The Beothuk ( or ; also spelled Beothuck) were a group of Indigenous who lived on the island of Newfoundland. They were declared extinct in 1829.
The Beothuk culture formed around AD 1500. This may have been the most recent cultural manifestation of peoples who first migrated from Labrador to present-day Newfoundland around AD 1. The ancestors of this group had three earlier cultural phases, each lasting approximately 500 years.
Description The Beothuk lived throughout the island of Newfoundland, mostly in the Notre Dame and Bonavista Bay areas. Estimates of the Beothuk population at the time of contact with Europeans vary. Historian of the Beothuk Ingeborg Marshall argued that European historical records of Beothuk history are clouded by ethnocentrism and unreliable. Scholars from the 19th and early 20th century estimated about 2,000 Beothuk individuals lived at the time of European contact in the 15th century; however, there may have been no more than 500 to 700 people. Based on the carrying capacity of the ecosystem at the time of contact the population is estimated to have been between 1,000 and 1,500. They lived in independent, self-sufficient, extended family groups of 30 to 55 people.
Like many other hunter-gatherers, they appear to have had band leaders but probably not more formal chiefs, in the anthropological definition of the word. They lived in conical dwellings known as mamateeks, which were fortified for the winter season. These were constructed by arranging poles in a circle, tying them at the top, and covering them with birch bark. The floors were dug with hollows used for sleeping. A fireplace was made at the centre.
During spring, the Beothuk used red ochre to paint not only their bodies but also their houses, canoes, weapons, household appliances, and musical instruments. This practice led Europeans to refer to them as "Red Indians". The use of ochre had great cultural significance. The decorating was done during an annual multi-day spring celebration. It designated tribal identity; for example, decorating newborn children was a way to welcome them into the tribe. Forbidding a person to wear ochre was a form of punishment.
Their main food were caribou, salmon, and seals, augmented by harvesting other animal and plant species. The Beothuk followed the seasonal migratory habits of their principal quarry. In the fall, they set up deer fences, sometimes long, used to drive migrating caribou toward waiting hunters armed with bows and arrows. (Reprint, Toronto: Canadiana House, 1969)
The Beothuk are also known to have made a pudding out of tree sap and the dried yolk of the eggs of the great auk. They preserved surplus food for use during winter, trapped various fur-bearing animals, and worked their skins for warm clothing. The fur side was worn next to the skin, to trap air against a person's body.
Beothuk canoes were made of caribou or seal skin, and the bows of canoes were stiffened with spruce bark. Canoes resembled kayaks and were said to be in length and in width with enough room to carry children, dogs, and property.
The Beothuk followed elaborate burial practices. After wrapping the bodies in birch bark, they buried the dead in isolated locations, often in caves or under rock overhangs on smaller islands. In one form, a shallow grave was covered with a rock pile. At other times they laid the body on a scaffold, or placed it in a burial box, with the knees folded. The survivors placed offerings at burial sites to accompany the dead, such as figurines, pendants, and replicas of tools.
European exploration
About AD 1000, Norse explorers led by Leif Erikson encountered Indigenous people in northern Newfoundland, who may have been ancestors of the later Beothuk, or Dorset inhabitants of Labrador and Newfoundland. The Norse called them skrælingjar ("skraelings"). Beginning in 1497, with the arrival of the Italian explorer John Cabot, sailing under the auspices of King Henry VII, waves of European explorers and settlers had more contacts.
Unlike some other Indigenous groups, the Beothuk tried to avoid contact with Europeans; they moved inland as European settlements grew. The Beothuk visited their former camps only to pick up metal objects. They would also collect any tools, shelters, and building materials left by the European fishermen who had dried and cured their catch before taking it to Europe at the end of the season. Contact between Europeans and the Beothuk was usually negative for one side, with a few exceptions like John Guy's party in 1612. Settlers and the Beothuk competed for natural resources, such as salmon, seals, and birds. In the interior, fur trappers established traplines, disrupted the caribou hunts, and ransacked Beothuk stores, camps, and supplies. The Beothuk would steal traps to reuse the metals, and steal from the homes and shelters of European settlers and sometimes ambush them. These encounters led to enmity and mutual violence. With superior arms technology, the settlers generally had the upper hand in hunting and warfare. (Unlike other Native American peoples, the Beothuk appeared to have had no interest in adopting firearms.)
Intermittently, Europeans attempted to improve relations with the Beothuk. Examples included expeditions by army officer George Cartwright and his brother naval officer John Cartwright in 1768, and naval lieutenant David Buchan in 1811. Cartwright's 1768 expedition was commissioned by Governor Hugh Palliser; he found no Beothuk, but brought back important cultural information. Governor John Duckworth commissioned Buchan's 1811 expedition. Although undertaken for information gathering, the expedition ended in violence. Buchan's party encountered several Beothuk near Beothuk Lake. After an initially friendly reception, Buchan left two of his men behind with the Beothuk. The next day, he found them murdered and mutilated. According to the Beothuk Shanawdithit's later account, the marines were killed when one refused to give up his jacket and both ran away.
