ABSTRACT
IN Wagawaga when the relatives return from their purification rites, they cut down three or four of the dead man's cocoanut trees. Both nuts and trees are left to rot, but the mother and sisters of the dead man may use the leaves of these cocoanuts to make petticoats or a basket commonly in use for carrying fish. Cocoanuts are cut down for a woman in the same fashion as for a man. l Immediately after the funeral of a deceased Tubetube native the brother of the dead man cuts down two or three of the cocoanut trees belonging to the latter. This might also be done by the son or a sister's child.2 When an aborigine dies among the Trobriands of Northern Massim, four or five of his cocoanut trees are cut down by his brothers, children, and sisters' children. No restrictions seemed to be in evidence relative to eating these nuts, and the leaves might be used by the women of any clan for baskets or for making petticoats.s Although when a paramount chief dies in the Trobriands, no cocoanut trees are destroyed in the village subject to his jurisdiction, yet a number of cocoanuts are cut down in his own village.4 In the Island of Ysabel cocoanut trees are cut and groves of bananas hacked.5
