Journal of California and Great Basin Anthropology

Native Californians collected and consumed wild plants and animals even as they encountered colonial programs. Persistent interaction with native plant and animal communities can usually be inferred from colonial documents or by their presence as archaeological remains collected at missions, ranchos, or other colonial sites. Growing interest in the archaeology of spaces beyond the walls of colonial sites encourages expanded perspectives on indigenous foodways and the natural environments that may have supported resilient traditions, even as both transformed. In this article, we assess the persistence of indigenous foodways at CA-MRN-202, the site of a mid-nineteenth century trading post on Toms Point in western Marin County. Analysis of zooarchaeological and paleoethnobotanical assemblages suggests native people continued to collect and consume wild foods. They also selectively incorporated new foods and new technologies, we argue, to maintain connections to meaningful places.