This bone dagger from the Iatmil people, Middle Sepik River, Papua New Guinea, is fashioned from a cassowary bone, which has been sharpened to a point and decorated with an ancestral clay face with shell inlay and painted with ochre pigments. The head of the dagger has a plume of cassowary feathers. In the lower areas of the Sepik, weapons and tools are made from available material. The cassowary is a large bird whose bones provide an ideal material for a sharp implement. These daggers are carried in a woven belt or in bracelets on the upper arm. While used in hand to hand combat and hunting, this one with an ornate style is for ceremonial use.

The various daggers that are usually made from the bones of cassowary birds are worn in armbands. The “Payback Dagger” is used in rituals that return the spirit of a creature that has been killed to the source-of-all-things, so it can be born again to feed others on another day, or to avenge a person who has been wrongfully killed, This dagger has the face of a person who will be avenged. (FLG)

The vast majority of the populace in Papua New Guinea are Christians today. Prior to conversion, traditional beliefs included animism and ancestor worship.

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