Name: _______

Inuinnait (Copper Inuit)

Source: The Canadian Encyclopedia
Indigenous communities knew that Copper was a precious element. Copper
was utilized extensively in ritual, ceremony and feasts. Copper was known to
purify water that Scientists are just realizing now.

Social organization was based on kinship and on various types of formal

partnership, and affiliation between individuals tended to be more a matter of
personal choice than is usually found among other Inuit groups.
The Inuinnait, also known as the Copper Inuit because of their extensive use
of artifacts made from the native copper deposits of the region, originally
occupied Banks and Victoria islands and the adjacent mainland region of the
central Canadian Arctic. In the early 20th century, they numbered about 800
people, divided into numerous regional bands averaging about 50. Several
bands would combine during the winter when engaged in hunting seals. At
this season they lived in large snow-house communities on the sea ice,
moving to new areas as the local seal population was hunted out. In the
spring these communities broke up and the bands moved to specific areas on
the coasts, from where they travelled into the interior in search of caribou,
muskoxen and fish. Throughout the summer they moved about the interior
within defined territories, in small groups of one or a few families, living in skin
tents. Caribou hunting was intensified in late summer, and people began to
gather at points along the coast where the women prepared winter clothing.

Social organization was based on kinship and on various types of formal

partnership, and affiliation between individuals tended to be more a matter of
personal choice than is usually found among other Inuit groups. Religion was
based on shamanism, with the shaman charged primarily with curing the sick
and providing good hunting. Religion, language and most other aspects of the
culture were similar to those of other central arctic Inuit groups, of whom
the Inuinnait were the most westerly.

Archaeology indicates that the Inuinnait are descended from a group of Thule

Culture people who moved into the area shortly after 1000 AD and adapted
their maritime way of life to seal and caribou resources. During the cooler
climate of the Little Ice Age of the 17th to 19th centuries, these people
abandoned the permanent winter houses and other elements of their Thule
ancestors. Traditionally, hunting weapons including arrows, harpoon and
spear heads, and tools such as knife blades and chisels were formed from
copper and used for personal use and for trade with other nations. Greater
nomadism and increasing exposure and involvement with imported European
technology gave rise to the distinctive culture of the historic Inuinnait. Regular
European contact began during the early 20th century, involving
the Inuinnait in a trapping economy. However, in addition to trade, the
European contact brought diseases including influenza, typhoid
and smallpox epidemics that devastated the Inuinnait population.

Most Inuinnait now live in the villages of Sachs Harbour, Ulukhaktok (also

known as Uluqsaqtuua), which means "where there is copper" in
Inuktitut; Kugluktuk; Bathurst Inlet; and Cambridge Bay. In 1984 the
communities of Sachs Harbour and Holman [Ulukhaktok] were included in the
Inuvialuit Land Claims Agreement. Other settlements were negotiated as part
of the creation of Nunavut.

See also Aboriginal People: Arctic.

10 Marks Total/ _______

Questions:

1. What is the atomic number of Copper?

2. What is the symbol of Copper?

3. Where do you see Copper today in the year 2020 the most?

4. Where did Indigenous Communities use and continue to copper the most? What types of
instruments, and uses today?

5. How can you use Copper more in your every day life today?