In this zone, which can be up to several hundred kilometers broad, developed much of the culture of modern Eskimo (Inupiat and Yupik in Alaska) peoples. Some decisive and significant adaptations took place here and in adjacent Siberia that allowed a more efficient exploitation of this zone. Settlements spread and grew, in some places becoming more specialized, as the historically visible cultures appeared.

Arctic Small Tool Tradition
One of the most distinctive and widespread Arctic cultural traditions appeared around 4000 BP. The Arctic Small Tool tradition (ASTt) was first called the Denbigh Flint complex by its discoverer, Louis Giddings (1964), after the type site on Cape Denbigh on Norton Sound. Subsequently, it has been found throughout the Tundra and Arctic Zone that is characterized by coasts that are ice-bound in winter and treeless hinterland, from the Bering Sea side of the Alaska Peninsula, northward along the coast and throughout the Brooks Range, and eventually, along the Canadian Arctic coast and the Arctic Archipelago to Greenland. The archeological assemblage is distinctive. It derives its name from the finely-flaked, tiny lithic tools that are its hallmark. Irving (1964), from the perspective of the Punyik Point site in the Brooks Range, linked the widespread appeance of these distinctive tools into the Arctic Small Tool tradition.

The origins of this tradition are obscure. It appeared fully developed in northwestern Alaska and spread rapidly southward and eastward. Its microblade, core and burin technology seem to have roots in the Paleoarctic tradition and in the general technology of Siberia and northeastern Asia. However, the continuity with Paleoarctic is cut almost everywhere in Alaska by the intervening and widespread Northern Archaic tradition which had its roots to the south and east in the boreal forests. It seems most probable that the transition to ASTt must have occurred somewhere outside of Alaska, probably northeastern Asia. Also noteworthy is that this time period marked the development and spread of circumboreal cultural adaptations (perhaps as arctic environments stabilized worldwide).

Subsistence was apparently balanced between hunting and fishing with the most likely mainstay species being caribou and anadromous fish. According to Dumond (1987), there is very little evidence for winter ice sealing, consistent use of dogs, or boat use - all of which are traits of the modern Arctic Eskimo groups. Some investigators feel that the Arctic Small Tool tradition marks the arrival of the ancestral Eskimo cultures while many others feel that, although there appears to be some technological continuity, the ancestral development of the historic Eskimo cultures took place in Siberia and the islands of the Bering Sea at a much later date. Nevertheless, the AST tradition people, by exploiting the resources of the coast and the hinterland, were the first group of people to spread across the North American arctic, as far east as Greenland (recognizable there as the Pre-Dorset culture).

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