CANNIBALISM
About 1850, when the first details of cannibalism among the Fijians
began to reach England through the missionary reports, there was a good
deal of scepticism. Naval officers who had visited the group had seen
nothing of the practice, which, indeed, seemed incompatible with the
polished and courtly manners of the chiefs who entertained them.[39] But
as soon as the existence of the practice was proved there came a
reaction, and its extent is now as much exaggerated as it was formerly
underestimated. Professor Sayce, for instance, in a book published
within the last few years,[40] has committed himself to the ridiculous
assertion that the Fijians ate their aged relations--an act which would
be regarded by them with a horror at least as great as would be felt by
an European. To eat, even unwittingly, the flesh of your relation,
however distant, or to eat or drink from a vessel used by a man who had
done this, would result, so the Fijians believe, in the loss of all your
teeth.
Except in rare cases, none but the bodies of real or potential enemies
were eaten, and these must have been slain or captured in battle, or
cast away in wrecks "with salt water in their eyes." The bodies of those
who had died naturally were invariably buried, and though there are
instances recorded of the secret desecration of graves for the purposes
of cannibalism, these were very rare, and they excited disgust among the
people themselves.
[Pageheader: THE MORALITY OF CANNIBALISM]
There are various traditions of the origin of cannibalism, but all agree
in saying that it was not introduced from without, and that there was a
time when the practice was unknown. The most plausible ascribes it to
the practice of presenting the human body a sacrifice to the gods as
being the most costly offering that could be made, and that, as all
presentations of food were afterwards eaten, the human sacrifice was
treated in the same way. It is tabu for an inferior to decline food
offered to him by a chief. If a slave cannot eat a cooked yam so
presented to him, he wraps it up and takes it home with him to eat at a
future meal, or if he throws it away, he does it secretly lest he should
give offence to the donor. Thus in 1853 the chief of Somosomo, in reply
to the missionary's remonstrance, said, "We must eat the bodies if
Thakombau gives them to us." This obligation was tenfold stronger when
the gods themselves were the givers.
But whereas in times past cannibalism was confined to ceremonial
sacrifices in celebration of victory, the launching of a chief's canoe
or the lowering of its mast, it increased alarmingly about the end of
the eighteenth century--that is, a few years before the arrival of
Europeans--just as human sacrifice and its attendant cannibalism among
the Aztecs became intolerable just before the Spanish conquest. In the
Fijian mind it was but a step from offering gifts to a god and taking
them to a high chief, and great feasts soon came to be considered
incomplete without a human body to grace the meal. Among a few of the
chiefs there began to grow a vitiated taste for human flesh, though
there were not a few who never overcame their dislike to it.
The moral attitude of Fijians towards cannibalism is as difficult to
understand as our own is difficult to explain. Apart from the fact that
cannibalism must entail homicide, there is no manifest reason for our
horror of the practice, except our reverence and tenderness for the
dead. Most, if not all, of the other carnivora are cannibals, and the
distinction we draw between the flesh of men and the flesh of other
mammalia is purely sentimental. Our other instincts are based upon some
law of Nature whose infraction is visited by Nature's penalties; yet,
so instinctive is the horror of cannibalism in Aryan races that not one
of them has thought of condemning it in its penal code, and cannibalism
has never been illegal in Europe. Some trace of this instinct is
discernible among the Fijians. Human flesh was tabu to women, and the
Mbau women of rank who indulged in it did so in secret. Except in
moments of excitement, the cooked flesh was shared out with elaborate
ceremonial, and eaten only in the privacy of the house. The care with
which the practice was concealed from Europeans, though partly due to
the knowledge that it would excite detestation and contempt, suggests
also some trace of instinctive shame. The tabus and ceremonies
surrounding it clearly indicate its religious origin. The alarming
drum-beat, called _Nderua_, which haunts all who have heard it; the
death-dance (_thimbi_); the presentation of the body to the War-god of
Mbau, and the part played by the priests in Vanualevu and other places;
the eating after decomposition had set in when the slightest taint in
other meat excited disgust; and, lastly, the fear of touching the meat
with the fingers or the lips, and the use of a special fork which was
given a name like a person, are all evidences that the gods had a share
in the rite. Every part of the body had, moreover, its symbolic name,
which was only used in connection with cannibalism. The trunk, which was
eaten first, was called _Na vale ka rusa_ (the house that perishes); the
feet, _Ndua-rua_(one-two). The fiction that bodies intended to be eaten
were popularly called "Long pig" (_Vuaka Mbalavu_) is founded upon a
_vakathivo_, or jocose toast of Tanoa, chief of Mbau, after drinking
kava, in which the object of desire was concealed in a euphemism, such
as _Sese Matairua_! ("spear with two points," _i.e._ the breast of a
virgin).
