RELIGION
Richard Feinberg
Kent State University
Judith Macdonald
University of Waikato
Roger Ivar Lohmann
Trent University
Introduction
To say that ethnographic understanding of the Polynesian outliers is uneven would be an understatement, and no area of ethnographic inquiry for these islands has been more uneven than religion and related phenomena. On Tikopia, thanks to Raymond Firth (1961, 1967a [1940], 1967b, 1970, and assorted journal articles) the subject is documented as thoroughly as for any comparably-sized community anywhere. Torben Monberg and colleagues (Monberg 1966, 1991; Elbert and Monberg 1965; Kuschel 1975, 1989) have recorded Bellonese beliefs, religious rituals, and oral traditions in detail comparable to that extant for Tikopia. By contrast, we know little of pre-Christian religion on the likes of Mele-Fila, Emae, or West Uvea.
For many of the outliers our level of knowledge lies between the two extremes. Significant published documentation exists for Kapingamarangi (Emory 1965), Ontong Java (Hogbin 1930, 1932, 1961 [1934]), Anuta (Feinberg 1995a, 1996a, 1996b, 1998), Takū (Moyle 2007), and West Futuna (Keller and Kuautonga 2007; Keller and Lehman 1991). In addition, religion plays a prominent role in works that focus on other aspects of cultural life: Anutan and Nukumanu medicine (Feinberg 1979, 1990), Takū music (Moyle 2007), and Ontong Javanese, Anutan, or Nukumanu social structure (e.g., Hogbin 1931; Feinberg 2004, 2009). In addition, Feinberg’s as-yet unpublished 2007-08 ethnographic research on Taumako delved into matters of religion, both contemporary and late pre-Christian.
Comparison of the religions that were practiced in the outliers before Western contact and Christianization reveals patterns based on a shared cultural ancestry. Also apparent are variants endemic to particular islands. The variation indicates cultural diversification over time spurred by adaptation to different population sizes and social scales, divergent cultural evolution and creativity, and contact with other traditions. Traditional outlier religions originated in west Polynesia and evolved, diffused, mixed, and diversified over time as people came together and split apart. While it is tempting to regard island traditions as isolates, in most regions there is a long history of intermittent—and sometimes continuous—interaction (Terrell 1998). Culture-dynamic processes similar to those that governed the pagan past surround Christianity before and after its introduction to these islands.
This chapter summarizes what we know of Polynesian outlier religion, past and present, and explores comparisons, both among the outliers and with islands of the Polynesian Triangle. A few comparisons are also made with religious phenomena from neighboring Melanesia. In this chapter, we use the term, “religion” broadly to encompass a variety of metaphysical beliefs and related practices. Such beliefs and practices, often described as “supernaturalism,” involve an arguably panhuman tendency to assume that volition precedes and is the ultimate cause of physical phenomena (Lohmann 2003b). This notion, which might be described as mind-over-matter, helps generate images of spiritual beings as agents of this volition, and spiritual powers as manifestations of spiritual will in the natural and cultural world, that persist and diverge over time. These powers include what anthropologists sometimes distinguish as magic, sorcery, and witchcraft; notions of tapu and mana, long discussed in Oceanic studies; and oral traditions concerning spirits, gods, and notions of extra-material causality. We survey in turn pre-Christian gods and spirits; pre-Christian worship procedures and personnel; mana and tapu; magic and sorcery; oral traditions; the establishment of Christianity; and syncretism. All of these cultural phenomena exhibit supernaturalism and are subject to diffusion and historical change.
PRE-CHRISTIAN GODS AND SPIRITS
Tylor (1877 [1871] long ago identified animism, which he defined simply as the belief in spiritual beings, as the core of religion. Central in the traditional religions of the outliers are the spiritual beings in whom people believe and to whom they relate, including entities that are usually glossed ‘gods’ and ‘spirits’. Spiritual beings of various types directly express the anthropomorphism inherent in religion, since they exhibit humanlike form or abilities, including most importantly mind and volition (Guthrie 1993). Anthropologists often call those beings that are relatively powerful, “well-defined [and] socially encompassing” “gods,” while the term “spirits” is used to refer to beings of narrower scope and power, identified with particular places, things, or persons, alive or deceased, that are by comparison to gods “socially marginal, fleeting presences” (Levy, Mageo, and Howard 1996:11). These agents are enshrined in cultural traditions and are directly encountered in dreams or trance, enabling people to have a sense of relationship with them.1 Such experiences also provide apparent personal evidence for their veracity (Lohmann 2000) and inspire people to interpret certain waking experiences as spiritual encounters (Lohmann 2003a). With each generation, personal experiences reconstitute, vivify, and alter religious beliefs and images, helping to change and diversify religious beliefs over time.
Outliers for which we have good information appear to have had elaborately developed religious systems that were recognizably Polynesian. However, to borrow an expression from other ethnographic areas, the outliers are allied to the “Little” rather than the “Great” tradition.2 The names of widely-recognized great gods of the Polynesian Triangle—Tu (Ku), Tane (Kane), Rongo (Lono), and Tangaroa (Tangaloa; Kanaloa)—evoke little recognition in the outliers. For example, Kanaloa, the name of Hawai‘i’s god of the sea, is recognized on Nukumanu as tanaloa; but there it is not the name of a spiritual being. Rather, it is the word for ‘meteor’, a natural phenomenon with supernatural connotations: the Nukumanu say that when a sailor was lost at sea in prior generations, a tanaloa might guide him to the nearest island. On Anuta, tangaroa figures in some narratives of a genre known as tangikakai—fantastic tales recited for the benefit of children, mostly as bedtime stories. For Anutans, the name applies not to an individual but a group of spirits. In one of the island’s foundational stories, nga tangaroa are defeated by a clever culture hero, and they are not regarded as a serious cosmological force. Nonetheless, a number of key figures common in Polynesian oral traditions are also widely recognized in outlier mythology. Best known of these, perhaps, is Maui, the demigod and trickster credited with pulling up the islands from the ocean floor with his enchanted fishhook. He appears in similar roles on many of the outliers, where he is identified by some variant of the name, Mautikitiki. Sina or Hina, commonly appearing in Polynesian oral traditions as the name of a beautiful woman, is also found on Nukumanu, Takū, Ontong Java, Tikopia, and Anuta. And Hawai‘i’s Laka, credited with critical seafaring innovations, appears in a similar role in oral traditions of Taumako and Vaeakau (as Lata), Anuta and Tikopia (as Rata), and elsewhere. An analogous character on Takū is called Hatuvave. Such continuities and divergences provide tantalizing clues on the history of ideas and the peoples who bore them in their travels through space and time.
