Chapter 3.12 The coconut palm

Malcolm Ross and Bethwyn Evans

1. Introduction⇫

The products of the coconut palm are labelled by a complex terminology whose ancestry stretches back to Proto Oceanic (POc), a measure of their constant importance in the lives of Oceanic speakers.

2. The coconut palm⇫

Growing to between 20 and 30m in height, coconut palms are found in profusion along coasts and on lowlands throughout the Oceanic-speaking region. They need well drained, sandy soil, more than 1000 mm rain per year and plenty of sunlight. Because they tolerate salinity, they often grow along beaches (French 1986: 31). Coconuts appear to have spread from southeast Asia both naturally (coconuts float) and anthropogenically (carried in the canoes of early settlers).1

Just about every part of the palm and the fruit is used in traditional societies, and many of these parts are named. Because of the salience of the coconut in Oceanic cultures and because different uses are made of it at different stages of its growth, it is common for the fruit and palm to be given different names at different growth stages. These names are reconstructed in §3. Names for the parts of the fruit are reconstructed in §4 and for the parts of the palm other than the fruit in §5.

2.1. Cocos nucifera, coconut, TP, B kokonas, P kokonat (Arecaceae)⇫

POc *niuR appears to have been used in at least two senses: the fruit at any stage of growth, and the palm. A number of the glosses below are simply ‘coconut’: in all these cases the gloss almost certainly denotes both the fruit and the palm.

PMP *niuR ‘coconut, Cocos nucifera; ripe coconut (growth stage of Cocos nucifera)’ (Dempwolff 1938)
POc *niuR ‘coconut palm and/or fruit, Cocos nucifera’
Adm Loniu niu ‘coconut’ (Nevermann 1934)
Adm Titan niw ‘coconut, completely ripe’
NNG Kove niu ‘coconut’
NNG Numbami niwila ‘coconut’
NNG Kaiwa niuk ‘coconut’
NNG Lukep (matuk) niu ‘green coconut’
PT Gapapaiwa niura ‘coconut’
PT Iamalele niula ‘coconut (tree, nut, meat)’
PT Tawala neula ‘coconut’
PT Saliba niu ‘coconut’ (archaic)
PT Motu niu ‘coconut tree and mature fruit’
MM Bola niu ‘coconut’
MM Nalik nur ‘coconut’
MM Tabar niu ‘coconut’
MM Mono-Alu niunu ‘coconut’
TM Buma luro ‘coconut’
TM Nebao na-nə ‘coconut’
TM Asuboa u-ñio ‘coconut’
TM Tanibili no-ñio ‘coconut’
SES Gela niu ‘coconut palm, nut’
SES Kwaio niu ‘coconut’
SES Sa’a niu ‘coconut’
NCV Nokuku niu ‘coconut’
NCV Raga niu ‘coconut’
NCV Uripiv ne-ni ‘coconut’
NCV Paamese a-nii ‘green coconut w. soft flesh’
NCV Lewo niu ‘green drinking nut’
NCV South Efate na-niu ‘coconut’
NCal Nêlêmwa nu ‘coconut’
NCal Iaai (wa)nu ‘coconut’
NCal Xârâcùù nũ ‘coconut’
Mic Kiribati nii ‘coconut’
Mic Kosraean nu ‘coconut’
Mic Mokilese ni ‘coconut’
Mic Marshallese niy ‘coconut’
Mic Ponapean nī ‘coconut’
Mic Woleaian lǖ ‘coconut’
Mic Puluwatese nɨ̄ ‘coconut’
Mic Chuukese nɨ̄ ‘coconut’
Fij Wayan niu ‘coconut palm, nut’
Pn Tongan niu ‘coconut palm, nut’
Pn Tikopia niu ‘coconut palm, nut’

3. Growth stages of the coconut⇫

Right across Oceania, languages distinguish a number of growth stages of a coconut. These terminologies are often not cognate, but roughly agree on the semantic categories they distinguish.2 Sometimes a term for a growth stage becomes the generic term for coconut. For example, Lukep (Pono) (NNG) matuk and Mota (NCV) matig, both ‘coconut (generic)’ and reflexes of POc *matuqu ‘ripe coconut’, have displaced the reflex of POc *niuR ‘coconut (generic)’.3

The growth stages are distinguished according to the states of the various parts of the fruit (Figure 12.1, p.369). At and after its drinkable stage, a coconut consists of a hollow shell (the endocarp) lined with flesh (the endosperm) and filled with coconut water. The shell is surrounded by a thick husk (the mesocarp) composed of fibres (coir) and enclosed by an outer skin (the exocarp ).4 The shell has three germination pores that are visible on the shell once the husk is removed. It is through one of these that the radicle emerges when the embryo germinates.

