Athabaskan-speaking Native American group in the United States
This article is about the ethnic group. For their language, see Tolowa language.
This article or section should specify the language of its non-English content, using {{lang}}, {{transliteration}} for transliterated languages, and {{IPA}} for phonetic transcriptions, with an appropriate ISO 639 code. Wikipedia's multilingual support templates may also be used.See why.(March 2021)
The Tolowa people or Taa-laa-wa Dee-ni’ are a Native American people of the Athabaskan-speaking ethno-linguistic group. Two rancherías (Smith River and Elk Valley) still reside in their traditional territory in northwestern California. Those removed to the Siletz Reservation in Oregon are located there.
Their homeland, Taa-laa-waa-dvn (“Tolowa ancestral-land”) lies along the Pacific Coast between the watersheds of Wilson Creek and Smith River (Tolowa-Chetco: Xaa-wun-taa-ghii~-li, Xaa-wvn’-taa-ghii~-li~, or Nii~-li~) basin and vicinity in northwestern CaliforniaDel Norte. The area was bounded by the California/Oregon to the north and Wilson Creek, north of the Klamath River (Tolowa-Chetco: Tʽáˑtʃʽɪᵗˑʼdɜn) in California, to the south. They lived in approximately eight permanent villages including on Crescent Bay and Lake Earl (Tolowa-Chetco: Ee-chuu-le' or Ch'uu-let - "large body of water").[5] The most important Tolowa village is Yontocket, California (Tolowa-Chetco: Yan’-daa-k’vt). Their tribal neighbors were the Chetco (Tolowa-Chetco: Chit Dee-ni’ or Chit-dv-ne' , also: Chit-dee-ni / Chit-dee-ne), Tututni (Tolowa-Chetco: T’uu-du’-dee-ni’ or Ta-́a te ́ne, also: Tu-́tutûn t̟ûn-nĕ) to the north; Shasta Costa (Tolowa-Chetco: Shis-taa-k'wvs-sta-dv-ne or See-staa-k’wvt-sta Dee-ni’), Takelma (Tolowa-Chetco: Ghan’-ts’ii-ne), Galice Creek / Taltushtuntede (Tolowa-Chetco: Talh-dash-dv-ne' ) to the NE, all of which were removed to the Siletz Reservation, and Karuk (Tolowa-Chetco: Ch'vm-ne Dee-ni' , also: Ch’vm-ne Xee-she’ ) to the east; and the Yurok (Tolowa-Chetco: Dvtlh-mvsh, also: Dvtlh-mvsh Xee-she’ ) to the south.
The name "Tolowa" is derived from Taa-laa-welh (Taa-laa-wa), an Algic name given to them by the Yurok (Klamath River People) (meaning "people of Lake Earl").
Their autonym is Hush, Xus or Xvsh, meaning "person" or "human being".[2]
The neighboring Karuk called them Yuh'ára, or Yurúkvaarar ("Indian from downriver") and used this Karuk name also for the Yurok,[6] and the Tolowa territory Yuh'aráriik / Yuh'ararih (″Place of the Downriver Indians″). Today the Karuk use also the term Imtípaheenshas (from Imtipahéeniik - ″Tolowa Indian place, i.e. Crescent City, California″).[7]
They called themselves in a political sense also Dee-ni’ , Dee-ne, Dvn-’ee, Dee-te which means "(is a) citizen of a yvtlh-’i~ (polity)" or "a person belonging to a place or village".
The Tolowa or Dee-ni’ population exceeded 10,000. In the 19th century, epidemics of new infectious diseases, such as smallpox, broke out among the Tolowa, resulting in high mortality. These occurred before they had face-to-face encounters with non-natives because of contact through intermediaries. In 1828 the American Jedediah Smith and his exploration party were the first known non-natives to contact the Tolowa.
