Food and Gender in Fiji: Ethnoarchaeological Explorations

FOOD AND GENDER IN FIJI Ethnoarchaeological Explorations

SHARYN JONES

Food and Gender in Fiji

Food and Gender in Fiji Ethnoarchaeological Explorations Sharyn Jones

LEXINGTON BOOKS A division of ROWMAN & LITTLEFIELD PUBLISHERS, INC.

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Published by Lexington Books A division of Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc. A wholly owned subsidiary of The Rowman & Littlefield Publishing Group, Inc. 4501 Forbes Boulevard, Suite 200, Lanham, Maryland 20706 http://www.lexingtonbooks.com Estover Road, Plymouth PL6 7PY, United Kingdom Copyright © 2009 by Lexington Books All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the publisher, except by a reviewer who may quote passages in a review. British Library Cataloguing in Publication Information Available Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Jones, Sharyn, 1974– Food and gender in Fiji : ethnoarchaeological explorations / Sharyn Jones. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-0-7391-3480-1 (cloth : alk. paper) — ISBN 978-0-7391-3482-5 (electronic) 1. Food habits—Fiji—Lau Province. 2. Food consumption—Fiji—Lau Province. 3. Women—Fiji—Lau Province—Social conditions. 4. Sex role—Fiji—Lau Province. 5. Ethnoarchaeology—Fiji—Lau Province. 6. Plant remains (Archaeology)—Fiji—Lau Province. 7. Fish remains (Archaeology)—Fiji—Lau Province. 8. Lau Province (Fiji)—Antiquities. 9. Lau Province (Fiji)—Social life and customs. I. Title. GT2853.F3J66 2009 394.1'2099611—dc22 2009017860

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Contents

Preface

vii

Acknowledgments

xv

1 Fieldwork: Motivations, Plans, and Realities

1

2 The Environmental and Social Landscape: The Lau Islands, Fiji

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3 Foodways and Social Relations in the Past and Present

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4 Food Consumption Patterns and Refuse Disposal

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5 Lauan Fishing

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6 Food in the Lau Islands and Its Implications for Ethnoarchaeology and Archaeology

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Appendix A: Archaeological Methods

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Appendix B: Structured Ethnographic Interviews Conducted on Nayau, October and November 2003

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Bibliography

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Index

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About the Author

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Preface

S

itting on the torn linoleum-covered dirt floor in the dark kitchen (vale ni kuro), I worked to hack up a freshly killed chicken on a slab of local hard wood with the same sharp machete I use to clear archaeological sites in the jungle. I watched Rusila, my principal collaborator, who leaned over the hearth, tending a large pot of boiling taro. She smiled and stoked the fire by blowing and fanning the wood, rocks, and ash with coconut fronds. The cramped warm space was smoky and full of life. Chickens, who had not yet met their fate, were running around as laughing children habitually chased them out of the house again and again. “Sheee toa! Sheee!” they yelled. Later in the afternoon the children ran down one of those chickens and presented it to their mother for dinner. I hoped that they had caught the one that left its small footprint in my fresh baked pie that morning. Rusila barked orders at me about how to prepare the bird properly, “Don’t cut its head that way, we want it all in one piece. That is the best part!” I appreciated her straightforward manner and was pleased to finally be ordered around like a true member of the family. It had taken three years of hard work to get to this point in our relationship. Neighbors and relatives drop by throughout the day to gossip and exchange stories about happenings in the village and beyond. The background conversation included, for example, the following snippets: “The village store has run out of flour again!” “How is the fishing?” “A storm is on the horizon.” “The village headman is acting shamefully again.” “Osama is still in hiding. When will the Americans catch him?” The vale ni kuro is the central social area of domestic space and the locus of food production. This is where Rusila taught me to make bread and vii

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filet a large tuna the “proper way.” This is where her daughters assist their mother with the tasks of food preparation, learning the Lauan way to do things. In the kitchen Rusila transformed raw or natural items (such as reef fish, coconut, and sweet potatoes) into desirable edible foods. She instructed me how to peel cooked taro and other tubers; for formal meals these items were never served with the skins on. Social interactions in the vale ni kuro are more informal than in other domestic spaces as well as public places. Rusila, her husband Sepesa, and their children sometimes share informal lunches or snacks in the kitchen where there is less focus on high and low space and seating patterns oriented by the rules of hierarchy. As a female anthropologist conducting research in the isolated Lau Group of Fiji, I was privy to the rich Lauan social life associated with the kitchen and other domestic interaction spheres. Being trained as an archaeologist, my studies began with a focus on the interpretation of patterns revealed in fragmentary pieces of the past, such as sherds of pottery and ancient food rubbish. My first field season in Lau was eye-opening, leading me to turn to ethnoarchaeology because I simply could not focus solely on the past in this life-filled environment. Within the village every human action was dripping with meaning, and the intensity of the community’s life seemed fertile ground to explore Lauan lifeways in the present and the past. After a short time I was admitted into the primarily female spaces and allowed to observe and eventually participate in female activities. With economics, kinship, behavior, subsistence, and politics before me in such rich textured detail, it became impossible to imagine and interpret the past without recognizing and documenting the present. Some will argue that this is a crutch or an impediment to the scientific objective analysis of prehistory. I suggest that this close historical association between past and present makes for stronger inferences and an explicit base of comparison. Furthermore, the analogies I derive from the contemporary peoples of Lau have a historical continuity that is rarely possible in modern archaeology. For this reason, the Lau Group is an excellent place to conduct ethnoarchaeological research. Moreover, the oceanoriented subsistence system of Lauans and the great natural marine biological diversity make this an ideal locale to study the female associations with fishing and foodways, a study that is relevant to a wide range of Island and coastal contexts. I first came to Fiji in 2001, following the recommendation of a colleague, David Steadman, who conducted biogeographic research in the Lau Group in 2000. Steadman was interested in avian paleontology and finding early archaeological sites in Lau in order to reconstruct the prehistoric distribution and local impacts on bird species. He recommended that I survey and conduct test excavations on Nayau and the small nearby is-

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lands of Aiwa Levu and Aiwa Lailai, located in central Lau. I planned to focus on prehistoric settlement and subsistence, especially marine resource exploitation. My previous archaeological research experience was in Hawai’i and Micronesia, therefore Fiji seemed an appropriate and intriguing area to examine the questions I was interested in. The first night I arrived on Nayau I was encouraged to “hang back in the house” with the women and kids while my male colleagues went off with the men to drink kava, or yaqona, a traditional narcotic ritually prepared into a drink that is consumed by groups of men. I joined the men, but the obvious discomfort my presence caused the males made me reevaluate my decision. In the “grog house,” a small one-room thatch structure on the beach, I was totally ignored while the Lauan men joked with my male colleagues, eagerly asked them questions, and encouraged them to drink more yaqona. On the occasions that I would ask or answer questions, the men would look away and address my colleagues, attempting to ignore me or speak to my inquiries indirectly. Despite years of studying Pacific Island cultures and working in a variety of Pacific field settings, nothing prepared me for the stark division between men and women in Fijian public life. Moreover, my Western upbringing made it difficult not to be offended when blatantly ignored. The men avoided me as a sign of respect, which is typical in Fiji and in many cultures. I slowly became more comfortable with this Lauan tradition and the inherent overt separation between women and men in Fijian society. In this context, I was naturally allowed access to female aspects of society. While I was permitted to observe some of the male social sphere, men were uneasy when I was around. Lauan social order dictated my focus on women and my engagement with female-associated activities. As I began my archaeological work, field surveys, mapping, and excavations on Nayau, the gender-based division of labor and social spheres became even more apparent. During my first field season I selected and hired two women to assist me with archaeological excavations at some prehistoric fortified sites located a half-hour walk from the village I was staying in. I also hired two male assistants. Many members of the community viewed the employment of female field assistants as totally unacceptable for several reasons. First, Lauan women traditionally do not dig; digging is an activity associated with men and their primary subsistence task, gardening. Moreover, the land outside the village bounds is considered a male domain. Second, I compensated local field assistants with cash payment at the end of the workday. The elected village headman (Turaga ni Koro) instructed me to hire people he would select and to change workers each day, but all of the field assistants were to be men. In Lau, men often handle money, and the male head of the household typically negotiates female labor outside the family dwelling.

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Social division based on rank and gender was a salient and recurring theme that appeared to permeate every aspect of Lauan society. One’s rank and gender determines what tasks are conducted throughout the day, when and where individuals eat, and how a person carries her or himself in the home, to name a few examples. Because hierarchical social divisions are both an obvious and important structural aspect of day-today interactions, I take rank, gender, and domestic activities as central loci of analysis. I believe that these components of society are important in structuring Lauan interactions and behavior in the present, just as they did in the past. My anthropological focus, as described herein, includes past and present in a long historical continuum. I do not mean to imply that Lauans are unchanged and static in thinking or behavior. On the contrary, Lauans, like all humans, constantly change and respond to their social and physical environments. However, I believe that societies and individuals behave and change in ways that are historically informed and structured by culture and tradition. By understanding the past, we may better understand the present and ultimately use this information to connect the two. I use ethnoarchaeology to explore gender relations and foodways over a broad temporal frame.

ASSUMPTIONS: HUMAN BEHAVIOR, IDEOLOGY, HIERARCHY, AND HISTORY Everyday activities are essentially repetitive patterned behaviors that have social meaning, which may be conscious or subconscious. Nevertheless, these activities are not the sum of mundane actions. I believe that the way people behave is variously constructed of tradition, exigency, and self-expression. Behavior communicates a rich density of messages and attitudes and is ultimately conditioned by ideology. Everyday behaviors are part of a system of meaningful, socially approved, proper relations between individuals and groups. Moreover, everyday actions facilitate the expression of a person’s identity and self to the community (Deverell 1986; Leach 1965, 1976). Turner (1992), Becker (1995), and Toren (1990, 1999) have clearly and definitively demonstrated this phenomenon in Fiji from an ethnographic perspective. Importantly, ideology influences the patterned everyday practices that produce the material residues of the archaeological record. As in any society, all human interactions in Fiji are guided by socially correct and expected behaviors. These behaviors are determined by social morals and standards that are learned at childhood, strictly enforced throughout one’s life cycle, and reinforced though continued action; proper behaviors are patterned and repeated in public and private social situations. It

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should be noted that because village life is communal and most interactions are public, individuals are virtually never alone and, unlike Western norms, the community rather than the individual is the focus (Becker 1995; Lawson 1997; Toren 1990, 1999). Patterned behavior is evidenced and accessible to archaeologists through its material correlates. Ethnoarchaeology can record modern lifeways and behaviors associated with specific materials. This approach provides an avenue to examine the ideational realm, which is often overlooked or simply assumed to be inaccessible to archaeologists. In Fiji and Polynesia everyday activities, including secular and religious actions, are related within a holistic social system. Unlike the Western tradition of dividing a given society into more easily approachable categories, in this cultural reality the parts form a conflated totality, often making categories difficult to delineate when examining ethnographically recorded behavior (Leach 1965; Weiner 1992; Weismantel 1988). Hocart (1970, 256) argued that in Fiji there is no religion, “. . . only a system that in Europe has been split up into religion and business.” Economic and food-related activities were at the time of European colonization, and are today, intricately related to politics and cosmology. These rituals characterize the social and cosmic order of society by repeatedly establishing hierarchies based on birth order, age, and gender. For example, activities and rituals associated with food production and the harnessing of raw materials from the natural world, the realm of the gods, are described as the work of the gods, a fundamentally religious process (Firth 1967; Handy 1927). Humans reaffirm and re-create their hierarchical relation to the gods, or ancestors, through ritualized patterned acts of production and consumption. Geographically, the remarkably widespread ideology surrounding food production, distribution, and consumption based on hierarchy suggests an institution that is anchored in the deep values of Fijian and Polynesian society. This ideology has endured colonization and Christianization, suggesting that it existed long before Western contact. Neotraditional secular rituals as they are practiced today—including subsistence production and food consumption and distribution patterns— provide points of connection between social and material phenomena (e.g., food, spatial organization of the house and village, cooking technologies). Fijian domestic life renews connections between cosmological creation, the ancestors, and humans (e.g., Eliade 1959). The practices of eating food and drinking yaqona (or kava, a mild narcotic made into a traditional drink) are patterned or ritualized forms of sacrifice and acts of mana (supernatural efficacy) (Sahlins 1983; Toren 1998, 1999). These rituals are patterned by proscribed actions. Despite modernization in Fiji, “. . . production, exchange, tribute, and consumption . . . are still distinctly Fijian

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. . . [and] . . . eating together still defines the household . . .” (Toren 1998, 113). Every meal is structured. Ideology and worldview are mapped into Fijian villages and individual house plans. These points are critical from an archaeological perspective as evidence of a direct link between ideological phenomena and material phenomena, as will be discussed in more detail in the chapters that follow. Ideology and practice together define the context within which foods are used. If archaeologists are to understand and identify this social context of food use, then we must have a clear understanding of ideology and foodways in living populations. This understanding will come from ethnoarchaeological explorations and participant observation. On a general level, my research aims to generate data that will create a better understanding of the diverse ways that gender roles and material culture, specifically food, operate in living societies. This study might be labeled ethnoarchaeology to “raise analogical consciousness” (David 1992, 352), in addition to doing ethnography with specific archaeological questions in mind. I hope that this work will enable archaeologists to develop increasingly humanistic and potentially accurate interpretations of archaeologically observed patterns, such as the distribution of faunal remains, the occurrence and character of subsurface features, and household spatial organization. My research exhibits some of the fluidity and complexity of ethnographic settings and should serve to heighten awareness of human behaviors that could have occurred, in order to explain the patterns of archaeological facts. This view challenges the perspective that relies on the assumption of cultural simplicity and provides a constant reminder that archaeological material culture was created by people. I believe that culture cannot be understood as simple, logically predictable, and uniform. David has noted, “Ethnoarchaeology’s primary service mission is still the raising of the analogical consciousness of archaeologists, many of whom prefer their culture dead, sensitizing them to dimensions of variability and the richness of the relationship between human and their artifacts . . .” (David 1992, 352). Finally, my ethnoarchaeological study aims to understand how social processes articulate in ethnographic contexts and create material variation. This work seeks to produce knowledge of causal processes working in this specific context, but which are also applicable and relevant for other archaeological and anthropological contexts. The ethnographic data and social issues described and examined in chapters 3–5 should be considered as a backdrop, or the context within which material culture may be understood and interpreted. This data provides both an analog against which archaeological information can be compared and understood and an example of some of the social issues that may potentially remain invisible archaeologically.

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BOOK STRUCTURE I begin by providing background to my research in chapter 1. This chapter includes a description of my goals, the methods I employ, and the social and political circumstances surrounding my work in Fiji. A geographic, environmental, historical, social, and archaeological introduction to my study area is provided in chapter 2. I discuss the islands of Nayau, Lakeba, Aiwa Levu, and Aiwa Lailai. While most of my research was conducted on Nayau, I include these closely related islands where I also worked, and where the people of Nayau have deep historical, political, and genealogical connections. Additionally, I examine Lauan political organization, hierarchy, social status, kinship, subsistence practices, division of labor, economic wealth, and Lauan history and archaeology. The succeeding chapters focus on ethnographic data with specific reference to archaeological questions that may be illuminated with the contemporary information (chapters 3–5). Each chapter concludes with interpretations based on answers to the archaeological questions and ethnoarchaeological analogs. Chapter 3 contains ethnographic descriptions of lifeways on Nayau, specifically those associated with food and subsistence activities. I examine domestic group organization and report on interview data. Issues including the folk taxonomy of food, its social dimensions, kitchen activities, food preference, and consumption patterns are all addressed. Food collection patterns and the disposal of food remains are also discussed. Archaeological information collected from a variety of sites on Nayau is introduced in chapter 3. In this chapter I describe excavations and stratigraphy, subsurface features, material culture, zooarchaeological remains, and subsurface features that are interpreted with reference to ethnographically recorded behaviors and material culture. I conclude with a discussion of the potential for zooarchaeological data to address social issues related to foodways, gender, and hierarchy. Lauan food consumption patterns and information about refuse disposal are presented in chapter 4. I documented the types of fishes collected and consumed regularly by the community and specific cases of individual household eating. I asked a group of women to collect the fish bones from their families’ meals over a one-week period and present an analysis of these remains and interview data on the relative proportions of food types and classes consumed. The importance of imported versus local foods is considered in this chapter. In sum, an ethnoarchaeological synthesis, articulating the ethnographic and archaeological data is presented. Chapter 5 includes data on Lauan fishing methods, gear, decisionmaking, characteristics of the typical catch, and food division and distribution patterns. Qualitative accounts of several fishing expeditions are

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described and analyzed. Lists of the Lauan names, common names, and scientific names for bony fishes accompany this data. Ethnozooarchaeological conclusions are provided at the end of this chapter. In chapter 6, I summarize my findings and analyze and interpret the data I collected from archaeological and ethnographic fieldwork in Lau. I incorporate previously recorded ethnohistoric and ethnographic information into my interpretations as well. I explore the zooarchaeological and archaeological patterns using ethnographic homology, and also describe directions for future research. In summation, I discuss the implications of my work on food in the Lau Islands, and more generally for ethnoarchaeology and zooarchaeology.

Acknowledgments

T

he assistance and encouragement of my colleagues, friends, and family made this book possible. I thank all the people who supported this work. First and foremost my thanks go to Michael Heckenberger, David Steadman, Elizabeth Wing, and Patrick Kirch. Each of them contributed invaluable insights and inspiration. The excavations and some of the analysis presented in this work were funded by grants to David Steadman (National Science Foundation) and to me (National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship). Additional funding that supported my research came from the Center for Women’s Studies and Gender Research at the University of Florida (the Lockhart Fellowship), and the National Geographic Society via a Research and Exploration Grant. I also thank Patrick O’Day, Heather Walsh-Haney, Sean Connaughton, Kenneth Sassaman, Russ Bernard, Susan deFrance, Maureen Kelley, Sidsel Millerstrom, and Joe Ortega. David Steadman, Elizabeth Wing, Kitty Emery, and the Florida Museum of Natural History made multiple laboratories and comparative collections available for part of my analyses. In Fiji, the Fiji Museum staff assisted in excavations and organizing my research. I thank Sepeti Matararaba and Jone Naucabalavu for facilitating my fieldwork. Patrick O’Day provided abundant assistance and insights during the process of field research. Additional field and laboratory assistance was provided by Sean Connaughton, Rusila Colati, Sepeti Matararaba, Tina Bell, Gustav Paulay, and Joe Ortega. I gratefully acknowledge the late Na Gone Turaga Na Tui Lau, Tui Nayau Ka Sau ni Vanua ko Lau, The Right Honorable Ratu Sir Kamisese Mara, and his family

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for allowing me to conduct research on Nayau, Lakeba, and Aiwa. I am especially grateful to the people of Nayau and Lakeba for welcoming and facilitating my research, in addition to providing me with a wealth of local knowledge, collaboration, and support in all forms. Vinaka vakalevu Jack, Sera, Cakacaka, Colati, Rusila, Mote, Sina, and Nasi.

1

Fieldwork: Motivations, Plans, and Realities

Cooking is a language through which that society unconsciously reveals its structure, unless—just as unconsciously—it resigns itself to using the medium to express its contradictions. —Claude Lévi-Strauss

W

omen’s work and inshore marine resources exploitation are fundamental components of Pacific Island foodways. Nevertheless, until recently these issues were frequently ignored or marginalized in anthropological literature. Teenagers and children are also commonly overlooked by anthropologists, despite the fact that they form a productive labor force and a fundamental part of social, kin, and economic networks. Over twenty years ago Betty Meehan (1982) remarked on the paucity of studies that produced ethnographic observations of socioeconomics with sufficient detail to enable direct comparisons between faunal and material components in archaeological sites with those of living groups. Unfortunately, few studies of Pacific Islanders in the last twenty years, by either ethnographers or archaeologists, have focused on the production of inshore marine food despite its significant dietary contribution.1 Instead, research in Fiji and Polynesia has largely focused on chiefly and malecentered power and sociopolitical complexity. One is left to speculate whether women and their power are recorded in the materials of the past, and if so, how archaeologists can explore and understand this. “The differential prestige accorded to women and men in our own society has also had a profound effect on our interpretations of the prehistoric past” (Nelson 1997, 19). Moreover, the way indigenous groups view 1

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gender relations and perceive value has changed significantly as a result of European colonization, Christianization, and engagement in an everexpanding world economy. To alleviate a biased perspective of both women and men in the past, archaeologists are increasingly exploring methods to better interpret power, prestige, and everyday activities. The topics examined by archaeologists and the way archaeology is conducted have been brought into question by archaeologists who employ gendersensitive approaches (Clark 2004; Gero and Conkey 1991; GiffordGonzalez 1993, 1997; Gilchrist 1999; Marshall 1985; Meskell 2002; Nelson 1997, 2006). Fijian women, adolescents, and children, as the primary producers of inshore marine resources provide the vast majority of animal protein consumed each day by the inhabitants of Fiji’s Lau Island Group. The economics of food production, distribution, and consumption are also intricately related to politics and ideology. As such, this situation offers an opportunity to investigate gender-specific subsistence production, associated social relations, and the material correlates of this economic system. Using ethnoarchaeology and a direct historical approach (Kirch and Green 2001), I aim to explore the relationship between archaeological phenomena and social processes. To examine gender-associated relations, including hierarchy and prestige, requires data on long-term processes. What are the historical particularities and patterns of rank and gender relations in a given society? The challenge is fundamentally one of connecting ethnography with archaeological data to answer this question. Ethnoarchaeology is the means I employ to explore and better understand long-term trends in foodways; this is not a comprehensive ethnography, rather it is a targeted ethnographic study to answer archaeological questions. Toward this end, I have three primary goals for my study of Lauan lifeways and more specifically, foodways. • The first goal is ethnographic; I seek to make a detailed description of foodways and the articulation between food and everyday lifeways of contemporary Pacific Island peoples. I describe food procurement on the reef and women’s and men’s food preparation activities in domestic settings. • Second, this is an ethnoarchaeological investigation focused on understanding material culture, what people eat in the present, what they ate in the past, and an endeavor to illuminate food-related social issues through historical homology and comparison with the lifeways of Lauans. Ethnoarchaeological studies can increase the range of possible interpretations of archaeological data. The first step is to record the information, as I do in this work; interpretations may then be subject to independent evaluation.

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• Third, on a general level, this study is an exploration of quotidian activities surrounding food, especially women’s work and the domestic environment. I am attempting to comprehend everyday social life and historical processes, or long-term patterns in human action and social interaction. Undoubtedly, much more archaeological and ethnographic research is needed to achieve this goal. However, I believe that my preliminary findings related to everyday life and longterm histories provide a starting point for future research. This work raises new questions and provides insights into life in Fiji. Moreover, these findings are applicable to a wide range of anthropological research beyond my study area. In Fiji and Polynesia the etic heuristic categories of economics, politics, and cosmology are all interrelated in holistic emic conceptions (Goldman 1970; Hocart 1929; Sahlins 1962, 1985; Thompson 1940). This relationship has been documented archaeologically, on some Pacific islands, through the practice of household archaeology (VanGilder and Kirch 1997; Weisler and Kirch 1985). Food and ideas about reproduction, both biological and symbolic, are also enmeshed in these concepts. Women actively contribute by producing large amounts of food daily (i.e., protein in the form of inshore marine resources), and are biologically and symbolically associated with the production of human life. Therefore, we might expect that female activities produce material correlates for rank and gender that are visible in modern and archaeological remains of households. My literature search on the subject of food production yielded few studies that focused on women’s work. It is unlikely that only maleassociated food production held social, economic, and religious significance. A close examination of ethnographic data, especially recent work, reveals seemingly contradictory and countervailing gender relations associated with division of labor, ritual and ideological roles, political authority, social organization, and interpersonal relations (Gailey 1987; Linnekin 1990; Mead 1949; Ortner 1996; Toren 1990; Weiner 1992). Rather than attempting to generate simple equations between women and their status (vis-à-vis men), this research seeks to understand the nature of female power, its basis, context, and how female and male relations mutually define each other. I aim to determine if and how archaeologists can use material phenomena to identify hierarchy and gender relations associated with foodways in the past. I believe that all people will become visible through a gender-informed perspective, which facilitates understanding of humans, conflict, change, identity, and all aspects of society. This undertaking will require a long-term historical perspective employing both archaeology and ethnography (original and comparative).