Tikopia
Raymond Firth first visited Tikopia at a time when approximately half the island’s population still practiced the traditional religion. Thus, he had an opportunity to speak with practicing pagans and act as a participant observer in their many ceremonies. What he learned through this experience is documented in a remarkable series of articles and books. The following summarizes a few of his most noteworthy observations.
In some parts of Polynesia gods, atua, are loosely differentiated from spirits, aitu. However, the gods and spirits of pre-Christian Tikopia are collectively known as atua. Nonetheless, there is a recognized hierarchy of spirit entities from ones who never were human, through ancestors now deified, to irritating local spirits, atua vare, who may or may not have once been human.
The chronology of the gods has various accretions and contradictions. However, the most coherent story recognizes Te Atua Lasi ‘The Great God’ who fathered four sons. The sons were the originators of Tikopia’s four clans; their story is told in the section on oral traditions, below. A second generation of gods is largely associated with the Kāfika deity, and their exploits establish “mourning observances with their abstention from levity and sociability; courting and marriage observances…[and] social norms in a man’s relations with his parents, his siblings and his wife” (Firth 1961:50). Thereafter a descendant of Kāfika, the premier chiefly line, became a mortal man, but he returned to the heavens as the most feared of all the gods, Te Atua i Kāfika. As culture hero he had established much of the order of both society and nature and, at the end of his life, he refrained from an act of revenge, which gave him supreme power among the gods.
Tikopia’s few female deities were, on the whole, dangerous to humans. Pre-eminent in this group is Nau Fiora who is still believed to have the power to steal the souls of children, thereby killing them. Other female spirits, not deities but also never human, existed in various parts of the island and were sometimes seen benignly leading their spirit children to the sea. More dangerous ones lived in the bush and would seduce men who wandered there alone. It was believed that the malignant female spirit would then become pregnant, and she would cause the man to die so that he would join his spirit family.
There were also some potentially dangerous entities with human origins such as the spirits of children either stillborn or miscarried. A child who died before recognizing its parent, that is, up to about six weeks of age, also came into this category, as did occasionally the spirits of young men who had died in accidents. While these spirits could perform mischievous actions by themselves—whistling outside the house at night, for instance—they also often played constructive social roles by manifesting themselves through spirit mediums.
Lastly, there were what could be conceptualized as domestic spirits. The Tikopia believe they have an immaterial and immortal element, the ora ‘soul’, which after death goes to the appropriate clan heaven. The ora may appear to family members—sometimes while they are awake, sometimes in dreams—and the clan souls would come at the death of kin to see their living descendants and collect the ora of the newly dead at nightfall.
Anuta
Anuta has been Christian since 1916. Islanders continue to believe that pre-Christian spirits formerly existed and played a major role in human affairs. However, they have not been a major focus of religious attention for almost a century. Our knowledge of Anuta’s pagan spirits comes primarily from islanders’ comments to Feinberg during his visits in the 1970s and 80s. In addition to statements based on what consultants had heard from their elders, one or two of the oldest islanders had vague recollections of “traditional” beliefs and practices from their participation while children, more than a half century earlier.
Anutan spirits fall into a number of distinct classes. Still there are some properties that spirits share, regardless of their type. They are discrete beings, each with its own personality and autonomous will. They are sexual beings, whose emotional and social lives resemble those of living people. Spirits tend to be invisible and intangible; thus, most spirit activities are hidden from human perception. However, they can take on a variety of shapes. Sometimes they enter and possess bodies (pakatino) of animals or other natural phenomena, and that is how they tend to manifest themselves to mortal human beings. At other times, they enter human bodies, causing bizarre actions and speaking through the vocal apparatus of their hosts. In pre-Christian times, a person so possessed was called a vakaatua ‘spirit vessel’ or ‘spirit medium’, and it is through such mediums that spirits made their feelings known to the human world. Mediums whose spirit familiars were especially prominent gods were known as tauraatua ‘spirit anchors’. Firth (1967e [1966], 1970) depicts spirit mediumship as a major Tikopian psychological and social preoccupation, at least through the 1950s. Anutans, by contrast, have not practiced spirit mediumship in this sense for many decades. On occasion people may still be possessed by spirits, resulting in temporary insanity (see Feinberg 1979); but Anutans view such phenomena as devoid of social benefits.
Spirits are more powerful than human beings, as is demonstrated by their ability to materialize and dematerialize at will, to travel at astounding speeds, and to control natural phenomena. They can cause rain or sunshine, make crops die or flourish, cause fish to fling themselves onto an angler’s hook or shun the clutches of a hungry fisherman. They can cause disease and dreadful accidents or make one impervious to injury. Although they have their own concerns, they also take an interest in living people. People can induce spirits to treat them kindly by observing proper ritual, or they can anger spirits by failing to act with deference. Anutans recognize several types of pre-Christian spirit, the most common being tupua penua, atua vare, and atua. The first two types are non-human; the last is often the shade of a departed person.
Tupua penua ‘spirits of the land’ are powerful beings associated with particular locations. So long as one respects them and does not intrude upon their territory, they rarely bother human beings. Yet, they are potentially dangerous, and people normally avoid locales inhabited by them, particularly at night. If angered they attack their victims, sometimes in their sleep, and cause infirmity, depravity, or death.
Atua vare are ‘common’ or ‘undistinguished spirits’. They do not have personal names but haunt the bush and are particularly active at night. They tend to be malicious rather than evil, but they enjoy frightening people by such acts as calling out to them or shaking a tree that one has climbed to hunt for birds. Occasionally atua of several varieties might take the form of birds, land animals, or fish; or they may impersonate human beings in order to lure others into a vulnerable or compromising position.
Atua is the generic term for spiritual beings, but it may also be used in a specific sense to denote the ghost of a deceased person. Anuta’s most important gods and spirits, apparently in contrast with such islands as Taumako and the Outer Reefs, were ghosts of deceased human beings. The power of a ghost (te atua o te tangata mate) varied in more or less direct proportion to the person’s power as a human being. Thus, the shade of an obscure commoner drew little attention except, perhaps, from the departed person’s closest relatives. By contrast, ghosts of chiefs or other prominent personages were powerful gods to whom living chiefs and their assistants performed worship ceremonies on behalf of the community at large. Most powerful of all was Tearakura, a chief who is said to have lived about ten generations ago, presided over the extermination of most of the island’s male population, and established basic elements of the contemporary social structure. Other powerful gods, for whom worship ceremonies were performed, included Nau Ariki (Tearakura’s elder sister), Pu Tepuko (Tearakura’s younger brother), and Toroaki. The latter was Tearakura’s great grandfather and one of the island’s earliest chiefs.
