Raed
FIELD MUSEUM OF NATURAL HISTORY
DEPARTMENT OF ANTHROPOLOGY
GUIDE
PART 6
ETHNOLOGY OF POLYNESIA \
' AND MICRONESIA
HALL F (Ground Floor)
BY
RALPH LINTON
' Assistant Curator of Oceanic and Malayan Ethnology
1 Map, 59 Text-Figures, 14 Photogravures
BERTHOLD LAUFER
Curator of Anthropology
EDITOR
lh aren ae \,
es & HISTORY yh
a fw
CHICAGO
1926
oneweer s~
rer 4 "
:
fers. is
S Sos Se Bae “+
RX AWS
oi a eee
‘OIAIDWd HLNOS S3HL AO dVW SNITLNO
or
| VISANATOd
7
‘ + 4 * 4
‘ z
te a 4 ¥
: ; t-m ¢
% . a. x» i
WITHDRAWS Nog
< + 7s oa '
\ ‘ AY »~
ais yhak LAA S
ty is } atiats ~
Die + \' 4 > Sy
ia) \ ‘ 7 P “a Be
MAA ee ee F% Ue
‘PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF 4
. BY FIELD MUSEUM bee c
| ‘*
. : ui va
CONTENTS
Page
Introduction . : : : : o
Races : ; ‘ 12
Settlement of the Islands ; : ; : . 14
Food . : ; 20
Cooking and Utensils ; ; 38
Kava and Betel : . 48
Clothing and Ornament . : 50
Tattooing and Mutilations . é ‘ 57
Hair-dressing . F : é 61
Personal Ornaments 2 j : ‘ 64
Dwellings . : ; 73
Furniture . ; . . ‘ ‘ : 80
Basketry . ; ; % : 83
Tools . ‘ : ; : 88
Musical iecruments : 97
Transportation ; ‘ : : 102
Oreemneana Wattare . . °. .4%. 4. 108
Cannibalism . ; : é 129
Games ; : ; : 1S2
art: i : : : : 136
Mana and Tapu ; i t 146
Social Organization : : ; ; 152
Religion. : : : 4 ‘ 164
Death and Burial ; : : : : ; 178
Bibliography by the Editor ‘ ; : : ; 189
ETHNOLOGY OF POLYNESIA AND
MICRONESIA
INTRODUCTION
The islands of the western and central Pacific,
exclusive of the Philippines and Japan, are usually
classified as belonging to one or another of three great
divisions, — Melanesia, Micronesia, and Polynesia.
These divisions are based partly on the geographic po-
sition of the islands and partly on differences in the
race and culture of their inhabitants. Melanesia lies
north and northeast of Australia. It includes New
Guinea, the Admiralties, New Britain, New Ireland,
the Solomons, the New Hebrides, New Caledonia, and
Fiji. Most of the Melanesian islands are large and
mountainous, New Guinea being one of the largest in
the world. They are relatively close lying, and many
of them were connected with one another and with the
Australian continent by land bridges which survived
until near the end of the glacial period. The fauna of |
the larger islands resembles that of Australia. The cli-
mate along the coasts is unhealthy, and the natives are
much less friendly than those of either Micronesia or
Polynesia so that much of the region is still imper-
fectly known. The Fijians, who are the easternmost of
the Melanesians, have been strongly influenced by the
Polynesians, and their culture is described in this guide.
Micronesia lies north of Melanesia, occupying the
region between approximately 20 N. and 5 S. latitude
and 130 and 180 E. longitude. It includes five groups,
the Pelews, Carolines, Marshalls, Marianas, and Gil-
5
6 ETHNOLOGY OF POLYNESIA AND MICRONESIA
berts. The Pelews, Carolines, and Marshalls form a
more or less continuous belt of islands extending from
west to east in the order named for about three thou-
sand miles. They are in about the same latitude as the
southern Philippines. The Marianas lie north north-
east of the Carolines. Guam, an American possession,
is near the southern end of this group. The Gilberts
lie southeast of the Marshalls and form a connecting
link between Micronesia and Polynesia. The Microne-
sian islands are all small, and are mostly coral forma-
tions. Their total area is less than 1400 square miles,
and their population did not exceed 100,000 at the be-
ginning of the historic period.
Polynesia is by far the largest of the three divi-
sions. It has somewhat the form of a great crescent,
five thousand miles from tip to tip and three thousand
miles wide at its broadest point. This crescent faces
west, its points extending far to the north and south
of Micronesia and Melanesia and partially enveloping
them. It includes the Hawaiian, Marquesas, Tuamotu,
Society, Cook, Austral, Samoan, Tongan, Ellice and
Union groups, New Zealand, and a great number of
isolated islands two of which, Easter Island and Niue,
are of great interest to ethnologists. Polynesia is a
region of enormous distances. Hawaii, at the northern
end of the crescent, is over two thousand miles from
its nearest inhabited neighbor, and Easter Island is
over a thousand miles from any other land. Most of
the islands are small, their total area exclusive of New
Zealand being only a little more than 10,000 square
miles. All the more important ones are of volcanic ori-
gin. New Zealand, at the southern end of the crescent,
differs from the other Polynesian islands in its great
size and also in its temperate climate.
INTRODUCTION 7
The Polynesian and Micronesian islands, except
New Zealand, nearly all belong to one of the other of
two great classes, high islands and low islands. The
former are of volcanic origin, while the latter are the
work of the coral polyps. A typical high island has a
tall, central peak or mountain-range from which many
deep, narrow valleys run down to the sea. There is
almost no level ground in the interior, and the scenery
is usually wild and fantastic. Between the mountains
and the sea there is a narrow, more or less continuous
strip of level land which has been built up partly by
the coral polyps and partly by the wash from the
mountains. Some distance out from this coastal strip
there will be a coral reef, known as the fringing reef,
and beyond this and separated from it by deeper water
a second reef, the barrier reef, beyond which the ocean
drops to great depths. Both barrier and fringing reefs
usually have breaks opposite the mouths of the prin-
cipal rivers. High islands are usually well watered,
for their peaks catch and precipitate the rain clouds.
On those which lie within the belt of seasonal rains
each valley contains a clear, cold stream. The moun-
tains are covered with verdure, and the valleys are
choked with heavy growth. In the Hawaiian and
Marquesan groups the growth is much less heavy. In
Hawaii there are rain forests at a high elevation, but
the lower levels are relatively dry, and are covered
with scrub and grass. In the Marquesas, which suffer
from long and destructive droughts, the uplands are
covered with reeds and low fern, with occasional
clumps of Pandanus and Hibiscus, where depressions
have held the moisture. The Marquesan Islands also
lack the coastal strip, fringing and barrier reefs, the
mountains rising straight from the sea. In all the is-
8 ETHNOLOGY OF POLYNESIA AND MICRONESIA
lands which have a coastal strip, the population was
concentrated upon it. Tribes that had been defeated
in war often fled inland for a time, but the mountains
were usually uninhabited, except for plume-hunters
and fugitives from justice. This was due to the almost
complete absence of food. There were few birds and
no native animals, and the slopes were too steep for
agriculture. The people of the coastal strip lived
partly by cultivating the level ground there and in the
valley bottoms, and partly by fishing in the shallow
water about the reefs.
The low coral islands, called atolls, rest upon the
tops of submerged mountains. When the top of such
a mountain came within twenty or thirty fathoms of
the surface, corals took root upon it and began to build
a reef. The corals on the outside of the reef were bet-
ter fed than those on the inside and grew more rap-
idly. By the time the reef reached the surface, it had
the form of a ring or of a horseshoe with the opening
on the side away from the prevailing winds and cur-
rents. The waves broke off fragments of the coral and
piled them upon the reef until low islands were formed.
Atolls are sometimes as much as eighty or ninety miles
across, but a large part of their circuit is usually bare
reef awash at high tide. The highest parts are rarely
more than ten or fifteen feet above sea level or more
than half a mile wide. There is often a gently sloping,
sandy beach on the lagoon side of the island, but the
seaward side is made up of lumps of rough coral. The
white rock and sand reflect the sun, so that the glare
is almost unendurable. The villages of the natives are
nearly always built on the inner side of the island,
facing the lagoon. They live almost entirely on fish
and coconuts, and their life is much harder than that
INTRODUCTION 9
of the natives of the high islands. In spite of this they
are often of magnificent physique, and they are the
only natives who have been able to hold their own and
even increase in numbers since European contact.
Even the best of the high islands are relatively
poor in natural resources. Their reefs afforded a good
supply of fish, but there was no game except birds, and
most of the native roots and fruits were not edible.
All the animals and nearly all the plants of economic
importance present at the time of the European dis-
covery had been introduced by the natives themselves,
and most of them were of Asiatic origin. There was
usually an abundance of good timber and of stone suit-
able for implement-making, but there were no metallic
ores. The soil was rich and would raise good crops,
but there were few large areas suitable for agricul-
ture. The low islands had no large timber, no stone
for implements and almost no soil. The coconut and
Pandanus were the only plants of economic value
which would grow on them. A still greater difficulty
was the absence of fresh water. The natives of the low
islands were forced to rely on coconuts, on brackish
water from shallow wells and on rain water which
they collected by digging pits at the foot of coconut-
palms and collecting the rain which drained from them.
The climate of all the islands except New Zealand
is tropical or subtropical, but the heat is never oppres-
sive. The nights are always comfortably cool, and are
often quite cold at the higher altitudes. Many of the
islands have dry and rainy seasons, but there is little
change in the mean temperature throughout the year.
There are no fevers, and the only serious diseases
known to the natives in pre-EKuropean times were lep-
rosy and elephantiasis. There are no poisonous rep-
10 ETHNOLOGY OF POLYNESIA AND MICRONESIA
tiles and few noxious insects, although many of the
islands now suffer from a plague of mosquitoes. These
are especially bad in some of the low islands, where
they breed in the rain water collected at the base of
the palm fronds. White men find the constant heat
somewhat enervating, but Micronesia and Polynesia
are probably the safest and pleasantest tropical re-
gions in the world.
New Zealand stands somewhat apart from the rest
of Polynesia. It consists of two islands separated by a
channel so narrow that they form an almost continu-
ous land mass. Their combined area is 104,471 square
miles. The northern peninsula of the north island is
subtropical, but the southern part has a temperate
climate not unlike that of southern England. The
south island is still colder, and is very mountainous
with many glaciers. About half the total area of New
Zealand was heavily forested at the time of the Euro-
pean discovery. There were no native mammals, but
the bird life was fairly abundant, and the first native
settlers found a great flightless bird, the moa. They
hunted this for food and finally exterminated it. The
geological formations are quite varied; there are even
some metallic ores, although the natives never learned
to work these. Their finest implements were made
from nephrite, a variety of jade. This material is ex-
tremely hard and tough; tools made from it are scarcely
inferior to those of metal. Much of the New Zealand
nephrite is of fine green color, and the best of it was
fashioned into beautiful ornaments. It is said that
samples of nephrite were carried back to Central Poly-
nesia by the first native explorers and that the desire
for this precious material was one of the main motives
in the migration to New Zealand from that region.
INTRODUCTION 11
The climate and natural resources of New Zealand
produced profound changes in the culture of the set-
tlers who came to it from Central Polynesia. Only one
of their food plants, the kumara, a kind of sweet po-
tato (Convolvulus chrysorhizus), could be grown profi-
tably, and the paper-mulberry, from whose bark they
made their clothing, would only live in the northern
peninsula, and did not flourish there. They eked out
their food supply with the starchy roots of a native
fern and learned to make warm garments from the
fibre of the Phormium tenax, commonly called New
Zealand flax. They abandoned their flimsy thatched
houses and developed new types better suited to the
climate. The abundance of fine, hard woods led to a
remarkable development of wood-working and carving
and to the almost complete abandonment of stone con-
struction. They acquired an energy and force of char-
acter rarely found among their tropical relatives, and
became not only the best of the Polynesians, but one of
the finest races in the world.
RACES
The physical anthropology of the Oceanic peoples
is still very imperfectly known. The Polynesians are
the only ones who have been intensively studied, and
even there a great deal of work remains to be done.
In the light of our present information they appear to
be an extremely mixed group made up of at least four
originally distinct stocks. These stocks are:—
(1) A long-headed, broad-nosed race of moderate
stature with dark brown skin, curly hair, and a ten-
dency toward prognathism (projecting face). This
type is distinctly Negroid. It is the dominant one in
Easter Island, and is fairly common in New Zealand
and, to a lesser degree, in Central Polynesia.
(2) A short-headed, broad-nosed race of short
stature with dark skin and curly hair. The affiliations
of this type are uncertain, but it shows both Negroid
and Mongoloid affinities. It was present in some
strength in Hawaii and the Marquesas, but was rather
rare elsewhere in Polynesia.
(3) A long-headed, narrow-nosed race of mode-
rate stature, with light brown skin and wavy to mode-
rately curly hair. This is probably a very primitive
Caucasic (white) type. It is found in all parts of Poly-
nesia, but seems to be strongest in New Zealand and
the Marquesas.
(4) A very short-headed race with a relatively
narrow nose, tall stature, light brown skin, and straight
to wavy hair. This type is also Caucasic. It is domi-
nant in Samoa, Tonga, and Tahiti, and is present in
nearly all the other Polynesian islands. It was prob-
12
RACES 13
ably the last race to enter Polynesia, and seems to have
been gradually replacing the other races at the time of
the European discovery.
There is very little information on Micronesia,
but there can be no doubt that its population is even
more mixed than that of Polynesia. All the Polynesian
races, with the possible exception of the type men-
tioned under (2) are present, and at least in the west-
ern groups there is an additional stock, a round-headed,
straight-haired people of low stature with somewhat
oblique eyes. ‘These people are Mongoloid, and are
closely related to the Malays. The information on
Melanesia is still less satisfactory, but the bulk of the
population is distinctly Negroid, corresponding to type
(1) in Polynesia. Along the coasts of the larger
islands and in the smaller outlying ones, there are
groups which show all degrees of mixture between
this type and the Polynesian types (3) and (4).
SETTLEMENT OF THE ISLANDS
There are a great many different theories of
Oceanic settlement. Nearly every student of the re-
gion from the days of Captain Cook to the present
time has had his own ideas on the subject. Most of
the theories advanced have been based on a single
class of evidence, such as language or traditions, and
none of them is entirely satisfactory. The problem
is an extremely complex one, and no final solution will
be possible until we have much more complete data.
The Polynesians have a wealth of migration legends,
but those dealing with their entry into the region are
full of marvelous incidents, and most of the places
named in them can no longer be identified. Their
oldest authentic traditions do not go farther back than
A.D. 500, and most of them refer to voyages between
groups which were already known and at least par-
tially occupied. The Micronesians also have stories
of relatively late movements within the area, but the
Melanesians seem to have lost all memory of their
migrations.
Melanesia was no doubt the first of the three re-
gions to be occupied. At the close of the glacial period
many of its islands were connected with the Australian
continent, while the Indonesian islands were connected
with Asia. The sea separating these two land masses
was narrow enough to have been crossed by men who
knew the rudiments of navigation. The first Mela-
nesian settlers may have been in the palzolithic
stage of culture, for the Tasmanians were still in it
at the time of their discovery, and the Australians had
14
SETTLEMENT OF THE ISLANDS 15
progressed little beyond it. The race of these first
inhabitants can only be conjectured, but it seems cer-
tain that Negroid peoples entered the region at a very
early. time, and were thoroughly established there be-
fore any large scale penetration of Polynesia and
Micronesia began.
The Micronesian and Polynesian islands have
never been connected with any continent. Only races
of fairly advanced culture could have made the long
voyages necessary to reach them, and they were prob-
ably the last part of the habitable earth to be occu-
pied. The first Polynesian settlers seem to have been
of Negroid race, corresponding to type (1) of the his-
toric races. They entered the region from Melanesia.
Their eastward migration may have been largely in-
voluntary for their descendants, although they build
good canoes, are timid sailors, and will not put out
into the open sea. Perhaps they entered Polynesia at
first as castaways who had been swept eastward by
cyclonic storms. They established themselves in
Tonga, Samoa, Niue, and the Cook, Austral, Society
and Tuamotu groups, but it is doubtful whether they
reached the Marquesas or New Zealand, and it is
fairly certain that they did not reach Hawaii. They
probably settled some of the Micronesian groups as
well, but: it is impossible to tell the extent of their
occupation.
The next people to reach Polynesia were prob-
ably the short, dark, round-headed race designated as
type (2). The historic distribution of this type sug-
gests that it was the first to occupy the Marquesas and
Hawaii, but it has left few traces elsewhere; it prob-
ably failed to make much impression on the islands
which were already occupied by the Negroid people.
16 ETHNOLOGY OF POLYNESIA AND MICRONESIA
The third race to appear on the scene seems to
have been the long-headed Caucasic stock designated
as type (8). There are many traces of this race in
the Philippines and in the larger Indonesian islands.
It was probably an old southeastern Asiatic stock.
These newcomers seem to have been fairly good navi-
gators, and may have been the first of the Oceanic
peoples deliberately to explore and colonize. They
entered the Pacific through the gap between the south-
ern Philippines and New Guinea, and apparently split
into two streams one of which travelled eastward
through Micronesia, while the other coasted southward
along New Guinea and the islands immediately to the
east. The climate of these islands was unhealthy;
they were already well populated so that this wing of
the migration was largely absorbed or dissipated be-
fore it reached Polynesia. It left many traces of its
blood and culture in Melanesia, and may have been
responsible for the development of the Melanesian,
as distinct from the Papuan, languages. Some of the
emigrants who had taken the Micronesian route seem
to have gone on eastward to Hawaii, while others
turned southward into western and central Polynesia.
There they found the Negroid race already in posses-
sion and intermarried with it, producing a hybrid
population. This mixed race seems to have developed
a distinctive type of culture, which was eventually
carried to the Marquesas and New Zealand and sur-
vived there, in modified form, until the beginning of
the historic period. A group of the mixed race in
whom the Negroid strain was dominant discovered
and colonized Easter Island.
At a later time, probably not much before the
beginning of our era, a fourth race entered the region.
SETTLEMENT OF THE ISLANDS 17
These people, type (4) of the historic races, were the
Vikings of the Pacific. They seem to have reached
Polynesia by way of Micronesia, arriving’ first in
Samoa and Tonga, but they rapidly extended their
voyages over the whole area. Most of the Polynesian
migration-legends apparently deal with their move-
ments or with those of groups who had learned their
navigation methods and had been set in motion by
them. Some of their voyages covered amazing dis-
tances. Ui-te-rangiora, a great Rarotongan navigator,
sailed southward from that group until he encountered
the icebergs of the Antarctic. They repeatedly sailed
from Tahiti to Hawaii and from Rarotonga to New
Zealand. Polynesian traditions make it possible
largely to reconstruct the equipment and methods of
these daring navigators. They used great double
canoes, sometimes as much as 150 feet long, made of
planks sewn together with coconut fibre. The space
between the two hulls was decked over and bore a
small house. There were either one or two masts with
sails of Pandanus matting. They are probably to be
eredited with the introduction of the lateen sail which
made it possible for them to run closer to the wind
than the best European square-rigged ship. |
Their stores were baked bread-fruit paste, sweet
potatoes, and coconuts. They caught the bonito and
other fish of the open sea. Water was carried in
gourds and wooden vessels, but they relied mostly
upon rain. They steered by the stars and by the long
Pacific swell, and were experts at holding a course.
Whole tribes sometimes set out in search of new
homes, taking with them their gods and the plants and
animals which would be needed to found a colony.
On such expeditions the fleet spread out into a great
18 ETHNOLOGY OF POLYNESIA AND MICRONESIA
crescent with four or five mile intervals between
the canoes, thus sweeping a wide expanse of sea. A
sharp lookout was kept, and particular attention was
paid to the flight of birds. Those which were known
to sleep on land were sometimes caught, fed and re-
leased, the voyagers following the direction of their
homeward flight. If the first land encountered by
the fleet was undesirable, perhaps a barren atoll, they
would rest for a time and revictual, and then put out
to sea once more. When they found inhabited land,
they conquered the natives if they could. If they were
too weak for this, they tried to ally themselves with
some one tribe and aided it against the others. By
the beginning of the historic period they had estab-
lished themselves as rulers in most of the Polynesian
islands, and had largely replaced the earlier races in
Samoa, Tonga, and the Cook and Society groups.
Many of the legends which deal with voyages
within Polynesia are supported by the genealogical
records kept in the various groups. It is possible
from these to date approximately some of the later
movements. During the period between A.D. 1000
and 1300 there were a series of migrations from the
Society group to Hawaii which seem to have strongly
influenced Hawaiian culture and to have brought
about certain changes in the language and physical
type. The Hawaiians evidently looked upon these im-
migrants as a superior stock. Many of their historic
chiefs traced their descent from them. Between A.D.
1250 and 1850 there were many voyages from the
Cook and Society groups to New Zealand culminating
about the year 1350 in the great heke (“migration”)
from Rarotonga. Most of the historic Maori traced
their descent from individuals who came during this
SETTLEMENT OF THE ISLANDS 19
period, although there can be no doubt that New Zea-
land was known and inhabited at a far earlier time.
The last people to pass into the Pacific were of
Mongoloid type, much like the present Malays. They
penetrated western and central Micronesia, but ap-
parently did not reach Polynesia in any strength.
FOOD
The Polynesians and Micronesians were primarily
fishermen. There was almost no game, and agricul-
ture was possible only in favored localities. Their
staple diet was sea food. It was a calamity for any
tribe to be cut off from its fishing grounds. Crabs,
shell-fish, and other slow moving forms were caught
by hand. The natives of both sexes were expert
swimmers, and this was usually women’s work. The
octopus was a favorite food. Living in holes in the
coral, it was gathered by divers who thrust a stick
into the middle of its arms. The animal twined itself
around the stick and could then be drawn out. It was
also caught with a special type of long-shanked hook
to which a cowrie-shell was attached as alure (Fig. 1).
The pearl-oyster was of great importance in the
low islands, its flesh being used for food and its shell
for a variety of implements and ornaments. It was
gathered by divers who went as deep as 120 feet.
For three days in every year the western Polynesian
enjoyed a special delicacy, the palolo worm (Hunice
viridis). This curious animal spends its life in a bur-
ro in the coral reef. Once a year, when its eggs are
ripe, the rear half of its body breaks away and swims
rapidly to the surface, where it bursts, scattering the
eggs. This happens to millions of the worms simul-
taneously, and the bodies rise in swarms. The natives
caught them in nets and roasted them. The time of
the rising can be accurately forecast. In Samoa the
palolo rises in late October or early November on the
day before, the day of, and the day after the last
20
Foop oi
quarter of the moon. This was always a time of feast-
ing, for the worms had to be eaten as soon as caught.
The natives had a thorough knowledge of the local
fishing grounds, which often included banks many
miles from land, and knew where each species of fish
was to be obtained, the proper bait for it, etc. There
Fic. 1.
Octopus Hook of Wood with a Heavy Stone Sinker.
The octopus twines its arms around the shell, and is impaled by a sharp jerk.
Hawaii. Case 35.
were many edible kinds, but there were others which
were poisonous and certain species which were good
during certain months and deadly at others. In some
islands a single species might even be edible in a few
places and poisonous elsewhere. There were a great
variety of fishing appliances. In the Carolines and
Gilberts weirs of coral rock, sometimes supplemented
22 ETHNOLOGY OF POLYNESIA AND MICRONESIA
by cane work, were built in shallow water, and the
fish herded into them at high tide. Simple stone weirs
were also used in the Society and Tonga. Basketry fish
traps were widely used. Ropes of coconut-palm fronds,
sometimes as much as half a mile in length, were used
in shallow water. The rope was laid out until a wide
area had been enclosed. It was then gradually drawn
in, driving the fish together into a small area, where
they were speared or netted. In the Carolines and
Marquesas, and perhaps elsewhere, tide pools, caves
in the reef, and other confined areas were poisoned
with certain plants. The poison stupified the fish and
made them rise to the surface, but did not injure their
flesh. The Gilbert Islanders were expert at noosing
fish, catching eels and even sharks in this way. The
noose was attached to a long pole, and another pole
with bait on the end was used to entice the victim into
it (Fig. 5). The practice of spearing fish was uni-
versal. The spearsmen lured them to the surface at
night with torches, and in daytime often swam after
them, following their movements under water. The
ordinary fish-spear had a cluster of long-barbed points
(Fig. 6). In the Marquesas the giant ray, which
sometimes attains a width of fifteen feet, was taken
with harpoons which had detachable heads. In that
group and Samoa fish were also shot with the bow and
arrow.
Nets were used everywhere. They were com-
monly made from Hibiscus bark which was scraped,
shredded, and rolled into cord between the palm of
the hand and the bare thigh. Very strong nets for
turtles or shark were sometimes made of coconut fibre,
and the New Zealanders used the native flax. The
netting needles were of wood, and were shaped much
Foop 23
like the European ones. Nets were of all sizes and
many forms, depending on the use for which they were
intended. Seins were used everywhere, and were
sometimes over 100 feet long and 10-20 feet wide.
They were provided with floats of light wood and were
/)
,
y,
A
y)
WIZZ
eis
ah
Fic. ne Fic. 3.
