No. 89891 [1735] (Fig. 17), which is nearly new, is a very large tub (ilulĭ´kpûñ, which appears to mean “a capacious thing”) without a bail, and is 11 inches high and 20 in diameter. The sides are made of two pieces of plank of equal length, whose ends overlap alternately and are sewed together as before. The bottom is in two pieces, one large and one small, neatly fastened together with two dowels, and is not only held in by having its edge chamfered to fit the croze, but is pegged in with fourteen small treenails. The seams, edges, and two ornamental grooves around the top are painted red as before.
No. 89890 [1753] is smaller, 9.7 inches high and 14.5 in diameter. It has no bail, and is ornamented with two grooves, of which the lower is painted with black lead. The bottom is in two equal pieces, fastened together with three dowels. This is a new tub and has the knotholes neatly plugged with wood. There are a number of these tubs in every house. They are known by the generic name of imusiáru (which is applied also to a barrel, and which means literally “an unusual cup or dipper,” small cups of the same shape being called i´musyû), but have special names signifying their use. For instance, the little tub about 6 inches in diameter, used by the males as a urinal, is called kúvwĭñ (“the place for urine.”) One of these large tubs always stands to catch the drip from the lump of snow in the house, and those of the largest size, like No. 89891 [1735], are the kind used as chamber pots.
Vessels of this sort are in use throughout Alaska, and have been observed among the eastern Eskimo where they have wood enough to make them. For instance, the Eskimo of the Coppermine River “form very neat dishes of fir, the sides being made of thin deal, bent into an oval form, secured at the ends by sewing, and fitted so nicely to the bottom as to be perfectly water-tight.”172 There are specimens in the Museum from the Mackenzie and Anderson Rivers, described in the MacFarlane MS. as “pots for drinking with, pails for carrying and keeping water, and also as chamber pots. Oil is also sometimes carried in them in winter.”
In some places where wood is scarce vessels of a similar pattern are made of whalebone. Vessels “made of whalebone, in a circular form, one piece being bent into the proper shape for the sides,” are mentioned by Capt. Parry on the west shore of Baffins Bay,173 and “circular and oval vessels of whalebone” were in use at Iglulik.174 This is the same as the Greenlandic vessel called pertaĸ (a name which appears to have been transferred in the form pĭ´túño to the wooden meat bowl at Point Barrow), “a dish made of a piece of whalebone bent into a hoop, which makes the sides, with a wooden bottom inserted.”175 Nordenskiöld speaks of vessels of whalebone at Pitlekaj, but does not specify the pattern.176 Whalebone dishes were used at Point Barrow, but at the present day only small ones for drinking-cups are in general service. One large dish was collected. (Fig. 18. No. 89850 [1199]).
Fig. 18.—Whalebone dish.
A strip of whalebone 4¼ inches wide is bent round a nearly circular bottom of cottonwood so as to form a small tub. The edges of the bottom are chamfered to fit a shallow croze in the whalebone. The overlapping ends of the whalebone are sewed together with a strip of whalebone in long stitches. This dish is quite old and impregnated with grease. Vessels of this kind are uncommon, and it is probable that none have been made since whalebone acquired its present commercial value. They were very likely in much more general use formerly, as when there was no such market for whalebone as at present it would be cheaper to make tubs of this material than to buy wooden ones. In corroboration of this view it may be noted that Dr. Simpson does not mention woodenware among the articles brought for sale by the Nunatañmiun.177 The small whalebone vessels will be described under drinking cups, which see.
Large wooden bowls are used to hold meat, fat, etc., both raw and cooked, which are generally served on trays. These are of local manufacture and carved from blocks of soft driftwood. The four specimens collected are all made of cottonwood, and, excepting No. 73570 [408], have been long in use and are thoroughly impregnated with grease and blood.
No. 89864 [1322] (Fig. 19) will serve as the type. This is deep and nearly circular, with flat bottom and rounded sides. The brim is ornamented with seven large sky-blue glass beads imbedded in it at equal intervals, except on one side, where there is a broken notch in the place of a bead.
Fig. 19.—Meat bowl.
