The economic exploitation of land

Rarotonga is a volcanic island about twenty-six square miles in area; its high mountainous core being dissected into a series of valleys and ridges which radiate out across the coastal lowlands to the lagoon which encompasses the island. The three major soil types follow the pattern of physical configuration: ¹ the relatively infertile coastal flats giving way to a narrow low-lying belt of very fertile soil lying between the coastal flats and the mountains and often extending up the valley floors for half a mile or more, while behind it lies the deeply dissected mountainous interior occupying two-thirds of the island's total area.

Corresponding to these three soil zones were three zones of plant life, but those of the coastal fringe and the mountainous interior supplied relatively few of the needs of the people, the bulk of the food and other subsistence requirements (apart from marine products) being obtained from the middle zone, the whole of which had been cropped at one time or another, and was covered entirely with either second growth or cultivations.² It was in this zone that the dwellings of the people were situated.

Most of the food supply was produced by agriculture, the principal crops being taro (colocasia esculenta), breadfruit, bananas, kumara (ipomea batatas), yams, arrowroot, kape (alocasia macrorhiza), coconuts and ti (cordyline terminalis). Kava (piper methysticum) was grown for use as a beverage.¹ Fowls and pigs were domesticated and kept in considerable numbers,² but pigs were eaten only on festive occasions. Rats and lizards were prevalent, but were not eaten in Rarotonga (though rats were a common item of diet on the neighbouring island of Mangaia). Hunting was restricted to the snaring of birds and wildfowl.

Fishing was carried out in the streams, in the lagoon, and in the open sea, and provided an important part of the diet. Eels were caught in the taro swamps and crabs were taken on the beaches at certain seasons. Fish weirs, made of coral boulders, were constructed in the lagoon. Watercress was gathered from the stream-beds and edible seaweeds were collected in the lagoon.

Other foods were gathered but not generally cultivated, the most important being plantains, chestnuts, roots and berries. In periods of famine after hurricanes or destructive wars, candlenuts, roots, pandanus drupes and even banana stalks were eaten. The main green foods consumed were taro leaves and the leaves of the poroporo shrub (solanum oleraceum).

Breadfruit, taro, bananas, and plantains were the most important crops. The breadfruit was seasonal, producing but one crop annually, in summer, which was the season of plenty.¹ Most of the other agricultural crops could be harvested throughout the year, and there was accordingly relatively little food preservation; the only recorded types being breadfruit paste stored in pits, chestnuts preserved in the same manner, and dry coconuts stacked in houses built for the purpose. Bananas were buried in the ground, but this was for the purpose of ripening the fruit rather than preserving it.² Foods were stored against the time of breadfruit shortage (the winter months) and also as emergency supplies in the event of large numbers of visitors for occasions like weddings and funerals or in the event of hurricanes or drought.³

Timber for house-building and the manufacture of canoes and other artifacts was obtained from cultivated trees such as the coconut and breadfruit, as well as from forest trees. A host of articles of lesser importance was obtained from the land - candlenuts for torches and dyes, barringtonia for fish poisons, pua (fagraea bertercana) for perfumes, vines for the making of fishtraps and a variety of products for medicinal purposes. None of these products were cultivated, supplies being collected from self-propagated trees. Owing to the random growth of such trees, a considerable area of land was necessary to ensure an adequate supply of all products.¹

There being no trading on the island (or between this and any other island) there was no incentive for production beyond the quantities necessary for subsistence, for gifts and tribute, and for the entertaining of guests. The risk of hurricanes, to which most of the crops were vulnerable, made food preservation prudent, but known techniques of preservation were limited to the few products already mentioned, and nothing could be done to protect most of the crops from hurricane damage.

Land was not regarded as a capital good and there was no conception of the sale of land or its produce. Line ages with surplus land could nevertheless exploit it to their own advantage, in order to swell their ranks and prestige, by making land available to distant relatives and refugees whose subordinate status made them vulnerable to larger than usual contributions of tribute.

The Rarotongan people were aware of the different soil types and their potentialities for various crops. Taro was planted in the alluvial soils of the stream-beds and swampy depressions of the old lagoon bed. Most varieties were grown in swamps (both natural and artificial) and necessitated the use of a simple irrigation system of dams and water channels to enable the crop to be grown across the valley floor and not just in the stream-beds themselves.¹

As Buck noted, a good deal of supervision was required to ensure that the various families, having terraces at various levels, got their fair share of water, especially in dry periods. Such a system required organization above the household level (for various households used a common source of water) and would probably have been the responsibility of the head of the major lineage.²

The rich soil and the warm moist climate made growth rapid and easy. Consequently there were not the refinements in agricultural technique which are often found in areas where the pressure of the external environment necessitates more careful husbandry. The only agricultural implements were the ironwood digging stick (ko), and the planting stick.³ Unlike the digging stick, which is of uniform thickness, the planting stick has a thick rounded end and was used to drive holes in the soft earth to plant taro. It was also known as the ‘ko’.

