Page:The disappearance of useful arts.djvu/12

116 Pöch found that the Monumbo living on the coast opposite Vulcan Island in German New Guinea do not use the bow and arrow. They have, however, a word for the bow in their language, and in their marriage ceremony the bride holds in her hand a symbolic bow and arrow, this ceremonial use pointing unmistakeably to the ancient importance of the weapon thus symbolized.

Again, in British New Guinea the storing of the bow and arrow in the marea or clubhouse among the Roro suggests that this weapon is an ancient possession of the people, and this is supported by the fact that even the Papuan tribes from whom the bow is obtained apply to it terms which are almost certainly Melanesian. In New Guinea, as in Melanesia, there is thus reason to believe that the bow and arrow was once a more important element of the culture than it is at present.

Having now established the fact that in certain parts of Oceania there have been lost three arts the utility of which would seem to make their disappearance most unlikely, I proceed to consider to what causes this disappearance is to be ascribed. I will consider these causes under three heads, material, social and magico-religious.

MATERIAL CAUSES.

The most obvious cause of the disappearance of an art, however useful it may be, is the absence of the raw material out of which it is made and I have first to consider whether the disuse of the canoe and of the bow in many