1. Athabascan The Native People of Alaska
Denali 2013

2. About 35,000 years ago people came over to Alaska across the Bering Land Bridge.  
The ancestors of the Athabascans probably migrated across the Bering Land Bridge at the end of the last ice age, about 12,000 years ago.

3. Those people make up the Alaska Natives today which are: Inupiat , Athabascan, Tlingit, Haidi, Yup’ik, Aleut, and Alutiiq.
The Athabascan people of yesteryear generally lived in the taiga, a land covered with spruce and birch trees.
Today, the Athabascans inhabit the Interior Alaska.

4. Native Languages
Today there are 11 Athabascan languages in Alaska alone: Ahtna, Denaina , Holikachuk, Koyukon, Upper Kuskokwim, Tanana, Tanacross, Upper Tanana, Han, Gwich'in, and Deg Hit'an. There are other Athabascan languages in Canada and the United States.

5. The People
In Cree, "Athabasca" means "grass here and there", and was a descriptive name for the lake which they lived by.
They were a hunting and gathering people who depended substantially on fish, moose, caribou and berries.
Because of the small concentration of fish and game in the Interior region, hard times and famines were frequent for the Athabascan people.
These environmental circumstances forced the Athabascans to live a nomadic lifestyle, moving from place to place as food sources were depleted.
The Athabascan people call
themselves ‘Dena,’ or ‘the people.’ 

6. Way of Life
The general pattern of life was one of fishing in the summer and fall, to take advantage of the salmon runs and schools of whitefish and grayling, with hunting caribou in the fall, trapping water mammals in the spring, and harvesting vegetable foods (roots and berries) in the spring, summer and fall.

7. Tanana/ Koyukon: log homes on banks
Shelter
Deg Hit'an: semi-subterranean log dwellings with a tunnel entry.
Tanana/ Koyukon: log homes on banks
of rivers.
Ahtna-large plank house that
housed up to 10 families.

8. Masters of mobile architecture, summertime would find the Athabascans living near rivers and fish camps, usually in tents like these.

9. Activities were marked by the passing moons, each named according to the changing conditions: "when the first king salmon comes," "when the moose lose their antlers," "little crust comes on snow," and so on.
The winter was "the time we gathered together." when scattered families returned to their winter villages, hunted smaller animals close by and gathered for potlatches and other community celebrations.

10. Customs and Beliefs
The traditional Athabascan potlatch had, social, religious and economic significance.
A potlatch is a gathering that combines aspects of competition, peace keeping and a show of wealth.
During a potlatch, members of the society with a surplus of food and supplies provide these for all members of a clan, and in situations with other clans this sharing of resources is either a competitive showing or one of creating loyalties and sometimes even both simultaneously.

11. Customs and Beliefs
The Athabascan culture is a matrilineal system in which children belong to the mother's clan, rather than to the father's clan.
Clan elders made decisions concerning marriage, leadership, and trading customs.
A person belonged to the same "side", "clan" or "sib" as his mother, and all other members of the same sib were relatives of a very special nature. 
Often the core of the traditional culture was a woman and her brother, and their two families.
A central feature of traditional Athabascan life was (and still is for some) a system whereby the mother's brother takes social responsibility for training and socializing his sister's children so that the children grow up knowing their clan history and customs.

12. Athabascan men were responsible for hunting big game: moose, caribou and bears.
Athabascan bows were distinctive. They were characterized by a string arrestor, a block of bone or antler positioned just above the hand grip, designed to stop the bowstring from cutting into the hunter's hand when he released his arrow.
Arrows with long, barbed tips were used to hunt big game. Arrows with blunt heads were used to stun small game.
The Ulu is a style of knife used to skin animals and cut meat and fish.

13. Traditionally, fish were caught in traps woven from wood
Traditionally, fish were caught in traps woven from wood. The fish would swim into a small opening at the end of a cone shaped piece leading into the basket, and once inside, the fish were unable to escape.
Although they did not invent it, the Athabascan adapted and became skilled fisherman with "fish wheels." A fish wheel consists of two large baskets, each about 8x12 feet across the opening and each attached to opposite sides of an axle. 

14. Today, there are many small villages through the region -- a majority along the great rivers -- and trapping, hunting and fishing remain crucial to the subsistence lifestyle.
People return to their traditional fish sites to spend time together, fishing, cutting and smoking fish, and enjoying the company of extended family and friends.
At special times, the people gather at potlatches to share food, celebrate an event, or commemorate the dead.
Preserving traditions, sharing, and teaching lessons from the past remain important to Athabascans, as to all Alaska Native peoples.
Drying seeds for the next years crop.

15. Traditional
Clothing
The Athabaskans made clothes from the different animal hides.
They preferred to use caribou hide for clothing because of its warmth. They removed the hair from the hide for summer clothing.
For cold weather clothing they left the hair on the hide and turned it inward. Winter clothing for men and women included trousers with attached moccasins, a long coat with belted waist, a separate hood or hat, and mittens.
Athabaskans made warm, light underclothes from skins of the snowshoe hare. 

16. During the prehistoric period porcupine quills, seeds and dentalium shells decorated their clothing; in the historic period Athabascan women eagerly began using beads as a symbol of wealth and as a means of forming designs.
Catholic missionary nuns in Canada taught floral designs that spread westward into Alaska. These mittens show the ornate floral style patterns that developed during the 19th century and which continue to be used by Athabascan beadworkers today.

17. Athabascan women made
heavily decorated baby belts
or slings to hold infants against
their upper backs when traveling.

18. Transportation
Dog sleds
Birch canoe
Snowshoes

19. Religious Beliefs
The animistic belief system was common to all Alaskan Athabascan groups. All creatures, and some inanimate objects, had spirits which were active and powerful components of those creatures. 
If human beings did something which displeased the animal's spirit, the animal itself would remain aloof from the people, and the people might starve.