20 Facts About Thule people

1.

Evidence supports the idea that the Thule people were in contact with the Vikings, who had reached the shores of Canada in the 11th century as part of Norse colonization of North America.

FactSnippet No. 1,607,832
2.

Some Thule people migrated southward, in the "Second Expansion" or "Second Phase".

FactSnippet No. 1,607,833
3.

Thule people excavated sites on Baffin Island and the northwestern Hudson Bay region, which he considered to be the remains of a highly developed Eskimo whaling culture that had originated in Alaska and moved to Arctic Canada approximately 1000 years ago.

FactSnippet No. 1,607,834
4.

The Thule people Tradition replaced the Dorset Tradition in the Eastern Arctic and introduced both kayaks and umiaks, or skin covered boats, into the archaeological record as well as developed new uses for iron and copper and demonstrated advanced harpoon technology and use of bowhead whales, the largest animal in the Arctic.

FactSnippet No. 1,607,835
5.

Birnirk Thule people used many of the same hunting methods and technology as Punuk and Old Bering Sea, but there was no art.

FactSnippet No. 1,607,836
6.

Birnirk Thule people were sea-mammal hunters who engaged in fishing and whaling.

FactSnippet No. 1,607,837
7.

Thule people were living along the Hudson Strait coasts, in the Hudson Bay region, on the shores of the Foxe Basin, and along the present-day Canadian mainland from the Mackenzie Delta to the Melville Peninsula.

FactSnippet No. 1,607,838
8.

Thule people still lived in semi-subterranean winter houses, but in the summer moved into skin tents, the edges held down by circles of stone.

FactSnippet No. 1,607,839
9.

The iron came both from meteoric resources and from trade from the Norse expansion; Thule people used the metal to form projectile points through a process called epi-metallurgy, which made stronger, harder, more efficient points.

FactSnippet No. 1,607,840
10.

Post-Classic Thule people tradition existed from 1400 up until European contact in areas where whales were not as prevalent so there is an increase in evidence of other means of subsistence, such as caribou, seal and fish.

FactSnippet No. 1,607,841
11.

The redistribution of the Thule people reflects the population pressures of the Classic Thule, but the climate played a more important role.

FactSnippet No. 1,607,842
12.

Thule people culture was first identified in the Eastern Arctic by interdisciplinary researches of Danish scholars between 1921 and 1924.

FactSnippet No. 1,607,843
13.

Therkel Mathiassen added upon their research and claimed that the tradition had started out in Alaska, and that Thule people hunting was based on the dog sled, the large skin boat and the kayak which enabled them to range over a much greater hunting territory, participate in widespread trade, and transport heavier loads.

FactSnippet No. 1,607,844
14.

Different stages of the Thule people Tradition are distinguished by their different styles of making tools and art.

FactSnippet No. 1,607,845
15.

The Thule people are well known for their technological advances in transportation and hunting techniques and tools.

FactSnippet No. 1,607,846
16.

The harpoon played a very significant role in whaling and the Thule people made several types of harpoon points out of whale bone.

FactSnippet No. 1,607,847
17.

Classic Thule people tradition relied heavily on the bowhead whale for survival because bowhead whales swim slowly and sleep near the water's surface.

FactSnippet No. 1,607,848
18.

The Thule people could get a lot of meat for food, blubber for oil that could be used for fires for light and cooking purposes, and the bones could be used for building structures and making tools.

FactSnippet No. 1,607,849
19.

The Thule people survived predominantly on fish, large sea mammals and caribou outside of the whaling communities.

FactSnippet No. 1,607,850
20.

The Thule people developed an expertise in hunting and utilizing as many parts of an animal as possible.

FactSnippet No. 1,607,851