Description:
This cribbage board, made from a walrus tusk, features intricately carved animals--two fish on the left and an owl on the right. Its reverse shows a line of fish, seal, fox, and caribou. The designs signal that an Inuit artist created the item to resemble a European cribbage board while using scrimshaw, a uniquely Inuit form of decoration. After the permanent arrival of Europeans (in the forms of missionaries and traders) during the 1700s-1800s, European goods became common in Inuit households. Signaling a melding of European and Inuit customs, this gaming board was sold to tourists or European settler colonists as a "curio." AP2018

Label Text:
Examined as pert of Fogg Conservation Survey 3/76-2/77, removed old labels

Tags:
cribbage; walrus; tusks

Link to share this object record:
https://museums.fivecolleges.edu/detail.php?t=objects&type=ext&id_number=SC+1960.152

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