Ethnological results of the Point Barrow expedition: Ninth Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology to the Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, 1887-1888, Government Printing Office, Washington, 1892, pages 3-442Murdoch, John
History
Ethnological results of the Point Barrow expedition: Ninth Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology to the Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, 1887-1888, Government Printing Office, Washington, 1892, pages 3-442
Murdoch, John
Eskimos -- Alaska -- Barrow, Point, Region
At the first glance it seems as if we had here a series illustrating
the development of the stone hammer. Fig. 32 would be the first form,
while the next step would be to increase the weight of the head by
lashing a large piece of bone to the end of the haft, instead of
carving the whole laboriously out of a larger piece of bone. The
substitution of the still heavier stone for the bone would obviously
suggest itself next. The weak point in this argument, however, is that
the advantage of the transition from the first to the next form is not
sufficiently obvious. It seems to me more natural to suppose that the
hafted stone hammer has been developed here, as is believed to have
been the case elsewhere, by simply adding a handle to the pebble which
had already been used as a hammer without one. These bone implements
are then to be considered as makeshifts or substitutes for the stone
hammer, when stones suitable for making the latter could not be
procured. Now, such stones are rare at Point Barrow, and must be
brought from a distance or purchased from other natives; hence the
occasional use of such makeshifts as these. This view will account for
the rarity of these bone hammers, as well as the rudeness of their
construction. No. 89845 [1049] would thus be merely the result of
individual fancy and not a link in the chain of development.
FOR SERVING AND EATING FOOD.
TRAYS.
Cooked food is generally served in large shallow trays more or less
neatly carved from driftwood and nearly circular or oblong in shape.
The collection contains two specimens of the circular form and three
oblong ones. All but one of these have been long in use and are very
greasy. No. 73576 [392] (Fig. 33) has been selected as the type of the
circular dishes (i´libiɐ). This is very smoothly carved from a single
piece of pine wood. The brim is rounded, with a large rounded gap in
one side, where a piece has probably been broken out. The brim is
slightly cracked and chipped. The vessel is very greasy and shows
marks inside where meat has been cut up in it. No. 89867 [1323] is a
very similar dish, and made of the same material, but elliptical
instead of circular, and larger, being 22.5 inches long, 15.5 broad,
and 2.1 deep. It has been split in two, and mended with whalebone
stitches in the manner previously described.
[Illustration: FIG. 33.--Meat dish. 1/7]
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