The Myth of the Flying Canoe of Kudayuri.

“Mokatuboda of the Lukuba clan and his younger brother Toweyre’i lived in the village of Kudayuri. With them lived their three sisters Kayguremwo, Na’ukuwakula and Murumweyri’a. They had all come out from underground in the spot called Labikewo, in Kitava. These people were the u’ula (foundation, basis, here: first possessors) of the ligogu and wayugo magic.”

“All the men of Kitava decided on a great Kula expedition to the Koya. The men of Kumwageya, Kaybutu, Kabululo and Lalela made their canoes. They scooped out the inside of the waga, they carved the tabuyo and lagim (decorated prow boards), they made the budaka (lateral gunwale planks). They brought the component parts to the beach, in order to make the yowaga (to put and lash them together).”

“The Kudayuri people made their canoe in the village. Mokatuboda, the head man of the Kudayuri village, ordered them to do so. They were angry: ‘Very heavy canoe. Who will carry it to the beach?’ He said: ‘No, not so; it will be well. I shall just lash my waga in the village.’ He refused to move the canoe; it remained in the village. The other people pieced their canoe on the beach; he pieced it together in the village. They lashed it with the wayugo creeper on the beach; he lashed his in the village. They caulked their canoes on the sea-shore; he caulked his in the village. They painted their canoes on the beach with black; he blackened his in the village. They made the youlala (painted red and white) on the beach; he made the youlala in the village. They sewed their sail on the beach; he did it in the village. They rigged up the mast and rigging on the beach; he in the village. After that, the men of Kitava made tasasoria (trial run) and kabigidoya (visit of ceremonial presentation), but the Kudayuri canoe did not make either.”

“By and by, all the men of Kitava ordered their women to prepare the food. The women one day put all the food, the gugu’a (personal belongings), the pari (presents and trade goods) into the canoe. The people of Kudayuri had all these things put into their canoe in the village. The headman of the Kudayuri, Mokatuboda, asked all his younger brothers, all the members of his crew, to bring some of their pari, and he performed magic over it, and made a lilava (magical bundle) of it.”

“The people of other villages went to the beach; each canoe was manned by its usagelu (members of the crew). The man of Kudayuri ordered his crew to man his canoe in the village. They of the other villages stepped the mast on the shore; he stepped the mast in the village. They prepared the rigging on the shore; he prepared the rigging in the village. They hoisted the sail on the sea; he spoke ‘May our sail be hoisted,’ and his companions hoisted the sail. He spoke: ‘Sit in your places, every man!’ He went into the house, he took his ligogu (adze), he took some coco-nut oil, he took a staff. He spoke magic over the adze, over the coco-nut oil. He came out of the house, he approached the canoe. A small dog of his called Tokulubweydoga jumped into the canoe.2 He spoke to his crew: ‘Pull up the sail higher.’ They pulled at the halyard. He rubbed the staff with the coco-nut oil. He knocked the canoe’s skids with the staff. Then he struck with his ligogu the u’ula of his canoe and the dobwana (that is, both ends of the canoe). He jumped into the canoe, sat down, and the canoe flew!”

“A rock stood before it. It pierced the rock in two, and flew through it. He bent down, he looked; his companions (that is, the other canoes of Kitava) sailed on the sea. He spoke to his younger brothers, (that is to his relatives in the canoe): ‘Bail out the water, pour it out!’ Those who sailed on the earth thought it was rain, this water which they poured out from above.”

“They (the other canoes) sailed to Giribwa, they saw a canoe anchored there. They said: ‘Is that the canoe from Dobu?’ They thought so, they wanted to lebu (take by force, but not necessarily as a hostile act) the buna (big cowrie) shells of the Dobu people. Then they saw the dog walking on the beach. They said: ‘Wi-i-i! This is Tokulubweydoga, the dog of the Lukuba! This canoe they lashed in the village, in the village of Kudayuri. Which way did it come? It was anchored in the jungle!’ They approached the people of Kudayuri, they spoke: ‘Which way did you come?’ ‘Oh, I came together with you (the same way).’ ‘It rained. Did it rain over you?’ ‘Oh yes, it has rained over me.’ ”

