# The Sexual Life of Savages in North-Western Melanesia

THE SEXUAL LIFE OF SAVAGES
in North-Western Melanesia
AN ETHNOGRAPHIC ACCOUNT OF COURTSHIP, MARRIAGE AND FAMILY LIFE AMONG THE NATIVES OF THE TROBRIAND ISLANDS, BRITISH NEW GUINEA
BY
BRONISLAW MALINOWSKI
PH.D., D.SC.
Complete in One Volume
WITH A PREFACE BY HAVELOCK ELLIS
READERS LEAGUE OF AMERICA
Distributed by
EUGENICS PUBLISHING COMPANY
New York
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Copyright, 1929, by
Bronislaw Malinowski
ROBERT MOND EXPEDITION TO NEW GUINEA, 1914-1918
Printed in the U. S. A.
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To my friend
E. POWYS MATHERS
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CONTENTS
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LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
Two Pretty Girls, One Disfigured by Mourning Frontispiece
* The Central Place of Omarakana
* The Chief and His Sons
* Two Hereditary Enemies
* The Chief's Favourite Wife and Her Family
* Ceremonial Cooking of Taro
* Women with Carrying Pads
* A Family on the Road
* Native Interior
* A Stage in Skirt Making
* Drying Skirt Fibre
* The Mortuary Dance
* Distribution of Skirts in Mortuary Ritual
* Decorated Women
* Men in Full Festive Attire
* Children Showing a Game to the Ethnographer
* The Children's Republic
* Small Boys Playing at Sagali
* A Group of Girls
* Boys in the Yam Garden
* A Decorated Bachelors' House
* Girl in Front of a Bukumatula
* Kalogusa, the Chief's Son
* Marriage Gift in Preparation
* The Marriage Gift Displayed
* Mitakaka and Orayse
* A Happy Family
* The Marriage Tribute in the Garden
* Carrying the Harvest Gift
* The Urigubu in the Village
* A Polygamous Family
* A Chief's Wife and Her Annual Dowry
* Decorated Corpse
* Body After First Exhumation
* Widow in Full Mourning
* Widow in Half Mourning
* A Decorated Jawbone
* Tomwaya Lakwabulo THE SeER
* Albino
* An Unmarried Mother
* Two Brothers
* Father and Son
* The Pregnancy Cloak
* First Charming of the Pregnancy Robes
* Cutting the White Lily Leaves
* The Way into the Water
* The Ritual Bathing
* Second Charming of the Pregnancy Cloaks
* Guarded from Contact with Earth
* Return to the Father's House
* Vigil on the Platform
* A Mother and Her First-born
* Children in a Round Game
* A Figure Game
* Rats
* The Fishing of Kuboya
* Typical Scenery of Hide and Seek
* A Harvest Scene
* A Ceremonial Dancing Demonstration
* The Ulatile of Kwaybwaga
* Ulatile on the Lagoon
* Girls Decorated for Katuyausi or Harvest Visit
* Katuyausi Party
* The Beach of the Lagoon
* Bagido'u
* Kaydebu Dance
* A Melanesian Beauty
* A Type Not Admired by the Natives
* Ethnographer with a Man in a Wig
* The Leaf and the Dress
* Lousing
* Ceremonial Distribution of Food
* After the Distribution
* Rehearsal of a Kasawaga Dance
* The Crowd Assembled Outside the Village for Beauty Magic
* The Magic of Mother of Pearl
* Magical Face Painting
* The Ritual Placing of the Vana
* The Last Touch to the Dancers' Toilet
* Ready for the Final Dance
* Women in the Water Collecting Shells .
* Head Pool of the Tidal Creek of Kwabulo
* The Inuvayla'u Dance
* Usikela Bananas in Kaulagu
* Accumulation of Food for a Feast
* Crowd Collected on a Beach to Admire a Large Catch
* A Small Group Eating Taro
* Typical Lagoon Village
* Tokeda — the Belt of Jungle Adjoining a Garden
* Ancestral Emergence Spot in a Small Village on the Island of Vakuta
* Mother and Child Father and Child
The Trobriand Islands Fig.
* Plan of Village of Omarakana
* Plan of a Dwelling-House
* Cats' -Cradle
* The Beach of Kumilabwaga