i-;© SECTIONAL ADDRESSES 



in the Naga hills. Thus the Fijian reluctance to kill a chief,®' although 

 it has its parallel in the taboo among the Konyak Nagas in shedding 

 chiefly blood (where a chief has been murdered it has generally been by 

 some method which avoids bloodshed), is also reported of the Lakher 

 and the Lushei,®^ where it is unlucky for even an enemy chief to be 

 killed accidentally when fighting against one, and he is never killed 

 wittingly. 



Teknonymy ^' is more typical of the Kuki than the Naga, though indeed 

 the Kachha Nagas and some non-Naga tribes practise it ; the payment 

 of ' bone prices ' ^°° is rather Kuki than Naga, in spite of occasional 

 occurrences in certain tribes, and cross cousin marriage, which the 

 Kuki advocates, is banned in the first generation by most Nagas. The 

 use of caves for burial ^"^ is also more Kuki than Naga, while the Fijian 

 belief that spirits perambulate up and down the street, making it necessary 

 that doorways should face across it,^''^ reappears in the same form among 

 the Thado Kuki, who will not build a house facing down the village street, 

 because if they did all the wandering spirits would drift in. The nose- 

 flute ^"^ does not appear in the Naga hills at all, but is to be found on 

 the north bank of the Bramaputra in Assam, and the practice of sitting 

 as a sign of respect, though probably general in Assam, as in Fiji,^*** 

 is only specifically prescribed by the Assamese themselves, though on 

 account of its association with the sanctity of the head it may probably be 

 inferred elsewhere in Assam. The double canoe, which is associated in 

 Fiji 1"^ with rank and quality, has possibly the same association in the 

 Manipur state, where the rooks on the black side of a Manipur chess set 

 take the form of double canoes as being superior to the single canoe 

 which serves as a rook for its white opponent. One close parallel in 

 Kuki and Fijian belief appears in the tradition of the serpent god coiled 

 round the earth, whose movements cause the earth to quake. ^°® This 

 god appears entirely unknown to the purely Naga tribes. Like the 

 Thado Kuki or Lakher, also the Fijian uses a recessed grave, at any rate 

 for his chiefs.^*^' 



I turn now to the Marquesas. Information as to these islands is much 

 less easily available than information as to Fiji, but such accounts as we 

 have very definitely suggest a number of comparisons with the Naga 

 hills in Assam. In the Marquesas the practice of head-hunting, with 

 the preservation and decoration of heads and with particular attention 

 to the preservation of the lower jaw,^"^ has points in common with Naga 



»' Williams, II, 39. »« Shakespear, 58 ; Parry, 63. 



»» Brewster, 181 ; Shakespear, 19 ; Shaw, 140 ; Parry, 238 ; Playfair, 147 ; 

 Mills, 270. 



1"" Shaw, 56 M.2 ; Parry, 288, 418 ; Shakespear, 147, 166, 199 ; Deane, 80. 



^""^ Shaw, 53 M.* 



"^ Williams, II, 245 ; Shaw, 85 n.^ i"' WiUiams, II, 163. 



104 Williams, I, 130 ; II, 38 ; Waterhouse, II, 340. 



105 Waterhouse, II, 347. 



'••* Brewster, 81, 255 ; Waterhouse, I, 42 ; Shaw, 72. 

 1"" Fison ; Shaw, 55 n.^, 56 n.^ ; Parry, 412 sq. 



i»8 Handy, 139. Cf. Ellis, III, 1, 308 : ' The victors [in Tahiti] took away 

 the lower jawbones of the most distinguished among the slain.' 



