Mission San Juan Capistrano () is a Spanish mission in San Juan Capistrano, Orange County, California. Founded November 1, 1776 in colonial Las Californias by Spanish Catholic missionaries of the Franciscan Order, it was named for Saint John of Capistrano, a 15th-century Italian priest. The Spanish Colonial Baroque style church was located in the Alta California province of the Viceroyalty of New Spain. The Mission was founded less than 60 yards from the village of Acjacheme. The Mission was secularized by the Mexican government in 1833, and returned to the Roman Catholic Church by the United States government in 1865. The Mission was damaged over the years by a number of natural disasters, but restoration and renovation efforts date from around 1910. It functions today as a museum.

Introduction The mission was founded in 1776, by the Spanish Catholics of the Franciscan Order. Named for Saint John of Capistrano, a 14th-century theologian and "warrior priest" who resided in the Abruzzo region of Italy, San Juan Capistrano has the distinction of being home to the oldest building in California still in use, a chapel built in 1782. "Father Serra's Church", also known as "Serra's Chapel", is the only extant structure where it has been documented that Junipero Serra celebrated Mass. The mission is one of the best known in Alta California, and one of the few to have actually been founded twice – the others being Mission San Gabriel Arcángel and Mission La Purísima Concepción. The site was originally consecrated on October 30, 1775, by Fermín Lasuén, but was quickly abandoned due to unrest among the indigenous population in San Diego.

The success of the settlement's population is evident in its historical records. Prior to the arrival of the missionaries, some 550 indigenous Acjachemen people lived in this area of their homeland. By 1790, the number of Indian reductions had grown to 700 Mission Indians, and just six years later nearly 1,000 "neophytes" (recent converts) lived in or around the Mission compound. Baptisms in that year alone numbered 1,649 out of the none total 4,639 people converted between 1776 and 1847.

More than 69 former inhabitants, mostly Juaneño Indians, have marked graves in the Mission's cemetery (campo santo). The remains of (later Monsignor) St. John O'Sullivan, who recognized the property's historic value and working tirelessly to conserve and rebuild its structures, are buried at the entrance to the cemetery on west side of the property, and a statue raised in his honor stands at the head of the crypt. The surviving chapel also serves as the final resting place of three priests who passed on while serving at the Mission: José Barona, Vicente Fustér, and Vicente Pascual Oliva are all entombed beneath the sanctuary floor.

The Criolla or "Mission grape," was first planted at San Juan Capistrano in 1779, and in 1783 the first wine produced in Alta California was from the Mission's winery.

The Mission entered a long period of gradual decline after Mexican government secularization in 1833. After 1850 U.S. statehood, numerous efforts were made over the latter 19th century to restore the Mission to its former state, but none achieved much success until the arrival of O'Sullivan in 1910. Restoration efforts continue, and the chapel called "Father Serra Church" is still used for religious services.

Over 500,000 visitors, including 80,000 school children, come to the Mission each year. And while the ruins of "The Great Stone Church" (which was all but leveled by an 1812 earthquake) are a renowned architectural wonder, the Mission is perhaps best known for the annual "Return of the Swallows" which is traditionally observed every March 19 (Saint Joseph's Day). Mission San Juan Capistrano has served as a favorite subject for many notable artists, and has been immortalized in literature and on film numerous times.

In 1984, a modern church complex was constructed just north and west of the Mission compound and is now known as Mission Basilica San Juan Capistrano. Today, the mission compound serves as a museum, with the Serra Chapel within the compound serving as a chapel for the mission parish.

History

Indigenous peoples

The former Spanish settlement at Sajavit lies within that area occupied during the late Paleoindian period and continuing on into the present day by the Native American society commonly known as the Juaneño;Kroeber 1925, p. 636: Kroeber estimated that the native population in the immediate vicinity of San Juan Capistrano was approximately 1,000 in 1770. the name denotes those people who were ministered by the priests at Mission San Juan Capistrano.As with other Spanish names given to the indigenous tribes they encountered, the appellation Juaneño does not necessarily identify a specific ethnic or tribal group. Many contemporary Juaneño, who identify themselves as descendants of the indigenous society living in the local San Juan and San Mateo Creek drainage areas, have adopted the indigenous term Acjachemen. Their language was related to the Luiseño language spoken by the nearby Luiseño tribe.Sparkman, p. 189: Linguistically, the Acjachemen tongue is a dialect of the larger Luiseño language, which itself is derived from the Takices language family (Luiseño, Juaneño, Cupeño, and Cahuilla Indians all belong to the Cupan subgroup), a part of the Uto-Aztecan (Shoshone) linguistic stock (this language is sometimes referred to as "Southern California Shoshonean"); however, the language at Capistrano and Soboba differed "considerably from that of the remainder of the Luiseños, and by some the people of these places are not included among the Luiseños."

