Native Americas

A

Aleut  Algonquians  Attiwandaron - see Neutrals 

Aleut

Main Page - Aleut (coming soon)

Aleut skill at hunting and survival in the harsh environment of the Aleutian Islands made them a valuable people, Later they were heavily exploited by Russian fur traders following their arrival around AD 1750.

Russian Orthodox missionaries referred to the austere environment of the Aleutian Islands and Alaska as 'the place which God forgot'.

Within fifty years of the first Russian contact, the Aleut population was at a figure of between twelve to fifteen thousand. At the end of the twentieth century it was at two thousand.

Eighty percent of the Aleut population had died thanks to violence and European diseases against which they had no defence. There was, however, a counterbalancing force which reached them through the missionary work of the Russian Orthodox church.

The educated priests took great interest in preserving the language and lifestyle of the indigenous people of Alaska. One of the earliest Christian martyrs in North America was St Peter 'the Aleut'.

The Aleut settlement site and archaeological Amnya I layer in Siberia, showing the depression left by a pit house in this remarkable fortified site

Text and map copyright © Mick Baker & P L Kessler. An original feature for the History Files.