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Encyclopedia Britannica - Main :: PAI-PAS |
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PAPUANS (Malay pap4wah or puwah-puwah, " frizzled," " woolly-haired," in reference to their characteristic hair-dressing) , the name given to the people of New Guinea and the other islands of Melanesia. The pure Papuan seems to be confined to the north-western part of New Guinea, and possibly the interior. But Papuans of mixed blood are found throughout the island (unless the Karons be of Negrito stock), and from Flores in the west to Fiji in the east. The ethnological affinities of the Papuans have not been satisfactorily settled. Physically they are negroid in type, and while tribes allied to the Papuans have been traced through Timor, Flores and the highlands of the Malay Peninsula to the Deccan of India, these"` Oriental negroes," as they have been called, have many curious resemblances with some East African tribes. Besides the appearance of the hair, the raised cicatrices, the belief in omens and sorcery, the practices for testing the courage of youths, &c., they are equally rude, merry and boisterous, but amenable to discipline, and with decided artistic tastes and faculty. Several of the above practices are common to the Australians, who, though generally inferior, have many points of resemblance (osteological and other) with Papuans, to whom the extinct Tasmanians were still more closely allied. It may be that from an indigenous Negrito stock of the Indian archipelago both negroes and Papuans sprang, and that the latter are an original cross between the Negrito and the immigrating Caucasian who passed eastward to found the great. Polynesian race). The typical Papuan is distinctly tall, far exceeding the average Malay height, and is seldom shorter, often taller, than the European. He is strongly built, somewhat "spur-heeled." He varies in colour from a sooty-brown to a black, little less intense than that of the darkest negro. He has a small dolichocephalous head, prominent nose somewhat curved and high but depressed at the tip, high narrow forehead with projecting brows, oval face and dark eyes. The jaw projects and the lips are full. His hair is black and frizzly, worn generally in a mop, often of large dimensions, but sometimes worked into plaits with grease or mud. On some islands the men collect their hair into small bunches, and carefully bind each bunch round with fine vegetable fibre from the roots up to within about two inches from the end. Dr Turner2 gives a good description of this process. He once counted the bunches on a young man's head, and found nearly seven hundred. There is usually little hair on the face, but chest, legs and fore-arms are generally hirsute, the hair short and crisp. The constitution of society is everywhere simple. The t Huxley believed that the Papuans were more closely allied to the negroes of Africa than any other race. Later scientists have endeavoured to identify the Papuans with the Negritos of the Philippines and the Semangs of the Malay Peninsula. Alfred Russel Wallace pronounced against this hypothesis in an appendix to his Malay Archipelago (1883 ed., p. 6oz), where he observes that " the black, woolly-haired races of the Philippines and the Malay Peninsula . . . have little affinity or resemblance to the Papuans. Malay Dr A. B. Meyer, who spent several years in the Malay Archipelago and New Guinea, developed a contrary conclusion in his Die Negritos der Philippinen (1878), holding that the Negritos and Papuans are identical, and that possibly, or even probably, the former are an offshoot of the latter, like some other Polynesian islanders. A. C. Haddon, discussing, in Nature (September 1899), a later paper by Dr Meyer in English on the same subject (The Distribution of the Negritos, Dresden, 1899), practically adopted Meyer's views, after an independent examination of numerous skulls. As to how the Papuans, who are the aborigines of New Guinea, may have peopled other and much more distant islands, information is lacking. 2 Nineteen Years in Polynesia, pp. 77, 78. 742 people live in village
village
and planting the soil. In western New Guinea, according to the Dutch missionaries, there is a vague notion of a universal spirit, practically represented Spirit- by several malevolent powers, as Manoin, the most worship . powerful, who resides in the woods; Narwoje, in theclouds, above the trees, a sort of Erl-Konig who carries off children; Faknik, in the rocks by the sea, who raises storms. As a protection against these the people constructhaving first with much ceremony chosen a tree for the purposecertain 'rude images called karwars, each representing a recently dead pro-genitor, whose spirit is then invoked to occupy the image and protect them against their enemies and give success to their undertakings. The karwar is about a foot high, with head disproportionately large; the male figures are sometimes represented with a spear and shield, the female holding a snake. They observe omens, have magicians and rain-makers, and sometimes resort to ordeal to discover a crime. Temples (so called) are found in the north and west, built like the houses, but larger, the piles being carved into figures, and the roof-beams and other prominent points decorated with representations of crocodiles or lizards, coarse human figures, and other grotesque ornamentation; but their use is not clear. Neither temples nor images (except small figures worn as amulets) occur among the people of the south-east; but they have a great dread of departed spirits, especially those of the hostile inland tribes, and of a being called Vata, who causes disease and death. All Papuans believe that within them resides an invisible other self, or spirit, which may occasionally leave the body in the hours of sleep and after death hovers for some period at least round the scenes of its embodied life. This ghost acquires supernatural powers, which