Recent archaeological studies have identified the presence of people in Calaveras County as long as 12,000 years ago. More abundant evidence exists, however, for the relatively recent residents of the last 2-3,000 years. These people, descendents of ancient Great Basin tribes, are identified by distinctive projectile points, rock art, burial practices, and food technologies. Somewhere between 1,000 and 500 years ago the Northern Miwuk arrived in the area, often settling on sites occupied by their predecessors. It was the Miwuk who intensified use of the acorn as a stable food and utilized milling stations with multiple grinding holes. They lived in tribal groups identified by family lineages, and moved seasonally through elevations in their territories. Oriented to water courses, the Miwuk of the Mokelumne River encompassed villages in both modern Amador and Calaveras Counties.
Until quite recently, archaeological researchers developed culture-histories for the Sierran foothill region based on the more studied areas of the western Great Basin and California Central Valley. Temporal divisions reflecting culture change in the foothills, therefore, hinged on data from bordering regions. A recent study for the East Sonora Bypass Project 1, however, has developed an entirely new chronology focusing on a synthesis of local data from more than 100 excavated sites in the watersheds of the Mokelumne, Calaveras, Stanislaus, and Tuolumne rivers. Based on spatial and stratigraphic analyses of more than 200 radiocarbon dates, more than 4,000 source-specific obsidian hydration readings, slightly more than 875 projectile points, and close to 600 shell beads, five major time periods are defined—Early Archaic, Middle Archaic, Late Archaic, Recent Prehistoric I, and Recent Prehistoric II. Each period has one or more relevant change that distinguishes it from what came before, such as subsistence (a new food sources, a change in preparation techniques), land-use (seasonal camps, long-term villages), or technological (e.g., a dominant projectile point style is identified for each period). Obsidian hydration brackets for the Bodie Hills obsidian source (located east of the Sierran crest) are associated with each time period, and are useful for interpreting the age of this obsidian when found on the west slope of the Sierra below snow level 2; Table 1).
Table 1. Chronology of the Sierra Nevada.
ARCHAEOLOGICAL PERIOD GEOLOGICAL PERIOD AGE RANGE (CAL BP) BODIE HILLS OBSIDIAN HYDRATION RANGE (MICRONS)a
Early Archaic Early Holocene 11,500-7000 8.6-6.9
Middle Archaic Middle Holocene 7000-3000 6.8-4.8
Late Archaic Late Holocene 3000-1100 4.7-3.2
Recent Prehistoric I 1100-610 3.1-2.5
Recent Prehistoric II 610-100 2.4-0.9
Notes: - cal BP – calibrated Before Present ; a - Applicable only below snow level (4,000 feet).
Early Archaic deposits are quite rare in the Sierra Nevada foothills, identified locally at two sites, both discovered in buried stratigraphic contexts. They include abundant Wide-Stem and Large Stemmed Dart points, hundreds of handstones and millingstones, as well as a variety of cobble-core tools, large percussion-flaked “greenstone” bifaces, and comparatively high frequencies of obsidian from the Bodie Hills source. Plant macrofossil assemblages are dominated by grey pine and acorn nutshell, but include few if any small seeds or other spring- and summer-ripening plant foods (e.g., manzanita). This indicates a pattern of repeated occupation, suggesting that land use in the western Sierra was seasonally structured. This is supported by an almost exclusive use of local toolstone for the manufacture of bifaces and projectile points.
Middle Archaic sites, also often buried, are primarily distinguished by Corner-notched Dart points, an occasional mortar and pestle, and the earliest house structures in association with large subterranean storage pits. Fall and winter occupation is evident where large quantities of nuts were stored in underground granaries. In contrast, summer-ripening berries and other fruits are dominant in sites from higher elevations in the lower forests. These differences reveal a pattern of seasonal movement, with fall and winter villages placed below the snowline in the blue oak-grey pine woodland, and summer camps situated in the conifer forest zone where annual roots, bulbs, seeds, and fruits are common during warmer months. Faunal assemblages from Middle Archaic sites are dominated by large mammal remains (e.g., deer), a pattern that continues throughout the region’s occupation. Soapstone “frying pans” and other vessels first appear in the local record during the Middle Archaic, along with various stone pendants, incised slate, and stone beads. The presence of atlatl weights and spurs in these deposits confirms that the dart and atlatl were the primary hunting implements.
