SSBMI Language Department

Mómtim Péwinan      River People

Thank you for visiting Mómtim Péwinan at the Sacramento History Museum, which was curated by the Shingle Springs Band of Miwok Indians Cultural Resources Division! Working together with the SSBMI Exhibits & Collections Center, the SSBMI Language Department is pleased to be able to share the Nisenan language with the Sacramento public as part of this exhibit.

As you tour Mómtim Péwinan, you will find Nisenan words and phrases that the SSBMI Language Department has provided on the signage. Below, you can listen to audio recordings of the Nisenan language that appears on these signs (organized alphabetically by Nisenan):

Esak’ahá daak’ábe mi c’aykɨ́? (Do you want to know more?)

The exhibit's title, Mómtim Péwinan, was selected by the SSBMI Language Department and Exhibits & Collections Center.

Mómtim Péwinan means "River People" in the dialect of the Nisenan language that is spoken by the Nísem Péwinan people, on whose ancestral lands the Sacramento History Museum currently stands. The Members of the Shingle Springs Band of Miwok Indians consider themselves to be Mómtim Péwinan because the community has always thrived through access to the rich resources of the waterways.

The word mómti means "river" and péwinan means "people" in this dialect of Nisenan. Tom Cleanso, a Nisenan man from the village of Pusúune at the confluence of the Sacramento and American Rivers, used the word péwinan in naming his own people, the Nísem Péwinan. The last "m" in Mómtim Péwinan is a grammatical marker that tells you that one word describes the word that follows it, hence mómti describes péwinan.

As you tour this exhibit, you will find signs that are labeled in Nisenan. There are several dialects of Nisenan, and Nisenan speakers often differ in how they talk about the same things. For example, whereas mómti means "river" in this dialect, the word sew means "river" in other dialects. In naming and labeling this exhibit, we chose to use words that reflect the dialect of Nisenan spoken at this site, i.e. that of the Nísem Péwinan.