Admiralty Island Lime Spatulas
By Philippe Bourgoin
The Bismarck Archipelago, a German colony from 1884 to 1914, has been part of Papua New Guinea since the country became independent in 1975. It is made up of three main islands: New Britain, New Ireland, and the Admiralty Islands group, as well as of numerous smaller islands including the Duke of York Islands, New Hanover (Lavongai), the Saint Matthias group (Mussau Islands) and the Vitu Islands. All of these islands share cultural foundations, although their ethnic and social compositions are not identical. According to the most recent evidence, the area’s first inhabitants arrived from Asia about 33,000 years ago. The Admiralty Islands group, which constitutes the northwestern portion of the archipelago, can rightly be seen as a world onto itself within the context of its Melanesian surroundings.
Discovered in 1528 by Spanish navigator Alvaro de Saavedra Cerón (?–1529) and mapped by British explorer Philip Carteret (1733–1796) in 1767, the Admiralty Archipelago is made up of about twenty less-important islands and eighteen main ones that are surrounded by atolls and coral reefs. They are inhabited by the Manus people, named after the largest of these islands, who lived mainly along the coasts in villages built on stilts, and whose main activity was fishing and maritime trade; by the Ussiai, who cultivated gardens in the interiors of these islands; and by the Matankor (or Matankol), skilled sculptors and fishermen who inhabited the smaller islands around the major ones.
This archipelago developed its own artistic and artisanal styles, and although, unlike its neighbors, the Admiralties Islands produced no masks, they were home to a great variety of artistic and creative traditions. Its sculptors had a predilection for the human figure, which is observed in all sizes, from the large house posts for the men’s houses, to the posts made for the ceremonial beds on Pāk, and the smaller ones seen on ladles, lime spatulas, weapons, ladders, and drums. The designs that adorn the surfaces of these realistic representations are primarily made up of repetitions of spirals, ovals, lozenges and rectangles, Maltese crosses, and symmetrical curves; and they are often observed along edges, sometimes in openwork or in relief, generally emphasized with black or white and presented against a red background. Other frequently observed subjects include animals like the turtle, the lizard, fish, and the crocodile. Just as it did in the Sepik River area, the latter had a special importance and the impressive mythical creature was perceived as the guardian and founder of communities. Other designs included that of the bird, and in particular that of the frigate bird with its forked tail, seen as the messenger of the islands by fishermen and navigators, but also those of the rooster and a bird endemic to Manus called the chauka (or Manus Friarbird, Philemon albatorques).
Photograph (detail), Jean Ratisbonne (1908–1993), Admiralty Islands, 1935. Baryte paper print, 11.8 × 19.8 cm. A man is seen in the background with a lime spatula and his gourd beneath his left arm. La Korrigane Voyage, 1934–1936. © Musée du quai Branly Jacques Chirac. Inv. PP0043420.Betel chewing originated in Southeast Asia and then became ubiquitous all over Melanesia. In all these islands, lime spatulas are used to deliver the white powder that is kept in gourds specifically made for the purpose of storing it, into the user’s mouth...
Sauvage des îles de l’Amirauté [tenant une gourde et sa spatule] (A Savage of the Admiralty Islands [holding a gourd and a spatula]), engraving after Jean-Hubert Piron (1767–1796). Jacques-Julien Houtou de La Billardière (1755–1834), Atlas pour servir à la relation du voyage à la recherche de La Pérouse, (Atlas for the account of the voyage of La Pérouse), H. J. Jansen, Paris, 1800, pl. 3.The areca nut, the fruit of the Areca catechu palm, when ingested along with the leaf of a betel plant (Piper betle), produces a mildly euphoric narcotic reaction...
Photograph, Alfred Bühler (1900–1981), Woman of Manus, Manus tru, M’bunai, Manus Island, Admiralties, 1935. Nabonop holding a gourd and her spatula. © Ohnemus, 1998, fig. 118; Museum der Kulturen, Basel. Inv. (F)Vb 1271] MKB.The spatulas were generally fashioned from fine-grained hardwoods like nohou, false ebony or the beach cordia (Cordia subcordata Lam)...
Photograph, Alfred Bühler (1900–1981), Men of Buboi, Manus, Admiralties, 1935. Sabandren (at left) carrying a long bag, with an adze on his shoulder and a spatula in his mouth. Bowake (at right) is carrying a rectangular bag with a calabash and his spatula in it. © Ohnemus, 1998, fig. 226; Museum der Kulturen, Basel. Inv. (F)Vb 1299] MKB.The simplest lime spatulas are short and wide and typical of the northwestern part of the main island...
Photograph, Alfred Bühler (1900–1981), 1932. Bahun, Lulai of Salien Island [Salchan], Admiralties, holding a lime gourd and his spatula under his arm. © Ohnemus, 1998, fig. 280; Museum der Kulturen, Basel. Inv. (F)Vb 1624] MKB.The men had all of the equipment required for the consumption of betel on them at all times and carried the lime gourd under their arms or in small baskets or braided nets...
The Admiralty Islands spatulas, each different from the next, are the products of its inhabitants’ imagination, and they constitute an amazing ensemble of variations on a single decorative concept. They are magnificent works in a miniature art form and the expressions of a truly remarkable artistic fecundity.
