Argonauts of the Western Pacific: An Account of Native Enterprise and Adventure in the Archipelagoes of Melanesian New Guinea (1922)

The Sinaketan fleet halts at a beach on Dobu for their last ceremonies before meeting their Kula partners. These rites are short and numerous and include applying blessed substances to their bodies and painting themselves with red and black designs. These are Kula magic associated with beauty and love to make the partners find them irresistible. The Kaykakaya spell refers to tabooed fish that would make a person ugly and references the wife of the Kula partner. The Talo spell is intended to beautify. The conch shell further induces good fortune.

Then they paddle their canoes, each saying a different magical spell. A “new emotion arises in their minds, that of awe and apprehension” (267). They use magic of safety now, fearing their partners though they know them and are expected. The Dobuans as a rule are fierce when the party arrives but then are friendly after ginger root is ritually spat on the village. If someone has died in the Dobuan village, they will be under mortuary taboo (gwara) in which palm and coconut cannot be touched or scaled. When the Kiriwinians visit, they will be the ones to break the taboo as dictated by tradition.