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My work in Lau documented socioeconomic behaviors associated with rank and gender in qualitative and quantitative detail in order to facilitate comparisons between these ethnographic data and late prehistoric archaeological households in Fiji. Thereby I could estimate how food refuse uncovered in archaeological households may be used to identify social relations in the past. Specifically, I recorded present day traditional (gender- and agespecific) roles in subsistence production, including: inshore marine resource collection; distribution (within and between households); variations in individual food consumption patterns (male versus female; adults versus children; elites versus nonelites); and refuse disposal. This is an exploratory work. There are few studies to compare my work to and even less in the realm of concrete methodology to guide my endeavors. Therefore, in the text I explore, but in no way succeed in answering, the following questions: What do food remains or zooarchaeological data actually represent in the Lauan context? Are the items that zooarchaeologists identify (bones and shells) simply food rubbish representing calories consumed in the past? Can a deeper meaning be gleaned from these items? For example, do archaeological remains encode information about rank and gender? What do food-associated archaeological features represent? Can the uses of scoop-shaped features such as hearths and earth ovens (lovo) and other components of households that are involved in food preparation or disposal be better understood? What are the social implications for the material commonly recovered from archaeological deposits (e.g., what is the use duration of features in a modern context)? What social elements are invisible in archaeological features (e.g., the gender, age, and rank of the user/maker/consumer, and the time spent by a person who was engaged in the activity associated with the archaeological feature and/or remains)? Can changes through time in consumption and subsistence patterns be detected in archaeological remains? If so, what might these changes represent? Are social variations in rank, gender, politics, ecological exploitation, and environmental impacts reflected in the zooarchaeological materials? The fishermen of the Pacific Islands have frequently been the subjects of anthropological and economic inquiry (Dye 1983; Goodenough 1963; Halapua 1982; Johannes 1981; Kirch and Dye 1979; Lieber 1992; Veitayaki 1995). However, women and adolescents in the Lau Islands traditionally perform the majority of the inshore fishing, which includes collecting by hand, netting, trapping, and spearing. Women are not prohibited from other forms of subsistence production, but women within a wide age range do focus on this activity, which is central to everyday subsistence. My investigation of traditional gender- and age-related roles in subsistence production with particular attention to inshore fishing practices explored the flexibility that exists in labor division, female production of

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food, and the forms of production most closely tied to age and gender. Trolling outside the reef is a fishing method almost exclusively practiced by men. This conforms with ethnographic work elsewhere in Polynesia, especially in Tonga (Dye 1983; Gailey 1987; Johannes 1981; Kirch and Dye 1979; Malm 1999), where men and those holding public power consider everyday inshore fishing a relatively nonprestigious activity. However, a more comprehensive understanding of culture and society will incorporate alternative interpretations of the activities and position of women and women’s work. In Lau I examined household activities and organization with a focus on material correlates of specific hierarchically regulated behaviors. Based on past archaeological data I expected that faunal remains associated with specific household contexts would be indicative of rank and gender relations in the past and present. In her study of contemporary hierarchical relations in Fiji, Christina Toren argues, “Fijian tradition evinces a dynamic continuity whereby traditional values are constituted anew and objectified in material culture. . . . These values find their focus and form in spatial constructs” (1990, 29). Importantly, she found that the Fijian house is the locus of hierarchical relations (Toren 1990). Fijians refer to natural and human-constructed landscapes in terms implying rank, and literally translating into “high” and “low” (Hocart 1929; Sahlins 1962; Thompson 1940; Toren 1990). Women are associated with the “inside” or “low” areas in space, whereas men are associated with the “outside” or “high” space. For example, the offshore area is referred to as the waitui, or noble sea (Malm 1999; Sahlins 1962). Likewise, the most sacred door of a house is often the “honored door,” facing the sea, and the eastern, male side of the house is the “noble side” (Sahlins 1962; Toren 1990). Archaeologists working in Fiji have yet to explore the connection between hierarchically regulated formal patterned behavior and archaeological phenomena such as spatial organization and food consumption patterns. An archaeological focus on the household and variability in domestic space, artifacts, cooking features, and depositional contexts has greatly advanced studies of social organization in Polynesia (Kirch and O’Day 2003; Van Gilder and Kirch 1997; Weisler and Kirch 1985). In my quest to better understand foodways over long-term history, I documented the contemporary contribution of women to domestic and political economies. Female labor, especially fishing activities, is described with a focus on the relative contribution of inshore marine resources to modern and prehistoric diets. I seek to illuminate the way in which marine resources and female food preparations relate to everyday consumption and ritual or ceremonial activities, including feasts for weddings, funerals, and tributes to chiefs and kin. On Nayau, I recorded the distribution of food within kin groups, in households, and beyond the bounds of these

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social groups. In the field of archaeology there is a great need to understand what happens to food before it ends up in the archaeological record. How do food processing, consumption, and discard determine what material remains are visible after these activities? Ethnoarchaeology provides a means to understanding these issues. My field and laboratory research were guided by the three research objectives presented above. I used a direct historical approach as the fundamental methodology to develop ethnographic homologs that can be applied to archaeological contexts, as has been successfully practiced in the Pacific (Kirch and Green 2001) and elsewhere (Heckenberger 2002, 2006). Women’s roles, distinctive behaviors, and associated material phenomena were recorded, and especially food remains and marine resource debris were traced through three levels of analysis including ethnographic (modern lifeways), ethnoarchaeological (living archaeology, modern deposition and disposal), and archaeological (prehistoric). First, I collected ethnographic data focused on women’s, adolescents’, and children’s roles in Nayau’s subsistence economy, documented current patterns of food production and collection in Nayau with an emphasis on marine resources, and conducted time-allocation studies of inshore subsistence activities through participant observation. I participated in fishing expeditions in order to quantify the types of fishes and quantities collected, record the technologies used, and plot where these activities took place (specific location and microhabitats exploited). Target taxa and habitats were also recorded. The relative importance of various taxa was determined based on the frequency of their collection. During a total of seven months (in 2001–2003) in Lau, I recorded frequencies of gathering, collecting, and variations in these activities due to social obligations, natural ecological shifts, weather patterns, and personal preference.2 I learned that the occupants of different villages exploit the inshore marine environment in flexible nonstandardized ways. For example, on Nayau, the leeward village of Liku is positioned so that at certain times of the year fishing grounds become less accessible due to inclement weather. At the same time fishing grounds associated with the villages of Narocivo and Salia, on the windward side of the island, are easily accessible. Likewise, a given family over certain months may prepare numerous feasts associated with birth, death, or marriage, thus affecting collecting and consumption patterns (e.g., stockpiling in preparation may result). Second, I documented present-day patterns of food distribution, preference, and disposal among various Fijian households. Collection of modern food materials, bones and shells, was necessary to determine what patterns might be visible archaeologically. This information is vital to understanding how ethnographic and ethnoarchaeological observations re-

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late to quantifiable material and/or spatial phenomena. During my ethnographic research, I witnessed numerous food distribution and consumption patterns that were directly influenced by hierarchical and gender roles. For example, men are served first and eat before women and children. Women and children then proceed to eat the leftovers after the men have finished. Because the head is the most valued part of any food animal, men and those of rank commonly consume all of the fish heads (including most of the soft tissue and occasionally small bones). Modern households were investigated with attention to food-related activities. Through participant observation and formal interviews I documented household food distribution, and chronicled the individuals who consumed different types and portions of foods, refuse disposal (what was disposed of and where), individual preference, and individual use of household space. I looked for patterning in consumption, modern refuse disposal, and spatial organization. Additionally, I recorded food consumption patterns in high-ranking families and commoner households in each of Nayau’s three villages. Data collected included information on what species of marine animals are consumed each day (other foods were also recorded), how much is consumed, the relative proportions of starch to meat, what individuals within households consume what types of marine resource and what parts of the animals. Attention was also given to the specifics of the social configuration within households and villages (i.e., rank, gender, and age). My Lauan collaborators were asked to make a food journal as a secondary check on the aforementioned information and as a backup for times when I was unable to personally record this information. A census of livestock was conducted as part of the formal interviews; this was aimed at determining the economic status of each household relative to the others on Nayau. Third, I investigated late-prehistoric archaeological households for indications of patterned distribution of faunal remains and material culture and sought evidence to refute or confirm that prehistoric households might exhibit patterns indicative of ranked and gendered social divisions. Knowing that these divisions permeate activities today, such as food production, division, and consumption, I assume that in the past women did most of the inshore fishing, just as they do now throughout the Pacific Islands. However, the extent and the degree of the marine contribution to the overall diet and the social value of this activity may have varied through time in ways perceptible in zooarchaeological and other household remains. In a situation where historical continuity exists, such as that in the Lau Group, ethnoarchaeology provides a mode of investigating the links between material culture, behavior, and meaning. Although the most obvious contribution of ethnoarchaeology is to archaeology, it can also

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provide data that is of interest to anthropology. Specifically, ethnoarchaeology (the study of the material culture and lifeways of living peoples) can facilitate the exploration of social issues and their long-term evolution. Before proceeding, a brief introduction to this subfield and its methods is in order.

ETHNOARCHAEOLOGY AND THE DIRECT HISTORICAL APPROACH Ethnoarchaeology can be traced to Fewkes (1900), but was not regularly practiced by archaeologists until the 1960s and 1970s. While anthropologists in the era of Morgan (1851) and Boas (1964) were especially attentive to material culture, cultural anthropologists later in the twentieth century lost interest in it and focused on other elements of culture. With special attention on material culture, objects, technology, and all material associated with daily life, ethnoarchaeological studies document what ethnographic research frequently fails to describe—material culture. Ethnoarchaeological studies were originally conceived to generate focused analogies applicable to archaeological data and research questions, thus filling a void inherent in many typical ethnographic studies (Binford 1967, 1978; Kleindienst and Watson 1956). Like many subfields within archaeology, ethnoarchaeology has primarily developed within regional specialties without a general set of methods and theoretical principles. Cunningham (2003) views the provincialism or regional focus of ethnoarchaeology as a positive characteristic, arguing that rather than adopting a single unified theory of human behavior, ethnoarchaeologists should have a pluralistic orientation that is sensitive to context and case studies (in particular, the local applicability of certain causal processes). What all ethnoarchaeological research does have in common is the application of and a concern with analogies (K. C. Chang claimed, “No archaeologist is worth his salt, it can almost be said, unless he makes an analogy or two in every monograph he writes” [Chang 1967, 229]). According to Wylie, analogy can be defined as “the selective transposition of information from source to subject on the basis of a comparison that, fully developed, specifies how the ‘terms’ (elements) compared are similar (positive components), different (negative components) or of unknown likeness (neutral components). . . . An argument by analogy, proper, involves the claim that given the similarities and differences specified in the premises, some specific aspects of the neutral analogy may also be assumed to be similar or, to comprise further points of positive analogy” (Wylie 1985, 93–94). Ethnoarchaeologists are generally

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cautious about analogical forms of reasoning, in an attempt to avoid affirming the consequent (Ascher 1961; Cunningham 2003; Trigger 1978, 1989; Wylie 1985). Generating analogical inferences is a fundamental and inescapable part of doing archaeology; this is true whether analogies are blatantly stated or ensconced in scientific terms. This realization has led some researchers to place emphasis on understanding the underlying causal mechanisms behind observable ethnoarchaeological patterns (Bowser 2000; Cunningham 2003; Wiessner 1983; Wylie 1982, 1985).3 Direct historical analogy, or homology, is an analogy based on observations of contemporary peoples who have a direct historical link through common ancestry with the archaeological populations and their materials under study. North American archaeologists including Wedel (1938) and Steward (1942) were interested in extending the short-term view of ethnohistory and ethnography by combining them with archaeological data in an effort to expose long-term cultural trajectories; these researchers relied on homology. With the advent of the New Archaeology in the 1960s, direct historical approaches fell out of favor. Recently, however, increased attention has been given to historical analogy because homology is thought to provide a more accurate reading of archaeological material culture (Agorsah 1990; Kirch and Green 2001; Trigger 1998). Although homology has sometimes been considered to be the strongest form of analogy, generating inferences with blatant links between the past and present, there are a number of valid criticisms of this type of research, which are relevant to my own work. An obvious potential problem inherent in the application of homology is the fact that similarities in material, or other aspects of culture, may be the result of contact, borrowing, coincidence, or descent. Moreover, Gould and Watson (1982, 359) have claimed that general and historical analogues must be subject to rigorous empirical testing in order to confirm an adequate interpretation (Watson 1982). Homologically derived interpretations, including my own, should be viewed with caution, as the lifeways of modern peoples cannot simply be equated one-to-one for prehistoric lifeways. While these are valid criticisms, it can be said that homology and historical continuity offer an increase in the likelihood that the same causal processes connect modern and archaeological contexts. Homologies, then, may presuppose a higher degree in the similarity of analogs generated at the onset, but are still subject to confirmation by testing and exploring additional lines of evidence. Multiple lines of evidence often accompany the application of homology to anthropological studies in Oceania. This makes for strong ethnoarchaeological inferences and interpretations based on multiple data sets including archaeology, linguistics, and ethnography. Kirch and Green have argued that “interpretations of archaeological data typically have deep

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roots within ethnology, as is evident in Polynesia where the transition from one data set to another is virtually seamless” (2001, 51). The direct historical approach, as illustrated by Kirch and Green’s study, is supported by numerous factors in Oceania. First and foremost, strong evidence for continuity is provided by well-dated local archaeological chronologies that exhibit change over time and little or no evidence of population replacement. Oceanic archeological sequences may be considered an independent line of evidence, providing a cross-check and test for linguistic and ethnographically derived constructions of the past. By combining these forms of data, it is possible to create truly historical deeptime accounts of Oceanic cultures (Kirch and Green 2001). In Fiji and the Lau Group specifically, the interpretive history I seek to generate includes indigenous histories and oral traditions, ethnography, linguistics, archaeology, and Western accounts. However, these materials may produce alternative and potentially competing interpretations. It becomes necessary to determine what the relationship is between each source, the methods used to collect information, potential biases, and the histories produced by each line of evidence. Analogs or hypotheses relating the past to the present are needed. While postprocessual and historical approaches lack a formal body of scientific theory, they complement more explicitly scientific processual approaches. Obviously, each view is relevant to examining different sets of questions, yet in the process of interpretation, both rely on analogy. I believe that when applied together these two approaches may result in a more balanced interpretation of the past, one that accounts for economics, ideology, social meaning, and long-term history. By its very nature archaeology requires many scientific procedures. Excavations are conducted with precision and the assistance of advanced technologies, and laboratory analyses require specialized processes appropriate to the material under study. Ethnoarchaeology combines the science of archaeology with the less-objective task of participant observation and ethnography. During my final years of graduate school, when I was applying for funding to return to Fiji and continue ethnoarchaeological work, I encountered some opposition to my proposed research. A common criticism by the reviewers of my grant applications was that I was not an ethnographer and should therefore focus on archaeology. On the other hand, some reviewers were very excited about my work and wanted to see it supported since archaeologists have a critical need to understand what material remains represent in terms of actual human behaviors and lifeways. I find the criticism interesting for a number of reasons. First, although we utilize different techniques, archaeologists and ethnographers are interested in culture in general and exploring many of the same questions. In fact, whether implicitly or explicitly archaeologists rely on ethno-

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graphic analogies for all interpretations. Nevertheless, ethnographic studies generally fall short in providing focused evaluations of the role of material culture in society, including issues such as manufacture, use life, and discard. The need is obvious. Second, many of the problems encountered by archaeologists are the same for ethnographers. Archaeological work in areas with indigenous communities presents the same challenges for most scientific and humanistic research. For example, we must all survive fieldwork, maintain some level of language competence, interact with local field assistants and interlocutors, adapt to and become accepted in the culture we are studying, select appropriate methods, and confront difficult ethical matters at every turn. Indeed, the challenges of fieldwork are much the same for archaeologists and ethnographers. Beyond the theoretical and methodological aspects of my work are the realities of actually doing ethnoarchaeological research in the Lau Group (see appendix A for a detailed description of my archaeological and zooarchaeological methods). Some background on my experiences is pertinent in order for readers to grasp particulars of the field situation and what working in a male-oriented society was like for a young female anthropologist. Moreover, the many nonscientific human elements of fieldwork that cannot be anticipated or controlled for comprise unavoidable complications that are worth discussing. Paul Bahn satirically noted that ethnoarchaeology is “an excellent means of getting an exotic adventure holiday in a remote location . . . after figuring out what you think is going on with the use and discard of objects (you should never stay around long enough to master the language) you return to your desk and use these brief studies to make sweeping generalizations about what people in the past and in totally different environments must have done” (Bahn 1989, 52–53). Bahn’s statement, while amusing, is unfortunate in its partial-truth. There are no hard established methods for conducting ethnoarchaeological research, and archaeologists seeking to do ethnoarchaeology can easily adopt some ethnographic techniques without appropriate accountability. Fortunately, ethnoarchaeological studies are becoming more mainstream, and an established literature focusing on methods and ethics is developing (e.g., David and Kramer 2001; Hudson 1993; Janes 1983). In an effort to maintain accountability and enable readers to evaluate my work, I now turn to a discussion of the conditions and duration of my research. Between September 2001 and December 2003, I made three research trips to Fiji; I spent a total of seven months there. On each trip my living situation differed, as did my research focus. In order to receive permission to work in Fiji, the Fiji Museum issues permits that must be applied for and purchased by researchers. Additionally, the museum requires that researchers take a museum staff member with them into the field and pay for

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the staff member’s travel, food, and lodging as well as their entire salary for the duration of the fieldwork. Technically, the museum personnel are sent to facilitate research. In reality, this person is assigned to a project and does not always assist in ways that Western scientists might imagine. For example, one of the most important ways that I expected to be assisted was with language translation. In Lau, English is taught in schools and spoken by some young people. However, people communicate entirely in the Lauan dialect except when children are being taught English in school. Most of the young to middle-aged people in Lau speak and understand some English, but most older people did not learn it in school and often do not speak or understand English. My level of Fijian language competence is low. I have never had formal instruction in Fijian and learned to get along in Lauan by spending time in the field and being submerged in the culture. I carry a Fijian dictionary and a Tongan dictionary4 in the field with me at all times, and I practiced speaking and reading Lauan with the villagers at every opportunity. I cannot translate word-for-word a conversation spoken in rapid Lauan. Subsequently, I expected that the museum staff member assigned to my project would facilitate understanding and translate important conversations. In all of the time I spent in Lau, this never happened.5 I came to rely on my Lauan collaborators as translators. My interlocutors6 also helped me to learn Fijian by constantly teaching and testing me. We communicated in English most of the time with Lauan mixed in. During my first field season on Nayau I stayed in one village the entire time on the island, living in the home of the Turaga ni Koro, or the elected village headman. He insisted that he and his immediate family move out of his living quarters and into his kitchen, while colleagues and I stayed in relative comfort and slept in their beds. The village headman’s choice to have us stay in his home was partially determined by tradition7 and partially by the prospect of personal monetary gain. It is customary for visitors to reciprocate in some way for accommodations and food, which in our case were supplied by the Turaga ni Koro and his family.8 Each field season we left generous contributions of cash and goods to the households that accommodated us, in addition to donations to each village where we conducted research. I lived in a number of different places during my second and third trips to Nayau. For a few weeks each trip, my colleagues and I camped on a beach near one of the Nayau’s largest archaeological sites. We also stayed with the Turaga ni Koro of other villages and the family of my principal collaborators. On the second trip, in order to spread the burden and reward of preparing and serving meals to us, I attempted to have different families cook dinner for us each night. On my third trip, I was permitted to live more like a Fijian and actually assist with the collection, preparation, serving, and cleanup associated with meals in the home of my prin-

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cipal collaborator, Rusila. I also helped with cleaning, laundry, collecting firewood, and other domestic tasks.9 I spent most of my time living with Rusila’s family and assisting her with her daily tasks, especially the cooking and fishing. Although my initial interests in Lau were archaeological, I carried out ethnographic work frequently at first and virtually full-time on my final trip.10 Because this living culture is such a rich source for understanding Fijian lifeways and history, I found it impossible not to engage in participant observation. I did not wait until the weekends to conduct ethnoarchaeological research, I was constantly taking notes and engaging people in conversations about history, archaeology, Lauan culture, language, food, fishing, kinship, religion, and so on. During my third field season, Rusila and I conducted structured interviews with women in all of Nayau’s three villages, which are included in appendix B. During these interviews we spoke with people in informal settings in their homes. Family members were frequently present, especially young children and/ or grandchildren. On one occasion a women’s husband who had just returned home from fishing sat in her kitchen with us for part of the interview while we talked with her. She was visibly less comfortable speaking freely after he arrived. As a result, we intentionally tried to make the interviews relaxing and natural in order to encourage women to speak openly and frankly with us in the absence of men. In every case the interview participants were excited to take part in the study.11 Through the experience of making multiple trips to Lau and living with Rusila and her family I have passed through certain Anthropological rites of passage that separate us from travelers and tourists. I gained knowledge about Lauan culture by talking with people, struggling to learn some of the language, getting sick, missing home and its material comforts, and spending months living with unrelated people in an utterly foreign environment. Anthropologists normally do not write about the confusion, depression, and illness that accompany fieldwork, but it is an important part of our experience, which ultimately contributes to the way we interpret our data. I include some of this ambience, but it should be noted that I do not do this with the intention of exoticizing the people I “study.” I want readers to be able to feel, see, and smell life in Lau as I lived it. At the same time, I hope that archaeologists and ethnographers and archaeologists will find this information useful in a comparative sense. The task of summing up and conveying what understanding I gleaned from this experience is daunting for two reasons in particular. First, I do not seek to make many sweeping statements about Lauan culture as a whole. Rather, I aim to convey my experiences and field observations and explore the complicated social relations that surround foodways. I have

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attempted to document a slice of everyday life in Lau, with a focus on women, hierarchy, foodways, and historical processes. The aim was not a comprehensive ethnography, but a targeted study to answer specific archaeological questions. Second, I am still in the process of understanding, reflecting, and revising my thoughts and interpretations. I strongly believe that anthropological work is never finished; we simply stop working toward something, but our ideas and understanding are never complete. My thinking about Fiji is constantly evolving as I make additional trips to the islands, engage in discussion with colleagues, write and read more, and teach anthropology. Moreover, the people I write about are also constantly changing. Although I have written some of my ethnographic accounts in the present tense, I do not mean to imply that time has stood still in Lau or anywhere else.

