Career
She and Hans Punngujooq translated the Bible into the Inuit language. She had an important position in the Danish missionary among the Inuit on Greenland in the 18th century, and has also been portrayed in fiction. She followed Egede to Denmark in 1740.
She visited the Danish royal court in 1740, where she was presented with an Inuit boy to the court as a curiosity.
In 1743, she retired to her home in the Disko area for twenty years. She was not popular among the Inuit, lecturing them about how they should live according to the Christian faith.
From 1763, she was again the interpreter and assistant to the Danish mission. She had an important and influential position among the missionaries, as she was the link between them and the Inuit, whose language they could not understand.
The year of her death is unknown.
The last year she is mentioned is 1778. Arnarsaq is portrayed in the novel of B. South. Ingemann, Kunuk og Naja (1842), which was written with support of the reports of the missionaries: in the novel, she is described as a religious old woman, pointed out by the Inuit as an Ilisiitsoq. A witch. Arnarsaq is one of a few Inuit, and the only female Inuit of her time, to be mentioned in Danish history.