It was probably due to the limited range of implements and to the fact that the staple vegetable (taro) required very little clearing and a minimum of other cultivation that the bulk of the food supply was obtained from this source, as well as from breadfruit, bananas and plantains, which did not require cultivation at all. Garden crops were grown, but they merely supplemented the above-mentioned staples. Shifting cultivation was practised, but it only applied to the less important crops like kumara, arrowroot, yams and giant taro which were grown on the alluvial flats and the lower slopes of the hills. Swamp taro, bananas and the tree crops did not require the rotation of soil or crop.

Planting was carried out according to the phases of the moon, each night being clearly categorized as propitious or otherwise for growth of the young plant.¹ The role of the priests in gardening lore, and the details of the system of gardening magic are no longer known.

Boundaries between contiguous taro plots were marked by stone retaining walls which were necessitated by the irrigation system. Alternatively earth-works (motu) were constructed to divided the plots, and bananas or breadfruit were planted on them. Trees, or stones, or a row of banana plants, are often used today to demarcate contiguous plots belonging to members of the same minor lineage and it is claimed that this is an old-established system. All lands, including home sites, were identified by a particular name and each subdivision within a block was individually named. It was the prerogative of the owning group to give or to change the name. A meaning was always ascribed to the name and it is not uncommon for disputants in Land Court cases to tender knowledge of the origin of the name as evidence of ownership. Likewise, the fact that members of a particular descent group had been buried on certain lands, or had marae there, was not infrequently used as evidence of ownership of the surrounding lands.³

The role of land in social relations

As discussed earlier, each tapere of land was associated with a particular descent group which, conquests apart, traced its connection with that land back through generations of illustrious ancestors to founder chiefs who were held in such veneration that they had assumed some of the qualities of deities. The spiritual and temporal prosperity of the group was closely related to the sanctity of the local marae, the presence in the locality of the buried remains of countless forbears, and the fertility of the soil from which the occupants of the tapere derived their sustenance.

The land and the society were intricately interwoven. No rank title and no descent group was conceivable apart from the lands associated with it, and no material good could be acquired other than from the land or the sea. The recruitment of additional members and the provision of ceremonial and hospitality so vital to the continued status of the group were dependent on adequate resources of land and labour. It is accordingly understandable that land acquired a considerable prestige value and that a man was ‘great according to the number of his kaingas or farms’.¹

The necessity to defend the land from those who would acquire it by aggression or encroachment necessitated joint action by those with interests in common, and this no doubt constituted a major unifying force in the society, acting as a brake on any tendency for the individual to pursue his own interests to the detriment of the right-holding group as a whole.

The exercise of land rights carried with it certain obligations to other members of the groups which held rights in the land concerned. There were obligations which functioned to maintain and reinforce social relations, such as the necessity to supply produce for marriages, funerals and other occasions of social interaction, and those requiring mutual assistance and the provision of land for the use of particular kin on appropriate occasions.

There were also obligations which functioned to reinforce the political organization. Members of the lower social orders rendered tribute to members of the higher strata within the same segment of the political structure. Two particular services which every man was expected to render were known as aratiroa (the provision of food and services for distinguished visitors) and arevananga (the construction of public buildings including the high chief's house). In addition there were various offerings, largely of a religious nature, which were known by the generic name of atinga. While particular forms of atinga were provided for particular ceremonial occasions, atinga was also payable to the head of the appropriate landowning group by persons who planted under conditions of permissive occupation.

Non-resident members of a lineage were, it is true, entitled to food from the lands of that lineage when passing over them, or when visiting the primary group. But the right to take fruits for refreshment when travelling, and the obligation to provide food for visitors or passers-by was universal and applied to all persons, whether relatives or otherwise. Such transient acts of use thus had no necessary correlation with rights of ownership.

An offering of first fruits took place in December each year, on the rising of the Pleiades and a variety of other ceremonies were held on particular occasions throughout the year. All participants were expected to contribute foodstuffs for the festivities, and while the pattern of contribution and distribution differed for various ceremonies, it was usual to leave a portion on the marae for the gods, to render a share to the chiefs, and to distribute the balance to the people on a household basis.³

While the household was the elementary unit of production and consumption, nearby related households were called on to assist with heavy tasks like clearing bush or constructing taro beds, and whole lineages must have co-operated in such tasks as carrying large tree-trunks, some of which Maretu says required fifty to one hundred men at a time.² The organizing (i.e. the assisted) group was obliged to provide food for the helpers.³

Chiefs were not exempt from agricultural labour, and were expected in this and other work to lead by active participation.⁴ While individuals and families undertook their own small-scale fishing activities, any large-scale operations were directed by fishing experts.

