Indian Antiquary Vol 52

Author(s): Richard Carnac Temple, Stephen Meredyth Edwardes, Krishnaswami Aiyangar
Publisher: Swati Publications

Page 547

SEPTEMBER, 1923) DICTIONARY OF THE SOUTH ANDAMAN LANGUAGE
191
APPENDIX XIII-contd. 1.0. The önge (i.e., Little Andaman) and järawa- (see Dict., p. 24) bows are straight and practically alike, and quite distinct from the kârama- and chokio, resembling as they do in crude fashion the English pattern. Though the onge bow (see Pl. x, fig. 1) is shorter and handier than the ordinary järawa - weapon, small bows are also made and used by the latter, Both are said to be made of the wood of a tree known as 10koma. (App. XI). That these savages of pigmy stature should find it necessary to make stout, heavy bows about 7 ft. long with corresponding large iron-headed arrows (see Pl. B.) is remarkable, and accounts for the erroneous belief which has been entertained by some observers that in making use of these stiff, unwieldy weapons a leg as well as both arms must be employed. No attempt at ornamenting their bows is made either by means of designs in paint or by incisions. As the extremities of all their bows are thick the nooks are formed in the usual way by notches cut in the wood When identification marks are provided they are attached to the upper loop of the string.
2. råta - (Pl. B.) Common, blunt, wooden-headed arrow, used when practising at some inanimate (preferably spherical) object in motion; the shaft usually consists of a slender variety of bamboo (bambusa nana) called ridi-, and the foreshaft is ordinarily made of the hard portion of the wood of the areca, or from the root of the rhizophora conjugata : it is then slightly pointed and the whole straightened by means of the teeth and fingers, after which it is hardened over or near a fire.
3. tirléd. (in construc. tirlêj-). (Pl. B.) The ordinary wooden-headed fish-arrow : it differs from the râta- only in having its foreshaft sharply pointed. The coast-men of Little Andaman use arrows having four wooden prongs of different lengths (see Pl. x, fig. 1).
4. tölb6d. (Pl. B. and E, figs. 4 and 7). This is practically a ráta- to which an iron point (and often an iron barb) has been attached. The sketches furnished in Pl. E represent the most common and efficient descriptions in general use. Barbed specimens have their string fastenings protected and rendered more durable by a coating of kanga-ta-baj. (item 62). Before iron was procurable the pointed end consisted of a fish-bone, preferably the serrate tail-spine of the sting-ray (item 53). The sketches 4 and 7 in Pl. E, also 7-8 in PID represent Ancient fish-arrows thus pointed.
5. bla.. (Pl. B). Used for shooting pigs, large fish, etc.: it is about 3-31 ft. in length; the foreshaft consists of a keen double-edged iron blade, at the base of which one, two or (rarely) three iron barbs (8t-châtmi.) are fixed. These are firmly secured by whipping of strong twine-subsequently coated with känga-td-baj. (item 62)—to the end of a trimmed stick 46 inches long, the other end of which is made to fit into a socket (aka-chånga) provided for it in the shaft-made of the wood of the tetranthera lancoefolia (ūj.); the latter is attached to the foreshaft by a flattened plaited fibre thong (peta-) about 8 inches long (made from the anodendron paniculatum) which, before the arrow can be used, has to be cerefully wound round that portion of the shaft and foreshaft which is between the two ends of the pêta-, by twirling the foreshaft when fixing it into the socket (see Pl. B, items l-a, 1-c, and 5). When making ready for use the nock of the arrow is so placed on the bow-string as to bring into line the blade and the barb (or two barbs, if such there be), as well as a seam provided in the whipping at the junction of the shaft and foreshaft. This combination serves as
7 The simple method of eatablishing the ownership of bowe, described in item 1 and footnote 4, in employed also in regard to thos.bogig-ngijl- and yorow-arrows of this class which have no barbe those that are barbed have their twine-whippinge covered with kanga-ta-b, thereby randering impossible the display of identification marks. As the ongo and Järawa-tribes do not apply wax to the whippings of their iron-headed arrows, whether these be barbod or not, allaliko exhibit their tokens of ownership. An incident is recalled by the writer which led to the detection by this means of a man who had killed an escaped oonviot with a tolbod- Arrow.