Salt

Trade in native salt ceased in the 1960s when salt bought in stores and received in payment from Europeans stationed in the Jimi and Simbai became freely available. Prior to contact trade in salt was of considerable importance. Rappaport (1968) has stressed the utilitarian, nutritional value of salt, though McArthur (1974) suggests he overestimated the importance of salt to Maring survival.^[7] My own impression is that the Kundagai neither traded in salt to the extent that the Tsembaga seem to have done from Rappaport's remarks nor valued salt as much for its addition to the diet. Rather, it seems to have been valued for its use as a trade good. Indeed, as I argue below, it is misleading to categorize trade goods as utilitarian and nonutilitarian when the goods may be used both to sustain life (if indeed that was the case with salt) and to exchange for other items of no direct subsistence value.

The Kundagai obtained six salt products. Five of these were mineral salts, the last, kiyop , was produced from the ash of a plant of the same name (Polypodium sp.). The salts timbi and rengen (glossed:

bunk ) were produced from pools near streams of the same names near Bank (Down-Simbai). Wum salt was refined from pools at Gai (Down-Simbai), while kanji came from a pool, apparently in Melpa territory, near Timbunki (Cross-Jimi). The exact origin of the last salt type, aka , is unknown. The Kundagai only rarely obtained it, in exchange for plumes and furs, mainly from nearby Up-Jimi communities said to have acquired it from Wum-Tsenga and other Cross-Jimi areas. Aka possibly came from Enga or Wahgi salt factories (see Hughes 1977).

Aka and timbi were considered to be superior in taste, followed by rengen , then wum and kanji , with kiyop least esteemed. Poorer-quality salts were sometimes improved by mixing them with better kinds.

Of the different salts only kiyop was probably widely produced in the Jimi and Simbai. I have only one record of trade in this salt, exported Up-Jimi in exchange for a pig.

The bunk varieties, from Down-Simbai, were often processed by the Kundagai. They traveled to Bank and collected saline water with the permission of kinsmen there. This was carried home in bamboo cylinders. The water was then evaporated slowly in clay vats built over a fire, and the salt residue collected. Bunk salts were also imported from Up-Simbai neighbors of the Bank salt-pool owners and, less frequently, from the lower Jimi. In turn, bunk salts were exported Up-Jimi in exchange for pigs, stone axes and, prior to 1945, Lesser Bird of Paradise plumes. Much salt sent Up-Jimi, especially to Kompiai, was redirected Cross-Jimi to the Wum-Tsenga axe makers. Some was also sent Down-Jimi to Bokapai and from thence Cross-Jimi to Rinyimp—that is, toward axe-making communities.

I have no case records of trade in the other three salt types, which were only rarely acquired by the Kundagai. Salt from Gai and Timbunki is said to have been extracted occasionally by the Kundagai, although since better-quality bunk salts were readily available it is unlikely that the Kundagai traded in these salts to any great degree.