454 ANNUAL REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 1926 
kabau, in Sumatra, owes its name to a contest of. this sort some- 
where back around the fourteenth century, the words meaning “ van- 
quished carabao” (water buffalo).*° 
Generally speaking, bullfights are common in all the Malay States 
not under British rule.2*. The same is the case in Java; but here, 
owing probably to the introduction first of Buddhism and later of 
Mohammedanism, the custom seems to have lost most of its ritual 
features and survives as little more than a popular pastime.?? In 
the island of Timor the actual fight itself seems not to have been 
reported as occurring; but other features of the rite appear, buffaloes 
being sacrificed at festivals attended by much hard drinking, while 
the slaughtered animals’ horns are set up on high poles as cult 
objects.*3 So perhaps it is fair to assume a connection with the 
rite as it appears elsewhere in fuller form. 
In Madagascar fights between bulls were the favorite amusement 
of the former sovereigns and their courtiers, who availed them- 
selves of such occasions (as they did, it is only fair to say, of every 
other) for getting royally drunk.** While direct evidence that 
ritualistic observances attached to these rites seems to be wanting, 
still we know that bulls were sacrificed and eaten at communal 
feasts and that they could only be killed by the local headmen 
officiating as chief priests of their respective groups. ‘The animals’ 
horns, furthermore, were mounted upon lofty masts just as else- 
where. Hence it seems likely that in Madagascar also the bull fight 
was originally of a ritual character and that it was one of the cul- 
ture elements brought with them, along with so many others char- 
acteristic of the irrigated rice culture area of southern Asia and 
the neighboring islands, by the Hovas. The latter, however, can 
hardly have transported cattle across the Indian Ocean, for prior 
to the introduction of the Arab dhow their largest craft appear to 
have been nothing more than fairly sizeable seagoing canoes, pro- 
pelled entirely by the paddle. Moreover, the existing breeds of the 
cattle owned by the Malagasy, together with the very word for 
“ox” itself,2> appear to have been derived from East Africa. That 
the immigrants, in spite of this, should have preserved so many 
features of the cult speaks strongly for its vitality. 
2G, E. Gerini, ‘‘ Researches on Ptolemy’s geography of eastern Asia (further India and 
Indo-Malay Archipelago),’’ London, 1909, p. 641 and note 1. 
21 Nelson Annandale, ‘The Faroes and Iceland: Studies in island life,’’ Oxford, 1905, 
p. 185. 
#2 A. H. Kiehl, “ Notes on the Javanese,” Journal of the Anthropological Institute, Vol. 
—, 1877, p. 357. 
23H. O. Forbes, ‘On some of the tribes of the island of Timor,” Journal of the Anthro- 
pological Institute, Vol, XIII, 1884, p. 419. 
*C, Staniland Wake, ‘“‘ Notes on the origin of the Malagasy,’ Journal of the Anthro- 
pological Institute, Vol. XI, 1882, p. 25; also James Sibree, “A naturalist in Madagascar,” 
Philadelphia, 1915, pp. 182 et seq. 
2 QOmby, almost certainly connected with the Swahili ngombe; cf. Sibree, op. cit., p. 35. 