Another, No. 89863 [1320], is larger and not flattened on the bottom, and the brim is thinner. It is also provided with a bail of seal thong, very neatly made, as follows: One end of the thong is knotted with a single knot into one of the holes so as to leave one long part and one short part (about 3 inches). The long part is then carried across and through the other hole from the outside, back again through the first hole and again across, so that there are three parts of thong stretched across the bowl. The end is then tightly wrapped in a close spiral round all the other parts, including the short end, and the wrapping is finished off by tucking the end under the last turn. The specimen shows the method of mending wooden dishes, boxes, etc., which have split. A hole is bored on each side of the crack, and through the two is worked a neat lashing of narrow strips of whalebone, which draws the parts together.
In No. 89865 [1321], which has been split wholly across, there are six such stitches, nearly equidistant, holding the two parts together. This bowl is strengthened by neatly riveting a thin flat “strap” of walrus ivory along the edge across the end of the crack. These three bowls are of nearly the same shape, which is the common one. The new bowl (No. 73570 [408]) is of a less common shape, being not so nearly hemispherical as the others, but shaped more like a common milk pan. It is ornamented with straight lines drawn in black lead, dividing the surface into quadrants. These were probably put on to catch the white man’s eye, as the bowl was made for the market. Dishes of this description are common throughout Alaska (see the National Museum collections) and have been noted at Plover Bay.178
In former times, pots of soapstone resembling those employed by the eastern Eskimo, and probably obtained from the same region as the lamps, were used for cooking food at Point Barrow, but the natives have so long been able to procure metal kettles directly or indirectly from the whites (Elson found copper kettles at Point Barrow in 1826)179 that the former have gone wholly out of use, and at the present day fragments only are to be found. There are four such fragments in the collection, of which three are of the same model and one quite different.
Fig. 20.—Stone pot.
No. 89885-6 [1559] (Fig. 20) is sufficiently whole to show the pattern of the first type. It is of soft gray soapstone. A large angular gap is broken from the middle of one side, taking out about half of this side, and a small angular piece from the bottom. From the corner of this gap the pot has been broken obliquely across the bottom, and mended in three places with stitches of whalebone made as described under No. 89865 [1321]. One end is cut down for about half its height, and the edge carried round in a straight line till it meets the gap in the broken side. This end appears to have been pieced with a fresh piece of stone, as there are holes for stitches in the edge of the whole side and in the upper edge of the broken side. There are also two “stitch holes” at the other side of the gap, showing how it was originally mended. A low transverse ridge across the middle of the whole end was probably an ornament. Holes for strings by which the pot was hung up are bored one-fourth to one-half inch from the brim. Two of these are bored obliquely through the corners, which are now broken off. The holes in the sides close to the corners were probably made to take the place of these. The pot is neatly and smoothly made, and the brim is slightly rounded. It shows signs of great age, and is blackened with soot and crusted with oil and dirt.180
Nos. 89886 [680] and 89868 [1096] are much less complete. They are the broken ends of pots slightly smaller than the above, but of precisely the same pattern, even to the ornamental transverse ridge across the end.181 The string holes are bored through the corners as before, and in both pots are holes showing where they have been mended by whalebone stitches, fragments of which are still sticking in one pot. This method of mending soapstone vessels by sewing is mentioned by Capt. Parry as practiced at Iglulik.182
Fig. 21.—Small stone pot.
No. 89883 [1097] (Fig. 21) is a small pot of a quite different shape, best understood from the figure. Round the edge are eight holes for strings nearly equidistant. The outside is rough, especially on the bottom. One of the sides is much gapped, and the acute tip has been broken off obliquely and mended with a stitch of whalebone. The care used in mending these vessels shows that they were valuable and not easily replaced. I can find no previous mention of the use of stone vessels for cooking on the western coast, and there are no specimens in the National Museum collections. The only Eskimo stone vessels are a couple of small stone bowls from Bristol Bay. These are very much the shape of the wooden bowls above described, and appear to have been used as oil dishes and not for cooking, as the inside is crusted with grease, while the outside is not blackened. On the other hand, stone cooking pots are very generally employed even now by the eastern Eskimos, and have been frequently described.183 The close resemblance of the pots from Point Barrow to those described by Capt. Parry, taken in connection with Dr. Simpson’s statement184 that the stone lamps were brought from the east, renders it very probable that the kettles were obtained in the same way. The absence of this utensil among the southern Eskimo of Alaska is probably due to the fact that being inhabitants of a well wooded district they would have no need of contrivances for cooking over a lamp.
