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

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THE DISTRIBUTION OF CULTURES 705
there is evidence that in some kava-drinking has been but recently
introduced (it had not spread to Santa Maria of the Banks
Islands until the last two decades of the nineteenth century) 1 ;
and tattooing is still restricted to East Ornba and North Raga.
Again, for example, the pcoplc of Sakau peninsula, in North-East
Santo, are very dark and tall ; the young men commonly went
nude and the women wore only a small leaf ; taro-irrigation was
not known, and their dialect is a. very aberrant form oi Melanesian.
This shows clearly that in the matrilineal area there is present
an earlier culture from which the elements of the mat-skirt
culture are absent.
In the patrilineal area we have the culture characterized by
the penis-sheath, incision, and the fringed pcttiwat. To this also
probably belong the musical bow of Ambryrn and the interior
of Malekula, and the special type of basketry or bag—making
(see Pl. IVB, I) which is found only in the interior of Malckula, in
South Raga, and perhaps in Ambrym.
We have thus distinguished between three main cultures
which we may call the “ Dual Organization Culture ", the " Mat-
Skirt Culture ", and the " Fringed-Skirt Culture ". What can
we gather as to their timerelation to each other? We have
already shown that the dual organization culture probably
extended originally throughout all the islands of the North and
North»CentraJ New Ilebrirlcs; the evidence supplied by the
distribution of cultures in Malekula goes to show further that
the fringed-skirt culture was introduced there bctore that of the
mat-skirt, for everywhere in this island the latter has occupied
the coastal areas surrounding the fringed-skirt culture to the
north, east, and south. It is possible, therefore, to reconstruct
the history of the New Hebrides somewhat as follows :—
(1) In the beginning there was a rnatrilineal society with dual
organization and a division into six marriage sections. Owing
to the practice of marrying the maternal uncle's widow, these
six sections very generally broke down and persisted only in
Ambrym and possibly South~West Raga.
(2) Then there arrived an immigrant culture, bringing with it
the rite of incision, the use ot the fringed-skirt, and penis-
sheath, the musical bow, and a special type of basketry. This
established itself in Epi, Paama, Ambrym, South Raga, and
Malekula. We may suppose, too, that it was this culture which
‘ R4 H. Codrington, 1891, p. 351.
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