Wooden boxes like this one were among a man’s most prized possessions. Great care was taken in their construction. They were shaped by steaming, bending and pegging the various parts to produce a work of both beauty and utility.
They were designed to hold spare heads for the harpoons used in hunting.
The box was thus believed to hold a spiritual power that favored successful hunting.
The hunter, by carrying the box decorated with these effigies, showed his reverence to the spirit of the Inua animals.

Our box features a hinged lid with a sinew handle. The lid is surmounted by a kayaker, surrounded by six half-moons set in wood. The animals adorning the sloping part of the lid represent the species hunted at sea or on the pack ice. Seals, bears, whales and seabirds (one animal is a native replacement).
The base of the box, mounted on a truncated cone-shaped base, is surrounded by a set of ten pegged-rod reinforcements accompanied by two rounded diamond-shaped pieces linked by a sinew thread running through the inside of the box to hold and solidify the whole. A painted decoration of half-moons covers the wood.

According to Jeffrey Myers, this box was probably presented and given to a man as part of a ceremony to honor his remarkable hunting skills, using his kayak as his primary means of transport for capturing native species.
This rare box is the most elaborate ever found in either private or museum collections.