Abstract
POLYNESIAN RELIGI0N.—In Bulletin 34 of the Bernice P. Bishop Museum of Honolulu, Mr. E. S. Craighi1l, has published an extensive study of of the belief and practice actarstic of the ancient worship of Polynesian peoples, the result partly of three years' literary research, partly of five years' personal investigation in the different island groups of Polynesia. On analysis it appears that the religions of the various island groups at the time of their discovery were of a composite nature. An ancient foundational system is fundamentally related to the culture as a whole, and is most pronounced in the large island groups on the periphery, Hawaii, the Marquesas, and New Zealand. It is termed Indo-Polynesian because the sources are to be found in regions long dominated by Indian religious influence. Second in importance is the region in which Tangaloa was regarded as supreme being, a region nearer the centre of recent cultural evolution, namely, Samoa, Tonga, and the Society Islands. Later intrusions or borrowings come from Melanesia and America, the Melanesian coming by way of Fiji and Tonga, or by borrowings of Polynesian voyagers, the American by the borrowing of Polynesian adventurers who found their way to Mexico and Peru. The IndoPolynesian religions show traces of ancient Indic, south-east Asiatic, historic Hindu, and Chinese influ ences. It may be that the fusion of the first three may have taken place in south-east Asia or Indonesia before they were carried to Polynesia, while the Chinese influences may have been brought in by stray Chinese Tan-kah-lo—seafarers of the river population.
Article PDF
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Research Items. Nature 120, 817–819 (1927). https://doi.org/10.1038/120817a0
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/120817a0