MURDOCH. ] CROOKED KNIVES. L5G 
Simpson (op. cit., p. 266) as brought for sale by the Nunatantmiun, who 
obtained them from the Siberian natives, and which he believes to be 
varried as far as the strait of Fury and Hecla. It would be interesting 
to decide whether the stone hunting knives were an original idea of the 
Eskimo, or whether they were copies, in stone, of the first few iron 
knives obtained from Siberia; but more material is needed before the 
matter can be cleared up. 
The natives of Point Barrow, in ordinary conversation, call all knives 
savik, which also means iron, and is identically the same as the word 
used in Greenland for the same objects. If, then, there was a time, as 
these people say, when their ancestors were totally ignorant of the use 
of iron—and the large number of stone implements still found among 
them is strongly corroborative of this—the use of this name indicates 
that the first iron was obtained from the east, along with the soap- 
stone lamps, instead of from Siberia. Had it first come from Siberia, as 
tobacco did, we should expect to find it, like the latter, called by a 
Russian or Siberian name. 
Like all the Eskimo of North America from Cape Bathurst westward, 
the natives of Point Barrow use for fine whittling and carving on wood, 
ivory, bone, ete., ‘‘ecrooked knives,” consisting of a small blade, set on 
the under side of the end of a long curved haft, so that the edge, which 
is beveled only on the upper face, projects about as much as that of a 
spokeshave. The curve of blade and haft is such that when the under 
surface of the blade rests against the surface to be cut the end of the 
haft points up at an angle of about 45°. This knife differs essentially 
from the crooked carying knife so generally used by the Indians of 
North America. As a rule the latter has only the blade (which is 
_otten double edged) curved and stuck into the end of a straight haft. 
These knives are at the present time made of iron or steel and are of two 
two sizes, a large knife, mi/dlin, with a haft 10 to 20 inches long, intended 
for working on wood, and a small one, savigro/n (lit. ‘an instrument for 
shaving”), with a haft 6 or 7 inches long and intended specially for cut- 
ting bone and ivory. Both sizes are handled in the same way. The 
knife is held close to the blade between the index and second fingers of 
the right hand with the thumb over the edge, which is toward the work- 
man. The workman draws the knife toward him, using his thumb as a 
check to gauge the depth of the cut. The natives use these knives with 
very great skill, taking off long and very even shavings and producing 
very neat workmanship. 
There are in the collection four large knives and thirteen small ones. 
No. 89278 [787] (Fig. 113) will serve as the type of the large knives. 
The haftt is a piece of reindeer antler, flat on one face and rounded on 
the other, and the curve is toward the rounded face. The flat face is 
hollowed out by cutting away the cancellated tissue from the bend to 
336). The almost exclusive use of the double-edged pan’na is the reason their work is so ‘‘ remarkably 
coarse and clumsy. 