Late Archaic sites are among the most common on the western slope, again with many occurring in buried stratigraphic contexts. Late Archaic lifeways, technologies, and subsistence patterns were quite similar to those of the previous time period, with the primary difference being an increase in the use of obsidian between about 3000 and 1100 BP. Chert, only available in the foothills of the western Sierra below about 3,000 feet, is common at Archaic sites in the lower Montane Forest up to about 6,000 feet. However, flaked stone assemblages on the western slope found above 6,000 feet are composed almost entirely of obsidian (>80%), suggesting that groups who utilized upper elevations of the western Sierra arrived from the east side where obsidian was the primary toolstone.
The beginning of the Prehistoric Period coincides with a region-wide interval of reduced precipitation known as the Medieval Climatic Anomaly. Among the most important changes in the archaeological record of the western slope at this time was the introduction of the bow and arrow (about 1100 cal BP), an innovation apparently borrowed from neighboring groups to the north or east. This shift in technology is clearly reflected by the dominance of small stemmed and corner-notched arrow points in Recent Prehistoric I sites. The common occurrence of bedrock mortars at Recent Prehistoric II sites suggests that they became an important milling technology by 610 cal BP.
Unfortunately, too few single-component Recent Prehistoric I assemblages exist to characterize basic lifeways and subsistence patterns during this interval. However, by the Recent Prehistoric II Period, numerous well-dated sites and site components (including the current project sites) provide substantial evidence for changes in the nature of local subsistence economies. The dominance of acorn nutshell in these sites is among the most compelling evidence for acorn intensification in central California. Bedrock milling fixtures are established across the landscape, near well-developed residential middens and as isolated features. The occurrence of these facilities above and below the oak zone suggests that a variety of foods, in addition to acorns, was processed in these features. Subsistence remains in foothill sites include many more spring and summer grasses, fruits, and berries than were present in Archaic deposits, indicating that occupation occurred for a longer part of the year, or that sites below the snow-line were more regularly used to store warm-season resources for winter use.
There also appears to have been greater settlement differentiation during the Recent Prehistoric II Period, with clear residential sites, often including house-depressions and other structural remains, but also special-use localities consisting simply of bedrock milling features. Summer use of higher elevations is also apparent, as many sites from this time period are found in the Lower Montane Forest, always dominated by summer-ripening plant foods. Like the Archaic, large mammal remains continue to make up a substantial portion of faunal assemblages from both high- and low-elevation sites. Many more specialized technologies are associated with the Recent Prehistoric II Period than were evident during the Archaic, including stone drills and the common occurrence of bone awls, suggesting that basketry and other composite implements may have taken on a new importance. The Desert Side-notched arrow point is first introduced on the western slope at about 610 cal BP, clearly adopted from Great Basin people to the east. Circular stone shaft-straighteners are also common in these sites, consistent with the use of the bow and arrow. Imported shell beads from coastal California first appear in appreciable amounts in Recent Prehistoric II village sites, as do other rare items such as shell ornaments and bone whistles.
The proto-historic is the period of European-Native American contact—the time between the prehistoric period with no written records, and the historic period when written records became common. This section presents a descriptive documentation of the Native American people and culture of the project area, and on behavior that is remembered by living people—a branch of anthropological study known as ethnography.
The Mi-Wuk is the Native American group that was present in the study area at the time of European contact. Their culture was documented by early explorers, settlers, and missionaries in dairies and mission records, and further studied in the 19th and early 20th centuries by ethnographers who spoke with Mi-Wuk descendents. The Mi-Wuk people today take a strong and active role in the study and documentation of their culture.
