The Cahuilla and the Santa Rosa Mountain Region: Places and Their Native American Association, A Review of Published and Unpublished Sources

The purpose of the research described in this report was to assemble data on the cultural resources of the Santa Rosa Mountains and associated parts of the California desert as part of a larger study presently being conducted by the Bureau of Land Management Desert Planning Staff. This larger study is directed toward the identification and evaluation of Native American traditional use areas, ritually associated resource localities, and sacred locations or areas, so that these Native American sites under the jurisdiction of the Bureau of Land Management can be identified, evaluated, and protected. The research results will also assist the Bureau of Land Management to make sure that projects initiated by the Bureau or actions coming under its jurisdiction do not inadvertently harm or destroy cultural resources.

These data then are designed to be used in a desert-wide land use allocation plan for the California Desert Conservation Area, an area likely to be seriously threatened by the rapidly growing population of southern California. The Study Area includes selective locations in the Santa Rosa Planning Units of Riverside County and small portions of San Diego and San Bernardino Counties (see attached maps). Emphasis is placed on vacant public domain within the California desert in and adjoining the Santa Rosa Mountains.

In addition to meeting the above listed objectives, this study provides a considerable amount of new information regarding Cahuilla land use and occupancy. The study provides new interpretations of data available from various sources, which are here for the first time placed in a single context. The material will be useful to scholars who wish to study Cahuilla land use and occupancy in greater depth.

For this report, Cultural Systems Research, Incorporated (CSRI) examined the published and unpublished ethnographic literature on the Native Americans known to have been associated with the Study Area. These are principally the Cahuilla Indians, but the Serranos have been associated with the western secondary Study Area, and in the historic period the Chemehuevis have been associated with the Study Area in that they live in the towns and reservations in Coachella Valley near the Primary Study Area. We have noted and mapped the sites recorded in the literature as being named, used, or told about in oral literature by Native Americans. Each site was given a number as it was encountered in the literature. Duplicate sites and most of those outside the Study Area were later deleted from the list.

Originally the information in this record was migrated into tDAR from the National Archaeological Database Reports Module (NADB-R) and updated. In 2014, as part of its effort to improve tDAR content, the Center for Digital Antiquity uploaded a copy of the document and further improved the record metadata.