Now as regards whaling and sealing, it is remarkable that along the whole northern coast of Europe and Asia there is no trace of any other race of seafaring hunters. Not until we come to the Chukches, near Bering Strait, do we find a sea-fishery culture, but this is borrowed from the Eskimo farther east, and originally came from the American side of Bering Strait. In Novaya Zemlya, it is true, there is a small tribe of Samoyeds who live by hunting both on sea and land, and who do not keep reindeer, but on the other hand use dogs for sleighing; but their sea-hunting is primitive, like the more casual sealing and walrus-hunting I have seen practised by the reindeer Samoyeds along the shores of the Kara Sea, with firearms, but without special appliances and with extremely clumsy boats. It is difficult to see in this the remains of an older, highly developed people of hunters.
This sealing culture which was found in Ottar’s time in northernmost Norway and on the Murman coast cannot, therefore, have come from the east along the coast of Siberia, but must have been a local development, perhaps arising from the amalgamation of the original hunting culture of these “Finns” with a higher European culture from the south.
Archæological relics of “Finns” in Varanger
It fortunately happens that at Kjelmö, on the southern side of the Varanger Fjord, a rich find of implements has been made, which must belong to the very same people of “Finns” who, as Ottar says, lived here and there along the coast (of Finmark and Terfinna Land) as hunters, fishermen and fowlers. Dr. O. Solberg in particular has in the last few years made valuable excavations on this island.[205] The many objects found lay evenly distributed in strata, the thickness of which shows that they must be the result of many centuries of accumulation. Solberg refers them to the period between the seventh and about the eleventh centuries.
In North Varanger many heathen graves containing implements have been found. By the help of the latter Solberg has been able to show that the graves are partly of the same age and partly of a somewhat later time than the Kjelmö find, and certainly belong to the same people. By comparing these various finds we can form a picture of this people’s culture and its associations.
7-9, Fish-hooks (of reindeer-horn); 10, potsherds; 1-6, harpoon-points (of reindeer-horn),
from Kjelmö; less than half natural size (after O. Solberg, 1909)
In addition to a number of bones of fish, birds and mammals, the Kjelmö find contains a variety of implements, mostly made of reindeer-horn and bone, which have been remarkably well preserved in the lime-charged sand, while on the other hand the iron, with few exceptions, has rusted entirely away. There are also many fragments of pottery, baked at an open fire and made of clay found on the island. These hunters and fishermen, therefore, understood the art of the potter as well as that of the smith, and thus the culture of this northern district on the shores of the Polar Sea was not on such a very low level. But it was not of independent growth; the pottery shows a connection with that of the older Iron Age in south Scandinavia; while on the other hand a couple of bronze objects, especially the small figure of a bear, found in a grave in North Varanger, are typically representative of the early part of the Permian Iron Age in eastern Russia (from the eighth century). Many other objects found in the graves also point to connection with the south-east, partly with Russia or Ottar’s Beormaland, and perhaps with Finland; while on the other side there may have been communication westwards and south-westwards (Ottar’s route) with Norway. Solberg has found marks of ownership on the Kjelmö implements which he shows to have much resemblance to those still in use among the Skolte-Lapps.[206] But the use of owner’s marks was an ancient and universal custom among the Germanic peoples, and the Finns probably derived it from them. The owner’s marks found by Solberg bear a resemblance to many ancient Germanic ones [cf. Hofmeyer, 1870; Michelsen, 1853], and seem rather to point to cultural connection with the Norsemen.
Probable mode of using the harpoon-points from Kjelmö