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Rush for iron spurred Inuit ancestors to sprint across Arctic, book contends
Vancouver Sun ^ | February 8, 2010 | Randy Boswell, Canwest News Service

Posted on 02/10/2010 4:03:00 PM PST by SunkenCiv

One of Canada's top archeologists argues in a new book that the prehistoric ancestors of this country's 55,000 Inuit probably migrated rapidly from Alaska clear across the Canadian North in just a few years -- not gradually over centuries as traditionally assumed -- after they learned about a rich supply of iron from a massive meteorite strike on Greenland's west coast.

The startling theory, tentatively floated two decades ago by Canadian Museum of Civilization curator emeritus Robert McGhee, has been bolstered by recent research indicating a later and faster migration of the ancient Thule Inuit across North America's polar frontier than previously believed... around 1250 AD...

new radiocarbon data and other reassessments of Eastern Arctic archeological sites suggest the Alaska-based Thule undertook an epic voyage by skin boat and dogsled -- almost directly from Alaska to Greenland, and within a few summer travelling seasons -- about 750 years ago.

...Thule Inuit archeological sites near the Cape York deposits are older than others in Canada closer to Alaska -- further suggesting an initial dash to the northeast Arctic followed by a more gradual dispersal of population groups throughout present-day Nunavut, Northwest Territories and Yukon.

McGhee believes the Thule Inuit had learned about the valuable metal at the Cape York meteorite field from contact with Canada's aboriginal Dorset people, who were already using iron and trading it with Norse sailors from southern Greenland and Iceland.

"It would seem plausible to suggest that metal -- meteoric iron from the Cape York meteorites and metal goods traded from the Norse -- may have been the magnet that drew ancestral Inuit eastward from Alaska," McGhee contends.

(Excerpt) Read more at vancouversun.com ...


TOPICS: History; Science; Travel
KEYWORDS: 18thdynasty; amarna; baffinisland; canada; catastrophism; cobalt; godsgravesglyphs; greenland; iceland; inuit; meteoriticiron; navigation; qalunaat; robertmcghee; thevikings; vikings
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To: BenKenobi

It’s much easier to travel when the polar bears aren’t in the area.


41 posted on 02/13/2010 4:23:18 PM PST by muawiyah ("Git Out The Way")
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To: muawiyah

Polar bears are like meat on a stick.


42 posted on 02/13/2010 4:34:41 PM PST by BenKenobi (;)
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To: BenKenobi

Hmm, I’d always been taught that “when it’s time” jus leave grandma on the icea and God will be along soon to take her.


43 posted on 02/13/2010 4:36:06 PM PST by muawiyah ("Git Out The Way")
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