You are here: Home » Uugaq
Uugaq
also known to Qallunaat as Ugarng, Uget and Ugar
Uugaq was born in the early 1800s near Newton Fiord in Frobisher Bay. His skill as a hunter enabled him to support several wives at a time, and he had at least 13 wives during his lifetime. Uugaq lived much of his later life near Qallunaat whaling bases, sometimes in the same camps as Ipiirvik, Taqulittuq, Johnnibo and Kimilu. He was Ipiirvik's uncle. His father and mother were known to Americans as Pierkoonemeloon and Ookijoxy Ninoo. Uugaq's mother could recount detailed stories about Martin Frobisher's expedition, which had occurred over 200 years before her birth. She outlived all of her eight children but Uugaq, and she was the oldest person in the region when she died in the early 1860s.
Like many Inuit in this period, Uugaq travelled widely by dog team and ship. He had been at least as far north as Padli. In 1854-1855, he visited the United States on the whaling ship Georgiana and spent the winter with whaling captain Sidney Budington's family. After returning from New York City, Uugaq was reported as saying, God damn! Too much horse – too much house – too much white people. Women? Ah! Women great many – good! This statement reflects Uugaq's strong attraction to women, and it also speaks to his ambivalent relationship to Qallunaat culture. While eagerly accepting what it could offer him, he remained critical of it.
Uugaq appears to have acquired opportunities, trade goods, an appreciation of fiddle music and a large vocabulary of swear words from his close association with Qallunaat. Yet the presence of the whalers and especially their germs also influenced his life in devastating ways. His 11th wife, Nikujar, moved in with him after her previous husband went blind in an epidemic and lost his ability to hunt. Nikujar herself was plagued by a chronic pulmonary disease. By 1860, she could only raise her voice to a whisper and [was] almost unable to utter a word without pain. She died of tuberculosis in March 1861.
Uugaq remained healthy at least into the 1860s, and Qallunaat were eager to employ him whenever possible. The American explorer Charles Francis Hall called Uugaq a bold, successful hunter; remarkably intelligent and industrious and persevering. Uugaq was a capable mapmaker with extensive knowledge of the land and sea. He lived and worked on his own terms. He must have heard about Christianity on whaling ships and in the United States, but he remained respectful of angakkuit (shamans) by following their rules and complying with their demands. He also seems to have left the whaling stations if he found something better to do. In the summer of 1861, when game was abundant, Uugaq moved with his family to a distant camp. He convinced many other Inuit, including Johnnibo, to leave the whalers and relocate with him. This decision caused Hall to brand Uugaq as someone on whom little dependence can be placed, a quote that says much about the dependence of Qallunaat whaling stations on Inuit goods, skills and labour. This story also suggests that Uugaq was able to gain benefits from Qallunaat without becoming subservient to their economy and culture.
NOTES :
Hall, Arctic Researches, 102-103.
Hall, Arctic Researches, 180.
Hall, Arctic Researches, 329; Letter from Charles Francis Hall to Sidney Budington, cited in Harper, Uugaq, Inuk Traveller.
Hall, Arctic Researches, 329.