“Next day, they (the men of the other villages of Kitava), sailed to Vakuta and went ashore. They made their Kula. The next day they sailed, and he (Mokatuboda) remained in Vakuta. When they disappeared on the sea, his canoe flew. He flew from Vakuta. When they (the other crews) arrived in Gumasila, he was there on the promontory of Lububuyama. They said: ‘This canoe is like the canoe of our companions,’ and the dog came out. ‘This is the dog of the Lukuba clan of Kudayuri.’ They asked him again which way he came; he said he came the same way as they. They made the Kula in Gumasila. He said: ‘You sail first, I shall sail later on.’ They were astonished: ‘Which way does he sail?’ They slept in Gumasila.”

“Next day they sailed to Tewara, they arrived at the beach of Kadimwatu. They saw his canoe anchored there, the dog came out and ran along the beach. They spoke to the Kudayuri men, ‘How did you come here?’ ‘We came with you, the same way we came.’ They made Kula in Tewara. Next day, they sailed to Bwayowa (village in Dobu district). He flew, and anchored at the beach Sarubwoyna. They arrived there, they saw: ‘Oh, look at the canoe, are these fishermen from Dobu?’ The dog came out. They recognised the dog. They asked him (Mokatuboda) which way he came: ‘I came with you, I anchored here.’ They went to the village of Bwayowa, they made Kula in the village, they loaded their canoes. They received presents from the Dobu people at parting, and the Kitava men sailed on the return journey. They sailed first, and he flew through the air.”

On the return journey, at every stage, they see him first, they ask him which way he went, and he gives them some sort of answer as the above ones.

“From Giribwa they sailed to Kitava; he remained in Giribwa; he flew from Giribwa; he went to Kitava, to the beach. His gugu’a (personal belongings) were being carried to the village when his companions came paddling along, and saw his canoe anchored and the dog running on the beach. All the other men were very angry, because his canoe flew.”

“They remained in Kitava. Next year, they made their gardens, all the men of Kitava. The sun was very strong, there was no rain at all. The sun burned their gardens. This man (the head man of Kudayuri, Mokatuboda) went into the garden. He remained there, he made a bulubwalata (evil magic) of the rain. A small cloud came and rained on his garden only, and their gardens the sun burned. They (the other men of Kitava) went and saw their gardens. They arrived there, they saw all was dead, already the sun had burned them. They went to his garden and it was all wet: yams, taitu, taro, all was fine. They spoke: ‘Let us kill him so that he might die. We shall then speak magic over the clouds, and it will rain over our gardens.’ ”

“The real, keen magic, the Kudayuri man (i.e. Mokatuboda) did not give to them; he gave them not the magic of the ligogu (adze); he gave them not the magic of kunisalili (rain magic); he gave them not the magic of the wayugo (lashing creeper), of the coco-nut oil and staff. Toweyre’i, his younger brother, thought that he had already received the magic, but he was mistaken. His elder brother gave him only part of the magic, the real one he kept back.”

“They came (to Mokatuboda, the head man of Kudayuri), he sat in his village. His brothers and maternal nephews sharpened the spear, they hit him, he died.”

“Next year, they decided to make a big Kula expedition, to Dobu. The old waga, cut and lashed by Mokatuboda, was no more good, the lashings had perished. Then Toweyre’i, the younger brother, cut a new one to replace the old. The people of Kumwageya and Lalela (the other villages in Kitava) heard that Toweyre’i cuts his waga, and they also cut theirs. They pieced and lashed their canoes on the beach. Toweyre’i did it in the village.”

Here the native narrative enumerates every detail of canoe making, drawing the contrast between the proceedings on the beach of the other Kitavans, and of Toweyre’i building the canoe in the village of Kudayuri. It is an exact repetition of what was said at the beginning, when Mokatuboda was building his canoe, and I shall not adduce it here. The narrative arrives at the critical moment when all the members of the crew are seated in the canoe ready for the flight.

