The Angmagsalik Eskimo. 405 
laboriously worded explanation: “that is they explained with this word, 
that the knives were made from sharks (presumably the teeth of sharks)” 
since OLEARIUS expressly states that they were made of “Backen Zähnen”. 
With regard to the closing words of the description: “The teeth 
are inserted into grooves along both edges, like the small iron blades 
in the primitive knives we know from northern West Greenland and 
Southampton Island (see p. 489)” it should be noted, 1) that shark’s 
tooth knives may be single-edged, and 2) that the knives from South- 
ampton Island, are made, not with iron blades, but with stonet, as 
Mr. THALBITZER himself, moreover, correctly states in the passage 
‚ (р. 489) to which he refers. 
We need not, by the way, hark back as far as the 17th century 
in order to find mention of shark’s tooth knives from West Greenland. 
In 1872, JAPETUS STEENSTRUP, in his treatise “Sur l’emploi du fer 
meteorique par les Esquimaux du Groenland”? gave an illustration of 
a fragment of a shark’s tooth knife, found in a grave in North Green- 
land. GRAAH's statement: “This instrument is also said to have been 
used in former times on the West Coast”? is of less weight, and may 
possibly be based on his recollections of OLEARIUS. 
On p. 677, Mr. THALBITZER again reverts — as he frequently does 
in the case of other subjects dealt with — to the shark’s tooth knives, 
and observes: “In the British Museum I have seen knives of a similar 
kind but much longer from the Hawaiian Islands, Polynesia, designated 
as fighting weapons armed with shark’s teeth’. Once more, it was 
not necessary to go so far afield; the National Museum in Copenhagen 
contains a whole series of similar large shark’s tooth weapons from the 
Gilbert Islands. And in any case, it is not easy to see how the remark 
bears upon the point in question. It merely tells us, as most ethno- 
graphers already know, that sharks’ teeth are used for making sharp 
instruments in some parts of the South Sea Islands. And the Editor 
admits that the objects to which he refers are not tools, but weapons, 
and differ considerably in point of size from the Greenland implements. 
It might further be added that the edge also is different in the two cases, 
the South Sea Islanders using single teeth, whereas in Greenland a whole 
row of teeth, still imbedded in the jaw, is used. Nevertheless, since Mr. 
THALBITZER inserts the remark in a special note, it must be presumed 
that he considers it of some relevant importance, and finds some con- 
nection between the small Greenland knives, edged with rows of 
teeth, and the large Hawaiian weapons in which single teeth are 
1 Franz Boas: The Eskimo of Baffin Land and Hudson Bay (Bulletin of 
the American Museum of Natural History vol. ХУ) р. 384; Fig. 178, “Вопе 
knives with stone blades”. 
2 Compte rendu du congres international d’anthropologie et d’archéologie 
préhistoriques, 6me session, Bruxelles 1872, Pl. 25, fig. 1; cf. p. 248. 
3 Undersogelsesrejse til Østkysten af Grønland. Kbh. 1832, р. 85. 
