The Duwamish people (today, members of the Muckleshoot Indian Tribe and the Suquamish Tribe) have made their homes on the shores of Elliott Bay for thousands of years. There were a number of villages and gathering places around the bay and up the Duwamish River. One, located where today’s Pioneer Square neighborhood, was called dzidzəlalič (Little Crossing-Over Place, often anglicized as Dzidzilalich), another, babaq’wəb (prairie), was located on the prairie where the Belltown neighborhood is today.

On the south end of the bay, the mouth of the Duwamish River created an enormous estuary. More than 2,000 acres of tidelands, since filled, teemed with natural resources such as shellfish, fish, and other marine life. River channels that meandered across the flats and salmon-fishing stations located at Duwamish Head (the northern tip of what is now West Seattle) provided access to magnificent runs of salmon.

A winter village called ťuʔəlalʔtxʷ, (Herring House), sat on the western bank of the river mouth. Another called yile’qwud, (Basketry Hat), was further upstream, where Herring’s House Park is today. Sites for gathering foods like cattail, waterfowl, or smelt/herring dotted the nearby shoreline and the riverbanks.

Dzidzilalich was a place where people came together. In the winter, an important time for ceremonial activities, people traded, socialized, made political alliances, and shared traditional knowledge. They also competed in canoe races and a variety of competitive games of strength and skill.

Elliott Bay was an ideal gathering place because of its location. The Duwamish moved around the region primarily by canoe and several nearby waterways provided routes extending in every direction. The saltwater routes led to Puget Sound, the Pacific Ocean, and the Inside Passage to Alaska. The Duwamish River could be ascended to the Black River and Lake Washington, the Cedar River, or the Green and White Rivers all the way to the Cascade range, where tribal members could hunt and then process the venison into jerky.

A short overland walk led to Lake Washington, the Sammamish Slough, and Lake Sammamish. From the lake’s southern end, an overland trail followed the pass over the Cascades where Interstate 90 travels today.

This “canoe highway” connected Duwamish people living here to people all around the region. Through generations of visiting and trading, a rich network of relationships thrived. The network drove the local economy, but it also provided for security through the family connections that developed.

Before the city grew over the forests and prairies around the bay, an abundance of foods that could be gathered, hunted, or fished along these shores. Some, like fish, shellfish, and kelp, came from the waters. Others, like garry oak acorns, camas, and wild rose hips, grew in the uplands and prairies. A multitude of berries, salmonberry, thimbleberry, huckleberry, and more, grew in the woods that blanketed the land around the bay.

An equally abundant variety of plants provided materials for household items. Bullwhip kelp made great containers for liquids. Tule reeds were woven into mats and baskets. Cedar trees could be used for a multitude of items, from enormous canoes to diapers for babies.

Indigenous peoples didn’t simply harvest from their environment; they stewarded the land and natural resources. They cultivated plants by practicing selective harvesting – taking only certain plants or animals to ensured that populations remained healthy and able to regenerate for future seasons, conducted controlled burning, which cleared underbrush and promoted new growth, and pruning and weeding, which encouraged plant growth.

Likewise, the preparation of foods and crafts was as varied as the people who made them. The way they dried clams, smoked salmon, or designed a basket reflected how they were taught by their elders and their personal tastes.

When non-Natives came to this region, the Duwamish incorporated the new people into their trade networks. They continued to live at their village sites until the non-Native settlers forced them out in the 1890s and continued to fish the bay until at least the 1910s. United States v. Washington, decided in 1974, affirmed the Coast Salish tribes’ reserved fishing rights and the Muckleshoot and Suquamish regained access to the bay and river fisheries. The tribes are deeply involved in habitat and fishery restoration projects around Elliott Bay today.

The vibrant and active trade conducted by the Duwamish and other Coast Salish people who gathered here has parallels in today’s Pike Place Market. People come together here to share and trade foods and goods made in this region, each reflecting the character of its farmer or crafter.

Muckleshoot tribal members fishing for chum salmon on Elliott Bay, 2024. Courtesy of Tyson Simmons. (left)

Portrait of David Sigo, a Commercial Fisherman from Suquamish Tribe. Courtesy of Rika Manabe. (right)