3.1. Growth stage terminologies⇫

In the Oceanic view of the coconut’s life cycle, the first stage is the formation of the tiny fruit from the bud. The fruit then acquires liquid, then soft flesh, and becomes a green drinking coconut. The main reason to pick the nut at this stage is to drink its water: a big nut contains up to one litre. As it matures, the outer skin turns from green to brown, and the flesh becomes harder and thereby suitable for scraping as a food ingredient and for wringing to produce coconut ‘milk’ or ‘cream’ (vol.1, ch.6, §5.8, and ch.9, §2.2 and §7). The liquid becomes less and less drinkable. At this stage the coconut falls from the tree, the liquid solidifies into a spongy mass (the ‘apple’) and finally, given appropriate circumstances, germination occurs and the coconut sprouts to become a new palm. This contrasts markedly with a botanist’s view of the coconut’s life cycle (e.g. M. Foale 2003: 43–50), which begins with germination, describes the stages of leaf production and culminates in flowering and fruiting. The botanist’s view focusses on the palm, the Oceanic view on the fruit.

Sample growth stage terminologies from seven well distributed Oceanic languages are listed below. The Petats terminology is from an ethnography, the others from dictionaries. The Petats, Mota, Anejom, Wayan and Tikopia stages are given in chronological order by their sources, whilst the Gumawana and Arosi stages were gleaned from dictionaries one term at a time and we have ordered them as best we can. The terminologies vary in size from 8 stages to 14, but we should probably not take these differences too seriously, for reasons discussed in association with Table 12.1. The number of stages seems to be about right: Glennon & Glennon (2005) list 7 for Nehan, Fox (1955) 7 for Gela, T. Crowley (1992) 11 for Paamese, Thieberger (2006b) 10 for S Efate, Abo et al. (1976) 8-10 for Marshallese,5 Churchward (1959) 11 for Tongan. Waterhouse (1949) lists 18 for Roviana, in order but unfortunately not glossed.

The first three terminologies, for Gumawana, Petats and Arosi, have sets of terms that are distributed across the fairly obviously recognisable growth stages of the coconut.

Gumawana (PT): 9 stages
asipu ‘very small, not drinkable’
gavi ‘a bit bigger, not drinkable’
mosali ‘bigger, not drinkable’
bosibosi ‘large green, drinkable’
nakulamata ‘starts turning brown’
nugomoyao ‘brown but has not fallen yet’
nadada ‘dry and will fall’
nadaiyada ‘dry and fallen’
tabona ‘sprouted’
Petats (MM): 11 stages (Blackwood 1935: 310)
teo ‘very young nut’
pesis, peli ‘young nut before it contains liquid’
kakarut ‘nut containing liquid before flesh appears’
irabil ‘nut with thin flesh layer at the cn~amy stage (drinking coconut)’
kuvo ‘nut with meat a little firmer, also used for drinking’
rut ‘nut containing a little (bitter) liquid and thick flesh’
laŋ ‘nut, the flesh of which has hardened (dry cococut)’
pitor ‘mature nut, the outer skin of which is not yet dry’
tunun ‘nut, the kernel of which has become spongy’
tus, alaun ‘nut which has become dry and fallen to the ground’
hala ‘nut which has sprouted’
Arosi (SES): 12 stages (Fox 1978)
ʔoraamai ‘the first bud of a coconut’
kopu ‘newly formed fruit’
poku ‘young nut’
poru ‘green nut’
pʷaruru ‘young green drinking nut’
ʔobu ‘drinking nut’
niu pʷaikari ‘a nut still containing liquid’
niu kokoru ‘nut with hard flesh already formed’ (lit. ‘coconut egg-white’)
niu saramarai ‘dry nut’
doʔo ‘ripe, dark nut’ (lit. ‘black’)
niu matere ‘fallen mature nut’
niu bʷaʔo ‘very young palm’

The order of the Mota items below is that given by Codrington & Palmer (1896: 84), except that we have added vara, not included among their growth stage terms. However, their definitions (scattered under the various entries in the dictionary) suggest that their sequencing may be wrong, as pulutyar and pepeya appear to belong before vusa maremare (see discussion in association with Table 12.1).

Mota (NCV): 14 stages (Codrington & Palmer 1896)
wovaŋ ‘bud’
matmateɣapun ‘just set, like the eye of a yapun crab’
sutarara ‘shell just formed, liquid not yet drinkable’ (sus ‘breast’, tarara ‘never given birth’)
mʷalu ‘young green coconut, liquid not yet drinkable’
ɣarake pʷarat lit. ‘fat of meat’
[vusa] ɣorɣor ‘enough meat to scrape aflter drinking’ (yor ‘scrape’)
vusa ‘green coconut for drinking’
vusa maremare ‘nut with hard flesh’ (maremare ‘hard’)
vusa sisis ‘flesh can be scraped with a thumbnail’
pulut-ɣar ‘ripening, flesh sticks to scraper’ (lit. ‘stick.to scrape’)
pepeɣa ‘outer skin turning yellow’ (pepeya ‘yellow’)
pane uwa lit. ‘turtle fin’ 6
kor ‘ready to fall’ (kor ‘become dry, with heat or time’)
vara ‘a sprouting coconut’

The last three terminologies, Anejom, Wayan Fijian and Tikopia, differ from those above in that they appear to recognise no stages between a newly formed fruit and a drinkable green coconut, a fact that emerges clearly in Table 12.1. Whether these stages are less salient than others for speakers or whether the relevant terms are simply missing from the sources is not clear.