I obtained three fragments of pottery, which had every appearance of great age and were said to be pieces of a kind of cooking-pot which they used to make “long ago, when there were no iron kettles.” The material was said to be earth (nu´na), bear’s blood, and feathers,185 and appears to have been baked. They are irregular fragments (No. 89697 [1589], Fig. 22) of perhaps more than one vessel, which appears to have been tall and cylindrical, perhaps shaped like a bean-pot, pretty smooth inside, and coated with dried oil or blood, black from age. The outside is rather rough, and marked with faint rounded transverse ridges, as if a large cord had been wound round the vessel while still soft. The largest shard has been broken obliquely across and mended with two stitches of sinew, and all are very old and black.
Fig. 22.—Fragments of pottery.
Beechey (Voyage, p. 295) speaks of “earthen jars for cooking” at Hotham Inlet in 1826 and 1827, and Mr. E. W. Nelson has collected a few jars from the Norton Sound region, very like what those used at Point Barrow must have been. Choris figures a similar vessel in his Voyage Pittoresque, Pl. III (2d), Fig. 2, from Kotzebue Sound. Metal kettles of various sorts are now exclusively used for cooking, and are called by the same name as the old soapstone vessels, which it will be observed corresponds to the name used by the eastern Eskimo. Light sheet-iron camp-kettles are eagerly purchased and they are very glad to get any kind of small tin cans, such as preserved meat tins, which they use for holding water, etc., and sometimes fit with bails of string or wire, so as to use them for cooking porridge, etc., over the lamp. They had learned the value of these as early as Maguire’s time,186 as had the people of Plover Bay in 1849.187
In preparing food it is often desirable to break the large bones of the meat, both to obtain the marrow and to facilitate the trying out of the fat for making the pemmican already described. Deer bones are crushed into a sort of coarse bone-meal for feeding the dogs when traveling. For this purpose heavy short-handled stone mauls are used. These tools may have been formerly serviceable as hammers for driving treenails, etc., as the first specimen obtained was described as “savik-pidjûk-nunamisinĭ´ktuɐ-kau´teɐ” (literally “iron-not-dead-hammer”), or the hammer used by those now dead, who had no iron. For this purpose, however, they are wholly superseded by iron hammers, and are now only used for bone crushers. The collection contains a large series of these implements, namely, 13 complete mauls and 13 unhafted heads. All are constructed on the same general plan, consisting of an oblong roughly cylindrical mass of stone, with flat ends, mounted on the expanded end of a short haft, which is applied to the middle of one side of the cylinder and is slightly curved, like the handle of an adz. Such a haft is frequently made of the “branch” of a reindeer antler, and the expanded end is made by cutting off a portion of the “beam” where the branch joins it. A haft so made is naturally elliptical and slightly curved at right angles to the longer diameter of the ellipse, and is applied to the head so that the greatest thickness and therefore the greatest strength comes in the line of the blow, as in a civilized ax or hammer. The head and haft are held together by a lashing of thong or three-ply braid of sinew, passing through a large hole in the large end of the haft and round the head. This lashing is put on wet and dries hard and tight.188 It follows the same general plan in all the specimens, though no two are exactly alike. The material of the heads, with three exceptions (No. 56631 [222], gray porphyry; No. 89654 [906], black quartzite, and No. 89655 [1241], coarse-grained gray syenite), is massive pectolite (see above, p. 60), generally of a pale greenish or bluish gray color and slightly translucent, sometimes dark and opaque. No. 56635 [243] will serve as the type of these implements.189
The head is of light bluish gray pectolite, and is lashed with a three-ply braid of reindeer sinew to a haft of some soft coniferous wood, probably spruce, rather smoothly whittled out and soiled by handling. The transverse ridge on the under side of the butt is to keep the hand from slipping off the grip. The whole is dirty and shows signs of considerable age.
