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INSTITUTE OF SOCIAL ANTHROPOLOGY — PUBLICATION NO. 15 



(1) The hdnyesu, an arrow which is used for 

 shooting monkeys and large birds, is made by lash- 

 ing an inch-long slender barb of siriva palm or 

 piuva about an inch back from the sharpened point 

 of the foreshaft. 



(2) The salditsu, or fish arrow, is made by 

 lashing four slender points of wood about 2 inches 

 long to the end of the foreshaft. This arrow need 

 not be feathered. Today wire is sometimes 

 substituted for the wooden points. 



(3) The dunkisu, or blunt bird arrow, used for 

 shooting small birds, has a separate piuva foreshaft, 

 the end of which forms a rounded flat surface about 

 an inch in diameter. 



(4) The hoptisu, or big game arrow, has a broad 

 split bamboo point about 12 inches in length 

 which is lashed to the foreshaft. As the bamboo 

 point is slightly grooved along the center, the 

 foreshaft lies along the groove permitting it to be 

 lashed firmly to the tapered sides of the point. 

 Formerly curare poison was smeared along the 

 groove. This was also the arrow used in war. 



Sometimes a bamboo point is serrated on one 

 or both sides. In former times, this arrow- 

 head was poisoned with curare. It was attached 

 loosely to the shaft so that when it struck an 

 animal it became detached from the shaft. This 

 arrow was used against big game like the jaguar, 

 tapir, deer, and against human enemies. 



The bow is held in a vertical position when 

 shooting; the arrow is held with the thumb and 

 forefinger while the middle and ring finger pull 

 the bowstring, with the arrow resting against the 

 hand side of the bow. 



Cordage is made from the fibers of the tucum 

 and buriti palms and from cotton. The tucum 

 palm (Astrocaryum tucuma), hatdtsu, provides not 

 only fiber but the hard shell of the nut is used for 

 making the black, round, flat necklace washers, 

 and the thorns from the trunk are used as spikes 

 in the manioc grater. Tucum twine which is a 

 little stronger than buriti twine is used for bow- 

 strings, for stringing beads, and for many other 

 purposes. When a man needs tucum twine he 

 sends his wife to gather the palm leaves. As the 

 young trees grow in clumps, it is a simple matter 

 for the woman to cut off a number of fronds. The 

 woman then takes a long slender leaf, bends it 

 double in the middle so that the woody fiber 

 breaks, then doubles it back and pulls downward 



on one half while holding the other, thus stripping 

 the fine fiber from the body of the leaf. She then 

 turns the leaf over and strips the other half. 

 Later she picks off whatever bits of green skin 

 that adheres to the fibers and twirls one end 

 between her fingers to keep the fibers together. 

 From each leaf, therefore, she gets a pale green 

 whip of fiber which forms the raw material for 

 cordage making. A number of these whips are 

 wrapped in embira, the bundle being known as 

 ddidjusu, and stored away for future use. 



When a man wishes to make cordage he begins 

 to add these whips to existing bits of twine or 

 cord. I never saw a man making a completely 

 new cord. The end of an old piece of cordage is J 

 unraveled and three whips are joined to it at 

 intervals of several inches and rolled together on 

 the thigh, the motion being toward the body, j 

 This stroke rolls up the fibers into three tight 

 strands. On the downward stroke the three sep- 

 arate strands are "laid up" or rolled together to 

 form the cord. Three new whips are added and 

 the process is repeated until the cord is of the 

 desired length. If the man wishes to make finer 

 cord he separates each whip into a number of parts. 



The making of cordage from buriti (Mauritia 

 mnvfera), yelasu, as has been mentioned, is man's 

 work. The man finds a young buriti palm and 

 from the top of it cuts down the shoot which 

 encloses the three leafstalks. This growing part 

 is a tapered rod about 5 feet long and triangular 

 in shape. When twisted this rod cracks open 

 revealing countless fine strands covered with a I 

 green skin, each strand having a hard embryonic , 

 leaf stem running through the center. First the 

 man peels off the green outer skin and then pulls 1 

 out the embryonic leaf stem. What he has left ; 

 is a hank of lemon-colored, soft, grasslike ribbons 

 the length of the original rod and about one-half 

 of an inch in width. These ribbons he coils and 

 places in a pot and boils for about 20 minutes so 

 that the starchy material is loosened. In former 

 times the hank was placed in the hot sand under 

 the fire and sprinkled with water. When the coil 

 is cool enough to handle the man opens it out and 

 begins to rub it between his hands just as does a 

 woman washing a strip of cloth, periodically 

 dipping it into the warm water. As he rubs, the 

 hank gets quite sticky as the starchy material 



