Culture
- Food. Acorn was their staple food item which they pulverized to make soup, bread, and flour. ...
- Clothing. In the summer months, the men wore loin clothes made of deerskin, grass, or fibers of bark. ...
- Jewelry and Accessories. ...
- Tattoo. ...
- Houses. ...
- Tools and Weapons. ...
- Arts and Music. ...
- Religious Beliefs. ...
- Miwok Ceremonies. ...
- Games and Toys. ...
What did the Miwok wear in the winter?
When the temperature dropped the Miwok wore blankets or capes made from skin or fur to keep warm, especially the Miwok who live in colder temperatures like the Sierra Nevada, they are called the Sierra Miwok. During ceremonies, many Miwok Indians wore body paintings.
What kind of food did the Miwok eat?
The Miwoks were hunter-gatherers. Miwok men hunted deer and small game and caught fish in the rivers and lakes. Miwok women gathered acorns and ground them into meal to make bread and fruits, as well as collecting berries, nuts, and other plants. Here is a website with more information about Native American recipes .
Did the Miwoks paint their faces?
The Miwoks didn't wear long headdresses like the Sioux. For dances and ceremonies, Miwok men would wear special headbands made of flicker feathers, like this. The Miwoks did paint their faces for special occasions, but not for everyday life. They also wore Native American tattoos on their faces and necks.
What jewelry did theiwok wear?
The miwok wore many jewelries made from bones, shells, wood, and feathers. The nose and ears were often pierced. The children usually wore flower earrings, and adults usually had their nose pierced.
What was the Miwok clothing made of?
These were made from dressed skins of various animals: deer, bear, mountain lion, coyote, and others. Buffalo skins were sometimes used. These were obtained by trade from the Washo and Eastern Mono.
Does the Miwok tribe still exist?
Today there are about 3,500 Miwok in total.
What did the Miwok tribe need?
While their most important food crop was acorns, their diet also consisted of mushrooms, insects, berries, roots, bulbs and greens. For hunting and fishing, the men had a range of tools. They used bows and arrows, spears, nets, clubs, snares, and baskets for fish and small animals.
What do Miwok houses look like?
In mountain areas, the Miwok house was made of layers of bark slabs leaning against each other in a cone shape. In the lower foothills and on the plains, the house was made around a frame of poles covered with bundles of grass or tule reeds, or with mats woven from tule reeds.
What are Miwok houses called?
Their traditional houses, called "kotcha", were constructed with slabs of tule grass or redwood bark in a cone-shaped form. Miwok people are skilled at basketry.
What did the Miwok do for fun?
Many Miwok children like to go hunting and fishing with their fathers. In the past, Indian kids had more chores and less time to play, just like colonial children. But they did have toys and games. One popular Miwok game was shinny, which is an athletic sport similar to lacrosse and rugby.
What plants did the Miwok use?
Coast Miwok are known to have used split roots of the yellow bush lupine, which grows in sandy soil behind the dunes, and fiber from the riparian shrub, ninebark, for twine and rope.
What language did the Miwok speak?
The Miwok or Miwokan languages (/ˈmiːwɒk/; Miwok: [míwːɨːk]), also known as Moquelumnan or Miwuk, are a group of endangered languages spoken in central California by the Miwok peoples, ranging from the Bay Area to the Sierra Nevada. There are seven Miwok languages, four of which have distinct regional dialects.
Did Miwok Indians have horses?
Some Miwok were killed, but others joined people from the Yokuts tribe and rebelled. During the 1820s and 1830s they learned Spanish fighting techniques and used them to carry out raids against the missions and to acquire horses from Spanish ranches.
How did the Miwok utilize deer?
The Miwok Indians took their deer hunting very seriously. Deer was one of the most important animals they hunted. A deer hunt could be conducted with a small group, or individually. When hunting individually, the deer was followed while the hunter wore a deer-head disguise.
What things did the Miwok trade?
The main trading partners of the Bay Miwok were probably the Ohlone and the Yokuts. They traded animal hides, baskets, bows and arrows, mortars and pestles for other things they needed like Ohlone mussels, abalone shells, salt, cinnabar, dried abalone, and olivella shells, and Yokut pine nuts and rabbitskin blankets.
What was the Miwok environment like?
They lived in semisubterranean pole- and earth-covered lodges and produced watertight basketry ornamented with beads or feathers. The interior Miwok—those of the Sierra and Plains—resided in the foothills and lowlands and generally moved into the high sierras only for summer hunting.