- Collection type
- Object
- Description
- Knife "nifo'oti". Single edged iron blade with hook on the end and bound wooden haft. [SM 17/04/2007]
- Long description
- Knife "nifo'oti". Single edged iron blade with hook on the end and bound wooden haft. The haft is bound with several bands of plaited plant fibre and three bands of copper alloy, which are secured with roundheaded copper alloy nails or tacks. [SM 17/04/2007]
- Date / Period
- Date made: Before 1890
- Date collected
- circa 1890
- Acquisition information
- Donated: 1940
- Materials and processes
- Material Steel Metal, Material Wood Plant, Material Plant Fibre, Material Copper Alloy Metal, Material String, Process Forged (Metal), Process Bound, Process Plaited, Process Nailed
- Dimensions
- Length: max 764 mm, Width: max 93 mm
- Object numbers
- Accession number: 1940.5.30
- Research and responses
The following notes are drawn from research compiled by Andy Mills as part of the DCF Cutting Edge Project in 2006-2007. This weapon, considered by many to be synonymous with traditional Samoan weaponry, is a fine example of the complex historical blurring that the post-European-contact period often demonstrates (Mallon, 2001). Nifo‘oti are generally termed ‘bush knives’ when spoken of by Samoans in English, and the designation ‘Head Knife’ which appears on Objects PRM is reductive, inaccurate and undoubtedly highly offensive to the Samoan people. The Samoans were not head-hunters by any definition other than an arguable prehistoric one, and certainly not in the 19th century when these knives were made. In the current postcolonial climate of Polynesia, the Samoan people are one of the most politically motivated, active and vocal, and I would recommend a [SIC] on the database at the very least to acknowledge that we are aware of this insinuation’s inaccuracy. The term nifo‘oti means ‘tooth at the end’, and clearly refers to the hook. Nifo‘oti are to be found with metal blades, such as these examples, or carved from toa (Casuarina Equisetifolia) to skeuomorphically represent the same hafted hooked blade.
Most scholars of Polynesian material culture are in agreement that the nifo‘oti is not a weapon form indigenous to Samoa, and the existence of the same form in imported steel and wood seals the question in my mind. As we also see steel and wooden machetes and cutlasses elsewhere in Western Polynesia during the 19th century, the nifo‘oti represents a class of imported steel weapons, of which there were not enough to satisfy demand, and of which there were consequently numerous wooden facsimiles carved. Anyone who has a basic familiarity with European farming implements will recognise these steel nifo‘oti as typical traditional British billhooks – tools which continue to be used for all manner of light-to-medium tree-cutting work, and particularly for laying hedges.
Numerous fanciful interpretations have been postulated for the hook on a nifo‘oti, from it being designed for impaling the removed head of a defeated enemy in order to take it home in triumph, to hooking under the enemy’s ribs, in order to pull him from the front of battle, so that he might be attacked more easily. Both ignore the fact of the much lesser length of nifo‘oti compared to almost all Samoan clubs, and certainly spears. This is not to deny that they were weapons – and unquestionably very effective ones – but they were modified agricultural tools, traded as agricultural tools, and most probably used far more often for their original purpose. [SM 17/03/2008]
1940.5.30
Knife "nifo'oti". Single edged iron blade with hook on the end and bound wooden haft. [SM 17/04/2007]
On display
1940.5.30
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