2. Fish-hook of Whale Ivory. Hawaii. Case 35.
3. Fish-hook and Line. The shank of the hook is made of pearl-shell; the barb,
of tortoise-shell. Sotoan, Caroline Islands. Case 7.
weighted with stones, pieces of coral, or large shells.
The central float of the Maori seins was often highly
ornamented, and carved stone sinkers, probably net-
weights, are found in both the Marquesas and north-
ern New Zealand. The Maori also had very large
funnel-shaped nets, sometimes as much as 25 feet in
24 ETHNOLOGY OF POLYNESIA AND MICRONESIA
diameter at the mouth and 75 feet long. The Mar-
quesans did most of their communal fishing with a
Fic. 4.
Fish-hook for Catching the Ruvettus, a Variety of Pelagic Mackerel.
Union Group. Case 1.
Eel Snare.
Fic. 6.
Wooden Fish Spear with Prongs of Hard, Heavy Wood.
Peculiar to Matty and Durour. Case 11,
large bag-shaped net which was alternately raised and
lowered between two canoes. Its sides sloped inward
Foop 25
to a small central pocket in which the fish were col-
lected. Smaller bag nets whose mouths were held
open with hoops or cross pieces, or which could be
closed with a draw string, were used everywhere.
They were lowered to the bottom with bait inside and
drawn up when the fish entered. The Marquesans had
an ingenious method for catching parrot-fish. These
fish live on mollusks, and each one has a section of
reef which he patrols, driving off intruders of the same
species. A bag net with a live parrot-fish tethered to
its centre was drawn slowly along the reef. Other
SN
’ Peet SSS eae ~ COI — OT EE S }
SSE ESSER SA
ws,
8 LN, es 1B
« Ns
Fic: 7.
Fish-hook of Shell.
Society Islands.
parrot-fish would come out to attack the intruder,
and both would be drawn up. Long-handled dip-nets
were in universal use for small fish. Light ones on
very long poles were used for catching flying fish at
night. They were lured by torches and netted on the
surface or in the air. Their flight is very rapid, and
as the fishing canoes were narrow and cranky, it re-
quired a good deal of skill both to catch them and to
avoid capsizing. Casting nets whose edges were
weighted with small stones or shells were important
in Hawaii, but seem to have been little used elsewhere.
Hooks and lines were universally used (Figs.
2, 3, 7). One-piece hooks were usually made from
26 ETHNOLOGY OF POLYNESIA AND MICRONESIA
pearl-shell, the gleam of the shell serving as a lure and
making bait unnecessary. They were rarely barbed,
and the points of some of them were so sharply re-
curved that it is hard to see how the fish could have
taken them. One-piece hooks were also made of bone
and whale ivory (Fig. 2). The Easter Islanders
had stone fish hooks. Large and finely made hooks
were sometimes worn as ornaments, especially by the
natives of the low islands. There were many types of
compound hook. The commonest was made from a
strip of pearl-shell painted at the thick end and with
a bone point fastened on the inner surface of the thin
end.
oS
UY
——!
{jf
L,
——o
Fic. 13.
Chief’s Meat Dish.
Kadavu, Fiji. Case 21.
gourd bottles with simple, stained designs, but the
practice was unknown elsewhere. Large gourd uten-
sils were usually carried in pots of coconut fibre or
hash cord. Gourd shells were little used in Samoa and
Micronesia.
44 ETHNOLOGY OF POLYNESIA AND MICRONESIA
Coconut shells were used wherever the tree grew,
for bottles, also for small bowls and cups (Fig. 10).
The Marquesans cleaned the nuts intended for use
as bottles by making a hole in the largest eye and
fastening them in the bed of a stream until the small
fresh-water shrimps had eaten out the kernel. Cups
were made from half shells which were often ground
to paper thinness, oiled and polished. Both cups and
bottles were sometimes carved.
Fic. 14,
Wooden Kava Bowl.
Fiji. Case 21.
Joints of bamboo, or sections with the septa between
the joints pierced, were used as water bottles wherever
the larger species grew.
There were a great variety of wooden utensils
(Figs. 12-16). The distribution of the various types
has never been worked out thoroughly. Simple, round
bowls were in universal use. They seem to have been
of secondary importance in Micronesia and western
Polynesia, but were the dominant form in Hawaii and
the Marquesas. Many of the Hawaiian specimens are
COOKING AND UTENSILS 45
of very large size, and are beautifully proportioned.
Oval bowls with round or pointed ends were also uni-
versal. They seem to have been the dominant type in
Micronesia, western Polynesia, and Fiji. They were
also important in the Society group and Marquesas.
Except for a few very shallow forms, platters rather
than bowls, they were almost lacking in Hawaii. Some
Fic. 15.
Old Popoi Bowl Repeatedly Mended by Its Owners.
Hawaii. Case 34.
of the Marquesan vessels of this type were as much as
eight feet long. Large oval bowls with tight-fitting,
domed covers were important in New Zealand (Plates
II and III) and the Marquesas, and are reported from
Pelew, but seem to have been unknown elsewhere.
Large, shallow round bowls with four or more
legs were important in Samoa, Tonga, and Fiji, but
unknown elsewhere. They were used for kava-making
46 ETHNOLOGY OF POLYNESIA AND MICRONESIA
(Fig. 17). A large, oval, four-legged bowl was com-
mon in the Society group, and a similar utensil ap-
pears in Hawaii as one of the rarer forms. Legged
Fic. 16.
Wooden Food Dish.
Matty and Durour. Case 10.
utensils of any sort were quite rare in Hawaii, and
were absent in the Marquesas. In the Carolines bowls
Fic. 17.
Wooden’Kava Bowl. Samoa. Case 30.
were often provided with a hase, either solid or
pierced. There were a number of peculiar local forms.
The Marquesans had a type shaped like a European
COOKING AND UTENSILS 47
soup tureen, with a carved handle at either end. The
Maoris made some of their bowls in the shape of a
gourd with a curved neck cut in two lengthwise. The
Fijians made many shallow dishes of peculiar shape,
and these were used as oil dishes by their priests
(Fig. 12). Micronesian and western Polynesian uten-
sils were rarely decorated. The natives of Ruk in the
Carolines painted their bowls red with a mixture of
ochre and coconut oil. The Pelew Islanders sometimes
inlaid theirs with pear! shell. Carving was infrequent,
and was limited to a few simple angular designs. The
Marquesans and Maoris carved their best utensils with
elaborate and beautiful patterns. The Hawaiians
never carved the surfaces of their bowls, relying for
their decorative effects on fine proportions, high polish,
and the beauty of the natural grain.
KAVA AND BETEL
Nearly all the Polynesians drank kava, a beverage
made from the root of a variety of pepper (Piper
methysticum). It was not used in New Zealand or
Easter Island. Its occurrence in Micronesia seems to
have been limited to Ponape and Kusaie in the Caro-
lines. Kava was prepared by crushing the fresh root,
adding water, and straining out the solid parts with a
bundle of fibre. In Ponape and Kusaie it was crushed
with stone pounders, but all the Polynesians chewed
it. The chewing was usually delegated to young wo-
men chosen for their good health and sound teeth. The
saliva helped to release the alkaloid which was the ac-
tive principle. Kava prepared from the chewed root
was somewhat more potent than that made from the
pounded root. The drink itself is cloudy white in color,
and tastes somewhat like weak soapsuds. When drunk
in quantities, it produces a mild intoxication. Kava
drinking was usually a ceremonial procedure. When
the drink had been prepared, the first cup was passed
to the person of highest rank present. It was then
given to the others in order of their rank, the master
of ceremonies calling out the name and title of each as
he passed the cup. A libation to the spirits of the dead,
or to some god, was usually poured before the drinking
began.
The chewing of betel occurred only in the Pelews
and in Yap of the Carolines. It was unknown in Poly-
nesia. The betel quid was made by taking a slice of
the fresh nut of the areca palm and wrapping it in a
pepper leaf with a pinch of lime. The mixture has a
48
KAVA AND BETEL 49
slight narcotic effect. It makes the saliva red, and in
time blackens the teeth. Betel-chewing is a wide-
spread practice in southeastern Asia and Indonesia,
and was probably introduced into Micronesia from
this region in relatively late times.
CLOTHING AND ORNAMENT
The warm and equitable climate of most of the
Polynesian and Micronesian islands made clothing al-
most unnecessary. In general the men wore a small
loin-cloth, apron, or kilt, and the women a kilt, but
there were many local variations. In Pelew the men
went naked and the women wore two short, thick
fringes of yellow-dyed coconut fibre which were tied
around the waist with a string. In the Carolines the
men wore a belt with bunches of bark in front and be-
hind, or a strip of fabric passed around the waist, be-
tween the legs, and tucked in behind. A kilt of grass
or leaves was often worn on the outside. On Yap the
women wore a voluminous skirt of leaves or bast
reaching to the ankles and on Ponape a knee-length
kilt of coarse cloth. In the Marshalls the men wore
two thick bunches of shredded bark connected by a
strip of matting which passed between the legs. This
was supported by a girdle. The women wore a skirt
made from two Pandanus-leaf mats, one in front and
the other behind.
In the Gilberts men wore a single Pandanus mat
as a kilt, while women wore a short skirt of split coco-
nut leaves, grass, or bark. In ancient Samoa the men
wore a small apron of tz leaves, and the women a skirt
of the same material reaching to below the knee. On
dress occasions both sexes wore voluminous skirts of
tapa or fine mats. In Tonga both men and women
wore a rather long skirt of tapa. In Fiji the men wore
a tapa loin-cloth made of a single strip passed around
the waist and between the legs, while the women wore
r
50
CLOTHING AND ORNAMENT 51
a short skirt of dyed fibre. Chiefs’ loin-cloths were
sometimes as much as fifty feet long. In Hawaii, the
Marquesas, Society and Cook groups the men wore a
similar loin-cloth of tapa, and the women a kilt or
skirt of the same material. The Maori men wore a
loin-cloth or a girdle with one or two aprons. A kilt
of flax was often added. The women wore aprons or
kilts.
Upper garments were unknown in Micronesia
except in the Gilberts, where the men sometimes wore
a poncho-like garment of bark matting with long,
hanging fringes. Garments of the same type, but made
of tapa or fine Pandanus matting, were worn by men
in the Cook and Society groups. Long cloaks were
worn in Hawaii, the Marquesas, New Zealand, while
a short cloak was worn by women in the Society group.
The material most used for clothing in Polynesia
was bark-cloth or tapa (Plates IV-VII). It was little
used in Micronesia, for the trees from which it was
made would not grow in the soil of the low coral is-
lands. The best grade was everywhere made from the
bark of the paper mulberry (Broussonetia papyri-
fera), which was cultivated for the purpose. Inferior
grades were made from the bark of the breadfruit,
banyan, and other trees. There were some local dif-
ferences in tapa-making methods, but in general the
process was as follows: Shoots up to two inches in
diameter were cut, and the bark removed in a single
piece. The stiff, outer bark was scraped off with a
sharp shell, and the inner bark soaked for a time in
fresh water. It was then beaten on a smooth log with
a short, square club. The faces of the club were us-
ually grooved to assist in matting the fibres. New
strips of bark were placed with their edges overlap-
52 ETHNOLOGY OF POLYNESIA AND MICRONESIA
ping the beaten portion and beaten out in turn. In
this way the piece could be made as large as desired.
As soon as the tapa was dry, it was ready for use.
The finished product was pure white, and had the con-
sistency of tough, soft paper. It was surprisingly
warm, and would stand fairly Sense wear, but fell to
pieces if it became wet.
All the Polynesians except the Marquesans deco-
rated their tapa. The Hawaiians dyed it in various
colors, painted it with designs, and also stamped it
with small stamps made from strips of bamboo. The
Society Islanders painted it and stamped it with leaves
and flowers dipped in dye. In the Cook group, Samoa,
Tonga and Fiji, it was decorated by being stretched
over a carved board or over a plate of Pandanus leaves
on which narrow splints had been sewn, producing a
raised design. It was then rubbed with red earth, the
parts over the raised portion of the stamp taking the
color, while the other parts did not. After rubbing de-
tails of the design were often gone over with paint.
The Fijians also had stencils and wooden cylinders
from two to four feet long, which were carved with
evenly spaced transverse rings or wrapped with cord.
They were covered with dye and then rolled across the
tapa, making straight parallel lines. Tapa was often
oiled to make it resistant to rain or varnished with
the sap of a tree.
Except in Micronesia and Samoa mats were little
used for clothing. The Samoans had very fine mats
which were woven from strips of Pandanus leaf as
thin as paper and only a sixteenth of an inch wide.
These were as pliable as cloth, and were highly valued
because of the great amount of labor involved. They
were often decorated at the edges with red feathers.
CLOTHING AND ORNAMENT 53
They had another type of clothing mat, worn in cold
weather, which was woven from strips of beaten Hi-
biscus bark. Threads of the same bark were caught
into the face of the mat on one side, so that it was
covered with a thick, rough pile two or three inches
long. Quite similar mats were used. The Micro-
nesian clothing mats were nearly all made from Pan-
danus, and were considerably coarser in Yap, in the
Carolines, than the best Samoan examples. Those
worn by the Marshall Island women were square, and
were decorated with broad borders embroidered with
dyed strips of bark.
True cloth was made in some of the islands of the
Caroline group and in Tasman, Lord Howe, Abgarris,
and other small islands lying on the edge of Melanesia.
It was woven from untwisted banana-fibre or from
narrow strips of bark. The loom was a simple belt-
loom. The natives of Kusaie, in the Carolines, pro-
duced beautiful designs by tying together fibres of
different colors to form the warp. Each section of
colored fibre had to be of exact length. They had small
bench-like frames with a gauge on one side on which
the warp was tied before it was transferred to the
loom. In some of the finer belts the warp had to be
knotted as much as fifteen thousand times. The prac-
tice is clearly related to the decorative warp-dying
cultivated by many of the Malays, and may represent
the original technique from which the Malay method
was developed.
The loom was unknown in Polynesia, but is known
in Micronesia (Fig. 18). The Maoris were the only
people who used textiles for clothing. At the time of
their first arrival in New Zealand they no doubt used
tapa, but the climate was too cold for the paper-
ETHNOLOGY OF POLYNESIA AND MICRONESIA
54
“SI 9D “pues, soy] pioT
"WOOT
ea
CLOTHING AND ORNAMENT 55
mulberry. There was no native tree from which it
could be made. They made a limited use of bird and
dog skins, but most of their clothing was manufac-
tured from the fibre of the New Zealand flax (Phor-
mium tenax) ; see Plate XIII. The leaves were cut and
_ dried, the outer skin scraped away with a shell, and
the fibre steeped for three or four days in running
water. It was then pounded with a stone beater, dried
in the sun, and chafed between the hands until tho-
roughly clean and soft. Thread was made by rolling
the fibre between the palm of the hand and the bare
thigh. Cloaks were made by the twining process. The
warp threads, which were simply untwisted hanks of
fibre, were attached to a cord stretched between two
sticks set upright in the ground. The weft threads,
which were of twisted fibre, were carried across in
pairs and given a half turn at each of the warp
threads. An interval of half an inch or more was us-
ually left between one pair of warp threads and the
next, but closely twined fabrics, not unlike coarse can-
vas, were sometimes made for use as war cloaks.
Cloaks were often shaped to fit the shoulders by means
of inserts. Kilts were usually made from strings of
partially cleaned fibre attached to a broad, plaited
waist-band. The outer side of the cloak was usually
decorated with hanging threads, like a long, thin pile,
or with feathers. The quills of the feathers were
caught into the fabric. They were arranged in over-
lapping rows, so that the surface of the cloth was com-
pletely covered. The fine hair-like feathers of the kiwi
(Apteryx) were especially prized, but those of pig-
eons, parrots, and other bright-colored birds were also
used. The making of feather robes required much
56 ETHNOLOGY OF POLYNESIA AND MICRONESIA
labor (Plate XIV). They were highly valued. The
Museum’s collection is the finest in America.
The Hawaiians also made very beautiful feather
robes, but employed a technique altogether different
from that of the Maori. The base of the robe was a
fine-meshed net made from twisted bark-cords. The
feathers were attached in small bunches, their quills
being caught into the knots of the netting. The under-
lying fabric was completely covered. Long robes of
red and yellow feathers were worn by chiefs. A
feather loin-cloth was the emblem of royalty, com-
parable to a European crown. The orange yellow
feathers of the mamo (Drepanis pacifica) were the
most prized. Each bird bore only a few of these, and
thousands of birds had to be trapped to make a single
robe. The chiefs kept professional bird-catchers.
Feathers for robe-making were regularly exacted as
taxes and tribute. The natives of the Society and Cook
groups also seem to have made a limited use of feather-
covered garments.
TATTOOING AND MUTILATIONS
Tattooing was practically universal in Polynesia
and Micronesia. The appliances and methods were much
the same everywhere except in New Zealand. Carbon
thinned to an ink with water was used as pigment.
The pricking was done with small-toothed blades of
bird or human bone set in short wooden handles, like
miniature adzes (Fig. 19). These were dipped in the
ink and driven into the skin with a sharp blow from a
short stick. The designs were often drawn on the skin
before tattooing, but the best artists worked free hand.
The process was painful, and the work was done a
little at a time with intervals of a few days between
operations to allow the patient to rest and heal. In
most of the islands the tattooers formed a special class,
and were well paid for their services.
The Maori used tattooing implements similar to
those of the other Polynesians, except that the blades
were straight-edged instead of toothed. The designs
were carved in the flesh, and the wounds kept open
so that a deep groove remained even when the flesh
had healed. In some places the soot used as pigment
was first mixed with bird fat and fed to a dog, the
black dung of the dog being then used. The tattooers
prided themselves on never tattooing two faces exactly
alike. In early historic times chiefs often used draw-
ings of their face-tattooing as signatures on legal docu-
ments.
The extent of the tattooing varied a good deal in
the different groups. In Pelew both sexes tattooed, the
men being marked from the navel to the feet. On Yap
57
58 ETHNOLOGY OF POLYNESIA AND MICRONESIA
in the Carolines free men and the women attached to
the men’s houses were tattooed, the latter being
marked on the hands and legs. On Ponape of the same
group both sexes tattooed the arms and legs. In the
Marshalls tattooing was a mark of rank, diagonal
lines on the cheek indicating a chief. Nobles often
wore elaborate symbolic designs on chest, back, and
arms, but commoners were not allowed to tattoo the
cheeks or sides. In the Gilberts men tattooed the
breast, back, and legs; and women, the thighs and legs.
Tattooing was forbidden to slaves everywhere in Mi-
Fic. 19.
Tattooing Instrument with Bone Comb for Pricking Designs into Skin.
Samoa. Case 29.
cronesia. In Fiji only the women were tattooed, being
marked on those parts covered by the skirt and on the
hands. It was believed that an untattooed woman
would be punished after death. In Tonga the men
were heavily tattooed from the waist to the knee, but
the women were not marked.
In Samoa the men were tattooed as in Tonga
(Fig. 19) ; and the women, with a few small designs
on the legs and hands. In the Society group the men
were heavily tattooed, having designs even on the head
and ears, though seldom on the face. The women, es-
pecially those of royal blood, were tattooed on the feet
and hands. In the Marquesas the men were completely
TATTOOING AND MUTILATIONS 59
tattooed, being marked even on the crown of the head,
lips, and eyelids. The women were tattooed from the
waist to the feet, on the arms and lips, and behind the
ears. The Hawaiians seem to have tattooed every-
where except on the face, but the designs were crude
and widely spaced. Maori men were marked on the
face and thighs, women only on the lips.
Scarification was practised only in the Gilberts
and Fiji, the women burning their flesh to produce
rows of raised dots on the breast and arms. More elab-
orate designs, made by cutting the flesh and causing it
to heal in a welt, were also used by the Fijian women.
Circumcision was practised everywhere in Poly-
nesia except New Zealand, also in Fiji, but seems to
have been unknown in Micronesia. Head deformation
also seems to have been nearly universal in Polynesia,
although there is little information on the methods.
In Samoa the child was laid on its back, and its head
surrounded by three flat stones, one at the crown and
one on either side. The forehead was then pressed
with the hand to flatten it, and the nose was also flat-
tened. In Tonga the child was kept lying on its back
on a hard surface with its head pressed against a flat
piece of wood, both the back and top of the head being
flattened in this way. In the Marquesas infants’ heads
were shaped by long-continued rubbing, a long head
with a retreating forehead being much admired. In
Fiji the coast natives deformed their infants’ heads to
make them short and round, while the interior tribes
deformed theirs to make them long and narrow. The
Maoris admired bowed legs and tried to produce them
by massaging their infants’ limbs. A few of them also
filed their teeth to points, but the practice was un-
known elsewhere.
60 ETHNOLOGY OF POLYNESIA AND MICRONESIA
The Micronesians all pierced their ears. In Yap
in the Carolines the hole was stretched with increas-
ingly large rolls of leaves, girls wearing coconut-shell
protectors over their ears, while the process was going
on. In Ruk and Mortlock heavy ornaments were in-
serted, dragging the lobes down almost to the shoul-
ders. In Polynesia ear-piercing seems to have been
limited to New Zealand, the Marquesas and Cook
groups, Tonga, and Easter Island. Both the Cook
group natives and the Easter Islanders stretched the
ear-lobe. The Marquesans did not stretch their ear-
lobes in historic times, but the form of certain of the
men’s ear-ornaments strongly suggests that they were
once familiar with the practice. In that group the ears
were pierced with long awls of bone or tortoise-shell
which were often beautifully carved, and were handed
down as heirlooms. The natives of Pelew pierced the
septum of the nose; those of Tasman Island, the side
of the nostril, but these mutilations were unknown
elsewhere.
HAIR-DRESSING
Micronesian hair-dressing was comparatively
simple. Women usually allowed their hair to flow
loose, sometimes cutting it off at the shoulders, while
men usually tied theirs into a knot on top of the head.
Polynesian hair-dressing varied a good deal in the dif-
ferent groups. In Samoa women wore their hair short,
with sometimes a small, twisted lock hanging from the
left temple. Men wore theirs long, gathering it up into
a knot a little to the right of the crown of the head.
They frequently bleached it red with lime. Tongan
women wore the hair long. In both the Society group
and the Marquesas women bobbed their hair, cutting
it off at the shoulders or above, while men arranged
theirs in fantastic ways. Sometimes one half the head
would be shaved, and the other half left long, or a
path would be shaved down the centre, and the hair
gathered in knots on either side, or it would be gath-
ered and plaited into a broad tail behind. In the So-
ciety group the heads of infants were usually shaved.
Among the Maori unmarried women usually wore
their hair short, while married ones wore theirs in
long braids around the head. Men usually wore it
long, gathering it into a knot on the back of the head
which was held with a comb. In Hawaii the women
wore the hair short; the men, long. The latter some-
times shaved the sides of the head, leaving a roach
down the centre. The hair was often cut as a sign of
mourning.
The Fijians had by far the most elaborate coif-
fures in the region. Their hair was naturally curly,
61
62 ETHNOLOGY OF POLYNESIA AND MICRONESIA
stiff, and wiry, and stood out from the head. Williams,
a reliable early visitor, measured one head of hair that
was five feet in circumference. The hair was dyed red,
yellow, white, and dark blue, several colors sometimes
appearing on the same head. Williams says, ‘One has
a knot of fiery hair on his crown, all the rest being
bald. Another has most of his hair cut away, leaving
three or four rows of small clusters, as if his head
were planted with small paint brushes. A third has
his head bare except where a large patch projects over
each temple. ... A mode that requires great care
has the hair wrought into distinct locks, radiating
from the head. Each lock is a perfect cone, about
seven inches long, having the base outward; so that
the surface of the hair is marked out into a great num-
ber of small circles, the ends being turned in in each
lock, toward the centre of the cone. In another kin-
dred style the locks are pyramidal, the sides and angles
of each being as regular as though formed of wood.
All round the head they look like square, black blocks,
the upper tier projecting horizontally from the crown,
and a flat space being left at the top of the head.”
Unmarried women wore short hair, but the married
ones sometimes copied the less extreme men’s styles.
Every chief kept a professional hair-dresser. Wigs
were worn by those whose natural hair was not of the
proper texture. When the hair had once been made
up, it was protected by sleeping on raised wooden pil-
lows which kept it from the ground.
Most of the Micronesians had light beards ae
usually plucked them out with a pair of small shells,
used like tweezers, although the Gilbert Islanders
prized their beards and allowed them to grow. The
Samoans, Tongans, and Maoris also plucked out their
HAIR-DRESSING 63
beards and body hair in this way. The Society
Islanders often plucked theirs, but also allowed them
to grow long and braided them. The Marquesans often
shaved a strip down the chin, allowing the beard to
grow on either side, and divided it into tresses which
were decorated with beads or teeth. The white beards
of old men were highly valued for ornaments, and when
a man wanted to make one of these, but had no rela-
tive whose beard was white, he would sometimes hire
an old man to let his beard grow. Most of the Hawai-
ian men wore beards, and the Fijians had heavy
beards, but seem to have paid little attention to their
arrangement.
