MURDOCH.] 



AMULETS. 



435 



Huke(1 from 



specific purpose, which indeed we learned in the case of some of those 



in the collection. Like the amulets of the Green landers, they appear to 



be &quot;certain animals or things which had belonged to or been in contact 



with certain persons (e. g., the people of an 



cient times, or fortunate hunters) or supernat 



ural beings,&quot; and &quot;objects which merely by their 



appearance recalled the effect expected from the 



amulet, such as figures of various objects.&quot; To 



the latter class belong the rudely flaked flint 



images of whales, already mentioned, and prob 



ably many of the other small images of men 



and animals already described, especially those 



fitted with holes for strings to hang them up by. 

 The flint whale is a very common amulet, in 



tended, as we understood, to give good luck in 



whaling, and is worn habitually by many of 



the men and boys under the clothes, suspended 



around the neck by a string. The captain and 



harpooner of a whaling crew also wear them 



as pendants on the fillets already described, Fl - 1 



and on the breast of the jacket. We obtained 



five of these objects, all of very nearly the same shape, but of differ 



ent materials and varying somewhat in size. Fig. 421 represents one 



of these (No. 5G703 [208] from Utkiavwlfi) made of a piece of hard 



colorless glass, probably a fragment of a ship s &quot; deadlight.&quot; It is rather 



roughly flaked into a figure of a &quot; bo whead&quot; whale, 34 inches long, as 



seen from above and very much flattened with exaggerated flukes. 



The flippers were rudely indicated in the outline, but the left one is 



broken off. 

 No. 89613 [771] from Utkiavwlfi is a very similar image, 2-4 inches 



long, which perhaps is of the same material, though it may be made of 



rock crystal. No. 56707 [159] from 

 Utkiavwlfi is a very small whale (1-4 

 inches long), chipped in large flakes 

 out of a water- worn pebble of smoky 

 quart/, while No. 89577 [939] Fig. 

 422, from the same village, w r hich is 

 a trifle larger (2 inches long), is made 

 of dark crimson jasper. The large 

 black flint whale, No. 56683 [01], 



also from Utkiavwlfi, which is 3-0 inches long, is the rudest of all the 



figures of the whales. It is precisely the shape of the blade of a skin 



scraper, except for the roughly indicated flukes. 



Fig. 423 (No. 8(1524 [1209] from Utkiavwlfi) is a rude wooden image 



of the same animal, 3i inches long, very broad and flat-bellied. It is 



Flo. 422. Whale flaked from red jasper. 



1 Kink, Tales, etc., p. 52. 



