THE KÁSGI OR DANCE HOUSE
With few exceptions, all dances take place in the village kásgi or dance hall. This is the public meeting place where the old men gather to sit and smoke while they discuss the village welfare, where the married men bring their work and take their sweat baths, and where the bachelors and young men, termed kásgimiut, have their sleeping quarters. The kásgi is built and maintained at public expense, each villager considering it an honor to contribute something. Any tools or furnishings brought into the kásgi are considered public property, and used as such.
When a kásgi is to be built, announcement is made through messengers to neighboring villages, and all gather to assist in the building and to help celebrate the event. First a trench several feet deep is dug in which to plant the timbers forming the sides. These are usually of driftwood, which is brought by the ocean currents from the Yukon. The ice breaks up first at the head of that great stream, and the débris dams up the river, which overflows its banks, tearing down trees, buildings and whatever borders its course as it breaks its way out to the sea. The wreckage is scattered along the coast for over a hundred miles, and the islands of Bering Sea get a small share. The islanders are constantly on the lookout for the drifting timber, and put out to sea in the stormiest weather for a distant piece, be it large or small. They also patrol the coast after a high tide for stray bits of wood. When one considers the toil and pain with which material is gathered, the building of a kásgi becomes an important matter.
After the timbers have been rough hewn with the adze (úlimon) they are set upright in the trench to a height of seven to eight feet and firmly bedded with rock. This is to prevent the fierce Polar winds which prevail in midwinter from tearing the houses to pieces. In the older buildings a protecting stone wall was built on the sides. Most of the houses are set in a side hill, or partly underground, for additional security, as well as for warmth. The roof is laid on top of the uprights, the logs being drawn in gradually in pyramid shape to a flat top. In the middle of the top is the ṙálok or smoke hole, an opening about two feet square. In a kásgi thirty feet square the rálok is twenty feet above the floor. It is covered with a translucent curtain of walrus gut. The dead are always taken out through this opening, and never by the entrance. The most important feature of the room is the inǵlak, a wide shelf supported by posts at intervals. It stands about five feet high extending around the room. This serves the double purpose of a seat and bed for the inmates of the kásgi. The rear, the káan, is the most desirable position, being the warmest, and is given to headmen and honored guests.[5] The side portions, káaklim, are given to the lesser lights and the women and children; and the front, the óaklim, being nearest the entrance and therefore cold and uncomfortable is left for the orphans and worthless men.
The floor of the kásgi is made of rough planking, and the boards in the center are left loose so that they may be easily removed. These cover the kēnéthluk or fireplace, an excavation four feet square, and four feet deep, used in the sweat baths. It is thought to be the place where the spirits sit, when they visit the kásgi, during festivals held in their honor. Offerings are poured to them through the cracks in the planks. In the center of the floor is a round hole about two feet in diameter, called the entrance hole or púgyarok. This connects with a long tunnel, the aǵveak, which leads outside. The tunnel is usually so low that it is necessary to enter in a stooping position, which the Eskimo does by placing both hands on the sides of the púgyarok, and drawing himself through. Some dance-houses have another entrance directly into the room on a level with the ground, the underground passage being used only in winter. The diagram ([Plate XI]) gives an idea of this arrangement.
Paraphernalia
The drum (saúyit)[6] is the only instrument employed in the dances. It is made of a circular hoop about eighteen inches in width over which is stretched a resonant covering made from the bladder of the walrus or seal. It is held in place by a cord of rawhide (oḱlinok)[7] which fits into a groove on the outer rim. The cover can therefore be tightened at will. It is customary during the intermissions between the dances for the drummers to rub a handful of snow over the skins to prevent them from cracking under the heavy blows. The drum is held aloft and struck with a thin stick (múmwa).[8] It gives a deep boom in answer. The shaman uses a smaller baton with which he beats a continuous tattoo as an accompaniment to his songs. The northerners strike the back of the rim with their sticks, while the Yukon people belabor the face of the drum.
The leader of the chorus frequently flourishes a baton, made from a fox tail or the skin of the ermine which is mounted on a stick. With this he marks the time of the dance. In [Plate XIV], the white blur is the ermine at the end of his stick. It is very difficult to obtain a good picture in the ill lighted kásgi, and not often that the natives will allow one taken there.
One indispensable part of a male dancer’s outfit is his gloves. I have never seen a man dancing without them. These are usually of wolverine, or of reindeer with elaborate trimmings, but on ordinary occasions any kind will do. The women do not share this peculiarity. In place of gloves they wear handlets of grass decorated with feathers of duck or of ptarmigan. The men in the Totem Dances also wear handlets which are carved and painted to represent the particular totem they seek to honor. These too are fantastically decorated with feathers, usually of the loon. The central feather is stripped, and crowned with a tuft of white down. Both men and women wear armlets and fillets of skin or feathers according to the animal character they represent. When in the full swing of the dance with fur and feathers streaming they present a pleasing spectacle, a picture full of the same wild grace and poetic motion which characterizes the animal forbears from which they claim descent.
The chief characters in the Totem and Comic Dances wear masks and carry staves decorated with feathers. Occasionally the women assistants carry feathered wands (Kelízruk).
Of the masks there is a great variety ranging from the plain wooden masks to those of such great size that they are suspended from the ceiling of the kásgi by a cord while the dancer performs behind them.
The Cape Prince of Wales (Kinígumiut) Eskimo construct complete figures of their totems. These are worked by means of concealed strings by the performers, a climax of art which is supposed to be particularly pleasing to the spirits addressed. Then the shaman (Túngalik)[9] has his own set of masks, hideous enough to strike terror to even the initiated. Each one of these represents a familiar spirit (túnghat)[10] which assists him in his operations.
Ordinary dance masks may be made by anyone, but the masks for the ceremonial dances are made by some renowned shaman, engaged for the occasion. These masks are burned at the close of the festival, but may be sold by the actors if they supply an equal amount of wood for the sacrificial fire.
Many of the masks are very complicated, having appendages of wood, fur and feathers. They are all fashioned with an idea of representing some feature in the mythology of the spirit (Inua) or animal shade (Tunghat) which they represent. In the latter case they are nearly always made double, the mythical beings who inhabited the early world being regarded as able to change from animal to human shape, by merely pushing up or pulling down the upper part of the face as a mask. Such masks are often hinged to complete the illusion, the actor changing the face at will.
It might be mentioned here that when the actor puts on the mask he is supposed to become imbued with the spirit of the being represented. This accounts, to the native mind, for the very lifelike imitation which he gives.
The masks are painted along conventional lines; the favorite colors for the inua masks are red (Karékteoak),[11] black (Auktoak), green (Cúngokyoak), white (Katéktoak), and blue (Taúkrektoak), in the order named. These colors[12] may hold a sacred or symbolic significance. The inua masks are decorated with some regard to the natural colors of the human face, but in the masks of the túnghat the imagination of the artist runs riot. The same is true of the comic masks, which are rendered as grotesque and horrible as possible. A mask with distorted features, a pale green complexion, surrounded by a bristling mass of hair, amuses them greatly. The Eskimo also caricature their neighbors, the Dènè, in this same manner, representing them by masks with very large noses and sullen features.