Marriage, Childbirth, etc. 167 



^aid that it had provided the foxes with a good meal. Very rarely some other 

 woman in the settlement takes pity on the helpless infant; thus, when a Dolphin 

 and Union strait woman named Keyuk exposed her baby without first suffocating 

 it, another woman rescued it and reared it as her own child. The mother seems 

 to forfeit all claim to it in such cases even when the child grows up. One 

 thing these natives have to their credit, however — they never resort to pre- 

 natal infanticide; I am not sure whether it is known even, although a native 

 who quarrelled with his wife when she was pregnant threw her down in the snow 

 and rolled his foot on her stomach. 



Within two or three days of its birth a child that escapes exposure is given 

 a name, or rather two and soix^etimes even three names. These are often suggest- 

 ed by relatives, but the decision rests with the parents. Usually there is very 

 little choice, for it is customary to name the child after a near kinsman who 

 has recently died; nevertheless differences of opinion do occasionally arise 

 when two or three kinsmen have died within the space of a few years. All 

 the names of the kinsmen descend to the child, or to the young dog, for the 

 same rule applies to dogs also. Aksiatak called one of his dogs Itaiyuk after 

 his dead father; later, when his wife bore him a son, he named him Itaiyuk 

 also. Higilak, again, held a discussion with Ikpakhuak as to the name she 

 should give to one of their pups; finally she called it Nerialak after Ikpakhuak's 

 elder brother who had died two or three years before. A few months later 

 her grandchild was born and received the name Nerialak also. 



Distinctions of sex never enter apparently into the question of names 

 The dead Nerialak above mentioned was a man, while the baby that was named 

 after him was a girl. Higilak's daughter was named Kanneyuk, and there 

 was a man Kanneyuk in a neighbouring group. I do not know in this instance 

 whether they were both named after the same person, in which case their other 

 names would be the same also. Such a thing is not uncommon however; there 

 were two Puivlik children, for example, both boys, who were called Utuallu 

 Taipanna after a common kinsman. 



The majority of the people seemed to have two names, though some had 

 only one and a few three; but the third was usually a nickname. Where a 

 native had two names one would often be used for a few months, then the other 

 would supersede it for a time without any apparent reason for the change. 

 Thus, when first we entered the country, Ikpakhuak's wife was always known 

 as Taktu. In the summer of 1915 her second name Higilak gradually took 

 its place, and during our last year the name of Taktu was seldom heard.' It 

 was used sometimes nevertheless, so that plainly there was no taboo concerning 

 the matter. A Noahognik boy had two names, Taptuna and Hahra, but 

 hardly anyone used the second name except his father. 



A child often receives another name later on in life, a sobriquet from some 

 peculiarity in its appearance or an event in its career. Sometimes this nickname 

 entirely supersedes the proper names. Thus a Puivlik Eskimo who possessed 

 an unusually big nose was always known as Kingalokanna, "Big Nose". Another 

 man who had both his feet amputated as a result of frost-bite was called Iti- 

 gaitok, "Footless", and a Kanghiryuak native for a similar reason was called 

 Nilgak, "The Limper". Higilak's elder brother received the name of Kaulak 

 when he was born, but one day when he was out hunting, he said, he heard some 

 wolves talking about him, caUing him Tusayok "The Listener", so he immediately 

 changed his name and was always called Tusayok afterwards. In recent years 



'Mr. Stefansson was misled by this use of the second name without any explanation, and consequently 

 over-estimated the number of the Hannerak group. The Puivlik natives told him of the family Tak- 

 tukkut (i.e. Taktuk's family), and of a man named Avranna (Anthrop. Papers, A.M.N.H., Vol. XIV, 

 pt. I, p. 250). Now Avranna was Taktuk's son, and Taktuk, or Taktu, was Higilak, the woman who 

 had travelled to Tree river and composed a song in commemoration of the journey, ibid., p. 34). 



