Nestled in the foothills of the Rocky Mountains in southern Alberta Canada, is Head Smashed In Buffalo Jump. The land can be located 18 km northwest of Fort Macleod, Alberta, Canada on highway 785. Because of it's historical importance, it has been declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
For 5500 years or more, the native people of Canada killed buffalo here. They would drive them off the cliff at full gallop. The beasts would crash down to the bottom with broken legs and fully immobile, making it easy to render the creatures into much needed food, clothing, and tools.
Archaeologists have found bone deposits 10 metres deep.
In Blackfoot legend, the site was so named when a young Blackfoot man wanted to watch the buffalo plunge off the cliff from below, but was buried underneath the falling buffalo. He was later found dead under the pile of carcasses "where he got his head smashed in."
Head-Smashed-In was abandoned by the indigineous people in the 19th century after European contact. The site was first recorded by Europeans in the 1880s, and first excavated by the American Museum of Natural History in 1938. It was designated a Canadian National Historic Site in 1968, a Provincial Historic Site in 1979, and a World Heritage Site in 1981.
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