i62 SECTIONAL ADDRESSES 



the heads of which consist of hollow wicker cases into which the skull is 

 put. Their neighbours, e.g. Angfang, carve on to the wooden statue 

 complete with head two projecting horns to hold the skull in place. In 

 neither case does the skull, however, form a permanent part of the soul 

 figure as it does in New Guinea, where at Ron (or Run) soul images are 

 reported, the heads of which are made with the skulls of the deceased.® 

 But an intermediate link appears to be found in the Nicobar Islands, 

 where to a deceased person a wooden image is set up which has a cup- 

 board in the back into which the bones are put and two horns or a sort 

 of cup, in this case arising out of the neck, to form a receptacle for the 

 dead man's skull. ^ A third link is supplied by the Khasia hills in Assam, 

 where the War of Sheila erect a wooden post to accommodate the bones 

 of the dead man, which are placed in the post symbolically by means of 

 a cowrie used to represent what is left of his bones after cremation.* 

 Another link is probably to be found in the Borneo practice of interring 

 the person's bones in a post.® 



The third example I offer is that of the associations of the hornbill 

 with head hunting. This is well known in Assam and there is no need 

 for me to go into details here, except to say that the tail feathers of 

 Dichoceros bicornis are used by all Naga tribes as insignia of successful 

 head-hunters,^" while the head of the same bird is worn at the back of 

 the neck by men of the Lhota Naga tribe ^^ who have set up a menhir, 

 and its split mandibles serve as ' horns ' with the same significance as 

 the feather for some tribes on their cane helmets as for the Angami on 

 their breast ornaments. ^^ The feathers and head of Aceros nepalensis 

 and Rhytidoceros undulatus are sometimes used as a substitute when those 

 of dichoceros cannot be obtained. 



For parallels in Borneo and New Guinea I am indebted to Dr. Haddon. 

 The white-crested hornbill {Berenicornis comatus) is looked for as an 

 omen on the warpath by Kayans, who wear hornbill feathers and, like 

 several Naga tribes, tattoo their hands or arms as insignia of head- 

 taking ^^ ; Buceros is similarly regarded as a good omen in Humboldt 

 Bay in New Guinea and the wearing of its upper mandible in the hair is 

 a sign that the wearer has taken human life elsewhere in New Guinea.^* 

 Williams, writing of Orokaiya society in 1930, says that the hornbill's 

 corrugated beak was apparently used as an emblem of homicide in former 

 times and concludes that hornbill beaks and heads were exclusive homicidal 

 insignia in British New Guinea. ^^ 



It will, however, probably be safer to examine limited areas more 

 closely for the existence of groups of parallels between Assam and Oceania 



' Frazer, I, 311, 324, quoting F. S. A. le Clercq and J. L. van der Roest. 

 ' Bonington, 1932, Man, 133. 



* Information in writer's possession, but as yet unpublished. 

 ® Ling, Roth, Natives of Sarawak and British North Borneo, 2, 210 (quoting 

 Prof. Kiikenthal). 



^° Hutton, I, 29, 392 ; Mills, I, 13, 109. 



" Mills, I. 14. " Hutton, I, 30. " Haddon, II, 388. 



^* Haddon, I, 200. 



1' Williams, F. E., Orokaiva Society, 19, 39, 17S. 