NOTES 1. Notable exceptions include Bird et al. (2002), Bird and Bliege Bird (2000), Malm (1999), and Thomas (2002). 2. Field observations were recorded in notebooks. Tape measures, a spring balance, and a battery-run scale were used to record the size and weight of each catch. Photographic records were created, using a waterproof camera and a standard 35mm digital camera. One hundred eighty-six whole fish specimens were collected for scientific identification and to expand my comparative osteological collection from Fiji. 3. Hodder (1986) and Conkey (1989), among others, have suggested a shift away from ethnoarchaeology toward “material culture studies,” focusing on how people construct their material worlds. In this scenario, culture and material culture are understood in relation to meaning. Hodder suggests that material cultures can only be understood by placing them into a cultural and historical context. 4. The Lauan dialect uses some Tongan words and varies from Fijian that is spoken in the main island groups. Published Fijian dictionaries, such as the one I use (Capell 1984), are in standard Fijian that is the Bau dialect. This is the Fijian that is taught in schools and printed in texts. 5. One of the most difficult things for me to deal with during my research was paying someone to accompany me who did not facilitate my work. Hiring the museum staff member was legally and ethnically necessary, yet I frequently felt that I was missing important conversations and critical information. I attribute some of these difficulties to age and gender differences between the museum official and myself. Cultural norms also undoubtedly influenced our relationship; in Fiji an older gentleman would never normally take direction from a significantly younger woman. 6. I use the term interlocutor to refer to my Lauan collaborators, who might also be referred to as informants. I prefer interlocutor or collaborator because the terms have implications recognizing that these people participated in my research. A

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number of Lauan collaborators helped to shape my work and took part in countless discussions that influenced my thinking and interpretations. 7. When a visitor comes to a Fijian village and does not have family to stay with, this person is traditionally invited to stay in the home of the Turaga ni Koro. It is unusual for Fijians to arrive in a village without a predetermined place to stay, since people have many extended family connections. Foreigners, on the other hand, commonly end up staying with the Turaga ni Koro. 8. All of my relations with the Turaga ni Koro of Salia village were difficult. Our relationship began with the village headman telling me that he was the village chief. The museum staff member did not clarify this. At the museum official’s suggestion, my colleagues and I even presented the Turaga ni Koro with a large bundle of kava root (yaqona), the traditional narcotic that is customarily presented (sevusevu) as a ceremonial gift to the village chief by visitors. The Turaga ni Koro was thrilled with this successful manipulation and spent all night drinking kava with his friends. This sort of manipulation was just the first of many that mark my relationship with this village headman during my work on Nayau. The community’s situation was unusual because for the duration of my research this particular village did not have a hereditary chief in a position of control. Two closely related individuals were in line for the appointment of village chief, which is made by the king of Lau (the Tui Lau). The Tui Lau was unable to officially select one of them due to illness. As a result the village was in political turmoil and clans aggressively vied for power and control. Not surprisingly, my research team and myself were caught up in this power struggle. 9. During my first season of fieldwork in Lau I was often treated as an honorary male; that is, I was allowed to join the men in certain tasks and situations that women generally are not a part of. I was seated near the top of the house and seating area at meal times and encouraged to eat with the men (before the women and children). Because I am a foreigner, this was permitted. However, men were visibly uncomfortable with my presence in some instances, such as during an evening of kava drinking, or when I would speak up in a room full of men. Many Lauan men are uncomfortable speaking with women, and they are not used to interacting with them in public. As a sign of respect, men generally ignore women in public situations. 10. I applied for, and received IRB (Institutional Review Board) approval for ethnographic activities after my first trip to Lau. 11. There are few opportunities for women to express their opinions and feelings about things to foreign visitors or in a public setting. Moreover, the presence of a researcher on Nayau was unprecedented. We found that people were excited to meet me and talk with our group. We also compensated women who participated in these interviews, which was an added incentive. In all instances the women interviewed did not request to remain anonymous and were excited at the prospect of having their information and photos appear in a book or article or publication.

2

The Environmental and Social Landscape: The Lau Islands, Fiji

The events of human life, whether public or private, are so intimately linked to architecture that most observers can reconstruct nations or individuals in all the truth of their habits from the remains of their public monuments or from their domestic relics. Archaeology is to social nature what comparative anatomy is to organized nature. A mosaic reveals an entire society, just as a skeleton of an ichthyosaur suggests an entire creation. —Honoré de Balzac

T

he day had turned to night hours before as I sat on a worn ibe, a handwoven pandanus mat, enjoying the ocean breeze and listening to the women sing. I was seated among the men of the village and their sons who were drinking yaqona for what seemed like most of the day while the women sang and prepared copious amounts of food, a veritable feast by any standard. I made serious efforts to drink the smallest amount of yaqona possible to be social, and wished that I was allowed to help with the food. The preparations took weeks and resulted in the most diverse collection of cuisine that I had ever seen. This mass of food would be consumed entirely in one sitting. The Lauan feast is quantitatively and qualitatively different from everyday meals. Two kinds of sweet potato, taro, cassava, yams, breadfruit, seaweeds, papaya, cooked banana, and delicacies including different varieties of baked puddings (grated tubers mixed with coconut milk, which are baked in the earth oven) were served alongside an equally diverse array of marine and terrestrial meats. This cornucopia was even more im16

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pressive given the circumstance—the producers were almost two hundred miles from a grocery store and everything consumed was harvested, produced, and prepared locally with the exception of flour and rice that were purchased from a cargo ship. The women, teenagers, and children sang and clapped in time from one side of the village meetinghouse as they prepared the food and patiently waited for the men to finish the yaqona. Their rhythmic sonorous songs accompanied all celebratory feasts and continued for hours before the eating commenced. The feast began with a grand display of food covering every inch of the lengthy tablecloth (i sulu ni teveli), which spread out on the floor before the chief. He sat at the top of the house (i cake) and relished a generous portion of each dish. The plate in front of the chief overflowed with the best parts of the young pig, the head and hindquarters. A foot-long Jack cranium with its glossy bulging fish eyes intact was also presented to the head of the group. The guests and men of high rank joined the chief, enjoying the meal while the women and children waited to begin eating until the people positioned i cake have finished with their first serving. Lively discussions abounded as people ate and relished this community event. The flavor and quality of the food was a common topic of conversation at both ends of the table. Everyone was encouraged to eat more, “kana vaka levu!” The eating went on for hours, and all participants were satiated as we hobbled away from the eating area. Most people moved to occupy more comfortable horizontal positions at various houses where discussion continued until sleep set in. Feasting rituals such as this have been going on in Fiji as long as humans have inhabited these islands. However, rituals associated with eating are not limited to feasts—in fact every Lauan meal is structured with formal elements, particular components, and a suite of expected proper behaviors. An average meal differs from a feast in terms of the quantity and types of special foods prepared, but the structure of the meal is basically the same. Indeed, daily life in Lau involves many rituals that might be classified as secular, but which carry deep meanings and have roots in ancient traditions. It is the long-standing Lauan practices and traditions associated with foodways that I am most interested in understanding. These islands offer a view into lifeways that have maintained some of their fundamental structure over the last 2,000 to 3,000 years of human occupation. In addition to the ethnographic and archeological data from Lau, which will be discussed in succeeding chapters, the accounts of early explorers and missionaries provide useful descriptions of Fijian lifeways at the time of European contact. The exploratory voyages of the Enlightenment brought the Fijian Islands, along with many Pacific archipelagos, into the consciousness of Europeans (figure 2.1). In 1643, the Dutch explorer Abel Tasman located Fiji

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Figure 2.1.

Chapter 2

Map of the Pacific Islands with Remote Oceania Indicated

for the Western world, when he sighted Vanuabalavu in the Lau Group, although he did not actually make contact with the people or set foot on Fijian soil. The first Europeans to interact with Fijians were the mutineers from the Bounty, who landed on the island of Matuku, located in the Moala Group between Viti Levu and central Lau (Thomson 1968; Thurn and Wharton 1922). Sustained interactions between Fijians and Westerners did not commence until late in the nineteenth century, as the islands were generally avoided by navigators who feared savage cannibals (Clunie 2003; Young 1982). William Lockerby, the sandalwood trader, recorded directions to the Fiji Islands in 1809 and suggested, “Ships going their I would recommend to go well armed and niver to be of their gard for althow they are hospitable people yet they are Canables and will take every Advantage from their propensity to stealing, the low class of them in particular. I would recommend never to go on shoar without being armed for though you may be very friendly with those you are trading with yet they are always at war among themselves and those that are their Enomies will be yours” (cited in Clunie 2003, 4). Indeed, fear deterred explorers from regularly visiting Fiji until late in the nineteenth century, when many other islands in the central Pacific had been in contact with Europeans for one hundred years or more.

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The accounts of these explorers prove fragmentary and biased yet describe one side of the early interactions between Europeans and Fijians and a glimpse of some traditional practices and lifeways (Wilkes 1985). Nevertheless, much of Fijian culture in the late precontact and early historical periods remains to be understood. For example, during this time, the economic and sociopolitical systems were undergoing dramatic changes as a result of population increases, environmental shifts, and likely the overtaxing of available resources. What were the characteristics of this period in terms of settlement, household organization, foodways, and hierarchical social order? How did large-scale social changes affect people’s lifeways, ideology, and everyday activities in terms of foodways, labor, and production? Through the combined efforts of archaeology, ethnohistory, and ethnography these questions can be explored, and a better understanding of the past may be reached. This chapter provides background on socioeconomics, foodways, and rank in late prehistoric and contemporary Fiji, focusing on the Lau Group. Thousands of years prior to the Enlightenment Voyages, Pacific Islanders explored and occupied the far-flung islands of Oceania. The region of Near Oceania includes the islands of Papua New Guinea, the Bismarck Archipelago, and much of the Solomon Islands (figure 2.1). Near Oceania has been occupied by humans since about 40,000 years ago, and it is an area of extreme cultural, linguistic, and biogeographic diversity. Remote Oceania includes the islands east, southeast, and north of Near Oceania. The islands of Remote Oceania were discovered relatively late in human prehistory, around 1500 B.C., and even more recently in some areas. The Lapita peoples are the ancestors of most of the modern occupants of Remote Oceania. Lapita peoples spoke languages in the Austronesian language family and shared a common culture (Kirch and Green 1987, 2001). This culture complex is recognizable by distinctive dentate stamped pottery and associated stone and shell tool assemblages, the archaeological signature of the “seafaring pottery making farmers” who first inhabited Remote Oceania (Lilly 2006, 5). Pacific Island food systems, including those of the Lapita peoples, are a combination of cultivation technologies and domesticated food items originating from Southeast Asia (Sus scrofa, Canis familiaris, Gallus gallus, Dioscorea yams) and New Guinea (Saccharum officinarum and Australimusa bananas), as well as marine resource exploitation. The Lapita peoples colonized the islands of modern day Fiji, western Viti Levu specifically, by about 3050 BP (Nunn 2007). However, the Lau Group was occupied later in prehistory and possibly from Tonga rather than from Viti Levu or the larger islands of Fiji. The Lau Group is a cluster of 80 islands (29 of which are inhabited today) extending north to south across 450 km of ocean along the 180° meridian from latitude 17° to 21° south (figure 2.2 does not include the

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southern Lau islands of Ono-i-Lau and Tuvana-i-Ra, located ca. 200 km south of Ogea). The main Fijian islands of Viti Levu and Vanua Levu are located about 200 km west and 100 km northwest of Lau, respectively. Lau lies about 320 km west of Tonga. The rock substrate that makes up the Lau Islands, classified as Lau volcanics, dates to the late Miocene, including 6- to 9-million-year-old volcanics with upper Miocene and lower Pliocene limestone. The islands have uplifted to form coralline limestone cliffs up to 100 m above sea level in places (Bayliss-Smith et al. 1988). Lau exhibits a variety of geological variations, although weathered limestone makes up much of the exposed bedrock (Ladd and Hoffmeister 1945; Stevenson et al. 1994). These islands are located relatively close together, with much inter-island visibility. Geologically, the area has been described as a plateau where the average water depth is 2 km (Best 1984). Extensive reef systems fringe most of the islands. In southern Lau, these reefs are often exposed a few meters above present sea level (BaylissSmith et al. 1988). Submerged reef systems cover large areas throughout the archipelago. The marine zone is rich in faunal resources (Vuki et al. 2000; Wright 1993), and today the coastal zone represents the most important component of the landscape from an economic perspective. Most

Figure 2.2.

Map of the Fiji Islands with the Study Area Indicated in the Square

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contemporary Lauan villages lie on the coast, with easy access to the sea, coconut plantations, churches, and visiting cargo ships (Bayliss-Smith et al. 1988; Hocart 1929; Thompson 1940). Drought and tropical storms are the two natural physical events that commonly adversely affect Lau. The southeast trades (locally referred to as “Lau i cake” or winds moving up the Lau group) are the predominant winds, which blow up along the axis of the chain and are especially persistent from July to December (Vuki et al. 2000). The climate is typically tropical and marine; mean annual temperatures are around 25°C, ranging from 21°C to 30°C with humidity around 78 percent. Rainfall is variable, ranging between 1,500 and 3,500 mm (Fiji Government 2004). In recent years, more severe dry seasons have been observed in central Lau. The wet season is between November and April, although most of the rain falls in heavy but short local showers during the wet season, the height of which is usually in March. Droughts in Fiji are closely linked to the El Niño–Southern Oscillation (ENSO) phenomenon. ENSOs result in weak trade winds, lower ocean temperatures, decreased rainfall, and altered migrations of tuna and billfish (Vuki et al. 2000; Zann and Vuki 2000). Strong ENSO episodes may even cause major droughts throughout the country (e.g., during 1982/1983 and 1997/1998) (Fiji Government 2004). In relatively normal years, the rainfall in dry areas may be so low during the dry season that below-average rainfall for a couple of months may cause a drought. This is a common occurrence in Lau. Between January and May, tropical cyclones are frequent. On average, ten to fifteen cyclones per decade affect some part of Fiji, and two to four cause severe damage. Lau is often hit hard by these events. My work primarily focused on the island of Nayau. However, I sometimes refer to my research in additional field localities, including on the islands of Lakeba, Aiwa Levu, and Aiwa Lailai, which lie to the southeast of Nayau (figure 2.2). Lakeba, the capital of Lau and the seat of the Lau Provincial Government, is the largest island in Lau, measuring 56 km2. Lakeba is surrounded by a fringing reef and has an eroded and dissected volcanic center; mainly andesites through dacites, with some basalts and limestone outcrops along the coast (Best 1984). Lakeba has eight villages, the largest of which is Tubou, located on the south coast. Tubou is the traditional home of the paramount chief of Lau, the Tui Nayau. Aiwa Levu and Aiwa Lailai are located southeast of Lakeba and are currently uninhabited. These two small islands are sometimes referred to collectively as “Aiwa,” and measure 1.2 km2 and 1.0 km2, respectively. The islands are composed of raised weathered late Miocene limestone, and are surrounded by an extensive reef, large parts of which are exposed at low tide. The interiors of both islands are pocketed, with caves and sinkholes. The land is covered with volcanic soils that become thinner

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around the island’s edges, exhibiting areas of limestone outcrop. Aiwa Levu is primarily used today as a temporary campground for fishermen who come by boat to exploit the islands’ rich and accessible marine resources. Aiwa Lailai is more difficult to access due to the lack of a beach or landing area. It has fewer flat areas suitable for camping and fewer caves and rockshelters than are found on Aiwa Levu. Nayau (figure 2.3) has a land area of 22 km2 and is located in northcentral Lau, about 240 km east of Viti Levu. The islands of Cicia to the northwest and Lakeba to the southeast are Nayau’s closest neighbors. The island is a geological composite of exposed volcanics and highly weathered raised limestone (Ladd and Hoffmeister 1945). Nayau’s central interior

Figure 2.3.

Map of Nayau Island

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zone is a basin (average elevation ca. 100 m) with large areas of highly degraded volcanic soils (from weathered andesitic and dacitic lavas) where principal crops are cultivated. The basin is surrounded by a discontinuous ring of elevated reefal limestone (maximum elevation ca. 160 m). The limestone varies in degree of surface weathering, from rugged karst outcrops to densely forested areas with substantial weathered soil. Extensive tracts of planted and tended coconut palms (Cocos nucifera) ring much of the island’s coastline. The palms produce copra, which is Nayau’s main commercial export. Nayau’s three villages (Salia, Narocivo, and Liku) are located along the coast and are all positioned on or next to prehistoric village occupations. Salia and Narocivo are on the east, and Liku is on the west. The coastal flats and reefal sands that fringe Nayau probably were formed mainly by storm-wave deposition during the past 4,000 years (McLean 1980). Like many of Fiji’s small peripheral islands, Nayau is subject to extensive damage from hurricanes and tropical storms. In 1979, Hurricane Meli’s wind-driven sea surges struck the northern and eastern coasts of Nayau, sweeping over the eastern two villages and causing a severe loss of life and physical damage to the landscape (Bayliss-Smith et al. 1988, 88). As a result, the island was evacuated, and copra production ceased for almost four years (Bayliss-Smith et al. 1988, 88). When discussing severe weather, people from Nayau often refer to this horrible hurricane and the physical and mental scars it left on them.

LIFE AND HISTORY IN LAU The current population on Nayau is around 400 people. In 2003, Salia village had 167 inhabitants, Narocivo had 164 people, and Liku had 80. At the time of Captain Charles Wilkes’s visit to Nayau in 1840, he claimed that Nayau had a population of 200 people, “who are perched upon inaccessible peaks, in order to protect themselves from depredations” (Wilkes 1985, 176). It is possible that Wilkes made a gross underestimate, given that he did not venture inland. My archaeological surveys of Nayau’s interior hilltop fortifications and their numerous house platforms indicate that populations were likely much grater than 200. The contemporary population on Nayau ranges widely in age, but most of the population is middle-aged to elderly people (about thirty-five to eighty years). This age structure is largely influenced by the emigration of young to middle-age groups; adolescents and young adults are increasingly leaving the island to pursue advanced educations and paying jobs in the cities of the main islands. Emigration affects local labor resources by creating a social environment where extended-family working groups are

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increasingly difficult to assemble. Bayliss-Smith et al. (1988) attribute the distorted age structure of Lakeba’s population to modern ideas about individualism that developed in the 1970s and 1980s. On Lakeba, and to a lesser degree on Nayau, changes in land-use patterns have contributed to growing dependence on store-bought foods. Lakeba, as the capital of Lau, is much more influenced by these changes than the surrounding islands. Wilkes estimated that Lau, or what he called the entire “Eastern Group,” was occupied by about 3,000 people in 1840 (Wilkes 1985, 323). This projection is also likely an underestimate. In terms of Fiji’s overall population, Wilkes estimated that “the whole group contains 130,000 inhabitants” (Wilkes, 1985, 323). Based on archaeological data, census information (starting in 1879), and historical records, Best argues that Lakeba’s maximum prehistoric population was around 2,000 people (Best 1984, 575). The 1976 census recorded 2,044 people on Lakeba. Culturally as well as geographically, the Lau Islands are the meeting point between what have been referred to as the culture areas of “Polynesia” (originally meaning “many islands”; a term that has since been defined as a culture area, see Kirch and Green 2001) and “Melanesia” (originally meaning “black islands”). In recent years the term Melanesia has fallen out of favor as it is inherently biased and flawed. When I use the term Melanesia here, I refer to geographic area only, rather than to a cultural or ethnic category. Preferable geographic, linguistic, and cultural divisions are Near and Remote Oceania, as depicted in figure 2.1. While the precise timing and origin of the cultural relationship between Tonga and Lau remain unknown, the two areas regularly interacted by the seventeenth century, and likely well before 1000 BP (Best 1984; Clark 1999; Reid 1990). By the seventeenth century, the Lauan people were intermediaries between chiefly lineages of Tonga and Fiji, and a “House of Fiji” (Ha’a Fale Fisi; Fijian family lines that are permanently connected to Tonga through marriage) was firmly established in Tonga (Hocart 1929; Reid 1990). At European contact, the Lauans were engaged in exchange networks that spanned much or all of Fiji, Tonga, and Samoa (Hocart 1929; Reid 1990; also see D’Arcy 2006). Wesleyan missionaries arrived in Lau in 1835. By 1849 Tui Nayau, the king of Lau, publicly accepted the Christian faith and was soon joined by many of his chiefs and people (Reid 1990). Powerful chiefs emerged throughout Fiji in the nineteenth century, although it was not the direct result of European contact. Particular power configurations can be traced to precapitalist Fijian society, where small confederations of chiefdoms, or Fijian states (matanitu), were common (Reid 1990; Sahlins 1985; Young 1982). However, a substantial shift in the political organization of the Fijian islands as a whole between 1800 and 1874 affected all of the islands,

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including Lau. In 1874 some chiefs ceded political control to the Queen of England, making Fiji part of the British Empire. Simultaneously, three states or matanitu, including Lakeba (all of central and southern Lau from Nayau south), Bau (the Lomaiviti Group off the east coast of Viti Levu from Koro south to Kadavu), and Cakaudrove (southeastern Vanua Levu, Taveuni and northern Lau, south to Cicia), subjugated all the small islands off the east coasts of Viti Levu and Vanua Levu, as well as much of these larger islands (Bayliss-Smith et al. 1988; Reid 1990; Sahlins 1985). As a result, rivalries, political alliances, and trade networks intensified. One outcome of this was the rapid spread of steel technologies that “transformed agriculture, boat-building, house construction and weapons manufacture. . . . This technology . . . had a major impact on the generation of surplus labour and product in Fijian communities, and these changes in the economic base undoubtedly played an important role in centralization of power among certain lineages in the political structure” (BaylissSmith et al. 1988, 48–49). Further compounding change was the increasing influence of the Tongans in Lau through immigration and political alliance, which ultimately affected Lau’s economic base in the mid-nineteenth century. Starting in precolonial times, Tongans and Fijians were involved in extensive trade networks that spanned the island groups of Fiji, Tonga, and Samoa. Tongans introduced Samoan adzes, which were brought to Fiji as exchange valuables, and traded for Lauan hardwoods (vesi or Intsia bijuga, especially for canoes), barkcloth (masi), and red parakeet feathers (D’Arcy 2006; Thompson 1940; Young 1982). Tongan immigrants also settled throughout Lau, thus increasing their connections to Fijians through marriage, political alliances, and exchange. In 1853, the Tongan chief Ma’afu was appointed as the deputy governor of the Tongans resident in Fiji (Reid 1990; Young 1993). Ma’afu settled in Vanua Balavu in 1855, and instituted changes in the land-tenure system that resulted in an increase in Fijian participation in surplus-commodity production for the export trade (especially coconut oils). In Bau, the powerful chief Cakobau exerted rigid control over land sales in Lomaiviti, and thus prevented large-scale European settlement on most of these islands, with the exception of Ovalau (Bayliss-Smith et al. 1988, 54). Generally, Fijian chiefs were reluctant to comply with European desires for Fijian land and local labor. Many of the chiefs were advised by Europeans to avoid the pattern of colonial domination that occurred in New Zealand and Australia. A treaty of friendship was agreed on by the king of Lakeba and the king of Tonga, declaring peace, mutual defense, and the freedom of Tongans and Lauans to settle in either kingdom, in 1865 (Reid 1990, 50). The treaty formally recognized bonds that had existed for many generations; but

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was needed to substantiate the claims of Tongans who, from their perspective, found themselves increasingly in competition with Europeans for control and manipulation of the Fijian islands. Using his popularity, political power, and kin affiliations, Ma’afu formed a confederation (tovata) in 1869 that united Lakeba’s possessions (the islands extending from Nayau south to Ono-i-Lau) with the adjacent Tongan possessions of Vanua Balavu and the Moala Group (figure 2.2); this confederation made Ma’afu the first Tui Lau, or king of Lau. In 1938, the Native Lands Commission recorded the Tukutuku Raraba, or oral traditions of the landowning units and individuals. Records show that Lauan society in the twentieth century was the product of political consolidation and economic organization that occurred over a period of at least four centuries (Young 1993, 160). Young (1993) demonstrates that these records are contingent on history and that they validated the social and political status quo and the rights of those people currently in possession of land. The Tukutuku Raraba is obviously biased toward the interests of the people in power, those who believed that they were the rightful owners of land. Nevertheless, these records are useful for understanding past land claims and political and social organization, which formed the historical foundation of the present. Currently, Lauan villages are each presided over by hereditary minor chiefs who hold the title Tui combined with the name of the village. For example, on the island of Nayau, Tui Liku is the chief of Liku village, and Narocivo is ruled by Tui Naro. Salia village does not have a chief, as the Tui Devo died years ago and a new chief has not been appointed by the Tui Lau. The term Devo refers to the name of the old village that was destroyed in 1979 by Hurricane Meli. Devo was located on the coastal strip; the newer village, Salia, is positioned on the alluvial slopes above where Devo was on the landscape. Hocart (1929, 23) claims that Ma’afu moved Salia to its present location. The village chiefs have tributary dealings with the high chiefs and are ranked according to their kin relationship to each other and to the high chief (Thompson 1940). The entire province of Lau is the domain of the high chief or king, the Tui Lau. His full dual title, Na Tui Lau, Tui Nayau Ka Sau ni Vanua ko Lau, translates to the King of Lau, King of Nayau, and High Chief of the Land of Lau; and refers to his lineage from Nayau and associations with Tonga. The title Sau is a Fijian cognate of the native Tongan term Hau. Reid (1990) explains that in Tonga the semi-divine king, the Tui Tonga, became separate from the acting king or high chief, the Hau. “Reluctant to involve the [Hau] in the rough and tumble government, brought to a head by violence, led to the separation of spiritual and temporal functions and the emergence of the Hau as distinct from the Tu’i Tonga” (Reid 1990, 6). In Fiji, the title Sau is only used in Lau, Taveuni, and Vanua Levu, the areas