Taumako
Throughout Polynesia, spirits of the dead are differentiated from those who never were human. The most important gods on Tikopia and Anuta were ancestors of deceased chiefs. The great pan-Polynesian gods, by contrast, were in a realm removed from humans, and the same is true of leading pagan deities on some of the outliers. On Taumako, for example, knowledgeable commentators told Feinberg in 2007 and 2008 that the island’s most important sua ‘god’ of pre-Christian times was a never-human being named Bliholu (or Bleholu).3 This spiritual being lived (according to many, he still lives) atop of Taumako’s tallest mountain; and anyone in need of something, regardless of residence or descent group, could approach him with the relevant request.
Bliholu was responsible for the community’s overall wellbeing, but his area of special concern was the sea and fishing. If a fisherman were after some particular quarry, he would climb the mountain and lodge a formal appeal. The process involved presenting Bliholu with carefully-selected tree branches. Then, after acquiring the fish, the beneficiary was expected to offer formal thanks. These procedures remained in practice during the lifetimes of some of Feinberg’s middle-aged consultants.
Aside from Bliholu, who was responsible for the entire island, residents of each village or neighborhood (kaenga) had one or more spiritual beings to whom they looked for assistance and protection. Many of these were embodied in rocks or other features of the landscape; others took the form of animals and might be considered “totemic.” These were termed nga sua (or tua or atua) te kaenga ‘local gods’ or ‘spirits of the place’. The major local gods of Kahula Village include Bionge, described as “a stone in the bush,” and Te Ube ‘The Pigeon’. The sua te kaenga of Takulu Village, is Te Moko Uli ‘The Black Lizard’. Most animals do not embody spirits and are simply pigeons, lizards, dogs, and so on. One can distinguish a spirit animal by its unusual behavior or because it appears under unusual circumstances. Former paramount chief Crusoe Kaveia indicated that these spirits had three major functions: some might serve as messengers, announcing sicknesses, deaths, births, or other news; some might be appealed to in cases of urgent need (e.g., if one is shipwrecked far from land); and they might be asked to strike down an adversary.4
In addition to Bliholu and nga sua te kaenga, Taumako recognize a variety of never-human spirits that are predominantly malevolent. Most prominent among these are sua lele, kovea, and te kau. Sua lele ‘flying spirits’ tend to live in certain types of large tree. They usually mind their own business, but sometimes they take an interest in people, either out of anger, spite, or attraction. Regardless of their motivation, they tend to cause illness, often by impaling their victims with a metaphysical hook. In a few instances, however, people have been able to make friends with sua lele, in which case they sometimes receive significant assistance. One famous case involves John Laulae, a recently-deceased man from Pileni in the Outer Reef Islands (Vaeakau), who befriended a sua lele and, with spiritual help, became legendary for his fishing prowess.
Kovea are “copy-cat” spirits. They impersonate human beings and attract members of the opposite sex. The consequence of having sex with a kovea is to fall gravely ill, and such illnesses are often fatal. Te kau is a group of spirits, sometimes thought to be ghosts of deceased humans, that patrol the reef and offshore fishing grounds. They carry an invisible net in which they catch unwary fishermen, causing severe headache, weakness, fever, and chills. The symptoms resemble malaria, but recovery requires spiritual as well as purely medical treatment.
Taumako also recognize the ghosts of deceased humans, which may remain in the community and affect living people. In contrast with more hierarchically-organized Polynesian communities, however, ghosts do not appear to play a prominent role in Taumako life, and Duff Islanders do not often speak of them.
Bellona
Torben Monberg’s comprehensive historical reconstruction of the traditional beliefs of Bellona can stand in part for Rennell, as the two islands shared the same important gods and culture heroes. However, Monberg (1966, 1991) notes that the detail in his account is predominantly about Bellona.
Monberg describes a hierarchy of gods and spirits, some of whom were worshipped and others who were not. The gods were fully anthropomorphic, anthroposocial, and anthropopsychic—they were believed to see what humans were doing and, roughly, to behave like them. However, they also had superhuman powers, being able, for example, to become invisible. The most important and most powerful gods, atua, were referred to as the ‘sky gods’. They were a brother and sister who were also husband and wife (one variation on the theme of divine and chiefly brother-sister consorts elsewhere in Polynesia [Dunis 2008]). Two standing stones, later significant in Bellona’s conversion to Christianity, represented the bodies of these deities. Below them were another brother-sister pair and their hermaphrodite child. They had never been human, nor did they have descendants among humans. Under them were the ‘district gods’ (ngasuenga), less fearsome than the sky gods and often referred to as aitu ‘spirits’. These deities, descendants of the sky gods, were connected with Rennell and Bellona’s eight original lineages. Six of the lineages died out, and only two district gods remained immediately prior to conversion to Christianity. Below the district gods were important ancestors, now deified, who had no relationship to the higher gods and spirits. Their role (Monberg 1991:125) was to bring health and welfare to their descendants, fertility of people and crops, and protection from danger. Some ancient ancestors were not worshipped—Monberg (1991:122) uses the expression “annihilated ancestors” and suggests that they were the ancestors of lines no longer extant. He notes (1991:24) that the establishment of the world and its hierarchy of gods was less important to the Bellonese than the perpetuation of the world and how to prevent it dying out, disappearing, or being polluted by ‘evil gods’.
Monberg glosses a category of deities called ‘apai as ‘non-worshipped gods’ or ‘evil gods’. They apparently came from the original homeland of ‘Ubea and proliferated. Their names were revealed by mediums when unexpected and unpleasant events, such as crop failure or death, occurred. The ‘apai sometimes became embodied in the form certain animals, especially inedible ones.
The district gods ate, drank, had wives and offspring, did good and were malicious like humans, but had power over nature. They could make people and gardens prosper, and mediums could communicate with them. Through ritual, men and deities exchanged goods and services and were bound in a system of mutual obligations. By contrast, the non-worshipped or evil gods were asocial, caused disaster, and could not be appeased by ritual; they had to be controlled by the worshipped gods.
