Topic: Greenlandic tupilaks (and other traditional arctic crafts and knives) (Read 21264 times)

Bump, I'd be interested in some pieces as well.

Received the whale tail I bought! The handwritten note was perfect, very nice. The girlfriend will love it once she gets back from visiting her family in rochester, ny. Can't wait for new products, would definitely purchase again.

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I'll definitely post photos, but it'll be a while. The earring would look quite a bit like these necklaces (half dollar) but smaller (US penny), they can be post or dangly and would cost about $50 for a pair. I'll also pick up a bunch of abstract muskox pieces of various sizes and prices.


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Is anyone interested in pre-ordering very thin muskox necklaces or pins, similar to the middle photo above (perhaps even thinner)? They are not traditional, somewhat my own idea, a bit fragile, though we're experimenting to perfection. When thin, colors blend through the translucent creamy-grained texture of the muskox horn. The piece will stand out while matching any skin color or piece of clothing.


Also, many of the hunters find huge hunks of ruby in the spring. If I can get a permit, might you be interested in big pieces of raw, but not gem-quality corundum? For an idea of what I'm talking about, check out Google images. The middle photo (not mine) is from Qaqat, the last photo (mine) is from Qeqertarsuatsiaat:


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Wow, that was close. Glad it worked out.

By popular request I've asked around for matching earrings and necklaces. These are available carved from in reindeer antler. I've also made requests for several pieces of jewelry made from gorgeous muskox horn. Fine detail is not possible with muskox horn, so it's less appropriate for carving, though one guy is making me matching lucky whale tail earrings.

Received mine today just in time to give it for christmas! Thanks you!

Even came with a hand written note, wow!

I saw 'Atanarjuat' many years ago. I thought it was pretty good. Maybe you'd enjoy these films. Donations appreciated (they don't yet accept bitcoin): Fast Runner Trilogy

I've loaned out a few kilos of books and at least a dozen DVD's and VHS tapes in the past few weeks. Except for a lot of material on climate change, ice cores, and mineral surveys, it's nearly all in Danish or W. Greenlandic, except for one short film I think you might enjoy: Echos A film by Ivalo Frank 2010 It's just a snapshot of a couple in Ikateq, an American airbase abandoned after WWII. Check out these photos of 300,000 rusty barrels. I thought I'd be able to see them from satellite images only about 10 km west of Tasiilaq (50km from Kulusuk). Many of the videos are real old, a few clips from Knud Rasmussen must be about 100 years old. I just watched one film "Eskimo Vinter / Sælfolket" (Eskimo Winter / Seal people) with footage from the 60's in Canada and Greenland. Dudes making igloos, and sleds from frozen fish halves wrapped in seal skin for ski blades lashed to a reindeer antler frame. Another series that might be fascinating are documentaries of the Sirius patrol. There are a bunch of brilliant films I saw at the Inuit Circumpolar Conference last year in Nuuk, with some wild arctic mythological themes. Let me know if you're into film and I'll dig some of the best up. As for written stories, again, nearly everything I've come across is in either Danish or Greenlandic, but many of them must have been translated from Canadian French, English, Inuktuk, maybe Russian (Chukotka). Birgitte Sonne wrote an anthro thesis in English "The Happy Family - Myths and Ritual and Society on Nunivak" (Copenhagen, 1979) Knud Rasmussen, who died in 1933 wrote and collected stories from all over the Arctic. He drove a team of dogs up Greenland across Canada to Alaska and was denied entry into Russia. Much of his collection was published in English after he died and matching location to story is unreliable, but the stories are all authentic. Margaret Lantis, an American anthropologist, collected stories in northern Canada during the late 30's and published material for a half century more. Perhaps you can find myths published by Hans Himmelheber a contemporary of Lantis in English and German. Paul Ivanoff and Edward Curtis' collections are likely perceived through thick Christian lenses. The linguist L. Hammerich translated a few Inuit stories into English himself. It's interesting that you notice the steam drop in the past fifty years. My trail seems to end about 1970. There must be more material, I just don't know about it. What got you into the topic?

