New Guinea
RIGO DISTRICT
DISPLAY CASE 1
“In Port Moresby I bought a small cutter…I set sail on July 3rd and on the morning of the following day I reached the village of Capa Capa, staying for two weeks in the home of the government agent, called Rigo station by the English…Here I dedicated myself to the collection of zoological and anthropological material and ethnographic research, making an inland visit as well…”
1. Wooden shield
Coating of woven rotang strips
2-3. “Mancatcher”
Rotang, wood and strips of palm leaves
The wooden rod was made to slide until the tip was stuck in the nape of the enemy’s neck
4. “Net for self-defense against boars”
Rotang and pandano leaf fiber
DISPLAY CASE 2
5. Spears
Palm wood
6. Wooden shield
Wooden shield with covering of woven rotang strips and parrot feather ornaments
7. Palm wood bows and bamboo arrows
The wooden tip is blackened with carbonblack
DISPLAY CASE 3
8. “Cuscus skin pendant hung by men on the hair at the nape of the neck”
The cuscus is a small nocturnal marsupial
9. Loincloth
Strips of painted barkcloth
10. “Hornbill beaks worn by warriors who killed the enemy in warfare”
11. Shell nose ornament (tridacna)
12. Necklace or tiara
Kangaroo teeth
13. Polished stone axes
14. Combat clubs
Discoid stone head
DISPLAY CASE 4
15. Skirt “worn by women in mourning”
Strips of banana and pandano leaves
16. Combs “worn on the head during the dance”
Wood, plant fiber and tufts of birds-of-paradise feathers. Some decorated with hair and bird feathers
17. Necklace with shell discs (monetaria moneta)
Small sea snail, used as currency by the population
18. Necklace “worn by women in mourning”
Seeds of coix lacrimae
19. Shell bracelets and pendants (conus litteratus)
20. Conical double bottom drum with monitor skin membrane
The surface of the wood is blackened
21. Necklace
Rotang
22. Cassowary feather tiara
The cassowary is a large, flightless bird, similar to an ostrich
HULA
DISPLAY CASE 5
The villagers of Hula near Hood Point “live by fishing, in which they are great experts. They make ingenious and robust nets and twist the fibers of dry leaves to make ropes. I bought several of them, of various shapes for small fish, turtles and dugong [marine mammals similar to seals]…The audacity of the fisherman in facing the sea in any weather is admirable…and the return of a group that has caught a good number of turtles is beautiful and dramatic. The fishermen announce the happy news from afar with a long howl, similar to the hoarse sound of a steamboat engine. The women run straight away to the verandas of the houses in celebration, and wave the straw of their skirts, accompanying the men’s singing and the strokes of the paddles that push the canoes onto the shore.”
1. Trammel net
Pandano fiber with shell weights and leaf strip bobs
2. Model canoe
Blackened wood and small strips of pandano leaves
3. Bailer for emptying water from canoes
Palm leaves
4. Fishing ne
Reed and pandano fiber
5. “Net for boar and cassowary hunting”
6. Harpoons
Spiral pyrography on the shaft
DISPLAY CASE 6
7. Wicker
Strips of palm leaves
8. Musikaka “ordinarily worn around the neck hanging down the back, but during combat held between the teeth to frighten the enemy”
Turtle, seeds, boar tusks and shell
9. Loincloth “worn by young men in a state of manhood around the waist and between the legs”
Strips of barkcloth
10. Necklace or tiara “worn by men”
Kangaroo teeth
11. Pendants of shell and fruit rinds
12. Ornament “worn by women in mourning”
Seeds of coix lacrimae
13. Bracelets of pandano fibre
One with inserts of coix lacrimae seeds
14. Bracelet
Rotang
15. Ladles
Coconut and wooden handle
16. Containers
Coconut
17. Stone axes with handles
Binding of rotang strips
18. Rope spool and rope sample
KALO
DISPLAY CASE 7
From the coastal villages of Hood Point “I went a little inland and visited Kalo, one of the richest and most important villages in this part of New Guinea…with a population of 700 to 800 souls. It lies on the right bank of the Kemps Weltch, a large and beautiful river that makes the land fertile and fruitful. Therefore the inhabitants are dedicated to agriculture and neglect fishing.”
