Social and cultural dynamics in early Marquesan history

Abstract

This study is concerned with the early social and political history of the Marquesas Islands in eastern Polynesia. This history is seen in part as a cultural process, and as one which cannot be dissociated from a wider Polynesian context of development and transformation. The first part reconstructs indigenous Marquesan social relations, drawing particularly upon evidence from Taiohae, Nukuhiva, and Tahuata. Although Marquesan societies could be described as ‘chiefdoms’, chiefs lacked potency because they were not associated with vital prosperity rituals - arguably the basis of chiefly power in many parts of Polynesia. Various other individuals, particularly landholders and shamanistic priests, appeared to have benefitted from an erosion of chiefly power. The interpenetration of a diffuse power structure and gender relations is examined. In chapter 4 it is argued that a particular system existed in which the process of competitive feasting played a key role in producing and maintaining prestige. Variations within the Marquesas are examined. In chapter 5 the apparent association between weak chiefs and powerful shamanistic priests is discussed. On the basis of evidence from various parts of Polynesia it is argued that important shamans are generally found where political devolution - specifically, a contraction of chiefly agency - has taken place. Where a strong ideology of hierarchical chiefly encompassment persists, shamans are non-existent or marginal. Chapters 6 and 7 deal with the transformations of the system during the first decades of intensive contact. Captain David Porter, who occupied the islands and involved himself in local disputes in 1813, was perceived as a conqueror chief and caused a new interest to develop on the part of Marquesan chiefs in links with Europeans and European weapons. The consequences of this reorientation on Tahuata in the 1830s and on Fatuiva in the 1850s are discussed. Chapter 8 moves to a consideration of the consequences of famine for the Marquesan polity and the longer term process of social transformation. Marquesan society is seen to reflect an earlier process of stratification which entailed the formation of a group of landholders subordinate to chiefs which was followed by an erosion of chiefly agency leaving unequal economic relations intact. The pertinence of this process for gender relations is considered, and theories of Polynesian social evolution are reconsidered in the light of the Marquesan material. The prologue and epilogue explore the peculiarities of the Marquesan case in the context of myth. Some Marquesan stories of predatory female characters reflect a wider concern with invasion, displacement and ravaging - a preoccupation which is explicable given periodic social crises involving the breakdown of reciprocal relationships. Show more