The Sadlermiut (also called Sagdlirmiut,
or Sallirmiut in modern
Inuktitut
Inuktitut (; , syllabics ; from , "person" + , "like", "in the manner of"), also Eastern Canadian Inuktitut, is one of the principal Inuit languages of Canada. It is spoken in all areas north of the tree line, including parts of the provinces o ...
spelling, from ''Sadlerk''
now ''Salliq'', the Inuktitut name for the settlement of
Coral Harbour
Coral Harbour (Inuktitut: Salliq/Salliit, Syllabics: ᓴᓪᓕᖅ/ᓴᓪᓖᑦ), is a small Inuit community that is located on Southampton Island, Kivalliq Region, in the Canadian territory of Nunavut. Its name is derived from the fossilized c ...
,
Nunavut
Nunavut ( , ; iu, ᓄᓇᕗᑦ , ; ) is the largest and northernmost Provinces and territories of Canada#Territories, territory of Canada. It was separated officially from the Northwest Territories on April 1, 1999, via the ''Nunavut Act'' ...
) were an
Inuit
Inuit (; iu, ᐃᓄᐃᑦ 'the people', singular: Inuk, , dual: Inuuk, ) are a group of culturally similar indigenous peoples inhabiting the Arctic and subarctic regions of Greenland, Labrador, Quebec, Nunavut, the Northwest Territories ...
group living in near isolation mainly on and around
Coats Island
Coats Island ( Inuktitut: ᐊᑉᐸᑑᕐᔪᐊᖅ, Appatuurjuaq) lies at the northern end of Hudson Bay in the Kivalliq Region of Nunavut. At in size, it is the 107th largest island in the world, and Canada's 24th largest island.
The island ...
,
Walrus Island, and
Southampton Island
Southampton Island (Inuktitut: ''Shugliaq'') is a large island at the entrance to Hudson Bay at Foxe Basin. One of the larger members of the Arctic Archipelago, Southampton Island is part of the Kivalliq Region in Nunavut, Canada. The area of the ...
in
Hudson Bay
Hudson Bay ( crj, text=ᐐᓂᐯᒄ, translit=Wînipekw; crl, text=ᐐᓂᐹᒄ, translit=Wînipâkw; iu, text=ᑲᖏᖅᓱᐊᓗᒃ ᐃᓗᐊ, translit=Kangiqsualuk ilua or iu, text=ᑕᓯᐅᔭᕐᔪᐊᖅ, translit=Tasiujarjuaq; french: b ...
.
They survived into the early 20th century and were thought by some to have been the last remnants of the
Dorset culture
The Dorset was a Paleo-Eskimo culture, lasting from to between and , that followed the Pre-Dorset and preceded the Thule people (proto-Inuit) in the North American Arctic. The culture and people are named after Cape Dorset (now Kinngait) in N ...
as they had preserved a culture and dialect distinct from the mainland Inuit. Despite their culture and local traditions seeming to show combined elements of both the Dorset and
Thule
Thule ( grc-gre, Θούλη, Thoúlē; la, Thūlē) is the most northerly location mentioned in ancient Greek literature, ancient Greek and Latin literature, Roman literature and cartography. Modern interpretations have included Orkney, Shet ...
societies,
genetic studies show no Dorset admixture and prove a sole Inuit ancestry leading many to conclude the cultural difference may be entirely due to their isolation from the mainland Inuit.
Research published in 2015 found that the Sadlermiut were genetically Thule who had somehow acquired Dorset cultural features, such as stone technology. It remains a mystery how they acquired Dorset technology in the absence of obvious
genetic admixture
Genetic admixture occurs when previously diverged or isolated genetic lineages mix.⅝ Admixture results in the introduction of new genetic lineages into a population.
Examples
Climatic cycles facilitate genetic admixture in cold periods and gene ...
such as through intermarrying.
History
In 1824,
HMS ''Griper'', under Captain
George Francis Lyon
George Francis Lyon (23 January 1796 – 8 October 1832) was an English naval officer and explorer of Africa and the Arctic. While not having a particularly distinguished career, he is remembered for the entertaining journals he kept and ...
