THE ORIGIN AND ANTIQUITY OF THE ESKIMO — COLLINS 435 

 OLD WORLD RELATIONSHIPS OF ESKIMO CULTURE 



The archeological discoveries sketched in the preceding pages 

 have provided a wealth of new information on prehistoric Eskimo 

 cukures in Alaska, the Central regions, and Greenland. If they have 

 not brought complete disproof of the American-origin theory they 

 at least have invested it with such serious difficulties that the theory 

 must fall of its own weight. Since, according to this theory, the 

 Proto-Eskimos are supposed to have lived as nomads in the Barren 

 Grounds west of Hudson Bay, they could hardly have left archeo- 

 logical remains. However, as the culture of the Proto-Eskimos is 

 supposed to have been essentially the same as that of the Caribou 

 Eskimos, their modern descendents in the Barren Grounds, this type 

 of culture or something like it should appear in the oldest archeologi- 

 cal horizons. This expectation, however, is not realized. The oldest 

 known Eskimo cultures, particularly those in Alaska, show no re- 

 semblance whatever to the supposed Central prototype. 



It now appears extremely unlikely that there will be found any- 

 where in the American Arctic a simple proto-Eskimo or parent cul- 

 ture from which the various modern Eskimo cultures originally 

 sprang. The oldest known Alaskan Eskimo cultures, instead of 

 being simple, are already specialized and highly developed. As 

 Bering Strait itself was an important culture center in prehistoric 

 times the stages immediately antecedent to Ipiutak and Old Bering 

 Sea will probably be found in the same region. Beyond this, however, 

 we must look to the Old World. For if we postulate an origin for 

 Eskimo culture anywhere in America we are faced immediately with 

 the difficulty that the basic features of the oldest known Eskimo cul- 

 tures are much more Asiatic, or Eurasiatic, than American. 



Years ago, before archeological work had been undertaken in the 

 Arctic, Thalbitzer, Hatt, and Kroeber, among others, presented 

 weighty reasons for assuming that the basic substratum of Eskimo 

 culture was Asiatic. The first systematic excavations — those made by 

 Mathiassen at Thule culture sites west and north of Hudson Bay — 

 brought tangible evidence sustaining and strengthening this point of 

 view. The discovery of the Birnirk culture in Alaska, which was 

 ancestral to the Thule, and of the related but still earlier Old Bering 

 Sea culture, yielded a mass of new data which pointed conclusively 

 in the same direction. Not one element of the Birnirk and Old 

 Bering Sea cultures was exclusively or predominantly American in 

 character. On the contrary, all of them were basically Asiatic. It is 

 only in the Old World that we find either existing today or having 

 existed in earlier times all the following elements : The square, wooden 

 semisubterranean house with entrance passage, skin boats, sleds and 

 toboggans, the toggle harpoon head, inserted side blades on imple- 



