a 
An Anthropogeographical Study of the Origin of the Eskimo Culture. 175 
there may be a question of various continental Asiatic elements: 
Korean, Japanese, indeed even Malayan, and, possibly, still other 
elements. 
ce. Direct influence from East Asiatic, not Paleasiatic, navigators who 
have reached as far as the Eskimo, along the Pacific Coast. In 
this connection ‘special attention must be paid to the Japanese, 
and to the period when they were great navigators, before the 
beginning of the 17th century. 
There might be a question of yet a 7th source for the influence 
on the Eskimo, viz., the old Norse population in the eastern and western 
districts of South-west Greenland. There has been an inclination to 
point to Norse influence, for instance, in the structure of the Eskimo 
house in South Greenland and in the Eskimo employment of iron etc.; 
but such influence has not been conclusively proved, and whatever the 
circumstances may be, a Scandinavian influence in South Greenland 
can never have had, however, any decisive influence whatever on the 
fundamental shaping of the Eskimo culture. 
In the following lines we shall further consider the economic culture 
of the Prairie Indians, and still more so, of the northern Forest Indians, 
‘inasmuch as, as has been suggested, it is amongst these two groups in 
particular that one may expect to find represented those conditions of 
culture which have formed the basis for the Eskimo culture. 
The Economie Culture of. the Prairie Indians. The economic culture 
which has developed on the prairie cannot entirely represent the direct 
mother-culture of the Paleeskimo culture. But a consideration of it 
will tend, however, to throw light upon pre-Eskimo conditions. This is 
especially true because the prairie and tundra, regarded anthropogeo- 
graphically, present very similar conditions. The Eskimo must have pas- 
sed the tundra, and have essentially lived there before they came to 
the shores of the Arctic. The chief means of subsistence with the prairie 
tribes was bison hunting, but on the tundra the bison herds were re- 
placed by the musk ox and enormous herds of reindeer. 
It is true that the climate of the tundra is considerably colder than 
that of the prairie, which accounts, also, for the difference in the vege- 
tation; but the northern parts of the prairie still have a very cold winter 
together with a comparatively warm, but short, summer. On the prairie, 
therefore, we also find a cultural dimorphism corresponding with this. 
This first shows itself in the conditions of their dwellings. The typical 
summer dwelling of the prairie tribes is the conical skin-tent of the 
“Tipi” form. It evidently originates from the dome-tent, but it is a 
form! which came into use even before the time of the Europeans, 
even if, with the introduction of the horse, it seems to have been more 
generally distributed. As a winter dwelling, either this form of tent or 
1 SARFERT, pp. 22 sqq. 