These mauls vary considerable in size. The largest is 7.1 inches long and 2.5 in diameter, and the smallest 2.1 inches long by 2.4. This is a very small hammer, No. 56634 [83] having a haft only 4.7 inches long. The haft is usually about 5 inches long. The longest (belonging to one of the smaller heads, 4 inches by 2) is 7.2 inches long, and the shortest (belonging to a slightly larger head, 4.7 by 3.1 inches) is 4.5 inches. The largest two heads, each 7.1 by 2.5 inches, have hafts 5 inches long.
The lashing of all is put on in the same general way, namely, by securing one end round the head and through the eye, then taking a variable number of turns round the head and through the hole, and tightening these up by wrapping the end spirally round all the parts, where they stretch from head to haft on each side. Seal thong, narrow or broad, is more generally used than sinew braid (only three specimens out of the thirteen have lashings of sinew). When broad thong is used the loop is made by splicing, as follows: A slit is cut about 1½ inches from the end of the thong, and the end is doubled in a bight and passed through this slit. The end is then slit and the other end of the thong passed through it and drawn taut, making a splice which holds all the tighter for drawing on it. A simple loop is tied in sinew braid.
The following figures will illustrate the most important variations in the form of this implement. Fig. 23, No. 56634 [83] from Utkiavwĭñ, has a head of light gray pectolite, slightly translucent, and evidently ground flat on the faces, and the haft is of reindeer antler, with a slight knob at the butt. A square piece of buckskin is doubled and inserted between the head and haft. The lashing is of fine sealskin twine, and the spiral wrapping is carried wholly round the head. This was the first stone maul collected, and was put together at the station, as mentioned above. It is rather smaller than usual. Fig. 24, No. 56637 [196], from Utkiavwĭñ, has the head of grayish pectolite, rough and unusually large. The haft is of some soft coniferous wood soaked with grease. It is nearly round, instead of elliptical, with an irregular knob at the butt, and not curved, but fastened obliquely to the head. The loop of double thong attached to the haft is probably to go round the wrist.
Fig. 25, No. 56639 [161], from Utkiavwĭñ, is of pectolite, the upper and lower faces almost black and the sides light gray. The haft is of hard wood and unusually long (7.2 inches). It is noticeable for being attached at right angles to the head, by a very stout lashing of thong of the usual kind, and further tightened by a short flat stick wedged in below the head on one side. There appears to have been a similar “key” on the other side. This is an unusual form.
Fig. 26, No. 89654 [906], is from Nuwŭk. The head is an oblong, nearly cylindrical, water-worn pebble of black quartzite, 7.1 inches long; the haft is of reindeer antler, and the lashing of seal thong.
Fig. 27, No. 89655 [1241], from Utkiavwĭñ. The head of this maul is a long pebble of rather coarse-grained gray syenite, and is peculiar in having a shallow groove roughly worked out round the middle to keep the lashing from slipping. It is 4.7 inches long and 3.1 in diameter. The haft is of reindeer antler 4.5 inches long, and the lashing of seal thong peculiar only in the large number of turns in the spiral wrappings.
Fig. 28, No. 89657 [877], from Nuwŭk. This is peculiar in having the haft fitted into a deep angular groove on one side of the head, which is of pectolite and otherwise of the common pattern. The haft of reindeer antler and the lashing of broad thong are evidently newer than the head and are clumsily made and put on, the latter making several turns about one side of the haft as well as through it and round the head.
None of the unmounted heads, which are all of pectolite, are grooved in this way to receive the haft, but No. 56658 [205] has two shallow, incomplete grooves round the middle for lashings, and No. 56655 [218], which is nearly square in section, has shallow notches on the edges for the same purpose. One specimen of the series comes from Sidaru, but differs in no way from specimens from the northern villages.