The settling of disputes in relation to land rights was a constant problem. Even given the system of priorities for the allocation of rights, and of conditions for their retention and loss, rival claimants did not always agree on the relative merits of their claims, and a tribunal or other machinery was necessary to give and enforce judgement in the event of dispute. This aspect of the tenure system was but little developed, and was probably its greatest weakness, being detrimental both to social stability and volume of production.

Differences could be handled by negotiation between the parties, by reference to a higher authority, or by fighting. As direct trial of strength was always possible, negotiations must have been made with an eye to the probable outcome if warfare were finally resorted to.

Those who lacked the physical resources to take direct action could resort to sorcery and invoke supernatural agencies to punish offenders. The mission so effectively destroyed the priesthood and crushed the indigenous magico-religious structure that little knowledge of these processes remains. All that can be said is that sorcery was practised and that a class of ‘priests’ specialized in the exercise of this craft.²

The state of land rights in 1823

The principles of land tenure described in the foregoing chapters should be regarded as a body of common understandings which, other things being equal, guided behaviour. But variations in physical strength, power of personalities, number of dependants and other factors resulted in other things not always being equal - and the application of the principles was modified accordingly. Ideally, the overlapping claims acquired through the various channels were reconciled by decisions issued by the chief or chiefs concerned; page 121 but no decisions were irrevocable and not everyone was necessarily prepared to accept the arrangements made by the titleholders.

The tenure system was one in which individuals sought their own maximum advantage in the face of two inhibiting factors. The first was the limitation of process, due to advantage having to be sought through the channels of accepted custom, and the second was the necessity to allow for the claims of other right-holders (in its extreme form the ability to resist aggression) limiting the extent to which that advantage could be pursued.

In view of the propensity to expand one's rights, coupled with the flexibility of means of acquiring and losing rights, it is not surprising that at the time of first European contact every inch of land on the island was claimed by one party or another - and sometimes by more than one. Theft and damage to crops in retaliation for other wrongs were very prevalent and acted as a strong disincentive to the expansion of plantings by those with adequate land. Furthermore, with a population of 7,000¹ living off the land (only 3,700 acres of which is regarded as suitable for agriculture);² with the whole of the Avarua district laid waste in war;³ with considerable areas of land between the districts lying idle in dispute,⁴ one cannot doubt Maretu's statement that of the remainder ‘scarcely one piece remained unoccupied’.⁵

Disputes as to ownership and use were frequent, though historical records show them to have been much more prevalent between lineages than within them.¹ The first European missionaries found that land disputes were constant and constituted the most contentious issue that they had to deal with during their early years. Pitman recorded after a meeting with some of the chiefs that: ‘Formerly they used to find some pretext to seize one another's kaingas or land consequently nothing but quarrels and wars were known among them. The principal difficulty appears to be whether the present holder of the land shall keep what he has or restore it to the person from whom it was taken. If the latter be adopted, it is likely to be attended with many unpleasant circumstances. The former at present appears to be the most likely for the continuation of peace.’²

Williams described the situation by saying: ‘Another difficulty was produced by what they call kai kainga, or land-eating, which is getting unjust possession of each other's lands; and these, once obtained, are held with the greatest possible tenacity; for land is exceedingly valuable in Rarotonga, and on no subject were their contentions more frequent and fierce. On investigating this last practice, we found it to be a species of oppression in which so many were involved, and also a point on which the feelings of all were so exquisitively sensitive, that to moot it would be to endanger the peace of the island. We therefore thought it most advisable to recommend the chiefs to allow it to remain for the present in abeyance.’³

Land disputes were most commonly encountered in cases where the primary holders of the rights concerned had died without surviving issue in the primary group, and where more than one secondary claimant wished to acquire the rights in question. While recorded pre-contact disputes most frequently involved titleholders of different lineages who claimed the same lands by different criteria, it is apparent that problems sometimes arose between chiefs and their subordinates within the same lineage group, for in 1833, after Buzacott had preached with fervour on the impending hell fire for unrepentant sinners, one of the ariki was induced to make a public confession of his sins. He admitted having ‘robbed some of the lesser chiefs of their lands, and he had placed some of his favourites as tenants upon them’.¹ This he had done prior to the arrival of the gospel, in all probability allotting extra portions to those who had supported him in his recent battle to retain supremacy over his district, and taking away from those who had not.

Such was the state of land rights in 1823. It was not due to any lack of suitable principles by which to determine the allocation, retention and transfer of land rights, but rather to the lack of any adequate machinery to give and enforce a binding decision in the event of the disputed application of particular principles in particular cases of inter-lineage conflict. Despite the chronic state of unresolved conflict which existed in respect of many portions of land, it was not of such dimensions as to preclude the planting of food crops, the construction of houses, or the continuance of the usual ebb and flow of life. Land disputes had, in fact, become an incorporated part of the pattern of life.