1(14 THE 1 OIXT HARROW ESKIMO. 



Tlic angular grooves on the, two faces were evidently begun witli the 

 intention of cutting the knife in two. We were told that this large 

 knife was specially for cutting &quot;blubber. It is a genuine antique. 



While ground slate is a quite common material for round knives, Hint 

 appears to have been rarely used. We obtained only three of this mate 

 rial. No. 8!)&amp;lt;&amp;gt;!tO [ 1311 ] is a flint knife hafted with a rough, irregular lump 

 of coarse whale s bone. The blade is a rather thin spall &quot; of light gray 

 Hint, flaked round the edges into the shape of a modern uli iri: blade, 

 with a very strongly curved cutting edge. Though the handle is new, 

 the flaking of the blade does not seem fresh, so that it is possibly u 

 genuine old blade fitted with a new haft for the market. A similar 

 flint blade, more neatly flaked, was brought from Kotzebue Sound by 

 Lieut. Stoney, U. S. Navy, in 1884. The other two flint knives are in 

 teresting from being made for use without handles. 



No. 8l(i!91 [1300], Fig. 127, from Sidani, is an oblong, wedge-shaped 

 spall of gray flint, of which the back still preserves the natural surface 

 of the pebble. It is slightly shaped by coarse flaking along the back 

 and one end, and the edge is finely flaked into a curved outline round 

 ing up at the ends. The specimen is old and dirty, and was probably 

 preserved as a sort of heirloom or amulet. Xo. SiHiKli [ 1 178] is a similar 



spall from a round pebble. Such knives as 

 these are evidently the first steps in the de 

 velopment of the round knife. The shape 

 of the spalls, produced by breaking a round 

 or oval pebble of flint, would naturally sug 

 gest using them as knives, and the next step 

 would be to improve the edge by flaking. 

 The greater adaptability of slate, from its j 



Km. I-JT. Woman s kuiiv of nuked softness and easy cleavage, for making such 



knives would soon be recognized, and we 



should expect to find, as we do, knives like No. 5(!li72 [1!H j. The next 

 step would naturally be to provide such a knife with a haft at the point 

 where the stone was grasped by the hand, while reducing this haft so as 

 to leave only just enough for the grasp and cutting away the superfluous 

 corners of the blade would give us the modern form of the blade. Hound 

 knives of shite are not peculiar to Point Barrow, but have been collected 

 in many other places in northwestern America. 1 



The relationship between these knives and the seiiiilunar slate blades 

 found in the North Atlantic, States has already been ably discussed by 

 Dr. Charles Han. 2 It must, however, be borne in mind that while these 

 are sufficiently &quot;fish-cutters&quot; to warrant their admission into a book 

 on fishing, the cutting of fish is but a small part of the work they do. 

 The name &quot;fish-cutter, as applied to these knives, would be no more 



1 See, I Hpecially, Dull, ( onti-ili., vol. 1. pp. f&amp;gt;fl and 79, Cor fij;im H of mich knives froin tin- i-avea of Una- 

 Iwhka. 

 Prehistoric Kishitij:, pp. 183-188, 



