Qajaq Making with Skin Covering

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In those times, yes, except in emergency cases you might shave the fur off but they (shaved skins) were smoother in the water and they didn't make any noise in the water When they are aged the skin is all smooth and flat.

After taking the fur off you take the first layer of the skin then you have to rinse them and you are ready to cut them up. You just don't cut the skins in any way. You have to cut it from one side of the head to the other side of the skin towards the lower part of the skin. You had to cut it as straight as possible by having someone holding onto it or you can tie it onto something the knife has to be very sharp because you have to cut it with one stroke so you have no curves on the edges after all the skins have been cut starting from the (USUUJAQ) front of the Qajaq you start sewing them together starting from the smaller skins. The larger skins are sewn around the middle part of the qajaq. If the skins were not cut properly additional skins were required to be added on to the top. Other times if they are cut properly you didn't need to add any skins to the top.

When everything is ready to be sewn, you have to chew on the edges just like you would in sewing the kamik soles. You chew out all the water from the edges. This is so that the stitches will become waterproof. Some young people would do the chewing around the edges.

Women would have braided sinew together from caribou leg sinew. Also they would make finger protectors (seal skin pieces sewn as tubes) to fit around all the fingers of women who were sewing the skins. When you are using the braided sinew it is very hard on ones' hands.

So after preparing everything, you hang the skins. Then they would start to sew them. The stitches would be called SUKKAITTULIJUQ when they couldn't make the stitches tight enough. The stitches would be sewn in a same manner as you would in sewing waterproof kamiks. Double seam on each stitch line. The skin edges would be slightly overlapped, and sewn from inside and the outside just like waterproofed seal skins.

The front of the qajaq cover was sometimes made of caribou skin so that even if it hit ice, the skin would not be punctured easily. Once the skins were sewn together, the men would stretch it on to the frame and tighten it as much as possible using skin ropes to tighten it .


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