A quite different category of supernaturals was the culture heroes or kakai. They had been humans in some distant time and place, but they were not immortal, and they brought death as well as many cultural features into the world with them. Mautikitiki, the premier culture hero in most of Polynesia, made eminent cultural and social sense for Bellona.
Nukumanu
Nukumanu’s traditional religious system was disrupted during the late nineteenth century, when the Forsayth Company made the atoll into a commercial copra plantation and a Roman Catholic church was established. At the outset of World War I, when the Germans withdrew from New Guinea, the Nukumanu mission disintegrated, and islanders reinstituted some of their old beliefs and practices. By that time, however, memories of the great gods and how they should be worshipped had largely vanished. As of Feinberg’s visit to Nukumanu in 1984, Christian churches and evangelism were forbidden by community government edict, and islanders continued to appeal to local spirits for protection from illness, shipwreck, famine, and natural disaster. Spells and prayers were uttered to pagan spirits in order to ensure success in deep sea fishing, ocean voyaging, healing, and protection from illness. Similarly, spells capable of causing famine, illness, or disaster at sea to one’s enemies were still known. Such prayers and ritual procedures were written down in family notebooks and continued to be enacted. While household spirits were respected and invoked, however, the great gods of yesteryear were only vaguely recalled.
Nukumanu islanders in 1984 provided Feinberg (1990) names of six spirits described as major deities dating to the distant past: Telolohenua, Loatu, Puapua, Avio, Arei, and Kailulu. The supreme deity was Telolohenua, the sky god whom all Nukumanu were said to have worshipped and to whom all were indebted for the community’s well-being. However, he was somewhat remote from everyday affairs. Loatu, the second-ranking deity, was more concerned with watching over practical matters in the land of the living. About equally important, Puapua was responsible for control of the weather and the growth of crops. He was said to have controlled the rain, sun, coconut, and taro; and, in case of problems with any of these, people would appeal to him for help. Feinberg could learn no specifics about the personalities or roles of the three other spirits in this class: Avio, Arei, and Kailulu. These six were described as “boss-gods” and either were benevolent or neutral. They were all distinguished from ‘evil spirits’ (na tipua haaeo).
Although the major deities and rites associated with them have been largely dormant since the advent of German colonialism in the nineteenth century, household spirits, even in the 1980s, were a matter of concern. People, when they died, were said to become tipua. And, while spirits of the recently deceased may not have the scope or power of great gods from the distant past, they continued to be concerned with matters involving their immediate kin and punished improper conduct. Evil spirits (tipua haaeo), some named and some not, were believed to inhabit certain portions of the atoll. One man in his twenties reported that when he was young, tipua haaeo inhabited the lagoon beach at one end of the village as well as the side of the islet facing the open ocean. He said that in the intervening years, the ‘evil spirits’ had entirely disappeared from the islet’s lagoon side (tai).
Most of the more prominent spirits (tipua) were associated with particular places. Their presence and continued activity were recognized by Nukumanu pagans and Christians alike, the difference being that devout Christians—of whom there were a number on the atoll—regarded them as essentially malignant, while the pagans tended to view them as neutral to benevolent, albeit dangerous. Their primary function, according to non-Christians, was to watch over the community, causing illness and misfortune to persons who violated social norms or caused trouble.
Three powerful spirits were said to rule Amotu, the post-plantation village islet. These included Ahelo, Hauelo, and Hiole. All three were described as male, and each had his own abode and sphere of influence. Ahelo was said to reside on the ocean side of the islet, ‘behind’ the dwelling houses. Hauelo resided behind the main canoe-cutting area, just past the west end of the village. And Hiole resided in the center of the islet. The atoll’s largest islet and traditional village area, known as Vaihale, was said to have four tipua: Kamakama, Teasi, Pakaiololo, and Hukikua; their function is described as being the same as that of the Amotu spirits.
Ontong Java
Hogbin (1930, 1961 [1934]) discusses two types of spirit on Ontong Java, both of which are connected with human beings. The ngeinga is associated with a person’s shadow, is vaguely protective, but ceases to exist when the person dies. The kipua (cognate with Nukumanu tipua and Anutan tupua) is immortal and continues as a ghost after the person dies. Kipua affect humans for good or ill and are responsible for sickness, misfortune, and death as well as health, prosperity, and general well-being. They enforce standards of proper behavior by punishing wrong-doers and communicate with the living through spirit mediums.
Kapingamarangi
Kapingamarangi is one of two Polynesian outliers located in Micronesia. Kenneth Emory spent three months on the atoll in 1947 and over five months in 1950. On his fist visit, he was accompanied by anthropologist Sir Peter Buck (Te Rangi Hiroa) and linguist Samuel Elbert; on the second, by medical researcher Ralph Miller. At the time of Emory’s investigation, Kapingamarangi had experienced four different colonial administrations, dating to the sixteenth century; and Christianity had been established on the atoll for three decades (Emory 1965:20). Still, enough of the traditional religion was remembered that he was able to include a 142-page section titled “The Ancient Religion” in his important Bishop Museum Monograph on Kapinga lifeways. In addition to lengthy transcriptions of chants and prayers associated with canoe building, fishing, and rites of passage, he devoted several pages to descriptions of pre-Christian gods and spirits.
According to Emory’s consultants, Kapinga made no terminological distinction between the shades of deceased humans and spirits that had never been human. The generic term for ‘god’ was eitu, cognate with the word aitu, found in much of Polynesia. The common Polynesian word, atua, however, occurs only in the phrase whare atua ‘god house’, which appears in but a single chant (Emory 1965:200).
Emory (1965:200) names six “main gods,” Utariki, Mongohenua, Mongotohoro, Tiwawe, Tipoinua, and Roua, who were “worshipped at the cult house.” The cult house, called Hereu, was a large ritual structure located in the spot later occupied by the atoll’s church (Emory 1965:206). Roua was the wife of Utamatua, the culture hero said to have discovered the atoll. Emory speculates that Utariki is Utamatua’s spiritual name. Mongohenua and Mongotohoro were either sons of Utamatua and Roua or, perhaps, gods brought by Utamatua from his original homeland (Emory 1965:37, 201). Hahui and Heweiki were also described as sons of Utamatua and Roua, but they were usually depicted as “high priests” rather than gods—although Emory notes that the distinction is less than clear, since important priests sometimes became deified. One consultant suggested that Tiwawe was another of Mongohenua’s brothers. An alternative suggestion is that Tiwawe was the Kapinga name for Wawe, the man said to have discovered neighboring Nukuoro. Roua, as the only goddess of this group, was believed to have a special relationship to childbearing and looked after souls (mouri) of women who had died in childbirth.