at any time it may return to exercise inimically to relations or acquaintances who offend it. In the dark, and in the depths of forests or mountains, malevolentnever embodiedspirits love to be abroad. These are the spirits which, taking up their abode in a village, cause disease and death ; and to escape from such attacks the inhabitants may fly the village for good, and, by dwelling scattered in the recesses of the forest for a time before choosing a new site, they hope to throw their enemy off their trail. Spirits of evil, but not of good, therefore require to be propitiated. The powers of naturethunder, lightning and storm, all supposed to be caused by evil and angry spiritsare held in the greatest dread. Under the category of religious observances may perhaps come those held previously to the departure of the great trading or lakatoi fleet: their taboo-proclaiming customs, their ceremonial and sacred initiation ceremonies for boys and girls on reaching puberty, when masks are worn and the " bull-roarer " swung, as also the harvest festivals, at which great trophies of the produce of field and forest are erected, preparatory to a big feast enlivened with music and dancing. In the north and north-east of New Guinea ancestor- worship is widely practised. Amulets are worn to ensure success in buying, selling, hunting, fishing and in war, as well as for protection against evil. Circumcision is practised in some regions. Although some of the coast peoples are nominally Mahommedans, and some few converts to Christianity have been made, the vast majority of Papuans remain pagan
The deall are disposed of in various ways. The spirit is supposed not to leave the body immediately, and a corpse is either buried for a time, and then disinterred and the bones cleaned and deposited in or near the deceased's dwelling or in some distant cave; or the body is exposed on a platform or dried over a fire, and the mummy kept for a few years. Sometimes the head, oftener the jaw-boneand portions of the skeleton are preserved as relics. Little houses are frequently erected over the grave as a habitation for the spirit. Soon after death food is offered to the departedwith an infant a calabash of its mother's milkand that he may have no wants, his earthly possessions, after being broken, are laid near his resting-place. A path through the jungle from the grave to the sea is often made so that the spirit may bathe. A widow must shave her head, smear her body with black and the exudations of the corpse, and wear mourning for a long time. The dead are referred to by some roundabout phrase, never by name, for this might have the dangerous result of bringing back the spirit. These dwell chiefly in the moon, and are particularly active at full moon. The houses which they haunt, and beneath or near which their bodies are buried, are deserted from time to time, especially by a newly-married couple or by women before child-birth. Yams, taro and sweet potatoes constitute in some districts the main food of the people, while in others sago is the staple diet. Forest fruits and vegetables are also eaten. Maize Food. and ricewhich are not indigenousare eagerly sought after. The Papuan varies his vegetable diet with the flesh of the wild pig, wallabi and other small animals, which are hunted with dogs. Birds are snared or limed. Fish abound at many parts of the coast, and are taken by lines, or speared at night by torch-light, or netted, or a river is dammed and the fish stupefied with the root of a milletia. Turtle and dugong are caught. The kima, a great mussel weighing (without shell) 20 to 30 lb, and other shell-fish, are eaten, as are also dogs, flying foxes, lizards, beetles and all kinds of insects. Food is cooked in various ways. Cooking-pots, made at various parts of the coast, form one of the great exchanges for sago; but where such vessels do not reach, food is cooked by the women on the embers, done up in leaves, or in holes in the ground over heated stones. The sexes eat apart. In the interior salt is difficult to get, and sea-water, which is carried inland in hollow bamboos, is used in cooking in place of it. Salt, too, is obtained from the ashes of wood saturated by sea-water. In the Fly River region, kava, prepared from Piper methysticum, is drunk without any of the ceremonial importance associated with it in Polynesia. As a rule the Papuans have no intoxicating drink and do not know the art of fermenting palm-sap or cane-juice. Tobacco is indigenous in some parts, and is smoked everywhere, except on the north-east coast and on the islands, where its use is quite unknown. In some few districts a species of clay is eaten. The male Papuan is usually naked save for a loin-cloth made of the bark of the Hibiscus, Broussonetia and other plants, or a girdle of leaves. In the more civilized parts cotton
flowers
tattoo
The Papuans build excellent canoes and other boats, and in some districts there are professional boat-builders of great skill, the best craft coming from East Cape and the Louisiades. These goat-boats are either plain dug-outs, with or without out- building. riggers, or regularly built by planks tightly laced and well caulked to an' excavated keel. The most remarkable of their vessels is the " lakatoi," composed of several capacious dug-outs, each nearly 50 ft. long, which are strongly lashed together to a width of some 24 ft., decked and fitted with two masts, each carrying a huge mat sail picturesquely fashioned. On the deck high crates are built for the reception of some thousands of pieces of pottery for conveyance annually to the Fly River district to exchange for sago. Papuans are very fond of music, using Pan-pipes, a Jew's harp of the Papuans' own fabrication, and the flute; on occasions Music. of ceremony the drum only is usedthis instrument being always open at one end and tapped by the fingers. To the accompaniment of the drum, dancingas a rhythmic but stationary movement
