The Vandals appear first as "a loose aggregation of restless tribes who must not be too definitely assigned to any precise district on the map," somewhere in central or eastern Prussia.[133] Far-reaching migrations aiming at a distant goal, like the Gothic and Hunnish conquests of Italy, demand both a geographical knowledge and an organization too high for primitive peoples, and therefore belong to a later period of development.[134] [Sidenote: Number and range.] The long list of recorded migrations has been supplemented by the researches of ethnologists, which have revealed a multitude of prehistoric movements.

These are disclosed in greater number and range with successive investigation.

The prehistoric wanderings of the Polynesians assume far more significance to-day than a hundred years ago, when their scope was supposed to have its western limit at Fiji and the Ellice group.

They have now been traced to almost every island of Melanesia; vestiges of their influence have been detected in the languages of Australia, and the culture of the distant coasts of Alaska and British Columbia.

The western pioneers of America knew the Shoshone Indians as small bands of savages, constantly moving about in search of food in the barren region west of the Rocky Mountains, and occasionally venturing eastward to hunt buffalo on the plains.