Concow, California

Concow is an unincorporated community and census-designated place of 700 people in Butte County, California, United States. It is named after the Native American tribe that is indigenous to the area, the Concow Maidu. The original inhabitants ate salmon from the Feather River, acorns and pine nuts, venison, nō-kōm-hē-i'-nē, and other sources of food which abounded in the California foothills.History"In the beginning Wahno-no-pem, the Great Spirit, made all things. Before he came, everything on the earth and in the skies was hidden in darkness and in gloom, but where he appeared he was the light. From his essence, out of his breath, he made the sun, the moon, and the countless stars, and pinned them in the blue vault of the heavens."ColonizationThere is no indication that there was external governance of the Concow region or the tribal peoples that inhabited the region during the 1697–1821 Spanish colonization or the 1821–1846 Mexican era, characterized by the spread of Californio slave ranchos. The Concow region is 20 miles north of the city of Oroville (an Anglo-Hispanic compound meaning 'gold-town') and about the same distance east of the town of Chico; named for Rancho Arroyo Chico—meaning 'little creek ranch.' Rancho Arroyo Chico was established through a land-grant from the Mexican authorities in 1844, two years before California was invaded by United States forces, an indication that there was some Mexican governance near the Concow region, but no indication of governance of the region.