530 



W. Thalbitzer 



tern has been made with sinew-thread on a white ground. The 

 human shapes are dark pieces of skin that have been sewn on 

 (a and b); on b there are also umiaks and kaiaks, birds etc. The 

 cross-shaped figures on с and / (bottom) are meant to be birds; 

 they are called itarqalnniijät, 'flying or flapping the wings.' I shall 

 later return to the description of the patterns (chapter on orna- 

 mentation). 



Larger bags of thick skin (imiijaq, plur. imikkat) are used for 

 holding the sealer's stores of blubber during the winter (pp. 41, 61, 

 131). I have seen a great sealer inspect 12 or 14 large bags filled 

 with seal-blubber after the hunting of crested seals in late summer 

 near Cape Dan. 



Near the lamps of the house there may be 

 seen some small, flat and open bags or skin- 

 bowls in which the wick-moss lies ready for 

 use (fig. 256 e). 



At Boothia Felix Mac Clintock saw a similar bag 

 in the snow-hut where the woman was sitting on the 

 platform: "Her 'tinder-box' was a little seal-skin bag 

 of soft dry moss, and with a lump of iron pyrites and 

 a broken file she struck fire upon it." ^) 



FlRE-MAKING IMPLEMENTS (p. 41). — Fig. 256 



shows all the diff'erent parts belonging here: a 

 is a piece of flat wood with many, blackened 

 conical holes on the upper side caused by the 

 drill-stick; in these depressions the sparks are 

 made by small loosened particles of the wood 



Fig. 255, Bag made 

 of fish heads sewn 

 together. (Greenland 

 Administ. coll.). C. Чз. 



which become red-hot owing to friction, b is 



the cross-bar with a concaved bone-knob fast- 

 ened to the middle which supports the top of the drill-stick during 

 use (thus replacing the mouth-piece in the boring of holes, cf. p. 480). 

 с shows a complete set of fire-making implements; the drill-stick, 

 the cross-bar and the skin-string lie upon a board with many black- 

 ened holes on the upper side; the cross-bar has ferrules at each 

 end besides the bone-knob in the middle; the string is provided 

 with a bone-handle at either end (instead of the drill-bow used in 

 boring holes), c/ is a piece of wood cut [in the shape of a bird, 

 which has been used for making fire, as seen by the blackened 

 hole in the middle of the one side, e is a skin-bowl filled with 

 tinder moss. 



It is generally two women who help each other to make fire. 

 The old Akernilik (a man) and his wife show^ed me the mode of 



') Mac Clintock (18.')!)) p. 25U. 