Anejom and Tikopia also recognise respectively three and four stages of sprouted coconut, but it can be argued that these are growth stages of the palm, not of the fruit. The other languages may have corresponding terms that are not listed as coconut growth stages.

Anejom (SV): 11 stages (Lynch 2001c)
nacomʷ ‘flower’
nohowa-nhuau ‘very small coconut’ (lit. ‘fruit a.boil’)
inhivañereri ‘green coconut with very soft flesh’
inhivañwou ‘green coconut with drinkable water’
inhivañ ‘green coconut for drinking’
inhivañɣai ‘green coconut with edible flesh, almost ripe’ (lit. ‘fruit tree’)
neañ metou ‘yellowish coconut’ (lit. ‘coconut ripe’)
inhamesei, neañ mesei ‘dry coconut’ (lit. ‘coconut dry’)
nelaneañ ‘germinated coconut or its pith’
neañθel ‘sprouting coconut’ (lit. ‘coconut grows (v)’)
nerenren ‘sprouting coconut, longer sprout than neafiBel’

Wayan Fijian (Fij): 7 stages (Pawley & Sayaba 2003)
bū takeri ‘very small coconut’ (lit. ‘fruit a.boil’)
sula ‘immature stage, before flesh has formed; full of liquid’
bū ‘coconut at a stage ideal for drinking and eating; still green but full-sized, flesh well developed and soft’
bū ðiði-vutovuto ‘stage between bu and drokai’ (lit. ‘drinking.coconut flesh.removed-flooded’, i.e. a bu which still has liquid but the flesh of which is hardening; A. Pawley, pers. comm.)
drokai ‘stage of late maturity; meat is hardening but still good to eat; juice becoming acidic’
sama ‘fully mature, old, a stage when no juice is left inside the nut and the flesh is oily and no longer edible but ready to be dried for copra or to be grated and squeezed to obtain coconut cream’
vara ‘ripe coconut, germinating; spongy flesh in kernel of ripe coconut’
Tikopia (Pn): 11 stages (Firth 1985)
foi kārekāre ‘very young with soft shell’ (joi classifier, karekare ‘very young plant’)
niu mata kaere ‘young with soft shell and flesh barely formed’ (lit. ‘coconut unripe very.young’)
niu mata [laui] ‘green, with a firm shell and soft flesh’ (lit. ‘coconut unripe [good]’)
niu motomoto ‘fully grown with hard flesh’
niu ŋaruru kiki ‘the liquid splashes around inside’
niu matua laui ‘mature with fully developed flesh’ (lit. ‘coconut mature good’)
niu pakuku ‘dry, with darkened husk, last edible stage, fit for storage’ (lit. ‘coconut parched’)
niu somo ‘germinated, beginning 1to sprout’ (lit. ‘coconut sprouts (v)’)
niu matatiri ‘germinated, with a short sprout’
niu kapakau maroro ‘germinated, with shoots of about 30 em’ (lit. ‘coconut fins flying.fish’)
niu raurau ‘germinated, with shoots of about 50 em’ (lit. ‘coconut leafy’)

Table 12.1 attempts a rough comparison of the seven growth stage terminologies above. A dot indicates that the language has a term corresponding at least roughly to the growth stage to its left. Two or more dots indicate that number of terms which more or less correspond to the growth stage. The problem of Mota is discussed above: if we reordered the terms on the basis of their definitions, the four dots against ‘ripe, flesh hardened’ would be reduced to two. The multiple entries on the bottom (‘sprouted’) line are also touched on above.

Two intermediate growth stages are of particular importance to coconut consumers: the stage when the coconut is maximally drinkable, and the stage when the flesh is hardened enough to allow scraping for the production of coconut ‘milk’. Not surprisingly, terms for these stages occur in every terminology. These are the two stages for which Tok Pisin of Papua New Guinea has distinct terms: kulau (from Ramoaaina) and drai.

