Discovering Fiji: Fiji’s famous war clubs, Part 2

Listen to this article:

A range of traditional Fijian weapons. Picture:www.greendragonsociety. com

Generally, Fiji war clubs were neither too heavy nor too light. Historical records show this made them effective and easy to use during battles and at the same time, this provided them with an “inflicting blow”.

Furthermore, each type of club was designed to specifically suit its user’s physical built, status in the community and personal taste, among other reasons.

On the other hand, ceremonial clubs were largely weightier than war clubs because they were made for carrying on the shoulders and not for fierce fighting.

Because ceremonial clubs were not used for crushing and striking, they had carvings on them using fine and intricate patterns.

Some were heavily decorated with inlaid bones and others – with “primitive decorative materials”. According to an online article on www. new-guinea-tribal-arts.com Fiji had “more styles of native weapons than anywhere else in the Pacific”. This has been attributed to the fact that Fiji experienced “a long history of warfare” and “rampant ceremonial cannibalism”.

Another online article on Pitt Rivers Museum website concurred that the type of club used in Fiji was “not surprising” given the “nature of Fijian society”.

“Warfare was part of everyday life on the islands whereby the early 1800s chaos reigned with local feuding and increasingly bloody civil wars becoming commonplace,” the article noted. “The different type of club illustrates that demand was great. The highly diversified array of Fijian war clubs reveals that the Fijian had devised a weapon for every type of stroke. Within the founding collection, the variety of club type is evident.” …Derrick classification To understand how war clubs were used, it is important to know a brief history of Fijian warfare. An expert and anecdotal commentary of Fijian warfare explained the state of affairs in Fiji to the end of the 19th century this way – that in most societies, tales of war pervaded “popular culture because they are rare breaks from long stretches of peace”.

In Fiji, according to the commentary, the case was a bit different! “Narratives of peace were told amidst an almost ceaseless series of family feuds and regional skirmishes,” it read.

“Account after account shows how Iliadic wars rose from infidelities. Battles did feature certain theatrical elements and some clubs were just used as representations of symbolic power, but men always kept a club on their person for personal safety rather than aesthetics.” Wars were not only against other neighbouring tribes and clans.

They were also against invading foreign forces like the Tongans. And as such, the design of some Fijian and Tongan clubs later shared a few similarities.

However, Tongan clubs were easily distinguished by the zigzag motifs carved on their surfaces. Clubs that had human and animal figures carved on them were believed to have given their handlers supernatural powers and protection. Others were elaborately designed with carvings inlaid with shells and whales tooth to signify rank, royalty and wealth.

A small range of clubs were used for ceremonies or as family inheritable antiques. An online commentary noted that by the 1880s, “war occupied the entire male population of Fiji”. As a result young boys were trained in the wielding of weapons from early childhood and only being given a real man’s name once they had killed an enemy.

Most battles started with missile weapons including showers of arrows and sling stones, spears and throwing clubs.

However, it was only when opposing warriors engaged each other with their heavy, two-handed clubs that casualties became serious. Among the earliest published sketches of Fijian clubs were those appearing in the Atlas Pittoresque accompanying the Narrative of Dumont d’Urville’s first voyage to the Pacifi c (1926-29), and in Fiji and the Fijians by Thomas Williams ( London, 1858).

D’Urville was in Fiji waters on this occasion only for a short time from May to June 1826. In his drawings, he recorded only a few weapons. The sketches were reasonably accurate nevertheless.

In Williams’s book, on the other hand, some of the twenty-one Fijian clubs illustrated were somewhat “distorted and out of proportion”.

Since the 1800s, war clubs had travelled outside of Fiji. Today, a wide range has found new homes in many museums in the world. Others remain in the hands of private collectors. Because of the interest around them, some of these clubs now fetch considerable high prices.

One BBC video put the cost of one totokia club, sometimes referred to as the “pineapple club”, at around 8000 pounds. “It (club) is made from an indigenous wood called vesi, which is incredibly tough. This club has taken a bit of a battering over the years, but it is equally very beautifully carved. Additionally, over the last few years, the market for native objects for these has shot up.

