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Samoan Material Culture

The Eight-Spiked Club

page 592

The Eight-Spiked Club

The eight-spiked club (taiavalu), with four spikes on either side, must be clearly distinguished from the bilateral-toothed type with more than eight teeth on one side. No examples of the taiavalu occur in Bishop Museum, but it is figured by Edge-Partington (10, vol. 1, 73, no. 3), Kramer (18, vol. 2 p. 213, Pl. 78 b), and Churchill (5, Pl. 3 f). The club is thus established in literature, but has been confused with the much more common bilateral-toothed type to which the name of talavalu has been wrongly applied.

The distal end of the eight-spiked club is wide and concave and has been aptly termed crutch-shaped by Churchill (5, p. 55). From the crutch-shaped end, the sides curve into the blade forming side projections which make the crutch-shaped appearance more marked.

The spikes. Four spikes, separated by distinct spaces, project from the blade on either side making eight in all, and thus giving the club the name of talavalu (eight spikes). In Churchill's club (fig. 309, c) the spikes range from 2.5 to 4 inches in width and the spaces between them range from 0.5 to 1 inch. The spikes were bevelled from their middle longitudinal line to sharpen their projecting side edges. The median longitudinal edge thus formed with each spike is carried on to meet the median longitudinal edges of the blade at right angles. The bevelling commenced on the spikes is carried inwards in decreasing depth until it disappears at the median longitudinal edge of the blade.

In the clubs figured by Churchill and Kramer, the proximal pair of spikes projected from the narrowing blade without any shoulder below them and Kramer's club was also crutch-shaped at the distal end. The presence of the crutch-shaped distal end with the absence of shoulders clearly indicate that the talavalu club was made from the coconut stalk structural pattern. Churchill (5, pp. 54, 55) saw the affinity of his club (fig. 309, c) to the coconut stalk pattern in the absence of a pointed head and proximal shoulder. The presence of the "crutch finish," he recognized as "characteristic of the coconut stalk clubs and in that connection is explicable structurally; the objection to such an ascription rests on the absence of serrate edges from that type; yet it might prove possible to discover intermediates which could connect the sparse teeth of this piece with an overdevelopment of the bands in such a club as 3 J."

The club 3 J referred to is a coconut stalk club with ribs. My Samoan informants in describing the ribbed coconut club (uatongi) stressed the fact that the ribs were serrated and projected beyond the edges of the blade. The natural sequence would appear to be that the plain ribs used to strengthen coconut stalk clubs became grooved and thus serrated on their lateral projections. The use of such serrations was carried a stage further by making tala spikes on a coconut stalk pattern with the spikes spaced in a manner similar page 593to the ribs of the earlier coconut stalk club derived from the coconut stalk pattern. The sequence may be followed in figure 309.

Figure 309.—Eight-spighiked clubs (talavalu) with sequence from coconut stalk pattern:

Figure 309.—Eight-spighiked clubs (talavalu) with sequence from coconut stalk pattern:

a, coconut stalk structural pattern with wide concave distal end (1) and blade narrowing to shaft without a shoulder. b, Uatongi coconut stalk club with spaced ribs (3) serrated and projecting in points beyond lateral edges; with wide concave distal end (2, 1) and no shoulder. c, Talavalu eight-spiked club figured by Churchill' (5, Pl. 3, f), with crutch-shaped distal end (2); four pairs of spikes (3), spaced like the ribs of the coconut talk club (b) and no shoulder; the crutch-shaped distal end and lack of shoulder establishes its origin from the coconut stalk, pattern; total length, 34 inches. d., The talavalu aberrant form figured by Edge-Partington (10, vol. 1, 73, No. 3); distal end (1) straight but wide (2) and thus maintaining coconut stalk pattern; 4 pairs of spaced spikes (3) forming talavalu; distinct shoulder (4) with upper part grooved as in ribs of coconut stalk club (uatongi) thus making departure from structural pattern yet incorporating an element from the other type of club derived from the same structural pattern; length, 44 inches.

Name. Kramer's Samoan informant (18, vol. 2, p. 214) gave the meaning of talavalu as eight-spiked (tala, spike; valu, eight). He was undoubtedly referring to the true eight-spiked club described. Churchill (5, p. 54), who regarded the term talavalu as applying to the many-toothed club with a pointed end, questioned Kramer's interpretation of the term. As the interpretation of "eight-spiked" could not literally apply in number to the many-toothed type, Churchill interpreted the word valu as meaning "to scrape" or "to rasp" instead of '"eight." He considered that Kramer's informant had rationalized the meaning of talavalu to explain an aberrant eight-spiked form, whereas it was Churchill himself, who, without knowing it, rationalized the meaning to suit the many-toothed club to which the name did not belong.