118 Morten P. Porsild. 



they have tried to classify them into types, and from the presumed rela- 

 tionship of the types have tried to draw conclusions as to the presumed 

 routes, and their directions, along which the tribes may have migrated. 

 Swenander's work may be characterized as an attempt in the same 

 direction. We must admit the merit of the intention which underlies 

 these monographs; but, at the same time, it is to be regretted that the 

 authors have often had no clear idea of what was essential in the im- 

 plement in question, and what non-essential and therefore subject to 

 the capricious alterations of the maker. It often strikes one that 

 the authors have not sufficiently understood the purpose and the use 

 of the implements, especially those authors who, as Museum officials, 

 have no doubt had a large material at their disposal, but have never 

 had an opportunity of seeing the individual parts of this material in use. 

 Proper attention has not always been paid to the information given by the 

 collectors, but the material has been treated as if it originated from 

 a form of culture so entirely extinct that any guess-work was permissible. 

 The result is that confusion has arisen between entirely different 

 implements: very ancient ones being regarded as modern, and vice- 

 versa. The conclusions and deductions which are thus derived are 

 of no more value than if we, for instance, took a modern axe 

 and hammer, called them types of the same implement, and arrived 

 at the conclusion that he who uses an axe stands on a higher, more 

 developed stage of culture than he who uses a hammer. By way of 

 example I may mention that in Mason's monograph "Aboriginal Ame- 

 rican Harpoons" the most heterogeneous articles have been confused 

 under "harpoons," and the author is quite at fault as regards the age 

 and purpose of the Greenland forms. Swenander also, influenced by 

 Mason, regards all his harpoons from the same point of view; considers 

 them as one and the same implement; does not conceive that they may 

 possibly differ as regards their purpose and use ; but, deriving and devel- 

 oping the one "type" from the other, thus draws conclusions as to the 

 age of the Eskimo culture in Greenland! 



Accordingly it will be 'necessary to begin by giving a clear defini- 

 tion of what is, and what is not a harpoon. I am not blind to 

 the difficulties and dangers of trying to give such definitions in a 

 language which is not my own. That my classification and division 

 are right in the main I conclude from the fact that they agree 

 with the Eskimo, that is to say the West Greenland, terminology. I also 

 hope that the English terms chosen express in some measure the corre- 

 sponding Eskimo conceptions, since they are in accordance with the 

 expressions used by the majority of the English-speaking authors who 

 have studied the conditions at first hand; though, on the other hand, 

 they do not agree with — for example — Mason's terminology and 

 definitions. 



