PART II. 



Personal Ornaments. 



By R. Shelford, m. a., f. l. s., etc. 

 Curator of the Sarawak Museum. 



This part of the illustrated catalogue treats only of the 

 objects worn for decorative purposes by the natives of Borneo 

 at the present day or in the immediate past, the objects forming- 

 no part of an essential body covering or attire. Consequently 

 such articles as caps, hats, jackets or kirtles decorated with bead- 

 work, metal rattles, cowries etc. are not included in this part of 

 the catalogue, they must be catalogued subsequently under 

 some such heading as Dress or Festal Attire. Similarly I have 

 excluded the antique ornaments and fragments of ornaments 

 that are found frequently by native gold-seekers in the head- 

 waters of the Sarawak river and elsewhere in Sarawak and 

 of which there is a small collection in the Sarawak Museum ; 

 they all seem to belong to a former civilization merely transitory 

 in Borneo.* An exception has been made in favour of the 

 antique beads of uncertain origin so largely worn in necklets 

 and girdles by the men and women of most Bornean tribes ; 

 these are shortly discussed in their proper place in this paper. 



The question of the relationship between magic and personal 

 ornamentation has not been lost sight of and many en- 

 quiries on the subject have been set afoot, without, however, 

 eliciting much information of any importance. In face of the 

 facts recorded from other parts of the world, it seems in the 

 highest degree probable that certain ornaments of some Bornean 

 tribes were also endowed once with a magical significance, and 

 it is possible that the restriction of the wearing of certain 

 ornaments at the present day to individuals of a given social 



* For an account of and a suggestion as to the origin of some gold 

 ornaments found at Limbang in Northern Sarawak in 1900 see Man 

 1903 No. 2. " Note on a collection of Gold Objects found in Sarawak, in 

 the possession of His Highness the Rajah of Sarawak" by C. H. Read. 



E. A Soc, No. 43, 1905. 