1. Skirt “worn by women in mourning
2. Irupa, ornaments that represent a pig’s tail
Pandano fiber
3. Monitor skin
“It shows how the pagans take care, after having skinned the animal, to stuff the skin so that it dries properly”
4. “Long wooden club”
5. Conical double bottom drum
Monitor skin membrane and fruit rind rattles
6. Tobacco wrapped in leaves
The dances
“The extraordinary abundance of products from the land allows the inhabitants of Kalo, divided into two parts, to annually exchange with each other festive kindnesses and many receptions which take place in the month of August. I reserved the right to stay…and obtained the assent of the natives, to whom I promised a splendid gift of two long pieces of red cloth and 103 sticks of tobacco.”
During a strange dance called the pala, each man waves a sort of drum, which they call capa, on which seeds are hung, and they accompany the tinkling of the seeds with a song. Aside from their lesser agility, women cannot sing in unison with the men, whose voices are softer and less shrill, nor would they know how to handle the drum with equal skill.”
In a dance called the hirupi, in connection with the ceremonial killing of pigs “only the maidens take part…In the dance the girls hold an old sack tied with a small net behind their skirts and make it beat and rub on the ground. This movement of the sack imitates the wagging of the dying pig’s tail.”
KEREPUNU (non attivo)
KEREMPU
DISPLAY CASE 8
“At this point there was nothing keeping me in Kalo and on foot I reached Kerepunu , where the cutter had preceded me… The people of Kerepunu go to Kalo to trade fish that they bring ready cooked on palm leaves, for bananas, yams, taro, sugar cane and coconuts. The natives of Kerepunu are specialized in canoes, which they build and then sell, using for this purpose a special stone hatchet that easily converts into an axe. As a hatchet it is used for smoothing and rounding tree trunks, as an axe for hollowing them out. I bought several…”
1. Stone axes with handles
2. Chisels
Cassowary bone
3. Wooden drills with flint or iron tips
Used for boring holes in shells
4. Container
Coconut decorated with fruit rinds
5. Container and ladle
Woods and coconut with wooden handle
6. Conical double bottom drum
Monitor skin membrane and remains of fruit rind rattles
7. Wooden ladle for sagù
Sagù is a starch extracted from the core of various palm species, a staple food for the population
AROMA, IGIBIREI, BUJAKORI
DISPLAY CASE 9
“From Kerepunu I went to the Gulf of Aroma…which includes 13 villages with a population of about 3000 inhabitants…In Aroma we notice that we are nearing the east of New Guinea: the objects of ornament change, those of mourning, and works of carving appear.”
1. Skirt “worn by women during dances”
Strips of banana leaves and filaments of sagu palm leaves dyed red
2. Ornament of coix lacrymae seeds, “worn around the forehead during mourning”
Band with a fringe of threads
3. Bracelets “worn during mourning”
Rotang and coix lacrymae seeds
4. Wooden club
Used for beating bark
5. Head ornaments “worn during mourning”
Rotang and coix lacrymae seeds
6. Stone axes with handles
Rotang binding
Gulf of Aroma, Igibirei, Bujakori
7. Clubs with disc-shaped heads
Stone and feather ornaments
Igibirei
FARM BAY
DISPLAY CASE 10
“From Aroma I went to Samarai, stopping for one day in Farm Bay… I learned that the bay was in great commotion because the inhabitants of two villages, Pululù and Vadabù were in a dispute over the ownership of a pig. Venas, the leader of the village of Vadabù, and Vadacuaja, the leader of Pululù, had both been killed. On September 26th Venas’ widow hung herself in grief. This happened between the 24th and the 26th of September, the eve of my arrival.”
