Painted Rock rises above the Carrizo Plain as an important cultural and spiritual site to California’s native peoples. Most of its pictographs, or painted images, are characteristic of the Chumash, who lived on the Channel Islands, central coast, and interior region of California. The painting style of the Yokuts from the San Joaquin Valley also suggests their use of Painted Rock, and the Salinan people in the Cholame area are the nearest native people to the northwest of Carrizo Plain. Bedrock mortars, or grinding holes for preparing food, are also found there. Cupules, or smaller holes pecked in the rock, may have served as petroglyphs or as places for mixing paint pigments. Rock painting held important meaning in the lives of the native peoples on the Carrizo Plain, and the images were likely created by spiritual leaders and tribal members for ceremonial, spiritual, and cultural purposes. These images are evidence of prolonged use and show the significance of Painted Rock as a gathering place. The meanings of the paintings are not fully understood, but the images and other cultural materials are clues to the traditional lifeways of the native peoples who used Painted Rock and the Carrizo Plain.