14 MEMOIES OF THE QUEENSLAND MUSEUM. 



MALEKULA EFFIGY. 



AS ILLUSTRATED BY A SPECIMEN IN THE QUEENSLAND 

 MUSEUM COLLECTIONS. 



By R. Hamlyn-Harris, D.Sc, Etc. (Director). 

 (Plates VII. and VIII.) 



We have in our collection an effigy from Malekula, New Hebrides, 

 and although specimens of this kind have been previously referred to, their 

 growing scarcity warrants a few descriptive remarks to the accompanying plates. 

 The south end of Malekula is inhabited by people materially different from 

 other inhabitants of the island in a great many particulars, and who stand 

 out as a peculiar race from any of the other natives of the New Hebrides group. 

 Some of their remarkable characteristics are particularly noticeable in their 

 dealing with their friends after death. Mr. Douglas Rannie, who spent some 

 years in the islands, has been good enough to supply me with the following 

 information:—" After death the cranium and as many of the bones as can 

 conveniently be gathered are collected and put together in the form of an effigy 

 resembling the human form. The body is composed of a framework made from 

 bones, sticks, grass, and fibre all inlaid with clay, which is ornamented and 

 painted with various coloured pigments, the whole being surmounted by the 

 skull of the deceased, on which is replaced the original scalp which has previously 

 been reinoved for the purpose. These effigies are then placed in upright positions 

 around the walls of the council chamber known as the ' Amil ' house. Arrows 

 are shot into the eye-sockets, presumably to deprive the dead from all knowledge 

 of the doings or actions of posterity. In many instances the most prized posses- 

 sions of the deceased during life are placed within grasp of the effigy." Now, 

 although these remarks may hold good in the main, our Queensland Museum 

 specimen is, I think, not prepared quite in the same way, since I cannot discover 

 the presence of human bones in the framework, with the exception of the 

 typically elongate head, but is apparently simply put together with sticks, grass, 

 and fibre, and matted together with clay. Individual specimens show consider- 

 able minor differences. Some have feet ; ours has the appearance of walking on 

 stilts, being minus feet; in addition, each knee is decorated with a small head. 

 The Melbourne Museum specimens carry nothing in their hands — in fact, they 

 do not possess them, they only appear to have stumps coming to a point; and 

 whereas the latter possess most elaborate shoulders drawn to a great height over 

 the head or mask with two faces on each shoulder one above the other, our 

 specimen contains only one face on each shoulder and is not unduly prolonged. 





