Taissumani, January 8

Hans Hendrik, an Inuk from southern Greenland, was terrified by the 24-hour darkness he experienced near Qaanaaq in 1853.

Ivaluardjuk, an Iglulingmiut, told the explorer, Knud Rasmussen, about how light came to the world.

During the first period after the creation of the earth, all was darkness. Among the earliest living beings were the raven and the fox. One day they met and began talking.

“Let us keep the dark and be without any daylight,” said the fox.

But the raven answered: “May the light come and daylight alternate with the dark of night.”

The raven kept on shrieking, “qauq, qauq” — this is the way that Inuit of old heard the sound that qallunaaq hear as “caw, caw” – and the sound of the raven is the word for dawn or light. Thus the raven is born calling for light.

The raven’s cry was answered and light appeared, and day began to alternate with light.

The Inuit north covers a vast expanse of land and sea, but its greatest distance from north to south is in Canada, where those living in Quebec, Labrador and the more southerly parts of Nunavut never experience the darkness that comes with the complete disappearance of the sun in mid-winter, counter-balanced by the never-setting presence of the sun in summer.

To those in Nunavut who live north of the Arctic Circle – as to those in northern Greenland and Alaska – this extreme difference between light and dark in summer and winter is commonplace.

For Inuit who journeyed in a single season from south to north, the extreme dark of the northern winter could be frightening, as it was for those from the Hudson Bay coast of Quebec, transplanted in 1953 to Resolute and Grise Fiord.

Indeed, a place like Resolute Bay, which lacked an Inuktitut name before 1953, was dubbed Qausuittuq — the land which never has light. The lack of light in the winter was the dominant factor in naming the place, and the fact that there was nothing but light in the summer was ignored.

The Inughuit of northwestern Greenland experience — I was tempted to say endure – the greatest seasonal extremities between light and dark of any Inuit group on earth.

Hans Hendrik was a south Greenlander from Fiskenaesset, a community below the Arctic Circle, on about the same latitude as Iqaluit, who was recruited by the American explorer, Elisha Kent Kane, to accompany him to the High Arctic in 1853. They wintered in 78 degrees north latitude, north of the present-day community of Qaanaaq, two degrees farther north than Grise Fiord.

As the dark of winter rapidly approached that autumn, Hans Hendrik, or Suersaq as he was known in Greenlandic, became terrified. In his memoirs, he wrote:

“Then it really grew winter and dreadfully cold, and the sky speedily darkened. Never had I seen the dark season like this, to be sure it was awful, I thought we should have no daylight any more. I was seized with fright, and fell a weeping. I never in my life saw such darkness at noon time. As the darkness continued for three months, I really believed we should have no daylight more. However, finally it dawned, and brightness having set in, I used to go shooting hares.”

After an initial season in the unaccustomed dark of winter, the newcomer who remains thinks little of it in future years. Suersaq spent two winters in the far north with Kane. The dark of the second year does not even merit a mention in his reminiscences.

Next Week — More thoughts on polar winter dark.

Taissumani recounts a specific event of historic interest. Kenn Harper is a historian, writer and linguist who lives in Iqaluit. Feedback? Send your comments and questions to kennharper@hotmail.com.