Chaguayanga was a

Tataviam The Tataviam (Kitanemuk: ''people on the south slope'') are a Native American group in Southern California. The ancestral land of the Tataviam people includes northwest present-day Los Angeles County and southern Ventura County, primarily in ...

village located at what is now

Santa Clarita, California Santa Clarita (; Spanish for "Little St. Clare") is a city in northwestern Los Angeles County, California, United States. With a 2020 census population of 228,673, it is the third-most populous city in Los Angeles County, the 17th-most popul ...

, around the Newhall,

Valencia Valencia ( , ), formally València (), is the capital of the Province of Valencia, province and Autonomous communities of Spain, autonomous community of Valencian Community, the same name in Spain. It is located on the banks of the Turia (r ...

, and

Castaic Castaic () (Chumash: ''Kaštiq''; Spanish: ''Castéc'') is an unincorporated community and census-designated place (CDP) in northwestern Los Angeles County, California, United States. As of the 2020 census it had a population of 18,937. Ten ...

areas. Its original site was located approximately fifteen miles north and slightly west of the San Fernando Mission in the eastern areas of the

San Fernando Valley The San Fernando Valley, known locally as the Valley, is an urbanized valley in Los Angeles County, Los Angeles County, California. Situated to the north of the Los Angeles Basin, it comprises a large portion of Los Angeles, the Municipal corpo ...

. Mixed

Chumash Chumash may refer to: *Chumash (Judaism), a Hebrew word for the Pentateuch, used in Judaism *Chumash people, a Native American people of southern California *Chumashan languages, Indigenous languages of California See also

* Pentateuch (dis ...

and Tataviam populations may have resided at the village.

History

The name "Genu" was used to denote the chief of the village. People with lineage to the village were known as Chaguayabit. The village had deep relational ties with the nearby

Tongva The Tongva ( ) are an Indigenous peoples of California, Indigenous people of California from the Los Angeles Basin and the Channel Islands of California, Southern Channel Islands, an area covering approximately . In the precolonial era, the peop ...

and Tataviam village of Cahuenga. With the invasion of Spanish missionaries and settlers in the region in the eighteenth century, the village came under the religious and military influence of the San Fernando Mission. Early mission records indicate several villagers being brought to and baptized at the mission. In 1851, a man by the name of Samuel, who was born at the village, owned a two-hundred acre ranch northwest of the mission site. This land was known as Sikwanga ("a green place"), as indicated by Setimo Lopez, an Indigenous informant to John Harrington. However, Samuel sold this site shortly after, possibly because of an "inability to pay taxes or fear that he couldn't manage the land claims process necessary to sustain his title" following the U.S. occupation of California shortly prior. In 1882, (Maria) Josefa Leyva, a woman with ancestral ties to the village, moved from

San Fernando San Fernando may refer to: People *Ferdinand III of Castile (c. 1200–1252), called ''San Fernando'' (Spanish) or ''Saint Ferdinand'', King of Castile, León, and Galicia Places Argentina *San Fernando de la Buena Vista, city of Greater Buenos ...

to Newhall, which was near the site of the original village.{{Cite book , last1=Champagne , first1=Duane , url=https://books.google.com/books?id=bRsoEAAAQBAJ&dq=Chaguayanga&pg=PA25 , title=A Coalition of Lineages: The Fernandeño Tataviam Band of Mission Indians , last2=Goldberg , first2=Carole , date=2021-05-25 , publisher=University of Arizona Press , isbn=978-0-8165-4222-2 , pages=138 , language=en

References

Former Native American populated places in California History of Los Angeles County, California