The Tenino people are a collection of Sahaptin American Indian subtribes whose traditional territory was in the north-central part of what is now the State of Oregon.

Now represented largely by the Confederated Tribes of Warm Springs, which governs the Warm Springs Indian Reservation, the Tenino people included four localized subtribes: the Tinainu, the Tigh, the Wyam, and the Dock-Spus.

Also known as the Dalles Tenino, the Tinainu (Tinaynuɫáma) occupied two adjacent summer villages along the south bank of the Dalles of the Columbia River, near Fivemile Rapids, and a winter village at Eightmile Creek, which is eight miles from the Dalles. The name of its larger summer village, tinainu, was applied to the local subtribe and to the whole Tinino people.

The Tigh (Tayxɫáma), or Upper Deschutes, had their summer village at the Upper Deschutes River, while their main winter village was at what is now the community of Tygh Valley. The Tigh had three local village groups: the Tayxɫáma at Tygh Valley, the Tiɫxniɫáma at Sherar's Bridge below Sherars Falls, and the Mliɫáma along Warm Springs River, in the area of the current Warm Springs Indian Reservation.

The Wyam (Wayámɫáma) were also known as the Lower Deschutes or as the Celilo Indians. Their summer village was at Celilo Falls, then known as Wyam, which meant "the sound of water upon the rocks," on the south bank of the Columbia River, while their winter village was on the left bank of the Lower Deschutes River, just above its junction with the Columbia River.

The Dock-Spus were also known as the Tukspush (Takspasɫáma), or John Day. They had two summer villages on the south bank of the Columbia River and twin winter villages on either side of the Lower John Day River.

These sub-tribes split their time between their inland winter villages, which were near water and fuel supplies, and their summer camps in good fishing areas.

The traditional language of the Tenino people was a dialect of the Sahaptin language, a family of languages shared with the neighboring Umatilla people. Other nearby tribes included the Wasco, Wishram, Molala, and Northern Paiute. The oral history of the Tenino people speaks of conflicts with the Molala, Klamath, and Northern Paiute tribes, although the Klamath people were generally a valued trading partner.

Prior to extended contact with European and European-Americans, the Tenino bands were semi-nomadic. Although their seasonal migrations were not long distances, they did not engage in agriculture or in the raising of animals for food. They fished, with salmon being a common food, although they likely fished other species as well, and they supplemented their diet by hunting local game animals and by gathering berries, nuts, roots, and other edible vegetation.

Responsibilities among the Tenino people were gender-specific. The men did the hunting and most of the fishing, as well as creating utilitarian instruments from stone, bone, or horn. The men built dugout canoes that were used for river transport and travel to their seasonal villages. Tenino women preserved the meat and fish for later use through drying or smoking, and were responsible for most of the gathering tasks, although it is likely that the men assisted in this. The women also did the cooking and the cleaning, and they also produced threat, rope, baskets, bags, and mats from locally available materials.

It was not uncommon for each Tenino family to have two houses: an oval dugout lodge covered with earth that was used for sleeping, and a rectangular above-ground home, covered with mats, that was used for cooking and other daytime activities. Summer villages generally consisted of temporary buildings made from poles and mats, although some of these may have been reused in subsequent years.

The first recorded visit by European-Americans involved parties from the Lewis and Clark Expedition in the fall of 1805. William Clark wrote about his observations of the tribe's traditional drying method used to preserve salmon.

In 1855, the Tenino people were a party to the Treaty with the Tribes of Middle Oregon, which was negotiated by Joel Palmer, Oregon Superintendent of Indian Affairs. Under the terms of this Treaty, the tribes ceded about ten million acres of land south of the Columbia River. In return, the Warm Springs Reservation was created on the Deschutes, Warm Springs, and Metolius rivers. Participating tribes were allowed to continue their traditional practices of traveling to various off-reservation sites for fishing, hunting, and gathering.

Upon ratification in 1859, the tribes moved onto the reservation but continued to fish at Celilo and travel throughout the Upper Deschutes country for other purposes. The subsequent Huntington Treaty of 1865 limited the tribe's freedom of movement outside of the reservation.

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