Table 12.1 Rough comparison of coconut growth stage terms in seven Oceanic languages
Gumawana Petats Arosi Mota Anejom Wayan Fijian Tikopia
1. coconut fruit bud • • •
2. very small newly formed fruit • • • • • • •
3. young, green, no liquid yet • • •
4. young, green, liquid but no flesh yet • • • ••• •
5. green, drinkable, very soft flesh • • • •
6. green, drinkable, with thin creamy flesh • • • • •• • •
7. starts turning brown, flesh firmer, still drinkable • • • • • ••
8. little (bitter) liquid, thick flesh • • • • •
9. ripe, flesh hardened • • • ••• • • •
10. dry and ready to fall •• •• • ••
11. dry, fallen • •
12. sprouted • • • • ••• • ••••

Interestingly, two other stages have a term in all seven languages and in all terminologies we have examined: they are a term for the newly formed, tiny fruit and a term for the sprouted coconut. These are effectively the first and last stages in the life of the coconut (the bud is not yet a coconut).

This means that stages 2, 6, 9 and 12, shown in bold in Table 12.1 are the effective landmarks in any Oceanic coconut growth stage terminology and that they are likely to have been present in the POc terminology. There is no principled means of determining, however, which intervening terms may have occurred in POc, and the level of cognacy among the seven terminologies above is low. What might be the reasons for this? One, at least, is that scholars who elicit ordered growth stage terminologies from Oceanic speakers may, in some cases at least, be imposing their concept of an ordered terminology on a somewhat less ordered collection of terms used for coconuts at various stages of development. Two kinds of fact support this contention. First, the terminologies above show considerable variation in the regions between the landmarks, almost as if in some cases the native-speaker informant was thinking of terms to satisfy the lexicographer. Second, some languages have binomial terms between the landmarks, where the first word denotes a nearby growth stage, usually a landmark, and the second is a modifier. For example, Mota vusa denotes a green drinking coconut, and terms on either side of it in the growth sequence are binomials: vusa ɣorɣor ‘drinking coconut [for] scraping’, vusa maremare ‘hard drinking coconut’, vusa sisis (meaning not known). Eight of the 11 stages in the Anejom sequence are built around inhivañ ‘drinking coconut’ or neañ ‘ripe coconut’. Three of the 7 Wayan Fijian stages contain bū ‘drinking coconut’. The 11-stage Tongan system7 carries this reliance on landmark categories a step further: two out of ŋono (meaning unknown), mata ‘unripe’ and motomoto ‘not quite ripe’ are strung together to create in-between categories (in bold below). Two other stages also include mata (assuming that matasili is a chance resemblance, as it does not denote an unripe stage).

Tongan (Pn): 11 stages (Churchward 1959)
po-niu ‘newly formed coconut’
niu ŋono
niu mata-gono
niu mata-velivali ‘green, unripe’
niu mata ‘green drinking coconut’
niu mata-hihiloku
niumata-motomoto
niu motomoto ‘not quite ripe’
niu motuʔu ‘quite ripe’
niu matasili ‘just beginning to sprout’
niu ʔuto ‘with a bigger sprout than niu mata-sili’

Thus we might expect to be able to reconstruct terms for the four landmark stages. This is broadly true, except that stage 2 terms are hard to reconstruct. Terms between the landmarks tend to involve descriptive modifiers, as seen in the literal translations of a number of Anejom and Tikopia terms, and these are easily replaced over time. A few are metaphorical, like Mota matmateɣapun ‘eye of a ɣapun crab’ and pane uwa ‘turtle fin’. New metaphors or descriptions are readily created by new generations of speakers, and we can be sure of little else than that some POc terms must also have been metaphorical or descriptive.

The Gumawana, Petats and Arosi terminologies above include no binomials (setting aside Arosi niu ‘coconut’). If our account is correct, we would expect to find that the terms between the landmarks in these terminolgoes also reflect earlier descriptive terms, but we lack the relevant data to test this expectation.

Reconstructions for the four landmark stages, 2, 6, 9 and 12, are presented first below.

3.2. Growth stage 2: very small newly formed fruit⇫

Two weakly supported etyma, POc *(q)a-bʷaji and PEOc *kiripʷa, can be offered for stage 2, ‘very small newly formed fruit’.8 The former may contain the root *bʷaji, which also occurs in POc *bʷaji-bʷaji ‘coconut growth stage 4 or 5’ (§3.6).

POc *(q)a-bʷaji ‘coconut growth stage 2: very small newly formed fruit’
MM East Kara vəbos ‘undeveloped coconut’
SV Kwamera (i)apʷas ‘small coconut, coconut fruit bud’
PEOc *kiripʷa ‘coconut growth stage 2: very small newly formed fruit’
SES ’Are’are kiriwa ‘immature coconut’
Mic Mokilese kiripʷ ‘young coconut up to one inch in diameter’
Mic Ponapean kurupʷ ‘immature coconut before teaching the growth stage called ūpʷ’

3.3. Growth stage 6: green, drinkable⇫

Two forms can be reconstructed for landmark stage 6, ‘green drinkable coconut with thin creamy flesh’. The first, POc *karut,9 has the best distributed support, but it is not as widely reflected as stage 9 terms, a fact that is surprising (and unexplained) in light of the salience of stage 6 in Oceanic cultures.

