Ethnographical collections from East Greenland. 535 



is thus not found in the row of the larger, cooking lamps, which 

 rest on the lamp-stools above the lamp-platforms along the edge of 

 the main-platform (cf. pp. 356 — 357). The lamp-stool is a block of 

 wood hollowed to a shallow bowl for receiving the oil dripping 

 from the lamp, and provided with three or four legs (figs. 30, 258c- 

 and 260 c). 



It is not the custom among the Ammassalikers as among the 

 West Greenlanders to fill the lamps with chewed or hammered 

 blubber (i. e. half melted into oil); the blubber melts owing to the 

 heat of the lamps^). Sometimes they place a piece of blubber over 

 the fire stuck on a wooden stick with a single or double hook hang- 

 ing down from the drying frame, so that the oil drips down into the 

 lamp to feed the flame. Amdrup found at Skærgaardshalvø north 

 of Ammassalik two sooty hooks of wood which were said by the 

 Ammassalikers to have been put to this use 2). — The w^ck-trimmer 

 is used for pressing and arranging the pieces of blubber and for 

 turning over and trimming the moss so that it does not smoke ^). 



The lamps burn all day long and part of the night; they are 

 looked after by the women on the platform who take great care 

 that they do not smoke. When the inmates are asleep during the 

 night most of the lamps are extinguished, but one or two are al- 

 ways kept burning unless there is a dearth of blubber. In hard 

 times the Ammassalikers have sometimes been obliged to use other 

 lighting material in their houses (heather, drift-timber) '^). 



Technical names: oonarqe (plur. oonarqilin) lamp; atter smaller 

 lamp placed on the floor; pisitiät (Holm) or ippatin lamp-stool; 

 aki'^nna interval between the legs of the lamp-stool; qurtulurpik, 

 quttuluppe 'dripping place,' the hollow in the lamp-stool, or else a 



The common Eskimo way of crushing the blubber for tlie lamp with a piece 

 of wood or a bone mallet (maul) is unknown at Ammassalik. The West Green- 

 landers call such a mallet kaawarsit, the crushed blubber kaawartaq. North- 

 wards on the east coast Amdrup found such a blubber-mallet (Thalbitzer, 1909, 

 pp. 441-443, fig. 44, cf. p. 533 and fig. 105. Idem, 1911, p. 39); similar imple- 

 ments are seen in the Gjøa collection (Amundsen) in Christiania, in the collec- 

 tions from the Netchilik Eskimo, described by Boas (1907, p. 402, fig. 199), and 

 in collections from Alaska (Murdoch, 1892, p. 98, figs 31-32 etc; Nelson, 1899, 

 p. 79). 



Thalbitzer (1909) pp. 406—407, fig. 24. 



Wick-trimmers of asbestos were used in earlier times on the west coast but 

 are unknown at Ammassalik. Several specimens (ca. 30 cm. in length) are found 

 in Pfaff's collection. They are used not onh^ for trimming the wicks but also 

 like candles for lighting up certain places. Parry also saw some in the Boothia 

 Gulf (Repulse Bay) where thej^ were called tatko, cf. the Greenland word tar- 

 qippaa 'to trim the wick and make the flame of the lamp burn higher.' 

 For the comparative study of the Eskimo lamps and their use I may refer the 

 reader to W. Houghs interesting paper on this matter (1896i. 



