208 H. P. STEENSBY. 
Here, however, I will venture to educe one of these sources, which 
in my opinion must have been active in a special degree, without, 
however, my being able to state certain ethnographical, or even 
certain historical, proofs of such influence. 
This particular and specially important influence which I suppose 
to have taken place is a direct influence from Japan through the Japa- 
nese navigation. Whether in ancient Japanese literature evidence is 
found of voyages so far north as the distriets round Bering Strait I do 
not know. But I consider it most improbable that a highly seafaring 
people such as the Japanese were, right from the older middle ages to 
the beginning of the 17th century, should not also have extended their 
voyages to Bering Strait, where they could carry on fishing, whale hun- 
ting and hunting of walrus, and trade such important products as blubber, 
ivory, and furs. 
One sees that the Japanese extended their sea voyages still further 
in a southern direction . On account of their nautical skill the Japanese 
were known in the waters of the East as “Kings of the Sea” as F. BRINK- 
LEY! expresses himself. But between the years 1614 and 1641 this 
navigation was destroyed, especially by the Shogun Iyeyasu. “He 
ordered that all vessels of sea-going capacity should be destroyed, and 
that no craft should thenceforth be built of sufficient size to venture 
beyond home waters.” 
In 1641 Japan was deprived of all craft which could go trading or 
whale hunting to the regions at Bering Strait. “Not a ship large enough 
to pass beyond the shadow of the coast may be built.” 
The Russian expeditions to the Pacific coast only occurred about 
a century after this period. According to Steller, with the inhabitants 
of the coast, the Kamchadales for example, they found knowledge of the 
Japanese, but naturally no direct evidence of this Japanese navigation 
which had ceased long before and had not been allowed to revive. 
Of course the stated argumentation that the Japanese navigation 
reached the districts at Bering Strait is no proof that the Eskimo cul- 
ture really was subjected to Japanese influence. Such proof might, I 
presume, be found in comparing the economic culture of the Eskimo 
with the economic possession of culture of the old fishermen and sailor 
population of Japan. It is only this class of the population which may 
be assumed to have influenced the Eskimo — on the other hand not 
the higher classes of Japan. But for this, material is still lacking, at 
any rate I have not access to such. 
Meanwhile I can in one respect mention testimony which in a rather 
obvious and striking manner speaks in favour of the Eskimo having 
had connection with the Japanese, and that is the anthropological fact 
that the specially Japanese form of Mongol type so unmistakably occurs 
1 F. BRINKLEY. Vol. 3, р. 128. 
