NO. 1616. A STUDY OF ALASKAN NEEDLECASES—BOAS. —- 25 
design is found on bone engravings (fig. 2, >) and it may be 
observed in a few of the specimens found by Parry in Fury 
and Hecla Strait in 1820. 
found in tattooings, 
the form of which is 
almost everywhere 
very stable. It oc- 
curs in the tattooings 
from the west coast 
of Hudson Bay, as 
well as in those from 
Baffin Land (fig. 3). 
Unfortunately I have 
not had opportunity 
Besides this, this design is commonly 
WMiyprnis’ 
Mii 
Mifyyy "| 
MI] 
7] 
My Mi) 
to examine exten- Fig. 3.—TATTOOINGS FROM THE WEST COAST OF HUDSON BAY AND 
sive collections from 
FROM HUDSON STRAIT, FROM Boas, ESKIMO OF BAFFIN LAND 
AND HUDSON BAY (BULL. AMER. Mus. NAT. HIST., XV, P. 473). 
Greenland, in order 
to ascertain the occurrence of these designs. In view of their wide 
distribution over the whole Eskimo area, it seems justifiable to 
consider them as a very old possession of the Eskimo, and to 
Fic. 4.—EAR-SPOON, 
NORTHERN KAM- 
CKATKA (AMER. 
Mus. NAT. HIST. 
No. 7335). FROM 
W. JOCHELSON. 
THE KONYAK; 
JESUP NORTH, PA- 
CIFIC EXPEDITION 
PUBLICATIONS, VI, 
P. 678. 
Tungus tribes. 
assume that originally they bore no relation to the 
needlecases on which they are found with such great 
regularity. Incidentally it may be remarked that 
the explanations of these forms as bushes and whales’ 
tails, which are given by the Alaskan Eskimo, appear 
so one-sided that they can not be accepted as a general 
interpretation. 
It is important to note that the designs here men- 
tioned do not seem to occur in parts of America or 
Asia which are outside of Eskimo influence. I have 
not been able to discover them on any objects of In- 
dian manufacture except on a few specimens from 
the Yukon River made by Athapascan tribes directly 
under Eskimo influence. In Asia the same designs 
occur among the Koryak and Chukchee (fig. 4), while 
farther to the west and south I have not been able 
to find them. I am not certain whether the alter- 
nate-spur-line design does occur in the art of the 
Samoyed, but I have not discovered a single example 
in a large collection of Yakut specimens brought 
together by Mr. Jochelson; and it does not seem 
to occur among the Gilyak, Ainu, and southeastern 
It seems that the design occurs occasionally in 
Polynesian and Micronesian art, but I should not venture to con- 
clude from this an historical relation, notwithstanding the rather 