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closest to Tonga; but unlike in Tonga, it may be held by the same individual who is the Tui. The late Ratu Sir Kamisese Mara was both the Tui Lau and Sau (1920–2005, installed in 1969). The Tui Lau is first installed as the Sau, and after a number of years is installed as the Tui Nayau. In addition to the hereditary chief, each village has a locally appointed government representative or village headman, the Turaga ni Koro. The headman is responsible for assigning and directing village communal work, making nightly announcements, and maintaining the general physical and esthetic state of the village. He is also the collector of tribute and taxes. High-ranking people on Lakeba refer to Nayau as “the land of our little house, of our kitchen,” and Lakebans consider the Nayau people to be the household servants to the Tui Nayau, and the island and all its resources to be theirs (Hocart 1929, 23). Narocivo was generally the most high ranked of Nayau’s three villages. This is where the Tui Nayau’s lineage originates. He is closely related to the Tui Naro. Salia gained power in the mid-1800s (Hocart n.d. ms); but since there is currently no chief, or Tui Devo, Salia has lost power and is ranked second to Narocivo. Lauans frequently refer to social hierarchies, which are central to all social relations in Fiji. Lauan kinship is a complicated system of ranking that is intricately interwoven with hierarchy, gender, and status relations, a tradition that undoubtedly derives from the first occupants of Lau. Every person on Nayau, in all three villages, is related through consanguinity, affinity, and/or fictive kin relationships in multiple ways. The reckoning of family is constantly referred to in conversation, but remains extremely flexible according to context. For example, if there is a crisis or someone becomes ill, people will begin to refer to individuals involved as brother, sister, father, or mother, when these people may or may not be consanguines. Hocart (n.d. ms, 40) has argued that knowing someone means that they are a relation and kin. I believe this adequately represents contemporary social relations on Nayau. The largest commonly recognized unit of Fijian kin organization is the yavusa, which has been referred to as a phratry by Thompson (1940). This term, derived from the word yavu (the earth foundation of a house where deceased members of the family were buried), originally referred to groups of ranked and related houses founded by a common ancestor or group of ancestors (Hocart 1929; Thompson 1940; Toren 1994). Phratry units are classified as either “land” (yavusa vanua, or kai vanua) or “sea” (yavusa wai or kai wai) people. Land people, who are always nonchiefly or commoner lineages, claim descent from the earliest known inhabitants of the land and form the largest portion of the population. Not all sea people are of chiefly status (although all chiefs are sea people), but they all

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claim descent from ancestors who came from off island. In common usage, yavusa refers to a patrilineal decent group or clan, which combines multiple mataqali (described below), and may refer to an entire village (as is the case in Liku Village). The mataqali, commonly referred to as the clan by ethnographers of Fijian society, is the basic local kin group directing economic activity, which is generally exogamous, patrilineal, and patrilocal. Mataqali are said to be descended from a heroic ancestral spirit, and are a smaller unit than the yavusa (Hocart 1929; Sahlins 1962; Thompson 1940). Thompson argues that mataqali are composed of descendents of a band of brothers who occupied a single hamlet site; before European contact, when hamlets were spread out over a single island. Capell (1984) cited four traditional classifications or types of mataqali in Fijian society; and this kin division appears to “have sprung from the subdivision of naturally increasing families, the sons of the original ancestor being the heads of the resulting mataqali. The mataqali-turaga was the mataqali of the eldest son (na ulumatua); mataqali bati, the warriors; mataqali bete, the priests; mataqali matanivanua, the heralds. These functions are thus hereditary amongst men of the mataqali. . . . The mataqali of a person may be known by (1) the food that is forbidden him; (2) his war-cry (i vakacaucau ni ravu); and (3) the animal or fish he must prepare for the chief of a certain place, and may not partake of himself in the presence of that chief (salu)” Capell (1984, 142). Within the mataqali are two or three smaller named residential kin units of common paternal descent, called tokatoka. Tokatoka maintain land claims, but were not recognized by the Native Lands Commission in the 1930s (the Native Lands Commission’s inquiries establish the land claims for villages and their kin groups at the mataqali level). Sahlins (1962, 241) noted that this kin division is also associated with the phrase “side of the oven” (baji ni lovo), indicating that tokatoka share a lovo and also constitute part of a mataqali. Hocart (n.d. ms) described Lauan cross-cousin marriage practices as the foundation of the kinship system. According to the crosscousin system, if a man is related to another man, he will be related to that man’s brother in exactly the same way; if he is related to a woman in any way, then he is related to this woman’s sister in exactly the same way, but not to her brother. In this situation, a man’s children should marry his sister’s children, and cross cousins are simply considered “man and wife” (p. 45). This is still practiced in Lau and on Nayau specifically, although it is becoming increasingly less common. At the time of European contact, several married couples within a tokatoka would occupy a single house. The term vu vale refers to this association of people who worked together and shared a house and kitchen; the term includes the physical house structure and the people using it (Hocart n.d. ms, 28). The colonial gov-

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ernment regulations of the late 1800s ordered that each married couple must live in a single house, but people no longer consistently follow this rule. All Lauan relations are ranked and hierarchical. Indeed, terminology referring to people is laden with literal and figurative references to their social status in relation to one another and to birth order. For example, a younger brother is often the “after eater” or kana i muri (Hocart n.d. ms, 53). “Small people” (tamata lailai) tend to the food basket at the lower end of the house; thus, the “basket carrier” (cola in kato) may also refer to a younger brother. Conversely, the older brother is often called the “old head” (ulu matua). This younger elder distinction applies to the men with the same mother (Hocart n.d. ms, 53). Seniority is only absolute between brother and sisters. Rank depends largely on seniority, but it is also qualified depending on the social context (Hocart n.d. ms, 72). Likewise the terms “highborn” or “noble” (turaga) and “lowborn” (kaisi) are relative, as is their use. Labor in Lau is organized according to gender, kinship, and age (Hocart 1929; Sahlins 1962; Thompson 1940). Adult male tasks include the following: gardening; fishing (with a spear offshore, with a hook and hand-line); animal husbandry; preparing the earth oven and cooking food in it for special occasions; woodworking and house building; participation in village politics; and contributing labor to village projects and social services (such as construction of fences, community centers, and churches). The primary tasks for women include child care; fishing (inshore, with small nets, hooks, and hand-line); gathering greens, fruits, and fuel for cooking; preparing and cooking food (except in the earthoven); masi, mat, and oil making; cleaning and laundry; and contributing labor to village projects and social services (making decorative items and collecting, preparing, and distributing food for special events). Women are symbolically linked with places on the landscape that are considered to be “inside.” Inside areas primarily consist of the village and inshore marine environments (O’Day 2004). Children also make an important contribution to the economy. In the village, when children are not in school, they are actively involved in tasks that directly result in the production of food, crafts, or other items or resources that are helpful to their families. For example, adults and adolescents often call upon children from about five to twelve years of age to collect firewood or coconuts, run down and kill a chicken for dinner, assist with gardening, and so forth. Lauan children are confident and capable in many everyday household and subsistence tasks. The impacts of gendered cultural expectations on the behavior of people within Fijian society are great. Women are expected to be caring, giving, and focused on members of the household rather than on themselves

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(see also Aucoin 2002; Becker 1995; Leckie 2000). These social pressures dictate what, when, and where women eat and the tasks that people engage in throughout the day. Much discussion within the village focuses on whether or not women are identified by their families and neighbors as respectable caregivers, wives, and mothers. The collection, preparation, and serving of food are critical components of care giving. Personal obligations determined by kinship are the basis of exchange systems in Lau (Hocart 1929; Sahlins 1962; Young 1993). This tradition, enabling people to exchange commodities within the region and with areas outside of it, was documented in the earliest accounts of Lau, and exists in the present despite the modern superimposition of the cash economy (Young 1993). All items of exchange (financial, food-related, and otherwise) move through kin groups. The resulting system is one where any item in the possession of an individual is considered property of immediate and extended kin groups. Begging (kerekere) and ceremonial exchange (soli, solevu) are the only traditional Lauan means by which property changes hands (Hocart n.d. ms, 129).1 In Lau today these traditional forms of exchange are supplemented by more Western modes of exchange such as loans and purchases with cash or trade-in-kind. Colonialism and Westernization have undoubtedly affected all aspects of the indigenous lifeways, and Nayau’s subsistence system is no exception. While living on the island, people primarily rely on a subsistence economy. However, Lauans are deeply immersed in the economics of the World System. Unfortunately, the phrase “subsistence economy” is fraught with intellectual baggage and suggests that a group with this relatively simple economic form is struggling. That is not the case in Lau. In fact, people generally have more than enough food to feed themselves and their families. They live off the land, are well nourished, and maintain healthy lifestyles. Lauans are acutely affected by colonization, and modernization. And, there is no doubt that Lau is in the periphery rather than the powerful industrialized core (Sahlins 1999; Wallerstein 1974). Places with subsistence economies are both enmeshed in and impoverished by the World System, that complex network of economic exchange relations traversing the globe. While Lauans maintain fundamentally traditional Fijian elements of existence, ideology, and culture, they are wrapped up in a system beyond the islands they inhabit. Not surprisingly, today imported commodities replace many of the meaning-laden items that were most likely to be exchanged and negotiated between Lauan communities in the past. Introductions with the most obvious impacts on eating habits are (1) cassava or manioc (Manihot esculenta and M. dulcis) and (2) technologies including microfiber fishing line, outboard motors, and fiberglass fishing boats. Cassava was introduced by the Colonial Government between 1900

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and 1912 (Bayliss-Smith et al. 1988). This reliable, rapidly maturing, lowmaintenance crop was quickly adopted by Lauans, and is presently the most commonly consumed root crop and starch staple. It is planted primarily inland in the center of the island, but also along the eroding alluvial slopes just outside the villages. Modern products replace or substitute traditional items readily because they fit into existing niches and thus the system as a whole. Some examples include: cotton replacing barkcloth; “tinfish” (or canned tuna) replacing large offshore fishes; cassava replacing taro and sweet potatoes; metal fishing gear replacing bone and shell fishhooks; alcoholic beverages replacing yaqona (or kava); yarn replacing bird feathers for decorating pandanus mats; and linoleum replacing pandanus mats. The replacement process should not be looked upon as a loss of culture and tradition. Marshall Sahlins recently pointed out, following Margaret Jolly, that when people in Western cultures change, it is called progress; but when indigenous peoples change, it is seen as a tragedy and the death of tradition (Sahlins 1999, ii). In fact, Fijians (just like people all over the world) “indigenize modernity” (Sahlins 1999, x). Modern products enhance existing social systems and are looked upon as a positive influence, as will be discussed in the following chapters. In terms of subsistence-based agriculture Lauans focus on slash-andburn gardening. This seasonally regulated cultivation is done by men and involves the clearing of partially forested areas inland that are outside the villages. Some of the areas cultivated are located on prehistoric archaeological sites; the interior hillforts positioned along the discontinuous ring of elevated limestone surrounding the island’s central basin are especially productive areas, as their soils are rich in organics. Irrigation agriculture, associated with aroid production, is practiced in limited areas of the island (primarily in the northeast and southwest). Most families have multiple garden plots that they regularly tend and harvest throughout the year. Staple starch foods compose a large portion (70–80 percent) of the total diet every day. Principal crops that are produced on island include sweet potatoes (Ipomoea batatas), yams (Dioscorea spp.), dryland aroids or taro (Colocasia esculenta and Alocasia macrorrhiza), cassava, breadfruit (Artocarpus altilis), and bananas (Musa sp.). Some people also plant sugarcane, melons, corn, cabbage, eggplant, beans, mangos, and papayas. Seaweeds form a small portion of the average diet. They are often eaten, but in limited quantities. They are usually served as a side dish or as a snack. In addition to locally produced foods, people supplement their diet with starches including flour, rice, and noodles (or ramen) that can be purchased at the local stores and from cargo ships with cash, credit, or through exchange.

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Coconuts (Cocos nucifera) are a significant component of the diet. They are used for drinking, and their flesh is often grated and combined with many traditional dishes, or eaten raw. Coconut milk is also used in cooking or as a dipping sauce. In addition to their use as food, coconuts produce a husk fiber that is made into sennit (fiber cordage) and oil that is used as a lubricant for the skin and hair. Their fronds are woven for thatch and baskets, and coconut wood is used as a building material. Currently, perhaps the most important economic contribution of coconuts is the production of copra, or dried coconut meat, for export and sale. Copra is a major source of income for people throughout Lau. On Nayau, tracts of cultivated coconut palms ring much of the island’s coastline, and also grow on the interior; forming a major resource, both locally and for copra export. The principal nonfood crops are pandanus (Pandanus caricosus) and paper mulberry (Broussonetia papyrifera). These crops are used by women to produce mats and barkcloth, for which Nayau is known. Importantly, kava or yaqona (Piper methysticum) that is used to make the mildly narcotic drink consumed at all ritual occasions is not grown on Nayau and must be imported. Interestingly, kava grows well on nearby islands, but people on Nayau claim that it will not grow on their island. Nayau’s terrestrial faunal resources consist of indigenous lizards, a boa, birds, and fruit bats; as well as prehistoric human introductions including pigs (Sus scrofa), dogs (Canis familiaris), chickens (Gallus gallus), and rats (Rattus exulans, R. praetor). Cattle (Bos taurus), goats (Capra hircus), and horses (Equus caballus) arrived on the island as European introductions in the late 1800s (Hocart 1929). Today, the main animal foods on the island include bony fish, shellfish and other invertebrates (including coconut crabs; lobsters and other crustaceans; sea cucumbers; cephalopods, especially octopus; seasonal annelid sea worms, or Eunice viridis; bivalves; and gastropods), turtles, chicken, pig, and cows. Animals that contribute small and irregular portions to the diet include seabirds, ducks, bats, and goats. Goats are primarily raised for sale to the main islands, and are rarely consumed. Pigs, chickens, and cows are reserved for consumption on special occasions. Locally produced meat is occasionally supplemented by canned meats (such as tuna and corned beef) that are available in Nayau’s stores. Pigs and cows are kept outside the villages by fences that are maintained by local communal labor. Men construct pig pens; but use them primarily for feeding pigs, as the animals run free outside the villages. Horses and cows are most often tied up outside the village. People often keep their goats tied up in the village, and they are occasionally allowed to roam the village along with chickens and dogs. Local perceptions regarding what items are considered valuable, or signs of economic wealth, today are the result of historical processes in Fiji

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and, to a lesser extent, Western ideas about wealth. It is thus instructive to explore the coevolution of economic and political systems through time in order to understand the present and the past. Working from historical records and missionary and indigenous accounts, Bayliss-Smith et al. (1988) characterized economic organization in the Fijian islands around the 1800s as a system focused on domestic production, but with the material resources to produce a surplus for significant ceremonial events and inter-island trade. During the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, Fiji experienced a period of political and social unrest due to shifts from “a weakly hierarchical and diffusely connected chiefly system to larger more complex lineage aristocracies based on geographical suzerainty rather than purely kinship ties” (Bayliss-Smith et al. 1988, 47). One aspect of this power shift was the intensified struggle among upperstatus individuals to harness and accumulate resources and economic wealth. This tradition continues in the present, as both chiefly individuals and commoners have access to material goods and the ability to gain cash through trade and labor. In the precolonial and early colonial years, smaller islands to the east and west of Viti Levu and Vanua Levu, “were not isolated self-sufficient cells, and by the time merchant capital began to extract value from the physical and human resources of Fiji, a complex system of political patronage, alliances and economic exchanges had evolved to exploit ecological diversity and to facilitate division of labour, centralization of power and inter-island trade” (Bayliss-Smith et al. 1988, 47). From the work of Hocart (1929), Quain (1948), Sahlins (1962), Thompson (1940), BaylissSmith et al. (1988), and Reid (1990), a general characterization of the economic basis of life in the 1800s can be constructed. The economic foundation of Fijian society included the following: • A simple means of production was based on human energy, land cultivation, animal husbandry, and marine-resource exploitation. • A hierarchical system of chiefly leadership and mutual obligations formed the basis of productive relations and labor organization. • Division of labor was based on gender and age, where the men do the gardening and land clearing, go on expeditions, do the offshore fishing, and fighting; while the adult women do the domesticassociated activities such as cooking, cleaning, and inshore fishing and collecting. • Social relations were marked by the appropriation of tribute derived from leadership, economic cooperation, kinship, and marriage. The current Lauan system of economic organization on Nayau overlaps considerably with the aforementioned characterization. I do not mean to

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imply that Lauans or the people of Nayau have remained unchanged and static since the precolonial era. Rather, certain important economic structures have remained in place, and while society is certainly changing and constantly incorporating new elements, some structures (including the means of production, the system of social obligations, division of labor, and the social relations of tribute) have remained relatively conservative. For example, the introduction of steel technology to Fiji enabled the generation of surplus labor and product, which contributed to the economic base utilized in the centralization of power among lineages with preexisting authority and political strength. Today’s economic wealth includes land, material good of both foreign and local manufacture (e.g., barkcloth, kava, kerosene, fiberglass boats), food items (e.g., domestic animals, locally collected and produced plants and animals, imported foods), and cash. In some contexts imported goods are becoming equally or more highly valued than certain locally produced goods. The conspicuous consumption and general accumulation of goods by members of the community are prestige-enhancing activities. Within the village there is a feeling that people who pursue this are generally distrusted and considered greedy. However, at the same time these people are envied by members of the community and looked to by kin for material support. The unabashed accumulation of materials goes against the Fijian ethos of giving from which people derive a positive view of their personal identity in the eyes of individuals and the community (Becker 1995). Traditionally, chiefs and the elite class sought material wealth in mass, but commoners generally did not (Hocart 1929; Sahlins 1962; Thompson 1940). This practice is evolving as more and more people at all social ranks seek to accumulate goods.

ARCHAEOLOGICAL RESEARCH ON NAYAU I conducted archaeological reconnaissance surveys on Nayau in September and November 2001, investigating all three of the island’s traditional districts. Each district corresponds to a modern village (Salia, Narocivo, and Liku). These surveys located thirty-four discrete prehistoric archaeological sites on the island, consisting of three occupation types including inland rockshelters, hilltop fortified villages, and open village sites along the coastal dunes (figure 2.4). Most of the sites were known to the inhabitants of Nayau by the names I use here (table 2.1). Archaeological structures and pottery scatters were mapped, described, photographed, and plotted on air photos and geological maps. Twelve sites were excavated in 2001, yielding preliminary data about chronology, settlement patterns, and animal exploitation from each of the traditional districts and each of

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35

the site types.2 In 2003, I excavated the site of Na Masimasi, the island’s earliest known occupation. Many of the excavated sites had relatively shallow deposits (⬍ 1 m deep; average 0.5 m) with simple stratigraphy. Waituruturu West and East, Korovatu Rockshelter 2, and Nukutubu Rockshelter 2 displayed more complex stratigraphy with fine lenses, subsurface pit features, and multiple strata. Na Masimasi also exhibited deep stratigraphy and features including possible trash pits, scooped fire features (likely lovo or hearths), and postholes. A prehistoric chronology for Nayau was obtained from the analysis of eight accelerator-mass spectrometer (AMS) radiocarbon (14 C) dates from

Figure 2.4.

Map of Nayau Island Showing Selected Archaeological Sites

Salia

Liku

Narocivo

Site name

Waituruturu East Waituruturu West Qara ni Lulu Vulaga Navutu Daku ni Tuba Na Masimasi Korovatu Rockshelter 1 Korovatu Rockshelter 2 Koro ni Gasau Ulu ni Koro Nukutubu Rockshelter 1 Nukutubu Rockshelter 2

District

WaiT E WaiT W Qara L Vul Nav DKT NaMM KV1 KV2 KoroNG UluNK NukuT 1 NukuT 2

Abbreviation

Summary of Excavated Sites on Nayau

Table 2.1.

Site type Fortified rockshelter with internal platforms Fortified rockshelter with internal platforms Rockshelter Open coastal dune site Hillfort Hillfort Open coastal dune site Rockshelter Rockshelter Hillfort Fortified rockshelter Rockshelter Open coastal dune with associated rockshelter

1⫻1 m test unit 1⫻1 m test units (2) 1⫻1 m test unit Shovel tests (15) 1⫻1 m test unit (1); shovel tests (2) 1⫻1 m test units (2) 1⫻1 m units (3) 1⫻1 m test unit 1⫻1 m test unit 1⫻1 m test unit 1⫻1 m test unit 1⫻1 m test unit 1⫻1 m test unit

Excavation method

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37

bone and charcoal samples (Jones 2007; O’Day et al. 2003). Samples from the following sites were dated: Na Masimasi, Waituruturu East, Qara ni Lulu, and Nukutubu Rockshelter 2 (table 2.2). The only dated site older than about 600 BP is Na Masimasi, which was occupied by people of the Lapita culture, the first inhabitants of Nayau.3 The site’s radiocarbon date (2400–2630 BP) and the style of the pottery both indicate that Na Masimasi was occupied in the late Lapita period. Elsewhere in Fiji, Lapita pottery and other artifacts similar to those from the site of Na Masimasi are associated with sites whose occupations date to around 3,000 years ago (Anderson and Clark 1999; Best 2002; Clark et al. 2001; Jones et al. 2007). The eight radiocarbon dates provide a baseline for developing Nayau’s cultural chronology. The majority of the excavated sites fall into the mid–late prehistoric period (table 2.3). In particular, these dates help a prehistoric context for both the island and the region and can be used to understand changes in foodways and marine resource exploitation over time. The three 14C samples from Waituruturu East indicate that occupation of this inland fortified rockshelter was confined to a relatively short period during the late prehistoric phase, ca. 680–520 Cal BP (table 2.3). These dates agree with Best’s findings on Lakeba, where inland fortified sites are dated from about 1200 to 200 Cal BP; Best refers to this as the stages of culture history, corresponding with his Periods III and IV (1984, 644–645; 2002, 17–23). Settlement during this phase was characteristically focused on fortifications and correlates with the Navutu and Vuda ceramic styles. Researchers argue that changes in ceramic style and settlement patterns represent a major cultural shift (Clark 1999; Hunt 1986, 1987; Marshall et al. 2000) that may involve contact from the West, especially Vanuatu (Best 1984, 2002). It is also likely that the shifts were related to the rapid cooling and sea-level fall, which according to Nunn (2003), occurred during the transition from the Little Climatic Optimum to the Little Ice Age between 730–525 BP (also referred to as the LCO/LIA transition; Allen 2006; Field 2004).4 The single date from Qara ni Lulu, based on an adult human tibia (not in a primary burial context), suggests a similar late prehistoric occupation of this site at 690–640 Cal BP. Additional evidence for a late occupation of this inland rockshelter comes from the style and elaborate incised and punctuated design motifs on the pottery (typical of the Vuda and later Ra pottery styles that date to ca. 900–100 BP on Viti Levu and Taveuni; Green 1963, Marshall et al. 2000). On Lakeba the gradual introduction of incised elements characteristic of Vuda ceramics occurred a few hundred years earlier than on the larger Fijian islands (Best 1984). The AMS 14C date for Qara ni Lulu is several centuries earlier than dates generally

Coracoid Gallus gallus Tarsometatarsus Ptilinopus porphyraceus Radius Pteropus samoensis Adult tibia Homo sapiens Radius Pteropus tonganus Metatarsal Homo sapiens Metatarsal Homo sapiens Charcoal

Material dated

NaMM

NaMM

NukuT 2

NukuT 2

Qara L

WaiT E

WaiT E

WaiT E

Site

G6, III/13

D8, II/8

IV/1

II–III/3

I/2

II–III/3

II/2

I/1

Unit, Layer/Level

AMS Radiocarbon Dates from Nayau

50 ⫾ 60 420 ⫾ 40

⫺19.9 ⫺15.7 ⫺19.2 ⫺16.6 ⫺14.5 ⫺28.0

610 ⫾ 40 550 ⫾ 40 100.6 ⫾ 0.8 % modern C 280 ⫾ 40 2400 ⫾ 40 2630 ⫾ 40

2580 ⫾ 40

2570 ⫾ 40

700 ⫾ 40

690 ⫾ 40

550 ⫾ 40

⫺21.1

490 ⫾ 40

560 ⫾ 40

Conventional 14C age (yr BP)

⫺19.5

13C/12 C ratio (o/oo)

470 ⫾ 40

Measured 14C age (yr BP)

2760–2700 and 2630–2620

2760–2700 and 2640–2610

540–420 and 380–320

270–180 and 150–10

690–640 and 590–560

680–630 and 600–560

640–580 and 570–520

640–520

OxCal Cal BP (2s) (2␴)

Note: Each determination (by Beta Analytic Inc., Miami, Florida) is on a single bone. The conventional 14C age is adjusted for 13C/12C ratios. Calibration for atmospheric variation in 14C follows OxCal version 3.3 and INTCAL98 Radiocarbon Age Calibration (Bronk Ramsey 1995 and Stuiver et al. 1998).

