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Samoan Material Culture

Headdresses

page 615

Headdresses

Head coverings are not worn on ordinary occasions, but wreaths, banana leaves, bark cloth, and a special headdress of human hair, are worn as circumstances demand.

Wreaths (pale). These are made of flowers, leaves, and creepers on festive occasions. Even on ordinary days, anyone who has anything special to do such as making kava or poi for visitors, carrying stones for the church floor, or similar duties, often plucks the neighboring greenery to make a wreath for the head.

Banana leaf hat (pulou lau fa'i). Though going without protection so much, the Samoan does not care to have his head wet when working in the bush in the rain. A section of banana leaf with the stem behind is placed over the head and tied on with a strip of bark passing round the head circumference. The pointed tip end is then doubled back over the head and the tip tucked down into the bark tie behind. Plucking the banana leaf, or any leaf, for that matter, is 'oto. Hence a saying applied to action which has become unnecessary: "A toe 'oto lava, 'ua la" (Why pluck again when the sun is shining?)

Turbans of bark cloth (faufau tu). A strip of bark cloth siapo was twisted round the head sometimes by fishermen but it could not be used in bonito fishing or mullet netting owing to special prohibitions. On occasions of war, the warriors often wore head coverings of cloth as a distinguishing mark against themselves.

Human hair headdress (tuinga lauulu). The tuinga headdress is a development associated with rank and status. Only certain families are allowed the privilege of wearing tuinga, and the honor became hereditary in the title with which it is associated. In important festivals, the tuinga is worn by the chief's official taupou and could also be worn by his son or manaia. The tuinga shown in Plate LIII, B was worn by Fa'apu'a, the taupou of Tufele at Tau, Manua. On occasions of war, it was worn by the chiefs or heads of families entitled to wear them.

The headdress consists of bleached human hair supported on a foundation of bark cloth and embellished with a lave upright framework decorated with feathers and a forehead band of shells. Sometimes an additional cover of feathers is used.

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The type of hair preferred is frizzy (mingimingi) and thick (pi'ipi'i). In olden times, women cut their hair short and men wore it long. A girl with hair of the above type was allowed to let her hair grow long for making a tuinga for those who had the right to use them. A chief desiring hair (lau ulu) approached the parents of the girl and made arrangements for the supply.

The hair is tied together in tufts (Pl. LIII, A, 2). The process of tying is called fa'atavaitui, and the tufts so tied are fua or fuatifuati lauulu. The extra thick fibres called tuatua are selected from the hanks of dressed coconut fibre and used to bind one end of the tufts into a closed loop or eye. (See figure 319.) The tufts are strung on a cord passed through the eyes of the loop. The hair is bleached (fa'aenaena) by two methods: a, lime—the tufts are rubbed well with coral lime or soaked in a wooden bowl in a thick mixture of lime. They are then hung up on the cord exposed to the sun and rain in the open air. Some hair is sufficiently bleached in three months, but dark hair requires relimeing at the end of three months. b, Salt water—the long cord carrying the tufts is tied to a pole at both ends so as to stretch out the tufts. The pole is dipped in sea water and one end stuck in the ground to allow the tufts to bleach in the sun. The dipping in sea water and exposure in the sun is repeated daily until the hair is thoroughly bleached.

When sufficiently bleached, the hair is cleaned with laumea leaves (u'u laumea) and fresh water in which the leaves form a lather. This removes the lime or salt. The tufts are set up on a number of three-ply twisted cords of fau songa. The tuinga examined in Savaii had five cords on which were 32, 32, 31, 21, and 26 tufts, making 142 tufts in all.

The lave is an upright frame, now made of five slender wooden rods kept together with three crossbars. (See fig. 320.) The rods which originally consisted of coconut leaflet midrib wrapped round with lauu'a bark cloth, are now usually wrapped round with some gaudy red foreign textile.

Side cords are attached to the lower end of the frame to be used for tying the lave in position.

It seems likely that the wider framework diverging outwards and upwards is a modern development to provide a framework for the introduced glass mirror. The more elaborate form of midrib comb is known as selu tuinga, and was used with the tuinga headdress as its name indicates. Such combs or midrib framework decorated with feathers including the long feathers of the tava'e'ula, a species of tropic bird (Phaeton rubricauda), were the precursors of the more elaborate form of modern lave.

The forehead band (pale fuiono) was formed of a length of three-ply fibre braid to which was attached a width of bark cloth about an inch wide to form the foundation for the shell ornamentation of fuiono which Pratt page 617
Figure 319.—Lashing of hair tufts (fa'atavaitui):

Figure 319.—Lashing of hair tufts (fa'atavaitui):

a, the end of the tuatua fibre (1) is tied around the proximal end of the tuft (2) with a single overhand knot, sufficiently far from the end to form the eye by doubling over. The fixation of fibre forms the fa'amau. b, The fibre (1) is then wound around the hair towards the end (3) in a close continuous spiral (saisai) for about 1.75 inches. c, The end (3) is doubled back to form the eye and the fibre wound around both portions for several turns (4). This is usually enough as in the tufts shown in Plate LIII, A, 2, but some people run vertical turns (5) through the eye and between the end and the tuft, finishing with an overhand knot in the last turn.

