Seal Harpoon
date: label: Accession Date
content: 23 Nov 1883
name: label: Collector
content: Lt P.H. Ray
label: Collector
content: John Murdoch
label: Collector
content: Middleton Smith
label: Donor Name
content: U.S. Signal Service
notes: label: Notes
content: From card: "Same as 72832. Illus. in BAE 9th AR, fig. 227, p. 233."
label: Notes
content: This object is on loan to the Anchorage Museum at Rasmuson Center, from 2010 through 2027.
label: Notes
content: Source of the information below: Smithsonian Arctic Studies Center Alaska Native Collections: Sharing Knowledge website, by Aron Crowell, entry on this artifact https://alaska.si.edu/record.asp?id=189 , retrieved 11-25-2021; see web page for additional information: Harpoon, Inupiaq. Ringed seals swim under the sea ice and come up for air at breathing holes. In the past, hunters with harpoons waited at the holes, standing silently on small stools until a feather placed in the hole on an ivory pin revealed the seal's first breath. Then they struck down through the opening with a harpoon that had a long, thin foreshaft. The pick on the upper end of the weapon was for enlarging the hole so the dead seal could be pulled out. Harpoons, used for hunting seals, walrus, beluga whales, and bowhead whales, were the heaviest traditional Inupiaq weapons. They have thicker wooden shafts than the lightweight darts that were used for seals, and unlike darts were always thrust or thrown by hand rather than launched with a throwing board. Harpoons, like this 1883 example from Barrow, have "toggling" points (heads) rather than the slender barbed points seen on darts. This short harpoon was specifically designed for killing seals at their breathing holes. The basic parts of a harpoon are the detachable head, foreshaft, socket piece, wooden shaft, and harpoon line. Toggling heads were made of bone, ivory, or antler, with a slot at the end to hold a thin stone or metal blade. This type is spurred at the base and has a hole for insertion of the slender foreshaft. It was connected to the harpoon line with a short leader, which enabled quick replacement of the head if it broke. The foreshaft-which improved penetration of the harpoon head-fit into the socket piece and was tied to the shaft so that it would not be lost. The heavy socket piece was made from bone or ivory, and its weight helped the weapon to hit with great force. The length of a harpoon shaft ranged from approximately four to nine feet depending on the size of the prey-shorter ones for small seals and longer, heavier ones for larger sea mammals. When a harpoon struck an animal the head penetrated well below the skin, came off the foreshaft, and turned sideways under tension from the harpoon line. In open water hunting, the shaft dragged behind the fleeing animal, slowing its escape.Sealskin floats were often tied to the harpoon line for greater drag when hunting whales and other large mammals. When hunting seals at the ice edge or breathing holes the hunter would hold on to the line rather than letting it go. Some harpoons have a finger rest on the side of the shaft to help in making long throws. A tapering ivory or bone point-often referred to as an ice pick-was lashed onto the butt end of some long harpoons and most short seal harpoons like this one. It was used to test the solidity of sea ice and to chip away ice at a seal's breathing hole. Pedestrian hunters harpooned seals when they hauled out on ice, surfaced at their breathing holes or swam along the ice edge. When stalking a seal on the ice, or to lure one to its breathing hole, a hunter used an ice scratcher that imitated the sound that a seal makes when digging. At breathing holes, men hunted ringed seals using a small harpoon like this one, which has a detachable point, long sealskin line, and fixed foreshaft. They hunted bearded seals, walrus and beluga whales by boat using larger harpoons with long foreshafts to penetrate the thicker skin and blubber. By the turn of the 19th century, the use of harpoons had begun to change. E. W. Nelson noted that by 1881, men in the Bering Strait region still hunted with harpoons but had begun to use firearms to kill sea mammals. By 1905, George Gordon reported that seal, walrus and whale harpoons were still in general use, but the stone harpoon blade was replaced by a metal one. Gordon noted that overall, firearms had begun to replace many Native-made weapons. Harrison Thornton-who lived in Wales from 1890 to 1893-reported that seal harpoons were used only occasionally to deliver the final blow to a seal after shooting it with a gun. John Murdoch-in the Barrow area from 1881 to 1883-reported that seals and walrus were often shot with rifles, while walrus were killed with a combination of rifle and large harpoon. Lt. P. H. Ray collected this seal harpoon from the Barrow area in 1883. It was used to hunt seals at their breathing holes. Ray wrote: "Many seals are taken with the hand spear, at the 'adlu,' the breathing-hole of a single seal. It is usually detected by an excessive deposit of hoar-frost on the surface of the snow over the hole; the snow is cleared away down to the solid ice, and in the hole, which is about one inch in diameter at the surface, is placed an ivory needle about one foot long and one-eighth of an inch in diameter; to the upper end a small cross-bar is attached, to prevent it dropping through, and a small feather, and the hunter takes his stand on a three-legged stool, which is always a part of his regular equipment, and patiently awaits the coming of the seal, of which the feathered needle gives warning; after the stroke is delivered, if he succeeds in fastening to the seal, he proceeds to enlarge the hole until it will admit hauling him to the surface; this is usually done with an ivory pick attached to the shaft of his spear; as soon as a seal is taken its mouth is fastened open with a piece of ice, and a slot cut through the lower jaw before it becomes frozen.
label: Record Last Modified
content: 4 Feb 2022
label: Specimen Count
content: 3
place: label: Place
content: Point Barrow, Alaska, United States, North America
topic: label: Topic
content: Ethnology
culture: label: Culture
content: Eskimo, Inupiaq
setName: label: See more items in
content: Anthropology
dataSource: label: Data Source
content: NMNH - Anthropology Dept.
identifier: label: Accession Number
content: 013712
label: USNM Number
content: E89910-0
objectType: label: Object Type
content: Harpoon
physicalDescription: label: Length - Object
content: 107 cm