Editing Arctic (section)

== Indigenous population ==
{{Main|Circumpolar peoples}}
{{Further|Indigenous peoples of Siberia|Inuit Circumpolar Council}}
[[File:Dorset, Norse, and Thule cultures 900-1500.svg|thumb|Maps showing the decline of the [[Dorset culture]] and expansion of the [[Thule people|Thule]] from {{circa|900 to 1500}}]]
[[File:Circumpolar coastal human population distribution ca. 2009.png|thumb|upright=1.4|Circumpolar coastal human population distribution {{Circa|2009}} (includes indigenous and non-indigenous).]]
The earliest inhabitants of North America's central and eastern Arctic are referred to as the [[Arctic small tool tradition]] (AST) and existed {{Circa|2500 BCE}}. AST consisted of several [[Paleo-Eskimo]] cultures, including the [[Independence I culture|Independence cultures]] and [[Pre-Dorset]] cultures.<ref name="Hoffecker">{{cite book |last=Hoffecker |first=John F. |title=A prehistory of the north: human settlement of the higher latitudes |publisher=Rutgers University Press |year=2005 |page=130 |isbn=978-0-8135-3469-5 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=_rL5F4EAaFkC&pg=PA132 |access-date=24 August 2020 |archive-date=30 June 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230630102129/https://books.google.com/books?id=_rL5F4EAaFkC&pg=PA132 |url-status=live}}</ref><ref name="Gibbon">Gibbon, pp. 28–31</ref> The [[Dorset culture]] ([[Inuktitut]]: ''Tuniit'' or ''Tunit'') refers to the next inhabitants of central and eastern Arctic. The Dorset culture evolved because of technological and economic changes during 1050–550 BCE. With the exception of the [[Quebec]] / [[Labrador]] peninsula, the Dorset culture vanished around 1500 CE.<ref>Gibbon, pp. 216–217</ref> Supported by [[genetic testing]], evidence shows that descendants of the Dorset culture, known as the [[Sadlermiut]], survived in Aivilik, [[Southampton Island|Southampton]] and [[Coats Island]]s, until the beginning of the 20th century.<ref>{{cite book |last=McGhee |first=Robert |title=The last imaginary place: a human history of the Arctic world |publisher=Oxford University Press |year=2005 |edition=Digitized 7 October 2008 |page=55 |isbn=978-0-19-518368-9 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=NdaAAAAAMAAJ&q=sagdlermiut+genetic |access-date=24 August 2020 |archive-date=30 June 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230630102049/https://books.google.com/books?id=NdaAAAAAMAAJ&q=sagdlermiut+genetic |url-status=live}}</ref>

The Dorset / [[Thule people|Thule culture]] transition dates around the ninth–10th centuries CE. Scientists theorize that there may have been cross-contact between the two cultures with the sharing of technology, such as fashioning harpoon heads, or the Thule may have found Dorset remnants and adapted their ways with the predecessor culture.<ref>Gibbon, p. 218.</ref> The evidence suggested that Inuit descend from the [[Birnirk culture|Birnirk]] of Siberia, through the Thule culture [[Pre-modern human migration|expanded]] into northern Canada and Greenland, where they genetically and culturally completely replaced the Indigenous [[Dorset people]] sometime after 1300 CE.<ref>{{cite news |title=New Study Offers Clues to Swift Arctic Extinction |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/29/science/study-offers-clues-to-arctic-mystery-paleo-eskimos-abrupt-extinction.html |work=The New York Times |date=August 28, 2014}}</ref> The question of why the Dorset disappeared so completely has led some to suggest that Thule invaders wiped out the Dorset people in "an example of prehistoric genocide."<ref>{{cite news|title=Dorset DNA: Genes Trace the Tale of the Arctic's Long-Gone 'Hobbits' |date=28 August 2014 |url=http://www.nbcnews.com/science/science-news/dorset-dna-genes-trace-tale-arctics-long-gone-hobbits-n191156|publisher=[[NBC News]]}}</ref>

By 1300 CE, the [[Inuit]], present-day Arctic inhabitants and descendants of Thule culture, had settled in west Greenland and moved into east Greenland over the following century ([[Inughuit]], [[Kalaallit]] and [[Tunumiit]] are modern Greenlandic Inuit groups descended from Thule). Over time, the Inuit have migrated throughout the Arctic regions of Eastern Russia, the United States, Canada, and Greenland.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.civilization.ca/cmc/exhibitions/tresors/ethno/etb0170e.shtml |title=First Nations Culture Areas Index |work=the Canadian Museum of Civilization |access-date=30 December 2009 |archive-date=11 August 2011 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110811033229/http://www.civilization.ca/cmc/exhibitions/tresors/ethno/etb0170e.shtml |url-status=live}}</ref>

Other [[Circumpolar peoples|Circumpolar North indigenous peoples]] include the [[Chukchi people|Chukchi]], [[Evenks]], [[Iñupiat]], [[Khanty]], [[Koryaks]], [[Nenets]], [[Sámi peoples|Sámi]], [[Yukaghir people|Yukaghir]], [[Gwichʼin]], and [[Yupik peoples|Yupik]].