Formosa Hill Tribe Swords ( for Yuanzhumin )

[yuanzhumin]

As I suggested in my second post on the swapforum, you will find a lot of informations on taiwanese tribes on Wikipedia. For more precise questions, no problem it's my pleasure to answer if I can. Rick, your sword is in fact from Taiwan. It is from the Rukai tribe and If I'm not mistaking should be a little over 50cm long. The Rukai and the Puyuma are two sub-groups of the Paiwan. They share a lot of common things with the Paiwan but still have their own particularities. They are living in the southern mountains of the island (if you have a good atlas, they are in the mountains 20 to 30 km away from the southern city of Pingtung) and are around 10 000 thousands today (the Paiwan proper are around 60 000 and the Puyuma, 10 000). These three tribes are mountain or hill tribes (by opposition with some other lowland or plain tribes of Taiwan). They were fierce headhunters, in a ritual purpose. They were among the last with the Bunun and the Atayal to fight against the Japanese before they were "pacified" in the twenties. But still some case of head huntings were reported at the end of the fourties. They were among the best soldiers when they fought in the rank of the Japanese army in the Pacific war (Taiwan was a japanese colony at that time and the aborigines considered themselves, after their pacification, as loyal subjects of the Emperor). They were very well known as military scouts, and if I don't mistake one of the last lost japanese soldiers to reappear from the jungle of South East Asia in the 70's was in fact a taiwanese aborigine. Concerning the swords or knives, the Paiwan (and the sub-groups which the Rukai are among) and the Yami that inhabits the Orchid Island (Lanyu in chinese, Botel Tobago former name), that are very well known for their pirogues, adorns their sheaths with motives. In the case of the Rukai, like on your sword, Rick, the serpent is fundamental as it is reprensenting the main ancestor of the tribe, a pattern that can be found on nearly every Paiwan objects.