POc *karut ‘coconut growth stage 6: green, drinkable’
PT Hula kalu ‘half ripened coconut’
PT Motu karu ‘young drinking coconut’
PT Lala alu-ʔalu ‘young drinking coconut’
MM Petats ka-karut ‘nut containing liquid before flesh appears’ (Blackwood 1935)
SES Longgu ʔaru ‘a coconut ready to drink and eat’
SES ’Are’are aru ‘green drinking coconut’

The other term, *polo, is less well reflected. Glosses pointing to growth stage 6 occur only in southern New Ireland, and we cannot be sure what it denoted.

POc *polo ‘coconut growth stage 6: green, drinkable’ (?)
Adm Lou puɔl ‘coconut’
MM Barok polo ‘young drinking coconut’
MM Sursurunga pol ‘young drinking coconut’
MM Label polo ‘coconut water, young drinking coconut’
MM Siar polo ‘coconut water’

3.4. Growth stage 9: ripe, flesh hardened⇫

Reconstructable terms for stage 9, ‘ripe, flesh hardened’, are POc *matuqu, POc *kulu and POc *maRaŋo. Reflexes of POc *matuqu have become the generic term for coconut in a number of languages, suggesting that in the minds of speakers it is this stage that is prototypical of the coconut. It is clearly the most useful, as the flesh is used for various culinary purposes.

PEMP *matu(qu) ‘dry coconut’ (Blust 1978a)
POc *matuqu ‘coconut growth stage 9: ripe, flesh hardened’
NNG Lukep matuk ‘coconut (generic)’
NNG Atui (ka)mutuk ‘ripe coconut’
NNG Roinji mutuɣo-na ‘ripe coconut’
NNG Matukar matiwa-n ‘ripe coconut’
PT Saliba matuli-na ‘ripe coconut, ready to fall’ (-li- < ?)
PT Sudest matu ‘dry coconut’
NCV Mwotlap na-mtiɣ ‘coconut (generic)’
NCV Mota matiɣ ‘coconut (generic)’
NCV Ambae matui ‘coconut (generic)’
NCV Nokuku metui ‘coconut (generic)’
NCV Tape mətiu ‘ripe coconut’
NCV Big Nambas nᫀətu ‘ripe coconut’
NCV Avava (ani) met-met ‘dry coconut but not fallen’
NCV Port Sandwich marue ‘ripe coconut’
NCV Paamese matou ‘dry coconut’
NCV Lewo maru ‘coconut (generic)’
SV Ura na-mda ‘green, starting to dry’
SV Sye na-mte ‘ripe coconut’
SV Anejom̃ (neañ)metou ‘drinking coconut with hard flesh’
NCal Iaai o-mɨṭ ‘ripe, yellow’
NCal Xârâcùù nû-mʌtʌ ‘ripe coconut’
Mic Marshallese məcə(wipᵚ) ‘coconut, nearly ripe’
Fij Rotuman mafu ‘mature and hard (of wood), lumpy (ofpudding), ripe and hard (of coconuts)’
Fij Bauan madū ‘dry (of wood and mature coconuts)’
Pn Tongan (niu) motuʔu ‘coconut growth stage: ripe’
Pn East Futunan (niu) mataʔu ‘very ripe dry coconut’
Pn Takuu matuu ‘coconut growth stage: mature coconut’

The Fijian gloss below calls into question the gloss of POc *kulu. However, a reflex of this term has become the Araki generic for ‘coconut’, and this is something that happens quite commonly to terms for ripe coconut. The Kuni and Roro terms reflect *-r- or *-R-, not *-l-.

POc *kulu ‘coconut growth stage 9: ripe, flesh hardened’ (French-Wright 1983)
MM Tangga kulu ‘fully grown drinking coconut’
NNG Uvol kul-kuli ‘ripe coconut’
SES ’Are’are ʔuru-ʔuru ‘ripe coconut’
SES Sa’a ʔulu-ʔulu ‘ripe coconut’
NCV Araki holo ‘coconut’
Fij Bauan kulu-kulu ‘the youngest stage of the coconut’
cf. also:
PT Kuni ol-olo ‘ripe coconut’
PT Roro kuro-kuro ‘ripe coconut’

The reconstruction of POc *maRaŋo ‘coconut growth stage 9: ripe, flesh hardened (or stage 10: dry and ready to fall)’ entails a phonological problem. I assumed in vol. 2 (ch.7, §5.6) that reflexes of this term were cognate with reflexes of POc *[ma]raŋo ‘become withered (of vegetation)’, reconstructed by Osmond in vol. 1 (ch.5, §9.4). I assumed further that both reflected PMP *(ma)Raŋaw and that the POc form was *[ma]Raŋo, regularly reflecting the PMP form. As I noted in vol.2, this is problematic, as Southeast Solomonic reflexes of the form raŋo ‘be withered’ reflect POc *r, not *R.