Stone mauls of this type have previously been seldom found among the American Eskimo. The only specimens in the Museum from America are two small unhafted maul heads of pectolite, one from Hotham Inlet and the other from Cape Nome, and a roughly made maul from Norton Sound, all collected by Mr. Nelson. The last is an oblong piece of dark-colored jade rudely lashed to the end of a short thick stick, which has a lateral projection round which the lashing passes instead of through a hole in the haft. Among the “Chukches” at Pithkaj, however, Nordenskiöld found stone mauls of precisely the same model as ours and also used as bone crushers. He observed that the natives themselves ate the crushed bone after boiling it with blood and water.190 Lieut. Ray saw only dogs fed with it in the interior. Nordenskiöld does not mention the kind of stone used for these tools, but the two in the National Museum, collected by Mr. Nelson at Cape Wankarem, are both of granite or syenite and have a groove for the lashing. (Compare No. 89655 [1241], fig. 27.)
In addition to the above-described stone mauls, there are in the collection five nearly similar mauls of heavy bone, which have evidently served the same purpose. They were all brought over for sale from Utkiavwĭñ at about the same time, and from their exceedingly oily condition were evidently brought to light in rummaging round in the old “blubber-rooms,” where they have long lain forgotten. Four of these differ in no respect from the stone mauls except in having the heads made of whale’s rib; the fifth is all in one piece.
Fig. 29.—Bone maul.
Fig. 30.—Bone maul.
The following figures will illustrate the general form of these implements: Fig. 29, No. 89847 [1046]: The head is a section of a small rib, 4.8 inches long, and has a deep notch on each side to receive the lashing. The haft is probably of spruce (it is so impregnated with grease that it is impossible to be sure about it), and is rough and somewhat knobby, with a rounded knob on the butt and two shallow finger notches on the under side of the grip. It is attached by a lashing of stout thong of the ordinary pattern. Fig. 30, No. 89849 [1047]: The head is a straight four-sided block of whale’s rib, 6 inches long. The deep notches for the lashing, one on each side, are 1 inch behind the middle. The haft is a roughly whittled knotty piece of spruce, and instead of a knob has a thick flange on the lower side of the butt. The lashing is of fourteen or fifteen turns of seal twine, and keyed upon each side by a roughly split stick thrust in under the head. Fig. 31, No. 89846 [1048]: This is peculiar in having the haft not attached at or near the middle of the head, but at one end, which is shouldered to receive it. The haft is of the common pattern and attached as usual, the lashing being made of very stout sinew braid. The head is a section of a small rib 6 inches long. Fig. 32, No. 89845 [1049]: This is made in one piece, and roughly carved with broad cuts from a piece of whale’s jaw. The grooves and holes in the bone are the natural canals of blood vessels. All these mauls are battered on the striking face, showing that they have been used.
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.
Fig. 31.—Bone maul.
Fig. 32.—Bone maul.
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.
Fig. 33.—Meat dish.
No. 73575 [223] (Fig. 34) is a typical oblong dish. It is neatly hollowed out, having a broad margin painted with red ocher. It measures 24 inches in length, is made of pine, rather roughly carved on the outside, and is new and clean. This is a common form of dish. Fig. 35, No. 89868 [1377], is an old tray of an unusual form. It is rudely hewn out of a straight piece of plank, 34.8 inches long, showing inside and out the marks of a dull adz, called by the seller “kau´dlo tu´mai,” “the footprints of the stone (scil. adz).” The excavation is shallow and leaves a margin of 2 inches at one end, and the outside is roughly beveled off at the sides and ends. The holes near the ends were evidently for handles of thong. The material is spruce, discolored and somewhat greasy. Fig. 36, No. 89866 [1376], was said by the native who brought it over for sale to be especially intended for fish. It is much the shape of No. 73575 [223], but broader, slightly deeper, and more curved. The brim is narrow and rounded and the bottom smoothly rounded off. It measures 23.3 inches in length, and is made of pine. It has been deeply split in two places and stitched together with whalebone in the usual way. Trays and dishes of this sort are in general use among all Eskimo,191 and are sometimes made of tanned sealskins.192
Fig. 34.—Oblong meat dish.
Fig. 35.—Oblong meat dish; very old.
Fig. 36.—Fish dish.
