A qarmaq (Inuktitut; plural qarmat) is a single-room family dwelling used by the Inuit and their Thule predecessors between the seasons of tent and snow house. Among the Central Inuit of northern Canada the word describes a hybrid of tent and igloo or of tent and sod house; in Greenland (Kalaallisut) it refers to the dwelling's wall.
Construction
- Walls: low walls of snow blocks in winter, or of stone or sod in other seasons.
- Frame: usually animal bone, preferably whalebone, because timber was scarce in the Arctic.
- Roof: skins prepared for roofing and siding, later replaced by canvas, stretched over the frame.
- Insulation: tundra moss packed into crevices; after snowfall, snow blocks could be set around the outside for extra protection.
- Interior: a slightly raised sleeping platform padded with caribou skin, heated only by the flame of a qulliq, a stone oil lamp.
Building was shared: men gathered boulders, assembled the frame and later cut snow blocks, while women and children gathered moss and prepared skins. Women also repaired the outer covering when weather or animals such as wolves and foxes damaged it. Sites were chosen with attention to local ground and weather.
Seasonal use
Qarmat were built in autumn and spring. Summer tents, easy to move, gave way to sod qarmat in autumn. In winter people also lived in snow houses, especially while travelling, but qarmat were preferred where possible. The snow house itself (iglu, or igluvijaq in some dialects) was mainly a Central Arctic and Qaanaaq-area form; other Inuit chiefly used snow to insulate houses of whalebone and hide.
History
The Thule people used qarmat, mainly in the cold season, and Inuit continued to use them up to the 1950s.
Significance for roofing
The qarmaq shows how a roof can be made where there is no timber: a bone frame, a waterproof skin membrane and packed insulation, a combination that parallels the layered logic of modern roof assemblies.