Page 61 - Micronesia

he labor of the women guaranteed an these canoes were considered some of the
T adequate supply of food year round
and thus gave them high social and politi-
cal importance in the community. The men,
freed from the time-consuming and physi-
cally demanding task of farming, devoted
their energies to other village affairs,
primarily the construction of public build-
ings, canoe houses and elaborate stone
causeways, docks and tree-lined stone
paths. Politics was foremost on the minds
as was inter-village warfare. Competition
was, and still is, a highly motivating force
between individuals, clans, villages, and
states. Historically there was a great power
struggle between the north and the south,
a rivalry that continues to this day. The arts fare were learned. The interior beams and
flourished. Women were fine weavers and
wove intricate baskets, blankets, and sails
for canoes. The men worked with wood and
carved elaborate bowls, plates and large,
intricate food containers that were inlaid
with shell. Master craftsmen built great war
canoes nearly sixty feet long and sleek sail-
ing canoes as long as thirty-three feet with
a beam of a mere fourteen inches. Though
finest in all of Micronesia, the most out-
standing example of Palauan craftsmanship
was the bai, a gathering place for the men
of the village. The bai was a masterpiece of
Micronesian architecture. Built with large,
heavy planks from trees that were felled
and carved without the benefit of metal
tools, the high-peaked structure was held
together by nothing more than the precise
of fit of the wooden beams, then lashed to-
gether with coconut sennit rope. The most
elaborately constructed bai functioned as
a meeting place or council house for the
governing chiefs of the village. Other bai
served as clubhouses - gathering places for
the men of the village where the traditional
skills of fishing, hunting, building and war- the power to rescind chiefly status. Women
outside gables of each bai were decorated
with carved and painted stories depicting
historic events of the village, humorous
tales and legends of importance to the
community.
he early Palauans developed a complex
T and highly organized social system that
today mystifies all but the most dedicated
anthropologist. In the Palauan matrilineal
system, which still exists, nuclear families
and extended families, called clans, were
related through the mother’s side of the
family. The mother’s brother had a role
nearly equal to that of the natural father
in providing for the children. And many
children were adopted, always within the
extended family and often as a means
to manipulate land, wealth and human
resources. Men ruled as chiefs, but it was
the women who chose those chiefs and had
also held the money of the clan. Money
made from beads of colored glass or high-
fired clay, substances not known to exist in
Palau, was used in a complex system of ex-
change. Each piece was named, its previous
clan owners known and its specific shape,
as individual as a fingerprint, committed to
memory in the minds of certain elders. Even
today, much of a clan’s history can be told
through its money.