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An Interactive Map of Historical Geography and Archaeological Context
This interactive map brings together two different kinds of spatial information: historical and ethnographic reference areas associated with Indigenous peoples, and archaeological sites where ancient DNA samples have been reported.
By viewing these layers together, visitors can explore the geographic distribution of Indigenous groups documented in historical sources and compare it with the locations and dates of ancient human remains from the Americas and the Beringian region.
The map is intended as an educational and research tool. It does not establish legal boundaries, tribal identity, territorial ownership, or direct biological continuity between ancient individuals and later Indigenous communities.
What the Map Contains
The map includes:
- 583 historical ethnolinguistic areas in North and Central America
- 470 traditional territory polygons in South America
- 1,276 dated ancient DNA samples from the Americas and the Beringian margin
By default, the ancient DNA layer displays 1,170 samples with at least 20,000 covered SNPs on the 1240K panel. Visitors can change the quality setting to display all samples with reported dates.
These datasets were produced at different times and for different purposes. They should therefore be treated as separate layers of evidence rather than as a single unified record of population history.
How to Use the Map
The control panel at the top of the map allows you to show or hide the following layers:
- North and Central American territories
- South American territories
- Ancient DNA samples
Click the title of the control panel to collapse or reopen the search and filter area. Collapsing the panel does not reset the current map view, filters, or search value.
The search box can be used to locate an Indigenous group or an ancient DNA sample. Select a result to move the map to the relevant territory or archaeological site.
Ancient DNA samples can be filtered by data quality and age:
- All periods
- 10,000 BP and older
- 5,000–9,999 BP
- 2,500–4,999 BP
- Younger than 2,500 BP
BP means “Before Present,” a chronological convention commonly used in archaeology, palaeogenomics, and palaeoenvironmental research. In radiocarbon convention, “Present” is fixed at 1950 CE.
The basemap can also be changed between:
- Street map
- Topographic map
- Satellite imagery
The topographic basemap is useful for examining terrain and regional geography. Satellite imagery allows the historical and archaeological layers to be compared with the modern landscape.
Exploring the Territory Polygons
Click a territory polygon to view available information such as:
- Group name
- Broad cultural area
- Language family
- Temporal basis
- Geometry detail
- Source dataset
- Other territories overlapping the selected location
Large polygons are drawn first and smaller polygons are placed above them. This prevents small areas from being completely hidden beneath larger ones.
When several polygons overlap, clicking the location produces a list ordered from the smallest polygon to the largest.
Overlap does not necessarily indicate an error. Historical activity areas may have shifted, intersected, or been shared. Different sources may also represent different periods, scales, and methods of defining spatial boundaries.
Exploring Ancient DNA Samples
Select an ancient DNA point to view information that may include:
- Sample or individual ID
- Archaeological site
- Estimated age
- Reported chronological range
- Archaeological culture or period
- Present-day political entity
- Molecular sex
- Y-chromosome lineage
- Mitochondrial lineage
- Number of covered 1240K SNPs
- Data-quality assessment
- Coordinate precision
The points represent archaeological locations associated with ancient human remains. They do not represent the geographic extent of an ancient population.
Some coordinates may be generalized because of source precision, archaeological-site sensitivity, or differences between the location information reported in the original studies.
The map contains sample metadata only. It does not embed raw DNA sequences, genotype files, or complete individual genome data.
How the Map Should Be Interpreted
The territory polygons are historical and ethnographic reference areas. They are not equivalent to modern national borders, reservations, trust lands, treaty boundaries, land-cession records, or legally recognized territories.
Historical Indigenous geography was not static. Population movement, trade, marriage networks, seasonal land use, political change, displacement, and colonial expansion could all alter how communities used and understood geographic space.
The polygon boundaries should therefore not be interpreted as precise border lines comparable to modern state boundaries.
A territory polygon and an ancient DNA sample may occupy the same location on the map. This spatial overlap provides geographic context, but it does not by itself demonstrate:
- Direct biological continuity
- A direct ancestor–descendant relationship
- Tribal or national identity
- Exclusive occupation
- Territorial ownership
- Legal rights to land
Establishing historical or biological relationships requires evidence from archaeology, chronology, material culture, historical records, linguistics, community knowledge, and population-genetic analysis.
This map is best used as a tool for exploration and question formation, not as a source of final conclusions about identity or ancestry.
Data Sources, Citations, and Licensing
This map is a derived visualization created from datasets with different temporal meanings, methodologies, and conditions of use.
North and Central American Historical Areas
The 583 North and Central American polygons are derived from Charles Perreault’s georeferenced digitization of the ethnolinguistic map published by Driver and colleagues in 1953.
The web layer preserves individual group polygons while adding broad cultural-area attributes and web-display simplification.
Perreault, C. (2025). A Georeferenced Ethnolinguistic Map of Driver et al. Indian Tribes of North America (1953). Journal of Open Archaeology Data, 13, Article 18, 1–5. https://doi.org/10.5334/joad.185
South American Territories
The 470 South American polygons are derived from the Territories layer provided through the Native Land Digital API.
This layer does not represent a single historical time slice. It contains traditional territory information assembled from community knowledge and sources with mixed or unspecified temporal bases.
Territory data: Native Land Digital and the respective Indigenous communities represented in the source data.
https://native-land.ca/