Causes of starvation The Beothuks avoided Europeans in Newfoundland by moving inland from their traditional settlements. First, they emigrated to different coastal areas of Newfoundland, places the Europeans did not have fish-camps, but they were over-run. Then, they emigrated to inland Newfoundland. The Beothuks' main food sources were caribou, fish, and seals; their forced displacement deprived them of two of these. This led to the over-hunting of caribou, leading to a decrease in the caribou population in Newfoundland. The Beothuks emigrated from their traditional land and lifestyle into ecosystems unable to support them, causing under-nourishment and, eventually, starvation.
Extinction Population estimates of Beothuks remaining at the end of the first decade of the 19th century vary widely, from about 150 up to 3,000. Information about the Beothuk was based on accounts by the woman Shanawdithit, who told about the people who "wintered on the Exploits River or at Red Indian Lake and resorted to the coast in Notre Dame Bay". References in records also noted some survivors on the Northern Peninsula in the early 19th century.
During the colonial period, the Beothuk people faced territorial pressure from other Indigenous groups: Mi'kmaq migrants from Cape Breton Island, and Inuit from Labrador. "The Beothuk were unable to procure sufficient subsistence within the areas left to them." It has been alleged French bounties induced the Mi'kmaq to kill Beothuk. This claim is, however, disputed by most historians and has since come to be known as the "Mercenary Myth".
Beothuk numbers dwindled rapidly due to a combination of factors, including: loss of access to important food sources, from the competition with and displacement by Europeans; infectious diseases to which they had no immunity, such as smallpox, introduced by European contact; endemic tuberculosis (TB), which weakened tribal members; and violent encounters with trappers and settlers.
By 1829, with the death of Shanawdithit, the people were declared extinct.
Claims of modern survivors Oral histories suggest a few Beothuk survived around the region of the Exploits River, Twillingate, Newfoundland and Labrador; it was also suggested that this population formed unions with Europeans, Inuit and Mi'kmaq. Some families in the Twillingate area claim descent from the Beothuk people of the early 19th century.
In 1910, a 75-year-old Indigenous woman named Santu Toney claimed she was the daughter of a Mi'kmaq mother and a Beothuk father. She recorded a song in the Beothuk language for the American anthropologist Frank Speck. He was conducting field studies in the area. She said her father taught her the song.
Since Santu Toney was born about 1835, this may be evidence some Beothuk people survived beyond the death of Shanawdithit in 1829. Contemporary researchers tried to transcribe the song, as well as improve the recording by current methods. Native groups learned the song to use in celebrations of tradition.
Claims of genocide Scholars disagree in their definition of "genocide" in relation to the Beothuk. While some scholars believe the Beothuk died out as an unintended consequence of European colonization, others argue Europeans conducted a sustained campaign of genocide against them.; ; Historian Mohamed Adhikari argued there was an intentional nature of destructive violence from European forces, and this is part of the evidence that makes this a case of genocide. Legal historian Sydney Harring argued there are parallels between the violence inflicted upon the Beothuk and the genocidal violence inflicted upon the Aboriginal Tasmanians, and also proposes the government's knowledge of such violence while not actively and successfully preventing and stopping it implies a tacit approval of the violence.
Writing in 1766, Governor Hugh Palliser reported to the British Secretary of State for the Northern Department, Augustus FitzRoy, 3rd Duke of Grafton, that "the barbarous system of killing prevails amongst our people towards the Native Indians — whom our People always kill, when they can meet them".
If such a campaign did occur, it was explicitly without official sanction after 1769. In that year, Governor John Byron's proclamation explicitly prohibited such conduct: "I do strictly enjoin and require all His Majesty's subjects to live in amity and brotherly kindness with the native savages [Beothuk] of the said island of Newfoundland", A subsequent Proclamation issued by Governor John Holloway on July 30, 1807 prohibited mistreatment of the Beothuk and offered a reward for any information on such mistreatment.
There are various accounts of violence by Europeans directed against the Beothuk. In 1792, British navy Lieutenant George Pulling collected numerous accounts of the interactions between settlers and the Beothuk, many of which ended violently. One significant example was a raid which occurred in the winter of 1781, in which John Peyton Sr., who was involved in multiple acts of violence against the Beothuk, led two other men in an expedition up the Exploits River, to recover fishing gear and other material believed taken by the Beothuk. Pulling noted two accounts of this event, one directly from one of the participants and another second-hand from Peyton Sr. himself. After three days, they came upon a Beothuk encampment (of likely 30 to 50 people); Peyton Sr. and his men fired on the Beothuk, killing some and wounding others, with the exact number of victims unknown. There was at least one uninjured survivor, and Peyton Sr. is recorded as having beaten an injured Beothuk to death with an animal trap. The surviving Beothuk who were able fled, and Peyton and his men collected what furs, skins and gear they could carry and left. Pulling believed both versions of the story left out significant details of what had occurred.
Notable Beothuk captives