I20  SMITHSONIAN    MISCELLANEOUS    COLLECTIONS  VOL.    96 
the  edges  descend  at  a  rather  sharp  angle  from  the  center,  which  is 
either  flat  or  slightly  concave.  The  small  rounded  elevations  to  either 
side  of  the  line  hole — survivals  of  the  elevated  Old  Bering  Sea 
"  eye  " — are  to  be  seen  on  these  type  III  (a)  x  heads  just  as  they 
were  on  the  early  Punuk  forms  of  type  III  x.  They  are  lacking  on 
plate  28,  figure  14,  a  head  which,  to  judge  from  the  decoration,  is  one 
of  the  latest  of  its  type  at  Miyowagh. 
In  short,  the  harpoon  heads  of  type  III  (a)  x  have  become  thor- 
oughly standardized ;  they  exhibit  hardly  a  trace  of  the  rich  diversity 
of  form  that  characterized  the  ancestral  Old  Bering  Sea  heads  of 
type  III  x.  The  ornamentation  has  likewise  arrived  at  an  almost 
dead  level  of  uniformity.  The  same  basic  design,  with  but  slight 
variation,  is  repeated  with  monotonous  regularity  on  each  decorated 
harpoon  head  of  this  type.  This  design  consists  of  two  parts :  a  pair 
of  lines  beginning  at  a  single  point  at  the  base  of  the  blade  slit  (on 
the  side  opposite  the  socket),  then  diverging  to  pass  around  either  side 
of  the  line  hole,  and  becoming  forked  at  the  lower  ends;  paralleling 
these  are  two  outer  lines,  beginning  nearer  the  tip  and  extending 
downward  along  the  edges,  where  at  a  point  below  the  level  of  the 
line  hole  they  each  meet  a  similar  line  from  the  opposite  side.  Between 
these  outer  lines  on  the  opposite  (or  socket)  side  there  is  again  a 
pair  of  lines  passing  around  the  line  hole,  but  because  of  the  space 
taken  up  by  the  socket,  these  lines  do  not  fork  at  the  ends  but  continue 
straight.  Such  is  the  skeleton  of  the  design  on  each  of  these  harpoon 
heads.  Within  these  lines  are  smaller  decorative  elements — light  spurs 
and  dots — which  fortunately  are  less  stereotyped  than  the  lines  them- 
selves. At  first  the  spurs  are  small  and  faint,  and  are  attached  to 
the  lines  more  or  less  at  a  right  angle  (pi.  28,  figs.  8-1 1).  They  may 
occur  either  singly  or  in  pairs ;  when  they  occupy  a  space  between  two 
converging  lines  there  is  a  tendency  for  them  to  join  and  for  a  dot, 
or  two  dots,  to  be  placed  just  above  or  below  the  point  of  junction. 
Later,  the  spurs  became  longer  (pi.  28,  figs.  12,  13)  and  of  necessity 
more  acute  in  order  that  they  might  occupy  the  narrow  space  between 
the  converging  lines.  Plate  28,  figure  14,  is  the  end  result  of  this 
elongation  of  the  spurs,  which,  having  joined,  now  appear  as  bold 
V-shaped  figures  between  the  forks  and  angles  of  the  lines.  This  and 
two  others  (cut  17,  34  in.,  and  cut  20,  26  in.)  are  the  only  harpoon 
heads  from  Miyowagh  with  spurs  that  have  reached  this  exaggerated 
stage,  which  as  we  shall  see  later  is  a  characteristic  style  of  decoration 
at  the  Punuk  site,  levoghiyoq. 
Open  socket  type  III  (a)  y. — Same  as  type  III  (a)  x  except  that 
the  blade  slit  is  at  right  angles  to  the  line  hole;  decoration  Punuk, 
or  plain  (rarely  Old  Bering  Sea).    (PI.  23,  fig.  9 ;  pi.  28,  figs.  15-18.) 
