МАЭ № 2888-89

Hunting headgear

The Alutiiq

1804 - 1805 гг.

wood, paint, sealskin, animal glue

height 16 cm, length 29.3 cm, width 21.5 cm, width with whiskers 30 cm

“They go after a harbor seal while it is dozing and it’s very amusing to see how they lure it to the shore. The hunter hides among the rocks, puts on his hat carved from wood to look like a seal, and yells in voice like that of a seal. The animal, wanting to find himself a partner, swims to the shore and there loses his life.” (Lisianskii 1947: 185). There are seven examples of headgear in the shape of harbor seal heads in other museums. There are two each in the British Museum (London, Great Britain) and the Museum of the Americas (Madrid, Spain), one in the National Museum of Finland (Helsinki, Finland), one at the University of Gottingen Museum (Gottingen, Germany) and one at the Peabody Museum of Harvard University (Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA). Hunter figures wearing hats in the form of seal heads are also found with model kayaks No. 536—11, No. 620—27 and in model umiak No. 4291—21.

Ethnography of America