Page:Archæology of the Central Eskimos.djvu/415
in the finds here must have been imported from the mainland. Even then, however, soapstone objects predominate, lime-stone only being used as an emergency material. Thus in house VII we have a find which is, it is true, closely connected with the Naujan find, but which shows that a special local development has been commenced.
House XVII in the lower house group seems to be almost con- temporary with VII, or perhaps a little later; in this case conclusions can only be drawn from the find itself, as the house was destroyed by the Eskimos. Like VII, the find from house XVII shows a mixture of older Thule types with later forms. In contrast to one harpoon head of the Thule type there are two of the later, flat type, and also the peculiar Cape Dorset form, the chronological position of which is uncertain; the arrow heads with conical tang, snow knife handle, mattock and soapstone shards are like those from Naujan, whereas the flint arrow heads, the lime-stone lamp and the side prong for bird dart, with barbs on the inner side, all point away from it.
House XVIII seems to be a little later still; there are the bone bird and the comb with the massive grip, but the lime-stone lamp, the flint blade and the small, square, toy cooking pot of ivory are all later objects; the absence of soapstone shards and slate blades point in the same direction. House V in the upper group seems, from its state of preservation, to almost match these ruins in age.
In house III we have got rather far away from the Naujan find. This comparatively well-preserved house gives the impression of being fairly new, and the find from it does the same. There are points of contact with the old culture, such as the slate blade, the adze head and the tube of bird bone, although these are types which are insignificant. But by far the greater part of the find consists of later forms: the only harpoon head belongs to a very flat type peculiar to Southampton Island; the knife handle with the knob on the side, the arrow points of flint with tang, the needle cases and the handsome comb with pierced grip, are all later forms peculiar to Southampton Island; flint flakers are very prominent in the find — five specimens — and the scraper blade is a fine example of the highly developed flint technique; the find is strongly marked by lamps and cooking pots of lime-stone slabs, whereas it does not contain one piece of soapstone and only a fragment of a cooking pot of a micaceous rock. The connection with the mainland now seems to have been broken off, soapstone is not obtainable and lime-stone is used as a substitute. The culture represented by this house ruin is very close to the Sadlermiut, who became extinct in 1902; a very considerable period must lie between this house ruin and the oldest, VI and IX.