The Miwok of Yosemite and Mariposa....

Not far from Yosemite Valley and the Ahwahnee Hotel is another area known to wandering bands of Miwok and other Native American Communities.  This area is located down the hill on Usona Road.  The area dates back with living communities of Native Americans some 10,000 years  with steady and consistent habituation.  Verifiable evidence is available of settlements with active human patterns of daily living.  During a summer excavation a few substantial artifacts were unearthed, such as daub, charcoal, grasses,  and arrow points, some in obsidian and others in steatite.  These fragments of a long ago civilization and evidence of a band of wandering humans can be found at Fresno State University in the Archeaology Lab of Dr. John Pryor, who has made his life work studying California Native American Cultures.


I had the privilege of being one of his students and sat still for three weeks in order to train myself as an illustrator of archealogical artifacts.  The above dramatization is one of my drawings in colored pencil.  I also performed renderings of charcoal, points, and botanical specimens that are indigenous to the area and the culture of the local Miwok community.

This drawing is of our excavation site and how it looked in 2009.  The above prior drawing is a suggestion of the way the village appeared 10,000 years ago.  This Blue Tarp drawing is the official class dig.  There were around 20 of us and we camped out for three weeks.  We dug the site and filled it when we completed our excavation project. Sometimes the weather heated us up and sometimes we had a little rain.  

These are drawings of charcoal dating back thousands of years...I was able compile these drawings from small bits of ancient charcoal.  This indicated an area where either warmth or cooking was created, and thus left bits and pieces of the remains of the firepit.

This is the acutal site of the Miwok Village in Yosemite Valley.  The recreational village has cedar bark tepees that have been specially constucted for public viewing and the offical roundhouse is used for special ceremonial occassions.  On the premises is also a sweat lodge.  The Miwok of Yosemite used this style of house during their stay in the Yosemite Valley.  Nearby the gathered acorns and rolled out their product on the large granite matates, using manos, or hand held stones.  There are large granite stones that display holes where they have been made or worn into servicable depressions for the purpose of grinding the acorns.  Many books are available in the Yosemite Book Store near the Visitor Center that explain the process and demonstrate the necessary skills to make excellent acorn mush.  If books do not satisfy your curiosity, then Julia Parker is on hand in the Museum to answer your questions and provide entertaining explanations to all your questions.