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Samoan Material Culture

Customs And Usage

Customs And Usage

There is nothing to be added to what has been said about the making of the smaller dugout canoes. They were common and did not enter into the ceremonial which surrounds expert craftsmanship. The plank canoes which involved the laying of keels and expert shaping came within the sphere of the Sa Tangaloa, the builders' guild. The builders built canoes as well as houses. In the mythical tales of the early meetings of the guild, with Tangaloa himself presiding, one of the subjects that came up for discussion was whether sennit braid ('afa) should be used first on a canoe or a house. It was decided in favor of the house and sennit braid was thus used on houses before the canoes. As the houses were the better type of house made by the Sa Tangaloa we may take it that the canoes were also the better types. The story would seem to indicate that the higher development of the house preceded the making of plank canoes. Cook houses, ordinary dwelling houses, and the simpler dugout canoes were beneath the notice of the Sa Tangaloa and would not, therefore, come up for discussion. The lashing of canoes with sennit braid must go as far back in time as there were coconuts to provide fibre so they historical discussion must have dealt with a special use that involved quantity and method such as is explained by the lashing of planks, and not the ordinary lashing of outrigger booms alone to ordinary dugouts.

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The person desiring a better class of canoe had to approach a master builder with all the ceremonial preliminaries observed in house building. The canoe and the house were on the same level. The chief, therefore, mobilized his family and his resources beforehand. He planted food crops and collected fine mats for he had to feed and pay the master builder and his associates. Everything being ready, he approached the desired builder with a fine mat and over the ceremonial bowl of kava made his request and proffered his mat. The builder replied and if he accepted the mat, the contract was sealed. If he refused, the chief sought another expert with the rejected mat.

The builder on an appointed day arrived with his party, selected the timber and did the preliminary shaping whilst the chief's family did the rough work in transporting the timber from the forest to the village. The wood was allowed to season while the builders returned home. The wood sufficiently seasoned, the builders returned and dwelt on the hospitality of the chief and his family. All the general observances described in house building were carried out in canoe building. The builders had to be fed on the best of food with variety in delicacies or they abandoned the work which no one else would take up. A member of the chief's family had to be in constant attendance to show the respect evinced by an active interest in the work, as well as to anticipate the material wants of the builders. Interim payments had to be made and if they proved unsatisfactory to the builders, they left on the pretext that they had not been treated with sufficient respect.

Stair (33, p. 150) gives the five interim payments as follows:

  • 'O le taunga. The fine mat at the first interview.
  • 'O le oloa. At the laying of the keel.
  • 'O le tao fanonga.
  • 'O le sa. On the completion of the sides,
  • 'O le umusanga. On the completion of the work.

According to Stair, the most ceremonial payment was on the completion of the sides of the canoe. The fine mats were divided up into six portions, and each portion was given with an appropriate speech for a specified reason.

  • 'O afu i vao. The covering (afu) for working in the bush.
  • 'O le solinga. The cutting of the timber.
  • 'O le afu o le tufunga. The covering of the principal builder.
  • 'O le afu o le ava. The covering of the builder's wife.
  • 'O le si'inga o le taumua. The lifting of the bow of the canoe.
  • 'O le salusalunga o le ta'ele. The rubbing smooth of the keel.

In house building, a similar enumeration took place at the final payment. Stair (33, p. 151) states that strange scenes were seen at the final payment. page 416The chief's family sat within the guest house and the builders sat outside in the open space before it. Women wearing the fine mats went out and then laid them before the builders. If not enough, the builders coaxed and threatened, saying the payment was inadequate and not what they considered in keeping with the rank of their employer. The chief pleaded poverty. The builders replied by asking why, if poor, he had presumed to employ them. If the chief produced some more mats, the builders were extravagant in their praise; if not, they were equally loud in their vituperation. However, the chief was at last in a commanding position for the canoe was finished and no strike could affect him. All that the builders could do was to return home and broadcast accounts of the chief's parsimony to all and sundry.

During the building of the canoe, however, the builders could adopt a rather mean way of venting their spite on a chief when it was net deemed advisable to go on strike. They could make the canoe, if it were a fishing canoe, unlucky. There were two ways of doing this. The lashings of the topsides or gunwale to the side pieces in a bonito canoe are called the pu fangota. The correct number of lashings as already stated are 15 on the right and 16 on the left. All the builders had to do was to change that number and the canoe would never catch more than ten bonito. This may apply only to Tutuila where it was told to me but it gives an idea of how simply a disaster could be brought on the man who was sparing of food and fine mats. The man who had reason to suspect the builders probably watched the drilling of the topsides very carefully. Even so, there was another method easily overlooked. In the temporary fitting of the side pieces, small wooden wedges, tina or mata lafi, were driven under the lashings to tighten them. In permanent lashings, these wedges were of course removed. All the dissatisfied builder had to do was to leave a temporary lashing with the wedge under it and the finest bonito hook could not overcome the evil influence of that one wedge. The wedge was left in a lashing under the bow or stern narrow part. When the bow or stern cover was lashed, the keenest-sighted owner could not locate the wedge. He found out afterwards from results or rather from lack of results.

In Savaii, I watched a master builder solemnly strike an unhusked green coconut against the bow piece of a newly-built bonito canoe, walk sedately around the canoe twice and as I waited with a camera until he struck it again sufficiently hard enough to crack it to make the contents flow, he cast it into the sea. He then pushed the canoe out into the lagoon and critically watched the set of the float and how the canoe rode in the water. The owner then waded out, got aboard and showed her speed to the admiring family gathered on the beach. Whether the coconut was a substitute for the bottle of wine of another culture, I was unable to determine. In spite of the head builder's page 417assurances to the contrary, I looked upon him as a biased witness. Besides, he was the man who said that stone adzes were hafted with the bevel surface in front.