An Anthropogeographical Study of the Origin of the Eskimo Culture. 61 
such as the kayak and dog-sledge, towards astounding dexterity. 
This falls to the lot of the man, but, at the same time, versatile 
calls are made on the woman’s ability. 
From a purely geographical point of view the Eskimo can be 
discriminated in various groups, but a form of tribe such as we 
know, for example, from the North American Indians only occurs as 
a rare exception in South Alaska. The sociological unity with the 
Eskimo is not in the tribe but in the settlement1, but at the same 
time it must be remembered that the latter is not stationary, there 
being a difference between its location in summer and winter, and 
both fluctuate, though with some Eskimo the winter settlement is 
almost stationary. Only in a slight degree do the conditions of 
descent, language, and the like, form a setting for the appurtenances 
of each settlement. Much more do their social, and above all, 
economic interests, maintain their unity. 
The Eskimo settlements, or rather, perhaps, groups of hunters, ~ 
are in an eminent degree self-sufficing groups. The Eskimo must 
himself procure all that is needful, food as well as material for tools, 
dwellings, and clothes. In themselves they bring along with them 
their traditional methods, learnt from their fathers, for the use of 
hunting implements and for the making of houses and clothes, ete. ; 
but, for the rest, they are dependent on the surrounding nature and 
its products. This ground for their existence and for the higher 
features of their culture I shall call the economic culture?. 
Tradition and natural surroundings are the two determining factors 
for the culture. What is traditional and customary can be trans- 
formed either by something having been learnt from without (borrowed 
culture), or by an adaptation having taken place in accordance 
with the altered natural conditions (new adaptation). 
With a primitive people like the Eskimo which is partly a remote 
border-folk and partly inhabits districts with distinct geographical 
characteristic features, it is natural to assume that new adaptation 
has played an important réle in the origin of the various nuances 
of the Eskimo culture, and perhaps, also, in the birth of the culture 
itself. 
What will be given in this work, then, will be an attempt to 
follow the adaptation or the direct dependence of the culture on 
nature by studying the relation between the conditions of nature on 
the one side and the conditions of culture on the other. Finally an 
‘ cf. Mauss et Beucuart, pp. 53 sqq. 
* I prefer in this connection the expression “economic culture” to “industrial 
culture” or to the even more comprehensive ‘‘material culture”, as I wish 
to express that it is just the basis of existence (especially the procuring of 
food), answering to the economic basis of the higher forms of culture, 
which will here be studied and pursued. 