The Acjachemen territory extended from Las Pulgas Creek in northern San Diego County up into the San Joaquin Hills along Orange County's central coast, and inland from the Pacific Ocean up into the Santa Ana Mountains. The bulk of the population occupied the outlets of two large creeks, San Juan Creek (and its major tributary, Trabuco Creek) and San Mateo Creek (combined with Arroyo San Onofre, which drained into the ocean at the same point). The highest concentration of villages was along the lower San Juan, where Mission San Juan Capistrano was ultimately situated and is preserved today.O'Neil, pp. 68–78 The Acjachemen resided in permanent, well-defined villages and seasonal camps. Village populations ranged from between 35 and 300 inhabitants, consisting of a single lineage in the smaller villages, and of a dominant clan joined with other families in the larger settlements.

Each clan had its own resource territory and was "politically" independent; ties to other villages were maintained through economic, religious, and social networks in the immediate region. The elite class (composed chiefly families, lineage heads, and other ceremonial specialists), a middle class (established and successful families), and people of disconnected or wandering families and captives of war comprised the three hierarchical social classes.Bean and Blackburn, pp. 109–111 Native leadership consisted of the Nota, or clan chief, who conducted community rites and regulated ceremonial life in conjunction with the council of elders (Puuplem), which was made up of lineage heads and ceremonial specialists in their own right. This body decided upon matters of the community, which were then carried out by the Nota and his underlings. While the placement of residential huts in a village was not regulated, the ceremonial enclosure (Vanquech) and the chief's home were most often centrally located.Boscana, p. 37

Much has been discovered about the native inhabitants in recent centuries, thanks in part to the efforts of the Spanish explorer Juan Rodríguez Cabrillo, who documented his observations of life in the coastal villages he encountered along the Southern California coast in October 1542.Yenne, p. 8 Fray Gerónimo Boscana, a Franciscan scholar who was stationed at San Juan Capistrano for more than a decade beginning in 1812, compiled what is widely considered to be the most comprehensive study of prehistoric religious practices in the San Juan Capistrano valley.Rawls, p. 26: Boscana deduced that the "Indians of California may be compared to a species of monkey" and described the native beliefs and customs as "horrible," "ludicrous," and "ridiculous." Religious knowledge was secret, and the prevalent religion, called Chinigchinich, placed village chiefs in the position of religious leaders, an arrangement that gave the chiefs broad power over their people.Kelsey, p. 3 Boscana divided the Acjachemen into two classes: the "Playanos" (who lived along the coast) and the "Serranos" (who inhabited the mountains, some three to four leagues from the Mission).Hittell, p. 746 The religious beliefs of the two groups as related to creation differed quite profoundly. The Playanos held that an all-powerful and unseen being called "Nocuma" brought about the earth and the sea, together with all of the trees, plants, and animals of sky, land, and water contained therein.Hittell, p. 749 The Serranos, on the other hand, believed in two separate but related existences: the "existence above" and the "existence below." These states of being were "altogether explicable and indefinite" (like brother and sister), and it was the fruits of the union of these two entities that created "...the rocks and sands of the earth; then trees, shrubbery, herbs and grass; then animals".Hittell, pp. 746–747 In 1908, noted cultural anthropologist Alfred L. Kroeber published the following observations with regard to the Juaneño religious observances:

We know that they adore a large bird similar to a kite, which they raise with the greatest of care from the time it is young, and they hold to many errors regarding it.Kroeber 1908, p. 11. According to Kroeber, the large bird was either the eagle or condor, as was the case with the Luiseño and Diegueño peoples. When a new moon shows itself they make a great outcry, which manifests their interest ("negosijo"). If there is an eclipse of the sun or of the moon, they shout with still louder outcries, beating the ground, skins, or mats with sticks, which shows their concerns and uneasiness.Kroeber 1908, p. 11. The "outcry" at the appearance of a new moon is more fully described by Boscana.

Mission Period (1776–1833) Juan Crespí, as a member of the 1769 Spanish Portolà expedition, authored the first written account of interaction between Europeans and the indigenous population in the region that today makes up Orange County. The expedition arrived at the site from the northeast, traveling down San Juan Creek, and camped near the future mission site on July 23. At the time, Crespi named the campsite after Santa Maria Magdalena (though it would also come to be called the Arroyo de la Quema and Cañada del Incendio, "Wildfire Hollow").Kelsey, p. 9

In early 1775, Don Antonio María de Bucareli y Ursúa, Viceroy of New Spain, authorized the establishment of a mission at a logical halfway point between Mission San Diego de Alcalá and Mission San Gabriel Arcángel. By that time, the site was already known by the name of its patron saint, "San Juan Capistrano".

At the proposed site, located approximately 26 leguas (Spanish Leagues) north of San Diego, 18 leagues south of San Gabriel, and half a league from the Pacific Ocean, an enramada (arbor) was constructed, two bronze bells were hung from the branch of a nearby tree, and a wooden cross was erected. The grounds were consecrated by Fermín Lasuén of Mission San Carlos Borromeo de Carmelo on October 30, 1775 (the last day of the octave after the feast of San Juan Capistrano), near an Indian settlement named "Sajavit"; thus, La Misión de San Juan Capistrano de Sajavit was founded.