A ''tomol'' or ''tomolo'' ( Chumash) or ''te'aat'' or ''ti'at'' (

Tongva The Tongva ( ) are an Indigenous people of California from the Los Angeles Basin and the Southern Channel Islands, an area covering approximately . Some descendants of the people prefer Kizh as an endonym that, they argue, is more historica ...

/ Kizh) are plank-built

boat A boat is a watercraft of a large range of types and sizes, but generally smaller than a ship, which is distinguished by its larger size, shape, cargo or passenger capacity, or its ability to carry boats. Small boats are typically found on i ...

s, historically and currently in the Santa Barbara and

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area. They replaced or supplemented tule reed boats. The boats were between in length and in width. The Chumash refer to the ''tomol'' as the "House of the Sea" for their reliability. Double-bladed

kayak A kayak is a small, narrow watercraft which is typically propelled by means of a double-bladed paddle. The word kayak originates from the Greenlandic word '' qajaq'' (). The traditional kayak has a covered deck and one or more cockpits, each ...

-like paddles are used to propel the boat through the ocean. Some sources suggest the boats may have origins at Catalina Island and have been in use for thousands of years. The ''tomol'' has been described as "the single most technologically complex watercraft built in North America" and as being unique to "the

New World The term ''New World'' is often used to mean the majority of Earth's Western Hemisphere, specifically the Americas."America." ''The Oxford Companion to the English Language'' (). McArthur, Tom, ed., 1992. New York: Oxford University Press, p. ...

." The boats are still constructed by Chumash, Tongva/Kizh, and Acjachemen people today.

Construction

''Tomols'' were preferably built out of redwood that had drifted down the coast. When supplies of redwood were lacking, local native

pine A pine is any conifer tree or shrub in the genus ''Pinus'' () of the family (biology), family Pinaceae. ''Pinus'' is the sole genus in the subfamily Pinoideae. The World Flora Online created by the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew and Missouri Botanic ...

was used. When splitting the wood with whalebone or antler wedges the crafters would seek straight planks without knotholes, then sand them with sharkskin. To bind the wood together, small holes were drilled in the planks so they could be lashed to one another. Finally, the seams were caulked with 'yop', a mixture of hard tar and

pine pitch Pitch is a viscoelastic polymer which can be natural or manufactured, derived from petroleum, coal tar, or plants. Various forms of pitch may also be called tar, bitumen, or asphalt. Pitch produced from plants is also known as resin. Some produc ...

melted and then boiled. A crossplank at midship reinforced the boat and functioned as a seat. Another coat of 'yop' was used to waterproof the boat, followed by a coat of red ochre paint, followed by a final coat of sealant. Shell mosaics were often added as decorations. This style of boat is unique in the Americas, though researcher Yorem Meroz notes that a simpler plant is found in

Chile Chile, officially the Republic of Chile, is a country in the western part of South America. It is the southernmost country in the world, and the closest to Antarctica, occupying a long and narrow strip of land between the Andes to the eas ...

and strakes were sewn onto dugout boat bases in the

Pacific Northwest The Pacific Northwest (sometimes Cascadia, or simply abbreviated as PNW) is a geographic region in western North America bounded by its coastal waters of the Pacific Ocean to the west and, loosely, by the Rocky Mountains to the east. Though ...

and Caribbean. The boats could take up to 500 days to be constructed by an experienced boatmaker. ''Tomols'' are propelled with kayak-like paddles with the user in a crouching position, unlike kayaks where sitting is the norm. They are highly maneuverable.

Significance

Eva Pagaling, a member of the Santa Ynez Band of Samala Chumash Indians, described the process of paddling in 2018 as follows: "During the crossing, a deep memory that’s shared among paddlers is that each pull of the oar is a prayer. And this year, I prayed for my loved ones, as well as everyone else in this world. I prayed for strength and healing for all people, wherever they may be on their path in life. Historically, we are water people and our medicine for the world can be found in the sacred and life-sustaining power of water." The boats were described by Cindi Alvitre (Tongva), co-founder of Ti'at Society, in 2019 as "a vessel that allows humans to connect to the underworld." In the Indigenous worldview, as Alvitre describes, "you have the underworld, which is watery existence, those deities that live underneath the ocean in their caves, the middle world, that's the existence of human beings, to the upper world, that's ancestral space. The ''ti'at'' is like an observation point, it's like you're hovering over the heavens of the underworld and being able to still have that connection to that ancestral space, to the stars, to the

Milky Way The Milky Way is the galaxy that includes our Solar System, with the name describing the galaxy's appearance from Earth: a hazy band of light seen in the night sky formed from stars that cannot be individually distinguished by the naked ey ...

