By JANET B. MONTGOMERY MCGOVERN, B.L. Diplomée in Anthropology, University of Oxford WITH A PREFACE BY R. R. MARETT, M.A., D.Sc. READER IN SOCIAL ANTHROPOLOGY, UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD ILLUSTRATED T. FISHER UNWIN LTD LONDON: ADELPHI TERRACE First published in 1922 ( All rights reserved ) TO W. M. M. MY SON AND THE COMPANION OF MY WANDERINGS “No human thought is so primitive as to have lost bearing on our own thought, or so ancient as to have broken connection with our own life.” E. B. Tylor , Primit

To treat her as a goddess has always been accounted a sure way of winning a lady’s favour. To the cynic, therefore, it might seem that Mrs. McGovern was bound to speak well of her head-hunting friends of the Formosan hills, seeing that they welcomed her with a respect that bordered on veneration. But of other head-hunters, hailing, say, from Borneo or from Assam, anthropologists have reported no less well, and that though the investigators were accorded no divine honours. The key to a just estim

Among the Head-hunters of Formosa contains the substance of observations made during a two-years’ stay in Formosa—from September 1916 to September 1918. The book is written for the general reader, rather than for the specialist in anthropology or ethnology. Hence many details—especially those concerning minor differences in manners and customs among the various aboriginal tribes—have been omitted; for these, while perhaps of interest to the specialist, would prove wearying to the layman. Inadequ

ANTHROPOLOGICAL MAP OF FORMOSA. Scale 1:2,000,000. Heights in feet...

IMPRESSIONS FROM A DISTANCE Scepticism regarding the Existence of a Matriarchate—Glimpse of Formosa from a Steamer’s Deck in passing—Hearsay in Japan concerning the Island Colony—Opportunity of going to Formosa as a Government Official. As to the actual existence of matriarchates I had always been sceptical. Matrilineal tribes, and those matrilocal—that was a different matter. The existence of these among certain primitive peoples had long been substantiated. But that the name should descend in

IMPRESSIONS AT FIRST-HAND The Voyage from Kobe to Keelung—The History of Formosa as recounted by a Chinese-Formosan—A Visit to a Chinese-Formosan Home—The Scenery of Formosa—Experience with Japanese Officialdom in Formosa. Formosa lies about a thousand miles south of Kobe—six hundred and sixty miles, it is estimated, south of Kagoshima, the southernmost point of Japan proper—and the voyage of four days down through the Tung Hai (Eastern China Sea) was a warm one, the latter part especially. Befo

My chief interest lay with the mountain tribes—the aborigines; my chief exercise consisted in what my Japanese friends called “prowling” among these tribes. Sometimes accompanied by another English teacher and a servant, sometimes by my son or secretary, sometimes quite alone, I went up into the mountains; going as far as I could by “trolly” (or toro , as the Japanese call it [31] )—a push-car, propelled by Chinese-Formosan coolies, on rails laid by the Japanese—rather, under their instructions—

The Japanese, who since the treaty of Shimonoseki (1895) have been masters of the island, number between 120,000 and 125,000, and are constantly increasing in population. All official positions, and those of authority of any sort, are in the hands of the Japanese as is now all the wealth of the island. The aboriginal population it is naturally more difficult to estimate. But the number of the aborigines at the present time cannot, in reality, exceed 105,000. Personally I doubt if a carefully tak

RACIAL STOCK Physical Appearance pointing to Indoneso-Malay Origin—Linguistic Evidence and Evidence of Handicraft—Tribal Divisions of the Aborigines—Moot Question as to the Existence of a Pigmy People in the Interior of the Island. While the aborigines are divided into a number of tribes, and are also grouped—by the Chinese—according to the “greenness” or “ripeness” of their barbarity, yet they may, collectively speaking, be regarded as belonging to the Indoneso-Malay stock, many tribes being st