– FIXME: errata –

On balance the data now available suggest that my assumption in vol. 2 was wrong, and that two POc reconstructions must be made: POc *[ma]raŋo ‘become withered (of vegetation)’, as reconstructed by Osmond, and *maRaŋo ‘coconut growth stage …’. Two pieces of data underlie this decision. The first is Baelelea (SES) maleŋa ‘coconut’, in which -l- reflects POc *-R-, contrasting with the SES items of the form raŋo ‘be withered’, reflecting POc *-r-. The second is the Tape pair meaŋ ‘green coconut’, probably reflecting POc *-R- as zero, and maraŋ ‘(of wood, leaves) dry’, probably reflecting POc *-r-.10 The data supporting both etyma are listed below. The Sursurunga item appears in both lists, as it appears to represent a conflation of the two etyma.

Other than the items mentioned in the previous paragraph, none of the items below is diagnostic of the difference between POc *-R- and *-r- except for Niuean and Samoan maŋo ‘dry’, and these reflect *-R- (with a zero reflex), not *-r- as their meaning would lead us to expect. Also noteworthy is the odd fact that PMP *(ma)Raŋaw ‘dry’ contains *-R- whilst the POc etymon of similar meaning contains *-r-. In both cases speakers seem to have conflated or confused the two etyma.

PMP *(ma)Raŋaw ‘dry’ (Blust 1981b)
POc *maRaŋo ‘coconut growth stage 9: ripe, flesh hardened (or stage 10: dry and ready to fall)’
NNG Medebur meraŋu-ŋ ‘ripe coconut’
NNG Kairiru maraŋ ‘ripe coconut’
MM Meramera mala ‘ripe coconut’
MM East Kara məyaŋ ‘dry coconut’
MM Nalik maraŋ ‘ripe coconut’
MM Lihir malan ‘ripe coconut’
MM Barok maŋa ‘ripe coconut’
MM Sursurunga maraŋ ‘(be) old, dry; (old) coconut with lots of meat and little milk’
MM Patpatar maraŋa ‘dry coconut’
SES Baelelea maleŋa ‘coconut’
NCV Naman (neni) meraŋ ‘ripe coconut’
NCV Neve’ei (nani) meraŋ ‘ripe coconut’
NCV Larëvat (nən) meraŋ ‘ripe coconut’
NCV Nese (nani) naraŋ ‘ripe coconut’
NCV Tape meaŋ ‘green coconut with flesh that has become hard and water that has begun to go fizzy’ (J. Lynch, pers. comm.)
POc *[ma-]raŋo ‘become withered (ofvegetation)’ (vol. 1, ch.5, §9.4)
Adm Mussau malaŋo ‘dry’
NNG Manam maraŋo ‘dry, arid’
MM Sursurunga maraŋ ‘(be) old, dry; (old) coconut with lots of meat and little milk’
MM Tolai ma-raŋa ‘withered, dry (leaves, husk, tree)’
MM Selau raŋo ‘dry’
SES Bugotu raŋo ‘wither (leaves, yam vines)’
SES Sa’a raŋo ‘be withered, dry (esp. yams when vine withers)’
SES Arosi raŋo ‘withered, dead (of grass, green boughs + )’
NCV Mota raŋo ‘become dried up in the course of nature’
NCV Tape məraŋ ‘(of wood, leaves) dry’ (J. Lynch, pers. comm.)
SV Kwamera (kahi)mareŋi ‘turning brown’
cf. also:
Pn Niuean maŋo ‘dry (of wood, trees)’
Pn Samoan maŋo ‘dry up; be dry (of wood, clothes)’

3.5. Growth stage 12: sprouting⇫

Growth stage 12, the sprouted coconut, is evidently strongly associated in Oceanic minds with the spongy mass (the ‘apple’) inside it - the coagulated remains of the coconut water, eaten as a delicacy in many parts of Oceania (Peekel 1984: 65). Terms for the spongy mass inside the sprouting nut are given in §4.3.

The cognate set below apparently reflects POc *tubuq ‘grow, swell’ (vol.1, ch.5, §9.2), with the added meaning ‘(plant) sprout’. Probably, as in Taboro niu tubu-na, the verb was used attributively with the term for coconut to denote growth stage 12.

PT Taboro (niu) tubu-na ‘sprouted coconut’
PT Motu tubu ‘sprouted coconut’
PT Roro kupu ‘coconut sprouted’
NCV Ambae tubu ‘germinated coconut or its pith’

POc *tabʷa ‘coconut growth stage 12: sprouted’ is formally similar to but almost certainly distinct from the set above. There are two difficulties with this set. First, the NNG and NCV glosses denote a later growth stage. Second, the Polynesian items reflect a form with POc *-p- rather than -bʷ-.