of the feet or an evolutionary Marchalmost invariably goes, but rarely singing. All sorts of jingling sounds also are music to the ear, especially the clattering in time of strings of beans in their dry shells, and so these and other rattles are found attached to the drum, leg-bands and many of the utensils, implements and weapons. Nearly all Papuan houses are built in Malay fashion on piles, and this not only on the coast but on the hillsides. In the north, the muses. east and south-west of the island immense communal houses (morong) are met with. Some of these are between 50o and 700 ft. in length, with a rounded, boat-shaped roof thatched with palm-branches, and looking inside, when undivided, like dark tunnels. In some districts the natives live together in one of these giant structures, which are divided into compartments. Communal dwellings on a much smaller scale occur at Meroka, east of the Astrolabe mountains. As a rule elsewhere each family has its independent dwelling. On the north coast the houses are not built on piles; the walls, of bamboo or palm branches, are very low, and the projecting roof nearly reaches the ground; a barrier at the entrance keeps out pigs and dogs. A sort of table or bench stands outside, used by the men only, for meals and for the subsequent siesta. In east New Guinea sometimes the houses are two-storeyed, the lower part being used for stores. The ordinary house is 6o to 7o ft. long with a passage down the centre, and stands on a platform or veranda raised on piles, with the ridge
on trees commanding its approaches. The dobbos," or tree- in ancient times widely cultivated in the Delta of Egypt, where houses, built in high trees, are more or less peculiar to British New it was used for various purposes, and especially as a writing Guinea. On the north-east coast many of the villages are tastefully I material. The plant is now extinct in Lower Egypt, but is kept, their whole area being clean swept, nicely sanded, and planted found in the Upper Nile regions and in Abyssinia. Theo-with ornamental shrubs, and have in their centre little square palaver places laid with flat stones, each with an erect stone pillar i phrastus (Hist. plant. iv. 10) states that it likewise grew in as a back-rest. Excellent suspension bridges span some of the Syria; and, according to Pliny, it was also a native plant of the larger rivers, made of interlaced rattan ropes secured to trees on Niger and Euphrates. Its Greek title aarrvpos, Lat. papyrus, opposite banks, so very similar to those seen in Sumatra as to suggest appears to be of Egyptian origin. By Herodotus it is always called (OX es. The first accurate description of the plant is given by Theophrastus, from whom we learn that it grew in shallows of 2 cubits (about 3 ft.) or less, its main root being of the thickness of a man's wrist and to cubits in length. From this root, which lay horizontally, smaller roots pushed down into the mud, and the stern of the plant sprang up to the height of 4 cubits, being triangular and tapering in form. The tufted head or umbel is likened by Pliny to a thyrsus. The various uses to which the papyrus plant was applied are also enumerated by Theophrastus. Of the head nothing could be made but garlands for the shrines of the gods; but the wood of the root was employed in the manufacture of different utensils as well as for fuel. Of the stem of the plant were made boats, sails, mats, cloth, cords, and, above all, writing materials. Its pith was also a common article of food, and was eaten both cooked and in its natural state. Herodotus, too, notices its consumption as food (ii. 92), and incidentally mentions that it provided the material of which the priests' sandals were made (ii. 37). He likewise refers to the use of byblus as tow for caulking the seams of ships; and the statement of Theophrastus that King Antigonus made the rigging of his fleet of the same material is illustrated by the ship's cable, SirXov 13v(3Xwov, wherewith the doors were fastened when Ulysses slew the suitors in his hall
languages. Consonants are freely used, some of the consonantal sounds being difficult to represent by Roman characters. Many of the syllables are closed. There does not appear to be any difference between the definite and the indefinite article, except in Fiji. Nouns are divided into two classes, one of which takes a pronominal suffix, while the other never takes such a suffix. The principle of this division appears to be a near or remote connexion between the possessor and the thing possessed. Those things which belong to a person, as the parts of his body, &c., take the pronominal suffix; a thing possessed merely for use would not take it. Thus, in Fijian the word luve means either a son or a daughterone s own child, and it takes the possessive pronoun suffixed, as luvena; but the word ngone, a child, but not necessarily one's own child, takes the possessive pronoun before it, as none ngone, his child, i.e. his to look after or bring up. Gender is only sexual. Many words are used indiscriminately, as nouns, adjectives or verbs, without change; but sometimes a noun is indicated by its termination. In most of the languages there are no changes in nouns to form the plural, but an added numeral indicates number. Case is shown by particles, which precede the nouns. Adjectives follow their substantives. Pronouns are numerous, and the personal pronoun includes four numberssingular, dual, trinal and general plural, also inclusive and exclusive. Almost any word may be made into a verb by using with it a verbal particle. The difference in the verbal particles in the different languages is very great. In the verbs there are causative, intensive or frequentative, and reciprocal forms. See R. H. Codrington, The Melanesians (1891), Melanesian Languages (1885); B. Hagen, Unter den Papuas (Wiesbaden, 1899); G. von der Gabelentz and A. B. Meyer, Beitrage zur Kenntniss der melanesischen, &c., Sprachen ( Leipzig
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