4 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [Bull. 192 



Cape Fairweather between Dry Bay and Lituya Bay. The Eyak of 

 the Copper River Delta farther west were not a distinct people; indeed, 

 the inhabitants of Cape Martin were grouped with them in Yakutat 

 thought, although the Cape Martin people are said to have been 

 originally an offshoot of those living in Controller Bay. Vague 

 traditions suggest that the area between Cape Fairweather and Cross 

 Sound ma,j have been occupied by the same groups that lived at Dry 

 Bay, though mixed with Tlingit of southeastern Alaskan derivation. 

 In any case, this Lituya Bay region is now deserted, though claimed 

 as hunting territory by a Tlingit sib of Hoonah, in southeastern 

 Alaska. (Map 2.) 



All of the Gulf of Alaska Indians are said to have been divided into 

 exogamous matrilineal moieties (Raven and Eagle), like those of the 

 Tlingit, and the legendary history of the area is told in the form of 

 sib traditions. The interior Athabaskans — the Atna of the Copper 

 River and the Southern Tutchone of the upper Yukon and Alsek 

 Rivers — also have a similar social organization, and the Yakutat 

 people felt that they were related to them through migration and 

 intermarriage. 



Excluding the Copper River Delta on the west and the Lituya Bay- 

 Cape Spencer area on the southeast, the GuK of Alaska may be 

 divided into the following four districts, according to native thought: 



(1) Controller Bay and the shore almost to the Icy Bay area is claimed 

 by the Qalyix-Kagwantan, an originally Eyak-speaking Eagle sib 

 who settled at the KaUakh River (from which the first part of 

 their name is derived), after "the Flood." There is, however, strong 

 evidence that a branch of Chugach Eskimo may have occupied, and 

 certainly frequented, Controller Bay during the 18th century, until 

 they were driven from it by the Tlingit or THngitized Eyak from the 

 east. This is attested by Chugach and Copper River Eyak traditions, 

 by Eskimo place names in Controller Bay, and by the observations of 

 Steller and other 18th-century explorers (Birket-Smith and de Laguna, 

 1938, pp. 341-354; Birket-Smith, 1953, pp. 19, 20). Before their 

 expansion westward, the Galyix-Kagwantan were presumably living 

 between Cape Suclding and Cape Yakataga. The distribution of the 

 Eyak language suggests, of course, that at a still earlier period the 

 Indians lived in Controller Bay. The division into Copper River and 

 Yakutat dialects may have been caused by the subsequent intrusion 

 of the Eskimo. Indian tradition tells of Chugach raids on the village 

 at the Kaliakh River, and even as far east as Yakutat Bay. The 

 versions of some infomiants that Yakutat Bay was originally occupied 

 by Eskimo may reflect Chugach occupation of Controller Bay and 

 their warlike excursions into Yakutat territory, as well as the fact that 

 skin boats, like those of the Chugach, were once used on Yakutat Bay. 



