Posted on December 16, 2015 in Melanesia, Sepik River, Solomon Islands, West Papua
“Those people are constantly chewing a fruit which they call areca, and which resembles a pear. They cut that fruit into four parts, and then wrap it in the leaves of their tree which they call betre…They mix it with a little lime, and when they have chewed it thoroughly, spit it out. It makes the mouth exceedingly red. All the people in those parts of the world use it, for it is very cooling to the heart, and if they ceased to use it they would die” – Antonio Pigafetta (1521)
Following my introductory post, this piece will explore specific uses of the bottle gourd (Lagenaria siceraria). Within the Pacific, a great importance is placed on the bottle gourd for storing lime powder. This is visible in the collections of the Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, Cambridge (MAA), which reflect the great geographical spread of such containers, having been collected from across Santa Cruz, the Bismarck Archipelago and the Solomon Islands, to name just a few places.
Historically, lime powder has been used by Pacific groups for its use in producing ‘betel’, as illustrated in the quote at the beginning of this post. Whilst its ability to prevent death is certainly questionable, this substance is one which can create powerful psychostimulating effects. The chewing of betel remains a popular practice within all aspects of Pacific life; courtship, death, peace-making, traditional medicine and ritual activity. It is frequently used across Melanesia, especially in New Guinea, New Britain and New Ireland. This is reflected in the material culture that was collected from these areas by colonial explorers during the late 19th-early 20th century, in particular a very high number of lime containers were collected. I will now introduce you to some specific examples of such containers, demonstrating the variety in form and decoration which can be seen within the MAA’s vast collection.
1927.1576
The first object (1927.1576) is a large, round gourd with no external decoration or patterning. It has a carved wooden spatula attached to its body by a string of sinnet material. This illustrates its use for combining lime powder with the areca palm fruit and betel pepper leaf. It was collected from the Massim District of Papua New Guinea, before being donated to the museum by Bernard Armitage (1890-1976), a physician and psychiatrist.
Z 11227
Z 11227
Z 11227
In contrast to the previous item, this lime box (Z 11227) is made of a gourd which has an elongated shape, manipulated to form its concave bottom. However, it displays a similarly plain exterior. It is from the Solomon Islands and was given to the museum by Baron Von Hügel in 1884; an explorer who was travelling in the Pacific between 1874 and 1877. What is especially intriguing about this object is the semi-human, semi-animal figure featured on the handle of its wooden stopper. This figure can be seen crouching on all fours, wearing a necklace of red and white glass beads around its neck. It is also wearing what appears to be a top hat, arguably depicting a Pacific representation of a European.
Z 1283
Z 1283
This gourd object (Z 1283) was collected by A.C. Haddon during his Torres Strait Expedition in 1898. It is from the Trobriand Islands. Unlike the previous items, its exterior features simple burnt designs. Where there is now a hole in the top of the item, a stopper would once have been placed in order to create a secure container for the lime powder it stored. It is worth drawing your attention to the damage which can be seen on the bottom of this vessel. This damage has created access to the interior material of the gourd, which can then be exploited for the sampling purposes I mentioned in my previous blog post. This minimises any risk of damaging a part of the object which is still intact.
I hope that you have enjoyed reading about these Pacific gourd containers. My next blog post will focus on MAA’s collection of Hawaiian gourds, a taster of which can be seen below!
Emily Wilkes
Z 6114
Posted on March 7, 2014 in West Papua
Dr Elizabeth Blake has been working as an affiliated researcher on the project, using her expertise on sound and music in archaeological contexts to shed light on the anthropological collections made by A F R Wollaston in Dutch New Guinea (present day West Papua). Her research will culminate in a small exhibition at MAA next year, but in the meantime she has catalogued some of Wollaston’s photographs and created this photo essay which gives a fascinating insight into his encounters with the local people and the landscape.
On 23 June 1912 Alexander F.R. Wollaston was in Singapore making final arrangements for the second British Ornithologists’ expedition to Dutch New Guinea (West Papua). Their goal was to reach the glaciers of Mount Carstensz by navigating up and along the Utakwa River, collecting plant and animal specimens and documenting their encounters with people. With great anticipation, on 16 September 1912 Wollaston and his colleagues, together with a sizable team including seventy-four Dayaks recruited from Borneo, arrived near the mouth of the Utakwa on a ‘beastly’ boat called the Valk. Over the course of six months, their journey to the ‘Snow Mountains’ was filled with a wealth of experiences, through which they assembled a panoply of socially significant objects from the Papuans they met in the coastal and mountain areas. Wollaston’s album from this expedition is here at the MAA and has recently been digitised as part of the Pacific Presences project. The album, containing 90 photographs, can be viewed alongside his accounts of their journey in the ‘Letters and Diaries of A. F. R. Wollaston (Wollaston, 1933). These images captured the striking beauty of both the landscapes that they travelled through and the people that they met along the way.
