Material Culture of the Iglulik Eskimos/Chapter 1

At the suggestion of Dr. Knud Rasmussen, the leader of the Fifth Thule Expedition, the ethnological work of the Expedition was split up, he himself undertaking the study of the intellectual culture of the Eskimo tribes with which the Expedition came into contact, whilst the study of the material culture was divided between Kaj Birket-Smith, M. A., and myself, Birket-Smith studying the tribes on the Barren Grounds and round about the North-West Passage (the groups: the Caribou and Netsilik Eskimos), whilst I studied the tribes on the Melville Peninsula and in Baffin Land; Birket-Smith also undertook the anthropological and linguistic work and I the archaeological. The result of my archaeological studies has already been published^[1]; the present work is to communicate the results of my studies of the present-day Eskimo tribes with whom I have had an opportunity of living while on the Expedition.

In this the name Iglulik Eskimos includes not only the Iglulingmiut group proper, but also the Aivilingmiut, who live more to the south, and the inhabitants of northern Baffin Land, Tununermiut, these groups, as will be shown later on, being in reality so closely related that they must be regarded as forming one Eskimo tribe with in all essentials a uniform culture. The whole of this Eskimo tribe is thus called the Iglulik Eskimos, after the place which from ancient times has been and is still the principal settlement, the island of Iglulik off the northern point of Melville Peninsula.

My sojourn in the land of the Iglulik Eskimos lasted from 18th September, 1921. when I arrived on our schooner "Sokongen” at Danish Island, close to Vansittart Island, the place which was to be the headquarters of the Expedition, and until 18th September, 1923, when I left Ponds Inlet in Northern Baffin Land on board the Hudson's Bay Company's steamer "Nascopie". It was not until December 1921 that I got into touch with the Eskimo inhabitants of the country, ​when I lived at Repulse Bay at the local station of the Hudson's Bay Company from 19th December to 2nd February; in my first studies of the Aivilik Eskimos there I was greatly assisted by the manager of the station, Capt. G. Cleveland, to whom I am extremely grateful for his hospitality and for his help as interpreter. From Repulse Bay I then travelled to the Eskimo settlement Itibdjeriang at Pt. Elizabeth on the east coast of Melville Peninsula, where I remained until 28th February when, together with Peter Freuchen, I started on a sledge journey northwards to the settlements Ingnertoq, Pingerqalik and Iglulik; from there I proceeded to Admiralty Inlet, with the inhabitants of which I did not get into communication on account of being occupied with cartographic work, and then back to Danish Island, which was reached on 29th May. In the middle of June I again went to Repulse Bay, principally for the purpose of excavating; but I had opportunities of seeing something of the summer life of the Eskimos, especially at Beach Point from 15th to 18th August. From there I, together with my interpreter and assistant, the Greenland cathechist Jacob Olsen, was taken over to Duke of York Bay, Southampton Island, in an Eskimo whale-boat. The object of this journey was to make excavations of old settlements, and after that it was the intention to go back to Danish Island about 1st September. Thus we were only equipped for a stay of about two weeks. The east winds, however, brought great masses of drift-ice in from Fox Basin and, after a week's persistent struggling with the ice, we had to abandon the thought of getting through and prepare ourselves for a winter stay. As we were without supplies and equipment of any kind. we had to join in with an Eskimo family, Angutimarik, with whom we moved round about the island, living Eskimo fashion, until a sledge from our headquarters in February was fortunate enough to get over Frozen Strait, which that winter was covered with ice quite exceptionally, and took us back to our comrades. If the recollections I have from my six months' stay on Southampton Island are not all pleasant ones — it was mostly a hard struggle for existence — at any rate it brought me into much more intimate touch with these people than is generally the case on the usual expedition sledge-journeys.

After a month's stay on Danish Island I started on 22nd March (1923) on my second journey to Baffin Land, during which I visited the Eskimo settlements Qajûvfik, Kingadjuaq, Pingerqalik and Iglulik, from there to the settlement of Manertoq in Steensby's Fjord. across country to Milne Inlet and Ponds Inlet, where I spent the whole summer, partly at the station of the Hudson's Bay Company. where Lieutenant G. Hérodier was a most kind host. partly in the ​most important spring settlement of the Eskimos there, Button Point. It was here that I also had an opportunity of seeing most of the population from Admiralty Inlet, many of them having gathered here at the police station in connection with an enquiry into a case of murder.

To the other members of the Expedition, Knud Rasmussen, Peter Freuchen, Birket-Smith, Helge Bangsted and Jacob Olsen, I owe much information regarding these Eskimos, with whom we were in daily contact for long periods; all the members have also helped towards getting together the considerable collection of more than 900 specimens (apart from a number of old specimens found in the ground) from this Eskimo tribe, now in the Ethnographic Section of the National Museum in Copenhagen and to be described in the following.

Although the Expedition's first-hand observations and the description of the collection acquired thus form the main contents of the following, this material will be supplemented by facts from previous publications and reports of journeys, so that as far as possible this work will form a monographically exhaustive description of the material culture of this Eskimo tribe.

The works which in particular have provided a valuable supplement to the Expedition's own records are Parry's and Lyon's reports of 1824, and Boas' publications of the specimens collected by Capt. G. Comer, 1901 and 1907. Information hos also been secured here and there from Rae, Hall, M'Clintock, Gilder, Klutschak, Low, Bernier, and several other reports of journeys.

Furthermore, with the help of the University grant in aid of travelling I have been enabled to study the collections brought home by Parry and Lyon in the British Museum, Pitt Rivers Museum at Oxford and the Royal Scottish Museum in Edinburgh. For granting me an opportunity to do so and giving me permission to photograph and publish several of these specimens, I tender my sincere thanks to Messrs H. J. Braunholtz, H. Balfour and R. Kerr. For looking through the spelling of the Eskimo names I must thank the Rev. H. Ostermann: the method of Kleinschmidt, modified for the dialect, has been used. The photographs of museum specimens are by Mr. S. Bengtsson; the translation is the work of Mr. W. E. Calvert.