A large room, filled with antique books, tribal masks, war shields, daggers, arrows and countless other objects from the tribes of New Guinea, all smelling of age and mystery, gave the impression of having been deserted decades ago. However at a closer look one would notice a desk strewn with piles of papers, behind which sat a long-haired figure, on whose face the sun, wind and rain had carved deep lines. It was like seeing an ancient hardwood carving left lying around in a village. The old anthropologist, finding time between the duties that the position of a museum curator requires, was transferring onto a computer hard drive the data from field notes recorded during his adventurous expeditions, from a time when New Guinea was his entire world and its people his only family.

Bill would sigh when, in some of the old photos, he saw the familiar faces of those now dead, some from grief at what they had lost of their traditional world in the face of the modern world. On those faces he did not see so much the warrior’s headdress or the aggressive boars’ tusks protruding through their nostrils; those faces evoked in him the warmest memories of hunting adventures and swimming in rivers inhabited by crocodiles that might freeze the blood in someone else. He ignored the risks, excited by the satisfaction of discovering something new among peoples and cultures known about by very few; even those who might have heard of them could be excused for thinking they were the product of someone’s imagination.

Cannibalism in New Guinea and Melanesia was not an unusual practice and until the 1870s, very few who had the misfortune to be shipwrecked around New Guinea or the Solomon Islands survived to bring home their story from the regions where, as one missionary expressed himself: ‘men walk hand in hand with the devil.’ There was no mercy for anyone who was not a member of the community. Members of other tribes, or outsiders in general, were considered suitable only for a ritual sacrifice or a good meal. However, behind these overt reasons for fighting were political concerns – the competition for power.

Headhunting attacks on other villages were an important part of male activity since the strength and reputation of the community depended on their success in this endeavor. The preparations for such ventures might last for days or weeks. On the Sepik River, they might make a human sacrifice at the completion of a new war canoe, slit gong or men’s cult house. Before attacking an enemy village, they prepared their weapons and when the canoes were ready, they carried out a divination ritual to find out whether or not their raid might be successful. When they returned, if successful they offered the heads to their ancestral spirits, resident in the human and animal forms of carved images. Knowing how antagonistic the tribes have been to each other, and considering the extremes of geography in such a country as New Guinea, it is not hard to comprehend why around 5 million people speak more than 750 languages.

Many decades of colonial rule had to pass, during which time several missionaries and government officers lost their lives, before cannibalism and headhunting were effectively prohibited. Naturally, as always throughout history, anywhere in the world, people have not abandoned their traditions easily and change has been slow. Many tribal rituals survive even today, although the Christian church is doing its utmost to destroy all traces of the old beliefs, whether ‘good’ or ‘bad.’ Bill, on the contrary, leaned towards preservation of the ancient traditions but kept a lookout for his own head…