Fig. 101.—Slate knife.
Fig. 101, No. 89583 [1305], is a knife of this class, with the blade a nearly equilateral triangle (1.4 inches long and 1.3 inches wide at the base), with a flat wooden haft as wide as the blade and 3½ inches long, cleft at the tip and lashed with thirteen or fourteen turns of sinew braid. The holes near the butt of the haft were probably to receive a lanyard. Fig. 102, No. 89591 [1016], is another form of the same class. The blade is secured by a single rivet of wood.
Fig. 102.—Slate knife.
Fig. 103.—Slate hunting-knife.
The third class consists of large knives, with long, broad, lanceolate blades, and short straight hafts. There is only one complete specimen, No. 89592 [1002], Fig. 103. This has a blade of soft, light greenish slate, 6 inches long and 2.6 inches broad, with the edges broadly beveled on both faces. The haft of spruce is in two longitudinal sections, put together so as to inclose the short tang of the blade, and is secured by a tight whipping of eighteen turns of fine seal twine, and painted with red ocher. This knife is new and was made for sale, but is undoubtedly a correct model of an ancient pattern, as No. 56676 [204] (Fig. 104), which is certainly ancient, appears to be the blade of just such a knife. We were told that the latter was intended for cutting blubber. This perhaps means that it was a whaling knife. Mr. Nelson brought home a magnificent knife of precisely the same pattern, made of light green jade.