Each of the major gods had a special dwelling place. Roua (or Riua) and Utariki (or Tariki) dwelt far out in the ocean; Hakatautai and Takame stayed near to the atoll; Mongohenua and Tiwawe dwelt near the surf line; and Mongotohoro, Riuta, and Rutapa occupied various portions of the reef. Emory (1965:202) identifies Hakatautai and Takame as “priests of the cult house,” who became deified and, in their role as gods, were largely responsible for success in fishing.
A number of gods were thought to have preceded Utamatua and his associates on Kapingamarangi. Most prominent were Korae, Tikaiange, and Tiatumaria, who were thought to inhabit a sacred islet called Turuaimu in the northern section of the atoll. Legend has it that when Utamatua arrived, he found Korae already in residence. To avoid ongoing conflict, the two men divided the atoll, with Korae and his gods taking control of the northern islets and Utamatua taking control of the south.
An important set of gods is associated with a group of castaways from Woleai in what is now Yap State of Micronesia. The castaways arrived in the early nineteenth century and, along with their descendants, became powerful spirits, capable of possessing mediums and, at times, effectively challenging indigenous political leaders on important issues. And one final spiritual presence is Tu-ariki, Emory (1965:202) identifies as a potential creator god. However, he says little about Tu-ariki’s divine characteristics.
Takū
Unlike the other Polynesian outliers, Takū’s supernatural world is sustained by ongoing traditional religious practice; it is thus possible to speak of such matters in the present tense. Moyle (2007:111-139; see also 2010a, 2010b) notes a wide range of named categories of spirit, whose generic name is aitu. Atua are largely unknown spirits, referred to only in ancient songs. Aitu nnui ‘great spirits’ colonized the atoll, and they are invoked by clan elders for personal and clan protection at gatherings on the marae ritual arena and during funerary rites. Tipua are mischief-makers, occasionally assuming grotesque visible form. Masalai, a word commonly denoting ‘spirits’ in Papua New Guinea’s Tok Pisin, are demigods with the unique ability to seduce humans. Masaurani, dwarf-sized beings who were the atoll’s first non-spirit inhabitants, have a guardian relationship with both living humans and human spirits after death. Tipuna ‘ancestors’, comprising members of one’s grandparental and older generations whom one saw while alive, are routinely invoked for success in fishing and gardening, and to ward off illness and physical danger. After death, the human spirit (mouri) travels to its own clan afterworld, there to partake in idealized circumstances of endless self-decoration, singing and dancing in the company of other clan members. The five afterworlds are also populated by sau spirits, whose faint sounds of singing forewarn Takū of an impending local death. Of these categories of spirit, only tipua do not have personal names, and all continue to be celebrated in songs sung on the island’s marae, its ritual arena.
A few spirits appear to operate independently of these named categories. Pākeva controls the movement of prestige fish and is invoked frequently on the ocean after a death, when a plentiful tuna catch signals that the human spirit has safely reached its afterworld. Pātara inhabits a mound in the center of the garden area, ready to attack with an axe if any gardener creates a noise. Pukena, the ariki’s personal ancestor, is distinguished visually by a sharp point on the top of his head. While on the marae, the ariki attaches a wooden representation of that point to his own head and is ritually transformed into the ancestor while presiding there. A carved image of Sinateahana erected on Nukurekia islet was stolen by collectors around 1910 and is now in Leipzig Museum, Germany; Takū remember this female spirit only in one song, apparently composed at the time of the theft. And Oroatu personifies supernatural evil and danger to the extent that his name is rarely uttered and always in a hushed voice lest he overhear and cause trouble.
The spirit of a dead resident is routinely invoked in the five-day tukumai ritual occurring six months after a local death. Inside the clan elder’s house, the medium, usually a member of the deceased’s family thought to have been close to the resident, is interrogated over a 30-minute period by a parent or close relative of the deceased on the second day of the tukumai ritual. Ideally, the medium will convey comforting confirmation of safe residence in the clan afterworld, although most verbal utterances tend to be short and equivocal.
Prior to 1974, a more protracted séance (tanaki) occurred after a death. In he tanaki, a deceased resident was expected to convey a newly composed dance song via the medium. In anticipation, the family allocated specific sections of the lyrics to specific members so that the medium’s single performance could be committed to memory and later taught for performance. Most mediums are unaware of their actions and utterances after the event.
PRE-CHRISTIAN WORSHIP PROCEDURES AND PERSONNEL
By worship, we mean ritual activities through which a community communicates with spiritual beings, expresses its respect, and requests their intercession to promote the general well-being. Aboriginal worship customs in the outliers range from highly centralized and formal procedures carried out by priests on behalf of the community to less formal interactions between people and supernaturals in forms such as spirit possession or prayer. In Wallace’s (1966:75) terms, all of these traditional worship practices are “cult institutions,” that is, “sets of rituals all having the same general goal, all explicitly rationalized by a set of similar or related beliefs, and all supported by the same group.” Wallace (1966:84-88) pointed out that institutions of worship vary based on the number of people involved and the social complexity of their organizations. This range of variation, from individual through ecclesiastical orders, is nicely represented in the outliers.
Frequently in the Polynesian Triangle, chiefs (called by such terms as ariki, aliki, ali‘i, eiki, tui, or tu‘i) are sacred or divine, and they also serve as priests, leading their communities in worship ceremonies. At the same time, a stratum of priests separate from the chiefs often exists. These priests are typically called by some cognate of tufunga or kahuna, a word that also applies to artisans or craftsmen such as carpenters, canoe builders, and tattoo specialists. A final type of religious practitioner is the spirit medium. Typically, a medium may be either male or female and come from any genealogically-defined social stratum. Mediums are able to enter trance states and communicate to an assembled group while in such states. The trance is understood to be induced by a spirit entering the medium’s body, and words uttered by the medium are understood to originate with the possessing spirit. All three types of practitioner are represented in the outliers as well as the Polynesian Triangle.
Tikopia and Anuta
On Tikopia and Anuta, the most important pagan deities were shades of deceased chiefs. Later chiefs have been direct patrilineal descendants of those deities, a fact that places them in a privileged position for requesting favors. Worship ceremonies (fai kava or pai kava) were performed under the chiefs’ direction, with the assistance of hereditary ritual specialists (Firth calls them ‘ritual elders’) known as pure or matāpure. These usually were men from chiefly lines. The most elaborate of Tikopia’s ceremonies was a ritual cycle called Te Fekau o nga Atua ‘The Work of the Gods’, which Firth got to observe and thoroughly document during his visit in 1928-29.
