Past Adaptations

I was hoping that in this blog post I could discuss at length the adaptations that had been made by Northern Communities in the past, particularly during the Medieval Warm Period and Little Ice Age. However, there seems to be very limited literature discussing the adaptations that the population must have made.

The Medieval Warm Period is generally agreed to have occurred between 1000-1300 A.D. During this period in history, when the temperature was up to 2C above average, it is said that wine-making grapes were grown in England and the Scandinavian tree line was up to 100-200m higher than today (Crowley and Lowry, 2000). This was closely followed by the Little Ice Age from 16^th – mid 19^th Century, with a drop of temperature by 0.6C (Mann, 2002) .

Both of these time periods are of specific interest to me, in order to understand the adaptations that must have taken place in the communities of Northern Canada.

The Dorset Culture lived in the Canadian Arctic until 1500 A.D. when they essentially became extinct. It is said that they had trouble adapting to the temperature of the Medieval Warm Period and that they were driven out by the Thule.

The warming period reduced the annual extent of sea ice across central and eastern parts of the Canadian Arctic (Wenzel, 2009). This created a larger space of open water which then allowed for the arrival of bowhead and presumably other whales (Wenzel, 2009). The Thule culture, who originated from Alaska then followed their main food resource across into Canada. The Thule culture quickly displaced the Dorset Culture. The reasons for the demise of the Dorset Culture is unclear, however it is thought that they were unable to adapt to changes in wildlife and climate (Rigby). The Dorset culture are still the subject of popular folklore tales told by Inuit today (Rigby).

However, it is interesting to look at the adaptations of the Thule culture. They arrived in the ‘warm period’ and as the climate transitioned into the Little Ice Age, the Thule culture had to adapt their whole way of life. I’ve summarized the changes that occurred and the adaptations that they had to make.

During Medieval Warm Period	During Little Ice Age
Whalebone and boulder dwellings	Igloos
Large Thule villages	Smaller, extended family encampments of 20 or so people
Winter food security – harvesting 20 – 30 tonne whales	Hunting of smaller, prey species e.g. caribou, seals and Arctic char
Whale blubber for fuel and bone for hunting	Some whale blubber but from smaller whales
Fairly sedentary lifestyle	Less sedentary lifestyle – the resources they relied upon were smaller, highly mobile and seasonally restricted

(Wenzel, 2009)

The climate transition that the Thule culture went through demonstrated their ability to adapt. The modern day Inuit people descend directly from the Thule and they have already begun to demonstrate their adaptive capacity. The Dorset culture were unable to adapt to changes and this saw the eventual extinction of their population.