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BERINGIA

Archaic Migrations to North America

(Hardcover - 1 Feb 2011)

 

Robert D. Morritt

 

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          “Beringia” shows comparisons, examinations of the implications of linguistics from anthropological, archaeological, folklore perspectives, and possible migratory roots of indigenous people in North America.

          This book looks at the migration of cultures from Asia to North America at the end of the Pleistocene era, when favorable conditions existed due to the appearance of the Anadyrsk strait near Chukot and later the Bering strait, both of which were still accessible to migratory groups, probably by small boats or by traversing the ice in winter. Evidence is also presented of a connection between the North American Athabaskan language family and possibly the Ket people of Siberia.

 

          The origins of the earliest people in the Americas is explored together with such topics as:  Siberian, Dene and Navajo Creation myths, also linguistic comparisons between Siberian Ket Navajo and Western Apache languages an  indigenous groups that appear to share the same origin. A hypothesis of a Siberian-Yukon-Dene origin of the Apache and the Navajo peoples is also explored together with the comparison and examination of the implication of   linguistics from anthropological, archaeological  and folklore perspectives to assist explain the  origins of the  earliest people in the Americas .

 

          The book considers a question that many have raised of how North and South America became populated. Theories abound of a north--south and vice-versa migration of different cultures.

 

          To obtain a better perspective, modern methods are analyzed such as paleogeographic analysis similar to the work of Canadian archaeologist, Jacques Cinq-Mars also specialists in oceanography and glaciations regarding the coastline and of ocean Also the study of flora and fauna to assist us to know more about the diet of these migratory people. Anthropological evidence is scarce regarding the people of the Pleistocene era. In both Siberia and in North America , therefore emphasis is placed on the use of scientific techniques such as radiocarbon dating and of Genetics (DNA) to allow us to learn more.

 

          Mythology from the Tutchone people of the Yukon, is included due to its description of early volcanic activity in the Yukon which combines Navajo folk tales of their migration south in an archaic era that was caused by an ‘explosion’ of a mountain, which hints of the geographical origin  of that culture.