“Toweyre’i went into the house and made magic over the adze and the coco-nut oil. He came out, smeared a staff with the oil, knocked the skids of the canoe. He then did as his elder brother did. He struck both ends of the canoe with the adze. He jumped into the canoe and sat down; but the waga did not fly. Toweyre’i went into the house and cried for his elder brother, whom he had slain; he had killed him without knowing his magic. The people of Kumwageya and Lalela went to Dobu and made their Kula. The people of Kudayuri remained in the village.”

“The three sisters were very angry with Toweyre’i, for he killed the elder brother and did not learn his magic. They themselves had learnt the ligogu, the wayugo magic; they had it already in their lopoula (belly). They could fly through the air, they were yoyova. In Kitava they lived on the top of Botigale’a hill. They said: ‘Let us leave Kitava and fly away.’ They flew through the air. One of them, Na’ukuwakula, flew to the West, pierced through the sea-passage Dikuwa’i (Somewhere in the Western Trobriands); she arrived at Simsim (one of the Lousançay). There she turned into a stone, she stands in the sea.”

“The two others flew first (due West) to the beach of Yalumugwa (on the Eastern shore of Boyowa). There they tried to pierce the coral rock named Yakayba—it was too hard. They went (further South on the Eastern shore) through the sea-passage of Vilasasa and tried to pierce the rock Kuyaluya—they couldn’t. They went (further South) and tried to pierce the rock of Kawakari—it was too hard. They went (further South). They tried to pierce the rocks at Giribwa. They succeeded. That is why there is now a sea passage at Giribwa (the straits dividing the main island of Boyowa from the island of Vakuta).”

“They flew (further South) towards Dobu. They came to the island of Tewara. They came to the beach of Kadimwatu and pierced it. This is where the straits of Kadimwatu are now between the islands of Tewara and Uwama. They went to Dobu; they travelled further South, to the promontory of Saramwa (near Dobu island). They spoke: ‘Shall we go round the point or pierce right through?’ They went round the point. They met another obstacle and pierced it through, making the Straits of Loma (at the Western end of Dawson Straits). They came back, they returned and settled near Tewara. They turned into stones; they stand in the sea. One of them cast her eyes on Dobu, this is Murumweyri’a; she eats men, and the Dobuans are cannibals. The other one, Kayguremwo, does not eat men, and her face is turned towards Boyowa. The people of Boyowa do not eat man.”

This story is extremely clear in its general outline, and very dramatic, and all its incidents and developments have a high degree of consistency and psychological motivation. It is perhaps the most telling of all myths from this part of the world which came under my notice. It is also a good example of what has been said before in Division II. Namely that the identical conditions, sociological and cultural, which obtain at the present time, are also reflected in mythical narratives. The only exception to this is the much higher efficiency of magic found in the world of myth. The tale of Kudayuri, on the one hand, describes minutely the sociological conditions of the heroes, their occupations and concerns, and all these do not differ at all from the present ones. On the other hand, it shows the hero endowed with a truly super-normal power through his magic of canoe building and of rain making. Nor could it be more convincingly stated than is done in this narrative that the full knowledge of the right magic was solely responsible for these supernatural powers.

In its enumeration of the various details of tribal life, this myth is truly a fount of ethnographic information. Its statements, when made complete and explicit by native comment, contain a good deal of what is to be known about the sociology, technology and organisation of canoe-making, sailing, and of the Kula. If followed up into detail, the incidents of this narrative make us acquainted for instance, with the division into clans; with the origin and local character of these latter; with ownership of magic and its association with the totemic group. In almost all mythological narratives of the Trobriands, the clan, the sub-clan and the locality of the heroes are stated. In the above version, we see that the heroes have emerged at a certain spot, and that they themselves came from underground; that is, that they are the first representatives of their totemic sub-clan on the surface of the earth. In the two other versions, this last point was not explicitly stated, though I think it is implied in the incidents of this myth, for obviously the flying canoe is built for the first time, as it is for the last. In other versions, I was told that the hole from which this sub-clan emerged is also called Kudayuri, and that the name of their magical system is Viluvayaba.

