Negotiating the coasts: status and the evolution of boat technology in California

For the Chumash of southern California, the plank canoe (tomol) played a crucial role in food acquisition, transport, exchange, and social integration, with significant consequences for status building and sociopolitical evolution. We present new data about plank canoe construction assemblages and new marine faunal data that help to pinpoint the date of the earliest appearance of the tomol, with the ultimate goal of situating this technological development in the broader sociopolitical evolution of coastal Chumash groups. Plank canoe manufacturing by-products, including asphaltum and redwood, and the remains of large open-ocean fish species such as swordfish provide new paths to understanding this symbolically and functionally important innovation.