Blazing the Trail: Geographic Information Systems Analysis of the Old North Trail

Abstract

The Old North Trail was the main north-to-south link running along the eastern flank of the Rocky Mountains, within the homeland of the Blackfoot people. While travelling along this trail, human groups stopped at resource patches and important landmarks, leaving evidence of their passing in the form of archaeological sites. This paper examines the historical and archaeological evidence for the Old North Trail and discusses use of least-cost path analysis within a geographic information system framework to model the route of the trail. Where differences exist between the location of least-cost paths and the course of the Old North Trail, the “pull” factors that may have drawn human groups away from the most efficient route across the landscape will be explored. This analysis suggests there was a sacred dimension to this landscape, with features of ecological and ideological importance affecting human movement through the region.