, anchored off
Cape Pembroke
Cape Pembroke ( es, Cabo San Felipe) is the easternmost point of the Falkland Islands, and is on East Falkland. There is an automated lighthouse here.
Lighthouse
An automated lighthouse on Cape Pembroke was built in 1855, and rebuilt in 1906 ...
on Coats Island in Hudson Bay. The
whalers then encountered a band of Inuit who were said to have spoken a "strange dialect" and were called ''Sadlermiut''.
The Sadlermiut continued to establish contact with Westerners. However, as with many North American
aboriginals, the Sadlermiut were often susceptible to Western diseases. By 1896, there were only 70 of them remaining. Then, in the fall of 1902, a
British
British may refer to:
Peoples, culture, and language
* British people, nationals or natives of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories, and Crown Dependencies.
** Britishness, the British identity and common culture
* British English, ...
trading/whaling
vessel named the ''Active'' had made a stop at Cape Low,
Southampton Island. It is said that some of the Sadlermiut caught a disease, possibly an
influenza
Influenza, commonly known as "the flu", is an infectious disease caused by influenza viruses. Symptoms range from mild to severe and often include fever, runny nose, sore throat, muscle pain, headache, coughing, and fatigue. These symptoms ...
,
typhoid
Typhoid fever, also known as typhoid, is a disease caused by '' Salmonella'' serotype Typhi bacteria. Symptoms vary from mild to severe, and usually begin six to 30 days after exposure. Often there is a gradual onset of a high fever over several ...
, or
typhus
Typhus, also known as typhus fever, is a group of infectious diseases that include epidemic typhus, scrub typhus, and murine typhus. Common symptoms include fever, headache, and a rash. Typically these begin one to two weeks after exposure.
...
, from a sick sailor aboard the ''Active'', which then spread to the entire community.
By the winter 1902-03, the entire Sadlermiut population except for a woman and four children had died.
In 1954 and 1955,
Henry B. Collins of the
Smithsonian Institution
The Smithsonian Institution ( ), or simply the Smithsonian, is a group of museums and education and research centers, the largest such complex in the world, created by the U.S. government "for the increase and diffusion of knowledge". Founded ...
studied Inuit house ruins in the Canadian
Arctic
The Arctic ( or ) is a polar regions of Earth, polar region located at the northernmost part of Earth. The Arctic consists of the Arctic Ocean, adjacent seas, and parts of Canada (Yukon, Northwest Territories, Nunavut), Danish Realm (Greenla ...
. He determined that the ruins found at
Native Point
Native Point (Inuktitut: ''Tunirmiut'' or ''Tuneriut'') is a peninsula in the Kivalliq Region, Nunavut, Canada. It is located on Southampton Island's Bell Peninsula at the mouth of Native Bay. It is notable for being the location of an abandoned S ...
were characteristic of Sadlermiut culture which had once been quite extensive. He also found evidence that the Sadlermiut were the last remnants of the Dorset culture.
Origins
The Sadlermiut are most often cited for having maintained a unique culture and dialect apart from other Inuit, similar to the
Unangam (Aleut), which is principally the result of an adaptation to environmental and historical constraints,
whereas they show a closer genetic profile to
paleo-Eskimo
The Paleo-Eskimo (also pre-Thule or pre-Inuit) were the peoples who inhabited the Arctic region from Chukotka Autonomous Okrug, Chukotka (e.g., Chertov Ovrag) in present-day Russia across North America to Greenland prior to the arrival of the mode ...
groups than neo-Eskimo groups. Because of this, various theories have been established to try to explain the Sadlermiut's
cultural
Culture () is an umbrella term which encompasses the social behavior, institutions, and Social norm, norms found in human Society, societies, as well as the knowledge, beliefs, arts, laws, Social norm, customs, capabilities, and habits of the ...
differences. One of these has tried to establish a clear link between the Sadlermiut as direct descendants of the Dorset culture. Another theory explains that rather than being related to the Dorset, the Sadlermiut were in fact descendants of the Thule, whose geographically isolated culture would have developed idiosyncratically from the mainland Thule culture. A third theory indicates that the Sadlermiut did not necessarily belong to either group, but because of intermarriage, their roots may have in fact been part of both Dorset and Thule cultures.
