The Mafulu: Mountain People of British New Guinea. Robert Wood Williamson
made and worn by both men and women. The belt is made out of a hank of loose separate strands between 4 and 5 feet long, tied together with string or bark cloth at two opposite points, so as to form a belt of between 2 feet and 2 feet 6 inches in length. For better description I would liken it to a skein of wool, as it looks when held on the hands of one person for the purpose of being wound off into a ball by someone else, but which, instead of being wound off, is tied up at the two points where it passes round the hands of the holder, and is then pulled out into a straight line of double the original number of strands, and so forms a single many-stranded belt of 2 feet or more in length. It is fastened round the waist with a piece of bark cloth attached to one of the points where the hank has been tied up.6
The number of strands is considerable. Belts examined by me and counted gave numbers varying from eighteen to thirty-five, and the number of strands of the belt round the body would be double that. Each strand is made of three parts plaited together, and is one-eighth of an inch or less in width. Various materials, including all the materials used for armlets (see below), are employed for making these belts, some for one and some for another. Sometimes a belt has its strands all plaited out of one material only, in which case the belt will be all of one colour. Sometimes its strands are plaited out of two different coloured materials. There is no colouring of the belt, except that of its strands.
Belt No. 1, as worn, is seen in Plates 9 and 11. Belt No. 3 is worn by the man at the extreme right in Plate 16. It is worn by many of the women figured in the plates, and several of them have two belts. One of the women figured in Plates 18 and 19 has three of them. Belt No. 4 is worn by one of the men figured in Plates 7 and 8 (he has three of them). Belt No. 7 is worn by one or two of the women figured in the frontispiece, the one to the extreme right having a many-stranded belt, and it is excellently illustrated in Plate 17.
Capes made of bark cloth are made and worn by men and women. They are only put on after recovery from an illness by which the wearer has been laid up, including childbirth. The cape is simply a plain long narrow piece of undyed bark cloth. The corners of one end are fastened together, and the whole of that end is bunched up into a sort of hood, which is placed over the head, whilst the rest of the cloth hangs down as a narrow strip behind. The cape in no way covers or conceals any part of the body when viewed from the front or side. It is only worn for a few days; but whilst wearing it the wearer discards all, or nearly all, his or her ornaments. I could learn no reason for the custom. Plates 18 and 19 show these capes, and the way in which they are worn.
Mourning strings (Plate 30, Fig. 1) are made and worn by both men and women. These are plain undecorated necklaces varying much in size and appearance; sometimes they are made of undyed twisted bark cloth, and vary in thickness from one-sixteenth of an inch to an inch; sometimes they are only made of string, and are quite thin. There is always an end or tassel to the necklace, made out of the extremities of the neck part, and hanging in front over the chest; and, if the necklace is of string, and not of bark cloth, some bark cloth is twisted round this tassel. This sign of grief is after a death worn by the widow or widower or other nearest relative (male or female) of the deceased; and at times two people of equal degree of relationship will both wear it. It is worn until the formal ending of the mourning. The woman to the extreme right in Plate 26 is wearing one of these.
Widows’ vests. These are mourning garments, only worn by the widows of chiefs. The garment, which is made by women, is a vest made of string network (like a string bag), the mesh of which is the special Mafulu mesh, which will be described hereafter, and it is not coloured. It is plainly and simply made, with openings at the top for the neck, and at the sides for the arms (no sleeves), and coming down to about the waist, without any other opening either in front or at the back. This garment is also worn until the formal end of the period of mourning.7 I was unable to secure a picture of one of these.
There is no special dress for chiefs to distinguish them from other people.
European calico clothing has not been adopted by these people, even in the district where they are in touch with the missionaries. Indeed I may say that the people, happily for their own health, show no inclination to wear more clothing; and no doubt as a result of their conservatism in this respect they escape many a fatal cold and attack of pneumonia, and the spread of infectious skin diseases is somewhat reduced. I may also add that the Bishop and Fathers of the Mission do not attempt, or seem to desire, to urge the people who come under their influence to endanger their health and their lives for the sake of conforming to views as to clothing which have played such havoc with tropical natives in many parts of the globe.8
Physical Body Decoration, &c.
Tattooing and body-scarring are not practised by either men or women among the Mafulu.
Depilation. When a young man’s beard begins to grow, the hairs of the beard and moustache and eye-brows are extracted. No other depilation is practised by men, and none whatever by women; and none of them shave any part of the body. The depilation is effected with two fibre threads twisted round each other, the hair to be extracted being inserted between the threads. Anyone can do this, and there is no ceremony connected with it.
Nose-piercing. The septa of the noses of both men and women are pierced at or after the age of 15 or 18, and either before or after marriage. This is done for men by men, and for women by women. There is no special person whose duty it is to do it, but he or she must be one who knows the incantations which are required. There is no restriction as to diet or otherwise placed upon the operator prior to the operation, but there is a day’s food restriction imposed upon the person whose nose is to be pierced.
Two instruments are used for the operation, one being a piercing instrument made of pig bone and sharpened, and the other being a small wooden plug, also sharpened. The operator first visibly, but silently, engages in two incantations, during the former of which he holds up the thumb and first finger of his right hand, and during the latter of which he holds up the two instruments. He then with the thumb and first finger of his right hand holds the septum of the nose of the person to be operated upon, whom I will call the “patient,” and with the left hand pierces the septum with the bone instrument. He next inserts the wooden plug into the hole, so as to make it larger, and leaves the plug there. Then he takes a blade of grass, which he also inserts through the hole, by the side of the plug, and, holding the grass by the two ends, he makes it rotate round and round the plug. This is a painful process, which frequently causes tears and cries from the patient. He then probably goes through the same process with various other patients, as it is the custom to operate on several persons at the same time.
The patients are then all lodged in houses built for the purpose, one house being for men and one for women. These are not houses which are kept permanently standing, but are specially built on each occasion on which the nose-boring operation is going to be performed. A great swelling of the patients’ noses develops, and this spreads more or less over their faces. The patients are confined in the special houses until the holes in their noses are large enough and the wounds are healed. During this confinement each patient has himself to do what is requisite to further enlarge the hole by the insertion into it from time to time of pieces of wood and by putting in rolled up leaves and pushing pieces of wood inside these leaves. During all this period he is not allowed to come out of the house, at all events not so as to be seen, and his diet is confined to sweet potato, cooked in a certain way. The cooking for all the patients, men and women, is done by the woman nose-piercing operator, assisted by other women. The potatoes are wrapped up in leaves (usually banana), each potato being generally wrapped up separately in one or more leaves; and, when so wrapped up, they are cooked in red-hot ashes, and then taken to the houses where the patients are.
When the hole in any patient’s nose has reached the requisite size, and the wound is healed, he inserts a large croton leaf9 into the hole; he may then come out and return to his own house, retaining the croton leaf in his nose. He must next occupy himself in searching for a black non-poisonous snake about 12 or 18 inches long, which is commonly found in the grass. I cannot say what snake this is, but I am advised that it is probably Tropidonotus mairii.