ETHNOLOGY OF ARCTIC AMERICA 



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as, or higher than, any known today and whose influence reached 

 as far to the north as Point Barrow. 



Need for Archeological Excavation 



We cannot hope to determine the antiquity of all these early 

 cultures, their relationship to each other, or their subsequent develop- 

 ments and changes down to the present time until we have a much 

 fuller knowledge of the elements of each and a more extensive collec- 

 tion of the implements and utensils it has left behind. For the 



Fig. 3 — Objects representing the 

 early Bering Sea culture: a, ivory 

 handle of a skin scraper; h, decorated 

 harpoon foreshaft; c, ivory harpoon 

 head with multiple terminal barbs 

 and slots in the fore end for fllint 

 blades. Objects a and 6 are three- 

 eighths, c is three-fifths natural size. 



moment our most pressing need in the Arctic is the excavation of 

 the ancient ruins, not in the haphazard, uncritical manner only too 

 common in past years, when Eskimos were paid for the number of 

 "curios" they could recover, without regard to their origin or age — 

 this will only confuse the problems — ; but by rigid, scientific methods 

 that will take into account the geological and botanical conditions, 

 the locations of the sites, the depths of the remains beneath the soil, 

 and all the other factors that are relevant to the inquiry. A little 

 such work has already been done in Alaska, the Hudson Bay region, 

 and Greenland; but much more is required. Travelers who have no 

 time to excavate can render good service by noting the locations, 

 condition, and apparent ages of all the ruined dwellings they en- 

 counter and recording, especially in the central region from the 

 Mackenzie River delta to Hudson Bay, the materials that entered 

 into their construction, whether wood, stone, or bones of whale. 



