"The World was made by the World's Heart, Tikado Hedache. He was Annikadel's grandfather. Annikadel was the greatest man; he knew everything. "At first there was nothing but water; no land anywhere, and no light. The world was dark." So begins the creation myth of the Modesse (Madesiwi) Indians, an Achumawi people living along the Pit River in northern California. Their mythology embraces not only archetypal tales of primeval darkness and battles between good and evil, but also the doings of the First People--Animal People, who are neither animal nor human--who immediately before the appearance of Real People were transformed into animals, trees, and rocks. Stories told to Merriam by Istet Woiche, Speaker and Keeper of the Laws for his tribe. In them we meet Annikadel, who with his grandfather Tikado was a supreme deity existing before the world, and also such divinities as Coyote-man, Silver Fox-man, and Frog-woman, all magicians who existed before the ocean foam was condensed into earth. In tales of these gods and of the First People they created, we read of travels to the roundhouse of the sun and moon, the search for Another World, the coming of a Great Flood, and are introduced to a literature that reflects the sensibilities of a people whose lives were intertwined with nature for millennia, and who recognized in animals a kinship of activities, relationships, and powers. At the last meeting of the Animal People, before they were transformed into the creatures we know today, Coyote-man was asked how the people who were to come would know the history of the world. "If the Real People will dream," he said, "I will tell them the history of my people, and how long we were in making the world."

The best-known work by the eccentric anthropologist Jaime de Angulo, Indians in Overalls is a fascinating account of his first linguistic field trip-in 1921-to the Achumawi tribe of northeastern California. The Pit River tribe had lived in the barren high country for thousands of years and, despite the harsh climate and difficult living conditions, they had developed an extraordinary complex language and a rich mythology. As he traveled with the tribe and learned the spoken language, he observed gambling games and shamanistic practices, and he collected some of the marvelous stories told around the fire in the winter lodges. Of all the people he worked with, he felt closest to the Achumawi, among whom he discovered "the spirit of wonder, the recognition of life as power."

This classic of American Indian ethnography, originally published in 1877, is again available in its complete form. In the summers of 1871 and 1872 Powers visited Indian groups in the northern two-thirds of California. A journalist by profession, he was untrained in ethnography, but was nonetheless an astonishingly intelligent observer who had a gift for writing in a spirited manner. He reported faithfully what he heard and portrayed accurately what he saw among the native survivors of Gold Rush days in a series of seventeen articles published mostly in The Overland Monthly. These were partly unwritten, added to, and reorganized by Powers to be published in 1877 as a report of the U.S. Geographical Survey of the Rocky Mountain Region. Powers’ book is still basic and is referred to by everyone who deals with native cultures. The 1877 edition was not large, and Tribes of California is at last reprinted in response to growing demand for this rare volume. For this edition all of the original illustrations have been retained and the basic text printed in facsimile. Professor Robert F. Heizer has provided annotations throughout and an introduction to indicate contemporary thought about the volume.

Fire in California’s Ecosystems describes fire in detail—both as an integral natural process in the California landscape and as a growing threat to urban and suburban developments in the state. Written by many of the foremost authorities on the subject, this comprehensive volume is an ideal authoritative reference tool and the foremost synthesis of knowledge on the science, ecology, and management of fire in California. Part One introduces the basics of fire ecology, including overviews of historical fires, vegetation, climate, weather, fire as a physical and ecological process, and fire regimes, and reviews the interactions between fire and the physical, plant, and animal components of the environment. Part Two explores the history and ecology of fire in each of California's nine bioregions. Part Three examines fire management in California during Native American and post-Euro-American settlement and also current issues related to fire policy such as fuel management, watershed management, air quality, invasive plant species, at-risk species, climate change, social dynamics, and the future of fire management. This edition includes critical scientific and management updates and four new chapters on fire weather, fire regimes, climate change, and social dynamics.

Lela Rhoades has a voice so sharp, so funny, warm, and honest, that the stories of her life and the traditions of her parents will barely sit still on the page. As told to Molly Curtis in the 1970's, this memoir takes us back into a world where men chased mother grizzlies out of their dens for their meat, where manzanita berries were ground up into sugar and houses built with the door right in the middle of the roof. It was an intricate, complex life that was unknown to the strangers that would take over the land. For all of her recollections, old recipes, and legends, this is also a story of transition for Lela Rhoades, her Achumawi people, and for Native California in general. Here, Rhoades walks the line between tradition and change, watching the land and hunting rights of her people vanish, telling creation stories that blend both Coyote and Jesus, and recounting her marriage to a white rancher. Come, sit down at the feet of Lela Rhoades, and listen to the strength and beauty of her world. "There was an aristocratic presence, an aristocratic aura about the heavy, elder lady, Lela Grant Rhoades, slowly rocking in her chair as she quietly embroidered a delicate pattern, silver needles flashing in the fading evening light, black-rimmed glasses resting on her nose a mysterious aristocratic something, like she knew many secrets or something more necessary than life. I thought of Grandmother Spider creating her web with great confidence." From the Foreword by Darryl Babe Wilson

Describes patterns of village life, and covers such subjects as Indian tools and artifacts, hunting techniques, and food.--From publisher description.

This comprehensive survey of indigenous languages of the New World introduces students and general readers to the mosaic of American Indian languages and cultures and offers an approach to grasping their subtleties. Authors Silver and Miller demonstrate the complexity and diversity of these languages while dispelling popular misconceptions. Their text reveals the linguistic richness of languages found throughout the Americas, emphasizing those located in the western United States and Mexico while drawing on a wide range of other examples from Canada to the Andes. It introduces readers to such varied aspects of communicating as directionals and counting systems, storytelling, expressive speech, Mexican Kickapoo whistle speech, and Plains sign language. The authors have included the basics of grammar and historical linguistics while emphasizing such issues as speech genres and other sociolinguistic issues and the relation between language and worldview. American Indian Languages: Cultural and Social Contexts is a comprehensive resource that will serve as a text in undergraduate and lower-level graduate courses on Native American languages and provide a useful reference for students of American Indian literature or general linguistics. It also introduces general readers interested in Native Americans to the amazing diversity and richness of indigenous American languages.

Before outsiders arrived, about 100 distinct Indian languages were spoken in California, many of them alive today. Each of these languages represents a unique way of understanding the world and expressing that understanding. Flutes of Fire examines many different aspects of Indian languages: languages, such as Yana, in which men and women have markedly different ways of speaking; ingenious ways used in each language for counting. Hinton discusses how language can retain evidence of ancient migrations, and addresses what different groups are doing to keep languages alive and pass them down to the younger generations.

The most persistent enemy of the native Californians was the firmly rooted white philosophy which preached that, one way or another, the Indian was doomed. Beyond the callous references to "Diggers" and "Poor Lo", the single most important catchword of the period was "extermination." It was used early and often and picked up by the newspapers and repeated in the army reports, letters, government documents, and journals of the time. It was a word that set the stage for slaughter. When the Great Spirit Died is a sad and tragic story that will haunt our country forever.