[Pageheader: AN ACT OF VENGEANCE]
Dr. E. B. Tylor gives six reasons for the practice of
cannibalism--Famine, Revenge or Bravado, Morbid Affection, Magic,
Religion, Habit. Three of these had no application in Fiji. The famines
were transitory, and in Tonga, where cannibalism was occasionally
resorted to from this cause, the practice died as soon as the cause was
removed. Cannibalism from morbid affection, such as Herodotus describes
among the Essedones of Central Asia, was equally unknown, since, as I
have already said, the Fijians had a superstitious horror of eating
their own relations; and as to magic, I do not think that any trace of a
belief that by eating the flesh of a warrior the eater absorbed his
courage can be found. There remain Religion, Revenge or Bravado, and
Habit, which were at the root of the Fijian practice in the order
enumerated. The history of the Aztecs shows how soon ceremonial
cannibalism degenerated into a vicious appetite for human flesh. In the
Fijian wars of the early nineteenth century a portion of every captive
was eaten, and raids were undertaken solely to procure human flesh for
chiefs who had become addicted to cannibalism. But bravado and the
gratification of revenge was the most powerful motive with the bulk of
the people. In Nandronga the liver and the hands of an enemy were
sometimes preserved by smoke in the house of one whose relations he had
slain; and whenever regrets for the dead would wring his heart, the
warrior would take down the bundle from the shelf over the fire-place,
and cook and eat a portion of his enemy to assuage his grief. Thus he
continued to sate his vengeance for one or two years until all was
consumed. In the native mind the poles of triumph and of humiliation are
touched by the man who eats his enemy and the man who is about to be
eaten. Even to-day the grossest Fijian insult is to call a man _Mbakola_
(cannibal meat); the most appalling threat to exclaim, "Were it not for
the government I would eat you!" There was but one higher flight of
vengeance, and that was to cook the body, and leave it in the oven as if
unfit for food. The Rev. Joseph Waterhouse dug up one of these ovens
while gardening at Mbau. The element of vengeance superimposed upon
religion is admirably illustrated in the narrative of John Jackson,[41]
who was an eye-witness of what he relates. The bodies of the slain were
set up in a sitting posture in the bow of the canoe by being trussed
under the knees with a stick as schoolboys play at cockfighting. The
drums kept beating the _nderua_ all the way across the strait, and as
they neared the village a man kept striking the water with a long pole
to apprise the inhabitants of their success, and the warriors danced the
_thimbi_ on the deck. It was usual for the women to troop down to the
water's edge dancing a lascivious dance, and when the bodies were flung
out, to cover them with nameless insults; but in this instance (on the
Vanualevu coast near Male) they were carried to the village square and
set up in a row, with their war-paint still on them, while the whole
population of the village sat down in a wide circle. An old man now
approached the bodies, and, taking a dead hand in his, began talking to
them in a low tone. Why, he asked, had they been so rash? Did they not
feel ashamed to be sitting there exposed to the gaze of so many people?
