ABSTRACT
Before modern means of communication formalized and permanently prescribed routes and transportation modes, just about every activity that took people away from their familiar environment brought along the opportunity for landscape learning (see Chapter 1). In that context, pathway networks likely developed in tandem with exploratory or scouting activities. In his survey of Indian thoroughfares in the North American Midwest, Hulbert (1902: 14) observed that animal trails offered the most visible and easily accessible exploratory or scouting routes. The American elk, for example, open least-resistance trails along escarpments or through heavily vegetated areas; such trails could save the hunter or the scout some travel time and effort. Longer and wider least-resistance paths made by the roaming buffalo were not only used by Indian hunters and explorers but also defined the territorial identity of historic tribes like the Plains Cree (Milloy 1991). Famous buffalo roads such as the Big Bone Lick in Kentucky and the French Lick and South Fork roads in Tennessee were followed every year by diverse tribes who flocked to the springs to make salt. According to Myer (1928: 741-3), these buffalo roads determined the routes of seasonal movement, pilgrimage, trade and transportation, migration, and, ultimately, the location of Indian and non-Indian settlements.
