THE ULU, OR WOMAN'S KNIFE, OF THE ESKIMO, 



By Otis T. Mason. 



The apparatus described in this paper finds its modern representative 

 in the saddlers knife, the shoemaker's knife, the tailor's shears, the 

 butcher's knife, the fishmonger's knife, and the kitchen knife. A cu- 

 rious survival of form with change of function is the common kitchen 

 " chopping knife," which woman may be said to have held in her pos-* 

 session since the birth of invention. This little instrument that has ever 

 attended the march of civilization is called " uln," or " ooloo," by the 

 Eskimo, or more commonly the " woman's knife." 



It is well to recall in this connection that in savagery the peaceful 

 arts, such as housemaking, furnishing, tailoring, butchering, gleaning, 

 milling, cooking, spinuing, netting, weaving, and the like, belong to 

 women. Many of the stone implements and pottery vessels recovered 

 from the mounds and graves are found with skeletons of females. In 

 the study of culture, therefore, the work of women can not be over- 

 looked. 



The motive for bringing together this series of objects, however, is to 

 show how, by means of a very simple form or invention, some of the 

 most difficult problems of anthropology may be discussed. They will be 

 taken up in the following order: 



(1) Among the same race or stock, and in the same period, there are 

 varieties of form, structure, a:ul decoration, peculiar to separate culture 

 areas. 



(2) Upon the simplest as upon the most complicated appliance of 

 human activity the earth and its productions leave unmistakable im- 

 pressions. 



(3) The coarseness or refinement of a tribe or location is revealed in 

 the tools of the commonest occupation. 



(4) The arts and apparatus of savagery are continued into civilization, 

 and with change of name or function retain some of their original form. 



There are a great many examples of the Ulu in the National Museum, 

 and there are thousands of pieces of slate, shale, quartzite, and other 

 stone which correspond exactly with the blades of the Eskimo woman's 

 knife. These have been gathered from village sites, shell heaps, the 

 surface of the soil, from graves, mounds, and Indian camps in countless 

 numbers. This need surprise no one who reflects that every woman 



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