28 SMITHSONIAN MISCELLANEOUS COLLECTIONS VOL, 8l 



that make up the composition. The Punuk art, on the other hand, 

 shows no such discrimination. The lines are all uniform and usually 

 quite deep. There is still a slight tendency to utilize the outline of the 

 object for the enhancement of the design but not to nearly such an ex- 

 tent as in the older art. Designs are much more formal and rigid ; on 

 harpoon heads, for example, the relatively simple ornamentation is 

 repeated almost exactly over and over again. The same adherence to 

 convention is seen in many of the other objects, resulting in a fixed 

 mechanical style, which though symmetrical and graceful in its sim- 

 plicity, distinctly lacks the elasticity and exuberance that mark the 

 finer products of the older Bering Sea culture as works of real art. 

 While the carving and surface decoration of the older objects bear 

 evidence of high skill there is no reason why they should not be re- 

 garded as the result of cutting with stone tools. There is direct evi- 

 dence, on the other hand, that metal was employed during the Punuk 

 stage. The possibility that the evenly inscribed circles were made with 

 a stone bit is extremely remote. The invariable uniformity in depth 

 and width of the circles shows plainly enough that they could only 

 have been produced by a very narrow, sharp and smooth instrument. 

 The extreme precision of the other lines is evidence in the same 

 direction. Reference has been made to the four fragments of iron 

 found in the upper levels of the Punuk midden and to the file marks 

 on a few of the artifacts. File marks are of more definite value as an 

 aid to chronology than small fragments of iron, for the latter, even 

 after eliminating the possibility of its being of meteoric origin, might 

 still have reached its destination as wreckage, to be salvaged and util- 

 ized by the Eskimo. A file, however, could hardly have come into their 

 possession in such a manner but must almost certainly have been ob- 

 tained, even though indirectly, from a European or, possibly. Oriental 

 source. With the Punuk midden yielding objects from top to bottom 

 (along the outer edges only, however ; the bottom of the midden at 

 the center was not reached) showing decorations apparently made with 

 metal tools and with an occasional specimen also showing file marks, 

 we are forced to the conclusion, if the metal be regarded as European, 

 that the Punuk settlement cannot be older than three hundred years ; 

 for it was toward the middle of the 17th century that the Cossacks 

 began to penetrate Northeast Siberia, bringing metal which the 

 Chukchi received and passed on in trade to the Siberian and Alaskan 

 Eskimos. It is quite possible that the greater number of objects from 

 the old Punuk site were carved with stone tools ; certainly the hun- 

 dreds of stone knife, harpoon, and adz blades found show that stone 

 played an important part in their industries. The first few tools of 



