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
Fig. 101, No. 89583 [1305], is a knife of this class, with the blade a
nearly equilateral triangle (1.4 inches long and 1.3 inches wide at
the base), with a flat wooden haft as wide as the blade and 3½ inches
long, cleft at the tip and lashed with thirteen or fourteen turns of
sinew braid. The holes near the butt of the haft were probably to
receive a lanyard. Fig. 102, No. 89591 [1016], is another form of the
same class. The blade is secured by a single rivet of wood.
[Illustration: FIG. 102.--Slate knife. 1/4]
[Illustration: FIG. 103.--Slate hunting-knife. 1/4]
The third class consists of large knives, with long, broad, lanceolate
blades, and short straight hafts. There is only one complete specimen,
No. 89592 [1002], Fig. 103. This has a blade of soft, light greenish
slate, 6 inches long and 2.6 inches broad, with the edges broadly
beveled on both faces. The haft of spruce is in two longitudinal
sections, put together so as to inclose the short tang of the blade,
and is secured by a tight whipping of eighteen turns of fine seal
twine, and painted with red ocher. This knife is new and was made for
sale, but is undoubtedly a correct model of an ancient pattern, as No.
56676 [204] (Fig. 104), which is certainly ancient, appears to be the
blade of just such a knife. We were told that the latter was intended
for cutting blubber. This perhaps means that it was a whaling knife.
Mr. Nelson brought home a magnificent knife of precisely the same
pattern, made of light green jade.
[Illustration: FIG. 104.--Blade of slate hunting-knife. 1/4]
[Illustration: FIG. 105.--Large slate knife. 1/4]
The two knives, representing the fourth class, are both new and made
for sale, having blades of soft slate. As we obtained no genuine
knives of this pattern, it is possible that they are merely commercial
fabrications. The two knives are very nearly alike, but the larger,
No. 89590 [984] (Fig. 105), is the more carefully made. The blade is of
light greenish gray slate, 6.2 inches long and 2 inches broad, and is
straight nearly to the tip, where it curves to a sharp point, making a
blade like that of the Roman gladius. The haft is a piece sawed out of
the beam of an antler, and has a cleft sawed in one end to receive the
short broad tang of the blade. The whipping is of sinew braid.
[Illustration: FIG. 106.--Large single-edged slate knife. 1/4]
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