# June17,2023 **Published by:** [AndrewDaBest](https://paragraph.com/@andrewdabest/) **Published on:** 2023-06-18 **URL:** https://paragraph.com/@andrewdabest/june17-2023 ## Content ** ** All About The Inuit By Andrew Shen Between 1610 and 1632, five European expeditions seeking a Northwest Passage to the Pacific reached the Hudson and James bays where they recorded one face-to-face encounter with most probably an Inuit individual. Before contact with Europeans, Inuit lived in small, autonomous, nomadic groups, dependent upon hunting, fishing, and gathering for survival and all their physical needs. Precontact Inuit lived in a variety of structures, depending on the time of year and type of activity they were engaged in. They built all of their houses/shelters themselves with materials gathered from the physical environment. During the summer, they lived in conical tents framed with wooden poles and covered with the hides of seals, caribou, or other animals. Inuit are Indigenous people of the Arctic. Inuit means "the people" in the Inuit language of Inuktut. The singular of Inuit is Inuk. For 5,000 years, the people and culture known worldwide as Inuit have occupied the vast territory stretching from the shores of the Chukchi Peninsula of Russia, east across Alaska and Canada, to the southeastern coast of Greenland. The Inuit of the Canadian Arctic have traditionally been hunter-gatherers. The Inuit traditionally consume an animal-rich diet, composed of marine and terrestrial mammals (e.g., seal and caribou), as well as wild birds and fish. Meat and fish can be consumed raw, frozen, cooked, or fermented. Inuit are the descendants of what anthropologists call the Thule people, who emerged from western Alaska around 1000 CE. They had split from the related Aleut group about 4000 years ago and from northeastern Siberian migrants. They spread eastward across the Arctic. The bow was an important weapon for the Inuit. It could kill animals from distances and also could be used to kill marine animals which was a big part of their supply and food. An Inuit bow is called “Eskimo” or Eskimo archery. The bows are made of wood such as spruce and tamarack. The arrows would have a pointy side and feathers or some kind of decoration at the back. They would first carve the bow out of wood and then stretch a band around the middle for grip or for the mount. Some Eskimos would have a band around the curve on the left and right. The artifact below is the type with the band around the middle. After the European Explorers made first contact with the Inuit, Inuit kids began to go to the residential schools the European Explorers made. After a while, the Inuit started to fight back which lead to many gruesome battles. Before the Explorers came, the Inuit lived in igloos then they started to live in regular modern houses or wood houses(Though they are hard to build in the climate). The Inuit live in arctic regions. Not much changed after the Explorers came other than the ones listed on top. This section is for Inuit living styles, transportation, traditions, and food/hunting. The Inuit used sleds and skin-covered boats. The sleds and boats are made of wood. Dogs pulled the sleds. Dogs pulled sleds and served as hunting animals, locating seal-breathing holes in the sea ice, hunting muskoxen, holding bears at bay, and serving as pack animals in the summer. Women were traditionally responsible for the butchering, skinning, and cooking of animals taken by the hunters. In Inuit culture, it was believed that the women's respect for the animals killed during hunting trips, and subsequent care when butchering them, would ensure successful hunts. The men were responsible for hunting for food and voting on politics or decisions. Hunting is at the core of Inuit culture. Comprehensive knowledge of local wildlife and survival techniques combined with incredible patience, hunting skills, physical and mental strength, stamina, and courage are fundamental values in traditional Inuit culture. ## Publication Information - [AndrewDaBest](https://paragraph.com/@andrewdabest/): Publication homepage - [All Posts](https://paragraph.com/@andrewdabest/): More posts from this publication - [RSS Feed](https://api.paragraph.com/blogs/rss/@andrewdabest): Subscribe to updates