It seems to me probable that Polynesian cannibalism is traceable to this period of their history, and that they learnt it from their Melanesian neighbours in Fiji. The branches of the race that have been most addicted to this practice are the Maoris, the Rarotongans, the Paumotuans and the Marquesans. In Samoa it was unknown, and was very little practised in Hawaii[1] and Tahiti. The reason for this would appear to be—in the case of the Samoans, that they occupied their group before the subsequent arrival in Fiji of what we call the Maori-Rarotongan branch, who mixed more with the Melanesians than did the Samoans. It is true that there was an old custom in Samoa of offering a prisoner to a chief, tied up in coco-nut leaves, ready for "baking" but he was never eaten. This has been stated to be a relic of the time when they were cannibals; but once cannibals, why not always cannibals, as were Maoris and others? Rather, I think, is this a custom that was introduced into Samoa as a mark of humiliation and degradation, based on the known fact that their Maori-Rarotongan and Melanesian neighbours adopted this custom, not that the Samoans themselves were ever cannibals any more than their remote ancestors in India and Indonesia were. The very few references to cannibalism in Samoan traditions may, I think, be traced to a recollection of the Maori-Rarotongan occupation of the coasts of that group.
With respect to the Tahitians; if, as seems likely, their genealogies show only from forty to fifty generations of residence in that group, then they spread there somewhere about the period of the great Rarotongan navigator, Ui-te-rangiora, and therefore before the closer connection of Polynesians and Melanesians took place in
- ↑ Professor Alexander says, not at all.
