218 H. P. STEENSBY. 
advances in the 14th century, must be explained with a backward view 
to the special development in the economic culture of the Eskimo which 
had taken place in the districts round Bering Strait, and had gradually 
extended to more eastern regions. Several crowds of these Neoeskimo 
have possibly reached Greenland from the Archipelago. Some of them 
have gone round the northern point of Greenland and down along the 
east coast, while others have gone south across Melville Bay. Some 
even seem to have come right down to the southern point, and further 
north along the east coast, even before the Scandinavian colonization 
began. That there must have been a certain connection between the 
west and east coasts of Greenland seems to be evident from certain 
cultural congruities which, here, however, I shall not enter upon. 
As, then, the Vesterbygd and Eysterbygd were colonized by the Scan- 
dinavians, the presence of these has surely at one time had the effect 
of restraining and stopping the Eskimo wanderings. But later on a 
certain connection was, possibly, established between the two peoples; 
at any rate the wanderings were reassumed. It seems to have happened 
as in the case of water which has been dammed up, in that it broke 
forth with renewed strength. The Eskimo advanced from north to 
south along both the west and the east coasts. Originally this advance 
was, no doubt, peaceful; but, as is well known, it led to hostilities, and, 
finally, to the destruction of the colonization of the Scandinavians. 
It is very difficult to say anything definite about what has been the 
real driving factor in the advances. One is probably correct in assuming 
that fresh Neoeskimo crowds immigrating into North-east and North- 
west Greenland started the movement. 
From this presentment of the immigration of the Eskimo into 
Greenland one gets, in addition, an explanation of why the Eskimo 
type in the more southern districts of Greenland seems to be the most 
Mongolian. The explanation of the matter is, I think, that these Eskimo 
represent Alaskan Neoeskimo.. But as the source of the Neoeskimo 
people in Alaska ceased to flow, or at least ceased to be the overwhelming 
influence, then it was again the Arctic Archipelago, or the region north 
of the Barren Ground Peninsula, which proved to be the most important 
centre for Eskimo culture, from where new cultural elements spread 
towards the east, the west, and the north-east, and whence new small 
groups of Eskimo wandered northwards to Greenland, along the musk- 
ox route. Some of these left the stamp of a more Indian type on the 
Polar Eskimo and the most northern West Greenlanders. Others went 
down along the east coast, and to them may probably be accounted 
the “third immigration” of the Danmark Expedition, as also the small 
group which in 1823 was met with on Clavering Island. Probably 
some of these groups have reached right down to Angmagsalik. 