235994

235993

173059

165468

164253

164247

164248

164249

Beta Number

Table 2.2.

Mid-prehistoric

Period III

Spread of sites across the landscape to farthest inland areas

Initial spread over landscaped during Period II, with ten times as many sites as Period I on Lakeba

Period I–Period II (Late Lapita)

Navatu (100 BC–AD 1100)

Coastal dune occupations

Site Type/Settlement

Lapita-Sigatoka (1200–100 BC)

Cultural phases according to Green (1963) and Best (2002)

Carved paddle impressions (e.g., cord wrapped) on globular vessels

Polynesian Plainware

Lapita dentate stamp ceramics

Pottery

Red siliceous/chert tools; slate pencil sea urchin spine abraders; broad and long shell ornaments, ceramic bands and pendants; small circular shell beads and shell armbands (present throughout prehistoric periods) Obsidian (from Vanuatu)

Material Culture

(continued )

Waituruturu East and West, Daku ni Tuba

Best’s Period I (ca. 2800 BP on Lakeba)

Na Masimasi and late period Eastern Lapita style pottery (ca. 1000 BC)

Nayau sites and Lauan characteristics (Best 1984, 2002; Jones et al. 2007; O’Day et al. 2003)

General Archaeological Sequences for Material Culture in Fiji and the Lau Region with Notes on the Archaeology of Nayau

Initial colonization ca. 3000 BP by Lapita peoples

Period

Table 2.3.

Historic or Contact

Villages on coast On Lakeba, coastal ring ditch fortified villages

Coastal limestone fortified sites and inland hilltop fortifications on Lakeba

Period IV–Period V (begins ca. 400 BP on Lakeaba and continues through contact)

Ra European Contact (commencing ca. 1791–1805)

Inland fortified villages

Site Type/Settlement

Vunda (AD 1100–1800)

Cultural phases according to Green (1963) and Best (2002)

(continued )

Late-prehistoric

Period

Table 2.3.

Siliceous fakes and cores

Material Culture

On Lakeba: Glass, metal systematic incising, appliqué, end tool impressing, some cross-hatch paddle impressing

New incised decorative elements (also spot carved paddle impressing, appliqué, and end tool impressing on Lakeba)

Pottery

Cannibalism on Lakeba (continuing through Contact Period) Nukutubu Rockshelter 2 (Layers II–III)

Waituruturu East and West, Qara ni Lulu, Nukutubu Rockshelter 2

Nayau sites and Lauan characteristics (Best 1984, 2002; Jones et al. 2007; O’Day et al. 2003)

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41

associated with Ra style pottery (200–100 BP), which also parallels the Lakeba situation. The Nukutubu Rockshelter 2 date no older than 270–180 Cal BP was from the radius of a fruit bat (Pteropus tonganus) in Layer III. The date suggests occupation of the site during the latest prehistoric to historic periods. A metatarsal from the human burial, undisturbed and confined to Layer IV, yielded an older date of 540–420 Cal BP, thus placing the burial and the lower strata of the site in the mid–late prehistoric phase.

HISTORY AND LAU’S IMPORTANCE TO ANTHROPOLOGICAL AND ARCHAEOLOGICAL RESEARCH IN OCEANIA Fijians have rich, long-established traditions of recording their histories and the events of the past. Oral traditions can be combined with other forms of evidence such as the archaeological information, records of missionary and commercial contact, and those of the colonial government in order to better understand the past and the present in Lau. These sources provide a variety of ideological and national viewpoints. Each of these alternative perspectives emphasizes different historical viewpoints based on a particular political agenda and the inherent limitations of that source. Archaeology is able to “correct the forgetfulness of the oral tradition by . . . demonstrating the strategic importance of sites now forgotten entirely, or relegated to minor importance in the officially remembered version of events. It is also useful in correcting the chronological, and perhaps the political assumptions supported by other forms of evidence” (Young 1993, 160). My research, presented in the following chapters, draws from these multiple lines of evidence with a particular focus on archaeology and ethnography to reconstruct a history of Lau in general and Nayau in particular. Because the vital population of people in Lau has a vested interest in their history and the way it is interpreted, anthropological research offers an opportunity to draw upon these varied sources of information, including the actions, statements, and traditions of living peoples, and to contribute to a subject that is debated and important to Lauans today. Lauans distinguish between history and tales in their oral traditions. As Hocart stated, “Tales begin with announcement tukuni [to tell or announce]—and proceed with tiktiko (there was). The narrator aims at making his tale interesting and amusing. History, known as ‘stories of ancient days,’ is told informally, but with great care for accuracy” (1929, 3). Fijian history (tukutuku) is characteristically marked by detached episodes rather than a continuous string of events. Some of this history is detailed in the records of the Native Land Commission, the Tukutuku

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Raraba, while other elements of the past are documented in the names of places and people. Other histories are confined to archaeological material culture. Place names tend to refer to events that occurred in specific places or to people, and evoke a meaning beyond the term. For example, the place called Na Masimasi on Nayau is where the island’s only known Lapita period archaeological site exists, representing the earliest human occupation of the Nayau (ca. 2800–3000 BP). High-ranked people on Nayau explained that Na Masimasi is where the gods of origin (kalou vu) lived when they first came to the island. The term masi has many meanings, including barkcloth, and the tree used to make barkcloth. It is also used as part of the title Ramasi, or Sir Cloth. Ramasi refers to men that rule the land, such as chiefs of a village or island. Masi is likely used in the name of Nayau’s earliest archaeological site as a reference to the island’s founders and first rulers of Nayau. Legends of the Pacific Islands often refer to the original colonizers of a place as gods, thus the reference to the “place of the gods” associated with Na Masimasi make sense in this context according to the structure of Lauan myth. Oral traditions recorded in the Tukutuku Raraba explain that Lau was originally colonized by people coming from the west. On Lakeba, these original settlers are said to be from Vuna on the island of Taveuni (Reid 1990). While he does not go into specifics, Hocart (1929) points to a significant Tongan association later in prehistory with central and southern Lau. He argues that this would account for the distinctly Lauan culture that exists today and appears to be a blend of Tongan and Fijian. Further support for interactions between Lau and Tonga are found linguistically and in oral traditions (Hocart 1929, 230). The details of pre-European Lauan cultural development and interactions remain to be resolved with archaeological data, although Best has recently published an informative account of early Lauan history (Best 2002). Due to its geographic position, the Lau archipelago is ideally suited to investigate the influences and transformation in archaeological, historical, and social phenomena since initial human colonization. The area also provides a setting to test inter-island variability in ancient Lauan exchange networks, production systems, subsistence practices, and local cultural development. Lau is thought to have been critical to trade prehistorically and after initial European contact (Best 1984, 1987). Hunt (1988) suggests that the island of Lakeba, in particular, was a central political node of the region due to Lau’s geographical position between Polynesia and the main Fijian Islands, a notion that is supported by Best (1984, 2002). A long-term detailed archaeological analysis of various islands in Lau will lead to a better understanding of the region’s evolution and social inter-

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43

actions through time. Unfortunately, as Best noted in 1984, “Fijian archaeology is still in the ‘what’ rather than ‘why’ stage” of development (Best 1984, 3). The extensive work by Simon Best (1984) on Lakeba is generally considered the archaeological baseline for Lau. Nevertheless, the Lau Islands still have much to contribute to archaeological interpretations of the FijiPolynesia region. Best’s work established that initial human colonization of Lakeba by Lapita peoples occurred by about 2,800 years BP, but a chronology for the remainder of Lau has yet to be established. Recently, archaeological work has been carried out on Vanua Balavu (Nunn 2000; Nunn and Matararaba 2000; Thomas et al. 2004) and Yacata (Clark and Hope 2001). Through the combined efforts of these projects and my own (Jones et al. 2007; Jones 2007) a picture of prehistoric life in Lau is beginning to emerge (see table 2.3). I aim to add to the understanding of Lauan lifeways and foodways over the long term through my ethnoarchaeological research. Fiji’s Lau Island Group, with its incredible marine diversity and a vibrant traditional culture that is actively engaged in marine-oriented subsistence activities, is an ideal location to conduct ethnoarchaeological research. This fact is enhanced by the long-term historical continuity that exists between the living and past populations. Ethnoarchaeological work of this nature would not be possible in other locales, such as Hawai’i, the Caribbean, or Mexico, which lack indigenous populations engaged in intensive marine exploitation in areas where they have lived and subsisted in this way for thousands of years. Moreover, many of the world’s tropical islands and coastal areas support much less diverse marine reef communities, and their reefs are impacted by tourism and extensive modern developments. Finally, research from the Lau Islands may serve as a model of long-term subsistence in rich marine environments, an example that can be compared to other marine-oriented economies and lifeways in tropical settings including the Pacific and the Caribbean. NOTES 1. A material advantage to hosting my colleagues and me in a family’s home is the close relationship that results. When someone stays with a family, they become subject to the social system of exchange. It is both difficult and rude to resist a host’s request for something. 2. Test excavations were carried out in 5 to 10 cm levels using trowels, following natural stratigraphy whenever possible. A permanent datum was established in each rockshelter site to provide vertical and horizontal control. All excavated sediment was screened through nested sieves of 1⁄2" (12.8 mm), 1⁄4" (6.4 mm), 1⁄8" (3.2

44

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mm), and 1⁄16" (1.6 mm) mesh, from which I collected shell, bone, pottery, lithics, nonlocal rock, and any other artifacts and visible ecofacts. All excavations were recorded on standardized field forms. 3. The Lapita peoples were the first inhabitants of Fiji and Polynesia. They occupied Lakeba in Lau around 2,800 years BP (Best 2002). 4. On the large island of Viti Levu the LCO/LIA transition is associated with archaeological fortified settlements and environmental changes that likely included increased storminess, water-table fall, reef-surface death, increased lagoonal turbidity, and the conversion of seawater embayments to brackish-water wetlands (Field 2004; Kumar et al. 2006; Nunn 2003).

3

Foodways and Social Relations in the Past and Present

The seeing eye is the organ of tradition. —Franz Boas

A

s I walked through the forest and around the island with the village chief he told me stories about the landscape, describing places, archaeological sites, and the people who occupied them over the last 3,000 years. Without referencing chronological time in years, he described the past in terms of the first occupation of the island by the gods, the arrival of the first humans, the time when people moved inland and occupied hilltop fortifications, and the arrival of the foreign missionaries. I scribbled as quickly as possible in my notebook, trying to get all these valuable oral traditions down. While I walked and recorded, I looked for archaeological sites that might be marked by features such as walls and house platforms, or pottery scatters on the ground. Our entourage moved over the island, hacking our way through thick areas of the underbrush with freshly sharpened machetes. The sizable Lauan man behind me carried a basket that contained our lunch. When we stopped at midday, he unpacked a feast of boiled sweet potatoes, taro, and large slabs of meat that I did not immediately recognize as pig. All of this was laid out on banana leaves as the chief offered me favored cuts of meat and explained how each tasted distinct from the others. After lunch we hiked toward the southeastern edge of the island, along the coastal dunes. White sand beaches, palm trees, and crystal clear waters of a lagoon fringed by small offshore islands looked like something out of a postcard. The chief described this area as the home of the first 45

46

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gods who arrived on Nayau. The ground was littered with copious amounts of bright red pottery, some of which was decorated with fine dentate stamping that looked like traditional tattoos. Between the coconut trees we found fragments of giant clam, red chert tools, and basalt axes; all of these artifacts represented the remains of a village and the domestic activities of its occupants. More specifically, the material culture, pottery and other artifacts, were undoubtedly evidence of the island’s first occupants, the Lapita people. The chief explained that this place is called Na Masimasi. People believe that Na Masimasi is where the gods of origin (kalou vu), or ancestors of the modern population, lived when they first arrived on Nayau. One of the many meanings of the term masi is barkcloth and the tree used to make this traditional material. In pre-European times masi was both everyday clothing and a sacred item that are traded in association with rites of passage and formal events. In contemporary Lau, masi is primarily used as an important exchange item and for sale to tourists. The title Ramasi, or Sir Cloth is used to refer to rulers of the land, including village and island chiefs. As part of the name for Nayau’s earliest archaeological site, masi references the island’s founders and first rulers of Nayau. Pacific island legends frequently allude to the first colonizers of a place as gods.

CONNECTING THE PAST AND THE PRESENT Ethnographers commonly document domestic activities and economic behaviors relating to food collection, distribution, and consumption (Becker 1995; Lepowsky 1993; Sahlins 1962; Thompson 1940). My ethnoarchaeological study of food focuses on these activities with an analytical emphasis on the material correlates of economic behaviors; this is driven by archaeological questions. In this chapter and the succeeding two, I describe ethnographic and archaeological data derived from seven months of research on Nayau and Lakeba. My participant observations, structured interviews, and archaeological data contribute to this discussion. Beginning with an examination of domestic groups and household spatial organization, I describe domestic contexts and my archaeological findings, which are aimed at providing (1) insights into the social relations and behaviors surrounding foodways that may be invisible archaeologically and (2) a structural framework for homological comparisons between the archaeological data and contemporary domestic contexts. This chapter presents ethnographic information from formal and informal interviews (see appendix B), centering on issues of folk taxonomy, the social dimensions of food, and kitchen activities.

Foodways and Social Relations in the Past and Present

47

The archaeological sites and features I focus on produced an abundance of fish bones and shellfish. These data provide context for the interpretations of prehistoric foodways and their historical evolution on the island. Archaeological data are also useful for understanding long-term trends in prehistoric inshore marine resource exploitation, consumption, and the distribution of food within a household or site. The subsequent discussion is aimed at fleshing out elements of the archaeology that are pertinent to the research themes described in the following chapters. Specifically, I examine patterns of prehistoric foodways, animal use, and domestic features such as cooking areas (scoop-shaped features including earth ovens or lovo and hearths). The archaeological questions driving discussions in this chapter include the following: 1. What do village and household spatial arrangements (features, architecture, layout) tell us about social relations in the past? 2. What characteristics can archaeologists use to identify kitchens and cooking features? 3. What is the use life of household features, and cooking features specifically? 4. Do archaeological remains encode information about social structures, such as rank and gender? And, what social issues are invisible archaeologically? These questions will be addressed with ethnographic observations that contribute understanding and some answers in the succeeding sections.

DOMESTIC GROUPS Household Spatial Arrangements The domestic group is the most fundamental category of social organization and economic production in Fijian society. On Nayau the structure of the domestic group (or “house,” vale) is clearly manifest on the landscape (figure 3.1). At the village level, spatial organization is indicative of social relations including rank (chiefly or commoner class), seniority (relative age), and kinship ties. Houses in the village are built around a central open space, which is usually delineated by the presence of the church on one side and a structure such as a town hall on the other. The villages of Narocivo and Liku are organized this way, but Salia Village is not (Salia and Narocivo were rebuilt after Hurricane Meli in 1979). Toren argues that the layout of the villages on Viti Levu expresses balanced reciprocity and “notational equality” (1999, 53). Looking at villages in Eastern Fiji

48

Figure 3.1.

Chapter 3

Aerial View of Liku Village, Nayau

from a broader landscape perspective, one could also argue that spatial organization reflects hierarchy. This is especially true in Eastern Fiji where social formations are more complex than those in Western Fiji (Aucoin 2002; Sahlins 1962, 1976). On Nayau, hierarchy is reflected on the landscape, in the relative position of houses associated with each ranked clan in relation to the village center. Houses belonging to members of each clan, or mataqali, are grouped in close proximity in all the villages. There are four mataqali in Salia, four in Narocivo, and two in Liku. Spatially Liku is divided into three parts based on descent with the Tui Liku and his mataqali in the middle of the village, and the mataqali descended from two brothers on the east and west sides of the village (figure 3.2). The highest ranked mataqali, or the chiefly clans, are located in the center of the village. Houses are aligned with the long axis parallel to the sea and facing each other. Brothers typically live next to each other in the village, and a traditional extended family structure prevails, although independent nuclear families are becoming more common. Households (lewe ni vale) are architecturally divided into functionally distinct units that commonly include the following structures: a main house for sleeping and eating formal meals (vale levu); a kitchen (vale ni kuro); a small oven house (it may consist of a roof and four poles, or the oven may be without an associated shelter and located farther from the vale levu than the kitchen); and various additional sleeping houses (bure) for younger family members, extended family, or visitors. The vale levu is usually one of two styles. The first is a modern rectangular concrete block structure (figure 3.3). This style of house was erected by the Peace Corps in 1979 following Hurricane Meli. The second form is

Foodways and Social Relations in the Past and Present

Figure 3.2.

49

Plan View of Liku Village, Nayau

an oval-shaped thatch structure with six posts on a raised coral and sand filled platform (yavu; figure 3.4). This traditional oval house and yavu are found in the Eastern Fijian Islands and in Tonga. The style in Western Fiji is square or rectangular, and includes a yavu. The relative height of the yavu is generally indicative of the rank of the owner. The house foundation is a topographic marker of tributary relations and social hierarchy.

50

Figure 3.3.

Chapter 3

Modern-Style Rectangular Concrete House in Narocivo Village, Nayau

Note that this is changing in contemporary times as more non-chiefly people create a show of status by building vale on relatively tall yavu. The yavu for Tui Nayau’s vale levu in Narocivo is 2 m in height (see figure 3.4) and Tui Liku’s yavu is raised 1 m above ground level (figures 3.2 and 3.5). Most of the known prehistoric villages and residences on Nayau are marked by yavu. In Fijian society, the yavu is traditionally named. The bodies of deceased family members were buried there prehistorically, a practice that became increasingly less common with the rise of Christianity. Because the yavu and its name were considered eternal, when people moved from one place to another, they gave this name to the new yavu (Toren 1999, 69), a practice common throughout Polynesia and Melanesia. People trace their lineages to yavusa, groups of related households combining multiple mataqali that were founded by a mythical ancestor or group of ancestors. After Hurricane Meli in 1979, Salia and Narocivo moved from the coast to where they are located today. These modern villages are positioned slightly inland on the hill slopes above the coastal strip. The old names of yavu were not given to the newer Western style houses, most of which do not have yavu. Modern houses are sometimes given names that lack a particular historical significance, such as “California” and “Rotuma.”

Figure 3.4. Style Vale

The Tui Nayau’s Home in Narocivo Village, Nayau; a Traditional Lauan-

Figure 3.5.

Tui Liku’s Vale, Liku Village, Nayau

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Fiji’s colonial government introduced formal kitchens (Thompson 1940). However, household functional divisions separate oven houses and sleeping houses and are an indigenous feature that is recorded ethnographically and archaeologically elsewhere in Fiji and Polynesia (Kirch and Green 2001; Sahlins 1962). Earth ovens, lovo, are positioned 1 to 10 m away from the kitchen and vale levu; sometimes these are located on the edge of the village, especially if the lovo is large. Kitchens and their associated hearths are positioned in close proximity, usually a few steps away from the vale levu and its yavu. Fijians refer to all natural and human constructed landscapes in terms connoting rank, which literally translate into “high” and “low” (Hocart 1929; Sahlins 1962; Toren 1990, 1999). Houses and bure are spatially organized along vertical and horizontal axes corresponding to the Fijian cultural

Figure 3.6.

Generalized Lauan House Plan

Adapted from Toren

Foodways and Social Relations in the Past and Present

53

categories of “above” (i cake) and “below” (i ra; figure 3.6). Women are associated with the “low” and/or “inside” areas in space (within the household and village), whereas men are associated with the “high” and “outside” spaces. Each house typically has three doors. In all three villages on Nayau, the main or common entrance (darava i sue) is located at the north end of most houses. Women position themselves “below” (i ra), by the “common entrance,” or, literally, the “door of the cooking irons” (darava i sue). The position of the house and its entrances in relation to the sea and island’s interior is also mapped on to residential space and referred to as the side of the “sea door” (darava e wai), and the land side or the “land door” (darava e vanua). The most sacred door of a house is the “honored door,” facing the sea (Sahlins 1962; Toren 1990, 1999). The eastern, male side of the house is the “noble side.” Likewise, the offshore area of the island, outside the fringing reef, is referred to as the waitui, or noble sea. On Nayau, economically linked familial household groups are often marked by their shared use of a cookhouse and/or kitchen structures. In addition, the extended family (with several nuclear subunits) often takes their meals together. This pattern is typically Fijian, being found throughout Lau, extending to the time of European contact and likely before. Just as Sahlins noted on the island of Moala (1962, 97), a cookhouse in common is indicative of a communal economic life, which involves the distribution of all familial resources including, labor, food, land, and social guidance by the head of the extended household. Families frequently work together in food production activities, such as gardening and fishing, and women often consolidate labor focused on domestic activities. Members of extended kin networks and multiple domestic groups come together to prepare food and cook for special occasions. Vale ni kuro or Kitchens The kitchen is where women spend half or more of every day. It is the center of female social space and a key locus of social interactions within each household. As one Liku woman told me, “In the kitchen I am the boss.” Each household generally has one kitchen that is shared between about two to seven married and unmarried women (affines or consanguines to brothers who live next to each other). Kitchens are often constructed in traditional Lauan style, with an oval floor plan and six posts, with thatch covered walls and roof (figure 3.7). These kitchens have three low, small doors, measuring around 0.65 ⫻ 1.4 m. Some kitchens are large (7 ⫻ 4 m) and constructed on elevated yavu of coral, dirt, and sand, while others sit on a paving of dirt and sand at ground level. At the time of my fieldwork, approximately half of the kitchens on Nayau were constructed using a combination of sheet metal and wood with metal or thatch roofs. These

54

Figure 3.7.

Chapter 3

Traditional-Style Lauan Kitchen, Liku Village, Nayau

are generally smaller in size (6 ⫻ 4 m) than more traditional kitchens made entirely of thatch (figure 3.8). The sheet metal style of kitchen is sometimes added onto the vale levu, or it may be built to stand alone. The structures are connected by a path to the main house and usually located within 5 to 10 m of it. Kitchens sometimes have a low yavu, which may be lined with stones. The following is a description of an average contemporary kitchen on Nayau. The exterior of the kitchen is littered with food rubbish such as plastic and paper wrappers, coconut husks, leaves, cassava and sweet potato peels, fragments of bone and shell. Kitchen utensils (coconut grater and bowls) and machetes are typically left outside where tubers are often peeled and other initial preparations take place. Because of the small door, adults must crouch and lower the head to enter traditional Lauan style kitchens. The kitchen is dimly lit with hearth fires burning continuously and providing light. The air is smoky and thick with the smells of food cooking on the hearth. The windows are small and few, measuring about 50 cm2; these close with a thin wood shutter or a section of woven coconut fronds and are rarely open. The floor is covered with pandanus mats, and often a small low table is positioned in the center or along a wall. Dishes, pots, and utensils are piled along one wall, and sometimes there are shelves running along a portion of the interior that hold containers of water, flour, sugar, tea, and leftovers from the last meal. Women often keep a

Foodways and Social Relations in the Past and Present

Figure 3.8.

