Melodies from East Greenland. 51 
Every word, every tone had to be isolated and repeated, often 
10 or 20 times, before the final result was obtained. But this pene- 
trating analysis had a rich reward. We succeeded in determining 
that these Eskimo songs, which are regarded as primitive music, in 
reality contain very different types of song; that in these, in the 
melodies as in the poetry composed for them, there reigns a wonderful 
technique with distinct rules for composition and rhythm. These 
rules naturally are very different in certain characteristics from those 
we know, for example, from the European folk-songs of the Middle 
Ages or from the Icelandic bard-songs. But even in Greenland we 
also meet with artistically formed poems and songs. With regard 
to the music the results of the analysis are dealt with in Part I 
by Hj. Thuren; the texts will be discussed in detail by myself in 
Part Ш. 
I had already begun to use my phonograph on the west coast 
of Greenland. At the end of July 1905 I arrived at Egedesminde 
from Iginiarfik (a Greenland settlement in one of the large fjords 
south of the main town in North-West Greenland). In Egedesminde 
my baggage and apparatus for the Ammassalik journey were stored 
for the time; also my phonograph. In the beginning of August I 
brought this from the store to my house. In addition to the un- 
played rolls I had also a dozen with European music. With these 
I first of all amused the Greenlanders and my countrymen of the 
town. The phonograph was brought up into an opening in the gable 
of the church, and from here one light night rang out over the town 
and harbour of Egedesminde the voices of the Danish opera singers 
and Mendelssohn’s Midsummer’s Nighi’s Dream. The natives — here 
as all along the west coast of mixed blood, half or three-quarters 
Danish, half or less than half Eskimo — were delighted with these 
musical entertainments, so rare in arctic latitudes. In contrast to 
their heathen countrymen of the east coast they are acquainted with 
European music, which they copy after their own fashion, in songs 
of their own composition or in variants on the concertina and violin. 
The oldest of their psalms, popular songs and peasant dances, came 
from Europe about 150 years ago and are now common along the 
whole of this coast of the Davis Strait. It is only here and there, 
at certain secluded spots in the deep fjords, that the older national 
music is remembered, chiefly in altered form and uncertain con- 
ception. In Egedesminde I took some examples of the native songs 
on the phonograph and these are given here in an appendix which 
supplements my earlier published melodies from West Greenland. 
4 