Shaving and hair-cutting were everywhere done
by means of shark-teeth. The tooth was set in a
wooden handle, and the hair gathered in small bunches
and sawed off. When this became too painful, it was
singed off with a brand.
PERSONAL ORNAMENTS
All the Polynesians and Micronesians were fond
of ornaments, but they were less extreme in this than
the Melanesians. Body and face painting, except in
connection with religious rites, was unknown except
in Fiji, although the Pelew and Caroline Islanders and
the Marquesans smeared themselves with a mixture of
oil and turmeric. The latter bleached their skins be-
fore dances by covering themselves with the sap of a
vine and remaining in the shade for several days.
Head-ornaments were little used in Micronesia, al-
though wreaths of flowers and herbs were sometimes
worn. Hats woven from strips of Pandanus were used
in the Gilberts. The men of Ruk, in the Carolines,
wore a long comb to the top of which a flat feather
ornament, shaped somewhat like a bird’s wing, was
attached. In Fiji and Tonga the commonest head-dress
was a turban of white tapa. The Samoans wore orna-
mental combs and also high head-dresses of bleached
human hair with brow bands covered with rows of.
iridescent Nautilus-shell plaques. In the Cook and
Society groups warriors often wore high head-dresses
of radiating feathers. In the Society group these were
attached to a broad, flat semi-circle of coconut-fibre
matting which was covered with shark-teeth, pearl-
shell plaques, or small feathers. The Society and Tua-
motu Islanders also wore shell wreaths made by string-
ing small shells together and wrapping the string
about a ring of tapa or Pandanus leaves.
The Marquesans had a great variety of head-
dresses. The commonest was made from porpoise
64
PERSONAL ORNAMENTS 65
teeth pierced and made into short strings which were
fastened perpendicularly on a band of coconut fibre.
Crowns made from curved alternate strips of white
shell and carved tortoise-shell, fastened at the base to
a fibre band covered with small pearl disks, were also
much used. A large pear! shell overlaid with a piece
of tortoise-shell cut into delicate tracery was often
worn on the forehead, and warriors wore a high head-
dress made from cock’s tail-feathers. Aigrettes made
from old men’s beards were usually fastened to the
porpoise-tooth wreaths and shell crowns. Hawaiian
chiefs wore ornaments of wickerwork covered with red
or yellow feathers. The shape was very much like that
of the ancient Greek helmet. The Maori wore orna-
mental combs of wood or whalebone, or inserted one
or more feathers in the hair. Wreaths of flowers and
fragrant herbs and single flowers thrust in the hair or
over one ear were used everywhere.
In Micronesia flowers or bunches of dyed leaves
were the commonest ear-ornaments. Inlaid tortoise-
shell ornaments were worn by men in the Pelews; ear-
rings of beads or shell, by men in Yap, in the Caro-
lines. In Ruk and Mortlock of the same group the men
wore a great number of tortoise-shell rings. In the
Cook group leaves and flowers or small polished coco-
nut shells were worn in the distended ear-lobes. The
Easter Islanders wore round, wooden plugs. The Mar-
quesans had a variety of ear-ornaments. The most
prized men’s ornaments were disks cut from single
whale-teeth. A long spike was left on one side of the
disk, which passed through the hole in the ear-lobe
and projected behind. The weight of the ornaments
was borne by a band across the head. Large plates of
whitened wood with similar spikes were also worn.
66 ETHNOLOGY OF POLYNESIA AND MICRONESIA
Women wore ear-ornaments made from narrow strips
of carved human bone, the decorated portion project-
ing horizontally behind the ear. The Maori wore long
ear-drops of jade or bowenite, or pennants made from
shark-teeth. They also inserted bunches of strips of
white tapa in the ear perforations—the only use which
Fic. 20.
Chief's Necklace. Hook of Whale’s Tooth and Bundles of Braided Human Hair.
Hawaii. Case 35.
they made of this substance. A nose ornament of tor-
toise-shell was worn by priests and old men on Lord
Howe Island (Fig. 22).
Necklaces of flowers and small shells were in uni-
versal use and were, perhaps, the commonest of all
native ornaments. Tooth necklaces were also much
67
PERSONAL ORNAMENTS
Fic. 21.
Breast Ornaments Ground out of Shell.
Lord Howe Island. Case 13
68 ETHNOLOGY OF POLYNESIA AND MICRONESIA
used. Porpoise and small whale teeth were the com-
monest (Fig. 20), but the Gilbert Islanders and Maoris
used shark-teeth and the teeth of slain enemies. Single
whale-teeth attached to heavy cord were worn as
breast ornaments in Fiji, New Zealand, and the Mar-
quesas. In Fiji they were the most valued of all orna-
ments. The gift of a whale-tooth always accompanied
Fic. 22.
Nose Ornament of Tortoise-shell for Priests and Old Men.
Lord Howe Island. Case 13.
overtures from one chief to another. Necklaces made
from a number of whale-teeth ground to long slender
points and threaded together by a cord through their
bases were worn in Fiji, Samoa, and Tonga (Fig. 23).
In the Gilberts, Marquesas, and Hawaii necklaces
made from many yards of slender, braided human hair
were highly valued. In Hawaii they were worn only
by chiefs, and had a peculiar hook-shaped ornament
of whale ivory attached to the centre (Fig. 20).
PERSONAL ORNAMENTS 69
Necklaces made from cylindrical beads of shell
or coconut shell were worn nearly everywhere in Mi-
cronesia, but were almost unkown in Polynesia. In the
Marshalls and Carolines those made from pink shell
were most prized. On Yap, in the Carolines, the wo-
Fic. 23.
Necklace of Whale Ivory.
Viti Levu, Fiji. Case 23.
men wore a string of black-dyed Hibiscus bark as a
necklace, and it was considered indecent to appear
without it. Disks ground from the ends of large conus
shells were worn as gorgets everywhere in Micronesia
(Fig. 21), and occurred as a rare form in the Mar-
70 ETHNOLOGY OF POLYNESIA AND MICRONESIA
quesas. The Marquesans wore stiff collars or ruffs
made of light wood encrusted with the bright, red
Abrus seeds. The Tahitians had large semi-circular
breast-plates of stiff coconut-fibre matting overlaid
with feathers, shark-teeth, and plaques of pearl-shell.
The favorite Maori ornament was the heitiki (Plate
XIV), a small grotesque human figure carved from
jade or whalebone, which was worn around the neck
on a cord. It apparently represented an ancestor.
Heitiki were handed down in families as heirlooms,
being buried with the last member. There was a curi-
ous rule that when a chief had been conquered and en-
slaved, his wife had to send her heitiki to the wife of
the conqueror. Large hook-shaped pendants and small
adze-blades or chisels of fine green jade were also
worn as breast-ornaments. A rare type of Maori neck-
lace made from alternate beads and points of human
bone with a knife-shaped pendant of bowenite is
shown in the collection.
Rings of tortoise-shell were worn in Tonga in an-
cient times. The Hawaiians sometimes wore small
ivory effigies of turtles attached to the finger with a
cord. Bracelets were worn all over Micronesia, but
were rare in Polynesia. Those of Micronesia were
ground from Conus or Tridacna shell. The Hawaiians
wore a variety of bracelets, some of shell, some of al-
ternate pieces of black wood and ivory, and others of
hogs’-teeth or boar-tusks. Men sometimes wore a
broad band of netted fibre covered with shells on the
upper arm. The Marquesans wore kilts, capes, knee-
wrist and ankle ornaments made from long tresses of
human hair fastened to bands of coconut fibre. Girdles
of plaited hair-cord were worn by men in the Gilberts.
In the Marshalls women wore a girdle made from
PERSONAL ORNAMENTS 71
coconut-fibre cord encased in a woven sleeve of Pan-
danus. The length of the cord varied with the rank
of the wearer, those of female chiefs being sometimes
as much as seventy yards long. In the Carolines men
wore broad belts made from a number of parallel
strings of coconut shell and shell beads. Ornamental
girdles were little used in Polynesia, but Maori men
wore special war belts of flax.
Fans were used everywhere in the region. They
were usually braided from strips of coconut or Pan-
danus leaf, and were used for coolness or to drive
away insects. Those from the Marshalls, Fiji, Tonga,
and Samoa are often braided from dyed strips of dif-
ferent colors, and are unusually graceful and pleasing.
The Samoan fans are sometimes woven in open-work
designs. A fan of thin wood was used there as a rare
form. The Marquesans and Cook Islanders had very
finely woven fans with carved handles of wood, bone,
or whale ivory. Those from the Marquesans are espe-
cially beautiful, the woven part being whitened with
clay, and the handle carved into one or more pairs of
conventionalized human figures. Such fans were car-
ried by female chiefs as insignia of rank and descended
in families as heirlooms. In the Cook group men car-
ried very large fans in time of peace. In Hawaii the
chiefs used a special type of fan with a very short and
broad blade, often almost crescent-shaped, and handles
wrapped with fine cord of fibre or human hair.
Fly-flaps made from long bunches of coconut fibre
attached to a slender wooden handle were used in Fiji,
Tonga, Samoa, and the Society group. In the Society
group the handles were often carved into crude human
figures. In Samoa a fly-flap was carried by a chief or
orator as part of his dress costume. The specimens
72 ETHNOLOGY OF POLYNESIA AND MICRONESIA
from the Society group are so carefully made that they
probably served some ceremonial purpose. In Hawaii
large fly-flaps of feathers were an emblem of royalty.
DWELLINGS
? Practically all Micronesian and Polynesian houses
were built of wood and thatch, but they were by no
means crude or flimsy structures. The timbers were
well dressed and accurately fitted, the thatch was laid
with care. There were many little refinements of con-
struction which one would hardly expect to find among
an uncivilized people. There were highly paid pro-
fessional house-builders in nearly all groups. Kramer
estimates that a Samoan dwelling of the better sort
cost its owner the equivalent of from $1200 to $2000.
On town-houses and other large ceremonial structures
the expense must have been far higher.
The Easter Islanders made a few crude stone
huts. Stone house-posts or pillars are recorded from
Pelew and the Gilberts, but with these exceptions the
use of stone in house-construction was limited to foun-
dations. Throughout the whole of Polynesia except
New Zealand dwellings and ceremonial structures
were often raised on low stone-faced platforms. The
Marquesan platforms were especially large and well
made, those of chiefs being sometimes six to eight feet
high. The forward part of the platforms was uncov-
ered and served as a lounging place, while the house
itself stood on a second and lower platform built on
the rear of the main one. Cut stone was often used to
face the smaller platform. High stone-house platforms
were also used in Yap and Ponape of the Carolines,
those of Yap often being double as in the Marquesas.
In Fiji the platforms of chiefs’ houses and temples
were often several feet high.
73
74 ETHNOLOGY OF POLYNESIA AND MICRONESIA
All the Micronesian houses were rectangular with
high-peaked roofs. The timbers of the frame were
lashed together with cords of braided coconut-fibre
(cinnet), which were often dyed in different colors
and interlaced to form designs. In the Pelews the
houses were raised about three feet above the ground
on stone pillars, the floor being made of thick planks
or split bamboo. The walls were made of interwoven
bamboo splints or palm leaves. There were several
doors which were closed with sliding shutters of the
same material. In Ponape the houses had high, steep
roofs and low walls made from bundles of reed or
cane. The floor was laid with planks. In Kusaie the
houses were somewhat cruder with very high gables
and a saddle-shaped roof. The walls were low, and
there was a door on each side. The saddle roof was
also used in the Marshall group. It is said that in the
ancient Marshall Island dwellings the roof rested di-
rectly on the ground, with no side walls. The Gilbert
Island houses were two-storied, with a low loft under
the peak of the roof. They were frequently raised on
posts.
Large council-houses were used in the Pelews,
Carolines, and Gilberts. Those of the Pelews were
from sixty to eighty feet long and from twelve to fif-
teen feet wide. The cross beams and supports were
carved. Those in Yap were extremely high with a pro-
jecting gable at one end, and had platforms in the in-
terior. Both the pillars and platforms were carved.
In both the Pelews and Yap these large houses were
occupied by the unmarried men, and were tapu to wo-
men at ordinary times. The council-houses on Ponape
were decorated only with ornamental lashings. At one
end there was a high platform, with a ladder, on which
DWELLINGS 15
the chief sat during ceremonies. Low platforms along
both sides served as seats for other spectators. Part
of the house was screened off as a sleeping room for
the chief and his family. The council-houses of the Gil-
berts were sometimes as much as 120 feet long, 45 feet
wide, and 40 feet high. The sides were open, and there
were no platforms. The ridge pole was painted with
black bands and ornamented with rows of white shells.
The Fijians used dwellings of several different
kinds, the form varying with the tribe and region. Wil-
liams says, “The form of the houses in Fiji is so varied
that a description of a building in one of the windward
islands would give a very imperfect idea of those to
leeward, those of the former being much the better. In
one district a village looks like an assemblage of square
wicker baskets; in another, like so many rustic arbors;
a third seems a collection of oblong hayricks with holes
in the sides, while in a fourth these ricks are conical.
By one tribe just enough framework is built to receive
the covering for the walls and roofs, the inside of the
house being an open space. Another tribe introduces
long centre posts, posts half as long to receive the
wall-plates, and others still shorter as quarterings to
strengthen the walls. ... Along the sides is a sub-
stantial gallery on which property is stored. . . . The
walls range in thickness from a single reed to three
feet.” Grass or leaves of various sorts were used for
the thatch, which often extended to the ground. The
walls were made from reed panels, the reeds being
laced together with cinnet in ornamental designs. The
timbers were also fastened together with ornamental
lashings, but there was little decorative carving. In
the better houses the ends of the ridge-pole projected
beyond the thatch, and were blackened and decorated
76 ETHNOLOGY OF POLYNESIA AND MICRONESIA
with white shells. The temples were built on high
stone platforms, and had very high steep roofs.
In Tonga, Samoa, Niue, and the Society group the
houses were oval, consisting of a rectangular central
portion with rounded apses at either end. In many of
the Samoan dwellings the central portion was short-
ened until the house was almost round. House plat-
forms, when used, were low, and the floor was not
paved. The Samoan houses were not walled; elsewhere
the walls were made of reeds or matting. Council-
houses and temples were shaped like the ordinary
dwellings. The only decorations were ornamental lash-
ings of cinnet. In the Society group square houses
were used by the poorer classes. The Easter Islanders
used long-pointed houses shaped like an inverted
canoe. The house floor was surrounded by long, nar-
row cut stones, like curb-stones, which were socketed
to receive the lower ends of the rafters. There was a
doorway with a short porch in the centre of one side.
These houses were sometimes as much as 120 feet long
by 12 feet wide, and were shared by several related
families.
In Hawaii, the Marquesas, and New Zealand the
houses were square, although there seems to have been
a limited use of round and oval forms in the south is-
land of New Zealand. The Hawaiian houses were usu-
ally built on stone platforms, and the floors were
paved. When the site of a village was subject to floods,
the dwellings were sometimes raised on posts. The
whole house was covered with long grass thatch, the
only opening being a low doorway in one side. There
was almost no attempt at decoration. Temples were
shaped like the dwellings, but within the sacred pre-
cincts there were usually “oracle towers,” tall, slender,
DWELLINGS V7
tapa-covered structures like obelisks, from which the
priests delivered their prophecies.
The Marquesan houses were always built on stone
platforms, but only the forward half of the floor was
paved, the rear half being covered with mats and used
as a bed. They were long and narrow with steeply
pitched rear roofs which came down to the ground and
less steep front roofs supported by a row of low posts.
The ends and front were often left open. Walls, when
present, were made from small Hibiscus poles lashed
together with cinnet. The doorway was in the middle
of the front, and was made very low, for defence. It
was closed with a wooden shutter in a slide. The posts
were elaborately carved, often being shaped into At-
lantid figures. There was a considerable use of orna-
mental lashings. Each village had its men’s house, built
like the dwellings, but of larger size. There were also
decorated storehouses raised on posts which were some-
_ times used as sleeping quarters by the old men. Both
these and the men’s houses were tapu to women. The
temples were rather small with enormously high roofs.
The ordinary dwellings of the Maori were small
and rather crudely made, with a light framework of
sticks, and thatch which came to the ground. The door
was at one end, and was protected by a veranda. In
the south island the floor was often rather deeply ex-
cavated for the sake of warmth. Each village had a
small storehouse raised on posts and a large council-
house which was also used as a dormitory. Both the
store-houses and council-houses were elaborately deco-
rated with carved and painted designs. Ornamental
lashings seem to have been unknown.
The Maori council-houses were by far the most
beautiful structures in the Pacific. A fine example,
78 ETHNOLOGY OF POLYNESIA AND MICRONESIA
obtained by the Museum many years ago, has been
erected at the south end of the Hall (Plate XI). It is
one of perhaps six now in existence, and is the only
one which has a completely carved front. Even with
abundant labor the construction of such a house re-
quired several months. Seasoned timber was used for
the frame, that which had been buried in a river-bed
for many years being preferred. The most important
piece was the ridge-pole, which was hewn from a
single log. That of the house in the Museum is sixty
feet long, and weighs over a ton and a half. Two other
very large timbers were required for the end posts,
which were set in the ground just within the line of
the front and rear walls. The ridge-pole was raised
by means of sheers, the workmen lifting first one end
and then the other and supporting the weight by scaf-
folding. When in place, the end of the ridge-pole pro-
jected several feet beyond the front post, supporting
the veranda roof. The walls were made from wooden
slabs set in the ground at equal intervals. The spaces
between these were filled with panels of reeds fastened
together with flax. Rafters ran from the top of each
wall slab to the ridge-pole. All parts of the frame
were lashed together with flax cord. The roof and
sides of the house were covered with thatch, two feet
or more thick.
A low, continuous bed of grass covered with mats
ran around the inside of the house. There was a small
fireplace a short distance back of the door. The only
openings were a smoke-hole at the peak of the front
wall, a door and a window. ‘The latter were closed
at night with sliding panels of wood. The posts, pan-
els, projecting end of the ridge-pole and, in this case,
the front of the house, were carved with highly con-
DWELLINGS 719
ventionalized human figures representing ancestors or
mythological beings. After carving they were colored
red with a mixture of ochre and oil. The rafters and
underside of the ridge-pole were painted with scroll
designs in red, black, and white. The reed panels of
the walls were worked into designs. The finished
house was the pride of the village, and so potent were
the spells recited at its erection that even if the vil-
lage was taken by an enemy, its council-house would
be allowed to stand unplundered until it fell to pieces.
Micronesian dwellings were often divided into
rooms or stalls by light walls, but the Polynesian and
Fijian houses rarely contained partitions. If privacy
was desired, part of the house would be screened off
with tapa curtains. In the Pelew and Caroline groups,
Samoa, Hawaii, and New Zealand, small fireplaces
were built inside the house, but these were intended
primarily for warmth and light. Cooking was every-
where done in small, detached houses, usually a simple
roof on posts. Polynesian dwellings were kept scru-
pulously clean, the house-wives sweeping their floors
every few days with brooms of coconut splints and
renewing the floor mats whenever they became soiled.
FURNITURE
The ordinary Polynesian or Micronesian dwelling
was empty except for mats on the floor, a few baskets
and utensils, and the bed-coverings and personal be-
longings of the residents. Throughout most of the
region the ordinary floor and bed-mats were made
from strips of Pandanus leaf, varying in width from
one-quarter to three-quarters of an inch. The leaves
were often steeped in salt water and pounded to be
made more pliable, and were trimmed with sharp
shells. The plaiting was varied to produce designs
and natural leaves of two colors, or dyed and undyed
leaves were interwoven in simple patterns. A thick,
springy mat made from whole Pandanus leaves sewn
side by side was used in Ponape in the Carolines.
Coarse, narrow mats woven from single coconut
fronds were often laid on the floor under the finer ones
to protect them from dampness. In Hawaii and Fiji
the finest mats were made from sedge, and the Maori —
used Phormium leaves and rushes.
The natives commonly sat on the floor, but the So-
ciety Islanders and Tongans had four-legged stools
hewn from single blocks of wood. 'These were used
only by chiefs and heads of families. Those of great
chiefs in the Societies were sometimes as much as five
feet long, three feet wide, and three feet, six inches
high at the ends. In the Marquesas and Cook groups
sloping slabs of stone were often set in the house plat-
form in front of the house to serve as back rests.
There is little information on Micronesian sleeping
arrangements, but the beds of this region seem com-
80
FURNITURE 81
monly to have been made from a few mats laid on the
floor and rolled up when not in use. In Fiji, Tonga,
Samoa, and the Society group the beds were of the
same simple type, although those of Fijian and Tong-
an chiefs were sometimes elevated on piles of tapa.
The Hawaiians, Marquesans, and Maoris had perma-
nent beds. The Hawaiian bed was a long pile of mats
which often ran clear across the rear of the house. At
least in later times it was often raised on a low plat-
form. The Marquesan bed covered the rear half of
the dwelling. This part of the house floor was not
paved, and was bordered on either side by polished
coconut logs. It was filled with a thick layer of grass
or leaves covered with mats. Priests often slept on
low platforms supported by posts.
In the larger Maori houses the bed space was sepa-
rated from the floor by a line of squared timbers, and
was filled with grass and covered with mats. Pillows
made from pieces of wood or bamboo raised on legs
from three to five inches high were used in Fiji,
Tonga, Samoa, and the Society group. They were also
used in Hawaii in early times, but the commonest form
in that group was made from leaves encased in a neat-
ly woven, oblong cover of matting. In the Marquesas
the log along the rear of the bed served as a pillow, but
there were also pillows of leaves bound with tapa. The
Maori seems to have used simple blocks of wood, with-
out legs. Bed-coverings were usually made of tapa.
In Hawaii several sheets were often sewn together
along one edge to form a thick blanket. Tapa mos-
quito nets were used in Fiji.
In Hawaii, the Marquesas, and Tahiti many of the
houses had stands planted in the floor. These were
shaped very much like European clothes-trees, and
82 ETHNOLOGY OF POLYNESIA AND MICRONESIA
were used for hanging up objects which had to be
protected from rats. In the Carolines and Fiji wood-
en hooks or hangers suspended from the rafters were
used for the same purpose. Many of the Micronesian
houses had lofts used for storage. In the Marquesas
and New Zealand clothing and ornaments were stored
in long wooden boxes with tight-fitting covers. In
Hawaii the shells of very large gourds were employed
for this purpose.
Candle-nuts were used for light in all the islands
in which the tree would grow. The nuts were baked
in an earth oven, cracked, and the kernels threaded
upon the midrib of a coconut leaflet. When lighted,
they would burn with a smoky, flickering flame. Each
nut left a large cinder which had to be knocked off as
soon as the nut below caught fire, and the light re-
quired constant tending. In Hawaii and, rarely, in
the Society group small stone lamps were used. ‘They
were filled with candle-nut oil, and had one or two
floating wicks of tapa.
BASKETRY
Baskets were made everywhere in Micronesia and
Polynesia (Fig. 24), but very few old specimens have
been preserved. There is little information on the
ancient forms and techniques. Checker-work and
twilled baskets were in universal use. Twined bas-
ketry was highly developed in Hawaii, and was also
used in the Marshall group and New Zealand. A
coarse, open twining was used for fish-traps in all
these regions, as well as in Fiji, Samoa, and probably
elsewhere. Coiled basketry was used in the Carolines,
Gilberts, and Samoa (Fig. 25). In the commonest
form the coils were fastened together with strips of
Pandanus which were knotted between the coils, giv-
_Ing the basket an open texture. In another type,
which seems to have been limited to the Carolines, the
texture was much closer, and the knots between the
coils were introduced by a separate element.
The Tongans made some baskets of very close tex-
ture, but we do not know whether they were coiled or
twined. Coconut and Pandanus leaves were the fa-
vorite basket-making materials in all the groups where
these plants would grow. The coconut was univer-
sally used for the coarser types. The frond was split
lengthwise, and the midrib pared thin. A section of
the midrib was then bent, and its ends tied together
to form the rim of the basket, while the attached leaf-
lets were interwoven to make the sides and bottom.
In oval baskets the bottom was usually reinforced with
a braid. Young fronds which had just begun to un-
fold were used for the finer work. The material for
83
ETHNOLOGY OF POLYNESIA AND MICRONESIA
The Maoris made most of their checker-work and
Pandanus baskets was prepared and woven as in mat-
twill baskets from Phormium or Freycinetia leaves,
making.
84
SRRERMORMS OER
Po
eaeeeeeaee
a ie Cee ee *
(SECC Parr Pee eer ea ery
i ossccuan at tneueueteaecueaaatia!