History

''Tomols'' were an integral part of a widespread trading network between tribes who lived at what is now referred to as Point Conception,

Santa Monica Bay Santa Monica Bay is a bight of the Pacific Ocean in Southern California, United States. Its boundaries are slightly ambiguous, but it is generally considered to be the part of the Pacific within an imaginary line drawn between Point Dume, in ...

, and the

Channel Islands The Channel Islands ( nrf, Îles d'la Manche; french: îles Anglo-Normandes or ''îles de la Manche'') are an archipelago in the English Channel, off the French coast of Normandy. They include two Crown Dependencies: the Bailiwick of Jersey ...

. There were designated shipping routes and signal fires were utilized on the land were used as aides for navigation. Most trade occurred between what are now two of the largest trading ports,

and Long Beach, which was about a day's paddle. ''Tomols'' were so useful as to give rise to a new class in Chumash society: a

guild A guild ( ) is an association of artisans and merchants who oversee the practice of their craft/trade in a particular area. The earliest types of guild formed as organizations of tradesmen belonging to a professional association. They sometimes ...

known as the 'Brotherhood of the Canoe' which was "responsible for the construction of each new tomol, its boat-building knowledge handed down through the generation from senior craftsman to apprentice." Only male members of leading families were allowed to own ''tomol''. Grizzly or black bearskin identified the owners. When carefully maintained, the boats could last for decades and were passed down from one generation to the next. By 650 A.D., it is believed the ''tomol'' or ''te'aat'' was already of central importance to the Chumash and Tongva/Kizh respectively. In 1542, Spanish explorer Juan Rodriguez Cabrillo recorded that he saw so many ''tomols'' hauled up at a particular wealthy village—a location eventually to be referred to by later

settlers A settler is a person who has migrated to an area and established a permanent residence there, often to colonize the area. A settler who migrates to an area previously uninhabited or sparsely inhabited may be described as a pioneer. Settl ...

as Malibu—that he named it ''pueblo de las canoas'' or "town of canoes." Another explorer recorded the brotherhood doing boat carpentry in another village, and named it Carpinteria. Some scholars report that sewn plank technology may have been introduced by early Polynesian navigators sometime late in the first millennium, who had constructed sewn plank boats and had been known to have reached

South America South America is a continent entirely in the Western Hemisphere and mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a relatively small portion in the Northern Hemisphere at the northern tip of the continent. It can also be described as the souther ...

. Scholars state that "three native Californian boat terms are argued to be Polynesian loans: Chumashan ''tomol(o)'', and Gabrielino ''tarainxa'' (or ''taraina'') and ''ti?at''." Some modern Chumash and Tongva/Kizh state that “this is something we have always known happened." This was further explained in a short documentary episode by KCET produced in 2019. Partially intact tomols have been found in ancient Channel Islands middens along with dolphin bones, seal and fish bones, and abalone, clam, and limpet shells. The Santa Barbara Museum of Natural History, the Santa Barbara Maritime Museum, and The Chumash Maritime Association of California house reconstructed ''tomols'' created by contemporary Chumash.

Gallery

File:Chumash Tomol 'Elye'wun paddlers, CINMS.jpg, Paddlers making the crossing to Santa Cruz Island aboard the reconstructed ''tomol'' ''‘Elye’wun'', in 2006. File:Tomol Crossing Channel Islands (43101684130).jpg, ''Tomol'' crossing Channel Islands in 2012

References

Resources

{{Commons category, Chumash tomols
"Dark Water Journey: Power of memories guides paddler on historic crossing''"''
by Eva Pagaling
S2 E1: Rethinking the Coast with the Ti'at Society
KCET Native American culture Chumash Tongva Indigenous boats Wood products History of California