The Mi-Wuk traditionally occupied a large portion of the central Sierra Nevada range -- generally, the watersheds between and including the Merced and Consumnes Rivers, the adjacent foothills, and a portion of the adjacent Sacramento-San Joaquin river valley 1 2. Anthropologists and linguists are not certain when the Mi-Wuk arrived in central California, or from where; the native people themselves believe that they were created on this land and have always been here. Heizer and Elsasser 3 (p. 10) list the Mi-Wuk as one of the “five Penutian nations”; that is, they all traditionally spoke languages of the Pen-Utian stock as first defined by Dixon and Kroeber 4 5. Linguistic studies suggest that the ancestral Mi-Wuk occupied the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta area early-on, but did not arrive in the Sierran foothills and mountains until much more recently. Levy 6 (p.398) reports that the Western (Bay/Coast) and Eastern (Valley/Foothill/Mountain) Mi-Wuk languages separated some 2,500 years ago, and that the “internal time depth of Sierra Mi-Wuk is approximately 800 years.”
The first large-scale contact between native people and outsiders (not counting the occasional trapper or explorer) took place in the second half of the eighteenth century, when Spanish explorers and missionaries arrived. They had already missionized most of the coastal groups—those that had survived the European diseases—and now looked toward the interior for new converts. Many Mi-Wuk people, along with their neighbors, ended up at Mission San José. A few generations later, those Mi-Wuk still living in their traditional territory were overrun by gold seekers and settlers, who appropriated their hunting grounds and limited their access to other resources.
Although many among the general public today assume that the Mi-Wuk were an ancient people who “passed from the scene,” they are, in fact, alive and well, and working to maintain as much as they can of their cultural and religious traditions. Today the Calaveras Mi-Wuk community is centered on the area around West Point, on the ridge that separates the North and Middle forks of the Mokelumne River.
Regardless of when the Mi-Wuk arrived in central California, the first non-natives entering the area found a well-established society of hunters, fishermen, and plant-food gatherers whose territory stretched from the edge of the San Joaquin Valley to the high elevations of the Sierra Nevada. This wide topographic and vegetative range provided the native people with all manner of foods: antelope, elk, rabbit, salmon, waterfowl, and valley-oak acorns in the lowest zone; deer, rabbit, salmon, valley quail, gray pine nuts, and blue- and live-oak acorns in the foothills; and, at higher elevations, deer, squirrel, trout, mountain quail, pigeons, sugar-pine nuts, and black-oak acorns 1 (p.10). Acorns were particularly important and, according to Heizer and Elsasser, “the [ethnographic-period] Sierra Mi-Wuk carefully preserved the oak trees from which they annually gathered their staple food” 2(p.23).
In Calaveras County, the old Mi-Wuk villages that are known to anthropologists were clustered along the Mokelumne, Calaveras, and Stanislaus river drainages. Traditional Mi-Wuk houses reportedly were made of thatching, tule matting, or slabs of bark over a conical framework of poles 3 (p.408). In fine weather the people cooked and prepared food outdoors; in bad weather they used an interior hearth and oven. Some families also dug storage pits into the floors of their houses. Other important structures were the sweat lodge and the dance house, both of which are still in use today. Sweathouses are used mainly by men for health and purification, while the semi-subterranean dance houses were used as an assembly hall and for important ceremonies. Remains of some of these large structures have been found at archaeological sites in the central foothills.
The archaeological record also contains remnants of a rich material culture, with flaked stone hunting and butchering tools; plant-processing implements; cooking, eating, and storage vessels (including beautifully made stone bowls); and beads and ornaments made of shell, animal bone, and stone. No doubt there were a great many other items made of basketry, cordage, or wood which have not survived. Like other northern and central California groups, the Mi-Wuk made (and still make) excellent baskets, but as far as we know they did not traditionally make or use pottery. Small lumps and objects of baked clay have been found at several sites in the valley and lower foothills (e.g., 4), but no pots or dishes. The foothill groups did make vessels from soapstone, and many of these also have been found in archaeological deposits.
Stone sourcing studies from sites in Calaveras County and the Mokelumne and Stanislaus river drainages indicate that the Calaveras Mi-Wuk obtained nearly all of their obsidian toolstone from the Bodie Hills source, on the eastern side of the Sierra; also found in much smaller amounts are glass from Napa Valley and from Casa Diablo on the east side 5. While their obsidian had to be imported, the Mi-Wuk had access to many other toolstones in the geologically complex foothills, such as slate and basalt.