Gradually becoming intoxicated with his own eloquence and wit, he raised
his voice and delivered the last sentences as loud as he could shout. At
the climax of his peroration he kicked the bodies down, and ran off amid
the plaudits and laughter of the spectators, who now ran in upon the
bodies, and, seizing an arm or a leg, dragged them off through the mire
and over the stones to a temple standing apart in a grove of ironwood
trees. A heap of weather-whitened human bones lay before it, and other
bones were embedded in the fork of shaddock-trees, where they had been
laid many years before. An old priest, with nails two inches long, was
there awaiting them, and stones were ready heating in a fire for the
oven. A number of young girls now surrounded the bodies and danced their
lewd dance, singing a song whose import could be guessed from their
action in touching certain parts with sticks which they held in their
hands. The butcher, armed with a hatchet, some shells and a number of
split bamboos, now got to work. He first made a long deep gash down the
abdomen, and then cut all round the neck down to the bone, and severed
the head by a twist. In cutting through the joints he showed some
knowledge of anatomy, seeing that he used nothing but a split bamboo,
which makes a convenient knife, since it is only necessary to split off
a fresh portion to obtain a sharp edge. The trunk, the hands and the
head were usually thrown away, but on this occasion, the bodies being
but few, all was eaten except the intestines. Banana leaves were heaped
on the hot stones of the oven, the flesh and joints were laid on them,
and the whole covered with earth until the morning. The cooked meat was
then distributed with the ceremonies usual at feasts, and warriors from
a distance, after tasting a small portion, wrapped up the remainder to
take home as a proof of their prowess.
[Pageheader: THE EATING OF A MISSIONARY]
When a chief or a warrior of repute was cooked, portions of the flesh
were sent all over the country. The body of the missionary Baker, killed
at Navatusila (Central Vitilevu) in 1860, was thus treated, almost every
chief in Navosa receiving a portion.[42]
When a body had to be carried inland it was lashed to a pole face
downward in order that it might not double up, the ends of the pole
resting on men's shoulders. In dragging the body up the beach the
following words were chanted in a monotone, followed by shrill yells in
quick succession.
"Yari au malua. Yari au malua.
Oi au na saro ni nomu vanua.
Yi mundokia! Yi mundokia! Yi mundokia Ki Ndama le!
Yi! u-woa-ai-e!"
"Drag me gently. Drag me gently!
I am the champion of thy land.
Give thanks! Give thank!"
etc.
As the practice of cannibalism grew, many refinements of cruelty were
devised for enhancing the gratification of revenge. According to
Seemann,[43] a whole village in Namosi was doomed as a punishment to be
eaten household by household. They obeyed the chief's command to plant a
taro bed, and as soon, as the taro was ripe a household was clubbed, and
the bodies eaten with the vegetables. None knew when his turn would
come, for the house was chosen at the whim of the executioners. One
might be tempted to enlarge upon the horrible suspense in which these
unhappy villagers must have lived, and to wonder why they did not flee
to some distant province, but such sympathy would be wasted. If the
story is true, we may be sure that they went about their daily tasks
without a thought about the club hanging over them, and that the idea of
flight never entered their heads, for the Fijian looks not beyond the
evening of the next day, and certain death within a year or two seemed
no nearer to them than it does to us who pursue our futile little tasks
with Death plucking at our sleeves, having at the most but two decades
to live.
The torture (_vakatotonga_) consisted in the mutilation of the victim
before death. To avenge the of one of his relations, Ra Undreundre of
Rakiraki ordered a woman captured from the offending village to be laid
alive in a wooden trough and dismembered, that none of the blood might
be lost. This was a form of punishment practised in Tonga in ancient
times. In several well-authenticated cases the flesh of a victim has
been cooked and offered him to eat. A Fijian prisoner undergoes these
torments with stoical fatalism, making no attempt at escape or
resistance. In the entertainment of the Somosomo natives at Natewa,
Jackson saw standing by the pile of yams a young girl who was to be
killed and eaten when the ceremony of distribution was over. She showed
no outward sign of distress at her impending fate. At the risk of his
life Jackson caught hold of her and claimed her as his wife, and the
chiefs, more amused than angry at his breach of etiquette, granted his
request.
