page_title: History of the Yosemite area
section_title: Mariposa Wars and legacy
hierarchical_section_title: History of the Yosemite area / Early history / Mariposa Wars and legacy
caption_attribution_description: Yosemite Valley from Inspiration Point in Yosemite NP
context_page_description: Human habitation in the Sierra Nevada region of California reaches back 8,000 to 10,000 years ago. Historically attested Native American populations, such as the Sierra Miwok, Mono and Paiute, belong to the Uto-Aztecan and Utian phyla. In the mid-19th century, a band of Native Americans called the Ahwahnechee lived in Yosemite Valley. The California Gold Rush greatly increased the number of non-indigenous people in the region. Tensions between Native Americans and white settlers escalated into the Mariposa War. As part of this conflict, settler James Savage led the Mariposa Battalion into Yosemite Valley in 1851, in pursuit of Ahwaneechees led by Chief Tenaya. The California state military forces burned the tribe's villages, destroyed their food stores, killed the chief's sons, and forced the tribe out of Yosemite. Accounts from the Mariposa Battalion, especially from Dr. Lafayette Bunnell, popularized Yosemite Valley as a scenic wonder.
  In 1864, Yosemite Valley and the Mariposa Grove of giant sequoia trees were transferred from federal to state ownership. Yosemite pioneer Galen Clark became the park's first white guardian.
context_section_description: James Savage's trading camp on the Merced River, 10 miles (16 km) west of Yosemite Valley, was raided by Native Americans in December 1850, after which the raiders retreated into the mountains. An appeal to the governor of California to put an end to this and other raids led to the formation of the Mariposa Battalion in 1851, and the start of the Mariposa War.
  Savage led the battalion into Yosemite Valley in 1851, in pursuit of around 200 Ahwaneechees led by Chief Tenaya. On March 27, 1851, the company of 50 to 60 men reached what is now called Old Inspiration Point, from where Yosemite Valley's main features are visible. Chief Tenaya and his band were eventually captured and their village burned, fulfilling the prophecy an old and dying medicine man had given Tenaya many years before. The Ahwahnechee were escorted by their captor, Captain John Bowling,  to the Fresno River Reservation, and the battalion was disbanded on July 1, 1851. Life on the reservation was unpleasant and the Ahwahneechee longed for their valley. Reservation officials consented and allowed Tenaya and some of his band to return on their own recognizance.
  A group of eight miners in possession of guns entered Yosemite Valley in May 1852, and were allegedly attacked by Tenaya's warriors; two of the miners were killed. Regular army troops under the direction of Lt. Tredwell Moore retaliated by shooting six Ahwahneechee who were in possession of white men's clothing.
  Tenaya's band fled the valley and sought refuge with the Mono, his mother's tribe. In mid-1853, the Ahwahneechee returned to the valley, but they subsequently betrayed the hospitality of their former Mono hosts by stealing horses that the Mono had taken from non-indigenous ranchers. In return, the Monos tracked down and killed many of the remaining Ahwahneechee, including Tenaya; Tenaya Lake is named after the fallen chief. Hostilities subsided and by the mid-1850s local European American residents started to befriend Native Americans still living in the Yosemite area.
  Returning to the events of 1851, members of the Mariposa Battalion proposed names for the valley while they were camped at Bridalveil Meadow. The company physician who had been attached to Savage's unit, Dr. Lafayette Bunnell, suggested "Yo-sem-i-ty", after what the surrounding Sierra Miwok tribes, who feared the Yosemite Valley tribe, called them. Savage, who spoke some native dialects, translated this as "full-grown grizzly bear." The term, which was possibly derived from or confused with the similar uzumati or uhumati, meaning "grizzly bear," is the Southern Sierra Miwok word Yohhe'meti, meaning "they are killers." Bunnell named many other local topographic features on the same trip.
  Bunnell drafted an article about the trip, but destroyed it when a newspaper correspondent in San Francisco suggested cutting his 1,500- foot (460 m) height estimate for the valley's walls in half; the walls are in fact twice the height that Bunnell surmised. The first published account of Yosemite Valley was written by Lt. Tredwell Moore for the January 20, 1854, issue of the Mariposa Chronicle, establishing the modern spelling of Yosemite. Bunnell described his awestruck impressions of the valley in his book, The Discovery of the Yosemite, published in 1892.
caption: The Mariposa Battalion first viewed Yosemite Valley near Inspiration Point. Photo from 2003.
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