In the 21st century,
human mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) research on skeletal remains has seemed to show a genetic relationship between the Sadlermiut and various other related ethnic groups. An incorrect association led many to conclude the Sadlermiut were of Dorset and Thule ancestry due to apparent haplogroups
A (46%) and
D (54%) found in skeletal remains, attributed to the Thule (A 100%) and Dorset (D 100%) cultures respectively.
This evidence, along with statistical differences, led to the errant belief that the Sadlermiut would have been remnants of the Dorset culture, with more recent gene flow from the Thule, providing further evidence for a cultural displacement between the two groups approximately one thousand years ago.
Similarly, the same percentage of the presence of both
haplogroup
A haplotype is a group of alleles in an organism that are inherited together from a single parent, and a haplogroup (haploid from the el, ἁπλοῦς, ''haploûs'', "onefold, simple" and en, group) is a group of similar haplotypes that share ...
A and D was discovered among paleo-Aleut skeletal remains, while it also discovered D 27% and A 73% among the "Neo-Aleut" population.
This inconsistency may be attributed to the fact that a population displacement did not occur within the
Aleutian Islands
The Aleutian Islands (; ; ale, Unangam Tanangin,”Land of the Aleuts", possibly from Chukchi language, Chukchi ''aliat'', "island"), also called the Aleut Islands or Aleutic Islands and known before 1867 as the Catherine Archipelago, are a cha ...
between the Dorset and Thule transition,
meaning that the Sadlermiut may have not in fact been the very last remnants of the Dorset culture.
Further studies show there is no genetic evidence to show a direct Dorset ancestry, but there is evidence to show both cultures may have shared an earlier common Siberian ancestry.
Lifestyle
The Sadlermiut were a
hunter-gatherer
A traditional hunter-gatherer or forager is a human living an ancestrally derived lifestyle in which most or all food is obtained by foraging, that is, by gathering food from local sources, especially edible wild plants but also insects, fungi, ...
people whose subsistence relied primarily on fishing and
caribou
Reindeer (in North American English, known as caribou if wild and ''reindeer'' if domesticated) are deer in the genus ''Rangifer''. For the last few decades, reindeer were assigned to one species, ''Rangifer tarandus'', with about 10 subspe ...
hunting, although they also hunted
seals
Seals may refer to:
* Pinniped, a diverse group of semi-aquatic marine mammals, many of which are commonly called seals, particularly:
** Earless seal, or "true seal"
** Fur seal
* Seal (emblem), a device to impress an emblem, used as a means of a ...
,
polar bear
The polar bear (''Ursus maritimus'') is a hypercarnivorous bear whose native range lies largely within the Arctic Circle, encompassing the Arctic Ocean, its surrounding seas and surrounding land masses. It is the largest extant bear specie ...
s, and
walrus
The walrus (''Odobenus rosmarus'') is a large pinniped, flippered marine mammal with a discontinuous distribution about the North Pole in the Arctic Ocean and subarctic seas of the Northern Hemisphere. The walrus is the only living species in ...
es. Unlike the mainland Inuit, the Sadlermiut were reported to show very little interest in hunting whales and trapping and were thus of little use to traders who frequented Coral Harbour.
In addition, the Sadlermiut often kept a "vigilant distance" between themselves and the traders, the explorers and the
Aivilingmiut
The Aivilingmiut (or Aivilik) are those Inuit who traditionally have resided north of Hudson Bay in Canada, near Naujaat (Repulse Bay), Chesterfield Inlet, Southampton Island, and Cape Fullerton. They are descendants of the Thule people
The Thu ...
. This may be in part due to historical confrontations with the Aivilingmiut who sought Southampton Island for its prosperous whaling potential, and the
Dene
The Dene people () are an Aboriginal peoples in Canada, indigenous group of First Nations in Canada, First Nations who inhabit the northern Boreal forest of Canada, boreal and Arctic regions of Canada. The Dene speak Northern Athabaskan languag ...
peoples who moved northwards during the summer in pursuit of caribou.