[Pageheader: THE CANNIBAL FORK]
Neither sex nor age was a defence against the cannibal oven. Aged men
and women as well as children were eaten, though the flesh of young
people between sixteen and twenty was most esteemed. The upper arm, the
thigh and the heart were the greatest delicacies; an ex-cannibal in
Mongondro told me that the upper arm of a boy and girl tasted better
than any other meat. The same man, who had eaten part of the missionary
Baker, said that the flesh of white men was inferior to that of Fijians,
and had a saltish taste. Jackson describes it as being darker in colour,
and the fat yellower than that of the turtle. In the police expedition
to Navosa in 1876, Dr. (now Sir William) McGregor surprised a village,
and found a human leg, hot from the oven, laid out upon banana leaves.
The skin had parted like crackling, disclosing a layer of yellow fat.
When the flesh is kept for several days it is said to emit a
phosphorescent light in the darkness of the hut. The Fijians cannot
understand our feeling about the killing and eating of women and
children. _Moku na katikati_ (club the women and children) is their
principle, and they explain that, since the object of war is to inflict
the maximum of injury upon the enemy, a twofold purpose is served by
killing women--distress to their relations, and the destruction of those
who might breed warriors to avenge them.
The most celebrated cannibals from liking were Tambakauthoro, Tanoa and
Tuiveikoso of Mbau, and Tuikilakila of Somosomo, but the reputation of
these pale beside that of Ra Undreundre of Rakiraki. His victims were
called _Lewe ni mbi_ (contents of the turtle-pond), and his fork had a
name to itself--_Undro-undro_, a word used to designate a small person
carrying a great burden. His son took the missionary to a line of
stones, each of which represented a human being eaten without assistance
by his father since middle-age. They numbered eight hundred and
seventy-two, but a number had then (1849) been removed! The special fork
used exclusively for human flesh points clearly to the religious origin
of the practice, forks being never employed for other kinds of food,
even food presented to a god. There was some quality in human flesh that
made it tabu to touch it with the fingers or the lips. Moreover, the
fork was tabu to every one but its owner, and if it belonged to a high
chief, it had always a name of its own. The genuine forks have now all
been removed from the country, and those offered for sale in the group
are forgeries.[44]
Persons slain in battle were not invariably eaten, for chiefs of high
rank were often spared this indignity, and if a friend of the dead man
happened to be of the victorious party he might intercede to save the
body from the oven. In such cases a truce is called, and the relations
are allowed to come and remove the body for burial. At the funeral the
mourners cut out their thumb nails and fixed them on a spear, which was
preserved in the temple to remind them of the service done to them, and
at the close of the war they made valuable presents to their benefactor
to extinguish the debt.
The abolition of cannibalism cannot possibly have had any results
unfavourable to the race. It was an excrescence upon the religious and
social system, and it might have been swept away without disturbing them
in any way. In its later development, moreover, it was responsible for
raids in which many lives were lost.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 39: It is strange that the only act of cannibalism seen by any
member of the United States Exploring Expedition in 1840 was the eating
of an eye--a part of the body which was nearly always thrown away.]
[Footnote 40: _The Religions of Ancient Egypt and Babylonia_, p. 8.]
[Footnote 41: _Erskine's Voyage_, 1853.]
[Footnote 42: There is a well-worn story that the chief of Mongondro
received a leg from which the Wellington boot had not been removed.
Taking the leather to be the white man's skin, the chief was much
impressed with the toughness of the superior race.]
[Footnote 43: _Mission to Viti._]
[Footnote 44: The Rev. F. Langham was the first to point out the test
for these forgeries. The genuine forks are carefully finished at the
root of the prongs; the forgeries have inequalities and splinters. Mr.
H. Ling Roth has questioned this distinction, but I have never known it
fail in the specimens I have examined.]