10,000-YEAR-OLD INDIGENOUS OHLONE BEDROCK MORTARS IN EAST SF BAY AREA

By Mike Raccoon Eyes Kinney

Along the East Bay shoreline of the San Francisco Bay and San Pablo Bay lay some of the highest concentrations of Ohlone Bayshore shell mounds and nearby village sites that range from 8,000 to 10,000 years of age.

Shell mounds contain a mix of shells, bones, soil, ash, rocks, tools, regalia​ and human remains from burials. It is believed today that these shell mounds were sacred burial sites for important people ​within the tribelet.

There are some 425 recorded shell mounds, they were sacred burial sites of the Ohlone peoples, they are massive shell and burial midden deposits. Some of these sacred sites are huge spiritual centers of ceremony.

However, if one looks closely, you still find evidence of both small and large village sites adjacent to the shell mounds.

Recently, I visited where an old shell mound site located in the East Bay of San Francisco, where a series of bedrock mortars are to be found on large hill close to five hundred feet tall.

Bedrock mortars are processing work stations where acorns or buckeyes crushed or grinded with a pestle to be made into a refined flour for making bread and soups.

Walking along the trail among the oak and buckeye forests, one senses being watched by the Ancient Ones who once inhabited the old village site there. After about walking a tenth of mile, I finally arrive and quickly locate the bedrock mortars there.

I take photo images of the bedrock mortars and then I sing traditional Ohlone songs and light California sage so the Ancient Ones know they have not been forgotten.

And in the old village site, balance and harmony returns to how it has always been, blessed by the Great Creator.