WORDS YOU WILL MEET
A short glossary
Each meaning below is the museum’s own sentence about that word, taken from the chapter named with it. Words the museum does not define are left out rather than guessed at.
- drua
- The drua is a Fijian double-hulled sailing canoe: two hulls of unequal length joined by a raised deck.The drua, Fiji’s great double canoe →
- camakau
- The camakau is a single-hulled canoe with an outrigger float, used for fishing and travel between nearby islands.Camakau and outrigger canoes →
- kalia
- The Tongan double canoe (kalia) was developed from Fijian drua designs.Voyaging between Fiji, Tonga and Samoa →
- bure
- A bure is a traditional Fijian house built of timber, reeds and thatch.The village and the bure →
- koro
- The village (koro) is the centre of community life, with houses set around an open green.The village and the bure →
- yavusa, mataqali, tokatoka
- Yavusa, mataqali and tokatoka describe important kin and community groupings; their organisation has varied across places and time.Clans and chiefs →
- yaqona (kava)
- Yaqona (kava) is a drink made from the root of the Piper methysticum plant.Yaqona and ceremony →
- sevusevu
- A visitor presents yaqona to the village as a sevusevu, asking to be welcomed.Yaqona and ceremony →
- tanoa and bilo
- The drink is mixed in a large wooden bowl called a tanoa and served in a coconut-shell cup (bilo).Yaqona and ceremony →
- vesi
- Vesi (Intsia bijuga) is a dense hardwood prized for canoes, kava bowls and lali drums.Forests and the land →
- masi
- Masi is bark cloth made by soaking and beating the inner bark of the paper mulberry tree.Masi — bark cloth →
- lali
- A lali is a slit drum carved from a single log and beaten with two sticks.The lali drum →
- tabua
- A tabua is a polished sperm-whale tooth, usually hung on a cord of plaited coconut fibre.Tabua — the whale’s tooth →
- bure kalou
- A bure kalou was a temple house with a very tall, steep roof, where ancestral gods were honoured; priests (bete) spoke for the gods.Old gods and the missionaries →
- girmit and Girmitiya
- “Girmit” comes from “agreement”, the contract the labourers signed; those who came are called Girmitiya.Recruitment and the agreement →
- the lines
- Labourers lived in rows of barrack rooms called “lines”, with little privacy.Life in the lines →
- Fiji Hindi
- Fiji Hindi grew out of the languages they brought with them.After girmit →
- meke
- Dance forms such as the meke carry stories and history from one generation to the next.Living Fiji today →
The museum’s text is awaiting cultural and historical review, and that includes these definitions. If a word is explained wrongly here, the correction matters more than the convenience of having it listed.