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IGLULIK - David Amarualik grew up on tales of his great-grandmother handed down from his mother and grandmother.

One particular story was told and retold.

And what a tale it is: the harrowing survival story of the woman who would be called the Queen of Iglulik.

Ataguttaaluk, known as the Queen of Iglulik, was revered in the community of Iglulik after surviving starvation during a Baffin Island winter in the early 1900s. - photo courtesy of Judy Malliki from Ataguttaaluk school

"It was pretty much the same story, but it's always interesting," said David.

"She survived one of the greatest challenges ever," he said, voice filling with a storyteller's dramatics. "She had to eat her husband's body and some of her sons' meat to survive."

During one winter in the early 1900s, David's great-grandmother Ataguttaaluk, her husband and two children were travelling between Iglulik and Pond Inlet.

The hunting was bad and the family had nothing to eat. Slowly they starved.

"They survived within the family," explained Richard Amarualik, Ataguttaaluk's great-great-grandson.

"The husband agreed to give himself. The family ate the dogs first. The children died and then (the husband and wife) had to survive on them," said Richard. "Then the husband died later on, and he directed the wife to go ahead and survive through his flesh."

A group of Iglulik residents eventually found a very weak Ataguttaaluk and brought her back to the community.

She was unable to eat regular food for a while, said David.

"She knew - and everyone knew - that people who do the cannibalism shouldn't eat right away," said David. "She was trying to get back to herself for a long while."

Although the cannibalism may seem grisly, Ataguttaaluk did what she had to do in order to survive, said David. No one in the community objected to her actions as her husband had wished her to survive off him.

"The whole community supported her all the way," said David.

David believes she survived because she was special.

"She must have been some sort of shaman," he said, adding she was born with it.

Eventually, Ataguttaaluk remarried and became a revered presence in the community for surviving such a seemingly hopeless situation.

"People came to her for advice and they listened to her very well," said David. "She was a good adviser. She knew where the good hunting grounds were and they came to her for hunting advice and stuff like that."

Today, both the high school and elementary schools in Iglulik are named after Ataguttaaluk.