Indian Settlements

The arrival of Indian groups in the Pacific Northwest cannot be dated with great precision. However, archaeological investigations at the Manis mastodon site near Sequim on the Olympic Peninsula indicate man was in the area as early as 12,000 years ago.

There are more than 5,000 Indian sites on record in the state, of which only a few have been professionally evaluated. Generally, sites are located at river conjunctions within valleys and along the shoreline of Puget Sound. Known sites have been grouped into three rather broad time periods:

	Early sites approximately 12,000-8,000 years old,
	Middle-period sites between 8,000-3,000 years old, and
	Late-period sites about 3,000 years old.

A large number of different Indian tribes and bands inhabited the Pacific Northwest region with varied life-styles and different languages, dress, ceremonies, and adornments. Tribal characteristics are generally distinguished between the coastal tribes of western Washington and those of the interior. In general, the coastal tribes depended on the rivers and tidal waters for staple foods whereas the interior tribes relied more heavily upon plants and berries, as well as game and other animals.

The Snohomish and Snoqualmie River valleys were the traditional and current homeland for a number of Indian tribes of the Coast Salish groups including the Tulalips, Pilchucks, Snohomish, and Snoqualmie (Snuqualmi) Indian Tribes. Archaeologists and historians have verified tribal village sites throughout the Puget Lowlands including some reported sites that date 2,000 to 8,000 years before the Christian era.

In historic times, large permanent winter villages flourished along the Snohomish, Pilchuck, and Snoqualmie Rivers. The early tribes had no form of agriculture and no domesticated animals, except the dog. The tribes lived by hunting, fishing, and gathering. The people who lived in the Puget Lowlands depended largely on seafood - salmon and
shellfish, supplemented by berries and roots. The tribes built substantial wooden houses, often big enough to house a number of families, clustered into small villages.

The Indian population before the Europeans first came into the Pacific Northwest is estimated to have numbered 75,000 or possibly twice that number, divided into about 125 tribal groups. Early records indicate there may have been up to 1,000 Tulalip, Snohomish, Pilchuck, and Snoqualmie Indians within the local area in the early 1800s. Tribal numbers were subsequently reduced by small pox and tuberculosis epidemics to about 600 to 700 by 1858.

Today, many descendants of the Snohomish and Pilchuck Tribes live on the Tulalip Indian Reservation on Tulalip Bay north of Everett. The Tribes maintain tribal identity and individual members are also active members of the larger community.

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