55

Sheet Metal Kitchen, Liku Village, Nayau

mix of plastic and metal pots and bowls in the kitchen. These replace the locally handmade ceramic pots that were used until about thirty years ago. Cooking pots for boiling are ethnographically referred to as kuros. These low-fired vessels are used to prepare boro—the daily boiled food— and may be suspended above the fire with wood or iron rods (Thompson 1940, 155) or propped up on rocks. Lauans sometimes refer to modern metal cooking pots as kuros. Baskets and pots hang from the rafters where food and other items may be stored. Coconut frond baskets (kato) containing cassava, sweet potatoes, or dalo sit on the floor, ready to be peeled and boiled or baked. Next to these, are more baskets containing firewood, young green coconuts for drinking, and brown coconuts to be husked and grated. Some women still use traditional large wooden bowls, kumete, to mix foods in, mash root crops, and clean dishes (table 3.1). If the household has a kumete, the men of the house will also use it for mashing cassava or dalo to make solo pule and special puddings that are served at feasts and celebrations (figure 3.9). While some things have changed with the introduction of plastic and metal kitchen-wares, there is historical continuity in the association of women and boiled foods cooked on a hearth versus men and baked foods prepared in earth ovens, as I discuss below. At the high end of the modern Lauan kitchen, opposite the main door, is the hearth, which may consist of a metal grill over coals on the ground,

Lauan Term

Peseni Kumete Matadravu Lovo Sepuni Sakalo Kato Kuro Ka kana Kana or i kata lau Benu or droka Buta Ka kana vavi Solo Tuki Tatavu or vakasaqa Vaka tavutavu Vaka cawa Vavavi Wai savusavu Bu Boro I coi

Bowl Bowl Oven or hearth Earth oven Spoon Grater Basket Pots Food Meal Raw Cooked Earth oven food Grated food Pounded food Boil Cook over fire Steam Bake Fresh water Coconut water Vegetables Flesh foods

Specifically, a young coconut fit for drinking Starch and leafy, but in common usage refers to root crops Carries the connotation of accompanied food items (likely due to the cultural preference for eating flesh foods with a starch)

In reference to this cooking method, Lauans say that “Tongans usually do that.” Especially used in reference to puddings, scones, etc.

Taro mixed with coconut milk Galu

Refers to European style or metal spoon Lauan variants include “sakaro” Refers to the baskets made of coconut frond used for carrying food from the garden or firewood Metal or pottery Includes liquid and solid foods

Specifically, peseni lailai (small bowl) or peseni levu (large bowl) Large, and usually oblong, wooden bowl for mixing and for use as a general basin

Comments

Lauan Terms for Food and Related Items

English Name

Table 3.1.

Ka kana dina Vakalolo Madrai

Ika Vivili or kai Manumanu ni wasa Toa Bulumakau Soqo levu or magiti

Starchy crops Pudding Bread

Fish Shellfish Seabirds Chicken Beef Feast Generally referred to as “cow”

Literally, “true food”; includes cassava, bananas, taro, yams, breadfruit, etc. Many kinds, pounded root crop, mixed with coconut cream and baked in the earth oven Modern usage, refers to bread of flour and yeast, traditionally the term applies to Fijian bread of starch, buried in the ground to ferment

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Figure 3.9. Man in Narocivo Village Making Cassava Pudding in a Traditional Wooden Kumete (Bowl)

or a raised concrete or metal shelf where the fire and grill are positioned. Stones are also often used to prop up cooking pots, and if the hearth is constructed on the ground, it develops into a scoop-shaped feature over time due to reuse and the frequent rake-out of ash. These scooped hearths features typically measure 0.5 to 1 m in diameter and are filled with charcoal flecks, ashy dirt, and bits of partially charred wood. Hearth scoops are rarely deeper than about 20 cm below the surface and most are about 5 to 10 cm deep. The area around the hearth is marked by ashy dirt and littered with charcoal chunks and flecks as well as the remnants from cooking, such as bits of fish bones, shells, and vegetable peels. The hearth fire is kept going all day, and at night hot coals burn as women continually tend pots of boiling foods. A well worn, soot-covered teapot is always found close by. A few houses in each village now have gas stoves with ovens, or kerosene stoves that are used when people have cash to purchase fuel. However, modern stoves have not replaced the traditional wood-fire hearth. In fact, when I was conducting research on Nayau, I noticed that women who had these prestige goods rarely used them and most women did not know how to start and run their gas stove and oven units. These were often used for storage or nothing at all. Stoves

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are gifts from family members who work in a city, and who can afford to purchase pricey items and ship them to relatives on Nayau. When I was conducting interviews in Narocivo village, I taught two women to use their gas stoves and ovens. After that, different women repeatedly came to me asking that I come to their houses and teach them to use their ovens; this was often followed by an afternoon baking cakes, breads, and scones and eating together over hot tea. The atmosphere in the kitchen is lively, especially around dinnertime when all the women of the household get together to prepare, cook, and serve the evening meal. In the morning the women prepare breakfast, boiling water for tea and making starchy foods, such as scones, pancakes, cassava, or sweet potatoes. Breakfast and lunch are often served in the kitchen, and afterwards dishes are scrubbed there and laid to dry. Dinner preparations usually begin in the late afternoon. If there are toddlers and young children around, they may stay near the women during food preparation activities. Visitors are frequent in the kitchen. Often, a relative or friend will stop by to gossip, chat, or share snacks while meals are prepared. Women frequently visit each other’s houses and kitchens to give small gifts of food such as sweet potatoes, yams, breadfruit, fish, scones, bread, or fish in coconut milk. If a woman has recently gone to the store and purchased a large amount of flour, a box of tea, curry powder, or baking powder, it is common for other women to drop by and ask for some, knowing that the woman in possession of the item will not refuse her request except by falsely claiming to have nothing. In this way, food and specialty items are often redistributed throughout the community. Ovens and Oven Houses The Lauan lovo is the primary means of cooking large prestige items for the Sunday meal and all special events. Items frequently baked in the lovo include: pig, cow, taro (dalo), yams, fish, palusami (chicken, fish, or corned beef mixed with coconut cream and wrapped in taro leaves and tin foil for baking), solo pule (grated root vegetable mixed with coconut cream that is wrapped in leaves), and puddings. All extended households (comprised of relatives who live in close proximity) have multiple ovens (lovo) associated with them. The Lauan oven house is the realm of men; men tend the lovo, conducting and directing activities of its preparation and use. Adolescent and teenaged boys often assist with this, while women and girls are rarely seen around the lovo or the oven house. The exception to this pattern occurs when the lovo or oven house is located within a few meters of the kitchen; in this case there is almost always a hearth next to the lovo, which the women and girls constantly use to cook on and boil water for tea (figure 3.10). The atmosphere around the lovo is much more

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Figure 3.10. Lovo Located Next to a Kitchen with a Hearth and Teapot in the Background, Tubou Village, Lakeba

subdued than that in the kitchen as an air of seriousness surrounds the preparation of feast foods. On a typical Sunday, the man of the house will begin preparing the lovo in the early morning, around 5 or 6 a.m. Often, everyone in the household helps to peel the root vegetables that will be cooked in the oven. If there is a pig to be butchered, the men and boys will do this, and the women will prepare the palusami, an increasingly common part of the Sunday meal. With the men and other members of the family taking part in the preparation, the production of feast foods is markedly different from that of the everyday meal. Approximately half of the lovo on Nayau have a structure covering them with four to six poles and a thatch or tin roof (figure 3.11). These structures, referred to as “oven houses,” average 3 ⫻ 2 m, with the lovo in the center. Thatch or sheet metal is sometimes added around one or two of the sides to block the wind. Oven houses are located closer to the kitchen than to other household units, and are occasionally located within about 2 m of it. Lovo are also located on the edge of the village, especially if the lovo is large (greater than ca. 2 m on one side), the kind used for baking feast foods exclusively, or big loaves of bread for festivities.

Foodways and Social Relations in the Past and Present

Figure 3.11.

61

Outdoor Oven House and Lovo Area in Liku Village, Nayau

Most lovo measure 0.75 to 1 m in diameter on the surface and are circular in form, dipping into a basin shape about 50 cm below the surface. Next to the earth oven is another depression (0.75 ⫻ 0.50 m) where dirt is excavated to cover the lovo after it has been filled with food. This second depression is slightly smaller than the lovo, but very similar in form and typically located 0.3 to 5 m away. This dirt is recycled throughout the use life of the lovo, thus it becomes very ashy and filled with charcoal over time. The entire area around the oven house is dark grayish brown and littered with shell and bone fragments (mostly fish bones), charcoal, sticks, coconut frond baskets, leaves, coconut husks, pieces of root crops, partially burned rice sacks, and remnants of things that have been cooked in the oven. This midden and lovo sediments extend about 50 cm beyond the posts of the structure. If the earth oven does not have a structure associated with it, the midden and burned sediment extend around the lovo in a radius of about 1.5 to 2 m. When men are preparing foods in the lovo, they have piles of Hibiscus leaves, or vau (Hibiscus tiliaceus), baskets of dalo, yams, cassava, and/or sweet potatoes, fire wood, coconut husks to burn, and cooking utensils such as wooden bowls (kumete), machetes, and knives. Generally speaking, there are five steps involved in preparing an earth oven (vakaraulovo). First, a hole in the ground is excavated about 40 to 55 cm deep, depending on the size of the food to be cooked, and filled with

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fuel for the fire (usually wood chips and small branches or dried and cut coconut husks, then larger fuel and/or wood, dry branches, or any part of the coconut tree). Lauans say that they are “digging the hole of the lovo” (kelilovo). Second, the lovo stones (qoca) are gathered and piled up next to the hole. A fire (buka ni lovo) is started in the hole, and the burning wood is topped with stones (see figure 3.10). While the stones are heating, the food (root crops, fish, pig, or any other item) is wrapped in leaves (usually banana, palm, or breadfruit leaves). Third, when the stones are hot, they are spread out and sometimes covered with leaves, usually green coconut fronds or Hibiscus leaves, on which the wrapped food is placed. If tinfoil is used, as is becoming more common on Lakeba, the food is placed directly on the hot rocks. Fourth, after the oven is full of food, it is covered with palm fronds, Hibiscus leaves, and often rice bags. Finally, dirt is piled on top of the rice sacks. This recycled dirt may contain old palm leaf baskets, rice sack fragments, rubbish (e.g., fragments of bone and shell, metal scraps, plastic, and food wrappers), and anything that will burn or is left on the ground. After the food has cooked for a prescribed amount of time—for example, a young pig will cook for around two to four hours—the oven is opened up and the food is removed. Ideally, the meat should fall off of the bone when unwrapped from its leaf covering. The general position of a household’s lovo does not change over time. Earth ovens, especially those associated with oven house structures, are used again and again, being repeatedly dug up and then filled-in at least one time each week for as long as a family lives in the vicinity. The oven stones are also reused for many years, or until they fall apart; new stones are continuously added over time. The dirt around lovo and oven houses becomes dark, ashy, and filled with charcoal, ash, bone, and shell (figure 3.12).

Figure 3.12. Charcoal

Close-up of the Dirt Surrounding a Lovo; Note the Fish Bones, Shells, and

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63

ARCHEOLOGICAL QUESTIONS AND ETHNOGRAPHIC OBSERVATIONS In the beginning of this chapter I posed four archaeological questions that may be addressed with the ethnographic data presented above. I will discuss each of these questions in order and describe data that illuminates the issues. The first question centered on village and household spatial arrangements and asked what this aspect of the physically construed world, including features, architecture, and overall layout, might suggest about social relations in the present and past. The ethnographic data suggests a strong link between spatial organization and social relations. For example, the orientation of a given house and yavu relative to other houses is indicative of rank, seniority, and kinship relations. For archaeologists, an effective way to examine these social issues is to map archaeological village landscapes and the relative positions of each household.1 The orientations of the houses to each other, and to the sea and the inland areas of the island are significant. The environmental orientation—land versus sea-side of a house—indicates its architectural alignment, defining the vertical and horizontal divisions that correspond with the Lauan social categories of high and low or above and below. These social categories dictate the actions of individuals within the house and may further provide clues to the kin relations between the people who occupied houses located in proximity to each other. The position of archaeological earth ovens, which are traditionally shared among related households, may lend insights into the familial and economic relations of extended household complexes. The second question was: what characteristics can archaeologists use to identify kitchens and cooking features? In the Lauan kitchen, vale ni kuro, food is constantly cooked over a fire in a hearth. The women and children, who most frequently occupy the kitchen, snack as they prepare meals, and a variety of food preparation items can be found nearby. Architecturally, these female-associated areas vary in size, and they may or may not be built on a yavu. One would expect to find food rubbish, charcoal, ash, utensils and domestic implements for food preparation, such as pots and knives, in association with a kitchen. A hearth or shallow scoopshaped archaeological depression might also indicate a vale ni kuro, whereas a deeper scoop-shaped fire feature should be indicative of a lovo or earth oven. The lovo is generally positioned at least a few feet outside the kitchen, while a hearth is most often in the kitchen.2 In terms of behavior, men and boys sometimes snack or eat around the lovo and throw the food rubbish into the surrounding dirt. Food remains also end up in the lovo and the surrounding dirt when women sweep out nearby domestic areas. The food rubbish in the lovo dirt therefore results from the

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remains of regular meals and snacks, not necessarily from the foods that were cooked in the earth oven or feasts in particular. In comparison, considerably less bone, shell, and other food remains can be found in hearths. When women and children snack in the kitchen, they toss their food remains into a container for pig foods, or outside the door of the kitchen. Once the food is outside the house, hungry dogs that rove the village may consume it, or it may simply become deposited into the sediment that surrounds the household. My third question asked: what is the use life for household features, especially cooking features? I found that contemporary Lauans continually reuse cooking features, including hearths and lovo. Over many trips to Nayau and Lakeba since 2001, I noticed that people rarely move the household’s hearth or lovo unless they move their home. Therefore, archaeologists might expect that cooking features are used and reused over multiple generations and the remains found in them represent the accumulated remains of countless eating incidents. Fourth, I questioned if archaeological remains encode information about social structures, such as rank and gender, and what social issues are invisible archaeologically. One of the clearest connections between archaeological remains and gender is evident in the female association with the kitchen, hearth, and boiled everyday foods versus the male association with the oven house, lovo, and baked feast foods. The remains of these features look similar, but differentiating them may be possible based on the depth of the features and general differences in the content, as I described above. In the following section I present archaeological data from Nayau and attempt to interpret it based on the patterns discussed in these four ethnoarchaeological points.

ARCHAEOLOGICAL FINDINGS The recovered archaeological material culture associated with residences on Nayau is similar to what might be expected based on the descriptions of the modern residential and kitchen-associated material remains described above (table 3.2). The prehistoric domestic deposits are primarily composed of pottery, with nonceramic prehistoric artifacts such as basalt and shell adzes, chert flakes, clam-shell scrapers, worked bone and shell (ornaments and fishhooks), coral files, and other classes of material culture being much less common. This type of archaeological assemblage is characteristic for the region. Historic-period artifacts, including fragments of metal and glass, were recovered from disturbed contexts in the upper stratigraphic layers at two rockshelter sites (Daku ni Tuba and Nukutubu Rockshelter 2). While none

1 — — —

—

8

—

1 1

1

—

— —

— — — 1

—

—

—

— 1

—

—

— —

60

Total

143

— —

—

—

— —

1

5

—

— — — —

137

KV 1

267

— —

—

—

— —

1

—

—

— — — —

266

KV 2

4

— —

—

—

— —

—

—

—

— — — —

4

UluNK

153

— —

—

—

— —

—

—

—

— — — —

153

KoroNG

2

— —

—

—

— —

—

—

—

— — — —

2

17

— —

—

—

— —

—

—

—

— — — —

17

NukT1 NukT2

106

1 1

—

—

— 1

1

1

—

— — — —

101

2

— —

—

—

— —

—

—

—

— 1 — —

1

QaraL VNay

137

— 1

—

—

1 —

3

3

—

— 1 1 —

127

Vulaga

826

63 2

9

1

1 1

73

19

5

— 1 — 1

650

NaMM

184

— —

—

1

— —

—

—

—

— — — —

183

18

1 —

—

—

— —

—

—

1

— 1 — —

15

DKT Naleca

Note: Na Masimasi (NaMM) pottery count only includes diagnostic sherds (⬎ 4,000 undiagnostic sherds were recovered from the NaMM excavations).

41

29

58

WaiT E

Pottery Basalt tools Complete adzes Adz frags Adz preforms Adz flakes Other lithics and fragments Chert Red chert flakes Debitage or flake fragments Shell tools Tridacna adzes Bivalve scrapers Other Worked bone Fishhooks or fragment Worked shells (beads, ornaments, bracelets, other) Coral files

WaiT W

Distribution by Count of Prehistoric Artifact Classes from Sites on Nayau

Artifact Class

Table 3.2.

1,960

65 4

9

3

3 4

79

36

6

1 4 1 2

1743

Total

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of the excavated sites had stratigraphic sequences sufficient to detect stylistic changes in material culture over time, certain artifact classes and types were associated with specific site types (see table 2.3). For example, relatively fancy red-slipped and dentate-stamped Lapita pottery and large numbers of both formal (bifacial) and expedient red chert tools were found only on the open coastal dune site of Na Masimasi. These domestic items are likely associated with food preparation and serving. My preliminary analysis suggests that about 87 percent of the diagnostic Lapita pottery (represented by rim sherds) from Na Masimasi was used for noncooking purposes, such as presenting and serving foods. It is worth noting that Lapita plainewares are typically associated with cooking, corresponding to kuros, while the decorated wares were used in other ways. Ceramics characteristic of the later prehistoric period were recovered from inland hillfort villages and in their excavated deposits (table 3.2). The later period pottery is mostly plain, without decoration, but like much of the Lapita period material, was primarily used for cooking, and boiling over a fire.3 Pottery was recovered from surface scatters and/or excavations at every archaeological site identified on Nayau. The pottery recovered from sites other than Na Masimasi is typical in form and decoration to that of Fiji’s later period Navatu, Vuda, and Ra ceramic phases. Surface collections on the hillforts of Daku ni Tuba and Navutu produced sherds with incised designs, punctations, and elaborate rim decorations (tool-impressed lips and nubbins) similar to those illustrated in Birks (1973, figures 39–44). Such pottery is characteristic of the Navatu Phase on Viti Levu (Green 1979). The excavated pottery is highly fragmentary, but analysis indicates that the majority of pottery recovered from the nonLapita sites was primarily used in cooking, with the exception of a water jug recovered from the site of Qara ni Lulu, which is decorated with punctations and appliqué designs typical of the Vuda and Ra phases of Fijian pottery.

ARCHAEOLOGICAL SCOOP-SHAPED FEATURES: HEARTHS AND LOVO Scoop-shaped features were the most common subsurface feature-type encountered in my excavations. Of the thirteen sites where test excavations were conducted, eight sites produced one or more of these features (table 3.3). The size (diameter and depth or height of the feature) of the features is relatively consistent across contexts. The scoop features measure 75 to 100 cm in diameter and extend in height (or depth) 30 to 80 cm. Often, an accurate depth of individual features was difficult to determine because they commonly appear in profile as multiple overlapping basins;

Foodways and Social Relations in the Past and Present Table 3.3.

Scoop-Shaped Features in Test Excavations on Nayau # Lovo

Diameter (cm)

Depth of feature (cm)

WaiTE

⬎2

75 and 100

⬎80

WaiTW KV1 KV2 KoroNG UluNK NukuT2 NaMM

2 1 2 1 1 ⬎1 ⬎1

⬎80 and ⬎50 90 ⬎70 and ⬎100 ⬎100 ⬎100 70 60

30 35 40 30 40 30 ⬎30

Site

67

Content Charcoal, ash, copious firecracked rock (FCR), shell, bone, artifacts Same as above Same as above Same as above Same as above Same as above Same as above Same as above plus coral, sea urchin spines, pottery, lithics

undoubtedly, this represents reuse over time. The matrix of these features at all the sites was similar; they are typically composed of loosely packed sediments rich in charcoal and ash (some have ash layers), fire cracked rock, and fragments of shells, bones, and various artifacts. Below I describe representative examples of the scoop-features at two sites, Waituruturu and Na Masimasi, from an archaeological perspective in order to exemplify the archaeological signatures of these important domestic features. Waituruturu East and West The surface of the excavation unit at Waituruturu East, one component of a two-part fortified rockshelter complex, was littered with many modern rat (Rattus rattus or Rattus exulans) and bird bones, apparently the result of owl roosts in the overhanging limestone outcrop that forms this large rockshelter. The subsurface deposit consists of three primary strata, designated Layers I–III (figure 3.13). Layer I is divided further by lenses of ash and charcoal. The loose, organic, pebbly, cobbly silt composing much of Layer I4 yielded abundant faunal remains and material culture to a depth of 75 centimeters below surface (cmbs). Layer I is clearly an earth oven (lovo) feature, based on the laminated stratigraphy, its overall shape, the copious amounts of whole and broken fire-cracked volcanic cobblestones and the abundant charcoal flecking and chunks. Layer II is a uniform pebbly silt with much less fire-cracked rock and some charcoal flecking.5 Faunal remains and artifacts are substantial but less frequent than in Layer I. Layer III is lighter in color than overlying layers.6 This loose, highly weathered, indurated, limestone crust contains limestone cobbles and boulders up to 40 cm in diameter. Cultural remains

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Figure 3.13. Stratigraphic Profile of South Wall of Test Excavation 1 (TP-1) in Waituruturu East, Illustrating Lovo Feature

decrease and finally dropout completely in Layer III, which represents the precultural rubble underlying the anthropogenic sediment. The stratigraphy in Waituruturu West was much the same as that described above in Waituruturu East. Excavations uncovered overlapping lovo features and a rich, ashy deposit filled with charcoal and bones. The deposit was shallower than that in Waituruturu East, however, extending only 55 cmbs. Na Masimasi Decorated pottery in the Lapita-style (figure 3.14) was recovered from surface-collections and excavations at Na Masimasi, an open site on Nayau’s southeast coastal sand dunes. On the land surrounding, and including, the site is a coconut plantation used by the island’s contemporary inhabitants. The extensive surface scatter of pottery and artifacts in the area represents a village settlement that dates to about 2,400–2,630 BP,7 and represents a relatively late phase of the Lapita culture. The village extends ca. 360 meters north to south along the dunes, tapering off toward the south. The area referred to as Na Masimasi by people on Nayau appears to grade into the archaeological site referred to as Vulaga (see table 2.1). Lacking a clear boundary, the site names provided may correspond to northern and southern extents of what could be one massive site or

Foodways and Social Relations in the Past and Present

Figure 3.14.

69

An Example of Decorated Lapita Pottery from Na Masimasi

Drawing by Patrick O’Day

two, possibly contemporary, village sites in sum greater than 500 m in length, running parallel along the sand dunes. Surface scatters of artifacts included several basalt, chert, and shell tools and copious amounts of pottery. Na Masimasi’s position along the coastal dunes is typical of Lapita settlements, indicating a preferential focus on the marine environment. Three excavation units were dug at Na Masimsi (D8, G6, and G7). These were positioned in an area with a dense surface pottery scatter. The strata in each of the units were similar, and the deposit extended on average 1.6 meters below the surface, producing Lapita pottery throughout. This finding suggests that Lapita peoples occupied the site continuously over time and the ceramic technology did not change significantly during this occupation. A profile of the east wall of Unit G6 is illustrated in figure 3.15. Layer I is densely packed silty sand-filled sediment. It contains copious amounts

Figure 3.15.

Na Masimasi East Wall Profile of Unit G6 and Features

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of highly fragmentary pottery, midden, and pumice. Layer I8 is highly disturbed from coconut tree roots and modern human activity, including copra production and the burning of coconut fronds and detritus on the surface. Layer IIa9 is softer, silty, but still compact and contains more sand and charcoal flecks than Layer I. Layer IIa lacks root disturbance; it contains artifacts, fire-cracked rock, and midden composed of whole shells and more obvious bones. Pottery is positioned horizontally in the unit, starting with Layer IIa, indicating a primary deposition. Layer IIb10 is lighter colored than IIa, with higher sand content and produced less pottery than previous layers. In Layer III11 the material culture content, pottery and artifacts, drops off dramatically and the sediment transitions to a soft loose sand containing pumice, shells, and copious limestone cobbles. Below Layer III the sediment becomes very hard and compact, consisting of sand and limestone rock. The section of the unit delineated as “Features 1 and 2” represents one or more combustion features or areas where fire or burning has occurred. These features were created by the site’s occupants and may be the remains of one large lovo used over and over again through time. Both features were basin-shaped in plan view and contained fire-cracked rock, charcoal, bone, shell, pottery, and other artifacts. Features 1 and 2 were 25 cm deep and 40 cm deep, respectively.12 A thin dark brown lens of sediment separates these features.