3 |
) 1
GW lt |
a Picea ene ret (perience piety
Vesaeeecee CEE Eee eee eet \
walghroceat Meccenecb2cOnaniigaPRuaccseawacte mn
resesuceacal TIE DUR RS AEB RUE R ESS aanee AeA O Sot. aN
ie Wasav ee at ‘ Tree OT AOR ZOUR GREP RAS EanGma Ee \
EET Be eer Ly Pe
eesaiversttel: soaS0atgst Maus suauRSBEEteEeeeaeasauater|Maa\
anace Ra hs Arr . Boers
FossWechd a gene Ene hla datcha ide tole de Ey
Pret DA Aka) Pore reach eel Thieme Pel Ete
Bec DEEPLY Nee erry et erie iietea tte et edie op dd fed She det
TAPE ee a Berea BPEL eet eee
Pee Pa ad Rae HT pl
JOSeanenUbencr m Re Pettal takes teeice bets betea tetas state yates
nisaceecuaeec een: RSH t[tcasane Baasdnve Bec Beene AeseI 7,
eben pret a Repti ttc eb taeelel et tela bee ie foeel ED
He ESET ha Dr etapa oko t cee PRUAASELE Ny,
spomaabseor ces lt ee lapeueas [guegauereeaseeszoce RZ BUSAZEELE
eanadeaend setziteerteeuil poeraus tea BEE Eh ae
/ REGHERSNEOAS SPER OS goaarEeE S| ae Cg CO eer ey
4 SEPRPREnTAN i23saiaecueec0s SH Easeaos |
(tee ee ompoosn [Soe grres slaecsee
b Ma Perla aE TT Lt Tt ee
\ fiasezeceecas eels | Suapeeeent Le
ry seesserncc: aes, Be cel errs
i} SuUBAAnadvenatteeesrceccdics pope ecr te: laloa
SERUSSESBEIAN sacusiceuscr ad sa AEH caBg
cEPrdeser seu ieaetnecteeet,(adapazeeH RaaRE
fmm (ecestceiuti ieeecesscnie/ coggepeeely aes
| a (tzastaaititenitteciecsr dic Wszoeeoc~'- |ewaszas
\ vege seeaees serceraenac|/Sacecaaers tt Weirton aes
\\ [a SeaSaeciee Hepieletec(cscat oy) SiSRE ECE Mag ae sagan ae nr aE Tt ORCEL!
aa = a
| SaHeSBRSNESIpecorcasasascnstcciosttlt"< (g/mramaauaenmsaeeiu ae mu eeU se pey LoL
Beckee tH zm et ey LAA ELI L TE
In both New Zealand and
Fic. 24.
Gilbert Islands. Case 5.
They also made crude baskets from pieces
Common Type of Basket.
but employed many other materials, including strips
of bark.
of bark folded and tied.
BASKETRY 85
Hawaii the fine roots of the Freycinetia were used for
twined basketry. In the Marshall Islands soft, twined
baskets were made from grass. In Ponape in the
Carolines quite large baskets were sometimes made
7 ie
\
Ty
mr
r\
i
ie
di\\
LA
An
r
it
\
Wa enihy:
el
Te
=
Fic. 25.
Coiled Basket Made from Thin Splints Fastened together with Strips of Pandanus Leaf.
Gilbert Islands. Case 5.
from knotted cinnet. Mariner says that in Tonga the
finer baskets were made from the fibrous roots of the
coconut palm interwoven with cinnet.
Round and oval baskets were in universal use.
Practically all coiled or twined baskets had these
¥
AL ne
SRY
~~
ee
rah?
Cas
+1
..
~=e ek
a
=
SS
=)
—
Ce
eat
~~
iS
ras
=.
)
AY,
aN
gy
h}
LT}
SS
rtd
a
wr
43
sae
aus
te
hy
{i
ai
fi
7s
i}
ay,
Ss
Oy
og
7
LZ
my
vay
a
wa
—
at
(BST orn
:
IH}
ti]
TH,
=.
Sas
ae
fon
i
Rectangular baskets of Pandanus
{ES CUUEKSEE \
2 StU ees. BE
i
They were litte used in the Marquesas and
ETHNOLOGY OF POLYNESIA AND MICRONESIA
forms, but they were also common in twill and check-
er-work (Fig. 26).
or coconut seem to have been the most important in
Micronesia, but were also common in Fiji, Samoa, and
Hawaii.
86
HY?
iT}
Le
Fic. 26.
Basket of Thin Splints from Midribs of Coconut-
SS Zee
palm Leaves.
Samoa. Case 28.
Those made in the Gilbert group were
often quite elaborate with double walls, interior com-
New Zealand.
The Fijian and Hawaiian
ones were often made with a shoulder and a small
partments and flap covers.
_A close-fitting,
central opening with a short neck.
woven Cap Was used as a cover.
BASKETRY 87
Some of the Hawaiian specimens closely resemble
common Malay forms. Flat, rectangular satchels seem
to have been used throughout most of Polynesia and
Micronesia, but their distribution cannot be deter-
mined at present. They were important in the Gil-
berts and New Zealand, but were rare or lacking in
Hawaii. The finest Polynesian baskets were probably
the large ones of Hawaii twined from Freycinetia, but
the Tongan baskets were also very well made. In both
these localities wooden vessels were often covered with
basketry.
Most Polynesian and Micronesian baskets are
undecorated. Dyed strips of the material were inter-
woven for form designs in the rectangular Pandanus
baskets from the Gilberts, Fiji, and Samoa, and in the
satchels from these groups and New Zealand. The
New Zealand and Fijian designs were the most elabo-
rate. Changes of technique were used with ornament-
al effect in the Hawaiian twined baskets, the Samoan
coiled ones, and the Maori satchels. The Tongans
sometimes stained their fine baskets in various colors
and ornamented them by working in beads or shells.
TOOLS
The most important tool in both Micronesia and
Polynesia was the adze (Fig. 27). Axes were almost
unknown, their regular use being limited to a few
tribes in the North Island of New Zealand. The adze-
blades were made of stone or shell. Shell blades were
the rule in Micronesia (Fig. 28), stone blades being
used only on a few volcanic islands in the Caroline
and Mariana groups (Fig. 29). In Polynesia the use
of shell blades seems to have been limited to Tonga
and the low atolls of the Tuamotu group, although a
few of them were carried to New Zealand by native
voyagers. Adze-blades made from whole mitre shells
were used in a few of the Micronesian Islands which
lie on the eastern edge of Melanesia, but throughout
the rest of the area they were made from the shell of
the giant clam (Tridacna). These shells reach an
enormous size, and adzes made from them were some-
times as much as a foot long, three inches thick and
four inches wide at the cutting edge (Fig. 28). The
outer surface of the Tridacna shell bears a number of
ridges which radiate from the hinge to the edge. In
adze-making one of these ridges was broken away
from the rest of the shell, the soft or defective mate-
rial on its inner and outer surfaces chipped off and the
outer end of the ridge ground to a cutting edge. In
most cases the entire surface was ground and polished.
Because of the original shape of the ridge such blades
were commonly semicircular in cross section, and the
cutting edge was also semicircular, like that of a
gouge. They were shafted with the flat side of the
88
TOOLS 89
blade against the handle. The Tridacna shell is snow
white, extremely hard and heavy, so that blades made
from it were little if at all inferior to those of stone.
Stone blades were made from a variety of hard,
close-grained volcanic rocks. In New Zealand the fin-
est adzes were made from jade. In many of the islands
there were regular quarries from which the stone for
adze-making was obtained. Blades of volcanic stone
Fic. 27.
Adze with Shell Blade Set in a Wooden Socket which Fits into the Handle.
Blade and socket could be turned so as to give the cutting edge any angle desired.
Matty and Durour. Case 11.
were chipped or pecked into shape with hammer stones
and later ground and polished. Grinding was done by
rubbing the implement back and forth on a large rock,
sand being added as an abrasive. The New Zealand
jade implements were usually sawn into shape with
flint flakes or thin sheets of gritstone. Large blocks
of jade were cut with a flint flake set in a handle of
vines and drawn back and forth by two men, like a
crosscut saw.
90 ETHNOLOGY OF POLYNESIA AND MICRONESIA
The form and finish of the stone blades varied a
good deal in different localities. It is possible to dis-
tinguish a number of types. Polynesian adzes as a
whole were characterized by angularity, their faces
being formed by a few nearly flat planes. They re-
semble most closely those found in the Malay Penin-
sula, Camboja, and China, and differ sharply from the
ordinary Melanesian adzes, which have smoothly
rounded contours. Small, rather thin blades of trian-
Fic. 28.
Large Axe with Blade of Tridacna Shell.
Matty and Durour. Case 11.
gular section, without grips, were used throughout the
whole of Polynesia with the possible exception of
Hawaii. They had straight cutting edges, and were
hafted with the apex of the triangle against the
handle.
Rather thick adzes of rectangular section with
straight edges and pronounced grips were the normal
type in Hawaii, and were important in the Marquesas,
Society and Austral groups, as well as in the south
island of New Zealand. In the Marquesas, Society
TOOLS 91
and Austral groups they seem to have been specialized
implements used for the final dressing of planks.
Thick, narrow adzes of triangular or semicircular sec-
tion with well marked grips and curved cutting edges
were important in the Marquesas, and were also used
in the Society and Austral groups, as well as in New
Zealand. They were hafted with the flat side against
the handle. Except in the Marquesas they seem to
have been specialized forms used for work in narrow
places such as the bows of canoes or the ends of oval
Fic. 29.
Stone-bladed Adze.
Tahiti. Case 19.
utensils. Many of them resemble the Micronesian shell
forms; they may be copies of shell prototypes.
In the Society, Austral, and Cook groups the com-
monest type of adze was a rather thin blade of trian-
gular section with a wide, straight cutting edge and
small grip. There was often a distinct shoulder where
the blade and grip met. It was hafted with the apex
of the triangle against the handle. Blades of this type
also occur as rather rare forms in New Zealand and
the Marquesas. |
Samoan adzes are usually triangular or quadran-
gular in section, but are hafted with the base of the
triangle against the handle. They were usually crudely
92 ETHNOLOGY OF POLYNESIA AND MICRONESIA
made, and grips were rare or lacking. Tongan adzes
are of two quite distinct types. In one of these the |
blades are round, oval, or semicircular in section
with smooth contours, in the other they are thin,
broad, and short with a rectangular or triangular sec-
tion and well marked angles. Adzes of the first type
are identical with those found in Fiji and in some
other parts of Melanesia. Neither type has grips. The
commonest type of Maori adze has a wide, thin blade
of rectangular section without grip. The sides usually
taper toward the poll. There are also a number of
peculiar local types, the most characteristic being a
thick blade with a curved outer face, straight back and
sides, and pronounced grip. Blades of this type are
also common in Easter Island. True axes were found
in the north island of New Zealand. They commonly
have narrow or pointed polls and smoothly rounded
contours. Many of them are indistinguishable from
Melanesian forms except for the material.
The finish of Polynesian adzes varied considerably
in the different groups. In Hawaii they were normally
ground only at the bit, or on the bit and outer face.
In the Marquesas only the thick blades of rectangular
section were completely ground. In the Society, Aus-
tral and Cook groups, Easter Island, and Tonga com-
plete grinding was normal. The Samoan adzes were
never completely ground, and even the chipping is
erude and irregular.
Adze-handles were made from the limbs of trees,
a piece of the trunk being left attached to form an
elbow. In direct hafting, which was the commonest
form, a socket, usually shaped to fit the blade accu-
rately, was cut in the outer side of the elbow. The blade
was placed in this with a thin wrapping of shark-skin
TOOLS 93
or tapa and lashed fast with many turns of cord.
Cinnet was used in most of the islands, but the Ha-
waiians sometimes used bark cord, and the Maori flax.
The lashings were sometimes dyed, and were usually
laid on in simple designs. A heel, projecting for some
distance above the handle, was usually left when the
handle was cut, but this was lacking in some of the
Marquesan, Maori, and Fijian adze-hafts.
In the Society and Cook groups, and in the New
Zealand war adzes, the heel was quite long, and was
often carved. In indirect hafting the blade was fasten-
ed to a separate piece of wood which was then
lashed to the elbow of the handle. The indirect haft-
ings were of two types,—fixed, in which one side of the
piece bearing the blade was flattened and fitted snugly
against the elbow of the handle, and movable, in which
the upper end of the piece bearing the blade was
circular and fitted into a channel in the elbow, so that
it could be turned, varying the angle of the cutting
edge. Direct hafting was the only form known
throughout most of Polynesia, in Fiji, and the small
Micronesian islands on the edge of Melanesia. It was
also common in Micronesia, and seems to have been
the dominant form in the Gilberts. Fixed indirect
hafting was used throughout Micronesia, with the
exceptions just noted, and, rarely, in the Society
group. Movable, indirect hafting was limited to the
Carolines, Marshalls, and Hawaii.
Although scarcely to be classed as tools, the cere-
monial adzes from Mangaia in the Cook group
deserve special mention. A good collection of these
is on exhibition (Case 33). The blades were made
from black basalt, highly polished, while the handles
were completely carved with fine angular designs. The
94 ETHNOLOGY OF POLYNESIA AND MICRONESIA
handles of some were nearly five feet long, while those
of others were thick and square. There is little infor-
mation on the use of these adzes, but some of them
Fic. 30.
Pump Drill.
Gilbert Islands. Case 5.
seem to have been cult objects, worshipped as symbols
of the gods, while others were carried by chiefs and
priests in ceremonies.
TOOLS 95
The Maori had a peculiar tree-felling tool con-
sisting of a large stone blade set in the end of a long,
straight handle. This was either swung back and forth
against the trunk by several men, like a battering ram,
or a sapling was bent around the tree like a huge bow,
and the tool fastened to the string and repeatedly
drawn back and released. Two rows of holes were
punched all round the tree, and the wood between
chipped out with adzes.
Long, slender gouges and chisels of stone were
important in Hawaii, the Marquesas, and New Zea-
Fic. 31.
Hoe with Blade of Turtle-bone.
Mortlock, Caroline Islands. Case 7.
land, but seem to have been little used elsewhere. They
were primarily wood-carvers’ tools. They were usually
held in the hand, without hafting, but both the Mar-
quesans and Maoris had hafted chisels which were
struck with wooden mallets. Small chisels and gravers
made from shark-teeth or rat-teeth set in wooden
handles were everywhere used for fine carving. Flat
pieces of coral or lava were used to smooth the sur-
faces of wooden objects; and smooth pebbles, for
burnishing in the Marquesas. Rasps and files were
made from shark or ray skin wrapped about pieces
96 ETHNOLOGY OF POLYNESIA AND MICRONESIA
of wood while wet. A hoe with blade of turtle-bone
was used in the Caroline Islands (Fig. 31).
Knives were usually made from shell or bamboo,
but sharp-edged flakes of stone were also employed.
None of the natives knew the art of pressure flaking,
and they made no attempt to shape these stone knives
or to resharpen them when they became dull. Knives
made from a row of shark-teeth set along one side of
a wooden handle were used for cutting up meat in
Hawaii and New Zealand.
The pump-drill was in universal use (Fig. 30).
This contrivance consists of a straight shaft passing
through the centre of a disk of wood or stone. Cords
are fastened to the top of the shaft and to either end
of a short wooden bar. In use the cords are wrapped
around the shaft, and the bar forced down, causing
the shaft to revolve. The disk acts as a flywheel, and
the shaft continues turning until the cords are
wrapped about it once more. The drill-points were
made from stone, shell, shark or rat teeth, or even
from the spine of the sting ray.
MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS
Both the Polynesians and Micronesiang were ex-
tremely fond of music, and most of them used a con-
siderable variety of musical instruments. The only
exceptions were the Gilbert Islanders, who are said
to have had no musical instruments of any sort,
accompanying their dances merely by clapping their
hands. Drums were nearly universal. Large cylindri-
cal drums with heads of shark or ray skin, which were
set on end and beaten with the hand, were used in
Hawaii, the Marquesas, Tuamotus, Society group, and
possibly in the Cook group (Fig. 32). In the Marque-
sas the temple drums of this type were sometimes as
much as eight feet high, and the temple precincts
often contain stone platforms on which the drummers
stood, resting their drums on the ground in front of
them. Similar drums beaten with a stick of wood are
recorded from Ponape in the Carolines, and the Mar-
shall Islanders used a small skin-headed drum shaped
like an hourglass. Little hand-drums made from large
coconut shells with skin heads were used in Hawaii.
In Fiji, Tonga, Samoa, and the Cook group the
ordinary drums were cylindrical or canoe-shaped, with
solid ends and a slot along the side (Fig. 383). They
were beaten with short wooden clubs, and could be
heard for miles. The Maori used drums of this type
and also great wooden gongs, sometimes as much as
thirty feet long, which were suspended from a frame.
Small drums made from joints of giant bamboo with
a slot along one side were used in Fiji, Tonga, Samoa,
and the Cook and Society groups. In Tonga, Samoa,
97
98 ETHNOLOGY OF POLYNESIA AND MICRONESIA
and Hawaii a series of bamboos of different length
were thumped on the ground, closed end down, as an
accompaniment to dances. A curious drum made from
several joints of bamboo lashed together with their
open ends covered with matting was limited to Samoa.
ry aty Mf
tt Wy /)
th iN : iV.
HIN \ \
AY
\\ AS
Niimeattt |
AN:
; ‘
| : hs
a
Lobes 4
f te ,
{
all
TiN
AN (AV AIINA
fl
ea gt
LT tay) Adis
RARE
als “4 i
i]
FIG. 32.
Large Wooden Drum Used in Religious Ceremonies and to Accompany Dances.
Hawaiian Islands. Case 34.
Stringed instruments were used only in Hawaii
and the Marquesas. The Hawaiians had a three-
stringed musical bow with bridges. The strings were
plucked or tapped with a short stick. The Marque-
sans used a single-stringed bow, and seem to have also
had a many-stringed instrument in ancient times.
MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS 99
Bamboo jew’s-harps were used in Hawaii, the Mar-
quesas, and Fiji, with a crude form in New Zealand.
There was a considerable variety of wind instru-
ments. Nose flutes were used everywhere in Polynesia
except Samoa, also in Fiji, but seem to have been
unknown in Micronesia. Except in New Zealand, they
were made from joints of bamboo. In playing these
instruments the edge of the closed upper end of the
flute was held against the septum of the nose, the outer
nostril being closed with the thumb. The opening was
not held tightly against the nostril, but at a short dis-
A,
Uf
es Ny ud
Canoe-shaped Wooden Drum Used to Accompany Dances and for Signalling.
Fiji. Case 20.
tance from it, the flute being inclined at the proper
angle to set the column of air within it vibrating.
There were two or more stops which were manipulated
with the fingers. Mouth-flutes were used everywhere
in Polynesia except Hawaii, in Fiji, and in Ponape in
the Carolines. They were usually made of bamboo, but
there is little information on their form.
The Marquesan flutes were closed at the upper
end, and had a reed, made by shaving the bamboo thin.
There were from two to four stops. The Maori flutes
were made of wood or even bone, and were nearly
always elaborately carved. Both the Marquesan and
100 ETHNOLOGY OF POLYNESIA AND MICRONESIA
Society Islanders knew that the pitch of a flute could
be modified by changing its length, and both had de-
veloped tunable forms. In the Marquesas these were
made from two pieces of bamboo which slid one inside
the other, the lower piece being worked back and
forth until the pitch was correct. Several flutes were
sometimes tuned in this way and played together as
an orchestra at dances.
Whistles seem to have been limited to the Mar-
quesas and New Zealand. In New Zealand they were
used primarily for signaling in war. They were about
three inches and a half long, of hard polished wood
inlaid with Haliotis shell, and were worn around the
neck. Wooden trumpets were also limited to the Mar-
quesas and New Zealand. In the Marquesas they were
made from single pieces of wood hollowed out and
provided with bamboo mouthpieces. In New Zealand
they were made from two pieces of wood hollowed out
and joined lengthwise. Shell trumpets were used
everywhere. They were commonly made from Triton
shells, but Cassis shells were used in Hawaii and to
some extent in the Marquesas. In the Society Islands
they were provided with bamboo mouthpieces, three
feet long, which projected from the side at an
angle. In the Marquesas nut shells, or very small |
gourds, also placed on the side, were used as mouth-
pieces. In New Zealand the mouthpieces were of
carved wood, but were fastened to the tip of the shell.
Elsewhere no mouthpiece was used. Panpipes, made
from several pieces of bamboo of graduated length,
were used in Fiji and Tonga.
Vocal music was also well developed, especially in
Hawaii and the Society group. The Hawalians had
even advanced to the point of having choruses which
MUSICAL INSTEUMUNTS 101
8: ang i in parts. Modern Hawaiian music is largely the
work of European composers, and the famous ukulele
is a Portugese instrument quite unknown to the an-
cient Hawaiians.
cae) gear AACN Ai AE le rake
TRANSPORTATION
Land transportation was relatively unimportant.
There were no draught animals or vehicles, and most
of the roads were nothing more than narrow trails
following the natural contours of the ground. Burdens
were carried by means of a pole across the shoulder,
an equal weight being hung at each end. The Maoris
frequently carried burdens on their backs, but else-
where the preference for the shoulder pole was so
strong that when a native had an indivisible load, like
a live pig, he would tie a rock to the other end of his
pole to balance it and carry both. In the Society group
chiefs often rode on the shoulders of attendants, but
this was to prevent their feet touching the ground and
rendering it tapu.
Water transportation was everywhere important.
Canoes were in nearly universal use, but were lacking
in a few localities (Plate X). In Mangareva, in the
southern Tuamotus, the natives used triangular rafts’
with masts and sails. The Chatham Islanders used a
semi-raft, shaped like a boat, with a wooden frame
stuffed with bundles of the flower stalks of Phormium
tenax or the bladders of the kelp-fish. Some of this.
craft were from thirty to thirty-five feet long. Balsa-
like rafts made from bundles of bamboo were occa-
sionally used in most of the Polynesian groups. The
Gilbert Islanders had carefully made rafts of squared
timber which were used for fishing.
Simple dug-out canoes, made from single logs,
were used in all the localities, where there was large
enough timber. In Hawaii, the Marquesas, the Austral
and Cook groups, Samoa and New Zealand the dugout
102
TRANSPORTATION 103
was modified by the addition of pieces at the bow and
stern, which partially decked over the ends, and of a
long plank or row of planks along each side. In Ha-
waii, the Marquesas, and New Zealand even the
largest canoes seem to have been of this type. In the
Marquesas the dugout body was sometimes lengthened
by using two logs fitted together at the ends. In Ha-
waii great cedar logs from British Columbia, cast up
as driftwood, were used for the largest craft.
Throughout Micronesia and in Fiji, Tonga, Samoa,
and the Society and Tuamotu groups, all but the
smallest canoes were made from a number of pieces
of wood accurately cut and fitted. This form of con-
struction probably originated in the coral islands,
where large timber for dugouts was lacking, but it
mace possible the construction of very large craft.
Williams gives the dimensions of a Fijian canoe,
not the largest on record, as follows: ‘‘Length, 99 feet,
3 inches. Draught, 2 feet, 6 inches. Length of mast,
62 feet, 3 inches. Length of yards, 83 feet.” In all the
built-up canoes the parts were lashed together with
cord. The seams were usually caulked with coconut
fibre, and were sometimes pitched with breadfruit
gum. In Fiji, Tonga, Samoa, and the Society group,
the lashings passed through flanges left on the inner
sides of the planks, and were invisible on the outside.
The pieces were so closely fitted that the joints could
hardly be seen. In Micronesia and throughout the rest
of Polynesia, the lashing holes were cut clear through,
so that the lashings were visible on the outside, and
the seams were usually covered with strips of wood or
bamboo.
In the Marquesas, Austral and Cook groups, and
New Zealand, the bow pieces of built-up canoes with
104 ETHNOLOGY OF POLYNESIA AND MICRONESIA
dug-out bodies projected horizontally for some dis-
tance, usually terminating in a carved figure-head,
while the stern piece bore a narrow upcurved fin which
rose several feet above the canoe. The large Society
Island canoes, although of plank construction, had
either a projection or a high, upward curving piece at
the bow, while the whole stern of the canoe was curved
upward into the air. The Fijian, Tongan, Samoan,
and Gilbert Island canoes, on the other hand, were
flush for their entire length, although some of the
smaller Samoan forms had a slight horizontal projec-
tion at the bow. The larger Marshall and Caroline
Island canoes curved upward at both ends, having a
profile not unlike that of an old Norse long ship.
Even the plank canoes were extremely narrow in
proportion to their length and would capsize readily.
Outriggers were in universal use, although they were
becoming obsolete in New Zealand at the beginning
of the historic period. |
The outrigger was a straight log, somewhat
shorter than the canoe, which was fastened to the
canoe by crosspieces and floated in the water a few
feet away from the side. There were two types of out-
rigger attachment. In one the crosspieces bent down-
ward at their ends, and were attached directly to the
float. In the other the crosspieces were straight, and
a separate member was introduced between them and
the float. The direct type was normal in Hawaii, and
was used in ancient times in the Marquesas. In the
Society Island fishing canoes, the attachment of the
forward crosspiece was indirect; and that of the rear
piece, direct. Elsewhere only the indirect attachment
was used. None of the natives employed more than
one outrigger in historic times. In the large Microne-
TRANSPORTATION 105
sian sailing canoes a platform was usually built on the
erosspieces, and when the wind was from the outrig-
ger side, men and cargo were shifted to this to hold
the outrigger down. In Marshall Island canoes the
hull was asymmetrical, being curved on the side away
from the outrigger and nearly flat on that toward it.
