The Aboriginal Population of the North Coast of CaliforniaCook, Sherburne Friend
History
The Aboriginal Population of the North Coast of California
Cook, Sherburne Friend
Indians of North America -- California; Indians of North America -- Statistics
For the six major subdivisions mentioned above the total baptisms at
Solano and San Rafael were 264. If this number represents 15 per cent,
the population was 1,760, a value not basically different from the
arbitrary figure derived from the village lists. An intermediate
estimate, 1,800, will be taken for the population of the Lake Miwok and
Northern Wappo.
For the Central Wappo there is a paucity of ethnographic data.
Furthermore the territory itself is very circumscribed, since Pope
Valley has been allocated for present purposes to the Northern Wappo
and embraces little more than the flat land within a radius of a few
miles from the modern town of Calistoga. Merriam cites only one name
(in the manuscript entitled "Yukean"), viz., _Mi-yahk-ma_. Barrett
(1908, p. 269) gives _Maiyakma_, together with _Nilektsonoma_ and
_Tselmenan_, which were close by. In addition he lists _Mitustul_, five
miles to the west of Calistoga. It seems likely that we have here a
single small division, or tribelet, with the "capital" at Maiyakma and
with three smaller, peripheral villages. If we use the same population
estimates as we did farther north, we may ascribe 200 persons to
Maiyakma and 100 each to the others, making 500 in all.
The mission records supply two items of interest. The first is a note
from Sonoma that there were baptized 103 persons from Mayacma "o
Tamalsimas." The latter name is probably a corruption of the term
written by Barrett as Tselmenan, and indicates that this village was
then in existence. The other item is from San Rafael which reported 9
baptisms from Teluasuenhuca "o Tamalsimela." The total then is 112.
The baptism factor of 15 per cent cannot be used here with confidence
because the upper Napa Valley was much more accessible to the San
Rafael Mission and particularly the Sonoma Mission than was the area
around and above Middletown. At the same time the distance and
difficulty of approach were somewhat greater than in the case of the
lower Russian River Valley near Santa Rosa and Sebastopol, for which
the baptism factor was taken as one-third. As a compromise we may take
a factor of one-quarter, or 25 per cent. This yields an estimated
population of 450, a figure which appears not unreasonable.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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