UC Merced The Journal of California Anthropology Title The Alliklik Mystery Permalink https://escholarship.org/uc/item/1xw151z5 Journal The Journal of California Anthropology, 2(2) Author Bright, William Publication Date 1975-12-01 Peer reviewed eScholarship.org Powered by the California Digital Library University of California The Alliklik Mystery WILLIAM BRIGHT he standard listing and classification of turefio Chumash name for the group. A pos­ T Californian Indian tribes and languages, sible reason for Kroeber's change in name is his as presented by Kroeber (1925), includes the statement (1925:621) that "the Venturefio Chu­ term Alliklik, classified linguistically in the mash knew the Gabrielino, and perhaps all the Southern California Shoshonean group—now Shoshoneans beyond, as Ataphli'ish"—i.e., he more often called Takic—and located geo­ may have found that Ataplili'ish was too gene­ graphically in the upper Santa Clara Valley of ral a term for the group in the upper Santa Ventura and Los Angeles counties. However, Clara Valley. published information on Alliklik culture or After 1925, no further information was language is extremely slight. The first report pubhshed about the Allikhk. However, two is by Kroeber (1915), on the basis of informa­ relevant bodies of manuscript material, by tion gathered in 1912 from an Indian named C. Hart Merriam and J. P. Harrington, respec­ Juan Jose Fustero, then living near Piru (Ven­ tively, have recently come to light. These data tura County). Fustero spoke Kitanemuk, but provide considerable new, though somewhat stated that some of his grandparents, born near conflicting, evidence on the identity of the Newhall (Los Angeles County), had spoken the Alhkhk. language of a tribe called Ataplili'ish by the The Merriam manuscript, reported by neighboring Chumash. Of this language, Beeler and Klar (1974), is a vocabulary head­ Fustero was able to give Kroeber only two ed "Alhklik Chumash"—unidentified as to utterances with Kitanemuk equivalences for source, place, or date, but presumably re­ each: hami'kwa umi, 'Where are you going?' corded in the early decades of this century. (Kit. haimukat miimi) and the placename As Beeler and Klar show, this vocabulary pi'ibuku, 'Piru' (Kit. plvuht, lit. 'three-cornered clearly represents a Chumashan dialect very reed'); other placenames recorded from Fus­ close to Venturefio, though with many borrow­ tero by Kroeber are pure Kitanemuk, e.g., ings from Kitanemuk. On this evidence, Beeler a-kava-vi, (lit. 'his ears,' a place near Piru). and Klar suggest that the Allikhk of the upper Fustero believed that the Ataplili'ish ranged Santa Clara Valley were in fact a Chumashan from Piru to Soledad Canyon (Los Angeles rather than a Uto-Aztecan group, though they County)—i.e., over much of the upper Santa allow (p. 34) that "in such a region it is pos­ Clara Valley. sible that Chumash and Uto-Aztecan villages On the basis of these two utterances, then, alternated with each other." In this view, the and their apparent similarity to Kitanemuk, name "Alliklik" would no longer be listed Kroeber classified the Ataplili'ish language among Uto-Aztecan languages, and the two within the Southern Californian Shoshonean utterances which Kroeber recorded from group. Later, however, Kroeber (1925:577, Fustero would be most plausibly regarded as 613-614) used a different term (without explan­ dialectal variants of Kitanemuk. ation)—namely Alliklik, said to be the Ven­ A different perspective, however, comes THE ALLIKLIK MYSTERY 229 from three sets of notes by Harrington, which station by the lake".). Their language "sounded I will now describe. when they talked like English. Not like Ven­ The first set of notes is from an interview turefio or Tejoneiio—entirely different." In with Juan Jose Fustero in 1913, after Kroeber's another session, Montes said the Tataviam "discovery" of this consultant. Almost all the lived "over this way (gesture indicating east of hnguistic data recorded from Fustero are pure Piru region)," and again "at tsawajuq and all up Kitanemuk, though Harrington does not label this way" (tsawajuf) is located by other sources it as such (he did not work on Kitanemuk until at San Francisquito, near Newhall). 