PRIEST VALLEY REGION
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PREPARATORY NOTES FOR PRIEST VALLEY REGION – ATSNEL LOCAL GROUP
By Randall Milliken
Environment
Priest Valley (2,600 feet in elevation) takes up much of the east-central part of the region. To the west, separated from the valley by a ridge of the Coast Ranges, lies the somewhat lower Peachtree Valley (elevation 1,000 feet). High points overlooking Priest Valley on the north and east, including Center Peak, exceed 4,000 feet. Average annual rainfall is approximately 18 inches. Major streams in the region include San Lorenzo Creek, which flows northwest through Peachtree Valley (then into the Salinas River beyond the region), and Lewis Creek, which begins in Priest Valley and flows northwest to join San Lorenzo Creek to the northwest of the region. Both streams are currently dry for most of the year but may have carried some year-round flow prior to the introduction of wells. Vegetation is primarily blue oak savannah, with extensive chaparral and grey pine on steep hills. Some valley oak savannah exists on the larger valley floors, while canyon live oak and coast live oak occur in gullies and north slopes.
Early Expedition References
No early Spanish or Mexican expeditions are known to have passed through this region.
Mission Register References
Patterns of baptisms at missions up and down the Coast Ranges indicate that most of the native people of the Priest Valley region should have moved from their homeland to Mission San Antonio in the late 1790s and the 1800-1803 time period. Yet no direct clues indicate which of many small rancheria groups baptized at that mission during those years actually came from Priest Valley. Indirect methods, including relative baptismal patterns and regional intermarriage patterns, have been used to reconstruct the probable groups of the region. Gibson (1983:18) used those techniques to map three small rancheria groups listed in the Mission San Antonio baptismal registers in this region: Ajole, Atnil, and Quetaayno.
We will argue in other sections that Ajole was farther to the southeast and that Quetaayno was farther east. Gibson (1983:227-228) did not consider Lachayuam for this upland area, despite its late baptisms, because he considered it to be equivalent to Alecha, a Salinas Valley village. Initial genealogical chart work shows many nuclear families with both Lachayuam and Chuclac members, indicating that they may be equivalent terms for a single group. Of interest, Lachayuam was also called San Lucas in early records, possibly another factor that led Gibson to place it on the Salinas River. Our population distribution model predicts a pre-mission population of 240 for this rugged but biologically diverse region and a baptized adult population of ±102.
We tentatively assign the Priest Valley region to the Escoy, Chuclac, and Lachayuam people. The Escoy people, 13 adults, lived in the northern portion of the region; they also went to Mission Soledad. We place the mixed nuclear families of Lachayuam and Chuclac in Priest Valley itself (53 adults). To round out the adult population expected in our model, we assign 29 of the last unspecified Lix adults and one Zoltanel adult to this region. Most adult baptisms from the Priest Valley region occurred between 1802 and 1805. The halfway point in adult baptisms from the region was reached in October 1803, the same time that the coastal Estero Point reached the halfway point in adult baptism. Future work may show Mission Soledad connections to this region as well.
1840-1900 Historical References
To be developed.
Classic Ethnographic References
To be developed.
Recent Ethnographic References
To be developed.
