Inuit mother with her baby asleep in the furs of her parka. Nome, Alaska ca. 1912

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The Inuit are the descendants of what anthropologists call the Thule people, who emerged from western Alaska around 1000 AD. They had split from the related Aleut group about 4000 years ago and from northeastern Siberian migrants. They spread eastwards across the Arctic.

In Arctic regions, cold weather does not make a cradleboard feasible for an infant's survival, so instead they are carried by being placed in a sling worn under the mother's parka. One variant of these parkas is called ‘amauti’ which has a built-in baby-pouch just under the hood. The pouch is large and comfortable for the baby. The mother can bring the child from back to front for breastfeeding or for eliminatory functions without exposure to the elements. Amauti is a traditional eastern Arctic Inuit parka, designed to keep the child warm and safe from frostbite, wind and cold, also helps to develop bonding between mother and child.