One of the commonest forms of drinking vessels is a little tub of whalebone of precisely the same shape as the large whalebone dish described above (p. 88). Of these there are five specimens in the collection, all from Utkiavwĭñ. No. 89853 [1302] (Fig. 37) will serve as the type. It is 4.6 inches long and made by binding a strip of black whalebone round a spruce bottom, and sewing together the ends, which overlap each other about 1½ inches, with coarse strips of whalebone.
There are two vertical seams three-fourths inch apart. The bottom is held in by fitting its slightly chamfered edge into a shallow croze cut in the whalebone. All these cups are made almost exactly alike, and nearly of the same size, varying only a fraction of an inch in height, and from 4.2 to 5.5 inches in length. The only variation is in the distance the ends overlap and the number of stitches in the seams. Such cups are to be found in nearly every house, and one is generally kept conveniently near the water bucket. Though the pattern is an ancient one, they are still manufactured. No. 56560 [654] was found among the débris of one of the ruined houses at Utkiavwĭñ, and differs from the modern cups only in having the ends sewed together with one seam instead of two, while No. 89851 [1300], though it has been in actual use, was made after our arrival, as the bottom is made of a piece of one of our cigar boxes.
Dippers of horn are in very general use for drinking water. These are all of essentially the same shape, and are made of the light yellow translucent horn of the mountain sheep. There are three specimens in our collection, of which No. 56534 [28] (Fig. 38) has been selected as the type. This is made of a single piece of pale yellow translucent horn, apparently softened and molded into shape, cut only on the edges and the handle. A stout peg of antler is driven through the handle, 1 inch from the tip, and projects behind, serving as a hook by which to hang the dipper on the edge of a bucket. The other two are similar in shape and size, but No. 89831 [1293] has no peg, and has one side of the handle cut into a series of slight notches to keep the hand from slipping, while No. 89832 [1577] is rather straighter and has a smaller, shallower bowl, and the grip of the handle roughened with transverse grooves. Fig. 39, No. 89739 [774|, is a horn dipper, but one that is very old and of a pattern no longer in use. The bowl, which is much broken and gapped, is oval and deep, with a thick handle at one end, running out in the line of the axis of the bowl. This handle, which is the thick part of the horn, near the tip, is flat above, rounded below, and has its tip slightly rounded, apparently by a stone tool. Just where the bowl and handle meet there is a deep transverse saw-cut, made to facilitate bending the handle into its place. The material is horn, apparently of the mountain sheep, turned brown by age and exposure. The specimen had been long lying neglected round the village of Utkiavwĭñ.
Horn dippers of the same general pattern as these are common throughout Alaska. The Museum collection contains a large series of such utensils, collected by Mr. Nelson and others. The cups and dippers of musk-ox horn found by Parry at Iglulik are somewhat different in shape.193 Those made of the enlarged base of horn194 have a short handle and a nearly square bowl, while the hollow top of the horn is used for a cup without alteration beyond sometimes bending up the end, which serves as a handle.195 Curiously enough, cups of this last pattern appear not to be found anywhere else except at Plover Bay, eastern Siberia, where very similar vessels (as shown by the Museum collections) are made from the horn of the Siberian mountain sheep. An unusual form of dipper is beautifully made of fossil ivory. Such cups are rare and highly prized. We saw only three, one from each village, Nuwŭk, Utkiavwĭñ, and Sidaru, and all were obtained for the collection. They show signs of age and long use. They differ somewhat in shape and size, but each is carved from a single piece of ivory and has a large bowl and a straight handle. No. 56535 [371] (Fig. 40), which will serve as the type of the ivory dipper (i´musyû, kĭlĭgwû´garo), is neatly carved from a single piece of fine-grained fossil ivory, yellowed by age. The handle, polished by long use, terminates in a blunt, recurved, tapering hook, which serves the purpose of the peg in the horn dipper. The rounded gap in the brim opposite the handle is an accidental break. Another, No. 89830 [1259], from Sidaru, is a long trough-like cup, with rounded ends and a short flat handle at one end, made of a short transverse section of a rather small tusk, keeping the natural roundness of the tusk, but cut