1916). The only non-Kitanemuk items here are When Harrington read Fustero's ha-ikwe, these two: pTSuk'yg, 'placename,' (Piru, the 'Que hay, amigo?' to Montes, she said ikwe Kit. equivalent was given as pivut'u, (three- meant 'friend' in Tataviam. cornered reed'); ha-ikwe, 'que hay, amigo.' Montes gave pi'irukur) as the Kitanemuk (The phrase hami'kwa umi 'where are you name for Piru; no etymology was known to her. going?', recorded by Kroeber, is not in Har­ (The hook beneath vowels may stand for open rington's notes.) quality.) She said it had nothing to do with Fustero told Harrington that these were pivuht, 'three-cornered tule.' from his grandparents' language (as Kroeber Montes also "says positively that at ka\tek also noted), which he also called the "Castec they talked Ventureno but somewhat differen­ language," and which he claimed to be extinct. tiated." This presumably refers to Castaic in He also spoke of his grandfather's language as the Santa Clara Valley. being of "Castec and Soledad," and said that A third set of notes is from Harrington's "Newhall talked Soledad language"; thus interviews with Magdalena Olivas, a Kitane­ Fustero's ''lengua de los abuelos" is again muk speaker, and Jose Juan, herChumash hus­ located in the upper Santa Clara Valley. It band. These consultants located the Tataviam should be noted, however, that the placename not only at La Liebre and tsawajuCuJq, but "Castec," of Chumash origin (modern spelling also at Elizabeth Lake and in Antelope Valley. "Castaic"), is ambiguous, referring both to a Magdalena Olivas remembered a number of town in the upper Santa Clara Valley and to Tataviam expressions, as follows:^'A:He, 'amigo' "Castaic Lake" in the Tehachapi Mountains [the overbar is Harrington's symbol for near Fort Tejon. length]; kyli, 'perro'; mStske, 'ven paca' [= ven The second body of data is in Harrington's para acd, 'come here!']; h^leke, 'sientate'; 1916 notes on Kitanemuk, gathered at Tejon. hiutsapa, 'que es ese?'; (ra'c ka'meq, 'tengo He apparently asked his consultants if they had mucho miedo' [the dot below vowels may heard of a tribe called the "Pujadores" (it is stand for close quality, and k for a back-velar not clear where Harrington got the name); they stop]; kdkdva apakaii, 'Tularenos'—i.e., were doubtful about that term, but decided it Yokuts Indians: translated literally as 'su must refer to an extinct tribe which they called cabeza de rata'; pat', 'water' [cf Kitanemuk tdtdviam, whose name they linked to tdvijek, po/j]; and pikwaiaruku, 'baby.' 'sunny hillside' and atdvihukwa^, 'he is sunning Other information given by Jose Juan was: himself.' They also gave a verb nitdvia ^, 'I speak he spoke Castec Chumash, which was different the Tataviam language.' from both Coast Ventureiio and taslipun A consultant named Eugenia Montes gave [Emigdiano Chumash?]. The Chumash name, the following details: The Tataviam lived at 'at'aphli'i\, which Kroeber was given for Fus­ hwitahove, 'La Liebre' (a Kitanemuk name— tero's grandparents' people, "applies to the Fustero located this place as "camino Gorman's Fernandenos and Gabrielinos," and not to the 230 THE JOURNAL OF CALIFORNIA ANTHROPOLOGY Kitanemuk. "The whole Piru region was Ven­ tion to Harrington's Tataviam materials; to turefio territory, inf. says without any hesita­ Alice Anderton for Kitanemuk data, and for tion and Magd. agrees." presenting an earlier version of this paper, on What can we conclude from all this? On the my behalf, at the Third Annual Friends of Uto- evidence of the word for 'friend,' Fustero's Aztecan Conference at Flagstaff, in June 1975; grandparents' language was the same as that and to Madison Beeler for the Merriam data which the Kitanemuk call Tataviam. But it is and for helpful discussion. not at all clear how the language should be classified: the utterances first recorded by University of California Kroeber do indeed resemble Kitanemuk, but Los Angeles most of the other data do not—except for pat', 'water,' which looks so very close to Kitan­ REFERENCES emuk that it suggests an error on the part of Harrington's Kitanemuk-speaking consul­ tants. But nothing looks hke Chumash either Beeler, M. S., and Kathryn Klar (M. S. Beeler, personal communication); nor 1974 Interior Chumash. Unpubhshed manu­ can 1 identify anything resembhng Yokuts, the script on file at the University of Califor­ neighboring language to the north. nia, Los Angeles. It is also hard to come to any firm conclu­ sions about Tataviam territory, since sources Harrington, J. P. disagree. It apparently constituted at least part 1913 Notes from Juan Jose Fustero, Piru, of the area assigned by Kroeber to the "Allik­ Cahfornia, 17 March. On file in the Smithsonian Archives, Washington, hk," but not necessarily all of it. D.C. My tentative conclusions, then, are as fol­ lows. There were probably two types of speech in the upper Santa Clara Valley. One was a Chu­ 1916 Notes from Kitanemuk speakers at mashan dialect, related to Ventureiio; the term Tejon. On file at the Department of "Alliklik" might be most appropriately ap­ Linguistics, University of California, Berkeley. plied to this dialect. The other was "Tataviam," a language showing some Takic affinities. Per­ haps it represents a division of Takic separate 1917(?)Notes from Magdalena (Kitanemuk)and from those recognized by Kroeber; or possibly Jose Juan (Chumash). On file at the De­ it is the remnant, influenced by Takic, of a lan­ partment of Linguistics, University of guage family otherwise unknown in southern California, Berkeley.