AUT. 1^9 BUFFALO MOTIVE IN' MIDDLE CELEBES HOUGH 5 



cially instructive are the bands and panels of all-over geometric designs 

 met with in many places over the region mentioned but which in this 

 case are believed to be derived from the buffalo motives (pis. 8 and 9) . 

 Attention is called to the openwork projections at the ends of a 

 weaving frame which shows the buffalo design at its highest 

 excellence (pi. 9). 



BARK CLOTH IN THE CELEBES 



Bark cloth is quite generally used in the Celebes. It is made by 

 the simple tools and processes accompanying the art wherever it is 

 l)rosecuted. Naturally the art is of varying competency in different 

 ])arts of its area of distribution. The contrast between the bark cloth 

 of Africa, Malaysia, and Polynesia is very great. That of Africa is 

 crudest, of Malaysia intermediate, and of Polynesia best. There is 

 evident connection of Malay bark cloth w4th that of Polynesia and it 

 is possible that bark-cloth making in Africa is remotely derived from 

 East Indian sources. 



Bark cloth seems to have an ancient and wide distribution in 

 tropical and subtropical lands. The range of the art is seen to be 

 limited by the distribution of forest elements having interlacing 

 bark filaments capable of being softened and expanded by the uni- 

 versal process of beating practiced in the range of the bark-cloth art. 



The tools necessary in the making of bark cloth are simple, but are 

 the result of a knowledge that the expansion of the bark into cloth 

 is facilitated by an implement having a succession of ridges on its 

 s'arface. It was found that the ridged tool was essential to success in 

 working the bark. This tool is therefore found wherever bark cloth 

 is made. 



In the zones of the New "World where the bark of proper texture 

 occurs grooved beaters are found. So far as they have survived 

 only stone-age tools for bark beating are found in America as in 

 Mexico, but wooden beaters may have been used. Ethnological 

 specimens in the Abbott collections indicate that in Malaysia and in 

 the islands off the coast of New Guinea stone beaters ha f ted in 

 thong handles were the rule, but wooden grooved clubs were also 

 used. In the Celebes the wooden clubs were required for softening 

 the bark, which was then finished with the stone tools. Generally 

 these are oblong-ovate slabs of stone grooved on one or both sides, 

 or pestle shape as in some of the Papuan islands mentioned above. 

 The Celebes form is a pounder of wood and stone (U.S.N.M. No. 

 301345, from Koelawi). 



The material of which bark cloth is made in the Celebes has not 

 been botanicallv identified. The bark used at Koelawi is from the 



