SULKA WAR CLUB

A fine and rare war-club which is of the rarest form amongst the four or five typologies from the area. The striking head is composed of seven tiers of interspaced knobs under a conical
stabbing point. The grip is part of the prolongation of the haft with the butt as an enlarged conical finial. These clubs were rarely collected compared to other types of Sulka weapons and more rarely are they of great aesthetic value like the present example

Tumiup People, Sulka Language group, Wide Bay New Britain, Bismarck Archipelago, PNG, Melanesia. Hard wood with a very good patina of age and use. Carved with neolithic tools.
128 cm. XIXth century.

Literature: Published : CASSE-TÊTE II - Clubs & Weapons of Oceania. Galerie Meyer, Paris, 2022, pp. 54/55

See : Parkinson, Richard : Dreissig Jahre in der Südsee: Land und Leute, Sitten und Gebräuche im Bismarckarchipel und auf den deutschen Salomoinseln. Strecker & Schröder, Stuttgart, 1907, p. 229, PL. 32.

See another in the Linden Museum, Suttgart : https://sammlung-digital.lindenmuseum.de/de/objekt/keule-waffe_14945