Book
The nobility and the chiefly tradition in the modern Kingdom of Tonga
The Polynesian Society • (42) • Published In 1978 • Pages: 166
By: Marcus, George E..
AbstractBrief abstract written by HRAF anthropologists who have done the subject indexing for the document
This is a study of the adjustment of Tonga chiefs to modern society. In the traditional Tonga chiefdom, parallel lines of authority and rank passed through male and female lines, respectively. Chiefs controlled land and labor as titled heads of territorial-based bilateral kindreds (KAINGA). In 1875, under Western influence, a constitutional parliamentary monarchy was established to centralize power and control chiefly privilege, although not eradicate it altogether. Twenty chiefly titles with landholding rights and political representation in parliament were retained. Marcus examines the plight of these titleholders in a modernizing society and their status in regard to the old disenfranchised aristocracy and a newly emerging elite of commoners. In what he calls a compromise culture, he shows how chiefly privilege, or what's left of it, is negotiated in a value system that still partly adheres to a sacred honor ('EIKI) but also cleverness (POTO).
- SubjectsDocument-level OCM identifiers given by the anthropology subject indexers at HRAF
- Real property
- Status, role, and prestige
- Kindreds and ramages
- Government regulation
- Chief executive
- Religious denominations
- Education system
- cultureCulture name from the Outline of World Cultures (OWC)
- Tongans
- HRAF PubDateThe date HRAF published the document
- 2006
- RegionThe area the document pertains to
- Oceania
- Sub RegionThe more specific area the document pertains to, which is located within the Region
- Polynesia
- Document TypeMay include journal articles, essays, collections of essays, monographs, or chapters/parts of monographs
- Book
- Evaluation
- Creator TypeThe type of person writing the document, e.g. Ethnographer, Missionary, Archaeologist, Folklorist, Linguist, Indigenous Person, and so on.
- Ethnologist
- Document Rating A ranking done by HRAF anthropologists based on the strength of the source material on a scale of 1 to 5, as follows: 1 - poor; 2 - fair; 3 - good, useful data, but not uniformly excellent; 4 - excellent secondary data; 5 - excellent primary data.
- 4: Excellent Secondary Data
- 5: Excellent Primary Data
- AnalystThe HRAF anthropologist who subject indexed the document and prepared other materials for the eHRAF culture/tradition collection
- Ian Skoggard; 2004
- Field DateThe date the researcher conducted the fieldwork or archival research that produced the document
- 1972-1975
- Coverage DateThe date or dates that the information in the document pertains to
- 1875-1975
- Coverage PlaceLocation of the research culture or tradition (often a smaller unit such as a band, community, or archaeological site)
- Tonga
- NotesAdditional notes
- by George E. Marcus
- Includes bibliographical references (p. 163-166)
- LCSHLibrary of Congress Subject Headings
- Tongans