diary of the Anza 1776 expedition, recorded: The Indians of the Channel are of the Quabajay tribe. They and the Beneme (Gabrieleno and Serrano groups) have commerce with the Jamajab (Mojaves; these are ethnic labels used by the Mojave) and others of the Colorado River, with their cuentas or beads, consisting of flat, round, and small shells which they hunt for in the sands of the beach, and of which they have long strings 4 ECHUMASH ECONOMIC EXCHANGE hung around the neck and on the head . . . (Bolton, 1931: 250). Among the Indians who came to the camp I saw one who wore a cotton blanket like those made by the Gila Pimas, and I inferred that he must have acquired it from that great distance by means of the commerce which they have with others (Bolton, 1931: 257). Garcés traveled April 26, 1776, from San Gabriel with some ojave Indians to the Castaic area, where he stayed at two uabajay (Chumash, see Font above) villages, the largest of which probably near the village of kastek. The Mojaves who went th him were in the area for trade. Garcés then went north and plored part of the southern San Joaquin Valley; he returned to the Chumash villages where he made the following observations on ‘May 10, 1776: ‘‘I went over to the Rancheria de San Pasqual where found two Jamajabs recently arrived from their land (the others “who had accompanied me had already gone back leaving only Luis “and Ventura): hence is to be inferred the frequent commerce that the Jamajabs held with these nations and those of the sea’’ (Coues 1900: 301). The structure described for the Rancheria of San Pasqual has many features characteristic of the atisaderos used for tigh status people at fiestas, and Garcés may therefore have been escribing trading associated with a fiesta. On the 29th of May, 1819, it was reported, ‘‘Twenty-one eathen Amajavas’’ (Mojaves) arrived at San Buenaventura for the pose of trade and social relations. The soldiers of the guard enerated an incident in which several soldiers and some ten majavas were killed. Interrogations of some of the Mojaves who ere later caught provides some information concerning trade etween the Chumash and Mojave. On foot, it was said to take een or sixteen days to go from the Colorado River villages to entura. The Mojave brought red ochre and heavy, soft, black kets. These were traded for beads, light rope and Mexican lankets. The Mojave had planned to trade at Santa Barbara as well Ventura (Cook 1962: 159-161). Harrington’s informant, Luisa, said that the Mojave brought ight red ochre, and that her father had some of the Mojave ochre. iel Hill wrote the following concerning trade with Yokuts oups: E a