Tikopia’s four ariki, as descendants of the gods, were the main ritual performers assisted by their ritual elders. The most significant feature of traditional Tikopian religion was ‘The Work of the Gods’, a two-part cycle of seasonal rites that involved elaborate organization of the community and the assembly of large supplies of food. While not strictly calendrical, the two ritual cycles recognized the major seasonal alternations: the trade wind period from April to October, and the monsoon season of sometimes savage cyclones and rain, from November to March. The timing of each cycle was based on natural observations such as the appearance of constellations, especially the Pleiades, the migration of birds, and the flowering of the coral tree. Each ritual lasted about thirty days and was elaborately organized with much mobilization and exchange of food supplies, drawing the whole community into a vast network of social and economic relationships. The rituals allowed the ariki to demonstrate their power and encourage community solidarity.
The basic theme of the Work of the Gods was the periodic resacralization of some of the most important elements of Tikopian culture. Under religious auspices, canoes and temples were repaired and rededicated, yams were harvested and replanted, and a red pigment was extracted from turmeric rhizomes and preserved for ritual use. At the heart of the rituals was the presentation of kava to the gods. Kava is an intoxicant produced from the root of the so-called kava plant (Piper methysticum), which is pulverized and mixed with water. The liquid is drunk in many parts of Polynesia; in the Tikopian rituals the kava was a libation poured on the ground to the accompaniment of prayers. The chief donned a special waist cloth and leaf necklet and set out offerings of bark cloth and food. Using language that was highly symbolic and honorific, the chief adopted a tone of humility, pleading poverty and signifying abasement before a god. The chief then beseeched the gods to excrete on the earth, the gods’ excrement being seen symbolically as all the good things of the land and the sea. In addition to addressing the island’s economic affairs, these rituals included a sternly moral public address, under conditions of great sanctity, instructing the people on proper behavior as members of Tikopian society. This public policy instruction included injunctions about birth control, an essential matter on a small, isolated island.
The ceremonies ended with ritual dancing in which formal mimetic displays and chanting of archaic songs were succeeded by freer performances by firelight at night. There, men and women could indulge in often-ribald references to sexual matters, although still in a highly controlled setting. This aspect of the festival, partly cathartic in nature, was thought to seek the gods’ approval of human recreation. Most of the rituals of the Work of the Gods were carried out on marae, ceremonial assembly spaces, often outside temples or large meeting houses. On the whole, commoners were merely supporters in the rituals, providing food and mats and, on some but not all occasions, an audience.
In addition to the great worship ceremonies, there were minor rituals which did not necessarily involve the chiefs. Some men (and a few women past menopause) had the potential to go into a trance in which they contacted the spirit world. These mediums were called vaka atua ‘spirit vessels’. Their function was informal and usually involved healing by communicating with some spirit that may have caused the sickness. Spirits would also speak through mediums to express concern at social and interpersonal derelictions. While the chiefs and ritual elders performed ceremonies on behalf of their clans and lineages, the mediums tended to cater to the concerns of their immediate families.
On Tikopia in 1980, belief in spirit mediums was still quite strong. At that time, Macdonald observed a continuing struggle between a well known medium and the Anglican priest, Father Luke. The medium, who was possessed by or the mouthpiece for the soul of a teenage boy who had died in a fall from a cliff, foretold the death of the priest’s father, proclaiming to his mother, “Tomorrow you will weep.” Indeed, on the next day the man died. The priest challenged the medium and told him that there was a new God in the land and that old gods must be put away. The medium replied that he had seen the new God, who was like a bright fire, on his journeys to the spirit world. This medium was well known for foretelling future happenings on the Ravenga side of the island. The elderly mother of the fourth-ranking chief, the Ariki Fangarere, was also a practicing medium in the 1980s.
Worship ceremonies on Anuta were known as pai kava ‘make kava’ or ‘perform kava’. They were directed toward Tearakura and other major gods. The two chiefs would oversee the ceremonies, but in practice they were often represented by their ritual assistants, known as matāpure. The matāpure were members of particular genealogical lines closely related to the chiefs. They recited prayers, threw out bits of food, and poured water on the ground. The kava plant was known from Tikopia but not grown on Anuta. Thus, Anutans did not use it in their worship ritual despite the ceremony’s name.
Whereas a formally-recognized pagan priesthood has been long abandoned on all the Polynesian outliers, spirit possession occasionally occurs. Even that, however, is not positively valued in the way that it once was. Tikopians and Anutans, prior to establishment of Christianity, frequently consulted spirit mediums (vakaatua) to answer questions that had produced social unease. The medium would go into a trance, and spirit familiars, speaking through his or her mouth, would inform the population of the reasons for sickness, famine, drought, or other natural disaster; for the source of anti-social behavior such as theft; or for the fate of fellow islanders who had disappeared on overseas voyages. Since Christianity’s establishment, seizures are no longer commonly believed to indicate possession by benevolently-disposed spirits, but by Satan.
Rennell and Bellona
While Firth carried out his Tikopia fieldwork at a time when the old religion still was practiced on one side of the island, Monberg’s record of Bellona comes from the memories of old people who recalled their rituals from a quarter century before. Nonetheless, it is detailed and is comprehensively described in his 1991 study of Bellona’s beliefs and rituals. Humans and gods interacted in four places: sacred areas, homesteads, graves, and temples. Ritual objects considered sacred (tapu) were kept in the house, and women and children had to be careful not to touch them. The most elaborate rituals were conducted in the homestead. While temples were considered more sacred and their rituals more important, they were of less economic importance because the offerings made there were quite minor.
Three types of ritual actor—assistants to priests, second priest-chiefs, and priest-chiefs (tunihenua)—performed the rituals (Monberg 1991:175). The tunihenua embodied the sacred (the god possessing him) and the profane (his own humanity). Monberg (1991:chapter 14) describes in detail the rituals associated with the harvest, which took place in a temple and homestead and concluded at the grave of an ancestor. Like the Work of the Gods in Tikopia, the rituals were designed to make plants grow, fish be abundant and humans fertile.
