An Anthropogeographical Study of the Origin of the Eskimo Culture. 53 
part. Thus, K. Hasserr considers it probable that the Eskimo ‘in 
rapid flight have hurried through, and not again set foot on,” the 
Parry Archipelago. E. Astrup furnishes us with a new variation, 
as he is of opinion that the Eskimo from Siberia have crossed the 
New Siberia Islands and numerous presumed groups of islands to 
North Greenland and Smith Sound. Quite recently W. THatsirzer! 
has again referred to MarkHam’s theory in support of his own view 
that the Eskimo once lived west of Bering Strait, and from there 
have wandered towards the coast. Sosy 
Herewith we leave this theory, which obtained its greatest im- 
portance by having such a famous exponent as C. R. Markuam. In 
the following pages an account will be given of what one hitherto 
has thought it possible to conclude about the origin from ethno- 
graphical facts. He who did the first, and even to day, most im- 
portant work in this domain was H. Rink. After having pointed 
out, as mentioned above, that the Eskimo culture must have one 
and the same origin, independently of the home of the race, Rink 
sets up two general maxims before establishing any proof as to 
where the home of the culture may have been situated. 
He starts at once with the idea that the culture has originated ~ 
under similar climatic conditions and under the same distribution of 
land and sea as nowadays, and he nextly assumes that the Eskimo 
wanderings from the south have taken place through the interior of | 
the country outwards to the coast, along rivers, and not from a more | 
southern stretch of coast to a more northern one. RunK has, as will | 
appear later, come to a right conclusion in his last mentioned remark, 
and this conclusion is founded on the fact that the tribe’s enjoyment 
of economic culture ‘‘with the settling on the Polar coasts must have 
undergone a change which was rather abrupt and also must be sup- 
posed to have extended to the entire tribe, and therefore that the 
- people did not live scattered as they do now, but so united that a 
certain cohesion, and the necessary intercourse, could take place. 
But this is not consistent with a wandering along the coast which 
more or less suggests the idea of a successive line of advances.” 
Rink is undoubtedly right, also, in assuming that the geographical 
conditions have not greatly changed since the Eskimo culture was 
fashioned. Geologically it may be concluded that this must have— 
taken place during the latest geological period, or after the glacial 
period®. The linguistic homogeneity is evidence of a comparatively 
recent dispersion, and the purely historical fact that the distribution 
over the west coast of Greenland was not accomplished till from the 
llth to the 14th centuries is perhaps also to be understood as a 
proof that it is comparatively young. When one compares the 
1M. 0. G., Vol. 39, p. 717 and same page, note 1. 
* ef. A. HAmBerG. 
