Weapons of war.

The Fijians were once a most war-like people and warriors used a wide variety of wooden war clubs with different functions; specialist clubs for slicing, breaking bones, crushing or piercing skulls, throwing clubs and highly decorated cubs that were simply for show.


This is an Ula club, designed to be thrown with great force at the enemy. It dates from the early 19th century. Unfortunately, of course, if you missed the enemy then they were liable to throw it back at you! The bright white inlayed object is a human tooth. In his book Fijian Weapons and Warfare Fergus Clunie, one time Curator of the Fiji Museum, had this to say: "As with the two-handed clubs, a tally of the throwing club's kills was kept by inlaying their teeth, one tooth per kill, in the head of the throwing club, this being deliberate inlay and not the chance result of the victims having been 'clubbed' in their mouths. A tally of the kills was also sometimes kept by nicking or notching the handle."

A rather unpleasant weapon of war but not nearly as bad as the obscene horrors that we ourselves deploy. We might all sleep more soundly if Boris, the Donald,  Kim Jong-un, Vladimir Putin and the like, only had clubs to rattle.