476 ANNUAL KEPOKT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 1930 



The change in the psychologj^ of tlie Kussian settlers under 

 the influence of the Russianized native fishermen is the real cause 

 why the Russian parties of Cossacks and soldiers in the eighteenth 

 century could not subdue the fierce Chuckchee tribe. The party of 

 Major Parlatsay in 1747 was utterly defeated and he was taken 

 captive and tortured to denth simply because the ancient warlike 

 ardor was not there. 



Up to the present the mutual relationship between the Russianized 

 natives and the Chuckee reindeer breeders is quite peculiar. From 

 the economic point of view the Chukchee, as the animal breeders, are 

 of a higher stage than the fishermen of the Russian villages, while in 

 other things the Russian and Russianized natives are much higher 

 than the Chukchee. In this way the Russians who were and are the 

 domineering race, at the same time were living like mendicants and 

 parasites on the boons from the wealth}^ reindeer breeders of the 

 tundra. 



2. Hunting of sea mammals, in contrast to fishing, is practiced on 

 the sea, often even amidst the open water, or on the brink of the ice 

 fields about to break up, but never by hand from the shore. The psy- 

 chical character of the maritime hunters is quite different from that of 

 the fishermen. Northern hunters are mobile, always on the alert, 

 ready to go away into the open, given to wandering for many and 

 many miles. It has been the custom of the maritime Chukchee and 

 the Asiatic Eskimo to go over to America from very ancient times. 

 Even now they make quite long trips across the ocean. The Koryak 

 are much more passive, but they are fishermen rather than sea- 

 mammal hunters. 



The difference between the fishermen and hunters of sea mammals 

 is expressed in the choice of the site even on the sea coast. The 

 settlements of fishermen are on the river shore, in the inner estuaries, 

 or on the inland side of some adjacent island. The settlement of a 

 hunter of sea mammals is established on the outer capes or on the 

 windy side of an island where there is always a chance for the sudden 

 pursuit of a group of seals or a big walrus or even a whale. 



The species of sea mammals are more or less alike throughout the 

 Polar ocean of Eurasia — whales of various kinds and sizes, one or 

 two with precious whalebone, others giving only meat and blubber, 

 white whale and killer whale, and two varieties of walrus: Of seals, 

 ground seal, Plioca harhata; ribbon seal, Plioca fasciata.; and of 

 smaller seals, Plioca greenlmidica^ Phoca vittdina^ Phoca phoetida,, 

 and Phoca hasjnda. I could mention several names in Russian Creole 

 and native languages, but the trouble is that these names change from 

 one district to another, being given nt one time to one sj:)ecies, another 

 time to another. The white polar bear is also to be included among 

 the sea mammals. Of these the natives distinguish several varieties, 



