West Hudson Bay svingstikke (KHM Oslo)

A leaf-shaped blade of dark wood, its edges sawed into even teeth, hangs from a single twist of sinew — the whole instrument nineteen centimetres from tip to tail. It came off the west coast of Hudson Bay, Inuit country, with no note of community or maker, and entered the Oslo registers under two Norwegian names, svingstikke and brummer — whirling-stick and hummer — with a third word, leke, marking what its collector took it for: a toy.

Particulars

Object

A 19 cm leaf-shaped wooden blade, both edges cut into regular saw-teeth, on a single sinew cord (KHM Oslo UEM26188).

Function

Catalogued as a toy (leke); no field function recorded.