Nukumanu
For the reasons cited above, much of Nukumanu’s pre-Christian religious practice is more difficult to reconstruct than that on Tikopia, Anuta, or Bellona. However, it appears that there was not a paramount priest-chief looking after the entire atoll. Rather, ariki were associated with particular descent groups, of which there were at least four. Their primary duty was to lead collective worship rites. According to Feinberg’s consultants in 1984, all Nukumanu would gather on the marae ‘meeting ground’ in Vaihale, the main village in pre-contact times, and the ariki would “pray” to the deities. The priest would be adorned with special leaves, attached to his head, arms, legs, and chest; and he would be decorated with turmeric. These rites were said to involve no sacrifice of food or drink. Sometime in the eighteenth or nineteenth century, a secular or administrative chief, termed te tuku, took control of the atoll by military force, and the ariki were relieved of any secular power they may once have held. Francis Kipano, the tuku in 1984, insisted that the ariki were never more than minor ritual specialists or “doctors” (Feinberg 2009:280).
In contrast with the old ariki, as of 1984, diviners, including spirit mediums, continued to be positively valued and were routinely consulted to determine the cause of spiritually-derived misfortune. When someone became ill, spirit activity most often was suspected. If the illness was severe, especially if it did not respond to other treatments, a divining ceremony was held to identify the responsible spirit. The most common diagnostic procedure involved the use of tilo leaves. These are young leaves that sprout from the very top of a coconut palm, which, because of their lack of exposure to the sun, are pale green or almost white. They are used on Nukumanu for many decorative and ceremonial purposes. In the usual divination procedure, two leaves of approximately equal length were used. A series of overhand knots was tied in each of the leaves. Then, the spirits were asked a yes/no question, and the leaves were placed next to each other. If their ends still coincided, the spirits were thought to have answered “yes.” If they did not, the answer was “no.” Using this procedure, the diviner first determined the offended spirit’s identity. Then, as if in a game of "twenty questions," he determined the actions that the angry spirit had found offensive. Finally, if it was not already apparent what to do, the diviner determined what actions must be taken. Thilenius (1927) described similar procedures for the Caroline Islands of Micronesia and suggested the term “knot-divining”; likewise, Hogbin (1930, 1961 [1934]) reported this practice on Ontong Java. Nukumanu diviners also include spirit mediums (tauraaitu, literally ‘spirit anchors’), who could go into a trance and allow the offended spirit to communicate directly with the patient’s relatives.
If the spirit causing the problem were a household ghost who had taken offense at some transgression or failure to discharge one’s kinship duties, the most important curing measure was for the patient to mend his or her ways. In addition to symptomatic treatment, including the administration of leaf infusions, poultices, massage, and Western medicines, a curing ceremony might be held. Annoying but non-serious conditions such as boils were often treated through minor rites involving nothing more than a short chant (kavai or hakatapu), consisting of words that may have no denotative meaning to the participants. For serious and potentially life-threatening illnesses, especially when these were caused by community spirits who had no particular attachment to the patient’s household, more elaborate rites were held. These rites are described as sau na tipua ‘exorcising the spirits’. In these cases, it was thought that spirits cause illness by capturing and holding the victim’s ola ‘life force’ or inaina ‘soul’. The healer’s task was to mobilize his own spirits to rescue and return the patient’s life force. At the same time, the curer would avoid speaking the patient’s name to keep evil spirits from hearing it, thereby, providing further access to the victim. At the ceremony’s culmination, the ritual paraphernalia were tossed into the lagoon, far from the malignant spirit.
Ontong Java
Hogbin, whose fieldwork on Ontong Java dates to the 1920s, has a considerable body of data on that atoll’s pre-Christian religion. At one time, Nukumanu religion must have resembled that on Ontong Java, to which the atoll is closely related. Hogbin reports that leaders of what he calls joint families were known as ali‘i or maakua, and that their duties were primarily religious. According to Hogbin (1961 [1934]:166-167) maakua and ali‘i referred to the same individuals, but ali‘i seems to have highlighted a man’s secular functions. Hogbin translates maakua as ‘priest’. The Luangiua portion of Ontong Java, where Hogbin spent most of his time on the atoll, had eight maakua, three of whom were qualitatively elevated above the rest. Below these were three maakua of intermediate rank, termed ko‘oi. Hogbin designated the two of lowest rank as “minor” officials. The Peelau portion of the atoll had six maakua, divided equally between “major” maakua and ko‘oi. Each senior maakua had an executive assistant termed his ka‘ala.
Each year witnessed two month-long “festivals” called sanga, one performed on Luangiua and the other on Peelau. These may have been roughly analogous to Tikopia’s Work of the Gods. They required a gathering of the entire population, and a different ceremony was performed each day, under the direction of the maakua. The daily ceremonies are described in some detail by Hogbin (1961 [1934]:182-199). After the sanga, one of the leading maakua and one ko‘oi would remain on the village islet and would perform special ceremonies every day until the start of the following sanga, at the end of which a different senior maakua and ko‘oi would take over for the following year.
Hogbin’s depiction of spirits (kipua or aiku) and spirit mediums (koulaiku) on Ontong Java resembles that on Nukumanu, and he gives a fairly detailed account of a séance in which the ghosts of a sick man’s parents, uncles, and aunts discuss, through the medium, the reason for the patient’s illness. Once the offense was identified, the patient’s relatives were able to perform rituals intended to placate the angry spirit. Eventually, it was determined, benevolently-inclined kipua on the mother’s side persuaded the vindictive ones on the father’s side to allow the patient to recover.
Sikaiana
Hogbin’s description of the Ontong Javanese priesthood looks similar Sikaiana’s. Donner (1985:61) refers to island-wide ceremonies “conducted by the aliki and his ritual officers, takala, tautuku, and pule.” He goes on to say:
These offices were associated with specific clans (hale akina) and their ritual houses (hale henua). The ritual performed by each ritual officer was secret and had to be performed correctly in order to be effective. The authority of these men was limited to ritual matters; they had no power in political affairs or disputes. (Donner 1985:61)
Donner (personal communication) emphasizes that his Sikaiana research occurred in the early 1980s, some fifty years after conversion to Christianity. Therefore, his knowledge of the old beliefs and rituals is based on recollections of elderly islanders rather than direct observation. However, extrapolating from many conversations held during his three years of Sikaiana research, he suggests that Sikaiana ritual could be divided into two roughly-defined spheres. The first involved island-wide ceremonies that ensured the community’s welfare. These activities were overseen by ritual leaders who were so numerous that they must have in some way included most of the island’s men. The most prominent religious leaders included one aliki, best glossed perhaps as ‘high priest’, and his successor/assistant, known as te takala. These two leaders came from different descent lines, and when the aliki died the descent lines switched (hakahiti), along with many ritual offices.
