Headhunting

Headhunting refers to the practice of killing and decapitating a person, usually for some ritual purpose and with some kind of public or semi-public display. Although there is much reference to the ceremonial taking of heads in Western civilization, this term is used mostly in reference to the practice in the pre-colonial era in parts of Nigeria, Nurestan, Assam, Myanmar, Borneo, Indonesia, the Philippines, Taiwan, Micronesia, Melanesia, New Zealand, the Amazon Basin, and among certain sects of the Celts of ancient Europe. Generally the purpose of headhunting has been to act as a warning to those who threaten the group, although religious explanations have also been reported. In such cases, they expressed the belief that the removal, and in some cases shrinking, of the head of a slain enemy would allow the victor to control the spirit and benefit from its power. By the mid-twentieth century this practice became universally prohibited, although some reports still continued.

The practice of headhunting

Headhunting has been found in many parts of the world. Although those in contemporary western civilization think of it as primitive and barbaric, references to taking heads and displaying them appear in the Bible and in accounts from Medieval Europe. The practice has always been conducted by men warriors, and in some case may be related to proving their manhood.

As a practice, headhunting has been the subject of intense discussion within the anthropological community as to its possible social roles, functions, and motivations. Contemporary scholars generally agree that its primary function was ceremonial, and that it was part of the process of structuring, reinforcing, and defending hierarchical relationships between communities and individuals. In some cases, it may also have been practiced because of a belief that the head contained "soul matter" or a life force that could be harnessed through its capture. Themes that arise in anthropological writings about headhunting include mortification of the rival, ritual violence, cosmological balance, the display of manhood, cannibalism, and prestige.

Examples of headhunting

Southeast Asia and Melanesia

Head tray, Papua New Guinea, early 1900s (Field Museum of Natural History). The artifact itself is a two-head tray. The photograph behind it is of a seven-head tray. The display would have been hung on the wall of a communal men's house.

Headhunting was practiced in many parts of Southeast Asia. Anthropological writings exist on the Ilongot, Iban, Dayak, Berawan, Wana, Mappurondo, and other tribes. Among these groups, the rationale for the activity varies.

Studies in Sumba, Indonesia, by Janet Hoskins, showed that the rationale could vary even on one small island. In East Sumba, headhunting was largely to show territorial conquest. In West Sumba, it was an act of vengeance between equals. In many parts of Southeast Asia, the practice seems primarily for fertility rituals. Headhunting has been usually a ritual activity rather than an act of war or feuding, and involved the taking of a single head from another village. The spirit of the victim could be enlisted in one's own army of friends in the "skyworld." Headhunting also acted as a catalyst for the cessation of personal and collective mourning for the community's dead. Ideas of manhood were wrapped up in the practice and the taken heads were prized.

Around the 1930s, headhunting was suppressed among the Taiwanese aborigines during the Japanese occupation of Taiwan and among the Ilongot in the Philippines by the US authorities. In Sarawak, on the island of Borneo, the colonial dynasty of James Brooke and his descendants eradicated headhunting in the hundred years before World War II.

In 1968, Michelle Rosaldo and her husband Renato, while doing fieldwork in the Philippines, found that 65 of 70 adult Ilongot men of the northern Philippines over the age of 20 years had taken at least one head. This was a surprising finding, as the people seemed to "fit in" with more modern ideas of culture and seemed fairly peaceful. They did not report any previous reasons of earlier South East Asian tribes. They did not bring the heads back and display them, either. They said they took heads when they had a "heavy heart" or felt angry. In 1974, Rosaldo returned to study more about the reasons they took heads. She found they felt that men were more passionate than women, yet had less recourse to verbal and other means of expressing this passion. They felt that the spirit of the victim was actually with them and helping them mature and grow to find better expressions for their emotion. They felt that they were able to get prestige from the group and attract wives through their head-hunting.

Kenneth George (1996) wrote about annual headhunting rituals that he observed among the Mappurondo religious minority, an upland tribe in the south-west part of the Indonesian island of Sulawesi. Actual heads are not taken; instead, surrogate heads are used, in the form of coconuts. The ritual, called Pangngae, takes place at the conclusion of the rice harvesting season. It functions to bring an end to communal mourning for the deceased of the past year, express inter-cultural tensions and polemics, allow men to display manhood, distribute communal resources, and resist outside pressures to abandon Mappurondo life-ways.

New Zealand

In what is now known as New Zealand, the Māori would preserve the heads of enemies, removing the skull and smoking the head. Māori are currently attempting to reclaim the heads of their ancestors held in museums outside New Zealand.

China

During the Spring and Autumn Period and Warring States Period, Qin soldiers collected their enemies' heads. Since most of the soldiers were slaves, they and their families could be freed from slavery and even secure promotions in the army by returning victorious with heads. The act of Qin soldiers carrying heads in battles usually terrified their foes. This is why headhunting is one of the factors in the Qin dynasty defeating six other nations and unifying China.

Euopean headhunting

Although many practices in Europe could certainly be called "head-hunting," usually they have not referred to as such. Examples of such practices exist in the Bible, in Ancient Rome and Greece, and among Celtic and other northern European tribes.