Figure 320.—Lave frame in tuinga headdress:

Figure 320.—Lave frame in tuinga headdress:

a; five upright slender wooden rods; the middle rod (1), 22.5 inches long; the two intermediate (2,2), 21.5 inches long; the two outer (3, 3) 20.5 inches long. The five uprights are lashed to three crossbars (1', 2', 3') in such a way that those on either side of the middle one diverge slightly outwards. b, Small white feathers are attached in pairs to the rods, at intervals so spaced as to form curved lines across the five upright rods. Mirrors are now set on the front of the frame, a large one (1) reaching from the lower to the highest crossbar and a smaller one (2) above it. The smaller mirrors may exceed one in number.

page 618 (23, p. 144) gives as Nautilus pompilius. The pale fuiono in Bishop Museum was described for me by Dr. C. M. Cooke, Jr. The shell elements are arranged on the band in two rows. The upper row is made up of the nuclear whorls of a nautilus which have been ground to an almost uniform size and polished. The lower row is made up of fairly uniform ground outer portions of one of the post nuclear whorls also polished. The upper and lower pieces form pairs probably taken from the same shell.

The outer end of the nuclear piece is cut off square and directed downwards on the band. The outer whorl piece is cut off square at the end, directed upwards and rounded off below. The nuclear piece is drilled through from the side at its upper part making two holes and drilled with one hole in the middle line near the lower squared edge. The pieces are sewn on to the band with one continuous thread through the upper pair of holes whilst separate knotted loops are passed through the single holes below. The lower pieces have a hole bored through close to the edge on, either side at about the middle. They are attached by a continuous thread run along the back of the band with long stitches and with short stitches passing forward through the material and through the hole and back again before it makes another short stitch through the hole in the side of a neighboring shell. The lower pieces have the natural convexity facing outwards so that the concavity of the straight cut upper end fits over the lower part of the nuclear piece. The nuclear pieces thus have the appearance of large beads. (See Plate LIII, A, 1.) The Bishop Museum band had originally 17 pairs, but three pieces have been lost.

The cords carrying the hair tufts, the lave, and the forehead band are the essential decorative parts of the headdress, but each is independent of the other and are stored away as separate pieces. The headdress is only put together on the head of the wearer and taken to pieces again immediately after use. The assembling requires assistance.

The foundation (pou) is formed of a sheet of the thin lau u'a form of bark cloth. This is laid over the head and tied circumferentially round the head by a cord passing over it round the back of the head, across the temples and round the forehead. The cord comes low down above the outer end of the eyebrows in order to keep the sheet on firmly and prevent it being pulled upwards. When tied, the outer margins of the sheet are folded upwards and twisted to form an upward projecting knob on the top of the head. This knob is termed the pou (post) and gives support to the headdress. It must be large enough and high enough to allow the cords bearing the hair tufts to be tied to it.

The cords carrying the hair are wound round the knob and tied to it (noanoa le lau ulu) in such a way that the tufts are to the back and sides.

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The lave is then placed in position in front in the middle line and the side cords passed round the knob below the hair and tied behind.

The forehead band now crosses over the lower end of the lave and the end cords are also taken round the knob beneath the hair and tied at the back. Two bands of pale fuiono may be used. They cover both the lower end of the lave and the edge of the bark cloth covering so that they conceal as well as embellish. The part of the band covered with shells is 10.5 inches long which is quite long enough as the ends are covered by the hair at the sides. All the ties of the cords of the various parts are completely concealed by the hair tufts which hang down at the back and sides over the cords. See Plate LIII, B.)

The above completes the true tuinga but a cover (ufi) may be used, consisting of the long feathers of the tropic bird or shorter feathers tied to coconut leaflet midribs (tuaniu). These may be stuck into the hair near the knob or tied to the lave. A smaller set of the red parrakeet feathers arranged in strings as in the titi'ula kilt may also be added over the top of the hair. Often the titi'ula is wound round the knob instead of hair.

The tufts of hair are lastly combed out with coconut leaflet midrib so as to fluff the hair out at the back and sides.

The drawback of the tuinga as a headdress is that it is not permanently put together. It is an addition of various elements that have not developed into one structural combination. The attachment of the bark cloth foundation by a circumferential cord leads to constriction of the blood supply causing headache, pain, and even fainting. Immediately the ceremonial is over, the wearers of tuinga disappear, glad to have them removed instead of flaunting them for as long as possible, which would occur if the headdress were a better organized structure.