4  SMITHSONIAN    MISCELLANEOUS    COLLECTIONS  VOL.    96 
past  an  intimate  and  extensive  contact  between  the  tribes  of  north- 
eastern Asia  and  of  northwestern  America,  exclusive  of  the  Eskimo. 
The  latter,  according  to  the  theory,  were  thought  to  have  entered 
Alaska  from  the  eastward,  forming  a  wedge  which  separated  the 
northwestern  Indians  from  the  related  tribes  of  northeastern  Siberia 
(Boas,  1905,  pp.  91-100). 
From  the  standpoint  of  linguistics,  Thalbitzer  considers  that  the 
Eskimos  came  originally  from  the  region  around  Bering  Strait,  a 
view  which  is  also  shared  by  Bogoras  (1925,  p.  225)  and  Jenness 
(1933.  PP-  380-381). 
The  West  Eskimo  forms  of  words  are  as  a  rule  fuller  and  more  heterogeneous 
than  the  Greenlandic  forms ;  they  are  accordingly  at  an  earlier  stage  of  develop- 
ment.   [Thalbitzer,  1904,  p.  266.] 
I  still  believe  (like  Rink),  that  the  common  Eskimo  mother-group  has  at  one 
time  lived  to  the  west  of  the  Bering  Strait,  coming  originally  from  the  coasts 
of  Siberia.  In  this  way  we  should  best  explain  the  striking  agreement  in  those 
common  archaic  features  of  the  Greenland  implements  or  other  objects  (eye- 
shades  ornamented  with  ivory  reliefs,  etc.)  and  the  Alaskan,  which  are  absent 
from  the  intermediate  regions The  agreement  between  the  old  material 
culture  of  the  Greenlanders  and  a  little  older  stage  of  the  Alaskan  Eskimo's 
culture  is  striking.  In  a  large  number  of  points,  further,  this  common  Eskimo 
culture  agrees  with  the  cultures  in  Asia  of  the  Chukchee  and  neighbouring 
coastal  tribes.  In  the  points  in  which  the  culture  of  the  intervening  or  central 
Eskimo  groups  differs  from  the  main  types  of  this  common  culture,  in  special 
or  absent  features,  we  see  recent  inventions,  local  specializations  or  defects. 
[Thalbitzer,  1914,  pp.  717,  718.] 
With  the  publication  of  Steensby's  "  Anthropogeographical  Study 
of  the  Origin  of  the  Eskimo  Culture  "  in  1916,  the  problem  enters 
a  new  phase.  This  work  marked  a  notable  advance  in  that  it  pointed 
out  and  laid  particular  emphasis  upon  a  stratification  in  Eskimo  cul- 
ture, Steensby  recognized  that  the  Eskimos'  material  culture,  par- 
ticularly as  regards  hunting  methods  and  implements,  could  be  divided 
into  three  main  groups.  The  first  group  included  those  elements  which 
were  common  to  both  the  Arctic  and  sub-Arctic  Eskimos.  The  second 
group  comprised  the  methods  and  implements  which  occurred  among 
the  sub-Arctic  Eskimos  of  the  east  and  west,  but  which  were  lacking 
in  the  central  regions — kayak  hunting  on  the  open  sea,  the  umiak, 
bird  dart,  etc.  In  the  third  group  were  included  those  elements  of 
an  essentially  Arctic  character,  typical  of  the  central  archipelago — the 
various  methods  of  hunting  on  the  sea  ice,  the  dog  sledge,  snow  house, 
etc.  Steensby  considered  that  the  last  group  represented  the  oldest 
form  of  Eskimo  culture  because:  (i)  the  elements  of  the  second  or 
sub-Arctic  group  were  absent  in  the  central  regions  only  because  of 
