Minnesota's written history goes back only to the 1600s, when the first European visitors recorded the locations of native American populations. The ancestors of those native Americans are Minnesota's prehistoric peoples. Instead of written history, they left a rich record of their existence buried in the earth. Archaeologists study the lives of prehistoric people through careful excavation and analyses of the buried record. This booklet illustrates what they have found and tells what they have learned about Minnesota's prehistory.Â
