Notes

FROM CARD: "ILLUS. IN PROCEEDINGS, USNM, VOL. 60; NO. 5; P. 48."Source of the information below: Inuvialuit Pitqusiit Inuuniarutait: Inuvialuit Living History, The MacFarlane Collection website, by the Inuvialuit Cultural Resource Centre (ICRC), Inuvik, N.W.T., Canada (website credits here http://www.inuvialuitlivinghistory.ca/posts/12 ), entry on this artifact http://www.inuvialuitlivinghistory.ca/items/25 , retrieved 12-30-2019: Knife with a long iron blade hafted in a two-piece handle made from whalebone. A hide thong wrapped around the handle secures the blade, and would have made the handle easier to grip. The blade is sharpened along one edge only. Two pairs of lines cut into the back of the blade near the handle may be ownership marks. This object is identified in the Smithsonian Institution catalogue as a 'blubber knife', and was probably used for flensing beluga and bowhead whales.Flensing is the removing of the blubber or outer integument of whales, separating it from the animal's meat.