The Tolowa embraced the Ghost Dance religion from 1872 to 1882, in hopes of getting relief from European-American encroachment.[2]
Genocide
In 1770 the Tolowa had a population of 1,000;[8] their population soon dropped to 150[8] in 1910; this was almost entirely due to deliberate mass murder in what has been called genocide[9] which has been recognized by the state of California.[10] In a speech before representatives of Native American peoples in June 2019, California governor Gavin Newsom apologized for the genocide. Newsom said, "That’s what it was, a genocide. No other way to describe it. And that’s the way it needs to be described in the history books."[10] Among these killings the Yontoket Massacre left 150[9] to 500[9] Tolowa people recorded dead. Because their homes had burned down, the place received the name "Burnt Ranch". The Yontoket massacre decimated the cultural center of the Tolowa peoples. The natives from the surrounding areas would gather there for their celebrations and discussions. The survivors of the massacre were forced to move to the village north of Smith's River called Howonquet. The slaughtering of the Tolowa people continued for some years. They were seemingly always caught at their Needash celebrations. These massacres caused some unrest which led in part to the Rogue River Indian war. Many Tolowa people were incarcerated at Battery Point in 1855 to withhold them from joining an uprising led by their chief. In 1860, after the Chetco/Rogue River War, 600 Tolowa were forcibly relocated to Indian reservations in Oregon, including what is now known as the Siletz Reservation in the Central Coastal Range. Later, some were moved to the Hoopa Valley Reservation in California. Adding to the number of dead from the Yontoket Massacre and the Battery Point Attack are many more in the following years. These massacres included the Chetko Massacre with 24[9] dead, the Smith creek massacre with 7[9] dead, the Howonquet Massacre with 70[9] dead, the Achulet massacre with 65 dead[11] (not including those whose bodies were left in the lake) and the Stundossun Massacre with 300[9] dead. In total, 902 Tolowa Native Americans were killed in 7 years. There are no records that any of the perpetrators were ever held accountable.[9] This means over 90% of the entire Tolowa population was killed in deliberate massacres.
At the Siletz Reservation in central Oregon, tribes speaking 10 distinct languages were brought together in the mid-19th century. In the early 21st century, the remaining native language spoken is known as Siletz Dee-ni, related to Tolowa, although many of the original tribes spoke Salish languages.[12]
In 2007, in coordination with the Living Tongues Institute for Endangered Languages, the Confederated Tribes of Siletz Indians produced a "talking dictionary" in this language to aid in preservation and teaching.[12] Alfred "Bud" Lane, among the last fluent native speakers of Siletz Dee-ni on the reservation, has recorded 14,000 words of the language in this effort.[13]
Culture
The Tolowa organized their subsistence around the plentiful riverine and marine resources and acorns (san-chvn[14]). Their society was not formally stratified, but considerable emphasis was put on personal wealth.[15]
Tolowa villages were organized around a headman and usually consisted of related men, in a patrilinealkinship system, where inheritance and status passed through the male line. The men married women in neighboring tribes. The brides were usually related (sisters), in order for the wealth to remain in the paternal families.
Population
Estimates for the pre-contact populations of most native groups in California have varied substantially.[16] Various estimates for the 1770 population of Tolowa have ranged from as low as 450 to an upper end around 2,400.[17][18][19][20]
In 1910, there were reportedly 150 Tolowa.[17] The 1920 census listed 121 Tolowa left in Del Norte County, California. By 2009, there were approximately 1,000 Tolowa Indians.[5]
↑ American Indian and Alaska Native Tribes in the United States and Puerto Rico 2010 (retrieved 4 November 2019)
1 2 3 4 Pritzker, Barry M. A Native American Encyclopedia: History, Culture, and Peoples. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000. ISBN978-0-19-513877-1, p. 147
1 2 Kroeber, A. L. (1925). Handbook of the Indians of California. United States. Bureau of American Ethonology. Bulletin,78. Washington. p.883. hdl:2027/mdp.39015006584174.
