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

62 2 MALEKULA
(1928, pp. 214-16), as wellas thestories given above, show comidep
able variation in detail of the beliefs concerning these beings,
The myth of the creation of Tomman Island given by L'=yard-
appears to combine elements of the two versions recorded by
Deacon, but there are three points in it of peculiar interest. In
the ï¬Årst place it contains an apparent contradiction. It is said
that Amhat originally existed alone, and had no friends, and
that therefore he sent the owl to kill the giant clam, Later,
however, we are told that when Tomman Island had been made
the Ambat married Lindanda, a woman of the same race as
himself, and with her and his tour ambat friends he left Batu-
briingk and went to live on Tomman. As Deacon has shown,
the word ‘T Ambat " is sometimes used to indicate a single
individual, sometimes as a general tenn to include all the ï¬Åve
Ambat brothers, treating them as a single entity. In Layard’s
accounts of the creation of Tornman Island it may be that the
apparent contradiction is due to a confusion in the native’s
mind bctweenthe different uses of the word Ambat, but it is
curious that the other four male. Ambat who went with the ï¬Årst
to Tomman are referred to as his friends and not his brothers.‘
Again, in I.ayard’s version, there is no mention of the
antagonism between Ambat and his younger brothers, and of the
death of the former. On the contrary, the ï¬Åve Ambat and
Lindanda are said to have been the ancestors of the people of
Tommon Island, while the Ambat of Loormarit,' was the ancestor
of the people of the mainland. This evidence is important, for
the myths recorded by Deacon about the ï¬Åve brothers give no
direct evidence that they were regarded as the forbears of the
modern inhabitants, although the Kabat of Mewun, who appear to
correspond to them, are clearly the creators or ancestors of
mankind, or at least of some men,
The third point of interest in I.ayard‘s account is the part
played in the creation of Tomman Island by the woman Vin-
bumba-au. She is said to have been a black woman with long
ears, and is represented as a servant oi the Ambat brothers. When
1 It is noteworthy, however, that in the myths collected by Deacon the
eldest Ambat calls and is called by his brothers hula and not nsu or Man (cl.
p. 15).-c. H. w.
- This /mm of Loormerit probably corresponds to the Ambat Kihhn
who, according to Deacon's records, introduced the cow-nut eh Loormnxit and
so m Seniang district. ,