TRADE AND COMMUNICATIONS. 225 



about the mamacur, of its only being found in the possession of the kings, and moreover of its being 

 considered a holy object, an oracle, an amulet, the stripes and bubbles of the mass being of great signifi- 

 cance. As places of origin the natives mentioned différent localities; still the real mamacur was said to 

 hâve issued from the sea or from the mountains, while imitations came from Babber Island. Remarkable is 

 Rumphius's information, that the Papuans decidedly preferred the green sort of rings, and that they 

 believed in the Chinese origin of the others. 



Bickmore [186S, 151] saw some six of thèse rings, in the possession of the prince of Assilulu on 

 Ambon, coming from Ceram and having issued from the heads of snakes and wild boars and which were 

 worshipped as most extraordinary objects. They were "evidently made by cutting off a pièce of a glass 

 rod, nine or ten inches long and half an inch in diameter. This pièce, having been heated, was bent into 

 a ring and the two ends united by fusion". Indeed sometimes a place of fusion may be seen, as Rumphius 

 illustrâtes. Bickmore mentions China as the place of origin, because he found there néphrite rings of a 

 similar shape. 



Riedel [1886, 121] found them still used as ornaments for the arm on Ceram, which Valentijn 

 also mentions, and he explains the belief of the natives, who accept their originating from the soil, as 

 having arisen from the accidentai finding of thèse rings, purposely hidden in the earth; — he does not at 

 ail doubt their Chinese origin. A couple of thèse rings (blue), now in the Dresden Muséum (N os . 5203 — 5204), 

 were bought for 60 guilders; Meyer [1884, 15] considers them to hâve corne from China, which up till 

 now, as he proves, exports glass rings eastward and westward. From the fact that Martin [1894] does not 

 mention the glass rings among the numerous sorts of bracelets, which he describes, and that he never saw 

 them worn, as he kindly informed me in his letter of the 2 5 lh of Febr. 1905, may be concluded, that 

 now-a-days they very rarely occur as ornaments for the arm. 



According to Van der Chijs [1885, 182, N°. 3038], the two mamacurs in the Batavia Muséum 

 are from Ceram origin and not from Java itself ; both this, and Mr. P. G. Rouffaer's expérience, of which 

 he was kind enough to give me a written account (February the 9 th 1905), saying, that he had never 

 perceived anything like the mamacur in the island of Java, render Rumphius's narrative of the Javanese, 

 buying up the mamacurs as présents for their chiefs, very improbable. 



The Amsterdam Muséum possesses four of thèse mamacurs (Ser. 1, N° s . 1416 — 1419), ail coming 

 from Wahai on Ceram, and N°. 141 7 quite the same as the khâs of Tobadi. Also the Leyden Muséum 

 possesses a mamacur, which has proved the mamacur to be as highly valued on Ceram at présent, as 

 it was two centuries and a half ago, and the same story about the possession was repeated hère. Van 

 Hoëvell [1896, 508, 521], who presented the object to the Leyden Muséum, was in 1893 obliged to seize 

 this ring, because it was the subject of a quarrel between the villages of Sisiulu and Numiali, situated on 

 the north-west coast of Ceram, several murders having already been committed for its possession. From 

 little pièces, broken off, the material proved to be ordinary green glass. Van Hoëvell, Ex-Governor 

 of Celebes and Dependencies, and formerly Résident at Amboina, well acquainted with the Ceram ethno- 

 graphy, according to auricular intelligence, has no doubt about the Chinese origin. 



In ail thèse reports, New Guinea is very little mentioned. Meyer [1902 — 03, 14, 15], however, 

 considers a néphrite ring of unknown origin, preserved in the Dresden Muséum, and by its shape (inner 

 rim thicker than outerrim), perhaps an imitation (or example?) of the mamacur, probably coming from 

 New Guinea. I never heard of the ring being found in western New Guinea, nor has it been in Geelvink Bay. 

 It is to be hoped, that within a short time, especially on the coasts between Point 

 D' Urville and Humboldt Bay, a further exploration may be made, to confirm by other finds, 

 that Chinese trade had conquered thèse coasts before the arrivai of the Malays. 



In this connection I must mention three copper objects (N os . 694 — 696, PI. XXIV, 

 figs. 1, 2, 3), found in the community house of the village of Asé (Lake Sentâni). In this 

 Nova Guinea. III. Ethnography. 29 



