ABSTRACT
There are roughly 190,000 Indians and 12,000 Eskimos in Canada, though any estimate must be imprecise because of considerable interbreeding with whites. They are thought to be originally of Mongolian stock, their ancestors having crossed the Bering Straits between the last ice age, 20,000 B.C. and 3,000 B.C. (cf. Jenness, 1963). They came in numerous waves and spread out over the American continent, forming a number of subcultures largely distinct in their economies, customs and languages. The Eskimos were presumably the last wave, and they remained in the north, mostly above the Arctic circle, though spreading over the 4,000 miles from Alaska to Greenland.
