[Federal Register Volume 76, Number 50 (Tuesday, March 15, 2011)]
[Notices]
[Pages 14049-14050]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 2011-5855]


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DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR

National Park Service

[2253-665]


Notice of Intent To Repatriate Cultural Items: California State 
University, Sacramento, Sacramento, CA

AGENCY: National Park Service, Interior.

ACTION: Notice.

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    Notice is here given in accordance with the Native American Graves 
Protection and Repatriation Act (NAGPRA), 25 U.S.C. 3005, of intent to 
repatriate cultural items in the possession of California State 
University, Sacramento, Sacramento, CA, that meet the definition of 
unassociated funerary objects under 25 U.S.C. 3001.
    This notice is published as part of the National Park Service's 
administrative responsibilities under NAGPRA, 25 U.S.C. 3003(d)(3). The 
determinations in this notice are the sole responsibility of the 
museum, institution, or Federal agency that has control of the cultural 
items. The National Park Service is not responsible for the 
determinations in this notice.
    In a companion Notice of Inventory Completion, the Native American 
human remains and associated funerary objects removed from Site CA-SAC-
16 are described.
    At an unknown time in the 1930s, cultural items were removed from 
site CA-SAC-16 on private property, in Sacramento County, CA. In 1951, 
the Zallio Collection, which included these objects, was donated to 
Sacramento State College (now California State University, Sacramento). 
The 14 unassociated funerary objects currently in the collection are 13 
projectile points and 1 stone tool. Five additional unassociated 
funerary objects (one bone awl and four projectile points) are missing.
    In 1953, cultural items were removed from Site CA-SAC-16 on private 
property, in Sacramento County, CA, during an excavation project by the 
university. The unassociated funerary object is one bead. Three 
additional unassociated funerary objects (one baked clay artifact and 
two beads) are missing.
    From 1961 to 1971, cultural items were removed during an excavation 
project at Site CA-SAC-16 on private property, in Sacramento County, 
CA. The American River College conducted the salvage excavation, and 
the collection was later transferred to California State University, 
Sacramento. The two unassociated funerary objects are one bead and one 
bag of debitage. Twenty-three additional unassociated funerary objects 
(2 bags of baked clay, 1 bead, 2 bags of carbonized material, 13 bags 
of faunal material, 1 piece of jasper, 1 quartz crystal, 2 unidentified 
rocks, and 1 stone tool) are missing.
    In 1971, cultural items were removed during a salvage excavation 
project at Site CA-SAC-16 on private property, in Sacramento County, 
CA, by the university. The 510 unassociated funerary objects are 11 
bags of baked clay, 420 beads, 10 bags of carbonized material, 11 bags 
of debitage, 2 discoidals, 23 bags of faunal material, 3 bags of fire 
cracked rocks, 2 bags of grave fill, 4 modified faunal bones, 4 
ornaments, 15 projectile points, and 5 stone tools. Fifty-four 
additional unassociated funerary objects (1 bone awl, 30 beads, 1 bone 
tube, 16 bags of faunal material, 1 bag of fire fractured rock, 4 
projectile points, and 1 stone tool) are missing.
    The artifact types and burial practices observed at Site CA-SAC-16 
indicate that it was first occupied during the Middle Horizon, and was 
inhabited into the Historic Period. The presence of rough disk Olivella 
beads and glass trade beads associated with the Hudson Bay fur trappers 
suggests that some burials may date to the 1830s, when an epidemic 
attributed to malaria spread among Native populations along the 
Sacramento River. The lack of

[[Page 14050]]

