War Axe (Gaman)

Trapezoidal iron blade, curved oval at the top, the two sloping sides concave. One side of the blade is ground on both sides, the other ends in a point towards the top. Thorny leaf and secured with an iron cuff (7cm). Below this handle is decorated with four (1.5cm) braided rattan ribbons, between which the three (3cm wide) spaces are wrapped with rattan strips. Another braided rattan ribbon at the lower end of the shaft. The middle section of the shaft is grooved and - to match the rattan color - colored black-brown. Axes of this kind are not mentioned in the literature by the Ifugao. It was marked by the collector as "used for headhunting", but this can only have been the case before 1908, the year when the mountain province was finally pacified. In 1938 (1938: 449) Lamprecht recorded a few reports from eyewitnesses of earlier headhunt campaigns. After that, however, only three weapons were used: spear with iron blade (pa'hul), shield (hapiyo) and knife (ba'ngig).

Lit .: Lamprecht, F .: The Mayawyaw Ritual: Death and Death Ritual. Publ. Of the Cath. Anthropol. Conference VolIV, No. 3 1938

"gaman, pin-nang" in the Bontok language.
see: Kohnen, Norbert, 1986, Igorot. Everyday life and traditional ways of healing among Filipino mountain tribes, Triltsch Verlag Düsseldorf, p. 104

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Map Museum of World Cultures in Frankfurt (Weltkulturen Museum)

Date

Before 1930

Identifier

43624

Origin

Banaue, Philippines

(Ifugao)
(Culture of the Ifugao people values kinship, family ties, religious and cultural beliefs. They're unique among all ethnic groups in North Luzon for their interesting customs and traditions. The Spanish never were able to take control of the Ifugao territory.)

Materials

Iron, wood, rattan

Physical Dimensions

Length: L. sheet: 33 cm
Object size: H. sheet max .: 7 cm
Length: overall length: 52.5 cm

Provenance

Purchased from William Beyer

Acquisition Date

1964

Display status

Not on display

Acknowledgements

Contributed by Yanni R. Hernandez,
Photo: Weltkulturen Museum (Museum of World Cultures) Frankfurt, Germany

Official Website

https://www.weltkulturenmuseum.de/en

Collection

Museum of World Cultures in Frankfurt (Weltkulturen Museum)

Source

Translated from German by MPMC RA's and editors. Record accessed November 2021.

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“War Axe (Gaman),” Mapping Philippine Material Culture, accessed April 18, 2024, https://philippinestudies.uk/mapping/items/show/14909.

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