The Material Culture of the Eskimo in West Greenland. 227 



Fig. 60, 5 is a small soapstone lamp with ridges. Godhavn. 



Fig. 60, С is a piece of wood carved as a kayak. North Disco. 



The toy, figured by Holm (PI. 27) from Angmagsalik, which 

 represents two small birds picking up grain, is well known 

 here at Disco Bay. I have often seen them in Greenland homes; 

 some better finished, others made more rudely. The one illustrated in 

 Fig. 61 is not a very handsome specimen. It is carved from a whale's 

 bone at Hunde Eiland, and was intended for a child who died ; then 

 it was sold to me. There are holes at the end of the rods through 

 which strings were to have been passed, so that the figures — they 

 always represent snow-buntings, such being well-known to Greenland 

 children from rhymes and verses — could be moved without the 

 child being able to see how this was done. 



The game oi ajagarneq appears to be widely spread among all 

 the Eskimo tribes, and as far as I know, under the same name. 

 Holm found it at Angmagsalik ; and it has several times been brought 

 home, and the implement figured, from American tribes. Poul Egede 

 records that he saw it in West Greenland homes which he visited 

 as a child. The implement used for the game (ajagaq, 16) is in its 

 principle everywhere the same : some object with perforations, attached 

 to a pointed stick or to a bone staff by a cord. The stick is held 

 in the hand, and the object is swung out, and has to be caught upon 

 the stick by a stabbing or thrusting movement away from the player. 

 This movement is designated by the indicative third person singular, 

 ajagpoq, and this word is an old root-word from which a great 

 number of verbs and nouns are derived (see Kleinschmidt's dictionary). 



Also in the workmanship of these ajagaq there are numerous 

 points of resemblance. In West Greenland the humerus of a seal is 

 used by preference, especially that of the hooded seal ; or else the 

 humerus of the dog, the cranium of a hare, or specially-fashioned 

 pieces of wood or bone. From the Central Eskimo Boas records 

 sometimes "shoulder-bones of seal" (but his figure on p. 113 shows 

 that it is a humerus) and sometimes a barrel-shaped piece of horn 

 of the musk-ox with some holes at one end. Holm's specimen from 

 Angmagsalik resembles the latter. Turner illustrates on p. 256 a 

 specially fashioned piece of wood, the form of which somewhat 

 resembles that of the specimens represented here in Fig. 62, A and 

 В ; and he mentions the cranium of a hare as used for this purpose. 

 Turner found the ajagaq, made on the same principle, among 

 the Indians who, near Hudson Bay live close to the Eskimo, 

 but with them the workmanship differed greatly from that of the 

 Eskimo forms. 



In Greenland the game is often a mere amusement or pastime for 

 tedious hours, as for instance, during a journey, when weather-bound. 

 But ajagaq is also used, or at any rate has been used, for playing 



