BOTANICAL MUSEUM LEAFLETS 



HARVARD UNIVERSITY 



Cambridge, Massachusetts Spring 1984 Vol. 30 No. 2 



STUDIES IN BARK CLOTH: /. POL YNESIA 



Dorothy Kamen-Kaye, F.L.S.* 



ABSTRACT 



Bark cloth ("tapa" in the lingua franca of Oceania) is among the 

 most ingenious conversions of plant materials to his uses ever 

 devised by man. 



From the inner bark (bast, liber) of three moraceous trees, and 

 (less often) from a few other plants, he has provided himself, from 

 very early times, with a cloth not only suitable for daily clothing but 

 also with garments to be worn for ceremonial and religious obser- 

 vances or as an indicator of economic status. In parts of the world 

 where climate and flora favor its manufacture and use, and from his 

 loincloth to the "clothing" of his gods, man's use of bark cloth has 

 been a basic element of his life for unnumbered generations. 



Contact with cultures more technically advanced than his own 

 has made available to him materials with which to replace his 

 laboriously produced bark cloth, and has enabled primitive man in 

 both the Old and New Worlds to abandon the use of bark cloth for 

 clothing and domestic needs for suitable and practical substitutes. 

 That he has not abandoned its use completely is evident from its 

 presence today among the peoples of both Oceania and the Ameri- 

 cas where groups retain the practice of traditional observances and 

 customs. They continue to make bark cloth occasionally for every- 

 day clothing, especially for work, and for mandatory ceremonial 

 regalia. 



The representative teaching collections of bark cloth in the 

 Botanical Museum of Harvard University, which include examples 

 from the 18th, 19th, and 20th centuries, constitute the basic refer- 

 ences for this paper. 



♦Associate in Ethnobotany, Botanical Museum, Harvard University. 



Botanical Museum leaflets (ISSN 0006 8098). Published quarterly by the Botanical Museum. Har- 

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Published April 15. 1985 



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