archeological and historical evidence for occupation of the site after 
the epidemic provides circumstantial support that the site was 
abandoned at this time. The surviving occupants of the site may have 
joined with neighboring groups to the south (in the vicinity of 
Sacramento), to the north (Verona), and to the east (in the foothills).
    Archeological evidence indicates that the lower Sacramento Valley 
and Delta regions were continuously occupied since at least the Early 
Horizon (5550-550 B.C.). Cultural changes indicated by artifact 
typologies and burial patterns, historical linguistic evidence, and 
biological evidence reveal that the populations in the region were not 
static, with both in situ cultural changes and migrations of outside 
populations into the area. Linguistic evidence suggests that ancestral-
Penutian speaking groups related to modern day Miwok, Nisenan, and 
Patwin groups occupied the region during the Middle (550 B.C.-A.D. 
1100) and Late (A.D. 1100--Historic) Horizons, with some admixing 
between these groups and Hokan-speaking groups that occupied the region 
at an earlier date. The genetic data suggests that the Penutians may 
have arrived later than suggested by the linguistic evidence.
    Geographical data from ethnohistoric and ethnographic sources 
indicate that the site was most likely occupied by Nisenan-speaking 
groups at the beginning of the Historic Period, while Patwin-speakers 
occupied the valley west of the Sacramento River and Miwok-speakers 
resided south of the American River. Ethnographic data and expert 
testimony from tribal representatives support the high level of 
interaction between groups in the lower Sacramento Valley and Delta 
regions that crosscut linguistic boundaries. Historic population 
movements resulted in an increased level of shifting among populations, 
especially among the Miwok and Nisenan, who were impacted by disease 
and Euro-American activities relating to Sutter's Fort and later gold-
rush activities.
    In summary, officials of California State University, Sacramento, 
together with the University's College of Social Sciences and 
Interdisciplinary Studies Committee on Native American Graves 
Protection and Repatriation Act Compliance (SSIS NAGPRA Committee), 
reasonably believe that the ethnographic, historical, and geographical 
evidence indicates that the historic burials and cultural items 
recovered from Site CA-SAC-16 are most closely affiliated with 
contemporary descendants of the Nisenan, and have more distant ties to 
neighboring groups, such as the Plains Miwok. Furthermore, the earlier 
cultural items from the Middle and Late Horizons share cultural 
relations with the Nisenan and Plains Miwok based on archeological, 
biological, and historical linguistic evidence.
    Officials of California State University, Sacramento, have 
determined, pursuant to 25 U.S.C. 3001(3)(B), that the 527 cultural 
items described above are reasonably believed to have been placed with 
or near individual human remains at the time of death or later as part 
of the death rite or ceremony and are believed, by a preponderance of 
the evidence, to have been removed from a specific burial site of 
Native American individuals. Officials of California State University, 
Sacramento, have determined, pursuant to 25 U.S.C. 3001(2), that there 
is a relationship of shared group identity that can be reasonably 
traced between the unassociated funerary objects and the Buena Vista 
Rancheria of Me-Wuk Indians of California; Ione Band of Miwok Indians 
of California; Shingle Springs Band of Miwok Indians, Shingle Springs 
Rancheria (Verona Tract), California; United Auburn Indian Community of 
the Auburn Rancheria of California; and Wilton Rancheria, California, 
as well as the non-Federally recognized Indian groups of the El Dorado 
Miwok Tribe and Nashville-El Dorado Miwok.
    Representatives of any other Indian tribe that believes itself to 
be culturally affiliated with the unassociated funerary objects should 
contact Charles Gossett, Dean of the College of Social Sciences and 
Interdisciplinary Studies, CSUS, 6000 J St., Sacramento, CA 95819-6109, 
telephone: (916) 278-6504, before April 14, 2011. Repatriation of the 
unassociated funerary objects to the Buena Vista Rancheria of Me-Wuk 
Indians of California; Ione Band of Miwok Indians of California; 
Shingle Springs Band of Miwok Indians, Shingle Springs Rancheria 
(Verona Tract), California; United Auburn Indian Community of the 
Auburn Rancheria of California; and Wilton Rancheria, California, may 
proceed after that date if no additional claimants come forward.
    California State University, Sacramento, is responsible for 
notifying the Buena Vista Rancheria of Me-Wuk Indians of California; 
Cortina Indian Rancheria of Wintun Indians of California; Ione Band of 
Miwok Indians of California; Shingle Springs Band of Miwok Indians, 
Shingle Springs Rancheria (Verona Tract), California; United Auburn 
Indian Community of the Auburn Rancheria of California; Wilton 
Rancheria, California; and Yocha Dehe Wintun Nation, California, as 
well as the non-Federally recognized Indian groups of the El Dorado 
Miwok Tribe and Nashville-El Dorado Miwok that this notice has been 
published.

    Dated: March 9, 2011.
Sherry Hutt,
Manager, National NAGPRA Program.
[FR Doc. 2011-5855 Filed 3-14-11; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 4312-50-P