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 Norton, Jack (1979). Genocide in Northwestern California: When Our Worlds Cried. San Francisco: Indian Historian Press. pp. 54–56. ISBN0-913436-26-2 , LCCN78--65274. Lewis, David G. "The Most Persistent Attempt to Exterminate the Tribes, Beginning with the Yontocket Massacre 1853". NDNHISTORYRESEARCH, NDNHISTORYRESEARCH, 21 August 2017, ndnhistoryresearch.com/2017/04/21/the-most-persistent-attempt-to-exterminate-the-tribes-beginning-with-the-yontocket-massacre1853/. Madley, Benjamin. An American Genocide: the United States and the California Indian Catastrophe, 1846-1873. Yale University Press, 2017. https://books.google.com/books?id=ya0ODAAAQBAJ&q=the+california+genocide Lewis, David G. "Tolowa Dee-Ni Fish Camp & Chronology". NDNHISTORYRESEARCH, NDNHISTORYRESEARCH, 25 November 2017, ndnhistoryresearch.com/2015/08/30/dee-ni-tolowa-fish-camp-chronology/.
↑ Gould, Richard A. (18 February 1966). "The Wealth Quest Among the Tolowa Indians of Northwestern California". Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society. 110 (1): 67–89. JSTOR986003.
1 2 Kroeber, A. L. 1925. Handbook of the Indians of California. Bureau of American Ethnology Bulletin No. 78. Washington, D.C., p. 883
↑ Baumhoff, Martin A (1963). "Ecological Determinants of Aboriginal California Populations". University of California Publications in American Archaeology and Ethnology. 49: 155–236 [231].
↑ Cook, Sherburne F. 1943. The Conflict between the California Indian and White Civilization I: The Indian Versus the Spanish Mission. Ibero-Americana No. 21. University of California, Berkeley, p. 170
↑ Cook, Sherburne F. 1956. "The Aboriginal Population of the North Coast of California". Anthropological Records 16:81-130. University of California, Berkeley, p.101
Further reading
Collins, James. 1996. Understanding Tolowa Histories: Western Hegemonies and Native American Responses. London: Routledge.
Drucker, Philip. 1937. "The Tolowa and their Southwest Oregon Kin," University of California Publications in American Archaeology and Ethnology 36:221–300. Berkeley.
Gould, Richard A. 1978. "Tolowa," In California, edited by Robert F. Heizer, pp.128–136. Handbook of North American Indians, William C. Sturtevant, general editor, vol. 8. Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C.
The Umpqua people are an umbrella group of several distinct tribal entities of Native Americans of the Umpqua Basin in present-day south central Oregon in the United States. The area south of Roseburg is now known as the Umpqua Valley.
The Siletz were the southernmost of several divisions of the Tillamook people speaking a distinct dialect; the other dialect-divisions were: Salmon River on the Salmon River, Nestucca on Little Nestucca River, Nestucca River and Nestucca Bay, Tillamook Bay on the Tillamook Bay and the mouths of the Kilchis, Wilson, Trask and Tillamook rivers, and Nehalem on Nehalem River. The name "Siletz" comes from the name of the Siletz River on which they live. The origin of the name is unknown
Hupa are a Native American people of the Athabaskan-speaking ethnolinguistic group in northwestern California. Their endonym is Natinixwe, also spelled Natinook-wa, meaning "People of the Place Where the Trails Return". The Karuk name was Kishákeevar / Kishakeevra. The majority of the tribe is enrolled in the federally recognized Hoopa Valley Tribe.
The Karuk people are an indigenous people of California, and the Karuk Tribe is one of the largest tribes in California. Karuks are also enrolled in two other federally recognized tribes, the Cher-Ae Heights Indian Community of the Trinidad Rancheria and the Quartz Valley Indian Community.
The Wiyot are an indigenous people of California living near Humboldt Bay, California and a small surrounding area. They are culturally similar to the Yurok people. They called themselves simply Ku'wil, meaning "the People". Today, there are approximately 450 Wiyot people. They are enrolled in several federally recognized tribes, such as the Wiyot Tribe, Bear River Band of the Rohnerville Rancheria, Blue Lake Rancheria, and the Cher-Ae Heights Indian Community of the Trinidad Rancheria.
Pacific Coast Athabaskan is a geographical and possibly genealogical grouping of the Athabaskan language family.
The Rogue River Wars were an armed conflict in 1855–1856 between the U.S. Army, local militias and volunteers, and the Native American tribes commonly grouped under the designation of Rogue River Indians, in the Rogue River Valley area of what today is southern Oregon. The conflict designation usually includes only the hostilities that took place during 1855–1856, but there had been numerous previous skirmishes, as early as the 1830s, between European American settlers and the Native Americans, over territory and resources.
