THE HISTORY OF THE PRIMITIVE ETHNIC GROUPS

When the navigators and European conquerors arrived at the American coasts they called their inhabitants “Indians”, because they were convinced of arriving at the Indies, in the Asian coasts.  The Indians or aboriginal Americans arrived to the continent from Asia in diverse epochs, they crossed the strait of Bering and they passed Siberia through to Alaska. In the course of 18 thousand years they arrived to the south of the continent.  During that slow expansion, that along six hundred generations carried them to the present Tierra del Fuego, they underwent considerable changes.  Through these changes, contributions of new elements were added which arrived by sea to the coast of the Pacific. 

These primitive inhabitants had mongoloid characteristics, proper to a special type of population that was common to Asia and Europe, those that remained still vestige in marginal zones of the Old World, between the Australian aborigines and among the ainos of Japan as well.  Thus, the likely homo type “indoamericano” was of coppery skin, more than yellow, and perhaps the product of a crossing among “amurios” (or inhabitants of the Asian region of the Amur river) and mongoloids. Successive crossings and immigratory contributions resulted that the tribes that inhabited the Argentine soil at the arrival of the Spaniards, in the first few years of the XVI century.  These tribes and native groups that were still mostly found in nomadic state failed to reach the great development and the civilization that had been reached by the Maya, Aztec and Inca tribes in other zones of the continent.  

AMERICAN ABORIGINES

The American continent is inhabited by man for a little more than 25.000 years.  It is believed that the first human beings arrived by land from Asia and by sea from Australasia.  Little by little, to the extent of new inhabitants arriving, the previous inhabitants went changing their location, until they came to populate the whole continent, from the North extending to the South.  Many diverse cultures were lived through in America towards the fifteenth century.  Existing groups simply subsisted thanks to hunting, fishing and harvesting of fruits.  Others came imposing to build cities and achieve a social, political and economic development with enormous importance.  The most noticeable American cultures achieved these advances once they stopped being Nomadic thanks to agriculture and stockbreeding.  These groups were the Maya, the Inca and the Aztec.  

ARGENTINE ABORIGINES

Before the arrival of the Spaniards, native groups, called aborigins, inhabited our country. The lifeforms of the different groups depended on the zone in which they lived and of the influence of other American tribes that lived near them.  The aborigines from the Northwest of Argentina were seen influenced by the Inca culture of Peru. The groups of the Patagonia received new customs from the Chilean natives, the Araucanians. The Indians were free in the epoch of the colony, in spite of them being obliged to work for the Spaniards and many being exterminated.  Currently there still are aboriginal groups existing who conserve their language, their original culture and their traditions. The great majority like the Coyas, Matacos and Tobas live in the northern provinces of the country, Araucanos and Mapuches groups subsist in the Rio Negro province.