INTERPRETING ARCHAEOLOGICAL DATA In an effort to interpret my archaeological findings, I revisit the four ethnoarchaeological points discussed above that center on the relation between archaeological material culture and social relations. Because most of my excavations on Nayau were preliminary, I did not excavate an area wide enough in any one site to examine subsurface deposits from a complete household or house floor. This is a major drawback to my overall interpretations of the spatial arrangement of the sites, however I was able to identify probable cooking areas and associated features within archaeological villages. These findings will help guide my excavations in the future—for example, having identified cooking features, I can now turn to investigating nearby yavu that kin likely occupied and probable features where people cooked collectively and shared meals. Likely cooking areas and associated features were uncovered at most of the excavated sites. These cooking areas or kitchens appear to be indicated by dark organic soil, abundant charcoal chunks and flecking in the sediments, proximity to scoop-shaped features (representing earth ovens or hearths), large quantities of animal bones (especially fish bones), and

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material culture remains such as pottery and domestic tools. My excavations did not uncover any kitchens located on yavu, but most of the mid–late prehistoric sites yielded scoop features within a few meters of residential yavu, suggesting that in pre-European times people may have preferred to construct kitchens without yavu bases. The majority scoop features are likely lovo, based on the ethnographic analogs; the archaeological features are within the size and depth range recorded for modern lovo and appear to have been frequently reused over time. To understand the relationship between social status, particularly rank and gender, and material culture remains, the strongest physical connections evident archaeologically may be: female/kitchen/hearth/boiled foods, versus male/oven house/lovo/baked foods. If the archaeological features are interpreted as lovo rather than hearths, then we can assume that the lovo mark male activity areas. The question remains, however, what do the food refuse from lovo represent: midden from everyday meals cooked in hearths or remains of foods cooked in the lovo? Obviously, my assumption that the features represent lovo will need to be tested with additional archaeological and ethnographic data in Lau and elsewhere. Additional information will help determine what the food remains in archaeological cooking features represent. Nevertheless, my current archaeological findings provide a starting point for examining these complex issues. In the next section I present information from the ethnographic interviews that contribute additional insights into the social dimensions of food, including food sharing, household distribution of food, and consumption patterns.

INTERVIEWS The Lauan “Meal”: Folk Taxonomy of Food The Lauan word for meal is kana, but the phrase i kata lau may also refer in general to any of the typical three meals, breakfast (ti), lunch (vakasigalevu), or dinner (vakayakavi). A “meal,” unlike a snack, must include a starch food, and the participants should be seated to partake. A snack may be taken anywhere, any time, and might only include a piece of fruit or a cup of tea. For a formal meal, such as dinner, both a flesh food and a starch must be present. A very good meal would include a variety of starches (e.g., dalo, cassava, and bread) with the meat, and tea should be served at the end. The evening meals Thompson witnessed usually consisted of: steamed cassava, sweet potato, breadfruit, and greens with coconut cream and fish. “If there is no fish or meat the meal is considered poor” (Thompson 1940, 151). For Lauans, the important culinary distinc-

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tion is between starch foods and flesh foods. A starch can constitute a “meal,” but a flesh food alone cannot. This pattern has been documented elsewhere in Fiji and Polynesia (Becker 1995; Firth 1936; Kirch 2001). The Lauan meal is dependent on presentation almost as much as it is on the presence of the proper constituents (starch and meat). A good meal (ka kana vinaka) always involves an abundant spread that challenges the diners’ abilities to eat it all. As Bell noted, “one of the keenest forms of embarrassment which a Polynesian can suffer is to be unable to provide guests, invited or uninvited, with a sufficiency of food” (1931, 125). On Nayau, anytime people take a meal, a person passing by the house will be called to join the family and eat with them. During meal time throughout the village the phrases “Mai ti!” (Come have tea/breakfast!), or “Mai kana!” (Come eat!) can be heard, as the man or woman of the house waves any adult passerby in. Many of the daily activities of women between the ages of about thirteen and sixty-five are focused on getting food, preparing, serving, and cleaning up after meals, especially the evening meal—the most important meal of the day. This is not to imply that women spend their entire day in search of food. Female social situations are organized around the kitchen and preparation, presentation, and cleanup associated with meals. The Lauan meal, both its preparation and consumption, is fundamentally a social event where visitors are constantly called to join in. Thus, it is simultaneously a public and private/domestic display of wealth and an expression of a person’s ability to care and provide for family and community. The literal translation of the Fijian term va kani a is “giving food.” The practice of giving food is widely recognized as an important way to influence others. Thus, in common use the phrase communicates a tight association between sharing food, feeding people in the home and in the community, and enhancing power or prestige. Indeed, food functions as a marker of social connectedness and an expression of varied social relations. Social Dimensions of Food: Meals, Snacks, Place, Time, Household Distribution The interview data (appendix B) and observations indicate that people commonly eat two or three meals each day where the entire household sits down in either the kitchen or vale levu and consumes food together. All Fijian meals are ritualized. Formal meals, especially dinner, are taken in the vale levu, or main house, while people usually eat breakfast and lunch in the kitchen. In preparation for the meal, a mat is spread out on the floor along the vertical (or long) axis of the house and a cloth is laid on top, in the center of the mat. Both the mat and the cloth visually emphasize the above/below axis of household space. When people sit down

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to eat they literally take their seats; that is, each person knows where to sit according to their status relative to the other people present (figure 3.6). The senior man sits at the top of the house, and the other males sit below him, and generally above the women (unless one of the women present is a special guest or an older woman of rank). The woman of the house always sits nearest to the door or main house entrance, which is known as the “door of the cooking irons” or darava i sue. In this way, physical household space associated with formal eating reflects social hierarchy. The largest most impressive foods are placed at the top of the cloth near the high ranked members (e.g., fish heads, the households, largest most ornate bowls of curry pork, and plates piled high with dalo, sweet potatoes, and cassava). Thus prestige is enhanced, as images of abundance are key to a successful presentation. The meal begins with a prayer, and then the people seated “above” (i cake) eat. Individuals seated “below” (i ra), usually women and children, wait for the people above to finish eating before they begin. Both the seating arrangement and the order of eating within households are dependent on hierarchy. People on Nayau, including my host family, were greatly disturbed when I attempted to sit in a position other than the socially proscribed proper one for a foreign visitor that is near the top of the house. During the end of my fourth stay on Nayau, I was finally allowed to regularly sit at the bottom of the house, by the door during meals with my informant and her family. I sat in the seat that her daughter, who was living on Viti Levu to attend school, would normally occupy, and I waited to eat with the women and kids after the men had finished. The first time I sat in this position, my informant’s teenaged son protested and insisted that I move up, “Na,” he said, “Seroni vaka cabe cake!” (“Mom, Sharyn must move up!”). After two weeks of meals where I was seated at the door and assisted in the serving of meals with the woman of the house, the family finally became more comfortable with it. However, many of their neighbors and relatives found this seating arrangement laughable or simply unacceptable. This situation, when I was staying with my informant’s family and doing many of the things that Fijian women normally do each day, was a subject of much discussion and debate in Salia village. People were either amused or incensed by my intimate participation in the household. It also caused political strife because the Turaga ni Koro insisted that all foreign visitors stay with his family and be waited on and treated properly. There has not been a chief in Salia for over ten years, and because the village lacked powerful leadership or direction at the time of my research, Salia was in a constant state of political unrest. My insistence on staying with my informant’s family upset the Turaga ni Koro’s claims to power over foreigners and his standing in the eyes of some of the villagers. This was

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compounded by the fact that I was essentially waiting on my informant’s family and at the same time, elevating their status by staying in their home, providing cash payment for food and collaboration, and treating them as family. At the conclusion of a formal meal the participants (other than those cleaning up after the meal, usually the young unmarried women of the household), and especially guests, are expected to lie down and “relax” or “sit and rest here” (“vaka cequ” or “dabe ke”). The hostess will bring out pillows to recline on, people then assume a more informal posture and begin chatting in an easygoing manner. Men and women often separate— for example, the men may break off and go outside to relax or move into one of the household’s nearby bure. The conversation often reflects on the meal, local politics, and village gossip. It is socially acceptable, and encouraged, to nap after a Sunday lunch, the evening meal, or any feast. Fijian hosts take great pleasure in the degree to which visitors are able to recline, stretch out, and take repose. Snacks differ markedly from meals in both context and composition. In general, I witnessed women snacking more frequently then men. This may be related to their more consistent contact with foods, as women are engaged in meal preparation and clean up throughout each day. During interviews, I asked women if they snacked at all each day; 85 percent of the respondents claimed to snack. Typical snack foods include starches (bread, cassava, sweet potatoes), leftovers, a cup of tea, and fruit. Anytime women, adolescents, and children are collecting on the reef or in the bush, they snack on the items collected. Cooking Activities Women claim to do all of the cooking, but they also note that their husbands typically make the lovo for special occasions and on Sundays. Four of the women interviewed said that their husbands do some of the regular cooking during the week or when they need help. Nevertheless, it is obvious through observation that women do the vast majority of everyday food preparations and cooking. The Lauan cultural category of “cooking” does not appear to include making the lovo. Interviews indicate that Lauans maintain a sharp ideological division between everyday cooking activities and food preparations associated with special events that merit the use of the earth oven. When young unmarried women are members of a household, they take over all or part of the food preparations and postmeal cleaning activities from the older women in the house. To varying degrees, the senior ranking woman may direct the younger member’s activities. If young unmarried women within a household are extended family, they

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may spend a great deal of time around the houses of their father’s brothers. This is especially common if a house does not have any young women who live there, and thus a female affine may also assist with that household’s domestic activities. The wife of one of the village chiefs, Mary, does not do any cooking; the women of the village, especially her daughter-in-law (Lea, who is married to one of her oldest sons), do all of the cooking for this household. Lea uses Mary’s kitchen to prepare meals for both of their households. This pattern does not hold for the wife of the acting chief of a neighboring village; both the wife of the chief in the second village and the chief himself do all the cooking in their household. All of the interview respondents indicated that they eat cassava, sweet potatoes, and fish each day. When asked to characterize the differences between everyday cooking and foods prepared and served for feasts, these women consistently made reference to “big foods.” Big foods include cow, pig, chicken, large offshore fish, soup, curry, and chop suey. Pigs are frequently eaten on weekends, baked in the Sunday lovo, but cow is rarely eaten except for feasts associated with weddings, funerals, or other important events that are celebrated by the entire village. In terms of starch foods, yams and dalo are fundamental components of feasts. Lauans always make an effort to present many different root crops together with a variety of meats for feasts or celebrations. Meats and vegetables, especially greens cooked in coconut cream, are typical feast foods. The use of onion, garlic, curry, and soy sauce is another notable difference in the food prepared for special events. During feasts, people make an effort to eat considerably more than they normally do, and there is much encouragement by the participants to this end. One constantly hears the phrase, “kana vakalevu!” (eat big) when sitting at a feast. The presence of big foods, a large variety, and copious amounts of food were key characteristics that the interview respondents and other informants used to describe the fare associated with special events. Interestingly, none of the women interviewed listed puddings (vakalolo) or grated (solo) foods as components of feasts. In my experiences on Nayau and Lakeba “puddings” are always served for feasts and presented as gifts during special occasions. That these foods were not mentioned may be attributed to the fact that men often prepare vakaklolo and solopule. Women occasionally prepare the puddings, but not as often as men do. Food Preference and Individual Consumption Patterns Almost all of the women I interviewed claimed that the people living in their houses eat the same things. The only exceptions were people who said that a member of the household was on a special diet, due to illness

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or other health conditions, and the dieter could not eat items such as butter or flour. While the data indicate that most people eat the same basic suite of foods (cassava, dalo, sweet potatoes, bread, fish, and coconut milk), the portions of food, in terms of size and the animal parts consumed by individuals do vary according to rank, gender, age, and personal preference. The interview data indicate that individual preference for particular types of foods varies widely. All of the women interviewed claimed to prefer fish to other types of meat. Favored fishes varied widely by individual. People like to eat both small and large size fishes. Reef fishes and offshore taxa were listed as favorites during interviews (table 3.4). The most frequently preferred fish is kawakawa. The term kawakawa refers to specific types of Groupers, including Epinephelus merra, and various species in the genus Cephalopholis. These fishes are highly sought after despite their relatively small size. The E. merra caught on Nayau generally measure about 18 cm in total length, while Cephalopholis spp. average 25 to 40 cm in total length. In decreasing order of abundance, the following fish were commonly listed as favorites during interviews: kawakawa; mulu or nuqa (Siganus sp.); kanace (Mugilidae); saqa (Caranx ignobilis and C. melampygus); tabacee (Acanthurus triostegus); boosee (Scarus sp.); ivatui (Parupeneus cyclostomus).13 This includes preferred fishes of the women interviewed and their husbands. Some respondents claimed that they like all types of fishes and were unable to decide on one or two that they prefer.

Table 3.4.

Favorite Fishes as Indicated in Interviews

Lauan Name

Scientific Name

English Name

N

Kawakawa Mulu or Nuqa Kanace Tabacee Boosee Saqa Ika Ivatui Kabajia Tabacee ni Toga Saqa Sevaseva Matu Jivijivi

Cephalopholis spp. and E. merra Siganus sp. Mugilidae Acanthurus triostegus Scarus sp. Caranx ignobilis Any fish Parupeneus cyclostomus Lethrinus sp. Acanthurus guttatus Caranx melampygus Plectorhinchus sp. Gerres sp. Chaetodon sp.

Grouper Rabbitfish Mullet Convict Tang Parrotfish Giant Trevally Fish Goldsaddled Goatfish Emperorfish Whitespotted Surgeonfish Bluefin Trevally Sweetlips Silver Biddy Butterflyfish

8 7 5 3 3 3 2 2 2 1 1 1 1 1

Total Note : N ⫽ number of times fish cited as favorite; some people listed more than one fish.

40

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In addition to the data collected during structured interviews, I frequently questioned people about what foods they prefer and why. When respondents were asked why they preferred certain fishes to others, they always referred to the fish head and the size of the head and/or eyes. One informant said that she likes kabajia (Lethrinus sp.) better than other fishes because “It has red lips, big eyes, and sweet flesh.” Another woman claimed that kanace is her favorite fish “because it is fat and has a big head.” My primary informant, Rusila, who sells fish to people on Nayau and all over central Lau, targets kanace to sell “because it has firm flesh that lasts for a few days and it has a big head and big eyes.” Importantly, many people claimed to prefer small fish by specifically saying, for example, “I like the small kawakawa the best.” Alternatively, some respondents simply prefer notoriously small species of fish; four women stated during interviews that their favorite fish is tabacee (the Convict Tang, Acanthurus triostegus, a species that does not get bigger than about 20 cm in total length and average 16 cm TL). Four households exhibited extreme variations from the normal patterns of food consumption and preference. These households hold relatively high ranks, either ascribed or achieved. One of the most dramatic variations from the normal pattern of household food consumption was documented during my interview with Sera. Her husband is the acting Tui of one of the villages. They had far more packaged foods sitting around their kitchen and spread out all over the house than any other household I have seen on Nayau. Also, Sera is one of only two women interviewed that claimed to like imported foods (“Suva food”) better than Nayau food. She said, “Because I get many things from my daughter and sons in Suva, there is nothing here that we want or need from the store.” Sera estimated that about 80 percent of the food she and her husband consume comes from Suva and the rest is produced locally (reef fish and root crops compose the majority of Nayau foods that they eat). However, Sera also admitted that she visits the store every day for items such as flour, rice, and sugar. She sometimes purchases gasoline for her son’s boat; he provides much of the fish that she and her husband eat. Sera and her husband, the chief, both cook, and then she serves the meals. They eat at the same time, but he eats the fish heads. The second major variation from the norm was documented in an interview with Sue. She is the daughter of the last high chief of the village where she resides and is thus high ranked. She claimed that she prefers store-bought foods to Nayau foods and that her household purchases make up about 80 percent of the foods she and her husband eat, while only about 20 percent are produced locally. Sue eats at the same time with her husband, but she serves the food and eats the fish tails. This family owns twenty pigs and two cows, a relatively large number indicative of their considerable wealth.

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Individual consumption patterns in the house of one village chief and his wife, Mary, differ in some ways, but also conform to what was recorded in other households. Although Mary claimed that she and the chief eat the same foods as the other inhabitants of the village, they receive the majority of their foods as tribute and the local women do all of the cooking for them. When women collect inshore resources, they bring fish, invertebrates, and seaweed to Mary and the chief. I asked Mary if she selects particular foods from what is collected, taking the items that she wants. She responded, “I just take what is given to us.” During my interview with Mary’s daughter, she told me that turtle (vonu) and the Giant Trevally or Bluefin Trevally (saqa), especially the saqa head, are reserved for the chief. She noted that other than these foods, “The chief eats the same foods that everyone else does. When he receives a turtle or a saqa head, he returns with a tabua [whale’s tooth]. The chief’s son fishes for him a couple times each week. All the people in the village bring food to the chief when they return from fishing for their households. When they come back to the village, people bring him vasua [Tridacna sp., the giant clam].” Mary told me, “Our vegetable food comes from the chief’s garden. His garden is next to the other gardens that belong to the people of our village, but his garden is larger and has different crops. It is more organized. He has cassava, sweet potatoes, uvi, and, via. His son collects them for us [because the chief is blind].” The presentation of foods to people of rank is always elaborate and a deliberate show of excessive giving. When Lauans present foods to the chief and his family, they seek to outdo each other and give everything, often leaving little or nothing for themselves. Thus, despite the typical Fijian proclivity of describing acts in diminutive terms, the presentation of food, or other items, to a chief and his family is always impressive—that is, quantitatively and/or qualitatively elaborate. The chief and his family are well fed and cared for, which reflects positively upon the village. In Mary’s village, people respect the chief and show it by taking him all of their turtles, saqa (Caranx sp.), giant clams (Tridacna sp.), and sici (Turbo sp.). To supplement their diet, Mary occasionally collects seaweed (nama), sici, and sea cucumbers on the reef. She sells part of the sea cucumbers to passing cargo ships headed to the cities, in order to earn cash. Mary claims to buy only “a little bit” from the store, preferring Nayau foods to imported foods. Importantly, much of the store foods she purchases are paid for with sacks of copra. Various village residents, including the chief’s youngest son, give the copra to her husband as tribute. However, like most of the people interviewed, for everyday meals, Mary’s household consumes more fish than chicken, pork, or cow, and more starch than meat. A more obvious variation in consumption patterns occurs during feasts and special events, where the chief receives the “most,” “biggest,”

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and “best” of everything, including more cow, pork, chicken, large fish (and fish heads), coconut crab, etc. It is interesting that Sera (wife of the acting chief of one of the villages and daughter of the deceased high chief of another village), Sue (also the daughter of a deceased high chief), and Mary (wife of yet another chief) were the only interview respondents who included yams in their list of foods that are prepared for a feast. This finding may indicate that yams are more valuable to high-ranked women than to commoners; yams are still presented as first fruits offerings annually to chiefs during harvest times (specifically, regular yams are presented in May and sweet yams in July). The fourth household where consumption patterns varied markedly from the norm is that of Rusila. She and her husband have a business license and collect and sell fish on Nayau. They own one of the few fiberglass fishing boats on the island with a forty-horsepower outboard motor. Rusila spends more time fishing than any other woman on the island. Her family has access to both cash and a constant supply of fish (in addition to goods traded in payment for her catch), which is unusual in Lau. Moreover, unlike the other households, this family eats almost as much fish and meat as vegetables and starches. She told me during her interview that her husband eats fish heads, but there are usually enough heads to go around so that each member of their household gets one (there were five people living in her house at the time of my fieldwork). Often, the family will give their fish tails to neighbors, friends, and relatives. This household also boasts a relatively large amount of livestock: fourteen pigs, four horses, one cow, and fourteen chickens. Rusila estimates that her family purchases only about 10 percent or less of the food they eat from the store. “Other people in Salia probably spend more money on store food than we do; we spend money on fishing gear and fuel.” All of the most obvious variations in food consumption patterns, and notably different responses to my questions about feasts, occurred in households of relatively high-ranked women (Sera, Sue, Mary, and Rusila). Two of these women are married to powerful men (chiefs), and all four women came from high-status lineages before marriage. Among the people I interviewed, rank appears to be the most important factor determining the physical wealth of households and their individual consumption patterns. The acting chief of Narocivo, for example, has twenty-two pigs, more than twenty chickens, and five cows. His wealth, in terms of livestock, exceeds that of most the other households in Narocivo, Salia, and Liku. The number of cows that a person has is especially indicative of wealth and status. At the village level, a household’s social status appears to affect what foods its members consume. For example, Mary and her husband (a villagelevel chief) eat foods presented in tribute to the chief and collected for

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them. The daughter of another chief, Sue, purchases around 80 percent of the foods her household consumes from the store. The acting chief of another village and his wife (Sera) also eat foods that are very different from what most the villagers eat; these are largely store bought foods, but also consist of tribute (primarily fish). Finally, Rusila and the members of her household eat far more protein, especially fish, than the members of any other household I interviewed on Nayau. Age, Gender, and Rank in Contemporary Food Consumption Age, gender, and rank affect all aspects of food distribution and consumption within households, the village, and Lauan society in general. Thompson recorded the typical mode of serving in a Lauan household where food is presented in the center of the group or family and the fish is divided into portions according to rank. “The head of the fish, the center of mana [supernatural efficacy], goes to the highest ranking man” (Thompson 1940, 152). In contemporary Nayau, a striking difference exists between the parts of animals consumed by men and women. The most frequently observed and documented gendered variation in terms of animal body parts taken is the consumption of fish heads by the ranking male of the household. All of the interview respondents claimed that the men eat the fish heads and the women and children eat the tails at family meals. The head (uluna) of other animals is also reserved for men. When a pig is served, men will eat the head, buttocks (muna), and back legs (dibina). Depending on personal preference, some men also eat the backbone (suitu). Interview data indicates that men have preferential access to certain parts of the chicken as well. Many people do not eat chicken heads; unlike the heads of fish, pigs, and cows, chicken heads appear to lack particular value. According to the women I interviewed, men prefer the chicken backbone, legs, and thighs. Women on Nayau and Lakeba claim that, “the head of the pig is for the husband and for the chief.” Rank and gender determine the order in which people eat. Almost all of the women interviewed serve their husbands, or the male head of the household, first and eat only after the men have finished. This is also the order of eating that I have observed at nearly every meal during the entire course of my research on Nayau and Lakeba. Exceptions to this pattern were documented in four households. In the first household, two seventy-one-year-old twin sisters live with their nephew. The twin sisters told me that when they are eating with their nephew, sometimes they eat together—at the same time he eats. On other occasions, he arrives to the meal late, after they have already started eating; in this case, they eat first. Sometimes they eat the fish heads, and sometimes he does, but the women always serve the food.