The second sphere was a more personal one, involving individual contact between certain men and their ancestors by means spirit possession. Such contacts often related to rivalries and jealousies. Some ancestral spirits seemed very powerful; others less so. As on Ontong Java, one spirit might harm members of a particular family out of spite or anger over some perceived transgression by that family. On occasion, it appeared, ancestral spirits could have duels in which they harmed each other’s families. Mediums (vaka) would go into trances and deliver messages from a deceased relative, most often the medium’s father, in a largely-unintelligible language. The ghost was termed an aitu mate ‘dead spirit’ or ‘spirit of the dead’. The message was later translated either by the medium or someone who was present and knowledgeable, such as the medium’s wife. Some islanders believed that the earliest converts to Christianity were people connected to the least powerful ancestral spirits and who felt their families vulnerable to those with powerful ones.
Kapingamarangi
On Kapingamarangi, as on Nukumanu, Ontong Java, and Takū, religious leadership was distinguished from secular leadership for generations prior to establishment of Christianity. In contrast with most Polynesians, Kapinga use the term, ariki, exclusively to designate religious leaders; a secular chief is called by the circumlocution, tangata e putu tana henua, which Emory (1965:94) glosses as ‘one who looks after his people’. Emory (1965:50, 92) speculates that the positions of ariki and secular chief were once merged, but they became separated at least five generations prior to his study. He describes both posts as “elected,” but they are elected from among the direct patrilineal descendants of Utamatua (see above) and not the population at large. Moreover, the ariki, which Emory glosses as ‘high priests’, had to be members of a special “sacerdotal class” (pp. 93-94). Membership in that class, termed tangata tautonu ‘true servers’ was passed through the maternal line. Members of the “non-sacerdotal class” were termed tangata tauihara ‘wrong servers’, a status that was also matrilineally transmitted. In recent generations, the two “classes” have had little to distinguish them in relation to secular affairs, but tangata tautonu were the only ones permitted to lead traditional worship ceremonies or handle ritual paraphernalia. Apparently Kapingamarangi had only one ‘high priest’ (termed ariki without any modifier) at a time, and he was responsible for upkeep of the cult house, along with four or five “supplementary houses” (p. 225). He was mandated to recite special prayers every morning (oriori ruata) and evening (oriori hiahi) and to preside at a variety of other ceremonies. In these duties, the ariki was assisted by a variety of associate priests termed ariki hakaruru, ariki i nuo, ariki pahi, ariki kuongo, and meteitoko, plus two priestesses (ariki ahina).
Taumako
Comments made to Feinberg on Taumako in 2007-08 do not indicate any island-wide religious activities in pre-Christian times, although the population was small enough that such activities may well have occurred. Most worship activities, however, appear to have been conducted on an ad hoc basis, with individuals or kin groups appealing to local gods (like Bionge), or even island-wide gods (like Bliholu) for assistance in fishing, agricultural production, or treatment of illness. Chiefs, typically called aliki, exercised leadership over kin groups, but there is little evidence of a hereditary paramount chief holding power on a community-wide level.6 In general, aliki were (and are) expected to possess traditional knowledge, including knowledge of how to communicate effectively with the spirit world; but such knowledge was not restricted to aliki. Both men and women in a variety of genealogical positions are still familiar with a variety of spells and prayers intended to injure or to heal, to influence sea conditions, weather, and crop fertility, or to ensure safe, successful fishing expeditions. Rites of passage involve feasting and singing, and they may include a large portion of the island’s population. Arrangements, however, tend to be negotiated and invitations sent out by the initiates’ families and anyone else whose support those families may be able to enlist.
Takū
Takū’s sole ariki is the island’s supreme religious leader. Living in permanent seclusion in pre-contact times because of the sanctity of his person, and officiating over extended periods of daily dancing before an image of the founding spirit, Pukena, the ariki exercised total control over the local population. The accidental introduction of an epidemic in the mid-19th century, which reduced the population to a mere thirteen, was followed by the purchase of the atoll by Emma Forsayth in 1886, leading to the enforced removal of the community to a small islet where they lived in virtual confinement until 1930; for more than 40 years, religious life continued privately and despite the absence of a marae.
Since the early twentieth century, the formal role of each successive ariki has been that of a presiding protector and an pro-active intercessor. His physical presence on an area adjacent to his house changes the area’s status from mundane to sacred, thus creating the marae. He presides over all events there, which formerly included public recitations of family genealogies and presentation by a new mother of her firstborn child. Both then and now, however, time on the marae is primarily spent singing and dancing to celebrate past achievements and to entertain the spirits. Clan heads and dancers routinely wear leaf amulets to protect against the invisible and largely unknown spirits attracted by these activities. As the community’s sole representative having direct invocatory access to the island’s most powerful founding spirits, the ariki continues to exercise a predominantly religious role on a daily basis. As a consequence, his mundane activities are restricted: he undertakes no physical labor, delegating others to work in his gardens and maintain his house. His person is sacred, and only his wife may cut his hair or nails. He may participate in group song, but not dance, except in certain circumstances. He oversees each mortuary ritual, the construction of each new house, the attachment of the float and outrigger to each newly-carved canoe, and the creation of a new shark noose. More pro-actively, he also administers supernatural aid to anyone attacked by a predator fish or injured on land, provides ancestor-assisted massage on request, and offers the protective sanctuary of his own house to the seriously ill.
Although the public invocation called taku is restricted to the ariki of the day as he intervenes in matters of adverse weather, crop failure or community disaster, most men know and perform kavai invocations to personal ancestors to assist with the survival activities of fishing and gardening. The services of a senior clan member are normally requested when a new canoe is placed in the water for the first time to ensure general fishing success. Such a man may be also called on to render a new canoe irresistible to sharks, another prestige fish. Related activities include the donning of kaisuru leaf amulets over which invocations have been performed to render them potent artifacts in their own right. Supernatural assistance or protection is provided by attaching one or more kaisuru to a canoe lashing or shark noose or the neck of a fisherman, or by tying them to house-posts during a séance. Each person attending a mortuary ritual receives a kaisuru from a senior member of the hosting clan.
Each clan elder has a ritual assistant (tautua or taura) whose duties when hosting a tukumai include the placement of protective amulets on each man present during the séance, presentation of food to the spirits at each doorway of the elder’s house, distribution of spirit food to other clan heads, and complying with any other commands of the hosting elder.