Indeed cool looking stamps, I kept the stamp and a tupliakker ate his way half way through the bag

I read the entire story that the packaging came with, it was entertaining.

Hey Goat/Ty, I'm still quite keen on trading oolong.

Hey Xenland, that was kinda fast, and on a Sunday!? Actually, I don't really know when they left the island. It's just that the storms seemed to keep the planes grounded for weeks (one might have slipped away without me noticing). Did you keep the stamps and postmark? Also, the packaging doubled as a note. Hope you didn't throw that out nor that the tupilakker ate it.

They came sooner then I expected!
I'm using one for a Christmas gift and the other for a table piece!

Here are some pics to show how well they travel.

I could have swore I heard one of the buggers gasp for air
when I ripped open the packaging



Thank Netrin, I will be buying from you again in the future.

What did you read? I don't know many myth books, none in English.

There's a huge collection of modern Arctic (and Antarctic) literature that will get the testosterone flowing. Knud Rasmussen, Peter Freuchen, Ludvig Mylius-Erichsen, Roald Amundsen, Robert Peary, Ernest Shackleton, Robert Scott. I just finished a good read by Alvah Simon titled "North to the Night".

Not the way I heard it but...

As I remember it, he’d fashioned a chisel from his own excrement to chip his way out. In Peter Freuchen’s account of his 1924 journey through Canada’s far north, the Danish explorer recounted how in a driving storm his sled dogs had refused to go any further. He took refuge under his dog sled, overturned against the wind side of a large boulder.

While he slept, snow had buried his makeshift shelter and he awoke to find himself entombed and his feet painfully frozen. Barely able to move, he’d scraped at the hardened snow. After many hours of agonizing effort, Freuchen remembered how, during the previous day, his sled dogs’ turds had frozen solid almost instantaneously in the extreme cold.

Freuchen thus thought to resort to his frozen poo chisel. Despite narrowly escaping a slow death he lost an entire foot to frostbite.

Perhaps what pushed the lead over the edge and off the page was this addition:

His is not the only such tale to come out of the north. Famed Canadian ethno-botanist, Wade Davis, recounts a similar story collected from an Inuit community on Baffin Island.

An elder had resisted a 1950’s Canadian government plan to relocate the Inuit into settlements. In an effort to force him to move, his family took away all his tools and implements.

The elder stole out of the igloo that night and dropping his caribou and seal skin drawers in the harsh cold, he defecated and shaped the rapidly freezing feces into a knife. He spit on it to form a sharp saliva edge and butchered a dog. Using the dog’s ribcage as a sled and the hide to hitch onto another dog, he “put the shit knife in his belt and disappeared into the night.”

http://www.mywestworld.com/living/monster-mush-the-yukon-quest/

Seriously...I spent like, ten hours a couple months back reading through a bunch of awesome Greenlandic mythology. It's...unique, to say the least. I feel like the movement to record oral histories has lost steam in the past fifty years. There are still a bunch of projects to preserve them, but it seems like they are more focused on the preservation of the language rather than the culture. I just want my stories!

netrin, how can I find more? Are there some better-translated works that you can refer me to?

What the hell did I just read...

I wouldn't hold my breath for another sale, as I was shipping them below cost. I've just set all the prices in EUR and USD and am done with it. As for silver, that is an option I'd accept!

Sorry. I overlooked the post where you explained this. I'll keep my eyes open for the next sale.    PM me if you're interested in trading for silver.

That's an interesting question. Yes, I suppose you could send a sample of your victim to a third party (me?). Though, do you realize you could just as easily do it yourself? I'm not a big fan of harming anyone, particularly not those I don't know, who've done me no harm. But theoretically this would be possible.

Do we have the option of having them activated?



Wish I had seen this sale.

okay maybe cute is the wrong description. e.g. for me is the left one on your banner more sympathetic/friendly/cute than the one on the right hand side.
I would prefer it

What do you mean by 'cute'. Cuddly with a smiling face? How about a polar bear head?

You want a cute demonic curse? That's just mean.