Double canoes were in universal use in Polynesia
and in Fiji, but seem to have been unknown in Micro-
nesia. In Hawaii, the Marquesas, Society group, and
New Zealand, they were made from two hulls of equal
size joined together by numerous crosspieces. The
crosspieces were decked over, and a small house was
built on this deck if the voyage was to be a long one.
The same hull might be used alone or as part of a
double canoe. In Fiji, Tonga, and Samoa, the hulls of
double canoes were of different size, and were lashed
together permanently. The smaller hull was really an
enlarged outrigger, the crew storing their supplies in
it, but having their quarters in the larger hull and on
the deck between the two. When sailing in a high
wind, the smaller hull would often be lifted clear of
the water.
Both paddles and sails were used for propulsion.
The Chatham Islanders rowed their clumsy craft,
facing the stern and bracing their oars against a thole-
pin, but this method was unknown elsewhere. It seems
probable that very large double-sailing canoes were
everywhere sculled in a calm, the paddlers dipping
their blades vertically and levering them against the
crosspieces between the two hulls. With these excep-
tions, the natives paddled in ordinary fashion, the
paddlers being seated on thwarts, facing the bow.
The Marquesans, Mangarevans, and Easter Islanders
had a peculiar form of paddle with a broad, slightly
106 ETHNOLOGY OF POLYNESIA AND MICRONESIA
dished blade below which a curved knob projected.
The blades of Micronesian, Maori, and to a lesser
degree, Samoan paddles were narrow and pointed.
The Fijian, Cook and Society group, and Hawaiian
ones were broad and oval (Plate VIII).
Sails were in universal use, but there were im-
portant local differences in their form. They were
commonly made of Pandanus matting, although a few
of the easternmost Micronesians used cloth. Hawaiian,
Marquesan, and Maori sails were in the form of a
triangle with the apex at the bottom. One side of the
sail was fastened to the mast, and the other to a boom
which sloped upward at an angle of about 45 degrees.
The Samoans used this form on their smaller craft,
and the Society Islanders employed a modification of
it. The Society Island sail was narrow and nearly
oblong; the upper end of the boom was curved inward,
like a crab-claw. The triangular sail was a rather poor
contrivance. It gave little surface for its weight and
size; it was impossible to tack with it. |
In Fiji, Tonga, Samoa, and throughout Micro-
nesia, the sail was of lateen type. It was triangular,
with yards along two sides, and was suspended from
he masthead. Its forward end, where the two yards
joined, rested on the deck just behind the bow. A curi-
ous method was used in tacking. The ropes suspending
the sail were slacked off, and the end of it which rested
on the deck at the bow lifted bodily and carried to the
stern, where it was fastened once more. As the two
ends of the boat were exactly alike, the stern then
became the bow, and the ship bore away on its new
tack. In spite of the seeming clumsiness of this device,
the lateen sail was highly effective. Captain Cook
testifies that the natives could sail as close to the wind
TRANSPORTATION 107
as his own square-rigged ships, while the narrow beam
and shallow draught of their canoes made them ex-
tremely fast.
WEAPONS AND WARFARE
The principal Polynesian and Micronesian weap-
ons were the sling, spear, and club. The bow was
important in Fiji and in Tonga, where its use in war
was probably due to Fijian influence. The Tongan and
Fijian bows were straight, from five to six feet long.
The arrows were made from cane with barbed points
of hard wood or bone, and had no feathers. A single
Maori tribe is credited with using the bow as a weap-
on. The natives of Ponape, in the Carolines, also made
a limited use of it, employing wooden arrows tipped
with ray spines. The Ponapeans had traditions of a
race of dwarf, black aborigines who used the bow in
war. Throughout the rest of Polynesia and Microne-
sia the bow was employed only in hunting or for
sport.
The sling was known everywhere, and was an
important weapon in the Carolines (Fig. 34), Mar-
shalls, Hawaii, the Marquesas, the Society and Cook
groups, and to a lesser extent in Samoa. It was little
used in the Gilberts, Tonga, and Fiji, while the Maori
employed it mainly for hurling red hot stones into the
besieged towns to fire the thatch. The Hawaiian and
Marshall Island slings were crude affairs made from
braided leaves. Those of the Carolines, Marquesas,
and Society group were carefully plaited from coconut
fibre or bark, and often showed beautiful workman-
ship. The Marquesans often wore theirs as headbands,
especially when attending intertribal affairs which
might end in a fight. The Marquesan and Society
Island slings were sometimes as much as six feet long,
108
109
WEAPONS AND WARFARE
eo
Sling.
Ruk, Caroline Islands. Case 7,
Fic
SSS SASL SSS Steere
SS SS SSS SSS SSS SS
SSL Na
TL ET LF LP LOSE cao ee OS, I Ss
=
=
<=
=
4
SS
i
=
=
=
=
Fe a
4 i
Fic. 41.
Wooden Mushroom Club.
Samoa. Case 27,
bark. Sometimes the sapling was uprooted, and the
roots trimmed off to form a knotty mace (Fig. 45).
In another form the blade above the grip was diamond-
shaped in section, gradually widening and thickening
toward the tip. In still another the whole club above
the grip was covered with low bosses. Paddle clubs
with broad, sharp-edged blades were favorite weapons.
There were also several curved forms some of which
had broad, flat blades, while others (pineapple clubs)
ended in a mass of bosses from which a single sharp
i.
116
Fic, 42.
Hooked Club.
Fiji. Case 25.
WEAPONS AND WARFARE 117
spike projected downward (Fig. 44). All the curved
types were peculiar to Fiji. The Fijians also used
short throwing clubs with heavy round or knobbed
Shan Ud WISSUA 2A Owl
| ANZA LAD ie
LL
.
Fic. 43.
Lotus Club.
Fiji. Case 25.
heads and quite thin handles (Fig. 46). Each warrior
usually carried two of these, hurling them before he
came to grips with the enemy. Nearly all the better
Fijian clubs were carved; their handles were often
decorated with elaborate wrappings of dyed sennit.
Fic. 44.
Old Pineapple Club, with Carved Handle.
Fiji. Case 25.
Clubs were the favorite Tongan and Samoan weap-
ons. The Tongans seem to have preferred bat clubs
of round or diamond-shaped section with bluntly
118 ETHNOLOGY OF POLYNESIA AND MICRONESIA
pointed ends. Their weapons of this type are beauti-
fully balanced, and must have been very effective.
Paddle clubs were also important. The Samoans also
used the bat club and paddle club, but had certain local
types as well. Short, heavy clubs with a very broad,
flat head (mushroom clubs) were limited to Samoa
(Fig. 41), as were clubs with flat blades carved into
teeth along the edge. Some clubs were toothed on both
sides, while others were toothed along one side and
ended in a recurved hook, said to have been used to
carry the heads of slain enemies (Fig. 38). Short
throwing clubs of Fijian type were used in both Samoa
and Tonga. In historic times blubber knives, obtained
from white whalers, were favorite Samoan weapons. |
The Niue Islanders used long clubs with flat sickle-
shaped blades and straight broad-bladed clubs ending
in a spike. The favorite clubs of the Cook Islanders
had long, flat, diamond-shaped heads, much like those
of the spears from this group. The edges were some-
times notched or serrated. These clubs were some-
times as much as eight feet long. The Society Is-
landers used shorter clubs with heads of the same
shape and also simple bat clubs. The Marquesans used
very long paddle clubs and shorter clubs with broad
heads carved into conventionalized human faces
(Plate IX). Both these types ‘were extremely heavy
and unwieldy. The Hawaiians used bat clubs and
also short clubs with lobed stone heads, lashed to the
end of a wooden handle.
The Maori clubs were unlike those found in any
other part of the Pacific. The favorite weapon of the
Maori was a very short, flat-bladed club of stone,
whalebone, or wood with sharp edges (mere). This
was used primarily for thrusting, the warrior attempt-
WEAPONS AND WARFARE 119
ing to drive the end of his club into his enemy’s
temple, under the angle of his jaw, or under his ribs.
The most valued clubs of this type were made from
jade and sometimes required years of labor (Fig. 49).
Those made from wood or whalebone were often elabo-
Fic. 45,
Wooden Club Made from Saplings with the Root Lopped off.
Fiji. Case 25.
rately carved and inlaid with haliotis shell. A good
collection of these weapons is on exhibition. A wooden
quarter staff (taiaha) was also important. This was
usually about five and a half feet long, with a rather
narrow, sharp-edged blade and a carved spike or
tongue below the grip (Fig. 50). It was used as a com-
Fic. 46.
Throwing Club Used as Missile.
Fiji. Case 25.
bined club and spear. There was a science of taiaha
fencing with properly named points and guards. The
tewha-tewha was a straight club pointed at the lower
end and having a broad, flat blade projecting from
one side of the upper end (Fig. 51). The blow was
120 ETHNOLOGY OF POLYNESIA AND MICRONESIA
delivered with the straight edge opposite the blade.
Both taiaha and tewha-tewha were carried by chiefs
as emblems of authority. Staves very much like the
taiaha, but without the pointed tongue, were carried as
emblems of authority in the Marquesas, Mangareva,
and Easter Island.
An unhafted stone adze-blade, held in the hand,
was used as a weapon in both Hawaii and New Zea-
land. Adzes, often elaborately carved, were used as
weapons by the Maori and possibly in the Cook group.
Daggers tipped with ray spines were used throughout
Micronesia and in Fiji, Tonga, and the Society group.
Daggers of hard wood were important weapons in
Hawali. Daggers of wood, whalebone, or even stone
were often used in New Zealand. Double-pointed,
wooden daggers were important in the Australs, and
were also used in the Gilberts and Marquesas.
Cutting weapons edged with shark-teeth were im-
portant in the Gilbert and Society groups, but were
little used elsewhere. The Gilbert Islanders had many
types of spears, swords, and daggers (Figs. 47-48).
The body of these weapons was made of coconut wood,
the shark-teeth being drilled through the base and
attached in rows by lashings of fine cinnet or human
hair cord. They were often forked, or were provided
with long curved guards, also edged with teeth. The
Society Islanders had a weapon made with four or
five long prongs edged with teeth and also a long-
handled club with a flat, sickle-shaped blade with teeth
along the inner edge. Ellis says that these were the
most terrible of all the native weapons and would dis-
embowel a man at a single stroke.
Most of the Polynesians and Micronesians had no
defensive armament. Shields were unknown. The
WEAPONS AND WARFARE
uf
Fic. 47.
Dagger Used in Hand-to-hand Fighting.
Gilbert Islands. Case 3.
121
122 ETHNOLOGY OF POLYNESIA AND MICRONESIA
Hawaiians had helmets of wickerwork covered with
feathers, but although these were strong enough to
turn a blow, they were worn for decoration rather
than defence. The Maori sometimes wore heavy, close-
ly twined robes strong enough to stop a spear thrust.
The use of true armor seems to have been practically
limited to the regions in which shark-tooth weapons
were important, and it seems probable that it was
developed as an answer to them. The armor of the ©
Gilbert Islanders, shown in Case 2, was quite elaborate
(Plate XII). It consisted of a flexible under suit, made
in either one or two pieces which covered everything
but the head, hands, and feet. This was knotted from
heavy cinnet. Over this was worn a stiff cuirass with
a high collar to protect the back of the head. It was
made from thick rolls of coconut fibre sewn together
with cord, much as in coiled basketry. Helmets were
made from fibre, like the cuirass, or from the dried
skins of blow fish. A broad belt of fibre or ray skin
was often worn around the waist, over all. The com-
plete suit weighed from fifteen to twenty pounds and
made the wearer so unwieldy that each armored man
was attended in battle by an unarmored squire, who
passed him weapons and otherwise aided him.
Ellis says of the Society Islanders, “Some of the
fighting men wore a kind of armor of net-work, formed
by small cords, wound round the body and limbs, so
tight as merely to allow of the unencumbered exercise
of the legs and arms, and not to impede the circulation
of the blood: or the Ruuruu, a kind of wooden armor
for the breast, back, and sides, covered with succes-
sive folds of thick cloth bound on with ropes. . . . The
head was guarded with a corresponding quantity of
cloth; and thus defended, the warrior, secure against
WEAPONS AND WARFARE 123
=
—
— J
—S= z
=—— = yy x) z
= z
_——— = =
ZX = = SS J
= aNg= = SS!
SS’ = —=— =
= - SSS Sy
S = it, Ht
WZ
(
—S
—=
SS =S=
=———_—=
= = =
q U r
= =
RL
SS
<< ez
(Pa i eS
eit
LAY
ES,
Bz
7
ye:
Q =
rey N
= aoe
a eS
beatioct!
Curved Sword Set with Shark Teeth. Gilbert Islands. Case 3.
124 ETHNOLOGY OF POLYNESIA AND MICRONESIA
either club or spear, was generally stationed with the
main body of the army, though so encumbered as to
render retreat impracticable, and, in the event of the
defeat of his companions, was invariably captured or
slain.”
Fic. 49.
Jade Club (Mere) of Maori Chief.
New Zealand. Case 38.
The Micronesians rarely made use of fortifica-
tions, although stockaded towns are reported from the
southern part of the Gilbert group. The Fijians regu-
larly fortified their villages with moats and stone-
faced earth ramparts surmounted by reed fences or
stockades. All the Polynesians probably made some
use of fortifications, but they seem to have been rela- -
Fic. 50.
Stabbing Club of Whalebone.
Maori, New Zealand. Case 38.
tively unimportant in Hawaii, the Society and Cook
groups. The Maoris were the only Polynesians who
regularly fortified their villages. They employed
ditches and stockades with platforms and, in later
times, even towers several stories high. There were
WEAPONS AND WARFARE 125
often several lines of defences, one within the other.
Attackers carried on regular siege operations, encirc-
ling the town with a stockade to cut off relief, building
towers to match those of the fort, and advancing to
the attack behind large sapping shields pushed by
twenty men. In time of war the Tongans also forti-
fied their towns with stockades which had projecting
platforms screened and loop-holed for archers. The
Marquesans had stockaded forts with platforms, while
the Samoans used simple stockades. Both made a con-
siderable use of stone forts and breastworks.
The Micronesians, except the Gilbert Islanders,
do not seem to have been especially warlike. In the
Carved Wooden Club.
Maori, New Zealand.
Pelews, Carolines, and Marshalls combats from canoes,
without great loss of life, seem to have been the rule.
The Fijians were split up into a great number of small
tribes who were constantly at war, but their warfare
was one of skirmishes and raids without much blood-
shed. Villages were often besieged, but rarely as-
saulted. In Samoa and Tonga warfare was usually
connected with dynastic struggles. There were long
periods of peace. At such times the Tongans often
went to Fiji and served as mercenaries under native
chiefs. Throughout the rest of Polynesia complete
peace seems to have been exceptional. In the Mar-
-quesas and New Zealand some of the tribes were
126 ETHNOLOGY OF POLYNESIA AND MICRONESIA
always at war, while in Hawaii and the Society group
the tribes on one island, when at peace among them-
selves, would usually attack those of some other island.
Any slight or injury, no matter how small, might be
made an excuse for war. If the tribes engaged were
related to each other, peace was usually arranged be-
fore there had been heavy losses on either side; but, if
they were of different stocks, the war was carried on
until one side had been enslaved or exterminated.
Warfare was everywhere surrounded with elabo-
rate religious observances. Among the Maoris the
warriors were purified and dedicated to Tu, god of
war, before they set out; and a special sacrifice was
made to the gods. Each veteran recited an incantation,
which was a family secret, over his weapons to render
them invincible. One or more priests accompanied the
war party and watched for omens. There were a great
number of these; and, if the party encountered a
series of unfavorable ones, it would probably turn
back. Any man who crossed the path of a war party,
whether friend or foe, was killed at once. If he was
spared, misfortune was sure to follow. Before a strong
fort was assaulted, a close relative of the chief was
often sacrificed. While the war party was away, the
people in the village were tabu and could eat no food.
In the Society group a declaration of war was
always preceded by a human sacrifice to the god Oro.
Many other sacrifices, varying in number with the im-
portance of the operations, were made before the party
set out. While the warriors were assembling and mak-
ing their preparations, the priests prayed for some
days, and were three times rewarded by the chiefs
with rich gifts. A special house was built for the gods.
This was dedicated with a human sacrifice, and had to
WEAPONS AND WARFARE 127
be completed in a single day during which the whole
population lay under a strict tabu. On that day no one
could eat, light a fire, or launch a canoe. Lastly, small
temples were erected in the canoes, and many hogs
were offered, their heads being placed before the idol,
while the priests ate the flesh. Red feathers, taken
from the idol, were carried by the party. The idols
themselves were often taken along in the canoes. As
all their battles were fought near shore, a fleet usually
accompanied each army. In Hawaii a chief who
wished to go to war mace many sacrifices and often
restored old temples. When the armies were drawn up
in battle array, a soothsayer was called on to say
whether the omens were propitious. Two fires, one for
each side, were built in the space between the armies,
and a pig offered to the gods on each. Battle was not
joined until the offering had been completed.
Although all the Polynesians were courageous in
attack, they were less steady than white troops, and
would usually break at the first serious reverse. Some
battles were bitterly contested, however, and the
Tongans, Hawaiians, and Maoris seem to have been
able to stand a good deal of punishment. The Maoris
were especially brave and, although cruel, were not
lacking in chivalry. They would often send a warning
to a besieged town the night before an assault. There
are many instances of personal magnanimity to ene-
mies taken at a disadvantage. Captured enemies were
killed or enslaved, and even when enslaved were liable
to be put to death at any time.
In Micronesia the taking of heads seems to have
been limited to the Pelews. Wilson says that the head
of a slain chief was exhibited outsice the victor’s
house and that there was a row of enemy skulls above
128 ETHNOLOGY OF POLYNESIA AND MICRONESIA
the door of one council-house. In the Gilberts enemy
skulls were sometimes used as drinking cups. In Sa-
moa and possibly in Tonga the heads of enemies were
carried to the chief, who praised the warriors, but they
do not seem to be preserved. Both the Marquesans and
Maoris kept the heads of enemies as trophies. The
former cleaned the skulls and decorated them with
boars’ tusks and inset eyes of pear]-shell, while the
latter smoked the heads of important chiefs and ex-
posed them on their palisades or on poles by the way-
side.
CANNIBALISM
Cannibalism was everywhere intimately connected
with war. As a rule it was only slain enemies who
were eaten, although all the groups in which the prac-
tice prevailed, and even those in which it was unknown
in historic times, had legends of depraved individuals
who developed a taste for human flesh and devoured
their own people. Habitual cannibalism was lacking in
Micronesia, although the Gilbert Islanders sometimes
ate some of their enemies’ flesh. In Fiji cannibalism
was commoner than in any other part of the Pacific.
The victims were usually enemies, but the bodies of
commoners who had been sacrificed were also eaten.
Shipwrecked strangers were always eaten, being said
to have the salt upon them. Some of the Fijians de-
veloped a great fondness for this food. One chief, Ra
* Undreundre, ate about nine hundred persons during
his life. Another man, personally known to one of the
early missionaries, killed and ate his own wife. Hu-
man flesh was always cooked separately, and the uten-
sils used in preparing it were tabu for other purposes.
It was commonly eaten with large wooden forks. It
was rarely eaten by women, although not absolutely
tabu to them.
Cannibalism seems to have been practised to a
very limited extent in Samoa and Tonga in ancient
times. In Samoa the bodies treated in this way were
usually those of enemies notorious for their cruelty;
the practice had almost died out by the beginning of
the historic period. In Tonga cannibalism seems to
have been on the increase in recent times, due to the
129
130 ETHNOLOGY OF POLYNESIA AND MICRONESIA
close contact between Tonga and Fiji. The Hawaiians
and Society Islanders felt as great a horror of can-
nibalism as Europeans. The Marquesans, Maoris,
Kaster Islanders, and the natives of the Cook group
were inveterate cannibals. The Maoris considered
the flesh of their enemies as one of the most important
spoils of war, cutting up the bodies of the slain after
a battle, boning them and packing the meat in bas-
kets. In all these localities the flesh of enemy women
and children was also eaten, but human flesh was
generally tabu to women, and no one ate that of a
member of his own tribe.
Many theories have been advanced to actoine for
the origin of cannibalism, but there is no one theory
which seems to cover all the facts. Probably it arose
in different ways in different places. Polynesian can-
nibalism certainly was not due to lack of other food,
for the women, to whom human fiesh was everywhere
tabu, got along very well without it. Simple hunger
cannibalism in time of famine was certainly no more
frequent in this region than in Europe. An idea of
revenge was present, for all the Polynesians had a feel-
ing that food was, to some degree, unclean; and to use
an enemy for food was to degrade him utterly. There
are also some indications of the presence of the very
wide-spread belief that by partaking of the flesh of a
person or animal the eater can acquire some of the
victim’s qualities, but while this might account for the
eating of warriors, it would weigh against the use of
women’s and children’s flesh. However cannibalism
may have originated, it was no doubt stimulated and
kept alive by the native attitude toward persons out-
side the immediate group. Civilized man bases his
distinction between men and animals on biological
CANNIBALISM 131
grounds, and considers all human beings as his rela-
tives. The uncivilized man, on the other hand, draws
his line at the limits of his own tribe, strangers and
animals alike being outside the pale. To the ordinary
Polynesian an unrelated enemy was a being of a dif-
ferent order, and he felt that there was no more rea-
son for not eating him than for not eating a pig.
GAMES
The Polynesians and Micronesians had a great
variety of sports and pastimes, but the information
for a great part of the region is unsatisfactory.
Wrestling seems to have been universal, and was
fairly scientific, with many names for grips. Hawaiian
chiefs kept wrestlers in their retinues. In the Society
group the sport was so popular that even women of
royal blood sometimes entered the ring themselves.
Boxing was important in Hawaii, the Society group,
and Tonga, but was in less favor than wrestling. The
boxers were usually commoners and fought with bare
fists, relying on strength rather than skill. Foot rac-
ing was universal. Football was played in the Society
and Gilbert groups, the ball being a cube of Pandanus
matting stuffed with leaves. The object of the game
was to force the ball over the enemy’s goal line. Whole
districts often played against each other. A rougher
form of this game, in which the hands instead of the
feet were used, often resulted in serious injuries. In
the Society group the men played shinny, using curved
sticks and a small ball of tightly wrapped tapa.
The sport of throwing spears at a mark was uni-
versal. In Fiji, and throughout most of Polynesia
light darts were thrown along a level course in such
a way that they struck the ground and glanced, the
man whose dart traveled farthest being the winner.
Archery as a sport was regularly practised only in
the Society group, and possibly in Fiji and Tonga,
where the bow was an important weapon. The Society
group archery was accompanied by many religious ob-
132
GAMES 133
servances, and was really a sacred sport. The bow was
never used in war. The archers wore special costumes.
These, together with the bows, arrows, and quivers,
were kept between contests by an appointed keeper.
The shooting ground was a long, open space with a
low platform of stone at one end. The bows were
straight, about five feet long. The arrows, from two
to three feet long, were made of bamboo with un-
barbed heads of ironwood, and had no feathers. The
archers knelt on one knee on the platform, and shot
for distance, the maximum range being slightly over
three hundred yards. Before the contest began, the
contestants went through ceremonies in the temple,
and put on the archers’ costumes. After it was com-
pleted, they had to return to the temple, deliver up
their weapons, change their clothes and bathe before
they could eat or return home.
Stilt walking was an important sport in the Mar-
quesas and New Zealand, and was practised to some
extent in Hawaii and the Society group, but seems to
have been unknown elsewhere. The stilts were shaped
much like modern European ones, with steps made
from separate pieces of wood and long shafts which
were held in the hand. Marquesan stilt steps were
usually carved into small wooden figures. The Mar-
quesans were especially expert at running races on
stilts and engaging in sham fights, each man trying to
knock out his adversary’s stilts by quick blows from
his own.
Bowling was important in Hawaii, the natives
using carefully made stone disks, which were rolled
along a level course. A similar game is recorded from
the Cook group, but seems to have been unknown else-
where.
134 ETHNOLOGY OF POLYNESIA AND MICRONESIA
Coasting was a favorite sport of adults in Hawaii
and of children in New Zealand. In both places special
slides were constructed for the purpose. The Hawaiian
slides were carefully made of beaten earth covered
with long slippery grass. Their sleds had runners of
polished wood with crosspieces and boards for the
coaster to lie on. The Maori sleds were simple tobog-
gans made from a single plank about three feet long
and four inches wide with rests for the feet.
Kite flying was important in New Zealand and
the Cook group, and was known in the Marquesas.
The best kites were made of tapa over a frame of light
wood, and were flat, with long tails. Those of the
Maoris were sometimes made in human or other gro-
tesque forms.
Cock fighting was a favorite sport in Hawaii and
the Society group. In it, and in most of the athletic
sports, large wagers were often laid.
There were a great variety of toys and children’s
games. Whipping tops were in general use. The Maoris
also had humming tops, spun with a cord, which were
used as toys and also in a peculiar mourning ceremony
performed when friends came to condole with a de-
feated tribe after a battle. A form of cup and pin
game is reported from the Marquesas. The Maoris had
wooden jumping jacks worked with cords, hoops, and
many other toys. Juggling was universal, and so were
the use of cat’s cradles, figures made by interweaving
strings between the hands.