The Tolowa language is a member of the Pacific Coast subgroup of the Athabaskan language family. Together with three other closely related languages it forms a distinctive Oregon Athabaskan cluster within the subgroup.
The Confederated Tribes of Siletz Indians in the United States is a federally recognized confederation of more than 27 Native American tribes and bands who once inhabited an extensive homeland of more than 20 million acres from northern California to southwest Washington and between the summit of the Cascades and the Pacific Ocean. After the Rogue River Wars, these tribes were removed to the Coast Indian Reservation, now known as the Siletz Reservation. The tribes spoke at least 11 distinct languages, including Tillamook, Shasta, Lower Chinook, Kalapuya, Takelma, Alsea-Yaquina, Siuslaw/Lower Umpqua, Coos, the Plateau Penutian languages Molala and Klickitat, and several related Oregon Athabaskan languages.
The Yurok are an Indigenous people from along the Klamath River and Pacific coast, whose homelands are located in present-day California stretching from Trinidad in the south to Crescent City in the north.
Loren Me’-lash-ne Bommelyn is a tradition bearer for the Tolowa tribe. He has dedicated himself to preserving the traditional songs, language, and basketry. He is the foremost ceremonial leader of the tribe, and its most prolific basketweaver. Bommelyn is an enrolled member of the federally recognized Tolowa Dee-ni' Nation and was elected as their tribal chairperson.
The Big Lagoon Rancheria is a federally recognized tribe of Yurok and Tolowa Indians. They are located in Humboldt County, California, and their tribal headquarters is in Arcata, California.
Fort Dick is a small unincorporated community in rural Del Norte County, California. Fort Dick is around five miles north of Crescent City, California, and around 15 mi (24 km) south of the California–Oregon state line. Its population is 912 as of the 2020 census, up from 588 from the 2010 census.It is located on the U.S. Route 101 corridor on the Redwood Coast. A post office was set up in 1917.
The Chetco are a tribe of Native Americans who originally lived along the lower Chetco River and Winchuck River in Curry County in the U.S. state of Oregon. The name Chetco comes from the word meaning "close to the mouth of the Chetco River" in their own language, which is part of the Athapascan languages. Although they were once one of the largest tribes on the Pacific coast of Oregon, "the last known full-blooded Chetco" living on the Chetco River died in 1940.
The Yontocket massacre or Burnt Ranch massacre was an 1853 massacre of Tolowa people at the village of Yontocket, northwestern California.
The Tolowa Dee-ni' Nation, previously known as Smith River Rancheria, is a federally recognized tribe of Tolowa people in Del Norte County, California. They are Athabascan people, distantly related to northern Athabascans of eastern Alaska and western Canada, as well as the Apache and Navajo peoples of the American Southwest.
The Cher-Ae Heights Indian Community of the Trinidad Rancheria is a federally recognized tribe with members who are descendants of Chetco, Hupa, Karuk, Tolowa, Wiyot, and Yurok people in Humboldt County, California. As of the 2010 Census the population was 132.
Eunice Xash-wee-tes-na Henry Bommelyn was an American Tolowa cultural advocate, Tolowa language proponent, and tribal historian. Bommelyn was the last living person to speak Tolowa as a native first language; Bommelyn led the effort to revive fluency and teach the language. She uncovered and recorded the genealogy of the Tolowa from the present to the 1790s. Her genealogical records are used to determine the membership and enrollment of the Smith River Rancheria, the federally recognized tribe of Tolowa people in Del Norte County, California. Bommelyn was the mother of Loren Bommelyn, a ceremonial leader and basket weaver.
The California Indian Wars were a series of wars, battles, and massacres between the United States Army, and the Indigenous peoples of California. The wars lasted from 1850, immediately after Alta California, acquired during the Mexican–American War, became the state of California, to 1880 when the last minor military operation on the Colorado River ended the Calloway Affair of 1880.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply. Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.
United States 
California, 
Oregon)