off flat on top and excavated. A wooden peg, like those in the horn dippers, is inserted in the end of the handle. This cup is especially interesting from its resemblance to the one obtained by Beechey (Voyage, Pl. I, Fig. 4) at Eschscholtz Bay, from which it differs only in being about 2 inches shorter and deeper in proportion. Thomas Simpson speaks of obtaining an ivory cup from some Point Barrow natives at Dease Inlet exactly like the one figured by Beechey, but with the handle broken off.196 Fig. 41, No. 89833 [933], from Nuwŭk, has a large bowl, nearly circular, with a broad, straight handle and a broad hook. The part of the bowl to which the handle is attached, a semicircular piece 3 inches long and 1¾ wide, has been split out with the grain of the tusk, and mended with three stitches, in this case of sinew, in the usual manner. There was an old gap in the brim opposite to the handle, and the edges of it have been freshly and roughly whittled down. The ornamentation of the outside and handle, consisting of narrow incised lines and small circles, each with a dot in the center, is well shown in the figure. These engravings were originally colored with red ocher, but are now filled with dirt and are nearly effaced by wear on the handle. This dipper is not of such fine quality of ivory as the other two. It is not unlikely that all these vessels were made by the natives around Kotzebue Sound, where ivory is plenty, and where Beechey, as quoted above, found one so like one of ours. We were informed by the owner that No. 56535 [371] was obtained from the Nunatañmiun.
Each family has several spoons of various sizes, and narrow shallow ladles of horn, bone, etc. The large spoon is for stirring and ladling soup, etc. There is only one specimen in the collection, No. 89739 [1352] (Fig. 42). This is a new one, made by a native of Utkiavwĭñ, whom I asked to make himself a new spoon and bring me his old one. He, however, misunderstood me and brought over the new one, which Lieut. Ray purchased, not knowing that I had especially asked for the old one. These spoons seem to be in such constant use that the natives did not offer them for sale. This specimen is smoothly carved from a single piece of pine, and painted all over, except the inside of the bowl, with red ocher. A cross of red ocher is marked in the middle of the bowl, and there is a shallow groove, colored with blacklead, along the middle of the handle on top. The length is 13.2 inches. A small spoon of light-colored horn, No. 89416 [1379], has a bowl of the common spoon shape with a short, flat handle. Spoons of this sort were not seen in use, and as this is new and evidently made for sale it may be meant for a copy of one of our spoons. The narrow ladles of horn or bone may formerly have been used for eating before it was so easy to get tin pots, but at present are chiefly used for dipping oil, especially for filling the lamp. The collection contains one of horn and four of bone.
Fig. 44.—Bone ladle.
No. 89415 [1070], Fig. 43, is made of a single piece of mountain-sheep horn, dark brown from age and use, softened and molded into shape. It is impregnated with oil, showing that it has been long in use. This utensil closely resembles a great number of specimens in the Museum from the more southern parts of Alaska. No. 89411 [1294] (Fig. 44) is a typical bone ladle. The material is rather coarse-grained, compact bone from a whale’s rib or jawbone. No. 89414 [1013] closely resembles this but is a trifle larger. The other two specimens are interesting as showing an attempt at ornamentation. No. 89412 [1102] (Fig. 45, from Nuwŭk) is carved smoothly into a rude, flattened figure of a whale (Balaena mysticetus). The flukes form the handle and the belly is hollowed out into the bowl of the ladle. No. 89413 [934] (Fig. 46, from Utkiavwĭñ) has the handle carved into a rude bear’s head, which has the eyes, nostrils, and outline of the mouth incised and filled in with dark oil dregs. All these ladles have the curved side of the bowl on the left, showing that they were meant to be used with the right hand. The name, kĭliu´tɐ, obtained for these ladles is given in the vocabulary collected by Dr. Oldmixon as “scraper,” which seems to be the etymological meaning of the word. These implements may be used for scraping blubber from skins, or the name may correspond in meaning to the cognate Greenlandic kiliortût, “a scraper; especially a mussel shell (a natural scraper).” The resemblance of these ladles to a mussel shell is sufficiently apparent for the name to be applied to them. Indeed, they may have been made in imitation of mussel shells, which the Eskimo, in all probability, like so many other savages, used for ladles as well as scrapers.