The Tamien people (also spelled Tamyen or Thamien) are one of eight linguistic divisions of the Ohlone people; groups of Native Americans who live in Northern California.[Kroeber, Alfred L. 1925. Handbook of the Indians of California. Washington, D.C: Bureau of American Ethnology Bulletin No. 78. (map of villages, page 465)][Hylkema, Mark. Archaeological Investigations at the Third Location of Mission Santa Clara De Assis: The Murguia Mission 1781-1818, 1995. Caltrans Report (CA-SCL-30/H) (page 20)] The missionary fathers erected the mission on January 17, 1777, at the native village of So-co-is-u-ka.
Language
Traditionally, the Tamien people spoke the
Tamyen language, a Northern
Ohlone language, which ceased to be spoken since possibly the early 19th century. "Tamyen", also called
Santa Clara Costanoan, has been extended to mean the Native people of Santa Clara Valley, as well as the language they spoke. Tamyen is listed as one of eight Costanoan language dialects in the
Utian languages, although the cogency of the Utian language grouping (combining
Miwokan with
Ohlone languages) is contested.
[Randall Milliken, Laurence H. Shoup, and Beverly R. Ortiz, "Ohlone/Costanoan Indians of the San Francisco Peninsula and their Neighbors, Yesterday and Today"
]
/ref> Tamyen was the primary language of the Native people living at the first and second Mission Santa Clara (both founded in 1777). Linguistically, it is thought that Chochenyo, Tamyen, and Ramaytush are dialects of a single language. This is not to imply, however, that Chochenyo, Tamien, and Ramaytush people ever belonged to a single unified tribe.
Territory
Tamien territory extends over most of the present day Santa Clara County, California, and was bordered by communities that spoke other Ohlone languages: Ramaytush to the northwest on the San Francisco Peninsula, Chochenyo people, East Bay, Mutsun, south of San Martin, and the Awaswas to the southwest.
Tribes and villages
The Tamyen ( Tamien, Thamien) people are associated with the original site of Mission Santa Clara (Mission Santa Clara de Thamien) on the Guadalupe River, 1777. The entire Santa Clara Valley was populated with dozens of Tamyen-speaking villages, several on Coyote Creek.
Politics and tribal controversy
In 1925, Alfred Kroeber, then director of the Hearst Museum of Anthropology, declared the Ohlone extinct, which directly led to the historic Verona Band of Alameda County (whose lineal descendants established the unrecognized Muwekma Ohlone Tribe) losing federal recognition and land rights.
On January 25, 2022, in a virtual presentation at Santa Clara University, Tamien Nation Councilwoman Quirina Luna Geary claimed that the historic Tamien were not tribelets, rather "a nation based on Tamyen-speaking villages."
See also
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Ohlone tribes and villages in Santa Clara Valley
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Namesakes:
Citations
General and cited references
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Hylkema, Mark (1994). "Tamien Station Archeological Project", published by Bean, Lowell John, editor, in The Ohlone: Past and Present Native Americans of the San Francisco Bay Region. Menlo Park, CA: Ballena Press Publication. pp. 249–270. .
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Levy, Richard (1978). "Costanoan", in Handbook of North American Indians Vol. 8 California. William C. Sturtevant, and Robert F. Heizer, eds. Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution. pp. 485–495. , .
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Milliken, Randall (1995). A Time of Little Choice: The Disintegration of Tribal Culture in the San Francisco Bay Area 1769–1910. Menlo Park, CA: Ballena Press Publication. .
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Teixeira, Lauren (1997). The Costanoan/Ohlone Indians of the San Francisco and Monterey Bay Area: A Research Guide. Menlo Park, CA: Ballena Press Publication. .
External links