POc *tabʷa ‘coconut growth stage 12: sprouted’
NNG Ulau-Suain tabu-ñ ‘young drinking coconut’
NNG Ali tapu-ŋ ‘young drinking coconut’
PT Dobu tabʷa(-anuwa) ‘coconut sprouted’
PT Gumawana tabo ‘a shoot; flesh inside a coconut that has sprouted’
PT Gumawana tabo-na ‘coconut growth stage: coconut that has sprouted’
NCV Raga tabʷe(-laha) ‘coconut shell drinking cup’
SV Anejom̃ na-tpʷa(-neañ) ‘spongy mass formed in a coconut that has started to shoot’
cf. also:
Pn West Futunan tafa ‘coconut when meat has jellied and milk is still sweet’
Pn East Uvean tāfā ‘unripe coconut’
Pn Emae tāfā ‘very young coconut’
Pn Tikopia tāfā ‘coconut in developing stage with only water inside’

3.6. Other growth stages⇫

Reconstructing the meanings of growth stage terms which fall between the landmarks is difficult, both because these meanings tend not to match precisely across languages and because the meanings tend to shift along the growth stage taxonomy over time. This is reflected in the vagueness of the glosses of the reconstructions in this section.

Three terms, POc *kubu, POc *bʷaji-bʷaji and PWOc *pʷiga, denoted a stage when the coconut is young and green, somewhere among stages 3, 4 and 5. In the set supporting POc *kubu the meanings of the Oceanic glosses vary from stage 2, ‘newly formed fruit’ (Arosi), to stage 9, ‘mature coconut with meat’ (Wuvulu). However, they point in the direction of a young coconut, and one that is younger than a typical drinking coconut.

PEMP *kupu ‘very young coconut’ (ACD: *upu: ‘germinating coconut?’)11
POc *kubu ‘coconut growth stage 3, 4 or 5: young and green’ (ACD: *umpu: ‘young coconut?’)
Adm Wuvulu upu ‘mature coconut with meat’ (ACD)
Adm Aua upu ‘young coconut’ (Blust 1978b: 131)
Adm Seimat up ‘coconut’ (ACD)
MM Solos kubo ‘young drinking coconut’
MM Petats kuvo ‘nut with meat a little firmer than the prototypical drinking coconut’ (see Petats terminology above)
MM Tinputz (oē) kupū ‘green coconut with meat’
MM Roviana kubo(lokuhu) ‘very young coconut’
SES Longgu kobu ‘young coconut that has no meat, only water’
SES Arosi kopu ‘newly formed fruit’ (see Arosi terminology above; probably a borrowing from another SES language)
SES Arosi ʔobu ‘drinking nut’ (see Arosi terminology above)
Mic Kosraean uf ‘young coconut’ (ACD)
Mic Ponapean ūpʷ ‘drinking coconut’ (ACD)
Mic Mokilese upʷ ‘coconut stage, unripe, younger than a drinking coconut’

POc *bʷaji-bʷaji appears to have denoted either stage 4 (young, green, liquid but no flesh yet) or stage 5 (green, drinkable, very soft flesh), but it is not widely enough reflected for us to be sure.

POc *bʷaji-bʷaji ‘coconut growth stage 4 or 5’
Adm Mussau pasi-pasi-na ‘young drinking coconut’
PT Gumawana bosi-bosi ‘large green drinkable coconut still on the tree’
PT Kilivila bʷai-bʷai ‘young drinking coconut’
PT Misima bʷal-bʷal ‘young coconut with water but no meat’
PT Sudest bʷadi-bʷadi ‘coconut’

Ross (1996d) suggested that the cognate set reflecting PWOc *pʷiga implied a stage 5 meaning ‘just drinkable’ because in both PT languages and Roviana we find the apparently independent semantic development in meaning to ‘drinking vessel’. The element ku- in Ramoaaina ku-bika occurs in coconut terms in a number of Meso-Melanesian languages, and it is evidently cognate with Nehan ku ‘coconut oil’. The prefixed element in the Muyuw and Dobu terms may or may not be cognate.

PWOc *pʷiga ‘coconut growth stage 3, 4 or 5: young and green’
PT Suau biga-biga-na ‘young drinking coconut’
PT Kilivila viga ‘cup, drinking vessel’
PT Muyuw (kʷa)vig ‘half coconut shell used as cup’
PT Dobu (ke)iga ‘cup’
PT Maisin vuga ‘cup’
MM Ramoaaina (ku)bika ‘coconut growth stage before a green drinking coconut’
MM Nduke bika ‘small green coconut’
MM Roviana piga ‘coconut shell used as a bottle’

In vol. 2 (ch. 7, §5.6) POc *goRu ‘dry, of vegetation; coconut growth stage: dry and ready to fall’ was reconstructed. This gloss places a lot of weight on the Mota gloss: taken together the glosses suggest a stage 9 or 10 meaning, i.e. either ‘ripe’ or ‘dry and ready to fall’ . Lavukaleve, the non-Austronesian language of the Russell Islands (central Solomons) has ŋgolus ‘old dry coconut’ (Angela Terrill, pers. comm.), apparently borrowed from a NW Solomonic language that regularly retained POc final consonants. For this reason, we tentatively reconstruct POc final *-s here.