All the natives were expert swimmers, learning
to swim almost as soon as they learned to walk. Chil-
dren spent a good deal of their time in the water, and
the older people bathed at least once a day. There were
no organized water sports, but young men and women
GAMES 135
often contested in swimming and fancy diving. The
‘Polynesians were the inventors of the surf board, and
surf riding was an important amusement in Hawaii.
In Fiji, the Marquesas, and Society group the surf
_ board was rarely used by adults. In western Polyne-
gia and Micronesia it seems to have been unknown.
F.
j
'
a
#
je
J-
t
r
A
ART
Polynesian and Micronesian art is primarily deco-
rative (Figs. 52-59, Plates II-III). It was a love of
design and color for their own sake which led the na-
tives to ornament their garments and utensils. Most
of the designs were named, but it seems doubtful
whether symbolism or a belief in associative magic
was present in any of the secular work. Magical ideas
may have been present in the case of images and other
religious objects, but even in these aesthetic consider-
ations were never lost sight of; for instance, the cere-
monial paddles from Mangaia (shown in Case 32) are
carved with many repetitions of a conventionalized
human figure representing a god. The use of these
figures was probably believed to increase the mana
(indwelling power) of the adze, but the artist treated
them purely as designs, arranging them and modifying
them to suit his fancy.
Micronesian art is comparatively poor. The only
people to make any extensive use of decoration were
the Pelew Islanders, who ornamented their town
houses and other sacred structures with carved human
figures and with painted friezes depicting men and
animals of all sorts. Although the painted figures were
conventionalized, they were bold and possessed con-
siderable artistic merit. A few plant forms and a
number of simple angular designs were also used.
Utensils and weapons were sometimes decorated with
mother-of-pearl] inlay.
The Caroline Islanders carved a few of their im-
plements with angular designs, and used simple pat-
136
137
Fic. 52,
Pattern on Maori Rafter. (After A. Hamilton)
138 ETHNOLOGY OF POLYNESIA AND MICRONESIA
terns, usually stripes, in their textiles. In the Mar-
shalls decoration was practically limited to the bor-
ders of the women’s mat skirts, which were embroid-
ered with angular designs. In the Gilberts baskets
were decorated with angular designs, and armor was
sometimes ornamented with diamond-shaped figures
or conventionalized outlines of fish. Except for occa-
NA
WN
? < © xX
TR
BRASS
DMF SA
Fic. 53.
Tapa Designs, Hawaii.
(After Greiner)
sional images, used as cult objects, wood carving seems
to have been unknown in the Marshalls and Gilberts.
Throughout the whole region, ornamental lashings,
made by interlacing strings of cinnet dyed in different
colors, were important as house decoration, and were
used to a lesser extent on tools and weapons.
ART 139
The art of Fiji is much like that of the neighbor-
ing Polynesian groups, but is characterized by greater
boldness and force. The principal media were carving
and painting on tapa. The designs were nearly all an-
gular and geometric, although a few naturalistic out-
line figures of men and animals were used in carvings
on clubs and some more or less conventionalized plant
forms in tapa painting. Much of the tapa painting
shows a bold and effective use of black on white. Pot-
Fic. 54.
Design on Canoe Paddle, Marquesas.
(After Greiner)
tery was sometimes modeled in the form of fruit or
vegetables. The priests’ oil-dishes were made in fan-
tastic shapes, some of them representing animals or
birds. Mats were woven in simple patterns, and cin-
net lashings were important.
The art of Polynesia is unusually rich, the princi-
pal media being wood carving, painting on tapa, and
tattooing. Carving was universal, but was least de-
veloped in Hawaii, where it was rarely applied to or-
dinary implements and utensils. Inlaying, as an
140 ETHNOLOGY OF POLYNESIA AND MICRONESIA
adjunct of carving, was practised in Tonga, Manahiki,
Hawaii, and New Zealand. In the last two localities it
was practically limited to inserting shell eyes in carved
faces. In Samoa an effect somewhat like inlay was ob-
tained by filling carvings with hard lime-plaster and
rubbing the whole surface smooth. Tapa painting was
D GO] =
Fic. 55.
Design on a Bowl, Marquesas.
(After Greiner)
important in Tonga, Samoa, the Cook, Austral and
Society groups, as well as in Hawaii (Fig. 53 and
Plates V-VII), but was lacking in the Marquesas.
Painting on wood was limited to New Zealand
CFig?52):
Tattooing was universal, but was finest in New
Zealand and the Marquesas.
Ornamental cinnet
ART 141
lashings were important in Tonga, Samoa, the Cook,
Austral and Society groups, and the Marquesas, but
were almost unknown in Hawaii and New Zealand.
The Tongans, Samoans, Hawaiians, and Maoris deco-
rated their mats with simple patterns. The Maoris used
rather elaborate designs on their belts and the borders
of their robes. Decorated baskets seem to have been
limited to Tonga, Samoa, and New Zealand. Feather
robes with simple figures were important in Hawaii
and New Zealand (Plate XIV).
Fic. 56.
Samoan Design on a War Club.
(After Greiner)
It is impossible to give anything like a complete
account of Polynesian art in this guidebook. The art
of each group had certain distinctive features, and
even in the same locality different sorts of designs
would often be used on different classes of objects. In
general, the art of Tonga, Samoa, the Cook, Austral
and Society groups, and Hawaii was characterized by
the use of small, angular designs which were repeated
many times. The only curved designs were circles,
ovals, and crescents, the spiral being practically un-
known. There was a limited use of conventionalized
142 ETHNOLOGY OF POLYNESIA AND MICRONESIA
plant forms in all these localities, while small natural-
istic outline figures of men and animals were employed
everywhere, except in Hawaii. In the Marquesas the
designs were predominantly curvi-linear, the spiral
being of first importance. Large angular designs were
carved on house timbers, perhaps as an imitation of
Fic. 57.
Design on a War Club, Samoa.
(After Greiner)
ornamental lashings, but were rarely used elsewhere.
Highly conventionalized human faces were constantly
used, but human figures in outline were extremely
rare; animal forms were so conventionalized as to be
unrecognizable, and plant forms were almost lacking.
There were two quite distinct types of art in New
Zealand. The natives of the south island used simple
ART 143
angular designs in their carvings. All the Maoris em-
ployed angular designs on their baskets, textiles, and
feather robes. The natives of the north island employed
only curvi-linear designs in their carving and painting.
The most important single element was the spiral,
but highly conventionalized human figures, faces, and
animal forms were much used in carving. Many of the
scroll designs painted on rafters were said to be de-
rived from plant forms, but were so highly conven-
tionalized as to be unrecognizable. In Tonga, Samoa,
the Cook group, and the Marquesas the surface to be
Suan
SOO
S ‘
Ps
ROR
OX
GID,
SOROS |
Fic. 58.
Tonga Design for Tapa.
(After Greiner)
decorated was divided into a number of sections which
were treated as independent units. In Hawaii, New
Zealand, and probably in the Society group, the whole
surface was treated as a unit. The art of the Marque-
sans and northern Maoris was bold and forceful, and
found its closest parallel in that of certain parts of
Melanesia, notably the Massim region of New Guinea.
That of the other large Polynesian groups was deli-
cate, with a great attention to detail, but showed
little ability in large composition. It found its closest
parallel in the rather feeble art of eastern Micronesia.
144 ETHNOLOGY OF POLYNESIA AND MICRONESIA
All the natives seem to have made some use of
human figures carved in the round, which were set up
in sacred places as representations of gods or ances-
tors. Such images were least important in Micronesia,
Fiji, Tonga, and Samoa. The few examples preserved
from these localities show a crude attempt at natural-.
ism. In Hawaii, the Marquesas, and the Cook, Austral,
and Society .groups great numbers of images were
made. The Maoris had a few images in the round, but
a
=
Th wT
a
. A
ayers
= 3
2
Me
et
‘
Ta on :
- er
=
nd
Fic. 59.
Design from Ceremonial Paddle.
Mangaia, Cook Group. Case 32.
most of their human figures were carved in high relief
on slabs (Plate III). The Austral and Society Island
figures were rather crude. The legs were usually:
flexed, and the arms bent with the hands resting on
the abdomen or raised to the chin. The facial treat-
ment was simple, and in some instances the features
were omitted. In one example from the Australs eyes,
nose, and mouth are indicated by small human figures
carved in relief. ne
ART 145
In Hawaii, the Marquesas, the Cook group, and
New Zealand most of the images were rigidly conven-
tionalized, although both the Hawaiians and the Maoris
carved some rather good naturalistic figures and even
attempted portraiture. Although each group had its
own conventions, all of them had certain features in
common. The legs were shown half flexed and, except
in Hawaii, the arms were always bent, both hands
resting on the abdomen, or one hand being in this po-
sition, and the other raised to the mouth. The great-
est care was expended on the face. The brows were
greatly exaggerated, the nose reduced, and the mouth
made extremely wide, with parted lips showing the
tongue. In Hawaii and New Zealand the mouth was
often beaked, assuming the form of an eight. Al-
though the images were usually made of wood, stone
was sometimes employed in Hawaii, the Marquesas,
Society and Austral groups, and Easter Island, but
rarely in the Cook group and New Zealand. In every
case the convention of the stone figures agrees with
that of the local wooden forms.
MANA AND TAPU
The concepts of mana and tapu underlie the
whole fabric of Polynesian religion and social organi-
zation. The word mana has no exact English equiva-
lent. Perhaps it can be most nearly translated by
“power,” if that term is used with all its manifold
implications. It was an essence or force which per-
vaded the whole of nature, but was uneven in its dis-
tribution. Some persons or objects had a great deal
of it, others almost none. Its presence might be dis-
covered accidentally, as when it was found that the
use of a certain stone as a sinker was followed by an
unusual catch of fish. It could be strengthened by
spells, such as those recited by a warrior over his
weapons, or by use. A club that had killed many men,
or a chisel that had been used by a master carver, had
more mana than an unused weapon or club. Tregear
says, “In human beings mana had really a religious
basis, it was born with great chiefs as part of their
god-inheritance, but it could be lost. It could also be
greatly strengthened: it was not exactly success in
battle, or acquisition of power and lands, or repute
for wisdom, but the possession of these was a sign of
the indwelling of mana. Its outward form might be
what we vaguely call good luck, genius, reputation,
etc., but it might also be recognized in high courage,
lofty social position, and personal influence. Mana
was shown when a man undertook to do an unusual
and almost impossible thing and yet succeeded. It was
not always necessary to be of noble birth to possess
mana; the child of a slave could by great daring, in-
146
MANA AND TAPU 147
fluence, and good fortune rise to be a noted chief or
dreaded councilor. Lands and localities were supposed
to possess mana of their own, as well as men, weap-
ons, etc. This influence when it pertained to land
was on account of the spirits of famous men remain-
ing on guard over them.”
Tapu has been taken over into English as tabu.
Tregear writes, “Its proper sense seems to be neither
‘sacred’ nor ‘defiled,’ although it may take either
meaning, and that medial expression ‘prohibited’ per-
haps translates it best—‘prohibited’ for sacred rea-
sons, ‘prohibited’ for objectionable reasons. The true
inwardness of the word tapu is that it infers the set-
ting apart of certain persons or things on account of
their having become possessed or infected by the pres-
ence of supernatural beings. Great chiefs were by na-
ture tapu on account of their divine birth. If such
chiefs performed certain actions, such as entering a
common house, leaning against a post, eating a por-
tion of food, etc., the house, the post, or the remain-
ing scraps of victuals were tapu to others. If a com-
mon man partook of scraps left by his noble master, he
was then ‘eating the god’ of his own tribe, and thus
not only committing a terrible sacrilege against his
protecting deity, but probably bringing down upon his
- jJeader the wrath of heavenly beings whose essential
sacredness had been conveyed to the food by the touch
of the chief. That is the reason why the chief himself
would feel violent personal anger at his tapu being
broken by the act of an inferior. If a chief made a
thing tapu, such prohibition was only held binding on
lesser men; if some more powerful noble came, he
would take it, disregarding the tapu of the other, very
much as if he had said, ‘This fellow’s position in
148 ETHNOLOGY OF POLYNESIA AND MICRONESIA
regard to the gods is nothing compared to mine,’ but,
of course, he might have to maintain such superiority
at the point of the spear.
“The priests, especially the priest-chiefs (Ariki),
had the power of releasing from tapu and making
things common (noa) again; if this could not have
been done, the laws of tapu would have been too heavy
to be borne, and all social life must have ceased. As it
was, it was almost impossible not to infringe this
dreaded custom, even if scrupulous and pious care was
taken. The annoyance was almost as great for the
sacred person as for the sinner, although not so un-
pleasant or perhaps fatal in its consequences. Thus,
the chief must eat in the open air, whatever the
weather, so as not to tapu a house; must not eat from
a plate that another shared or that another might af-
terward use; must gather up all scraps and take them
away to a tapu spot lest another consume them. He
could not drink from a vessel if it was probable that
the lips of another would approach that vessel, so
that he had to hold his hand curved upward below
his lower lip, whilst water was poured from a cala-
bash into his mouth. A chief had to be careful not to
leave his comb or hair-fillet or shoulder-mat in any
place where a common person would touch them.
Even if another person equally sacred touched his
head, he would be tapu until the next day when the
purifying ceremony would proceed. A new sacred fire
was kindled by friction and fern-root cooked thereon
by some ‘unprohibited’ person. The food was then
rubbed over the disqualified hands, and afterwards
eaten by the female head of the family. If the shadow
of a great Ariki fell across a food-store, the contents
became tapu and had to be destroyed. If he blew on
MANA AND TAPU 149
a fire with his breath the fire became tapu. Should a
priest in drinking let fall some of the water from his
hand, that place was tapu, and the length of time it
so remained depended on the quantity of water spilt.
On one occasion the people of a village became tapu
from eating the wild cabbage which had grown on the
site once occupied by a chief’s house. The infringe-
ment of the tapu was not only a spiritual offence, but
sometimes produced actual physical consequences.
Death would almost certainly ensue if a common man
found, for instance, that he had cooked his food with
timber from some tapu place.”
The account of tapu just quoted refers specifically
to the Maori of New Zealand, but similar ideas and
practices were present everywhere in Polynesia. The
regulations of the tapu were extremely irksome to all
concerned, and a good chief was expected to regulate
his actions so as to cause as little damage as possible
to his followers. In some places certain paths were set
aside for the chief to traverse, and it was understood
that his feet only tapued the ground to a fixed dis-
tance. In others the chief went out only at night, to
avoid contaminating objects with his shadow. In still
others there was a class of persons, usually foreigners,
who were considered non-conductors, and could asso-
ciate with both chiefs and commoners without impart-
ing the tapu. These waited on the chief, cooked his
food, and even carried him from place to place. In
some of the groups the stringency of the tapu seems
to have been one of the main factors responsible for
the establishment of a dual chieftainship, one chief
being sacred and observing the tapus, while another
actually ruled.
150 ETHNOLOGY OF POLYNESIA AND MICRONESIA
In historic times involuntary tapus were only one
phase of the institution. There were everywhere a
long series of tapus which derived their sanction from
some ancient chief or god, and which took the place
of laws in regulating the conduct of individuals. Tem-
porary tapus, imposed and lifted at will, were used
for the protection of property or the conservation of
resources; for instance, when a Samoan village wished
to buy a large canoe, a tapu would be placed on coco-
nuts or other native products for a time, so that each
family would have enough to pay its quota. Standing
crops were often tapued as a protection from theft,
although this only guarded them from persons of lower
rank than the tapuer. A sign was usually hung up as
a warning. In Samoa these signs were of many differ-
ent sorts, and indicated the spirit in whose name the
tapu was imposed and the penalty which would fol-
low its infraction. Thus, when a man hung up a small
coconut-leaf figure of a shark in his breadfruit tree,
it indicated that the tree was under the protection of
the shark god and that the thief would be eaten by
sharks. There were no limits to the tapu power of
chiefs of the highest rank. They might reserve all
food of a certain sort to themselves or lay an embargo
on an island, so that no one could enter or leave. The
system of imposed tapu was most developed in Hawaii,
and finally became so irksome that the natives, en-
couraged by the fact that white men were immune,
rose and destroyed the whole institution.
In Fiji the concepts of mana and tapu, and the
use of the latter, were much the same as in western
Polynesia. In Micronesia the mana idea was relatively
weak, and seems to have taken the form common in
Melanesia, where the mana of a person or object was
MANA AND TAPU 151
believed to be due to its association with a spirit. The
idea of infectious tapu by involuntary contact was
weak or lacking, but there were conduct tapus inher-
ited from ancient times and temporary tapus. The lat-
ter seem to have been most important in the Carolines,
and were imposed by priests rather than chiefs.
SOCIAL ORGANIZATION
The ordinary Polynesian family was monogamous
for economic reasons. There was no feeling against
polygamy, but it was usually limited to chiefs, and
even these rarely had more than three wives at a time.
Polyandry (plurality of husbands) was very rare, ex-
cept in the Marquesas, where it was normal. Even
there, there was always a main or official husband,
the other husbands exercising their rights only when
he was away. In polygamous families there was a
principal wife, the one of highest birth. In Samoa a
chief’s daughter was accompanied, when she went to
her husband, by a younger sister who stayed with them
for a time and acted as an inferior wife. In Hawaii
the highest ranks practised brother and sister mar-
riage to insure the purity of the royal blood. A simi-
lar practice seems to have existed in the Cook group.
Elsewhere the marriage of close relatives was pro-
hibited, although that between cousins was often fa-
vored as a means of keeping property in the family.
Although children were sometimes betrothed in in-
fancy, marriage was relatively late, men rarely mat-
ing before they reached the age of twenty. Young
people of the lower classes enjoyed complete freedom
before marriage, and rarely settled down until they
had had several love affairs.
The children of chiefs and nobles were more care-
fully chaperoned. In both Tonga and Samoa the vir-
ginity of the bride was tested as a part of the mar-
riage ceremony. Commoners’ marriages were based
on personal choice, but those of chiefs were nearly
152
SOCIAL ORGANIZATION 153
always arranged by the councilors. They: were a favor-
ite method of cementing alliances between tribes.
Marriage by purchase seems to have been unknown.
In chiefs’ unions the two families exchanged gifts, but
those of the bride’s family, which constituted her
dowry, were usually the larger. The marriage bond
was easily severed, unions being dissolved at the wish
of either party. In such cases young children would re-
main with the mother, while the older ones stayed
with either parent they wished. Infanticide was espe-
cially common in the Society group, but was practised
everywhere. Large families were exceptional. Adop-
tion was common, being most important in the Mar-
quesas, where practically all children were adopted,
and where they were often spoken for before they
were born. Adopted children everywhere had exactly
the same position as natural ones.
Gentes or clans, that is, groups membership in
which was based on cescent reckoned exclusively in
the male or female line, seem to have been unknown in
Polynesia. The foundations of the social organization
were the family and tribe. The latter was really an
enlarged family, for all its free members were at least
remotely related by blood or adoption. In Tonga it is
said that if the entire population was removed one by
one, the last male survivor would have a ‘legitimate
claim to the title of Tuitonga (sacred chief of Tonga).
Several families lived together in a village, and when
the tribal territory was large, it was usually divided
into districts each of which included several villages.
The villages and districts were governmental units,
having their own chiefs and councils and, at least in
Samoa, their own patron deities, but membership in a
village or district was not necessarily a matter of
154 ETHNOLOGY OF POLYNESIA AND MICRONESIA
descent. Political groupings larger than the tribe
sometimes arose through conquest or through the fus-
ing of two royal lines by marriage, but they always
tended to fall apart. Temporary alliances between
tribes were common, but there were no confederacies.
All the Polynesians were obsessed with the idea
of rank. This was based exclusively on descent and
primogeniture, which overshadowed all other consider-
ations, even sex. The rank of a given individual was
dependent upon that of both parents, plus seniority
of birth. In tracing descent a person would give the
ancestor of highest rank in each generation, so that
nearly all genealogies contain both male and female
names. The system was not unlike that used by mod-
ern European families when trying to prove a royal ~
ancestry. In general, descent through the eldest son
was considered the most direct, but the eldest child of
either sex by the highest wife enjoyed the highest
rank in that particular family. Even the sacred chief
of Tonga had to accord certain marks of respect to his
elder sister. In New Zealand, which seems to have
been most nearly patrilineal, the eldest son of a chief
by a low-cast wife could not inherit his father’s social
status or office. It is said that in the Society group a
low-cast wife or husband could be elevated by certain
ceremonies at the marae (“temple”) and also by kill-
ing the first children of the union, the rank of the
lower partner increasing as each child was killed un-
til equality was reached.
The children of a royal woman and a commoner
were of higher rank than those of a royal man and
common woman, and, in general there was a tendency
toward the matrilineal descent of rank in all those
groups in which chastity was not very highly valued,
SOCIAL ORGANIZATION 155
and paternity was rather uncertain. The whole sys-
tem of rank had a religious sanction, being based on
ancestor worship. The person who was very closely
related to the tribal ancestors could be surest of their
help and support. In some groups the chief was con-
sidered an embodiment of these ancestors, and was
accorded divine honors. Each succeeding chief inher-
ited the mana of all his ancestors, so that an eldest
son was of higher rank than his own father.
In a system which laid so much stress on descent,
genealogies were of the utmost importance. Some of
those from the Marquesas purport to give over eighty
generations, but the earlier portions are clearly mythi-
cal. Actual genealogies recording from twenty to
thirty generations were quite common. Every well-
born native knew his genealogy by heart, for he might
have to appeal to it at any time to establish his right
to land or to some office. In the Society group the
descendant of a chief who had left an island several
generations before could return to that island and
take up his ancestor’s lands and titles if he could prove
his claim by reciting his genealogy correctly. For this
reason the Society Island genealogies were kept as
family secrets. Claimants were examined at their an-
cestral marae, and there was a special class of priests
whose business it was to memorize genealogies and
tribal records and to check up on such claims. In the
Marquesas and Hawaii there were also priests who
were supposed to know all the genealogies of the tribe,
and in Hawaii they were organized into a sort of col-
lege of heralds who passed on the claims of aspirants
to chiefly rank or office. There can be little doubt, how-
ever, that they sometimes discovered lofty genealogies
for chiefs who had acquired temporal power.
156 ETHNOLOGY OF POLYNESIA AND MICRONESIA
Social rank was purely a matter of birth and was
inalienable. It was a prerequisite for office, but its
possession did not mean temporal power. When the
social head of the tribe was a woman, the actual chief
would usually be a man, although, if there were no
male claimants of very high rank, or if she had ability
and force of character, she might rule. In New Zea-
land, the Society group, the Marquesas, and Hawaii
the social head of the tribe, if a man, exercised both
religious and temporal powers; he was, in short, a
priest-king. This condition probably existed every-
where in Polynesia in ancient times, but by the begin-
ning of the historic period the Samoans, Tongans, and
Cook Islanders had both sacred and secular chiefs.
The sacred chief was the social head of the tribe, but
was so hedged about by tapus that he rarely took any
part in the government and had little real power. The
secular chief was often a relative of the sacred chief,
perhaps a younger brother, but the office might pass
into the hands of another line. Although the chieftain-
ship was everywhere hereditary in theory, the tribal
councils seem to have often set aside the direct heir in
favor of some more able member of the family, and
chiefs were sometimes deposed for misconduct.
In general priests stood next to the chiefs in the
social order, but their rank varied with their individ-
ual status. The higher orders of ceremonial priests
were nearly always recruited from chiefly families,
and the high priest of an important god was little in-
ferior in rank to a sacred chief. Below the head chiefs
and high priests ranked the lesser chiefs and priests,
and below these, in turn, the commoners. There was
a good deal of intermarriage between the lower chiefs
and the commoners. There were many individuals
SOCIAL ORGANIZATION 157
whose social status was on the border line. The dis-
tinction between chiefs and commoners was strongest
in Hawaii, where most of the latter were tenants on
the chiefs’ land. Elsewhere there was a socially and
economically important middle class made up of land
owners and skilled craftsmen. The latter were or-
ganized into more or less hereditary guilds, and de-
manded high pay for their services. They were, in a
sense, priests, for they had to have a knowledge of the
spells and ritual necessary to make their work success-
ful. In some places the payments made them were con-
sidered offerings to the patron deity of their particular
trade. Labor was considered honorable, and minor
chiefs were often skilled artisans as well. At the bot-
tom of the social scale there was usually a class of
slaves or serfs, descendants of prisoners of war.
Polynesian government was comparatively simple.
Each chief was, in theory, the absolute ruler of his
group. His orders were expressed as tapus, and had a
divine sanction, so that disobedience automatically
brought punishment. In practice, however, the chief
was restrained by his council and by a strong public
opinion. The village councils were made up of the
heads of families and other important men with the
village chief presiding. They were really little more
than town meetings at which local affairs were dis-
cussed informally. District councils were made up of
the village chiefs and other important men, while
tribal councils were composed of all the chiefs. Tribal
councils were only convened to discuss matters of im-
portance to the whole tribe, such as declarations of
war or the selection of a new head chief. They were
usually attended with a good deal of formality, but
discussion was free, and few chiefs would dare to go
158 ETHNOLOGY OF POLYNESIA AND MICRONESIA
against the public will expressed there. The chiefs
were most despotic in Tonga and Hawaii and least so
in the Marquesas. In the latter group the organization
was quite democratic and, although the chief was ac-
corded respect in both temporal and religious matters,
his actual power depended upon his ability. In Hawaii
there seems to have been a distinct class of personal
councilors to the chief, commoners, who were able
generals or diplomats, and a chief’s personal at-
tendants everywhere did a good deal to influence his
decisions.