1. Avimorphic ornaments
They decorated the top of the huts’ roofs
2. Wooden club
3. Spatulas for tapping lime
Ebony
4. Front plate of pearl oyster shell and valve
Used as a cutting tool
5. Gourd containing lime to chew with betel leaves
6. Ornaments
Bird-of-paradise feathers and cuscus tail tassels
7. Pendants made from discs of spondylus shell
Used in intertribal exchanges
8. Pipes with pyrographic decorations
Bamboo
9. Canoe with balance wheel and balance wheel
Models
LINA BAY
DISPLAY CASE 11
After Cape Nelson “January 1st I put down anchor in a bay that I named after my niece Lina. I immediately went ashore… and left some gifts… I hoped with these to get the natives to welcome me with friendship, but I soon realized that I was deluding myself… In the following days a large group of natives began gathering in the bay, all armed, who danced a warlike dance and got excited with the sound of shells and drums…I went to the village and found the Papuans gathered and the leader clearly signaled to me that he would kill me by bashing my head with a club and then cut it off with his knife…Seeing that internment in that region would have been true madness, I decided to leave: first, however, I went to the village, drove out the inhabitants and made a good harvest of ethnological collections…”
1. Feather tiaras and ornaments
2. Feather tiaras
Bird-of-paradise and cassowary feathers
3. Gourds containing lime to chew with betel leaves
4. Feather tiaras
5. Bone awl
6. Ornament
Plant fiber
7. Shark skin
Used as saw and file
8. Bracelet
Rotang
9. Palm leaf wicker
In which feather tiaras were wrapped
10. Small conical double bottom drum
With missing membrane
11. Cylindrical drum
Rotang bands, with missing membrane
12. Basket
Plant fiber
KILLERTON
DISPLAY CASE 12
At the end of January 1890, before leaving for the Trobriand Islands and Woodlark, Il Loira accomplished a “fruitful expedition” to the island of Killerton near the East Cape.
1. War shield
Painted decorations in relief
2. Shield
Sagù palm bark
3. Wooden paddles
Polychrome decoration
4. War shield
Wood with painted decorations in relief
5. War shield
Painted decorations in relief
DAWSON STRAIT, TROBRIAND, WOODLARK
DISPLAY CASE 13
“In the Dawson Strait and on the Trobriand and Woodlark Islands I made an ethnographic collection that will never be made again…As luck would have it, I visited those coasts and islands a year or two before the discovery of pearls in those seas. When I went back to visit them five years later, I could no longer buy a beautiful betel spatula, or an intricately carved club, or a stone hatchet of any value. Now the natives make their products to sell them to white men, but they don’t construct them of very hard ebony wood and with such care, but of very soft white wood that they dye poorly black…In the old days, a man spent many months of his life making a club, now he does it in a couple of hours.”
1. Combat club
Ebony
2. Ornament for canoe
3. Ebony spatulas for tapping lime for betel
The pattern in relief on the handle is filled with lime
4. Oval war shield
Wood
5. Double bottom drum
Wood and palm leaves
THE CANOE
DISPLAY CASE 14
The inhabitants of the islands maintain a dense network of ceremonial exchanges with the populations of the southeastern coast of New Guinea. Traveling in richly decorated canoes, they circulate prestigious products within very extensive and complex commercial circuits. This explains the great attention given to the construction of the canoes and especially the importance of the two pairs of engraved and colored pieces, lagimu and tabula, which adorn the bow and the stern. These characterize the two ends of the canoe, so much so that they the natives call them its face (lagimu) and its nose (tabula).
1. Boards for canoe (lagimu)
Engraved and painted ornithomorphic and anthropomorphic motifs. The engravings are filled with lime
Dawson Strait
2. Boards for canoe (tabuya)
Engraved motifs
Dawson Strait
3. Boards for canoe (tabuya)
Engraved motifs filled with lime
Dawson Strait
4. Boards for canoe (tabuya)
Models with engraved and painted motifs
Dawson Strait
5. Boards for canoe (tabuya)
Engraved motifs
Dawson Strait
6. Boards for canoe (tabuya)
Engraved motifs filled with lime
Dawson Strait
DISPLAY CASE 15
7. War shield (vayola)
Polychrome decorations
Trobriand Islands
8. Boards for canoe (lagimu)
Models
Dawson Strait, Kitawa Islands, Trobriand and Woodlark Islands
9. Boards for canoe (lagimu)
Engraved motifs
Woodlark Islands, Voborobo village
10. Boards for canoe (lagimu)
Engraved models, with traces of lime
Dawson Strait, Kitawa Island, Woodlark Island
DISPLAY CASE 16
11. Boards for canoe (munkuris)
Decorated with sea eagles. The surface is blackened
Woodlark Island, Voborobo village
12. War shield (vayola)
Polychrome decorations
Trobriand Islands
13. Boards for canoe (munkuris)
Decorated with sea eagles. The surface is blackened
Woodlark Island, Voborobo village
14. Board for canoe shaped like a crocodile head with a crouching bird on top
Model
Woodlark Island, Voborobo village
15. Paddles
Wood with decorations in relief
Woodlark Island, Voborobo village
16. War shield (vayola)
Trobriand Islands