Mutsun Ohlone

Mutsun Ohlone

People of the Valley · San Benito County

The Mutsun-speaking Ohlone people inhabited the fertile valleys and oak woodlands of what is now San Benito County for thousands of years before Spanish contact. The San Benito River valley and the area around present-day Hollister were centers of Mutsun settlement, with large villages supported by acorn harvests, deer hunting, and the valley's abundant resources.

Timeline

Pre-contact

The Mutsun World

Mutsun villages were concentrated along the San Benito River and its tributaries. The Mutsun people maintained trade relationships with coastal Ohlone groups and with interior peoples of the San Joaquin Valley. After the founding of Mission San Juan Bautista in 1797, the Mutsun people were the primary group incorporated — and devastated — by the mission system.[1],[3]

Real places in our directory connected to Mutsun Ohlone.

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Sources

Citations behind the dates, names, and numbers on this page.

  1. 1
    U.S. Bureau of Indian Affairs — The Mutsun of San Juan Bautista and the Indian Signers of the 1851–1852 Treaties

    Historical account of the Mutsun people, San Juan Bautista mission incorporation, and treaty-era history.

  2. 2
    National Park Service — Ohlone Ethnohistory Bibliography

    NPS research bibliography covering Ohlone/Mutsun ethnography, mission records, and regional history.

  3. 3
    Monterey County Historical Society — Mission San Juan Bautista

    Local historical context for the 1797 mission and its effects on Indigenous communities.

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