Language
The Sadlermiut language is unknown, but appears to have been significantly different from that of their mainland neighbours. The neighbouring Inuit reported that they used "baby talk", but it is not clear if this means they spoke a distinct variety of
Inuit language
The Inuit languages are a closely related group of indigenous American languages traditionally spoken across the North American Arctic and adjacent subarctic, reaching farthest south in Labrador. The related Yupik languages (spoken in western ...
, or that they used
pidgin
A pidgin , or pidgin language, is a grammatically simplified means of communication that develops between two or more groups of people that do not have a language in common: typically, its vocabulary and grammar are limited and often drawn from s ...
Inuktitut as a contact language.
Extinction
By the second half of 19th century, the Sadlermiut population numbered above 200. But then the contact with outsiders increased and various diseases caused a steep decline in population. The ethnic group was wiped out in 1902-03, as a result of a pandemic that spread among the community from the whaling ship ''Active''. Out of the total population of 58, there were only 5 survivors (one adult woman and 4 children). The survivors were then evacuated to
Naujaat
Naujaat ( iu, ᓇᐅᔮᑦ, lit=seagulls' nesting place), known until 2 July 2015 as Repulse Bay, is an Inuit hamlet situated on the Arctic Circle. It is located on the shores of Hudson Bay, at the south end of the Melville Peninsula, in the K ...
. Out of this group of survivors, only two children were alive by 1908, and they had no memory of Sadlermiut traditions.
Genetics
A genetic study published in ''
Science
Science is a systematic endeavor that builds and organizes knowledge in the form of testable explanations and predictions about the universe.
Science may be as old as the human species, and some of the earliest archeological evidence for ...
'' in August 2014 examined the remains of 10 Sadlermiut buried between c. 1500 AD and 1900 AD. The 8 samples of
mtDNA
Mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA or mDNA) is the DNA located in mitochondria, cellular organelles within eukaryotic cells that convert chemical energy from food into a form that cells can use, such as adenosine triphosphate (ATP). Mitochondrial DNA ...
extracted were determined to belong to haplogroup
A2b (7 samples) and
D3a2a. The haplogroups are characteristic of the
Thule people
The Thule (, , ) or proto-Inuit were the ancestors of all modern Inuit. They developed in coastal Alaska by the year 1000 and expanded eastward across northern Canada, reaching Greenland by the 13th century. In the process, they replaced people ...
and
Inuit
Inuit (; iu, ᐃᓄᐃᑦ 'the people', singular: Inuk, , dual: Inuuk, ) are a group of culturally similar indigenous peoples inhabiting the Arctic and subarctic regions of Greenland, Labrador, Quebec, Nunavut, the Northwest Territories ...
, suggesting that the Sadlermiut were derived from the Thule people. It was found that the Thule people were further derived from the
Birnirk culture
The Birnirk culture was a prehistoric Inuit culture of the north coast of Alaska, dating from the sixth century A.D. to the twelfth century A.D. The Birnirk culture first appeared on the American side of the Bering Strait, descending from the Ol ...
of
Siberia
Siberia ( ; rus, Сибирь, r=Sibir', p=sʲɪˈbʲirʲ, a=Ru-Сибирь.ogg) is an extensive geographical region, constituting all of North Asia, from the Ural Mountains in the west to the Pacific Ocean in the east. It has been a part of ...
, from where they had migrated into North America and completely replaced the Dorset people around 1300 AD.
References
External links
*
* {{cite news , url=http://www.nunatsiaq.com/archives/nunavut020705/news/editorial/columns.html#nunani_july26 , title=In the bones of the world (Part eight) , work=Nortext Publishing Corporation (Iqaluit) , publisher=Nunatsiaq News , date=2002-07-26 , url-status=dead , archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190517234749/https://nunatsiaq.com/stories/article/nunani_in_the_bones_of_the_world_part_eight/ , archive-date=May 17, 2019
Article on the Sadlermiut from the Canadian encyclopediaat Civilization.ca.
by John N. Harris
Tooth wear and sexual division of labour in an Inuit population by Shannon Raye Wood
Indigenous peoples in Northern Canada
Archaeological cultures of North America
Inuit history
Archaeology of Canada
Indigenous peoples in the Arctic
Extinct ethnic groups