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Head-Smashed-In Buffalo Jump is a buffalo jump located where the foothills of the Rocky Mountains begin to rise from the prairie 18 km (11 mi) west of Fort Macleod, Alberta, Canada, on Highway 785. It is a UNESCO World Heritage Site and home of a museum of Blackfoot culture.
Head-Smashed-In Buffalo Jump is the most outstanding of the surviving bison jumps in the Americas in use from approximately 5,800 years BP until AD 1850.
May 20, 2024 · Head-Smashed-In Buffalo Jump Interpretive Centre is a UNESCO-designated World Heritage Site that preserves and interprets over 6,000 years of Plains Buffalo culture. Through vast landscapes, exhibits, and diverse programming, learn about the cultural significance of this cliff to the Plains People.
Head-Smashed-In Buffalo Jump bears witness to a method of hunting practiced by native people of the North American plains for nearly 6,000 years.
Feb 7, 2006 · Head-Smashed-In Buffalo Jump is one of the richest archaeological sites on the North American plains. In recognition of this, UNESCO declared it a United Nations World Heritage Site in 1981. Archaeological research suggests that this buffalo jump was used for nearly 6000 years.
Buffalo jumps were common on the northern Plains. But the biggest, oldest and best-preserved buffalo jump in North America is the Head-Smashed-In (or estipah-skikikini-kots in Blackfoot) Buffalo Jump in the Porcupine Hills of southwestern Alberta.
In southern Alberta, hunters used Head-Smashed-In Buffalo Jump for over 6,000 years, until the 1800s. Over time, hundreds of thousands of bison bones left at the bottom of the cliff formed a deposit 12 metres deep. The bone bed reveals a remarkably ancient and stable way of life.
