398 Memoirs Bcrnicc P. BisJwp Museum 



HOOK AND LINE 



Line fishing was carried on both from the rocks and fnnn canoes. On the 

 southern side of Hiva Oa the natives resorted to submerged banks which lay 

 several miles oft shore, and fishing expeditions to the various uninhabited 

 islands of the group were not uncommon. The lines used in deep sea fishing 

 were made either of fau bark or coconut fiber; those used by the women in 

 fishing for small fish were made of pineapple fiber. (See p. 379.) 



A varietv of hooks were used, their size and material varying with the 

 nature of the fishing. A tiny hook, made from a single thorn from the edge of 

 a pandanus leaf, was used to catch the little fish in the rock pools. Larger 

 hooks were made either from pearl shell or human bone or a combination of the 

 two. Simple shell hooks (PI. Lxxi, A, i) were laboriously ground out of a thick 

 pearl shell. The gleam of the nacre served as a lure and made bait unnecessary. 

 Such hooks were barbless with only slightly recurved ]-)oints and had nuich the 

 shape of a "]." The upjier end was slightlv notched on one or l)oth sides for 

 the attachment of the line. A more elaborate form of one piece hook is shown 

 (PI. LXXI, A, 2). A composite hook made entirelv of pearl shell was also em- 

 ployed. (PI. LXXI, A. 3.) One section of this hook corresponds to the one- 

 piece hook except for slightly greater angularitv at the bend. The second piece 

 consisted of a simple band of shell of the same width and length as the shank of 

 the first piece. It was bound to the shank with lashings near the toj) and bottom, 

 the nacre sides of the two pieces being brought together so that the surface of the 

 completed hook was dark except at the barb. The tvpe is represented only by sev- 

 eral specimens in the Salem Museum, and no information in regard to it was 

 obtained in the Marquesas. This form seems to be a purely local development 

 and does not occur in other ])arts of Polynesia. 



One-piece hooks of human bone were occasionallv used, made from the 

 curve of the lower jaw. Desgraz (15, p. 285) savs that thev were sharper than 

 the pearl hooks and that their form was angular rather than oval, but as no 

 specimens have been preserved in American collections exact description is im- 

 possible. 



Composite hooks of shell and human bone were used to troll for bonito. 



The ancient form with only slight modifications continues in use to the present 



date. (See PI. lxxi, B.) 



The body of a hook of this sort consists of a strip of shell J,] 2 to 4'j inches long and 

 about % of an inch wide, pointed at one end and square at the other. In inakina: this strip 

 the pointed end is ground from the valve. Some strips are as much as ^4 of an inch thick 

 at the point while the body of the strip is rarely over 3/16 of an inch thick. The outside of the 

 shell, which forms the bottom of the strip, is ground down until it sliows a good luster with a 

 pink, yellow or brown tint. The color is very important, for the strip serves as a lure, and fish 

 refuse to take hooks which are not of the right shade. The thick point of the strip is pierced 



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