326 



THE ESKIMO ABOUT BERING STRAIT 



[ETH. ANN. 13 



it was said, was due to the dog s ham-bone which he had with him, and 

 thereafter he carried this bone and adopted a mark to represent it in 



place of his totem 

 sign, as did his son 

 after him. 



At Sabotnisky, on 

 the lower Yukon, I 

 saw an oval door of 

 hewn boards in a 

 storehouse, on which 

 was marked, with red 

 ocher, the outline of 

 an extended wolfskin 

 with the rude figure 

 of a wolf outlined on 

 the skin and sur 

 rounded by a circle 

 (figure 117). In reply 

 to a question, one of 

 the villagers told me 

 that it was the fam 

 ily mark of one of the 

 villagers. &quot;All of our 

 people,&quot; he added, 

 &quot;have marks which 

 have been handed 

 down by our fathers 

 from very long ago, 

 and we put them on 

 all of our things.&quot; 

 Another man at 



FIG. 118 Tobacco board -with bear and loach signs. this Village Said that 



his ancient namesake 



had been a famous bowman, and once while hunting, having nothing 

 but blunt-head arrows, such as are used for killing rabbits and other 

 small game, came across a large red bear, which he immediately began 

 to shoot; finally he broke all of the 

 bear s bones and killed it. After this 

 he adopted the red bear as his sign and 

 his descendants still use this mark. 



Figure 118 represents a thin board, 

 on which tobacco is cut, which was 

 obtained at Sabotnisky. There is a 

 broad, shallow groove along each side, 

 succeeded by a small groove along its inner edge. The broad groove has 

 two incised curved marks representing bear claws. On each side and 





Fio. 119 Figures on a grave box. 



