Knud Rasmussen

My name is Knud Johan Victor Rasmussen, and I was born in Jakobshavn, Greenland on June 7, 1879. I am of both Inuit and Danish descent and speak fluent Inuktitut. I am an experienced arctic traveler whose life's work has been dedicated to the study of the Eskimos. Over the years, my companions and I have visited as many tribes as possible and collected some 20,000 artifacts. I have been fortunate to live among Eskimo friends who have shared their songs and stories and given me leave to ask many questions, allowing me to compile thousands of pages of notes and sketches. In 1910, my companion Peter Freuchen and I established the Thule Trade Station in Thule, Greenland. From this station, I led five expeditions from 1920 to 1924, exploring 29,000 miles of arctic North America, and became the first man to travel from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean by sledge. It was during the Great Sledge Journey that I came to meet the great angakkuq Aua and his wife Orulu. We were excellent friends, and we would often stretch at ease after a hearty meal and converse. These were the times to which I most looked forward.

This site uses the Euphemia font to display Inuktitut syllabics. You can download it for free here.
This site requires the Adobe Flash Player to view multimedia content. You can download it for free here.
This site requires the Adobe Acrobat Reader to display some content. You can download it for free here.

Produced with the financial participation of
Canada logo Canadian Heritage logo Telefilm Logo