Ethnographical collections from East Greenland. 537 



grating with three bars; also the broad end-pieces are found here 

 but are of quite a different shape, the one being triangular and end- 

 ing in a roundish blade (the seal-tail ornament at the lower end), 

 the other is more rectangular and has a knob shaped like a door- 

 handle at the upper end. In the specimen seen in fig. 259 the one 

 side of the lower blade is wanting and the shank of the handle is 

 broken (and repaired). It is however a typical specimen with its 

 characteristic "key-hole" at the upper end, intended for the terminal 

 knot of the strap that has to be wound round the frame for drying 

 purposes; by moving the knot a little downwards through this hole 

 the knot will come down in a countersinking and the strap could 

 then be tightened. This implement is mostly used for winding up 

 and drying the long harpoon and bladder lines which the sealer 

 uses from his kaiak. It is kept in the house. 



While the smaller drying frame is undoubtedly characteristic of the 

 Ammassalikers, the larger one is found in eastern Eskimo regions and west- 

 wards as far as the Mackenzie River (but I have not seen it from the west- 

 ern Eskimo regions) ^). Parry gives the following description of it from the 

 Eskimo snow-huts in Boothia Gulf. "Immediately over the lamp is fixed a 

 rude and ricketty framework of wood, from which their pots are suspended, 

 and serving also to sustain a large hoop of bone, having a net stretched 

 tight within it. This contrivance, called innetat, is intended for the reception 

 of any wet things, and is usually loaded with boots, shoes, and mittens." 



The cooking pots {ootsit, oolurturpik, neqileerïn, p. 39 and figs. 

 257, 258, 260) made of soapstone are only used for cooking the many 

 kinds of meat and fish. Roasting is not used. The pots are con- 

 sidered a valuable part of the furniture; they are inherited and 

 many or most of them are undoubtedly of great age. They are of 

 course also acquired by purchase. Umeerinneq for example had a 

 large and beautiful soapstone pot which he had bought from the 

 widow Noorjajerqwar for a gun transferred to her son, as her hus- 

 band the maker of the pot had died. — In most houses at Ammas- 

 salik the old soapstone pots have now been superseded by iron pots. 



Further north on the same coast soapstone pots have been found 

 among the ruins of houses by Amdrup at Nualik, by Ryder in 

 Scoresby Sound and by the German Expedition towards the north 

 at Jackson Island^). 



The food and its preparation. — The old woman named 

 Qiwingataaq (p. 526) told me all the dishes known in the houses of 

 the Ammassalikers. The following reveals her "cookery book." 



Dishes of meat. Seal-meat is eaten boiled, dried or frozen. The 

 boiled meat (ooiissaq) is the main food. There is a great difference 



^) Parry (1824) p. 502; Petitot (1887) fig. V. (pp. 192 — 193); Hough (1896) p. 1042. 

 3) Ryder (1895) pp. 328—329, fig. 26; Koldewey (1874) p. 649. 



