[Note: this transcription was produced by an automatic OCR engine]

526 MALEKULA
in the amel. When they were ï¬Ånished an object called mmzi
kombai, made of cross-pieces of nimbew BRANCHES (nimbal nin
m'mbew), was set up over the stretcher (which was still in the
house) and from it were hung objects resembling fruit, painted
in red.‘ When all this had been done, the gongs were manned
and the rhythms of all the grades of the Nimzmgki which Apwil
Naandu had entered were beaten out in the order in which he
had taken them, after which the rhythm ndelmielmas, the signal
for the ceremony of pig-killing, was given. e
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Fla 86. Plan of the dancing ground during the celebration of the Nimesiun
rites.
A = the house of the dead ruan. = the amel.
B = the overturned newt mmbar. = the nisamjk enclosure.
C C = the bushes planted around the = strand of lawyer cane (niurial
b I Ii
nu/st nambar. m n m al).
= the naai 1/or for the bier. T T = decorations of umnnnwgk.
= the fence along the '/mm‘ rule. N = a tall post, to which strands
the gangs. oi lawyer cane, decorated
= the tame: mminggnl. withu/Mm1Mlgk,a.re fastened,
= the fence around the gongs. whence they stretch to the
= the mmibou. a¢'mlm4>. amol and the nisamp.
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Next morning, the ï¬Åtth day after the death, the gong-beat
mmi ms, which belongs to all grades of the N ulawan, was
sounded. Then the men of Loorveli (that is, of the dead man's
own village) made an object called nivarmbur from a frond of the
ivy-nut palm which they stripped of its leaflets and painted white,
red, and yellow. This they fastened by means of a creeper
(newiinru) along the sides of the bier inside the deceased’s house.
Soon the guests who had come to attend the death-feast (nimerian)
1 Amanrantus could not explain the signiï¬Åcance of this.—A. B. D. ‘
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