Theft and crimes of violence were not uncommon.
When they occurred within the group, the case was
tried, and punishment prescribed by the chief and
council. There was no police to enforce the penalties,
but a man who fled to escape it would forfeit his prop-
erty. Death sentences were usually executed by a rela-
tive or retainer of the chief, to prevent the victim’s
relatives from taking revenge on the executioner. Pri-
vate revenge was common, and in general the whole
family or tribe was held responsible for the conduct
of each of its members. As a tribe would rarely give
up one of its members for an offence against an out-
sider, many wars began in this way. In New Zealand
certain classes of offences were punished by plunder-
ing, the friends of the injured party carrying off the
property of the offender’s relatives and even destroy-
ing their houses and standing crops. This plundering
was a recognized institution, and the victims were
forbidden to defend their property.
Personal property was individually owned. A
woman retained her rights after marriage. Land was
considered the property of the whole tribe. Its own-
ership was vested in the chief as the official head of the
SOCIAL ORGANIZATION 159
group, and the lesser chiefs and middle class held
their land from him. At the same time any family
who had held and used land for several generations
was felt to have a strong right to it. The chief could
not sequester it without good cause. As a rule even
the chiefs could not sell land to any outsider without
the consent of the council, and in practice such trans-
fers were extremely rare. The chiefs’ power over land
seems to have been greatest in Hawaii, where the bulk
of the population consisted of rent-paying tenants,
and even lesser chiefs had their land allotted them by
the high chiefs.
Micronesian social organization is still imper-
fectly known. In the Gilbert group descent was reck-
oned in the male line. Monogamy was the rule, al-
though a man had marital rights over the widows of
his deceased brothers and over his wife’s sisters by
the same mother. It was considered unworthy for a
man to exercise these rights unless his real wife was
childless. Incest was strictly forbidden, and great em-
phasis was laid on chastity. When an unmarried wom-
an was seduced, both parties would be put to death.
Infant betrothal was common, and all marriages were
arranged by the parents. Long genealogies were kept,
but the idea of rank was less developed than in most
islands of Polynesia. The powers of the chief depended
upon his personality, and he was not considered sac-
red. The ownership of land was vested in families. It
was regularly transferred as a part of a bride’s dowry.
In the Marshalls and Carolines descent was reck-
oned in the female line, and there seems to have been
a clan organization. In the Carolines the clans were
totemic and exogamous. In the Marshalls the popula-
tion was divided into four classes,—chiefs, nobles,
160 ETHNOLOGY OF POLYNESIA AND MICRONESIA
commoners, and slaves. The chiefs had autocratic
power, and were considered personal owners of the
land. In the Carolines the chiefs were sacred, and
were treated with great formality, but they did not
own land, and seem to have had little real power.
Throughout the Carolines the men’s house was an in-
stitution. This was a large house which was shared
by all unmarried men of a clan; it was tabu to women.
In Yap one or more women, abducted from other
tribes, were kept in each of these houses for the use of
the inmates. They were treated with respect, and us-
ually married later in life. A similar house for women
existed in some of the islands, but the distribution of
this practice is uncertain.
Fijian social organization was quite complex,
largely as a result of the superposition of a number of
Polynesian features on an older organization of Mela-
nesian type. Polygamy was common, chiefs often hav-
ing as many as twenty wives. Marriage between
brother and sister or between the children of two
brothers or two sisters was forbidden. The children —
of a brother and of a sister, on the other hand, were
considered the natural mates for each other, and were
looked upon as betrothed from birth. This feeling was
so strong that, even if the parties married persons out-
side the family, the woman’s children were considered
the children of her own instead of her real husband.
This system tended to stagnate blood within the fami-
ly, but actual statistics show that the children of such
close unions were more numerous than those from
marriages outside the family, and were » fully as good
mentally and physically.
Every Fijian tribe was divided into a number of
sections which were subdivided in turn. The members
SOCIAL ORGANIZATION 161
of each section traced their descent from a group of
brothers, while the members of each subsection traced
theirs from one of these brothers. There was a sug-
gestion of totemism, each group having a sacred bird
or animal, which it did not eat, and a sacred plant. In
some tribes the whole population was divided into two
groups which were exogamous; that is, members of
the same group were forbidden to intermarry. This
dual organization was most important in the part of
Fiji, where the Polynesian influence was strongest, al-
though the Polynesians themselves had no such ar-
rangement. The real political and social unit was the
tribe, and all larger groupings were more or less
transitory. A strong chief might conquer several
tribes and exact tribute, but the conquered retained
title to their land, and were not incorporated with the
conquerors. Tribute was usually paid to the conquer-
ing chief in person, but in some cases one village as a
whole would hold another village vassal. The vassal
village might be either a conquered enemy or a colony
founded by members of the ruling village.
The idea of rank and of social classes was most
- strongly developed among the tribes which had been in-
fluenced by Polynesia. The ancient Fijian social organ-
ization seems to have been more democratic than the
Polynesian one, but full membership in the group was
a matter of birth or adoption. Inheritance of rank and
property was in the female line. A man’s wives might
be of different rank, and therefore his children, but
rank made no difference in land ownership. There
were no long, carefully kept genealogies of the Poly-
nesian sort. In general the population was divided
into chiefs, nobles, commoners, and outcasts. The first
three groups were related by blood, while the lowest
162 ETHNOLOGY OF POLYNESIA AND MICRONESIA
class consisted of the descendants of outsiders, either
castaways or prisoners of war. Although there was
some intermarriage between commoners and outcasts,
the children of such marriages remained members of
the lowest class.
In ancient times a single chief seems to have held
both the secular and sacred power. In historic times
various tribes showed all stages in the development of
a dual chieftainship like that of western Polynesia.
The person of the sacred chief was extremely tapu,
and his rank was the highest in the tribe, but he had
little real. power. The secular chiefs seem to have had
more power over the lives and property of their sub-
jects than was usually the case in Polynesia, but even
they could not alienate land. Both the sacred and secu-
lar chieftainships were hereditary in certain families,
but the actual chiefs were elected from among those
eligible for the office. Priests were important, but do
not seem to have been organized.
The system of land tenure varied considerably in
different tribes. In general three classes of land were
recognized. The yavu or town lot belonged to the head
of the family. In theory at least, each village origi-
nated from the increase of a single family. As popu-
lation grew more, houses were built around that of the
original ancestor. All the houses were named, and
when the village was destroyed, it was rebuilt on the
same plan. The house and the land on which it stood
descended from the father to the eldest son. Nkele or
arable land was waste land which had been reclaimed
by some family. Final ownership of this was vested
in the section, but in practice it remained the property
of the reclaimers as long as it continued in use.
SOCIAL ORGANIZATION 163
Veikau or waste land was considered the prop-
erty of the whole tribe. It was administered by the
chief, and was usually apportioned out to tenants, not
full members of the tribe, who paid rent and service
directly to the chief. All the members of a tribe were
expected to give a certain amount of labor to the chief
each year. This was used to keep up roads and bridges,
and also to help members of the tribe. When a man
wanted to build a house, he would apply to the chief
for help, and the chief in turn would send out a call
for labor.
The Fijian commoner reckoned his wealth, not by
the amount of his property, but by the number of
friends from whom he could beg. Pure communism
was unknown, but the claims of relationship within
the tribe were so strong as to constitute a lien on all
personal property. This begging was really a substi-
tute for trade or barter. When a man had more salt
than he needed, a neighbor begged it from him, and
when the man needed yams, he in turn begged it from
the neighbor. A man’s rights were strongest over the
property of his maternal uncle, and he could carry off
anything that the latter possessed. People of two vil-
lages who traced their descent from a common ances-
- tor and worshipped the same gods also had a recipro-
cal right of plunder, visiting one another and stripping
the houses of all food and movable property.
RELIGION
The Polynesians believed in the existence of in-
numerable supernatural beings. These were classified
and arranged in a great hierarchy, but only a few of
them were actually worshipped. No attention was
paid to a multitude of minor spirits, who corresponded
in a general way to the European elves and goblins,
or to most of the great ancient gods of the creation
myths; for it was felt that the latter were too remote
to interfere in the world of human affairs. There was
no concept of a supreme being, although the higher or-
ders of priests and chiefs in New Zealand seem to have
approached it in their worship of the god Io. In New
Zealand and Hawaii three great deities,—Tane, Tu,
and Rongo,—stood at the head of the sacred hierarchy.
Tane was a sky god and creator, frequently re-
ferred to in the oldest chants and myths, but he had
no temples or direct worship. In the north island of
New Zealand he was a forest god and relatively unim-
portant. Tu was a war god, and was the foremost
deity in Hawaii, where the finest temples were dedi-
cated to him. He was the recipient of most of the hu-
man sacrifices. Rongo was an agricultural god. These
three deities were known throughout the rest of Poly-
nesia, but were of lesser importance and changed their
attributes somewhat in the various groups. In the
Society group Rongo was a war god. In Samoa,
Tonga, and the Society and Cook groups the head of
the sacred hierarchy was Tangaroa. He was a sea god
and creator. He was known in Hawaii and New Zea-
land, but was unimportant, being a sea or forest god.
164
RELIGION 165
Below the great gods just described there were
everywhere a number of deities who were worshipped
by part of the population. The activities of most of
these seem to have been rigidly prescribed. They
watched over a single tribe, family, or locality ; or were
the patrons of some trade. In Hawaii every industry
had its god, including a god of the thieves, while the
great universal gods were self-existent, and had never
had material form. Many of the lesser deities appear
to have originally been human beings. In western
Polynesia, especially Samoa, there was also a tendency
to identify the minor gods with animals. The animal
itself was not considered divine, but it was believed to
be the favorite vehicle of the god, and on that account
could not be injured or eaten by his followers.
There was a strong undercurrent of ancestor wor-
ship everywhere in Polynesia. It underlay the whole
social organization, and was the foundation of the ex-
aggerated respect paid to rank and descent. Even the
deities who had never been human came within its
scope, for the chiefs commonly traced their descent
from these and, in reverencing them, were reverencing
the founders of their line. The worship of recogniz-
edly human ancestors was least important in Samoa
and Tonga. Indeed, it hardly existed in Samoa, al-
though the spirits of chiefs were sometimes prayed to,
and even a commoner might invoke his immediate an-
cestors in time of stress. In Tonga the spirits of dead
chiefs formed one of the two classes of deities who
were worshipped, and their tombs were used as
temples. They were believed to return and give
oracles through the priests.
In Hawaii ancestor worship was a family affair,
overshadowed by the tribal worship of the greater
166 ETHNOLOGY OF POLYNESIA AND MICRONESIA
gods. In the Cook and Society groups ancestor wor-
ship was interwoven with that of the non-human
deities, and the temples of the latter were used as
burying grounds. At least in the Society group each
family also had its own sacred place dedicated to its
ancestors. In the Marquesas the ancestor cult was all
important, and little attention was paid to any other
deities. In New Zealand the ancestors were the guar-
dians of the tribe, and were frequently appealed to for
help and guidance. There can be little doubt that the
worship of ancestors, or of the lesser gods who were
the guardians of a man’s village or trade, stood much
closer to the hearts of the people than that of the great
deities. They were simple, familiar beings who could
be appealed to directly, while the great gods were
hedged about by the priests and the ritual of the temple.
The Polynesians felt that there was no connection
between religion and morality. As long as a man
avoided breaking the tapu, his conduct toward his fel-
low men did not concern the gods. To the ordinary na-
tive religion consisted of sacrifice and the repetition of
certain set formulas. His devotion to the gods was
based on fear and on the hope of future favors. Sac-
rifice was a part of practically all rites. Even at ordi-
nary meals a little food was set aside as an offering
to the ancestors, while all requests had to be accom-
panied by gifts. The sacrifices were usually food,
whose essence was consumed by the god, while his
priest consumed its substance. Human sacrifice was
rare in Tonga and Samoa, but seems to have been
fairly common in the rest of Polynesia. It was very
common in the Cook, Society, and Marquesas groups,
where human victims were offered at most important
ceremonies.
RELIGION 167
In Hawaii nearly all the human sacrifices were
made to Tu, the war god. The practice does not figure
in the oldest legends. Apparently it was introduced
into that group by immigrants who came from south-
eastern Polynesia between A.D. 1000 and 1200. The
victims were usually captive enemies, but criminals
and commoners who had incurred the ill will of the
priests were also offered. In the Cook group certain
tribes or families were set aside for sacrifice. The
proper performance of ritual was nearly as important
in gaining the god’s favor as the making of sacrifices.
The least slip would nullify the effect of all that had
gone before, and would make it necessary to begin
again. In some instances it was thought that an er-
ror would be fatal to the priest himself. The natives
did not distinguish between religion and magic, and
many of the formulas repeated by the priests were be-
lieved to compel the god to accede to their demands.
The priest acted as a medium of communication
between the people and the particular god whom he
served. It was his duty to present their offerings and
requests to the deity and to deliver the god’s answers.
He was also the keeper of the tribal lore and the guar-
dian of his god’s temple, if there was one. His most
important single function seems to have been the giv-
ing of oracles, which were usually delivered by word
of mouth while in a trance condition. Because of the
great importance attached to the rituals, priests us-
ually underwent a long novitiate. It was almost impos-
sible for an uninstructed man to become one. Mem-
bership in the priesthood everywhere tended to become
hereditary. It was strictly so in some groups. In
Tonga, Samoa, and New Zealand each priest. per-
formed all the priestly functions. The priesthood as a
168 ETHNOLOGY OF POLYNESIA AND MICRONESIA
whole was not organized. In the Cook group and the
Marquesas the priesthood seems to have been partially
organized. There was a distinction between the in-
spirational priests, who delivered the oracles, and the
ceremonial priests, who attended to the temples and
sacrificial rites. |
In the Society group and Hawaii the priesthood
was thoroughly organized, forming a distinct heredi-
tary cast. The various functions were delegated to
different orders of priests, one order keeping the gene-
alogies and myths, another caring for the temples, etc.
In Hawaii there were even farming priests, who tilled
the god’s lands, and warrior priests, who led armies in
battle and hurled spells against the enemy. Wherever
the priestly functions were divided, that of giving or-
acles was reserved for the highest order. The priest-
hood was chiefly recruited from the upper classes,
often from the younger brothers of chiefs. Its mem-
bers ranked above the commoners and lesser nobles.
The high priest of an important god was little inferior
in rank to the reigning chief.
Shamans were important everywhere in the area.
It is somewhat difficult to draw a line between them
and the unspecialized priests of the sort found in
Tonga and New Zealand. The real difference seems to
have been that, while the priest was controlled by his
god, the shaman controlled his supernatural helper.
The shaman’s helper was often the spirit of some dead
person which he had seized, or which had attached
itself to him. The principal function of the shaman
was to cure disease, but he worked magic of all sorts.
In New Zealand the shamans were specialists, one man
confining himself to diagnosing diseases, while another
made the cures. Many of them practised black magic.
RELIGION 169
It was generally believed that if they obtained the
cuttings of a man’s hair or nails, his spittle, etc., they
could bring about his death. The shamans as a class
were feared rather than respected. Their office was
not hereditary. They were not organized among them-
selves. They were usually men, but female shamans
were important in the Marquesas and Society groups.
In the Society group there was an organization
known as the Areoi, made up of men and women who
devoted themselves to pleasure. The members spent
their lives in wandering from place to place, giving
dances and musical entertainments. The people es-
teemed them as a superior order of beings, closely al-
lied to the gods. They were believed to go to a heaven
of their own after death. A man who wished to join
the society killed all his children, and any children
born to members were put to death. The society was
organized into a number of grades which were dis-
tinguished by different tattooed designs. Many of
their entertainments were obscene. It seems probable
that they were in some way connected with a gener-
ation cult, and that their acts were believed to increase
fertility.
All the Polynesians had sacred places of some
sort. In New Zealand there were no real temples, al-
though certain places were sacred. The nearest ap-
proach to a temple seems to have been the large house
in which young men were instructed in the tribal lore.
In Tonga and Samoa the temples were simple houses,
like dwellings. In Tonga the temple was often built
over the tomb of a dead chief, while in Samoa the town
houses were sometimes used as temples. In the Cook
and Austral groups the temples were usually stone en-
closures or platforms, often without houses. In the
170 ETHNOLOGY OF POLYNESIA AND MICRONESIA
Cook group they were used as burial places. In the
Society group the temples were quite elaborate. There
were several different forms, but the most important
temples were usually low-walled enclosures with a
platform or pyramid at one end. They were used as
burial places and also as assembly places. Each chief
had his hereditary seat in the marae (“temple”), and
when he emigrated to another island, he would usually
take one of the stones from the marae with him and
found a new marae of his own. The marae differed in
sanctity, the most sacred being one on the island of
Raiatea.
In the Marquesas there were two sorts of temple,
the public ones, which were attached to the sacred
places, and the mortuary ones, which were usually
built high up in the hills. The former were used
for public rites in which the whole tribe participated,
and were not used as burial places. The latter were
primarily burial places, but were the scene of most of
the human sacrifices. The temples of both sorts were
usually stone platforms which bore houses. These
houses were shaped like the dwellings, but had exces-
sively high roofs, so that early writers often refer to
them as obelisks. In Hawaii there were several types
of temple. The oldest form seems to have been a
simple stone platform or pyramid which sometimes
bore a house shaped like an ordinary dwelling. In
historic times the most important temples were stone-
walled enclosures containing a number of houses for
the priests and images. There were also tall structures
covered with tapa from which the priests delivered
their oracles. Only chiefs and priests were admitted
to the temple enclosure, the common people remaining
outside and being told what was going on by the priests.
RELIGION 7A
Images were used in all parts of Polynesia, but
were unimportant in Tonga, Samoa, and New Zealand.
In Tonga and Samoa the symbol of the god was usually
some object, such as a stone or shell trumpet, while in
New Zealand it was a carved stick, usually with a face
at the upper end, which was only set up during cere-
monies. In the Cook and Society groups crudely
carved images were kept in the temples, and were also
carried in processions and even taken to war. In the
Marquesas and Hawaii grotesquely carved human fig-
ures were set up in all the temples. In Easter Island
enormous stone figures were erected in the burial
places. None of the images or objects symbolizing the
gods seems to have been considered divine in them-
selves. They were simply bodies which the gods could
occupy at will.
Most of the important ceremonies centered about
war and agriculture. Harvest festivals at which the
gods were offered great heaps of food were common.
In the Society group there was a fire-walking cere-
mony. A large earth oven was built and, when the
stones had been heated red hot, the priests walked
across them barefoot. There seems to have been no
trick in the ceremony, and why they escaped injury
has never been satisfactorily explained.
Polynesian mythology was unusually elaborate.
The creation myths are of especial interest, for many
of them show a philosophic trend surprising in an un-
civilized people. The Maori believed that the original
state of the universe was kore, a condition of chaos or
nothingness permeated with generative power. From
this arose a yawning and immeasurable darkness, po,
which was blank and unformed, but carried within
itself the potency and essence of all life. From po
172 ETHNOLOGY OF POLYNESIA AND MICRONESIA
there arose successively eighteen periods, each of vast.
duration, which were named Nothingness, Darkness,
Seeking, Following on, Conception of thought, Enlarg-
ing, etc., until in the eighteenth period came light.
After many more periods rangi, “heaven” and papa,
“earth,” appeared. The heaven father and earth moth-
er embraced and clung together, and the gods were
begotten. From this point on the myth loses its philo-
sophic character. Tane, born from the embrace of
Heaven and Earth, tore his parents apart, and set up
the props of heaven to support the sky. From the
space that lay beyond and about Heaven and Earth
he brought in the children of light, the sun, moon and
stars, and established them in their places.
He then created plant and animal life, and lastly
man. There were many versions of the latter part of
creation. According to one, Tane made the first man
from red earth and breathed the breath of life into
him, while the first woman was born from the union
of the Mirage and Echo. Even the great periods which
preceded Heaven and Earth were personified, and the
myth was cast in the form of a genealogy of the uni-
verse in which each god and even each human line had
its place. The myth in its entirety was known only to
a few of the higher priests. An essentially similar cre-
ation myth was known in the Marquesas. In Hawaii
there was no long series of vaguely personified entities,
the first life springing directly from chaos. Creation
was divided into stages. In the first stage the sea
took form, and was inhabited by lowly forms of life
whose accumulating bodies gradually formed land. In
the second stage Black Night and Wide-spread Night
gave birth to leafy plants, insects and birds, and the
first glimmer of light appeared. In the third stage the
RELIGION 173
sea produced larger forms some of which began to
creep upon the muddy land. In the fourth stage food
plants came into existence. In the fifth, night and day
became separate, and the pig appeared. In the sixth,
the abstract psychic qualities to be embodied in man
were developed. In the seventh and last, confusion
ceased, light became clear, and man and woman, to-
gether with the higher gods, were born.
The evolutionary type of cosmogenic myth was
strongest in New Zealand, Hawaii, and the Marquesas.
In Tonga and Samoa the cosmogenic myth was cre-
ative. The gods lived in a sky world below which there
was only sea. One of them cast down a stone, which
became the world. Some of the gods descended to it,
and later mankind appeared. In the Society group
Tangaroa was conceived of as a world soul,—a self-
evolving, self-existing, creative deity who alone was
ultimately responsible for the origin of the universe.
Aside from the creation myths the best-known
Polynesian stories centre about the hero Maui, who
was the youngest and cleverest of six brothers. His
three most widely told exploits were fishing up the
land, snaring the sun, and obtaining fire for men. In
the first the land is a great fish which he catches with
his magic hook and kills with his adze, the valleys being
the cuts he made. In the second the sun travels across
the sky so fast that there is hardly any daylight. He
catches it with a magic rope as it comes up, and makes
it promise to go more slowly. There were several ver-
sions of the fire quest in different groups. In New Zea-
land he gets it from an old woman who lives under
the earth. In Hawaii he steals it from the mud hens.
The Fijians, like the Polynesians, believed in a
multitude of gods and spirits, but all the tribes re-
174 ETHNOLOGY OF POLYNESIA AND MICRONESIA
cognized one deity as of supreme importance. This god,
Ndengel, was an enormous serpent who lived in a cave
near the northern end of Viti Levu. His only emotion
was hunger, and he gave no sign of life beyond eating,
answering his priests, and changing his position from
side to side. He was the eldest of the gods and the
creator of the other gods and the universe, but he had
fewer priests and temples than many of the lesser
deities. Many of the lesser gods had monstrous form.
Thangawalu was a giant sixty feet tall. Roko Mbati-
ndua, ‘‘the one-toothed lord,” had the shape of a man
with wings instead of arms and a single tooth in his
lower jaw which rose above his head. Each district,
trade, etc., had its guardian deity, as in Polynesia.
Ancestor worship was much more important than in
western Polynesia. The head of the family was con-
sidered the incarnation of the ancestors. Sacrifices ac-
companied all petitions, but ritual seems to have been
rather poorly developed.
The priest of each god was a hereditary official,
but the priesthood as a whole was not organized. The
temples were high-roofed houses erected on tall, stone-
faced mounds, and were also used as tribal council-
houses and guest-houses. A man could only appeal to
his god at his temple and through his priest. There
were few if any images, but standing stones of un-
usual form were sometimes worshipped as the dwell-
ing-place of gods. In western Fiji a men’s secret so-
ciety, the Nanga, was important. All the men of the
tribe were initiated into this, there being three degrees
of membership. The initiation was largely a test of
courage and endurance, but the novice also had to
make gifts to the initiates. The ceremonies were held
in a stone-walled enclosure which was also used as a
RELIGION 175
gathering place for the men. A man might invoke his
ancestors there without the intercession of a priest.
Somewhat similar men’s societies were wide-spread in
Melanesia, but were lacking in Polynesia.
There is little satisfactory information on Micro-
nesian religion. That of the Gilbert group seems to
have been fundamentally ancestor worship. Even
their greatest deity, Tabueriki, was not improbably
a deified ancestor, once a mighty chief. Ancestor wor-
ship was less important elsewhere, but the natives
seem to have drawn no clear line betwen self-existing,
supernatural beings and those who had once been hu-
man. The functions of the gods were more or less
specialized, although this feature was less pronounced
than in Polynesia. A supreme creator deity was pres-
ent only in the western Carolines. There was a strong
tendency for spirits to be resident in, or associated
with, plants or animals. Sacrifices, usually of food,
were made everywhere in the region, but seem to have
been rather infrequent in the Carolines. Human sacri-
fice was unknown. Ritual was only moderately de-
veloped. In all the groups there were individuals who
combined the duties of priest and shaman, serving the
gods, curing the sick and working magic.
