658 



W. Thalbitzer 



certain places in and outside the house or a sledge-journey out to a foreign 

 settlement, all varying according to the way in which the ajagaq was caught, 

 e. g. as follows: — 1 (first throw), he appears from the inner part of the 

 platform, 2 he gets up, 3 comes to the middle of the platform, 4 to the 

 edge of it, 5 descends, 6 and goes out on the middle of the floor, 7 then to 

 the inner door-waj^ 8 descends, 9 goes to the middle of the house-passage, 

 10 to the outer door-way, 11 ascends, 12 the refuse-heap, 13 then the stone 



where the frozen blubber is beaten, 14 the umiak, 15 the 

 sledge, 16 arranges the traces, 17 harnesses the dogs to 

 the sledge etc. ; the following five throws are each for one 

 of the dogs, then come five for each of the points of 

 land they drive past in the sledges; in a similar way is 

 now described the arrival on land, the ascent across the 

 ice-knolls on shore to the umiak where the dogs are un- 

 harnessed; now the man beats another with clenched 

 fist, stabs a second one, splits the head of a third, cuts 

 a fourth to pieces, strikes off the head of a fifth, the 

 arms of a sixth and seventh; the pieces cut off are 

 thrown to the dogs, which devour them and then eject 

 certain parts; he throws them also to the foxes, the 

 raven, the crabs in the bottom of the sea, and also 

 these animals devour them and emit them again. The 



^ — ^ H^ — , , game is finished when one of the players has won, the 



Fig. 387. other lost. The whole of this tale which is probably 



Ajagaq tube. Nualik. connected locally with a part of the west coast was un- 

 (Amdrup coll.). known in the Ammassaliker's ajagaq-games. 

 In this connection I may mention another game which in olden times 

 has also been known in northern West Greenland but as far as I know not 

 near Ammassalik. It corresponds to the game nuglutang known from Baffin 

 Land, and by the late inspector Olrik has been described as follows: "For 

 this game a bodkin of walrus-tooth curved in the upper end') and an oval, 

 flat block of the same material are required; the latter is perforated and 

 made fast to a stick which is placed under the ceiling ^«^»^.»^ 



or on the floor, and at a distance of 10 to 12 feet 

 attempts are now made to throw the bodkin sus- 

 pended down from the ceiling by a long string in 

 such a way, that the point hits the hole in the flat 

 block. To make this more difficult some seal-teeth 

 strung on a sinew thread are often placed in front 

 of the hole to be struck." 2) 



Balls (artcät) varying in size from a walnut 

 to a clenched fist are made by the women of 

 two round pieces of raw-hide or gut-skin, a 

 larger and a smaller piece, stretched over and sewn together round 

 a lump of straw, moss or peat. The smaller piece of skin is 

 only intended to form a lid or cover, on the border of which the 

 folded and gathered edges of the large piece of skin are made fast 



^j^.vî%^^ 



Fig. 388. Ball. 

 (Thalbitzer coll.). 1/2. 



') Of this kind are undoubtedly the two bodkins with curved tops and ornamented 

 with carved human faces found in Pfaffs collection and previously described 

 by me аУ09) pp. 521—525, figs. 92 93. 



^) According to an extract from the inventory of the National Museum (Copenhagen). 



