The SalinanNative Americans lived in what is now Northern California, in the Salinas Valley. Now extinct, there were two to three thousand Salinans in 1770. The Census of 1910 reported 16, and 1930, none.
The Salinans spoke a language in the Hokan group.
There were two major divisions, the San Miguel in the south, on the upper course of the Salinas river (which flows south to north), and the San Antonio in the north, in the lower part of the Salinas basin. There were also the a Playano group which lived on the Pacific coast in the vicinity of what is now San Simeon and Lucia.
This corresponded to the two Missions in the Salinas Valley.
The Salinans lived by hunting and gathering and were organized in small groups with little centralized political structure.
The Salinan Indians inhabited parts of San Luis Obispo, Monterey, and perhaps San Benito Counties, their territory extending from the sea to the main ridge of the Coast range and from the head of the Salinas drainage to a short distance above Soledad.
The missions of San Antonio and San Miguel were established in Salinan territory in l771 and 1797.
The Salinan Indians appear to have lived in houses of brush or grass and to have had no canoes.
The Salinans lived by hunting and gathering and were organized in small groups with little centralized political structure.
Salinans were among the first Californianatives to be impacted by Europeans.
Her granddaughter is a Playaño Salinan, Margarita de Cortona, named in the mural on Mission San Antonio's wall recording the first marriage in California.
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