Passing to the following part of the tale, we find in it a description of canoe-building, and this was given to me in the same detailed manner in all three versions. Here again, if we would substitute for the short sentences a fuller account of what happens, such as could be elicited from any intelligent native informant; if for each word describing the stages of canoe-building we insert a full description of the processes for which these words stand—we would have in this myth an almost complete, ethnographic account of canoe-building. We would see the canoe pieced together, lashed, caulked, painted, rigged out, provided with a sail till it lies ready to be launched. Besides the successive enumeration of technical stages, we have in this myth a clear picture of the rôle played by the headman, who is the nominal owner of the canoe, and who speaks of it as his canoe and at the same time directs its building; overrides the wishes of others, and is responsible for the magic. We have even the mention of the tasasoria and kabigidoya, and several allusions to the Kula expedition of which the canoe-building in this myth is represented as a preliminary stage. The frequent, tedious repetitions and enumerations of customary sequences of events, interesting as data of folk-lore, are not less valuable as ethnographic documents, and as illustrations of the natives’ attitude towards custom. Incidentally, this feature of native mythology shows that the task of serving as ethnographic informant is not so foreign and difficult to a native as might at first appear. He is quite used to recite one after the other the various stages of customary proceedings in his own narratives, and he does it with an almost pedantic accuracy and completeness, and it is an easy task for him to transfer these qualities to the accounts, which he is called upon to make in the service of ethnography.

The dramatic effect of the climax of the story, of the unexpected flight of the canoe is clearly brought out in the narrative, and it was given to me in all its three versions. In all three, the members of the crew are made to pass through the numerous preparatory stages of sailing. And the parallel drawn between the reasonable proceedings of their fellows on the beach, and the absurd manner in which they are made to get ready in the middle of the village, some few hundred feet above the sea, makes the tension more palpable and the sudden denouement more effective. In all accounts of this myth, the magic is also performed just before the flight, and its performance is explicitly mentioned and included as an important episode in the story.

The incident of bailing some water out of a canoe which never touched the sea, seems to show some inconsistency. If we remember, however, that water is poured into a canoe, while it is built, in order to prevent its drying and consequently its shrinking, cracking and warping, the inconsistency and flaw in the narrative disappear. I may add that the bailing and rain incident is contained in one of my three versions only.

The episode of the dog is more significant and more important to the natives, and is mentioned in all three versions. The dog is the animal associated with the Lukuba clan; that is, the natives will say that the dog is a Lukuba, as the pig is a Malasi, and the igwana a Lukulabuta. In several stories about the origin and relative rank of the clans, each of them is represented by its totemic animal. Thus the igwana is the first to emerge from underground. Hence the Lukulabuta are the oldest clan. The dog and the pig dispute with one another the priority of rank, the dog basing his claims on his earlier appearance on the earth, for he followed immediately the igwana; the pig, asserting himself in virtue of not eating unclean things. The pig won the day, and therefore the Malasi clan are considered to be the clan of the highest rank, though this is really reached only in one of its sub-clans, that of the Tabalu of Omarakana. The incident of the lebu (taking by force) of some ornaments from the Dobuans refers to the custom of using friendly violence in certain Kula transactions (see chapter XIV, Division II).

In the second part of the story, we find the hero endowed again with magical powers far superior to those of the present-day wizards. They can make rain, or stay the clouds, it is true, but he is able to create a small cloud which pours copious rain over his own gardens, and leaves the others to be shrivelled up by the sun. This part of the narrative does not touch the canoe problem, and it is of interest to us only in so far as it again shows what appears to the natives the real source of their hero’s supernatural powers.