To see details of the recent publication, Letters and Diaries F R Wollaston, click here
Mr Alexander F.R. Wollaston
Mr C. Boden Kloss
Lieutenant A. Van de Water
![The S.S. Valk anchored in the Utakwa (Wollaston 1933: 122) “September 16. Anchored about 8 miles south of the Utakwa…got off only to find 14 feet [of water] and the tide falling rapidly. Had to go back again for the rest of the day and thought it was a great pity to waste time like this, but was somewhat rewarded by a fine view of the snows of Carstensz at sunset.”](http://pacificpresences-maa.hsps.cam.ac.uk/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/P.126089.WLS_.jpg)
The S.S. Valk anchored in the Utakwa (Wollaston 1933: 122)
“September 16. Anchored about 8 miles south of the Utakwa…got off only to find 14 feet [of water] and the tide falling rapidly. Had to go back again for the rest of the day and thought it was a great pity to waste time like this, but was somewhat rewarded by a fine view of the snows of Carstensz at sunset.”
Base Camp (Wollaston 1933: 123)
“September 19…Busy making camp and clearing ground. Find the Dayaks don’t like the tents we have got for them so they have made houses of their own kind roofed with pandanus. I gave them two days to do it and they have made a very good job of it. They are really very jolly fellows and I like them immensely—and I think they like me which is all to the good.”
Visitors arriving at Base Camp
Up the Utakwa in Dayak canoes
The ‘Canoe Camp’ (Wollaston 1933: 135)
“December 14-18. Up the river again and spent three days at No. 3 Camp, building ourselves a house of palm leaves and generally making camp good. Afterwards left this camp and made our way towards the mountains. We took with us two or three hill Papuans and they were very useful in showing us a track. Made good progress.”
Cooking outside of a house in the mountains (Wollaston 1933: 137)
“December 21…It was the first native house we had seen, for all those we have hitherto seen had been merely wayside shelters—not permanent houses. This one, typical of those seen afterwards, was built on piles about 6 feet from the ground and about 10 feet square; entrance by sloping planks or logs to an outside platform leading to a square room, in the middle of which there was a fireplace. Outside the house were a number of men, women and children, mostly occupied in preparing a very savour-smelling feast of sweet potatoes, yams and pig flesh.”
Greetings and gifts (Wollaston 1933:138-139)
“December 22…Following the ridge and passing a sort of rude fence across the path, we found ourselves on a levelled platform about the size of a lawn tennis court; ground quite hard and dry. Here were about sixty or seventy people of all ages and sizes, who set up the most extraordinary barking when we appeared, dancing and prancing and waving their bow and arrows.
Some came and shook hands, or rather pulled knuckles with us. You hold out the bent knuckle of your middle right finger, while the other person grips it between the bent first and second fingers of his right hand; then you both pull until your hand comes away and the other one’s two knuckles come together with a click. This was repeated three or four times, accompanied by a ‘Wah’ or other ejaculation. We were then told to stand with our party at one end of the platform while all the natives belonging to the place stood at the other. A man, a sort of boss among them, ordered silence, and then began a long harangue. In one hand he held a rough iron axe, in the other two white leaves, and towards the end of his speech a lean white pig was brought in from the back of the crowd and I was instructed to go forward and receive it, which I did…We gave them a small present, and then were told that we might proceed through the country of these mountain natives.”
A hot sulphur spring at 6,000 feet (Wollaston 1933: 142)
“January 24…They talked a great deal about ‘piu’, i.e. salt and asked us to go with them to see the ‘salt place’. We went, and after going through a great deal of bush came, not to a deposit of salt as we had expected, but to a warm sulphur spring; milky white water, gently steaming, 94 F…The man and woman with us took stems of the long grass that grows near the pool and proceeded to suck up the water as through straws. They drank a great deal and appeared to like it, but we tasted the stuff and found it very nasty.”
Camp No. 11, 8,000 feet (Wollaston 1933: 143)
“January 27. To-day we started by wading through very cold streams, then went steeply uphill where the character of the country changed rapidly. River widened, trees became smaller and less dense. Casuarinas and coniferous-looking trees, flowers much more numerous: orchids, a sort of meadowsweet, a rose-like bush and many others…Camped beside a boulder in the middle of the river bed; not a safe place if it rained heavily but fortunately it did not.”
Disappointment at 14,866 feet…(Wollaston 1933: 146-147)
“February 1…There is apparently no easy snow way up to the ridge from here. If we had been three men accustomed to ice we could have gone up, but it was not to be thought of…Nothing for it but to turn back…By getting to the snow we have accomplished nothing of any value whatever, whereas if we had gone a few hundred feet higher and had seen beyond, what might we not have seen? Further and further ridges? This prize was withheld—and nobody knows.”
The snow and ice of Mount Carstensz
Drums from the coast
Sago bowls
Wooden and stone clubs
Carved ceremonial ‘tablets’