 |
Long ago, native peoples made their homes on the lands that ring the Arctic Ocean. We know these regions now as Alaska, Canada, Greenland, northern Europe, and Russia. The cold climate doesn't permit much in the way of agriculture, so native Arctic peoples who follow traditional lifestyles must fish, or hunt and trap game animals for food, fur, and other necessities.
Although native peoples throughout the Artic have similar ways of life, language differences divide them into separate groups. The Inuit and Yupiit (also known as Eskimos and Aleuts) spread from Greenland, the northern shores of Canada and Alaska, to Siberia's Chukchi peninsula in Russia.
The map below shows the names and locations of the Arctic's other indigenous peoples.
Learn more about the Alaska Inuit at the Alaska Native Knowledge Network.