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In the second household, the acting chief of Narocivo eats with his wife. She does not wait for him, but she serves him the food and he always eats the fish heads. The third household is that of a seventy-three-year-old widow who lives alone. She takes her meals with her son-in-law, eating at the same time, while her daughter waits for them to finish, before eating. The elder woman sometimes eats fish heads, and other times she eats the tails. The fourth case is in a house where a seventy-five-year-old widow lives with her son and his wife; she eats at the same time as her son, although his wife waits for the elder woman and her husband to finish before eating. The categories of age, gender, and rank are not stable throughout an individual’s life. As women age, their rank appears to increase and they gain new opportunities or experiences in different social settings. When a woman becomes the oldest member of a household, she acquires some of the same privileges afforded to high-ranked men. At meal times men generally eat the fish heads unless women are eating without the men, in which case, the women will eat the fish heads. Regardless of rank, most of the women I interviewed who are over sixty take their meals at the same time as the man of the house. These women may or may not serve the food (depending on the presence of a younger woman), but they typically sit next to the door, just as young women do. One woman said that her son occasionally serves food to her. None of the respondents said that they eat before men, but if no men are in attendance at a meal, the ranking woman of the house may take her food before the other women and the children who are present. When I asked some of the older women how many meals they eat each day, they proudly responded that their families take good care of them, feeding them frequently and keeping them from cooking and other “hard work.” Luse Tayaga, a seventy-two-year-old woman, stated, “I eat three meals each day. My family looks out for me.” The daily activities of women over sixty-five to seventy are few in comparison with women of other age groups. During the day, older women typically weave mats or make masi and might go fishing once a week. They may help in the kitchen, or direct activity, but do not contribute significantly to food production, preparation, serving, and cleanup. One elder woman told me, “My son wants me to sit here all day and not work.” The community views this as a sign that her son is a good caregiver and an able provider.

ETHNOARCHAEOLOGICAL IMPLICATIONS OF THE INTERVIEW DATA The interviews I conducted on Nayau are helpful for outlining common behaviors associated with food and eating, which may be useful in the interpretation of archaeological remains. The ethnoarchaeological implica-

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tions of the interview data include seven important points. First, meals differ in context and content from snacks; meals are structured social rituals that might be expected to produce a specific suite of archaeological remains, including the animal bones and or invertebrates and the archaeobotanical residues of starches. A proper meal includes meat and starches presented in a formal manner to a group of people seated according to rank. Women occupy the “low” areas of the house during meals, and men occupy the “high” areas. Second, giving food enhances prestige and power. This is true both within and between households, and may also be seen when villagers pay tribute to a chief. Third, snacking is not an uncommon activity, even when women are working or collecting food on the reef. Fourth, Lauan women ideologically divide everyday cooking, a female activity, from the cooking of big foods (pigs, cows, offshore fishes, puddings) for special occasions. The latter is predominantly a male activity. Fifth, most women claim to prefer locally produced foods, and when asked about fish, my interlocutors explained that they like inshore fishes (which are relatively small-bodied). Preference for specific types of fishes appears to be related to the size of a fish’s head and eyes, as well as its color (red is a favorite color). Sixth, age, gender, and rank all play a role in determining what and how people eat. The order in which people eat at a meal is determined by these social factors; that is, if an animal is served, the male head of the household will eat the head and the women and children will eat the leftovers, most often the tail. Seventh, as women age, it is socially acceptable and often expected that they may assume some of the behaviors of higherranked men in regards to eating and the physical positions that they occupy at meals and other social events. Therefore, social categories are context dependent. The remains of prehistoric meals, as represented in zooarchaeological or faunal assemblages are described in the following section. After discussing this data, I aim to use it and these seven ethnoarchaeological points to further explore the questions posed at the beginning of this chapter.

ZOOARCHAEOLOGICAL REMAINS Nayau’s excavated archaeological sites yielded a rich assemblage of wellpreserved bones (table 3.5). The Na Masimasi assemblage differed from fauna recovered at other sites in terms of the faunal makeup, abundance, and diversity; I will discuss this material separate from that produced by the other sites. Unlike the bone from the Mid-prehistoric to Contact Period sites, the Na Masimasi fauna was dispersed throughout the strata, and while bone was recovered from probable lovo, it was not concentrated

Total

723

—

—

3,320

624 4 — 15 — 76 — — — 4

WaiT E

1,329 199 — 138 9 1,644 — — — 1

WaiT W

22

—

10 — — — — 2 — — — 10

KV 1

286

3

265 — 1 1 7 5 — — 4 —

KV 2

465

—

8 6 — 30 4 415 — — — 2

UluNK

69

—

36 7 — 1 5 11 — — — 9

KoroNG

13

2

9 — — — — — — — — 2

NukuT 1

152

—

28 — — — 20 2 — 1 — 101

NukT 2

119

—

47 — — — — 3 — 1 — 68

QaraL

Distribution of Selected Classes of Vertebrates (NISP) from Excavated Sites on Nayau

Fish Lizard/Snake Sea Turtle Bird Bat Rat Pig Dog Cat Human Med. Mammal

Class

Table 3.5.

18

—

18 — — — — — — — — —

Navutu

75

—

73 — — — 1 — — — — 1

Vulaga

630

12

599 2 — 3 12 1 — — — 1

DKT

8,317

12

7,570 6 11 3 3 664 2 4 — 42

Na MM

14,209

29

10,616 224 12 191 61 2,823 2 6 4 241

Total NISP

Foodways and Social Relations in the Past and Present

85

in these features. The sample described here includes about 80 percent of all the recovered fauna; I am currently working to analyze the remainder of the Na Masimasi assemblage. The Mid-prehistoric to Contact Period sites produced 5,889 individual specimens, of which only 2.5 percent display obvious evidence of human alteration such as burning or cut marks. Most of the burned bones were recovered from cooking features. Scoop-shaped features, likely lovo, produced the majority of the faunal assemblage from the Mid-prehistoric to Contact Period sites. Within Mid-prehistoric and Contact Period sites fish represents 52 percent of the recovered archaeological bone by count (NISP), weighing a total of 255.2 g (table 3.6). Intersite variation in fish remains is minimal for taxonomic composition, because Waituruturu East and West contributed 80 percent of the total fish NISP. Korovatu Rockshelter 2 contributed 11 percent. The other nine sites yielded comparatively few fish bones and contribute little to the understanding of prehistoric foodways; additional excavations in these sites would improve the data set. The fish assemblage reflects a heavy reliance on near-shore reef fishes, especially in the families Acanthuridae (Tang), Balisitidae (Triggerfish), Diodontidae (Porcupinefish), Lethrinidae (Emperorfish), Scaridae (Parrotfish), Serranidae (Grouper), and Labridae (Wrasse). These families make up 93 percent of the identified Mid-prehistoric to Contact Period assemblage by count or weight (table 3.7). Emperorfish contribute 5 percent of the MNI and 15 percent of the biomass. At the family level of identification the Nayau archaeological fish assemblage resembles other prehistoric Oceanic assemblages (Butler 1994; Davidson et al. 2002; Green 1986; Leach and Davidson 2000). Fishes that typically inhabit the offshore area and pelagic zone, including Scombridae (Tuna) and Exocoetidae (Flyingfish), were represented by only four bones. When the identified fish bones are grouped according to skeletal elements, the frequency of cranial to postcranial bones is apparent (table 3.8); this summary does not include over 2,000 unidentified elements classified as Osteichthyes (or unidentified bony fish) that consist primarily of spines and small undiagnostic fragments. A total of 527 identified bones (34.5 percent) are from the head or cranial region, while 1,001 (65.5 percent) are postcranial elements. Vertebrae form the most abundant portion of all skeletal elements identified, making up almost 43 percent of the total identified elements. This data indicates that head elements are particularly common and heads may have been preferred, or at least frequently eaten, by the occupants of these archaeological households. Fish bone was copious throughout the strata in the Na Masimasi units, making up 91 percent of all the recovered fauna by count. This is a diverse assemblage including 33 different taxa (table 3.9). Fish vertebrae make up

Table 3.6. Summary of Fish Bone from Mid-prehistoric to Contact Period Excavations on Nayau Taxon

Habitat

NISP

Mass (g)

Osteichthyes/unidentified Carcharhinidae Muraenidae Gymnothorax sp. Exocoetidae Belonidae Tylosurus crocodilus Myrpristis sp. Perciformes Serranidae Epinephelus merra Cephalopholis sp. Epinephelus sp. Carangidae Caranx sp. Lutjanidae Lutjanus sp. Lethrinidae Lethrinus sp. Lethrinus erythropterus Lethrinus harak Monotaxis grandoculis Mullidae Labridae Bodianus sp. Cheilinus sp. Halichoeres sp. Scaridae Sparisomatinae Scarus sp. Acanthuridae Acanthurus sp. Naso sp. Siganus sp. Scombridae Pleuronectidae cf. Pleuronectidae Balistidae Sufflamen sp. Ostraciidae Diodon sp. Diodon liturosus Diodon hystrix

— Near reefs and offshore Shallow reefs Shallow reefs Oceanic offshore waters Reefs and inshore Coastal waters and reefs Reefs, caves, and crevices Reefs and offshore Reefs and rocky shore Reefs and rocky shore Reefs and rocky shore Reefs and rocky shore Reefs and offshore Reefs and offshore Reefs Reefs Reef, sand, and rubble Reef, sand, and rubble Reef, sand, and rubble Reef, sand, and rubble Reef, sand, and rubble Reef and sand Reefs Reefs and coastal waters Reefs Reefs Reefs Reefs Reefs Reefs Reefs Reefs Reefs Oceanic offshore waters Sand and mud substrates Sand and mud substrates Reefs Reefs Reefs Reefs Reefs Reefs

2,380 1 8 2 2 6 1 1 12 35 18 4 3 3 3 1 1 12 6 1 4 3 7 7 7 1 1 4 7 42 179 37 8 5 2 2 1 104 18 4 55 32 16

128.2 0.2 0.9 0.2 0.1 0.7 — 0.1 1.2 3.9 1.9 1.6 0.7 1.7 2.7 — 0.2 5.3 4.4 1.2 3.8 6.6 0.6 0.9 1.0 0.5 0.1 1.4 3.9 11.9 16.1 2.9 0.6 0.3 0.2 0.5 0.4 17.3 6.0 1.5 16.2 2.6 5.0

3,046

255.2

Total

Table 3.7. Family-Level Summary of Fish Bone from Twelve Mid-prehistoric to Contact Period Sites on Nayau Family

Common name

NISP

% NISP

Mass (g)

% Mass

Carcharhinidae Muraenidae Exocoetidae Belonidae Holocentridae Serranidae Carangidae Lutjanidae Lethrinidae Mullidae Labridae Scaridae Acanthuridae Siganidae Scombridae Pleuronectidae Balistidae Ostraciidae Diodontidae

Requiem sharks Moray eels Flyingfishes Needlefishes Squirrelfishes Groupers Jacks Snappers Emperors Goatfishes Wrasses Parrotfishes Surgeonfishes Rabbitfishes Tunas Flounders Triggerfishes Trunkfishes Porcupinefishes

1 10 2 7 1 60 6 2 26 7 16 53 224 5 2 3 122 4 103

⬍1 2 ⬍1 1 ⬍1 9 1 ⬍1 4 1 3 8 34 1 ⬍1 ⬍1 19 ⬍1 16

0.2 1.1 0.1 0.7 0.1 8.1 4.4 0.2 21.3 0.6 2.5 17.2 19.6 0.3 0.2 0.9 23.3 1.5 23.8

⬍1 1 ⬍1 1 ⬍1 7 4 ⬍1 16 ⬍1 2 14 16 ⬍1 ⬍1 1 19 1 19

654

100

126.1

100

Total

Note : Nonspecific identifications (Osteichthyes and Perciformes) are not included here. Table 3.8. Fish Element Frequency from Identified Fish Bones from Mid-prehistoric to Contact Period Sites on Nayau Element General Cranial Articular Clethrum Dentary Hyomandibular Maxilla Opercle Preopercle and Premaxilla Quadrate General Postcranial Scale Vertebrae Atlas Pelvic Spines Total

Count

Percent (%)

118 25 88 26 80 26 36 97 31 11 10 653 8 23 296

7.7 1.6 5.8 1.7 5.2 1.7 2.4 6.4 2.0 0.7 0.7 42.7 0.5 1.5 19.4

1,528

100

2 2 18 1 22 51 4 1 12 46 3 21 5 3 1 1 1 1 1 1 39 4 4 27 3 32 1 19

NISP

Summary of Fish Bone from Na Masimasi

Carcharhinidae Dasyatidae Muraenidae Albula glossodonta Belonidae Exocoetidae Holocentridae Holocentrinae Perciformes Serranidae cf. Plectropomus sp. Epinephelus merra Epinephelus sp. Carangidae Caranx sp. Gerres sp. Lutjanidae Haemulidae Lethrinus sp. Monotaxis grandoculus Mullidae Pomacentridae Abudefduf sptemfasciatus Labridae Cheilinus sp. Scaridae Sparisomatinae Scarus spp.

Taxon

Table 3.9.

0.2 0.5 0.8 0.1 0.75 0.47 0.31 0.1 2.11 4.87 0.17 1.0 1.11 0.11 0.01 0.1 0.1 0.01 0.01 0.2 1.1 0.03 0.1 3.21 0.1 8.11 0.1 3.12

weight (g) 1 2 1 1 1 3 — 1 — — 1 4 2 — 1 1 1 1 1 1 2 1 1 3 1 — 1 4

MNI 8.47 17.47 25.32 4.90 24.06 16.63 11.97 4.90 51.19 102.48 6.33 27.54 30.03 4.41 0.60 4.07 4.07 0.60 0.60 7.24 29.81 1.50 4.07 72.51 4.07 156.49 4.07 70.82

biomass (g) 0.60 1.23 1.79 0.35 1.70 1.17 0.84 0.35 3.61 7.23 0.45 1.94 2.12 0.31 0.04 0.29 0.29 0.04 0.04 0.51 2.10 0.11 0.29 5.11 0.29 11.03 0.29 4.99

% biomass

7,570 550

Total Without unidentified fish

323.69 66.1

0.4 0.32 0.01 7.01 0.26 2.1 0.25 5.7 1.78 0.11 0.1 19.25 257.5

Note : Percent biomass calculated excluding unidentified bony fish.

15 3 1 69 10 3 11 5 49 2 3 53 7,020

Mugilidae Sphyraena barracuda Sphyraena sp. Acanthuridae Acanthurus sp. Naso sp. Siganus sp. Scombridae Balistidae Monacanthidae Ostraciidae Diodon sp. Unidentified bony fish 59 59

2 1 — — 10 1 1 1 3 1 1 2 — 4,065.03 1,418.18

12.87 10.70 0.60 138.66 9.00 50.98 8.72 116.78 44.45 4.41 4.07 320.68 2,646.85 100.00 100.00

0.91 0.75 0.04 9.78 0.63 3.60 0.61 8.23 3.13 0.31 0.29 22.61 —

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85 percent of the fish material (identified and unidentified). Spines make up the second most significant portion of the assemblage, 10 percent; this includes the diagnostic body spines of Porcupinefish, the first dorsal spines of Triggerfish and Filefish, Stingray spines, and dorsal spines that are unidentifiable to taxa (table 3.10). All other elements contribute less than 1 percent to the assemblage. Bones from reptiles and birds were uncommon in all excavations on Nayau. Sea turtles, lizards, and snakes make up a minor portion of the bone assemblage (ⱕ 4 percent by NISP or count). Most reptile specimens are from small lizards. The lizard remains, mainly from Waituruturu West, probably reflect commensal species or barn-owl prey remains rather than animals taken for food by people. One fragment of sea turtle (Cheloniidae) was identified from Korovatu Rockshelter 2. Sea turtle was also present in the Na Masimasi excavations, where eleven fragments representing two individuals (one adult and one subadult) were identified. According to my own research and ethnographic and traditional accounts, sea turtle was a highly valued commodity, primarily consumed by the chiefly and elite class (Hocart 1929; Thompson 1940). On Nayau today, captured sea turtles are usually given to village chiefs. Thus, the paucity of sea turtle remains in archaeological contexts is not surprising. A relative abundance of sea turtle in faunal assemblages from the Lapita period is common in the region (e.g., Best 2002). In later-period archaeological occupations, a relatively high frequency of sea turtle could support an inTable 3.10.

Na Masimasi Fish Element Frequency from Identified Fish Bones

Element

Count

Percent (%)

General Cranial Tooth isolate Articular Clethrum Dentary Pharyngeal grinder or plate Hyomandibular Maxilla Premaxilla Quadrate General Postcranial Scale Vertebrae Atlas Spines

4 19 4 3 17 31 4 10 36 9 3 18 3,323 32 389

⬍1 ⬍1 ⬍1 ⬍1 ⬍1 ⬍1 ⬍1 ⬍1 ⬍1 ⬍1 ⬍1 ⬍1 85 ⬍1 10

Total

3,902

100

Foodways and Social Relations in the Past and Present

91

terpretation of a site as an elite residence, just as elites consume more turtle bone in contemporary contexts. All the bird bone from Na Masimasi represents chicken. Chickens were introduced to Nayau by the Lapita peoples. The low avian diversity, as seen in Nayau archaeological sites, is typical of late prehistoric sites in the Fiji-Tonga-Samoa region, where most extinction of native birds took place in the earliest Lapita times (Steadman 2006; Steadman et al. 2002). Na Masimasi is a late Lapita occupation, thus the avifauna represents a time when the bird diversity had already been impacted by humans and introduced mammals including pigs, dogs, and rats (O’Day et al. 2003). The identified mammal bones (table 3.5) represent indigenous fruit bats (Pteropus spp.) and sheath-tailed bat (Emballonura semicaudata), as well as the prehistorically introduced pig (Sus scrofa), dog (Canis familiaris), and rats (Rattus spp.) (O’Day et al. 2003). Skeletal remains of the Europeanintroduced cat (Felis catus) were recovered from a disturbed archaeological context, Korovatu Rockshelter 2. The designation “medium mammal” refers to highly fragmentary mammal remains that could not be reliably assigned to pig or dog but fall into that size category. Rats make up 37 percent of the total NISP from Mid-prehistoric to Contact Period sites. Although present in 10 of the 13 excavated sites, 99 percent of Rattus bones were from the rockshelters of Waituruturu West (76 percent), Ulu ni Koro (19 percent), and Waituruturu East (4 percent). The abundance of rat bones is a result of the presence of barn-owl (Tyto alba) roosts in these three large rockshelters. Much of the rat material is relatively complete and was recovered in the upper levels of the excavations. The rat bones are primarily from the small Polynesian rat, R. exulans, which was introduced by Lapita peoples. Best (1984, 543) makes a case for rat consumption by the prehistoric inhabitants of Lakeba based on skeletal element frequency. By these same criteria, I believe it is unlikely that the Nayau rat remains in my assemblages represent food. Midden deposits yielded fragmentary human remains at eleven of the thirteen excavated sites. Many of these bones have signs of burning and fracturing potentially indicative of nonfunerary and possibly cannibalistic behavior. This is consistent with what Best (1984, 638; 2002, 26) encountered at numerous middle- to late-period sites on Lakeba, starting in what he terms “Period II” (ca. 2500 BP). He interpreted the common occurrence of human remains in archaeological sites to suggest that humans were a regular source of food. More data is needed from Nayau to confirm if the human bone is the result of cannibalism or other causes. A single burial (NISP ⫽ 101) was partially uncovered in a sand dune deposit at Nukutubu Rockshelter 2, comprising all of the obvious nonmidden human bone recovered from Nayau.

92

Chapter 3

Invertebrates Excavations produced a wide variety of marine shell. Over 3,000 specimens were recovered from Mid-prehistoric to Contact Period sites, including whole shells and fragments, weighing 11.5 kg (table 3.11). Most of the shell is well preserved except that nearly all specimens from earth oven features were charred and fragmentary. The marine invertebrate taxa are primarily mollusks from the classes Polyplacophora (Chitons), Gastropoda (univalves—e.g., marine snails), and Bivalvia (bivalves). A small amount of sea urchin remains (phylum Echinodermata) were identified. The marine shell from Mid-prehistoric to Contact Period sites is dominated by six gastropod and three bivalve taxa. The most frequently identified gastropods in order of abundance include: Turbo setosis, Turbo spp., Strombus gibberulus, Strombus spp., Cypraea spp., Conus spp., and Nerita spp. Among gastropod families, the Turbinidae accounts for 42 percent of the total shell NISP and 63 percent of the total shell mass, whereas the Strombidae comprises 19 percent NISP and 13 percent total mass. The most common bivalve species are Modiolus auriculatus (family Mytilidae), Atactodea striata (Mesodesmatidae), and Tellina spp. (Tellinidae), none of which is as common as the most frequently found gastropods (table 3.12). Gastropods weighed a total of 9,448.8 g, and contribute 5.5 kg of meat according to biomass estimates. Bivalves contribute only 631 g and an estimated 0.8 kg of meat to the overall assemblage. There are few detectable differences between the molluscan faunas associated with different Midprehistoric and Contact Period sites. The molluscan fauna from Na Masimasi is abundant and overwhelmingly dominated by Strombus gibberulus (the small Fighting Conch) in all measures including, count (NISP), MNI, and weight (table 3.13). Turbinids are the second most common invertebrate, while all other taxa occur in insignificant frequencies (figure 3.16). The Na Masimasi invertebrate assemblage is markedly different than those recovered from other archaeological sites. Most of the identified invertebrates inhabit areas that include the splash zone above the high-tide line, tide pools, sand flats, grass flats, and fringing reefs. The bivalves also can be found in shallow-water habitats such as silty or sandy inshore areas on fringing reefs (Colin and Arneson 1995; Gosliner et al. 1996; Kay 1979). Some of these species are commonly found along Nayau’s shoreline today, with Turbo spp. and Nerita spp. being especially common. Strombus gibberulus, which occurs in a high frequency at Na Masimasi, ranges widely, inhabiting coral reefs, intertidal zones, and shallow tidal and subtidal habitats (e.g., 0–3 m). It is commonly associated with sandy bottoms and muddy anoxic sediments.

Table 3.11. Summary of Identified Marine Shell from Excavations of Twelve Midprehistoric to Contact Period Sites on Nayau Taxon Turbo spp. Strombus spp. Modiolus auriculatus Turbo setosis Cypraea spp. Atactodea striata Conus spp. Strombus gibberulus Nerita spp. Echinoidea Tellina spp. Trochus spp. Chitonidae Cypraea annulus Littorina spp. Cryptoplax sp. Cymatium sp. Thais armigera Drupa morum Cerithidae Vasum ceramicum Astralium spp. Codakia sp. Spondylus sp. Lambus sp. Anadara sp. Astraea rhodostoma Drupa sp. Muricidae Pinctada sp. Terebra sp. Periglypta sp. Asaphis sp. Tridacna sp. Cypraea moneta Mitra sp. Fragum fragum Naticidae Patellidae Nassariidae Total

NISP

Mass (g)

952 393 347 156 155 150 101 96 90 35 32 19 18 14 9 8 5 4 4 4 3 3 3 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1

4,664.3 976.5 208.3 1,664.9 240.3 199.5 852.3 269.8 226.9 6.0 36.5 121.3 9.3 24.3 7.9 1.4 19.7 109.2 34.4 5.7 52.8 41.7 19.0 98.1 46.6 38.7 26.9 17.1 5.1 2.1 23.0 13.3 9.0 5.1 3.3 2.5 1.4 0.8 0.5 0.3

2,625

10,085.8

Table 3.12. Family-Level Summary of Marine Shell from Mid-prehistoric to Contact Period Sites on Nayau. Taxon

Common name

NISP

Turbinidae Strombidae Mytilidae Cypraeidae Mesodesmatidae Conidae Neritidae Echinoidae Tellinidae Chitonidae Trochidae Muricidae Littorinidae Cymatiidae Cerithiidae Lucinidae Spondylidae Arcidae Pteriidae Terebridae Veneridae Psammobiidae Tridacnidae Mitridae Cardiidae Patellidae Nassariidae

Turban Shells Vase and Harp Shells Mussels Cowries Sandy Beach Clam Cone Shells Nerites Sea Urchins Tellens Chitons Top Shells Rock snails Littorines/Periwinkles Triton Shells Cerithids Lucinas Spiny Oysters Arc Shells Pearl Oyster Auger Shells Venus Clams Sunset Clams Giant Clams Miter Shell Heart Shells and Cockles Limpets Nassarids

1,113 495 347 170 150 101 90 35 32 26 19 12 9 5 4 3 2 2 2 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1

42 19 13 6 6 4 3 1 1 1 1 ⬍1 ⬍1 ⬍1 4 ⬍1 ⬍1 ⬍1 ⬍1 ⬍1 ⬍1 ⬍1 ⬍1 ⬍1