The yam god dess of Nukulau
IN Roman mythology, Ceres was the goddess of agriculture and the harvest.
She was admired because her favour ensured that humans enjoyed plentiful harvests and fruitful crops.
She was the equivalent of Demeter, the ancient Greek goddess of the harvest and of fertility of the earth, believed to have taught man the art of growing and harvesting.
She too was revered because her disapproval meant hunger, famine and death.
In Nukulau Village in the highlands of Ra, a supernatural being associated with bountiful harvests of native yams had existed for countless generations.
She was Davovo, believed to reside at a sacred mount, on the bottom of a low-lying basin at the outskirts of the village boundary.
Because of the geographic isolation of Nukulau, which straddles the misty mountain range of the Ra/Naitasiri border, Davovo has remained virtually unknown to the world beyond the forested confines of the district of Nasau.
Popular during the olden and early days of Christian influence in Fiji, her status in the community today has sadly diminished.
Rituals that were once accorded to her with pride and tenacity are not performed anymore. They only exist in people’s memories to remind them of a time long gone.
And as time ushers in new developments in Nukulau’s hilly paradise, powerful and beyond people’s ability to control them, Davovo and the significance of yam cultivation hinge on the mercy of time.
To get to Nukulau, made up of the three yavusa of Togovere, Burelevu and Naisogobuli, one has to survive a rugged ride to the heavens through the gravelly Nasau access road, off the main Kings Road.
Here the soil is a blend of clay, sand and loam which enjoys good forest cover, making it the ideal environment for subsistence and commercial agriculture and native forest trees.
The altitude of the village also provides plenty of rain and intermittent sunshine during the wet end of the cyclone season.
The origin of Davovo is unclear, except that since time immemorial she endowed the fertile land with indigenous Fijians’ most priced crop – the uvi or yams.
In fact, yams were so prominent in olden day Fiji that five months of the year were named in association with yam cultivation and harvest. The yams, beking elongates in form, was treated as the male phalus in some parts of the Pacific.
September was known among the iTaukei as Vula i Vavakada, a time when shoots of recently planted yam tubers were tied to reeds to enable them to climb up.
The month was also the last month of the regular planting season and was preceded by the planting month called Vula i Cukicuki when the soil was prepared for the year’s seed yams.
The Sunday Times and Na iLalakai teams recently visited Nukulau, and spoke to kinsmen and women about their history, unique traditions and way of life.
I quickly realised we had arrived at the very time when, generations ago, yams would have been harvested, eaten and stored away in yam barns or lololo by the men of Nukulau since March was known as the yam harvest month or Vula i Kelikeli. The word kelikeli or digging is generally associated with yams.
Yams were harvested when their leaves turned brown and started to fall.
They were not only harvested for their nutritional value. They were preserved for food during off season and used as seedlings for the new planting cycle. This was because yam was the most durable of native root crops and some varieties remained edible for up to 12 months.
March was also a time when gasau plants flowered on rolling hills and rain fell frequently, important for the fattening of the duruka flower.
On the coast, the Pacific Golden Prover (dilio) gathered in large numbers in readiness for their yearly flight to breed in the Arctic tundra of Siberia and Alaska. Crustaceans were plentiful while fish were scarce, a phenomenon iTaukei people called drava.
Yavusa Burelevu member, Emosi Loloma, was the brave villager who volunteered to show the team the hallowed abode of the revered Davovo. He also kindly demonstrated how to appease and seek her mystic blessings.
“According to what was passed down to us, in the olden days men would go to Davovo with pride and zeal,” Emosi said.
“Nowadays, we’ve stopped going because Christianity has branded these unique traditional practices as ungodly and evil.”
In Nukulau, like most parts of Fiji, yam was the king crop, signifying power, status and the harmony between the people, the land and their culture, and the divine.
It was planted with great pride to ensure there was food security, people were adequately fed and there was enough for social and religious obligations.
As long as villagers respected the land and diligently caried out their duties to the vanua, Davovo was happy to pour out blessings to the people in the form of handsome yam harvests.
All that the deity needed was a token of respect and obedience from the men of the village.
“Men were required to gift Davovo with firewood from balabala sa, the branch of a type of wild fern,” Emosi continued.
As soon as this was done, yams would emerge in the plantation. Even wild yams flourished in the forest.
“We don’t take balabala sa to Davovo anymore and we don’t plant and harvest yams like we used to.”
The relationship between Nukulau men as yam planters, and divine power, can also be found in other parts of Fiji and Melanesia.
While the details are sketchy, it is possible that the visits to Davovo by the men of Nuku
lau were done at a specific time, possibly at the end of the planting season, three of four months before the first harvest.
The event might have involved meke and yaqona ceremony, special costumes and tabu, and the knowledge of these rituals would have been passed down ardently until they were at odds with Christian dogma.
In the district of Tokaimalo for instance, the chief would send his matanivanua to summon all clan heads.
When all were gathered, yaqona was mixed and special prayers were offered to the god for an abundant yam harvest.
People were not allowed to plant and eat yam until the sevu was performed. This was the most significant agricultural ritual, important for the continued blessings upon the soil.
“In the olden days, there was always enough to eat. This was attributed to our superior yam harvest,” said Sitivenu Seuseu, a member of Yavusa Naisogobuli.
“Women would boil water in pots and walk to the nearest shrubbery outside the house. Within minutes they’d be back with yams, even before their husbands returned from the plantation.”
Today, yam planting is not a popular activity in the village.
Cassava, dalo and bananas have taken precedence, foreign staples like rice and flour are invading homes and kitchen tables and young men who are educated have moved to towns and cities.
All this while, Davovo’s mount remains a quiet and shunned place at the fringes of the village, ready to arouse the interest of the curious traveller who’d show interest in Nukulau’s past and unique blessings.
“It is such a pity that many people look at mana like something we get from the devil,” an informant said during a grog session.
“Our bountiful yam harvest was our mana and we’ve lost it because we’ve thrown them away and abandoned our traditional practices that once made us unique in the world.”
“If we are not careful, we will lose all the precious things we have and own, including our songs, dances, stories and work of art.”
As the traditional significance of Davovo and yam planting pass into oblivion, together with the rituals associated with them, villagers see the dire situation as an opportunity to perhaps revive what used to be a proud activity and practice.
The visit and interest from this newspaper has invigorated people’s sense of duty and responsibility towards keeping alive their unique stories, traditional practices and ways of life.
Most of all, they realise that without these, there would be less or nothing at all, left behind for future generations.
■ History being the subject it is, a group’s version of events may not be the same as that held by another group. When publishing one account, it is not our intention to cause division or to disrespect other oral traditions. Those with a different version can contact us so we can publish your account of history too — Editor.