Turning now to the list of ownership in Kiriwina, the most important canoe is, of course, that owned by the chief of Omarakana. This canoe always leads the fleet; that is to say, on big ceremonial Kula sailings, called uvalaku, it has the privileged position. It lives in a big shed on the beach of Kaulukuba (see Plates XXII, XXX), distant about one mile from the village, the beach on which also each new canoe is made. The present canoe (see Plates XXI and XLI) is called Nigada Bu’a — „begging for an areca-nut”. Every canoe has a personal name of its own, sometimes just an appropriate expression, like the one quoted, sometimes derived from some special incident. When a new canoe is built, it often inherits the name of its predecessor, but sometimes it gets a new name. The present Omarakana canoe was constructed by a master-builder from Kitava, who also carved the ornamental prowboard. There is no one now in Omarakana who can build or carve properly. The magic over the latter stages ought to have been recited by the present chief, To’uluwa, but as he has very little capacity for remembering spells, the magic was performed by one of his kinsmen.
All the other canoes of Kiriwina are also housed in hangars, each on a beach of clean, white sand on the Eastern coast. The chief or headman of each village is the toliwaga. In Kasana’i, the sub-village of Omarakana, the canoe, called in feigned modesty tokwabu (something like „landlubber”), was built by Ibena, a chief of equal rank, but smaller power than To’uluwa, and he is also the toliwaga. Some other characteristic names of the canoes are: Kuyamataym’ — „Take care of yourself, that is, „because I shall get ahead of you”; the canoe of Liluta, called Siya’i, which is the name of a Government station, where some people from Liluta were once imprisoned; Topusa — a flying fish; Yagwa’u — a scarecrow; Akamta’u — I shall eat men, because the canoe was a gift from the cannibals of Dobu.
In the district of Luba there are at present only three canoes; one belongs to the chief of highest rank in the village of Olivilevi. This is the biggest canoe in all the Trobriands. Two are in the village of Wawela, and belong to two headmen, each ruling over a section of the village; one of them is seen being relashed on Plate XXVII.
The big settlement of Sinaketa, consisting of sectional villages, has also canoes. There are about four expert builders and carvers, and almost every man there knows a good deal about construction. In Vakuta the experts are even more numerous, and this is also the case in Kayleula and Kitava.
Chapter V. The ceremonial building of a waga
I — Construction of canoes as part of the Kula proceedings. Magic and mythology. The preparatory and the ceremonial stage of construction II — The first stage: expelling the wood sprite Tokway; transport of the log; the hollowingout of the log and the associated magic. III — The second stage: the inaugural rite of Kula magic; the native at grips with problems of construction; the wayugo creeper; the magical spell uttered over it; caulking; the three magical exorcisms. IV — Some general remarks about the two stages of canoe-building and the concomitant magic. Bulubwalata (evil magic) of canoes. The ornamental prowboards. The Dobuan and the Muruwan types of overseas canoe.
I
The building of the sea-going canoe (masawa) is inextricably bound up with the general proceedings of the Kula. As we have said before, in all villages where Kula is practised the masawa canoes are built and repaired only in direct connection with it. That is, as soon as a Kula expedition is decided upon, and its date fixed, all the canoes of the village must be overhauled, and those too old for repair must be replaced by new ones. As the overhauling differs only slightly from building in the later, ceremonial stages of the procedure, the account in this chapter covers both.
To the native, the construction of the canoe is the first link in the chain of the Kula performances. From the moment that the tree is felled till the return of the oversea party, there is one continuous flow of events, following in regular succession. Not only that: as we shall see, the technicalities of construction are interrupted and punctuated by magical rites. Some of these refer to the canoe, others belong to the Kula. Thus, canoe-building and the first stage of Kula dovetail into one another. Again, the launching of the canoe, and especially the kabigidoya (the formal presentation visit) are in one respect the final acts of canoe-building, and in another they belong to the Kula. In giving the account of canoe — building, therefore, we start on the long sequence of events which form a Kula expedition. No account of the Kula could be considered complete in which canoe-building had been omitted.
In this chapter, the incidents will be related one after the other as they happen in the normal routine of tribal life, obeying the commands of custom, and the indications of belief, the latter acting more rigidly and strongly even than the former. It will be necessary, in following this consecutive account, to keep in mind the definite, sociological mechanism underlying the activities, and the system of ideas at work in regulating labour and magic. The social organisation has been described in the previous chapter. We shall remember that the owner, the expert or experts, a small group of helpers, and the whole community are the social factors, each of which fulfils a different function in the organisation and performance of work. As to the magical ideas which govern the various rites, they will be analysed later on in the course of this and some of the following chapters, and also in Chapter XVII. Here it must suffice to say that they belong to several different systems of ideas. The one based on the myth of the flying canoe refers directly to the canoe; it aims at imparting a general excellence, and more especially the quality of speed to the canoe. The rites of the other type are really exorcisms directed against evil bewitchment (bulubwalata), of which the natives are much afraid. The third system of magic (performed during canoe construction) is the Kula magic, based on its own mythological cycle, and although performed on the canoe, yet aiming at the imparting of success to the toliwaga in his Kula transactions. Finally, at the beginnings of the proceedings there is some magic addressed to the tokway, the malignant wood sprite.