Taissumani, April 2

KENN HARPER

Over the last few weeks I have told about the life of James Mutch, a well-known Arctic whaler.

In 1883, the young German anthropologist, Franz Boas, arrived in Cumberland Sound, for a year of anthropological research among the Inuit.

He was fortunate in having a letter of introduction to James Mutch from Mutch’s employer in Scotland. Mutch agreed to help the anthropologist and his servant, Wilhelm Weike, and opened up his small home at Kekerten to them. The research that Boas conducted in Cumberland Sound formed the basis for his classic work, The Central Eskimo.

Without the assistance of Mutch, it is doubtful if Boas would have learned a lot of the information that he did in less than a year among the Inuit. Let’s look at some of the evidence to support this statement.

On September 4, 1883 Boas wrote a letter to his fiancée in Germany telling about the events immediately after his arrival: “After I showed Mr. Mutch… the letter from Mr. Noble… he was very kind and promised to be helpful in every way. My belongings were to be brought on land the next day. In the evening we visited all the topics (Eskimo tents)…”

In December he wrote again, “He [Mutch] is in every way obliging towards me and with his better knowledge of the Eskimo language wherever he can, so I am greatly indebted to him for increasing my knowledge in this regard. Also he has been lending me dogs for excursions; in short I must be grateful to him in every way…”

And later: “He has learned much in this country and is an open, honourable character, who moreover does not attempt to conceal his weaknesses.” The weaknesses to which Boas referred were Mutch’s relationship with at least one Inuk woman and the existence of a young daughter.

When Boas began to study the Inuit culture in detail, he acknowledged Mutch’s unstinting assistance with these words: “Now I began in earnest to make my ethnographical studies, and was greatly helped by Mr. Mutch…”

Boas was hampered in his studies by his poor understanding of English. Most of the Inuit, especially the men, spoke some English, having learned it from both Scottish and American whalers.

But Mutch’s English was difficult for Boas to understand for it was a unique dialect of Scots called Doric, spoken in and around Peterhead. “The English I am learning here is worse than atrocious,” he wrote. “I’m afraid it is more Scottish than English.”

And it wasn’t just English that Boas had trouble with. Learning Inuktitut was critical to his success, yet in December he wrote, “Now the Eskimos are sitting around me here, telling each other old stories. What a pity that I cannot understand any of it.” A week later he wrote, “Gradually I can make myself understood somewhat with the Eskimos. Their language is horribly difficult!”

Boas never returned to the Arctic after he left in 1884. But the following year he began a remarkable correspondence with Mutch, a series of exchanges that lasted for over 30 years. (He also corresponded with the whaler, George Comer, and the missionary, Edmund Peck.) The letters were chatty, sometimes gossipy, and filled with information about whaling, hunting, and the lives of the Inuit.

At Boas’s instigation, Mutch also collected legends and objects of Inuit material culture. He made a major collection in Cumberland Sound between 1897 and 1899.

This enabled Boas to publish the first volume of a two-volume set in 1901, under the title of The Eskimo of Baffin Land and Hudson Bay.

Although Comer contributed to the work, the vast majority of the information came from James Mutch. He contributed 72 of the 81 legends and stories (139 pages in all) of the section “Tales from Cumberland Sound.” Boas gave him his due when he wrote, “Ever since that time [1883] Captain Mutch has manifested a keen interest in Eskimo ethnology… From time to time he has sent me valuable replies to inquiries regarding obscure points… In the fall of 1899 Captain Mutch sent to the Museum his collection and the notes which are embodied in the present paper.”

Between 1900 and 1902 he collected more material from Cumberland Sound for Boas, and between 1903 and 1908 collected information and objects near present-day Pond Inlet.

James Mutch was unschooled but not uneducated. His assistance over the years was invaluable to Boas, whose career in anthropology had its beginnings with the assistance of Mutch as host, benefactor and interpreter. Boas described Mutch as “a remarkably good collector” who “obtains with his specimens the fullest information.”

In his own right, Mutch was a rough and untutored ethnographer, living among the Inuit for over half a century in conditions ideal for the role he voluntarily assumed as collector for Boas.

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.