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 common material for the body seems to have been rather coarse
whale’s bone, from the rib or jaw. Only two out of the thirteen have
ivory bodies, and these are both of the newer brass-bladed pattern.
The body is very long and slender, being usually about 8 or 8½ inches
long (one is 9¼ inches long) and not over 1½ inches broad at the
widest part. It is always cut off very obliquely at the base, and the
part in front of the line hole is contracted to a sort of shank, as in
Fig. 234 (No. 89747 [1044]), a head with slate blade (broken) and bone
body. This represents a very common form in which the shank is
four-sided, while back of the middle the outer face of the barb rises
into a ridge, making this part of the body five-sided. The edges of
the shank are sometimes rounded off so as to make this part elliptical
in section, and all the edges of the body except the keel, on the
outer face of the barb, are frequently rounded off as in Fig. 235_a_,
No. 89745 [1044], which has a slate blade wedged into the bone body
with a bit of old cloth and a wooden wedge. Fig. 235_b_, No. 56602
[157], from Utkiavwĭñ, is a head of the same shape, but has a brass
blade and a body of ivory. This blade is wedged in with deer hair, but
the other brass-bladed harpoon, No. 56601 [137], has a single rivet of
whalebone.
[Illustration: FIG. 234.--Body of whale harpoon head. 1/3]
The blade slit, and consequently the blade, is always in the plane of
the barb, which position, as I have said before, corresponds to the
last step but one in the development of the harpoon-head. When the
blade is of flint and inserted with a tang, the tip of the body is
always whipped with sinew braid, as in Fig. 212, No. 89748 [928], from
Nuwŭk. This specimen is remarkable as being the only one in the series
with a double point to the barb. These bodies are sometimes ornamented
with incised lines, in conventional patterns, as shown in the
different figures. A short incised mark somewhat resembling an arrow
(see above, Fig. 234, No. 89747 [1044]) may have some significance as
it is repeated on several of the heads. Harpoon-heads of this peculiar
pattern are to be found in the Museum collection from other
localities. As we should naturally expect, they have been found at the
Diomede Islands, St. Lawrence Island, and Plover Bay. It is very
interesting, however, to find a specimen of precisely the same type
from Greenland, where the modern harpoons are so different from those
used in the west.
[Illustration: FIG. 235.--Whale harpoon heads. 1/3]
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