THE ORIGIN AND ANTIQUITY OF THE ESKIMO — COLLINS 449 



. . . concerning the 44, assumed to be pure Chipewyan, it seems probable, now 

 that the report is worked up, that the judgments of tlie interpreters have proved 

 fallible, for it seems doubtful if the 44 men they selected as pure, are any more 

 pure than the 33 men of the Fond-du-lac baud who were induced to be measured, 

 and who were taken at random. . . . 



It becomes evident from a consideration of their general characteristics, teeth, 

 blood, and physical proportions, that those "assumed to be pure" are actually 

 slightly more mixed than the Fond-du-lac band as a whole. [Grant, 1930, 

 pp. 7, 29.] 



The correctness of Grant's judgment is borne out by his photo- 

 graphs, which show that half of the adults, from both Fond-du-lac 

 and Chipewyan, are clearly mixed-bloods. As such they can hardly 

 have played the ancestral role ascribed to them. 



Leaving in abeyance the question of when and how the Indian strain 

 entered the Central Eskimos, we may consider whether there is any 

 validity in the idea that some of the Alaskan groups are of Indian 

 origin. As mentioned before, it is not uncommon to find Eskimos 

 with Indian-like features around Kotzebue Sound and elsewhere on 

 the Arctic coast of Alaska. Such individuals, however, from this 

 very fact stand out from the others. The simplest and most logical 

 explanation is that a certain amount of Indian blood has been 

 absorbed by the north Alaskan Eskimos in fairly recent times, an 

 inevitable consequence of the fact that some Eskimo groups live far 

 up the rivers in close proximity to the interior Athapaskans, and, 

 further, that it was a general practice for the coast people themselves 

 to roam far into the interior in pursuit of caribou. This, however, 

 is very different from saying that these Eskimos as a whole are derived 

 from an Indian stock. And we must certainly reject the idea that the 

 Kotzebue Eskimos, most of whom are typically Eskimo in appearance, 

 are of Indian descent because they show certain metrical resemblances 

 to a mixed Indian-White group of Chipewyans living on Lake Atha- 

 baska far in the interior of Canada. 



We come to the same conclusion when we examine the suggested 

 relationship between Chipewyan and the St. Lawrence Island and 

 Seward Peninsula Eskimos. We know from the archeological record 

 that the relationships of the St. Lawrence Eskimos have always been 

 with Siberia, only 40 miles away, and never with the Alaskan main- 

 land. The archeological picture is one of the steady growth and 

 development of an Eskimo culture, enriched from time to time by 

 elements received from Siberia. Archeologically there is not the 

 slightest trace of Indian intrusion. The physical evidence is equally 

 decisive. The Old Bering Sea Eskimo on St. Lawrence Island, to 

 judge from the few skulls that have been found, belonged to the highly 

 specialized long-headed Birnirk type. The Punuk and modern St. 

 Lawrence Eskimos are broader- and lower-headed, being practically 

 identical with the Chuckchee, as Hrdlicka has shown. 



