88 THE POINT BARROW ESKIMO. 
make them. For instance, the Eskimo of the Coppermine River 
‘form very neat dishes of fir, the sides bemg made of thin deal, bent 
into an oval form, secured at the ends by sewing, and fitted so nicely 
to the bottom as to be perfectly water-tight.”! There are specimens in 
the Museum from the Mackenzie and Anderson Rivers, described in the 
MacFarlane MS. as ‘pots for drinking with, pails for carrying and 
keeping water, and also as chamber pots. Oil is also sometimes carried 
in them in winter.” 
In some places where wood is scarce vessels of a similar pattern are 
made of whalebone. Vessels ‘made of whalebone, in a circular form, 
one piece being bent into the proper shape for the sides,” are mentioned 
by Capt. Parry on the west shore of Baffins Bay,? and “ cirewlar and 
oval vessels of whalebone” were in use at Iglulik.2 This is the same 
as the Greenlandic vessel called pertak (a name which appears to have 
been transferred in the form pi/ttino to the wooden meat bowl at Point 
Barrow), ‘‘a dish made of a piece of whalebone bent into a hoop, which 
makes the sides, with a wooden bottom inserted.”4 Nordenskiéld 
speaks of vessels of whalebone at Pitlekaj, but does not specify the 
pattern. Whalebone dishes were used at Point Barrow, but at the 
present day only small ones for drinking-cups are in general service. 
One large dish was collected. (Fig. 18. No. 89850 [1199] ). 
A strip of whalebone 44 inches wide is bent round a nearly circular 
bottom of cottonwood so as to form a small tub. The edges of the bot- 
tom are chamfered to fit a 
shallow croze in the whale- 
bone. The overlapping ends 
of the whalebone are sewed 
together with a strip of 
whalebone in long stitches. 
This dish is quite old and 
impregnated with grease. 
Vessels of this kind are un- 
common, and it is probable 
that none have been made 
since whalebone acquired its 
present commercial value. 
They were very likely in much more general use formerly, as when there 
was no such market for whalebone as at present it would be cheaper to 
make tubs of this material than to buy wooden ones. In corroboration 
of this view it may be noted that Dr. Simpson does not mention wooden- 
ware among the articles brought for sale by the Nunatatmiun.’ The 
small whalebone vessels will be described under drinking cups, which 
see. 
Fic. 18.—Whalebone dish. 
' Franklin, Ist Exp., vol. 2, p. 181. 4Gronl. Ordbog., p. 293. 
2Virst Voy., p. 286. 5 Vega, vol. 2, p. 124. 
3Second Voy., p. 503. 6 Op. cit., p. 266. 
