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
The skins of the white mountain sheep, white and blue fox, wolf, dog,
ermine, and lynx are sometimes used for clothing, and under jackets
made of eider duck skins are rarely used. Sealskin dressed with the
hair on is used only for breeches and boots, and for those rarely.
Black dressed sealskin--that is, with the epidermis left on and the
hair shaved off--is used for waterproof boots, while the white
sealskin, tanned in urine, with the epidermis removed, is used for the
soles of winter boots. Waterproof boot soles are made of oil-dressed
skins of the white whale, bearded seal, walrus, or polar bear. The
last material is not usually mentioned as serving for sole leather
among the Eskimo. Nordenskiöld,[N205] however, found it in use among
the Chukches for this purpose. It is considered an excellent material
for soles at Point Barrow, and is sometimes used to make boat covers,
which are beautifully white. Heavy mittens for the winter are made of
the fur of the polar bear or of dogskin. Waterproof outer frocks are
of seal entrails, split and dried and sewed together. For trimmings
are used deerskin of different colors, mountain-sheep skin, and black
and white sealskin, wolf, wolverine, and marten fur, and whole ermine
skins, as well as red worsted, and occasionally beads.
[Footnote N204: Compare Nordenskiöld, Vega, vol 2. p. 213.]
[Footnote N205: Vega, vol. 2, p. 98.]
STYLE OF DRESS.
Dr. Simpson[N206] gave an excellent general description of the dress
of these people, which is the same at the present day. While the same
in general pattern as that worn by all other Eskimo, it differs in
many details from that worn by the eastern Eskimo,[N207] and most
closely resembles the style in vogue at and near Norton Sound.[N208]
The man’s dress (Fig. 51, from a photograph of Apaidyao) consists of
the usual loose hooded frock, without opening except at the neck and
wrists. This reaches just over the hips, rarely about to mid-thigh,
where it is cut off square, and is usually confined by a girdle at the
waist. Under this garment is worn a similar one, usually of lighter
skin and sometimes without a hood. The thighs are clad in one or two
pairs of tight-fitting knee breeches, confined round the hips by a
girdle and usually secured by a drawstring below the knee which ties
over the tops of the boots. On the legs and feet are worn, first,
a pair of long, deerskin stockings with the hair inside; then slippers
of tanned sealskin, in the bottom of which is spread a layer of
whalebone shavings, and outside a pair of close-fitting boots, held in
place by a string round the ankle, usually reaching above the knee and
ending with a rough edge, which is covered by the breeches. Dress
boots often end with an ornamental border and a drawstring just below
the knee. The boots are of reindeer skin, with white sealskin soles
for winter and dry weather, but in summer waterproof boots of black
sealskin with soles of white whale skin, etc., are worn. Overshoes of
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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