An organized priesthood seems to have been lim-
ited to the eastern Carolines, although in the Gilberts
there were priests attached to the service of special
gods. Mediums, who communicated with the souls of
the dead, or the lesser spirits, were a distinct class in
the Carolines and Marshalls. The priests do not seem
to have been inspired by their gods or to have given
oracles. The nearest approach to the latter was in the
Gilberts, where the priests listened at the sacred stones
and conveyed the message to the people, and where
176 ETHNOLOGY OF POLYNESIA AND MICRONESIA
chiefs were sometimes inspired by the spirits of their
ancestors. In the Mariana group there is said to have
been a society, known as the writoy, which resembled
the Tahitian Areoi in several respects. Sacred houses
were sometimes erected in all the groups, but were
most important in the Carolines and Gilberts. Images
of the gods were the exception rather than the rule.
In the Carolines the district gods were often repre-
sented by idols, but the high gods had no representa-
tions. In the Gilberts a few ancestral images were
made. Throughout Micronesia offerings were made
and rites performed at uncarved stones believed to be
the dwelling places of spirits. This practice was most
important in the Gilberts, where stone pillars were
commonly erected, anointed with oil, and bound with
leaves. |
Micronesian mythology has been collected to a
small extent, but the creation myths have some points
of interest. In the Pelews and western Carolines the
natives seem to have been indifferent to the origin of
the universe. The few myths recorded are of the cre-
ative type. In the rest of the Carolines the myths are
more elaborate, but are also purely creative, assuming
the immemorial existence of a deity. The origin myth
of the western Marshalls was also of the creative type,
but that of the eastern Marshalls begins with two
worms, male and female, which lay together in a co-
coon and stretched it until it was as large as the uni-
verse. Then from an abscess on the forehead of the
male worm, one of the gods appeared, while the female
one bore two female deities. The world and the other
deities arose in different ways from the primordial
pair. In this there is at least a suggestion of the evo- —
lutionary creation myths of Polynesia. The creative
RELIGION 177
and evolutionary types of origin myth meet in the Gil-
berts. In the northern islands of that group the myths
are predominantly creative, while in the southern is-
lands are found the Polynesian concepts of an original
chaos and the separation of earth and sky. Curiously
enough, these concepts are weak in the Polynesian
groups nearest to the Gilberts.
DEATH AND BURIAL
All the natives of Polynesia believe in the exis-
tence of a soul, a separate entity dwelling in each man
and surviving his death. There is no belief in multi-
ple souls. Even the souls of persons in good health
left their bodies in sleep, and dreams were actual
soul experiences. Such living souls retained the form
and features of their owners, and could be seen and
recognized by those who had that power. When a
man became ill, his soul was unusually restless, wan-
dering about constantly. When he died, the connec-
tion between the soul and body was severed. The loss
of a soul was certain, but not immediate death. A
person whose soul had gone might live for some time,
the body carrying on automatically. In some places
sorcerers could cause death by snaring the soul and
imprisoning it or destroying it. There seems to have
been a good deal of confusion in the minds of the na-
tives themselves as to the fate of the soul after death.
It persisted for some time, but its power and the
length of time before it disappeared were dependent
on the mana of its owner while alive.
The souls of great chiefs were almost immortal,
and could be appealed to as gods, while those of slaves
were so weak that there was some doubt whether they
had souls at all. There was no idea of future rewards
or punishments for moral conduct.
In Micronesia the soul usually went to some spirit
land at death, although belief in reincarnation was
not uncommon. Its fate was determined by its own-
er’s age, or social status, or the manner of his death.
178
DEATH AND BURIAL 179
It might return to earth, and was then able to do
injury to men, and had to be propitiated. In the
Carolines the dead went to sky heaven. The belief
of the natives of Namoluk was typical. There the
soul took the form of a seabird at death and flew to
the spirit dwellings, which stood one above another in
the sky. It bathed in a body of water, and immedi-
ately all became dark. A god, Rothe, led the soul to
a tree and gave it leaves. When it grasped these, the
light reappeared. Another god, Olaitin, then led the
soul up to heaven by a ladder, passing between two
rocks that clashed together. It might be caught there
and destroyed. In the heaven to which it was as-
signed it led a life very much like that on earth, feast-
ing and dancing all night and sleeping from sunrise
to late afternoon. When it wished, it could return
to earth to visit its friends.
The souls of men who fell in battle were taken
to a special heaven, where there was fighting. Those
of women who died in childbirth went to a far place,
where heaven and earth met. The souls of men who
hanged themselves were shut out of heaven, for the
gods were disgusted at the sight of their protruding
tongues. In Kusaie of the Carolines and in the Mar-
shalls the souls went to a far island. In the Gilberts
the natives of Peru believed in a sky heaven, but the
rest in an island heaven, like the Marshalls. The souls
of those who were not tattooed were caught and de-
stroyed by a giantess.
In Fiji the path of the soul was beset with great
dangers. Its final abode was a pleasant land, where
they led a life like on earth, but few reached it. When
a man’s soul first left his grave, he carried with him
the whale tooth placed in his dead hand, and at a
180 ETHNOLOGY OF POLYNESIA AND MICRONESIA
certain place threw it at a tree. If he missed, he had
to remain in his grave. If he struck it, he went to
another place, and there waited for the spirits of his
strangled wives. He could not go on until they joined
him, and when a bachelor he would be caught and de-
voured by a demon. When his wives joined him, he
set out to a place called Nai Thombothombo, meeting
and fighting certain spirits on the way. If he was
conquered, he was eaten. Nai Thombothombo was a
real locality in Fiji, and the spirits’ road to it ran
through a town. The houses in this town were all
built with the doors opposite to each other, so that the
spirits could pass through without hinderance, and its
inhabitants always spoke in low tones or communi-
cated by signs. They also had to be very careful in
handling edged tools, lest they inadvertently cut a
ghost. ;
The spirit next boarded a canoe and went to a
mountain, where he was interrogated as to his rank.
He was then sent back to earth, to be deified by his
descendants, or seated on the blade of an oar from
which he was dumped into the sea, through which he
passed to his final abode. There he lived almost the
same life as on earth, but might be punished for cer-
tain oversights while alive. Women who were not
tattooed were tormented by other women or scraped
up and made into food for the gods. Men who had
not slain an enemy were sentenced to beat a heap of
filth with a club, while the other men jeered at them.
In Tonga and Samoa the dwelling of the dead was
called Pulotu. The Tongans thought that it was an
island lying somewhere to the northwest, but some of
their myths also refer to it as an underworld. The
Samoans believed that it lay under the sea. Two cir-
DEATH AND BURIAL 181
cular openings among the rocks near the beach on the
western end of the island of Savaii were thought to
be the entrance to it. The larger one was used by
chiefs, and the other by commoners. A river flowed
at the bottom of the pit, which carried the souls to
Pulotu, where they bathed in the water of life and
became young and strong again. Life in Pulotu was
like the pleasantest on earth. The souls were very
light and volatile, and could return to the world at will.
In the Cook group ordinary souls were cooked
and eaten by an ogress, called Miru. The souls of men
who had died in battle eluded her, and were changed
to the clouds of the dry season. In the Society group
the soul was conducted by spirits to Po (‘‘Darknesg’’),
where its ancestors scraped it with a shell and fed it
to the god. It passed through his body and reshaped
itself. After undergoing this process three times, it
became deified, and could revisit the world and inspire
living persons. There was also a heaven, invisible to
mortals, located on the island of Raiatea, where the
souls of the Areoi and others led a life of pleasure. In
the Marquesas there were three underworlds, one
above the other. The lowest was a very pleasant place,
while the uppermost was a miserable one. Souls went
to one or another of these, according to the number of
pigs sacrificed for them. There was also an upper world
inhabited by the gods and the souls of deified chiefs.
In Hawaii the dead went to an underworld, and there
was a tale of a man who descended to it by a long
rope, captured the soul of his wife and, returning,
forced it to reenter her body. In New Zealand the
souls passed to the northernmost point of the island,
where they lacerated themselves after the manner of
mourners, and then slid or leaped into the underworld,
182 ETHNOLOGY OF POLYNESIA AND MICRONESIA
undergoing successive stages of death, passing to low-
er and lower regions, and finally being extinguished.
The dead were treated with the greatest respect,
for even when the natives were not ancestor worship-
pers, they had a lively fear of ghosts, and did not wish
to incur the ill will of the departed. As soon as death
occurred, all the relatives joined in loud wailing, which
was sometimes kept up for several days. In Polyne-
sia the mourners often beat their heads with stones
and lacerated their faces and breasts, but this was
rarely done in Micronesia or in Fiji. In Hawaii and
the Society group the whole population joined in vio-
lent mourning on the death of a chief. Such occasions
were made an excuse for the wildest license. In Fiji
the mourning and the preparation of the body for
burial were begun as soon as the person’s condition
was considered hopeless. The supposed corpse might
live for several hours, speak, eat, etc., but it was
thought that the spirit had left it and that its motions
were purely involuntary. In extreme cases a man
might be buried alive. In all the localities where earth
burial was practised the body was washed, anointed
with oil, and dressed in the best clothes and ornaments.
It was allowed to lie in state for a time, so that rela-
tives from a distance might pay their respects to it.
A few favorite belongings were buried with it.
In New Zealand, the Marquesas, Hawaii, and
probably the Society group human sacrifices were
made on the death of a chief that their spirits might
accompany the dead and serve him in the other world.
In New Zealand wives were often strangled at their
own request. In Fiji several of a chief’s wives were
usually strangled, and their bodies placed in the grave
as a carpet, while at least one strong warrior was
DEATH AND BURIAL 183
killed in order that he might go before the chief and
overcome the dangers of the spirit road for him. In
the Marshall Islands a man was sometimes killed and
buried with a chief, but the practice seems to have
been unknown elsewhere in Micronesia.
In Samoa the spirits of those who had not been
buried occasioned great concern. They wandered
comfortless and haunted their relatives. When a
man’s body could not be obtained, his relatives went
to some place near where he had met his death, spread
a piece of tapa on the ground, and prayed for his
spirit to visit them. The first living thing that
alighted on the sheet was believed to contain his spirit,
and was taken home and buried with the same cere-
monies as would have been accorded the real body.
Even the souls of those whose bodies had been prop-
erly tended were considered more or less malevolent,
and attempts were often made to drive or entice them
away from the living or to prevent their return. »
In the Gilbert group the whole village turned out
with clubs on three successive nights and went
through the town, beating the ground and trees to
make the ghost leave. In Tahiti, after the corpse had
been placed on a bier in the embalming house, a spec-
ial priest dug a hole at the foot of the bier and prayed
that the dead man’s sins might be deposited there.
He then planted a post in the hole and, going up to the
corpse, laid a few strips of plantain leaves on it, sym-
bolizing the members of its immediate family. He
bade the spirit to be contented in its new home and
not to return to trouble the living.
The Tahitians also had a peculiar ceremony in
which a masked and elaborately costumed priest went
through the district, accompanied by a number of men
184 ETHNOLOGY OF POLYNESIA AND MICRONESIA
whose bodies were painted red, white, and black, and
beat everyone whom he met. They were supposed to
be inspired by the spirit of the deceased and revenged
any injury to him. The Samoans kindled large fires
near the grave, and kept them burning all night for
ten nights. Persons who had touched a corpse were
under certain tapus until they had been ceremonially
purified, but the purification usually took place shortly
after the funeral, and long mourning periods were
unusual. The outward signs of mourning were old
garments and in some cases special ornaments or
methods of wearing the hair.
The methods of disposal of corpses were surpris-
ingly varied. Several different methods were often
practised simultaneously in the same group. Simple
earth burial in an extended position was the rule in
Micronesia. In the Carolines and Gilberts the body
was usually laid with the head east. In the Marshalls
the bodies of women were sometimes thrown into the
sea. Sea burial was also practised in the Carolines.
in Ruk, in the Carolines, the bones of the dead were
sometimes hung up in the dwelling. In the Gilberts
the bodies of some persons were mummified, and the
skulls of ancestors were preserved. The Marshall
Islanders raised mounds faced with coral slabs over
their graves, while burials in stone vaults have been
found in Ponape, in the Carolines.
In Fiji a man was usually buried under the floor ~
of his own house. If he was a chief, the house was
then abandoned and became a shrine where his spirit
was worshipped. In some cases the body was placed
in a niche in the side of the grave. In one instance
a chief’s son was laid on the deck of a large double
canoe, and the whole covered with a mound.
DEATH AND BURIAL 185
In Tonga chiefs were buried in langi, large
mounds containing a _ stone-lined vault. Smaller
mounds were erected over commoner’s graves, their
tops being covered with pebbles of different colors
arranged in simple designs. In Samoa simple earth
burial in an extended position with the head east was
the rule for all classes. Chief’s bodies were sometimes
placed in log coffins, and their graves were covered
with low mounds. Bodies were sometimes set adrift in
canoes. A single family of chiefs mummified their
dead and preserved the corpses in a special house. In
Niue corpses were set adrift or exposed, and the bones
placed in a cave or vault. In the Cook group corpses
were buried in a merae (‘sacred place’), placed in a
cave, or thrown into a chasm. Bodies were buried in a
flexed position, face down and head to the east. The
limbs were bound, and heavy stones placed on the
grave to keep the ghost from returning to trouble the
living. Bodies placed in caves were carried out into
the sun from time to time and rubbed with oil until
they finally became mummified. Rank seems to have
played no part in determining the method of disposal,
although one cave on Mangaia had one entrance for
chiefs and another for commoners. In some cases the
body was carried to a merae, left there for a few
hours, and then taken to the cave. When this was
done, the spirit was supposed to remain in the merae,
the disposal of the body being called “the throwing
away of the bones.”
In the Society and Marquesas groups and in the
island of Mangareva, in the Tuamotus, nearly all
corpses were mummified and kept for several months.
The viscera were removed by way of the anus, the
_ skin punctured to release the juices, and the body
186 ETHNOLOGY OF POLYNESIA AND. MICRONESIA
sunned and rubbed with coconut oil until it dried up.
In the Society group the brain was also removed, and
the body cavity packed with tapa soaked in oil. When
mummification was complete, the corpse was dressed,
and kept either in the dwelling or in a small special
house built for the purpose until it fell to pieces. The
bones were then gathered and hidden in a cave, or
were sometimes buried in a merae.
In the Society group the skulls of chiefs were pre-
served, and in the Marquesas those of most men.
Earth burial in a flexed position was also practised in
both these localities, but was limited to the very poor,
the insane, and certain persons whose ghosts were
especially feared. In the Marquesas the body was
sometimes placed in a log coffin after mummifica-
tion and carried to a cave or left in the branches
of a tree in some sacred place. Chiefs and priests are
said to have sometimes been buried in vaults. In ~
Easter Island bodies were exposed in a sacred place,
and the bones gathered and hidden in vaults. Burial
was also practised.
In Hawaii commoners were usually buried in a
flexed position, while chiefs and persons of importance
were placed in caves. ‘The bodies of some chiefs were
buried until the flesh had decayed, then dug up, and
the bones cleaned and preserved, either in a temple
or in a small sacred house near the dwelling. Great
care was taken that they should not fall into the hands
of an enemy. Lesser chiefs and priests were some-
times buried in an extended position, the priest’s
graves being within the temple where they had offici-
ated. Some priests were buried in stone vaults in
platforms. The bodies of fishermen were wrapped in
red tapa and thrown into the sea. Bodies placed in
DEATH AND BURIAL 187
caves were sometimes preserved for a time by evisce-
rating them and packing them with salt or by varnish-
ing them with tz root.
In New Zealand slaves and commoners were bur-
ied in a flexed position. Persons of importance were
usually placed in a coffin or canoe, and placed in a tree
or on a stage in some sacred place. About a year later
the bones were cleaned, oiled and painted red, and hid-
den in a cave, chasm, or hollow tree. The natives of the
south island sometimes mummified their dead, evisce-
rating the body, packing it with tow, and drying it
over a fire. All the Maori sometimes mummified and
preserved the heads of chiefs. In the northern part
of the south island and in a few parts of the north
island the dead were cremated. The related Moriori
of the Chatham Islands usually buried their dead with
the face toward the west. Chiefs were placed in
canoes or covered coffins. Commoners were sometimes
buried with the head or body above ground. Noted
fishermen were set adrift in canoes, and a single tribe
practised cremation.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Numerous scientific studies are contained in the volumes of the
Journal of the Polynesian Society, and Memoirs and other publications
of the Bernice Pauahi Bishop Museum. Only books in English which
may prove of interest to the general reader and student are listed here.
BeckwitH, M. W.—The Hawaiian Romance of Laieikawai.
Thirty-third Annual Report of the Bureau of American
Ethnology, Washington, 1919, pp. 285-666.
Best, E.—The Stone Implements of the Maori. Dominion
Museum, Wellington, 1912.
Maori Storehouses and Kindred Structures. Dominion
Museum, Wellington, Bulletin No. 5, 1916.
The Maori. Wellington, 1924.
Maori Agriculture. The Cultivated Food Plants of the
Natives of New Zealand, with some Account of Native
Methods of Agriculture, Its Ritual and Origin Myths.
Dominion Museum, Wellington, Bulletin No. 9, 1925.
Brewster, A. B.—The Hill Tribes of Fiji. Philadelphia, 1922.
Burton, J. W.—The Fiji of To-day. London, 1910.
CHRISTIAN, F. W.—The Caroline Islands. London, 1899.
CHURCHILL, W.—The Polynesian Wanderings. Carnegie Insti-
tution of Washington, 1911.
Easter Island, the Rapanui Speech and the Peopling of
Southeast Polynesia. Carnegie Institution of Washington,
1912.
Club Types of Nuclear Polynesia. Carnegie Institution
of Washington, 1917.
CoutLocoTT, E. E. V.—The Supernatural in Tonga. American
Anthropologist, 1921, pp. 415-444.
Cook, J.—Voyage to the Pacific Ocean. Voyages of Discovery.
The Three Voyages of. Various editions.
DEANE, W.—Fijian Society or the Sociology and Psychology of
the Fijians. London, 1921.
Dew Mar, F.—A Year among the Maoris: A Study of Their
Arts and Customs. London, 1924.
Drxon, R. B.—Oceanic Mythology. Boston, 1916.
ELLIS, W.—Polynesian Researches. 4 vols. London, 1831.
EMERSON, N. B.—Unwritten Literature of Hawaii. Bureau of
American Ethnology, Bulletin 38, Washington, 1909.
189
190 BIBLIOGRAPHY
Fison, L.—Tales from Old Fiji. London, 1904.
GILL, W. W.—Myths and Songs from the South Pacific. London,
1876.
GREINER, R. H.—Polynesian Decorative Designs. Bishop Mu-
seum Bulletin No. 7. Honolulu, 1923.
Grey, G.—Polynesian Mythology and Ancient Traditional Mytho-
logy of the New Zealand Race. London, 1855.
HAMILTON, A.—The Art Workmanship of the Maori Race in
New Zealand. 4 parts. Dunedin, New Zealand, 1896-1899.
JARVES, J. J.—History of the Hawaiian Islands. 4th ed., Hono-
lulu, 1872.
Lowir, R. H.—Primitive Religion. New York, 1924. Polynesian
Religion, pp. 75-96.
Mao, D.—Hawaiian Antiquities. Honolulu, 1903.
MarTIN, J.—An Account of the Natives of the Tonga Islands,
compiled and arranged from the extensive communications
of W. Mariner. Boston, 1820; also Edinburgh, 1827.
Moss, R.—The Life after Death in Oceania and the Malay
Archipelago. Oxford University Press, 1925.
Murray, A. W.—Forty Years’ Mission Work in Polynesia and
New Guinea, from 1835 to 1875. New York, 1876.
RoBLEY, Major-General.—Moko; or Maori Tattooing. London,
1896.
Rotu, H. L.—The Maori Mantle. Bankfield Museum, Halifax,
England, 1928.
ROUTLEDGE, S.—The Mystery of Easter Island. London, 1919.
RUSSELL, M.—Polynesia. Edinburgh, 1845.
SEEMANN, B.—Viti, an Account of a Government Mission to the
Naas or Fijian Islands in the Years 1860-61. Cambridge,
186
SETCHELL, W. A.—American Samoa. Part II. Ethnobotany of
the Samoans. Washington, Carnegie Institution, 1924.
SmitH, S. P.—Hawaiki; the Original Home of the Maori; with
a Sketch of Polynesian History. 2nd ed., Melbourne and
London, 1904.
TAYLOR, R.—New Zealand and Its Inhabitants. London, 1870.
THOMSON, B.—The Fijians. A Study of the Decay of Custom.
London, 1908.
TREGEAR, E.—The- Maori Race. Wangani, New Zealand, 1904.
BIBLIOGRAPHY 191
TURNER, G.—Nineteen Years in Polynesia. London, 1861.
Samoa a Hundred Years Ago and Long Before.
London, 1884.
WESTERVELT, W. D.—Legends of Old Honolulu. London, 1915.
WHITE, J.—The Ancient History of the Maori, His Mythology
an Traditions. 6 vols. Wellington, New Zealand, 1887-
WILLIAMS, T., and CALVERT, J.—Fiji and the Fijians. 2 vols.,
London, 1858; New York, 1859.
WILKES, C.—Narrative of the United States Exploring Expedi-
tion, 1838-42. New York, 1856.
WILLIAMSON, R. W.—The Social and Political Systems of Cen-
tral Polynesia. 3 vols. Cambridge, 1924.
GUIDE PART 6.
FIRE MAKING ON THE MARQUESAS ISLANDS (p. 38).
From Photograph by R. Linton.
PLATE I.
*
*souor ‘g anyjay Aq poyuesorg
‘ZL ASVO ‘GNV1IVAZ MSN ‘INOVW “(8h °d) SATGVNIAVA 4O SDVHOLS AHL YO4 XO NAQOOM G3sAYVO
“iW ALWId
wo
LYVd AQINS
AaLV1d
‘souor “g amuyzy £q pojueserg
"NVWOM V ‘L337 SHL LV LVHL ‘NVW V SLNSSSYd3Y ONS LHDIY 3HL LV AYNDI4 SHL
4 i
‘9L ASVO “GNV1IVAZ MAN ‘IHYOVIN “(PFT ‘Sh 4d) HSIG GOO4S NSGOOM G3aAYVO
*9 LYVd AGIND
PLATE IV.
GUIDE PART 6.
“ty ¥ wa Ny
a J aay q
~~ SS «Ww “wath A a .
> = | =4= =} ry
. . SN Wb
ae Be,
ee SY
eto Y/
4 ~~ WwW
Y ges; / ‘
SN C/A pre NF ALN
AZ ASN
. < -
OS NIT fro GIONS GPA FE
NS " > Owe ie 8
; — RF
\ “~\ i va fi ted
) : , " : -
‘ f rt
> Ca
‘ i SN . ‘
dias
ay of ; YO
RS x NY
\%
oA a Vata =
Ps "t ‘ee ;
‘+2 ‘ : ;
AN NP
P 4
‘ te, :
aa > -
‘ ‘
_ = + Sea =
/ » ‘\
» PS Pe ee
it
Nie
ROY
Mh
cot
N We.
=) @
t
BARK CLOTH OR TAPA, SAMOA (p. 51),
GUIDE PART 6. PLATE V.
PAINTED BARK CLOTH, SAMOA (p. 51),
A, en
‘SS
A )IN
\G fa) (fe —
PAINTED BARK CLOTH, SAMOA (p. 51).
GUIDE PART 6.
PAINTED BARK CLOTH, SAMOA (p. 51).
PLATE VII.
4
i
nN SN Ne Pe
ay ee
Se Ov Sr ee
GUIDE PART 6. Sie PLATE VIII.
| CEREMONIAL PADDLE (p. 106).
" MANGAIA, COOK GROUP. CASE 32.
‘GUIDE PART 6. : PLATE IX.
&
elect
WOODEN CLUBS (p. 118).
WITH BROAD HEADS CARVED INTO HUMAN FACES, MARQUESAS ISLANDS.
“SHDVAOA S:MOOO NIVIdvO WOUS
“(201 4) VONOL “SONVO
*9 LYVd 3GIND
“YSIY JooF USOZINOF ‘OpIM Joos APUBM,
*d TIVH ‘WNASNW G13ld NI GaL03y3
“(8L 4) GNV1VAZ MAN ‘ASNOH TIONNOD IYOVW IVNIDINO 4O M3IA LNOYS
s
“IX 3LV1d “9 LYVd AGIND
GUIDE PART 6. PLATE XI.
: | SUIT OF ARMOR, GILBERT ISLANDS (p. 122). CASE 2.
PLATE XIll.
GUIDE PART 6.
MAORI ROBE OF UNDYED FLAX (Phormium tenaz).
NEW ZEALAND. CASE 14.
WITH STRINGS OF BLACK FLAX ATTACHED.
GUIDE PART 6. PLATE XIV.
Ld
MAORI FEATHER ROBE (pp. 56, 70, 141).
_ WITH A BREAST ORNAMENT OF JADE (HEITIKI) REPRESENTING AN ANCESTOR.
NEW ZEALAND. CASE 14.
Ni ||| Hy
111 WH
(| H{I\
WAH I
Lill | l
WIV Hi NI
\))\|||
I
AW
AAT
| i |
\] Wl | |
nit | Tall | Wh |