Regarding the Malays of Singapore, I cannot speak from personal observation, as I have not been in Singapore; but as I spent six months in the Philippines, shortly before going to Formosa, [48] I am able to confirm Hamay’s statement as to the resemblance between Filipinos and Formosan aborigines. As regards the tribe of Igorotes, this resemblance extends also, to a certain degree, to social customs and religious beliefs. Considering physical resemblance alone, however, I should say that this is

( a ) Head-hunting and the point of view of the tribes-people regarding this custom. ( b ) “ Mother-right ” more fully developed than is usual, even among primitive people, at the present time. ( c ) The Communal System —that of holding property in common—which exists among several of the tribes. ( d ) The Chastity and Strict Monogamy customary among these “Naturvölker”; habits which strikingly impress one who goes among them after having spent some time in China or Japan, or in the Chinese and

The Ami seem more democratic in religion, as well as in politics, than the mountain tribes; that is, the theocracy of the priestesses seems less strong. Priestesses, however, exist among them, and in time of illness or danger they are asked to intercede with the various deities. Intercession takes the form of a sort of chanting prayer, growing louder and wilder as it continues, accompanied by the throwing into the air of small coloured pebbles (now sometimes glass beads bartered from Chinese and

Among those tribes, including the Taiyal, that have come least into touch with alien culture—Chinese, Japanese, or European—the religious side of the marriage ceremony seems to consist largely in purificatory rites—rites which tend to neutralize, as it were, the difference between the sexes. Sex is, to the aborigines of Formosa—as to many primitive peoples,—a thing of mystery, and one fraught with danger—danger not only to the man and woman chiefly concerned, but also to the tribal group, or who

Naturally the element of terror enters into such a conception; also that of helplessness, since against an enemy already dead there can be no reprisal. The advantage is all on the side of the dead man—an auto-suggestion which tends, of course, to aggravate the illness of the living. In any case of illness a priestess is summoned. The usual mode of procedure on the part of this lady is first to wave a banana-leaf over the patient, chanting as she does so. This is evidently to brush away—or fright

First, as regards their dwelling-houses. The mode of construction of these varies among the different tribes, and has already been referred to in the preceding chapter, in connection with funeral rites. The houses of the Taiyal—simple bamboo and grass shelters, having only a doorway, but no windows [86] —call for little in the way of detailed description. These huts are mere sleeping-places, the beds being bamboo benches, built against the sides of the wall, at about two feet elevation from the

The most painful form of mutilation, however, common among all the tribes except the Ami, is the knocking out of the two upper lateral incisor teeth. This constitutes a sort of puberty ceremony, being performed upon both boys and girls when they reach the age of thirteen or fourteen. Among the Taiyal, the teeth—instead of being knocked out with wooden blocks, as is common among the other tribes—are often extracted with twisted China grass, or with a strand from a loom of one of the women of the

Regarding the former, the only tribe that uses any sort of wheeled vehicle, or that knows anything of a beast of draught, is the Ami. The vehicle of this tribe is a primitive two-wheeled cart, the interesting point about it being that the solid wheels are fixed to the axle, the latter revolving with each revolution of the wheels. In fact, the construction of the cart causes it to resemble an enormous harrow rather than any vehicle usually associated with transport. The Ami tribes-people, however

The faith of the aboriginal Formosans, however, both in the power and the goodness of the white man—and white woman—is touching in the extreme. This does not happen to be due to the efforts of present-day missionaries, since the efforts of the latter are, as has been previously stated, confined to attempts at Christianizing Chinese-Formosans (those who are usually known as “Formosans”). The reverence among the aborigines for the white race is the result of the Dutch occupation of three hundred y

If it be true, as Dr. Tylor—in Primitive Culture —points out, that “no human thought is so primitive as to have lost bearing on our own thought, or so ancient as to have broken connection with our own life,” it opens up an interesting field for speculation. For one thing, as to what would have been the line of social evolution of the so-called superior races had they, like the seban , continued to regard the cutting off of an enemy head as meritorious rather than otherwise. (Yet what is war betw