HUTS OF THE SHOM PEṄ.
Iron Buffalo and Pig Spears.
CHAPTER III
THE NICOBARESE
The Evolution of the Nicobarese—Description—Character—Language—Legends of Origin—Origin of Coco Palms—Invention of Punishments—Superstitious Beliefs—Diseases—Medicines—Marriage—Matriarchal System—Divorce—Polygamy—Courtship—Property—Takoia—Headmen—Social State—Position of Women and Children—Domestic Animals—Weapons—Tools—Fishing—Turtle—Food—Beverages—Narcotics and Stimulants—Cleanliness—Clothing—Ornaments—Coiffure—Amusements—Arts and Industries—Cultivation—Produce—Traders and Commerce.
If the Shom Peṅ are not racially pure, the Nicobarese or coast-dwellers are still less so, and what components have gone to form them as they now exist is an interesting ethnical question.
To account for a certain similarity in all the people of the Archipelago, we may suppose that not all, but most, of the islands were occupied by groups of the aborigines, who everywhere but in Great Nicobar—where, because of its size and forest-clad nature they could find a refuge—became either exterminated or absorbed by successive arrivals of colonists that have since made the presence of the former almost indistinguishable.