The Material Culture of the Eskimo in West Greenland. 119 



But first I think it right shortly to mention the principles on which 

 I have based the classification, or what comes to the same thing the 

 method,^ which I have followed in the investigation not only of the 

 weapons but also of the other implements. In the investigation of any 

 implement, be it a weapon, a tool or a toy, and regardless of the culture 

 from which it originates, an endeavour should be made to solve the 

 following questions: — 



1) What is the object aimed at with the implement? 



2) How is it used in order to gain this object? 



3) How is the form of the implement adapted to this 

 use? 



4) How far has the quality of the material and tools 

 influenced the form, so that it is not, perhaps, the 

 ideal one? 



Not until these questions have been answered as minutely as pos- 

 sible can we proceed to an investigation as to whether some individual 

 parts remain which are of no real "use," but are due to style, to the 

 use and wont of the district, or to a sudden and casual caprice of the 

 maker. Hereby is understood all ornamentation. 



So long as we have no sure knowledge of the age of the individual 

 tribe in the region where we now meet it, all the points which are cleared 

 up by the solution of the above four questions are, evidently, of little 

 or no value as starting points for conclusions regarding the origin 

 and the migrations of the particular type of culture in question, or for 

 tracing influences from elsewhere. When the matter in question concerns 

 Eskimo tribes from West Greenland, regarding whom we know with fair 

 certainty that they have at different times wandered into the country 

 over Ellesmereland and Smith Sound, then we may take it for granted 

 that numerous implements which could not be used so far northwards 

 must, so to say, have been invented and perfected several times, namely, 

 every time the tribe came to a region where the implement was needed. 

 Of special interest in this connection is the kayak with all its accessories 

 which, as will subsequently be shown, in certain peculiarities of form 

 still bears testimony to what has just been said. 



In order to carry out an investigation according to the prin- 

 ciples on which the above-mentioned questions have been based — to 

 put it shortly I will call them technological principles — one 

 should preferably be able to use the implement which is to be in- 

 vestigated, and preferably, also, be able to make it oneself from the 

 materials, and with the tools used by the aborigines. Because, not 

 until we ourselves have made use of a complicated implement do we 



^ A more exhaustive description of the method will be given in the Zeit- 

 schrift für Ethnologie, ВегИп, 1912. 