The future King David in the Bible is known for killing Goliath, but few Sunday School classes teach the rest of the story. After Goliath was felled by the stone, David went over, beheaded him, and displayed the head to all around in order to verify his victory and terrify the enemy.

Romans and Greeks recorded their habits of nailing heads of personal enemies to walls, or dangling them from the necks of horses, and human skulls are found amongst votive offerings. The Apian Way in Rome was often lined with severed heads on stakes meant to terrify and preclude any thought of rebellion. The ceremonial display of heads was common throughout Europe in the Middle Ages as well, although it became less common toward the end of the thirteenth century.

The Celts practiced headhunting for an indeterminate religious reason. Headhunting continued to be practiced after their conversion to Christianity by the demi-Celtic Gaels, although this was probably more traditional than religious. Heads were also taken among the Germanic tribes and Iberians, but the purpose is unknown.

Shrunken heads

Shrunken head exhibited at the Lightner Museum in St. Augustine, Florida.

An authentic shrunken head is a human head that has been removed and prepared for display.

In World War II shrunken heads of prisoners were also found in German concentration camps. Most notable findings were in the Buchenwald camp, where they were displayed in the camp center to terrify the prisoners. There were also a few instances of U.S. soldiers who kept skulls taken from enemies in the South Pacific battles.

The manufacture of shrunken heads was formerly the specialty of a number of ethnic groups that practiced headhunting, most notably the Jívaro or Shuar people of Ecuador and Peru. Among the Shuar, a shrunken head is known as a tsantsa. The practice is no longer current, but the Shuar still produce replica heads which they sell to tourists.

Purpose

The practice of making shrunken heads originally had religious significance; the heads were believed to harness the spirits of those enemies and compel them to serve the shrinker. The Shuar in Amazonian Ecuador and Peru practiced headhunting in order to make shrunken heads and use them for ritual purposes.

The Shuar believed in the existence of three fundamental spirits:

• Wakani - innate to humans thus surviving their death, later turning into vapor.
• Arutam - literally "vision" or "power," protects humans from a violent death and assures their survival.
• Muisak - vengeful spirit, which surfaces when an arutam spirit-carrying person is murdered.

To block the last spirit from using its powers, and even turn them into their friends, they severed their enemies' heads and made them into shrunken forms. This also served as a warning to any surviving enemies or would be attackers.

How it was done

Shrunken head from the upper Amazon region, in the Pitt Rivers Museum, Oxford

The shrinking process primarily involved the desiccation of the skin. The skull was removed from the head: the maker would make an incision on the back of the neck and proceeded to remove all the skin and flesh from the cranium. Next, they sewed the eyelids shut and held the mouth together with splinters. Fat from the flesh of the head was removed. The flesh was then boiled in water in which a number of herbs containing tannins were steeped, and then dried with hot rocks and sand, while being molded by the preparer to retain its human feature. The lips were sewn shut, and various decorative beads were added to the head.

Shrunken heads are known for their mandibular prognathism, facial distortion and shrinkage of the lateral sides of the forehead; these are artifices of the shrinking process.

The process to reduce the size of the heads was accompanied by a ritual, which culminated with la Fiesta de la Victoria (Spanish for "victory feast") celebrated by the entire community.

Trade in shrunken heads

Traditionally, about one head a year would be taken, and then only from another village. There was, however, much fear and violence within the tribe and the need to revenge any offense was taught to the very young. It is estimated that these tribes would have self exterminated if it were not for the intervention of Christian missionaries who taught the concepts of grace and forgiveness.

There were many other cultural interventions, however, that increased the incidence in headhunting. Colonialists were fascinated by the process, and they created an economic demand for shrunken heads. A stop was put to this when the Peruvian and Ecuadorian governments outlawed the traffic in heads.

Replica shrunken heads are manufactured as curios for the tourist trade and can be bought in airport shops such as those in Quito, Ecuador. These are made from leather and animal hides carved to resemble the originals. The presence or absence of nasal hair is one clue as to whether a shrunken head is authentic or a replica.

One of the largest collections of authentic shrunken heads is a display of seven heads in Seattle, USA. It also includes the smallest shrunken head in the world, which is about the size of a tennis ball.

References

ISBN links support NWE through referral fees

• George, Kenneth. 1996. Showing Signs of Violence: The Cultural Politics of a Twentieth-century Headhunting Ritual. Berkeley: University of California Press. ISBN 0-52020-041-1
• Rosaldo, Michelle Z. 1980. Knowledge and Passion: Ilongot Notions of Self and Social Life. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0521295629
• Rosaldo, Renato. 2000. Of Headhunters and Soldiers: Separating Cultural and Ethical Relativism. Retrieved November 28, 2006.
• Russell, Susan. Head-Hunting in Southeast Asia. Retrieved November 28, 2006.

External links

• Encyclopedia Britannica entry 1996
• General information
• Head Hunting: History of the Shuar
• Picture of a shrunken head from the Buchenwald concentration camp
• Shrunken heads from the Discovery Channel

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