Bering Strait and Population Spread— Giddings 97 



legged archtype, and Shapiro has later stressed this point and 

 suggested Algonkian parallels for Eskimos of both east and 

 west. Very recently Laughlin has summarized as follows: 



The majority of Eskimos lived in the western portions of Alaska 

 and are brachycephalic. This brachycephaly distinguishes them 

 from the longheaded eastern Eskimos who have previously been 

 considered the classic or original Eskimo type owing in large part 

 to the historical priority of studies on them, rather than upon their 

 numbers or archaeological antiquity. Future archaeological studies 

 may be expected to demonstrate the entry of Eskimos of various 

 morphological types from Asia. (Wm. S. Laughlin, The Alaskan 

 Gatexuay Viewed from the Aleutian Islands, p. 124, in The Physical 

 Anthropology of the American Indian, Viking Fund, 1951. New 

 York). 



Culturally speaking, we may point out that generally the 

 Eskimoan peoples practice sealing with toggle harpoons where 

 seals occur, they whale at peninsular areas where whales pass 

 by regularly in abundance, they practice ice hunting where ice 

 conditions are right, and their women all use a semi-lunar 

 knife. It is impossible, however, to describe the material cul- 

 ture of one area and then apply it universally. Neither the 

 snow house nor the soapstone pot appears in the Bering Strait 

 area. Nor has dog sledding left incontrovertible evidence that 

 it even existed in the west more than 250 years ago. These par- 

 ticulars are not chosen to minimize the many similarities be- 

 tween east and west, but to indicate that the things used or 

 thought by Eskimos in one area are not necessarily the parts of 

 a universal formula. 



If it is then difficult to categorize Eskimo-speaking peoples 

 as a whole today, what are the criteria that we may apply freely 

 to the information gained from archaeological sites to set apart 

 "Eskimo" prehistoric cultures from all others? Archaeology 

 near Bering Strait shows little evidence of "static survival" of a 

 single culture, but records continual change within the limits 

 imposed by environment. The Thule Culture appears to be 

 valid as a concept both in the east and the west, but the Old 

 Bering Sea Culture has thus far appeared as such only on the 



