Volume 03 Item 03: Walter Edmund Roth Bulletin No. 13 Fighting Weapons, 1904-1906 - Page 19

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the dried (yellow) strips from the outer covering of the stalks of the "Rock Lily" (Dendrobium bigibbum Lindl.) orchids. The shell half haft is formed of two ovalent pieces of pera shell (nielo diadema, Lam) attached with beeswax, while a few Abrus precatorius beans may help to ornament the edges in between: the angle at which the shell-haft is affixed varies a good deal, and appears to depend on individual caprice.
10. The Koko-minni blacks of the middle Palmer R., Laura R., Maytown, etc have 'iron-wood' (Erythrophlaeum laboucherii) spear- throwers. The blade is long, comparatively narrow (though wider at the centre), with gradually sloping proximal (handle) extremity*. The long peg, which has a deep transverse neck in it to catch into the extremity of the spear-butt, is formed from an Acacia and fixed onto the blade by tendon passing through two holes in it, this portion of the peg being accordingly flattened from side to side, into two holes correspondingly drilled into the blade (Fig. 16): the ligature is covered with Grevillea cement, the back of the peg remaining free of it (Fig. 17). The haft, fixed at from anything of an acute to an obtuse angle is either of Nielo shell (KMI. torng or ye-cha) bartered from the Musgrave [River] etc, or else of a lath of wood doubled upon itself. The spear-thrower is known here as borna.
11. At Cape Bedford, on the Endeavour and Bloomfield R[ivers] and at Butchers Hill, the iron-wood spear-thrower has a comparatively long blade, even width throughout, and a short peg with a slight neck. The peg, which is cut from Petalostigma quadriloculare, [F.M.] (KYI. cha dun-jo), is neither flattened nor drilled but tied with twine tendon etc onto two holes drilled into the blade (Fig. 18), the cement covering the back of the peg (Fig.19): a similar arrangement to what is met with on the Pennefather. The cement used is usually that of the iron-wood, but the Grevillea** is preferable when