The Three Voyages of Captain Cook Round the World. Vol. I. Being the First of the First Voyage.Cook, James
History
The Three Voyages of Captain Cook Round the World. Vol. I. Being the First of the First Voyage.
Cook, James
Cook, James, 1728-1779 -- Travel; Explorers -- Great Britain -- Biography; Voyages around the world -- History -- 18th century
It is impossible but that, in relating incidents, many particulars with
respect to the customs, opinions, and works of these people should be
anticipated; to avoid repetition, therefore, I shall only supply
deficiencies. Of the manner of disposing of their dead, much has been
said already. I must more explicitly observe, that there are two places
in which the dead are deposited; one a kind of shed, where the flesh is
suffered to putrify; the other an enclosure, with erections of stone,
where the bones are afterwards buried. The sheds are called TUPAPOW, and
the enclosures MORAI. The Morais are also places of worship.
As soon as a native of Otaheite is known to be dead, the house is filled
with relations, who deplore their loss, some by loud lamentations, and
some by less clamorous, but more genuine expressions of grief. Those who
are in the nearest degree of kindred, and are really affected by the
event, are silent; the rest are one moment uttering passionate
exclamations in a chorus, and the next laughing and talking without the
least appearance of concern. In this manner the remainder of the day on
which they assemble is spent, and all the succeeding night. On the next
morning the body is shrouded in their cloth, and conveyed to the
sea-side upon a bier, which the bearers support upon their shoulders,
attended by the priest, who, having prayed over the body, repeats his
sentences during the procession. When it arrives at the water’s edge, it
is set down upon the beach; the priest renews his prayers, and taking up
some of the water in his hands, sprinkles it towards the body, but not
upon it. It is then carried back forty or fifty yards, and soon after
brought again to the beach, where the prayers and sprinkling are
repeated: it is thus removed backwards and forwards several times, and
while these ceremonies have been performing a house has been built, and
a small space of ground railed in. In the centre of this house, or
Tupapow, posts are set up to support the bier, which is at length
conveyed thither, and placed upon it, and here the body remains to
putrify till the flesh is wholly wasted from the bones.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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