This piece would currently fetch around £8,000,” the video noted. Meanwhile, in a www.bbc.co.uk posting, the media outlet said Fijian war clubs were often “buried with chiefs or great warriors to accompany their spirit to the afterworld”. Amongst all the Pacific cultures, Fiji has shown perhaps the most innovation in the development of effi cient and fearsome weapons.

A wide range of weapons was made and as a consequence the “i-wau”, or depending on dialect “i-ravu” (clubs) of various types were favoured. The totokia’s unique design, for example, has made it a highly sought after wooden artefact. It is different from other club designs in both purpose and fashion.

Some believe it may possibly have been developed under “European” or “other external infl uence”. However, there is no evidence to support such a hypothesis. The “pineapple” club was among those illustrated in Dumont d’Urville’s Atlas. It was depicted as having a “massive globular head”, elaborately carved a traditional pattern suggestive of the fruit of the pandanus (vadra) or the pineapple, but not necessarily derived from these.

It was not used as other war clubs were, for delivering a shattering blow. The operative part was the pointed “beak,” which with the globular head was cleverly designed to pierce the victim’s skull, inflicting a fatal wound.

To achieve this purpose no wide arm-swinging was necessary. The mass of the head gave sufficient momentum when the club was moved through a short arc.

The totokia was therefore favoured for assassination, since the blow could be delivered from behind, without the momentous swing that could warn the victim.

Some museum collections have shown that Fijian weapons sometimes had distinctive notches, drilled holes or even human teeth cut or inlaid into them. These were done to allow a warrior to ‘keep a scoresheet’ of his triumphs in combat.

Most of Fiji’s war clubs, perhaps with the exception of the throwing, bladed and piercing varieties were generally for heavy and blunt blows delivered at close range and often targeted at the skulls.

Hence, they would very often inflict blunt force trauma caused by a forceful impact to the body without necessarily penetrating it.

To enable this, the wood used for weapon design would have been heavy and hard. The resulting blows easily caused contusions, lacerations and fractures that resulted in blood loss, tearing of soft body tissues, organ failure and injury, the splintering of bones and ultimately death.

To say that Fiji’s tribal wars and the use of war clubs were merely part of Fiji’s history may seem like an understatement. The truth is, it was intrinsically entrenched in the Fijian way of life.

Therefore, in olden days, club-yielding warriors had an important place and role in society. They enabled chiefs to wrestle and hold power and therefore were an integral parcel of the traditional Fijian leadership structures.

Warriors were also so important to chiefs that they were often buried with their wives and their weapons, a rite normally accorded to royalties. War clubs were inextricably linked to the old religion and its deities who demanded human sacrifices and war. This indirectly meant that religious practices also had a hand in influencing the frequency of lethal attacks and the weapons needed to make those killings.

Hence, revenge and hatred did not end when the enemy died, but were, along with religion, key reasons why cannibalism persisted. “. . . . it must be lamented that their worst crimes are sanctioned, and are continually promoted, by their divinities, who are not only cannibals and adulterers like themselves, but have pleasure in those that are such,” wrote Reverend John Hunt in 1858.

Before there was a raid or war Fijians engaged in a range of religious ceremonies where priests consulted with their traditional deities in an attempt to secure success in battle. In some cases, divine intervention was sought to make the weapons of enemies virtually harmless to warriors’ bodies.

History being the subject it is, a group’s version of events may not be the same as that held by another group. When publishing one account, it is not our intention to cause division or to disrespect other oral traditions. Those with a different version can contact us so we can publish your account of history too — Editor.

Array
(
    [post_type] => post
    [post_status] => publish
    [orderby] => date
    [order] => DESC
    [update_post_term_cache] => 
    [update_post_meta_cache] => 
    [cache_results] => 
    [category__in] => 1
    [posts_per_page] => 4
    [offset] => 0
    [no_found_rows] => 1
    [date_query] => Array
        (
            [0] => Array
                (
                    [after] => Array
                        (
                            [year] => 2023
                            [month] => 12
                            [day] => 29
                        )

                    [inclusive] => 1
                )

        )

)

No Posts found for specific category