The Denetasiro peoples inhabited the Southwest Yukon, and interior
forests of the
Northwest Territories and probably spread into central Alaska and
east into northern Alberta, Saskatchewan and Manitoba. Denetasiro culture
probably began about 1000-2000 B.C. and continued up to about 1900 A.D. in some
areas. These cultures were probably descended from
Northwest
Microblade Tradition cultures and were immediately ancestral to
the historic Athapascan speaking peoples of the western half of Canada. The
Denetasiro region included all the cultures to the west of the Algonquin
dominated east and south and extended north as far as the Inuit cultures of the
Arctic. This period marked the decline of Northwest Microblade complexes and is
noted for the widespread use of polished stone wood-working tools. These
cultures subsisted on seasonal hunting fishing and trapping in a boreal forest
setting.
From: Willey, Gordon R. An Introduction to American Archaeology. Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey: Prentice-Hall inc., 1966