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Unique Skills

The Cahuilla, as we are learning, mastered three skills that were very unusual in California life, and that connected them culturally to the native peoples living in Arizona and New Mexico. Do you remember what any of those skills were?

One was the introduction of agriculture. None of the other backcountry tribes we have studied grew plants for food. The Cahuilla learned to grow corn, squash, beans, and melons, presumably receiving seeds from the eastern neighbors in the pueblos, who in turn had received seeds from their southern neighbors in Mexico. How did agriculture help the Cahuilla? It allowed them to create their own food source, and to not be totally dependent on what the native environment could provide. This was important because the mesquite beans were not as reliable a source of food as acorns were for other areas of California.

And the second unique skill? Pottery. Like their counterparts to the east, they learned to gather clay, shape and decorate containers, and fire them to make them strong and waterproof. And with the pottery, they could better cook the corn, squash and beans.

A third skill important to recognize as distinct to the Cahuilla is a technological accomplishment of great merit. The Cahuilla in the Coachella Valley area developed a skill unusual not only in California, but unusual in early native America. They knew how to build wells. They would dig a ramp system down below ground level, spiraling down until they hit the water table and could then manage their own water source with out reliance on springs or an oasis.