The motives which lead to the killing of Mokatuboda are not stated explicitly in the narrative. No myth as a rule enters very much into the subjective side of its events. But, from the lengthy, indeed wearisome repetition of how the other Kitava men constantly find the Kudayuri canoe outrunning them, how they are astonished and angry, it is clear that his success must have made many enemies to Mokatuboda. What is not so easily explained, is the fact that he is killed, not by the other Kitava men, but by his own kinsmen. One of the versions mentions his brothers and his sister’s sons as the slayers. One of them states that the people of Kitava ask Toweyre’i, the younger brother, whether he has already acquired the flying magic and the rain magic, and only after an affirmative is received, is Mokatuboda killed by his younger brother, in connivance with the other people. An interesting variant is added to this version, according to which Toweyre’i kills his elder brother in the garden. He then comes back to the village and instructs and admonishes Mokatuboda’s children to take the body, to give it the mortuary attentions, to prepare for the burial. Then he himself arranges the sagali, the big mortuary distribution of food. In this we find an interesting document of native custom and ideas. Toweyre’i, in spite of having killed his brother, is still the man who has to arrange the mortuary proceedings, act as master of ceremonies, and pay for the functions performed in them by others. He personally may neither touch the corpse, nor do any act of mourning or burial; nevertheless he, as the nearest of kin of the dead man, is the bereaved one, is the one from whom a limb has been severed, so to speak. A man whose brother has died cannot mourn any more than he could mourn for himself.3 To return to the motives of killing, as this was done according to all accounts by Mokatuboda’s own kinsmen, with the approval of the other men, envy, ambition, the desire to succeed the headman in his dignity, must have been mixed with spite against him. In fact, we see that Toweyre’i proceeds confidently to perform the magic, and bursts out into wailing only after he has discovered he has been duped.

Now we come to one of the most remarkable incidents of the whole myth, that namely which brings into connection the yoyova, or the flying witches, with the flying canoe, and with such speed of a canoe, as is imparted to it by magic. In the spells of swiftness there are frequent allusions to the yoyova or mulukwausi. This can be clearly seen in the spell of the wayugo, already adduced (Chapter V, Division III), and which is still to be analysed linguistically (Chapter XVIII, Divisions II to IV). The kariyala (magical portent, cf. Chapter XVII, Division VII) of the wayugo spell consists in shooting stars, that is, when a wayugo rite is performed at night over the creeper coils, there will be stars falling in the sky. And again, when a magician, knowing this system of magic, dies, shooting stars will be seen. Now, as we have seen (Chapter X, Division I), falling stars are mulukwausi in their flight.

In this story of the Kudayuri we see the mythological ground for this association. The same magic which allowed the canoe to sail through the air gives the three sisters of Kudayuri their power of being mulukwausi, and of flying. In this myth they are also endowed with the power of cleaving the rocks, a power which they share with the canoe, which cleft a rock immediately after leaving the village. The three sisters cleave rocks and pierce the land in several places. My native commentators assured me that when the canoe first visited Giribwa and Kadimwatu at the beginning of this myth, the land was still joined at these places and there was a beach at each of them. The mulukwausi tried to pierce Boyowa at several spots along the Eastern coast, but succeeded only at Giribwa. The myth thus has the archaic stamp of referring to deep changes in natural features. The two sisters, who fly to the South return from the furthest point and settle near Tewara, in which there is some analogy to several other myths in which heroes from the Marshall Bennett Islands settle down somewhere between the Amphletts and Dobu. One of them turns her eyes northwards towards the non-cannibal people of Boyowa and she is said to be averse to cannibalism. Probably this is a sort of mythological explanation of why the Boyowan people do not eat men and the Dobuans do, an explanation to which there is an analogy in another myth shortly to be adduced, that of Atu’a’ine and Aturamo’a, and a better one still in a myth about the origins of cannibalism, which I cannot quote here.

In all these traditions, so far, the heroes belonged to the clan of Lukuba. To it belong Gere’u, Tokosikuna, the Kudayuri family and their dog, and also the dog, Tokulubwaydoga of the myth told in Chapter X, Division V. I may add that, in some legends told about the origin of humanity, this clan emerges first from underground and in some it emerges second in time, but as the clan of highest rank, though in this it has to yield afterwards to the Malasi. The main Kultur-hero of Kiriwina, the ogre-slayer Tudava, belongs, also to the clan of Lukuba. There is even a historic fact, which agrees with this mythological primacy, and subsequent eclipse. The Lukuba were, some six or seven generations ago, the leading clan in Vakuta, and then they had to surrender the chieftainship of this place to the Malasi clan, when the sub-clan of the Tabalu, the Malasi chiefs of the highest rank in Kiriwina, migrated South, and settled down in Vakuta. In the myths quoted here, the Lukuba are leading canoe-builders, sailors, and adventurers, that is with one exception, that of Tokosikuna, who, though excelling in all other respects, knows nothing of canoe construction.