page_title: Indigenous architecture
section_title: Kanak traditional architecture
hierarchical_section_title: Indigenous architecture / New Caledonia (Kanaky) / Kanak traditional architecture
caption_attribution_description: Deutsch: Haus im Baustil der Kanak mit flèche faîtière. Aufgenommen im Tjibaou cultural center, Nouméa, Neukaledonien. English: Kanak house with flèche faîtière. Tjibaou cultural center, Nouméa, New Caledonia.Français&#160;: Maison kanak avec flèche faîtière. Centre culturel Tjibaou, Nouméa, Nouvelle-Calédonie.
context_page_description: The recent field of indigenous architecture refers to the study and practice of architecture of, for and by indigenous people. It is a field of study and practice in the United States, Australia, New Zealand, Canada, Arctic area of Sápmi and many other countries where Indigenous people have a built tradition or aspire translate or to have their cultures translated in the built environment. This sometimes has been extended to landscape architecture, public art, placemaking and ways of contributing to the design of built environments.
context_section_description: Kanak cultures developed in the New Caledonia  archipelago over a period of three thousand years. Today, France governs New Caledonia but has not developed a national culture. The Kanak claim for independence is upheld by a culture thought of as national by the indigenous population. Kanaks have settled over all the islands officially indicated by France as New Caledonia and Dependencies. The archipelago includes the principal island, Grande Terre, Belep Islands to the north and Isle of Pines to the south. It is bordered on the east by the Loyalty Islands, consisting of three coral atolls (Mare, Lifou, and Ouvea).
  Kanak society is organised around clans, which are both social and spatial units. The clan could initially be made up of people related through a common ancestor, comprising several families. There can be between fifty and several hundred people in a clan. This basic definition of the clan has become modified over the years due to historical situations and places involving wars, disagreements, new arrivals etc. The clan structure, therefore, evolved as new people arrived and were given a place and a role in the social organisation of the clan, or through clan members leaving to join other clans.
  Traditionally a village is set up in the following manner. The Chief's hut (called La Grande Case) lies at the end of a long and wide central walkway which is used for gathering and performing ceremonies. The Chief's younger brother lives in a hut at the other end. The rest of the village lives in huts along the central walkway, which is lined with auracarias or palms. Trees lined the alleys which were used as shady gathering places. For Kanak people, space is divided between premises reserved for important men and other residences placed closer to the women and children. Kanak people generally avoided being alone in empty spaces.
  The inside of a Grande Case is dominated by the central pole (made out of houp wood), which holds up the roof and the rooftop spear, the flèche faîtière. Along the walls are various posts which are carved to represent ancestors. The door is flanked by two carved door posts (called Katana), who were the “sentinels who reported the arrival of strangers”. There also is a carved door step. The rooftop spear has three main parts: the spear facing up, which prevents bad spirits coming down onto ancestor. The face, which represents the ancestor. The spear on the bottom which keep bad spirits coming up to ancestor.
  The flèche faîtière or a carved rooftop spear, spire or finial  is the home of ancestral spirits and is characterized by three major components.  The ancestor is symbolized by a flat, crowned face in the centre of the spear. The ancestor's voice is symbolized by a long, rounded pole that is run through by conch shells.  The symbolic connection of the clan, through the chief, is a base, which is planted into the case's central pole.  Sharply pointed wood pieces fan out from either end of the central area, symbolically preventing bad spirits from being able to reach the ancestor. It evokes, beyond a particular ancestor, the community of ancestors. and represents the ancestral spirits, symbolic of transition between the world of the dead and the world of the living.
  The arrow or the spear normally has a needle at the end to insert threaded shells from bottom to top; one of the shells contains arrangements to ensure protection of the house and the country. During wars enemies attacked this symbolic finial. After the death of a Kanak chief, the flèche faîtière is removed and his family takes it to their home. Though it is allowed to be used again, as a sign of respect, it is normally kept at burial grounds of noted citizens or at the mounds of abandoned grand houses.
  The form of the buildings varied from island to island, but were generally round in plan and conical in the vertical elevation. The traditional hut features represent the organization and lifestyle of the occupants. The hut is the endogenous Kanak architectural element and built entirely of plant material taken from the surrounding 
caption: La Grande Case (Chief's Hut) at the Jean-Marie Tjibaou Cultural Centre, Nouméa, New Caledonia.
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