POc *[ma-]goRu(s) ‘dry, of vegetation; coconut growth stage 9 or 10: ripe, perhaps dry and ready to fall’ (Ross 1996d)
NNG Malai gor-gori ‘ripe coconut’
NNG Kakuna kolu-ŋana ‘ripe coconut’
MM Nakanai ma-golu ‘dried up, withered; of a coconut, dry enough to fall’ (A. Chowning, pers. comm.)
SES Lengo golu ‘coconut flesh’
NCV Mota kor ‘coconut in its last condition before it falls from the tree; dry (of other things too)’
NCV Atchin kor ‘dry coconut’
NCV Uripiv (na-ni) kur ‘mature coconut (with firm meat and dry husk)’

4. Parts of the coconut fruit⇫

Terms for coconut parts are divided here into parts of the fruit (this section) and parts of the palm (§5). As we noted earlier *niuR denoted both the palm and the fruit. POc speakers evidently distinguished between them by calling the palm *puqun ni niuR, literally ‘trunk of coconut’) and the fruit *puaq ni niuR ‘fruit of coconut’, reflected in Bauan and Wayan Fijian as vu ni niu and vua ni niu and in Tongan as fuʔu ni niu and foʔi niu (ch.2, §7.1.3).

Figure 12.1: Parts of a coconut

In traditional times a palm bore between 5 and 30 coconuts a year, depending on the palm’s age.12 The usable parts of a coconut are related to its growth stages. At the green drinkable stage, the main usable product is the coconut water, although the thin flesh is sometimes eaten as a snack. At the ripe stage, when the flesh has thickened and hardened, the flesh is scraped and the scrapings are wrung out to give coconut milk, which is used in food, especially in stews. The husk of the ripe coconut is removed with a husking stick. Its mesocarp consists of densely matted dry fibres which have a variety of uses. Clean half-shells, with the flesh removed, are used as cups. At the sprouting stage, apart from use for planting a new palm, the main product is the ‘apple’, the edible sweet spongy mass that fills the shell cavity.

The fruit parts for which reconstructions are provided here are thus:

4.1. Coconut water⇫

POc *suRuq appears to have denoted drinkable liquids in general, including soups, but perhaps excluding plain water: its range clearly included coconut water. No more specialised designation for coconut water has been reconstructed, and it seems likely that the terms for a green drinking coconut (§3.3) were also used for the water inside it.13

POc *suRuq ‘sap, soup, drinkable liquid derived from plants, fruits or trees’ (Milke 1961: *suRu(q))
Adm Loniu cuy ‘soup’
Adm Titan sui ‘half-ripe coconut’
NNG Kove suhu ‘drinkable liquids; also tears, saliva’ (A. Chowning, pers. comm.)
NNG Gitua suru ‘coconut water, soup’
NNG Gitua suru-suru ‘saliva’
NNG Bing sur ‘coconut water, soup’
NNG Manam suru ‘soup’
NNG Yabem sulu ‘soup’
NNG Yabem (awa)sulu ‘saliva’ (i.e. ‘sap of mouth’, awa- ‘mouth’)
NNG Kaiwa ro-ruk ‘soup’
NNG Kaiwa (avo)rulu- ‘saliva’ (i.e. ‘sap of mouth’, avo- ‘mouth’)
PT Dobu sulu ‘coconut water’
PT Molima sulu ‘coconut water’
MM Bali zuruka ‘coconut water’
MM Halia siru ‘soup’
MM Tinputz hun ‘coconut water’
MM Mono-Alu lulu ‘soup’
SES To’aba’ita sulu ‘juice, liquid of fruit; broth, sauce, gravy’
SES Arosi suru ‘coconut water; k.o. yam soup’
NCV Raga hu- ‘oil, liquid, juice, semen’
NCV Paamese sii- ‘juice’
NCV Nguna na-su(a) ‘coconut water, juice, soup’
Pn Samoan sū ‘be moist; (taro) be watery’
Pn Samoan su(a) ‘liquid, fluid; jouice; coconut milk; soup’

The weakly attested etymon POc *namo may have denoted ‘coconut water’ or a drinkable growth stage.

POc *namo ‘coconut water’; ‘coconut growth stage: 3, 4 or 5: young and green’
MM Bulu namo ‘coconut water’
MM Bola namo ‘coconut water’
NCV South Efate namʷ ‘coconut growth stage: young, green, liquid but no flesh yet’

4.2. Coconut flesh and its products⇫

When the coconut is ripe, the hardened flesh is either removed from the shell and cut up, or scraped from the shell using a coconut scraper. Scraping produces parings which are then squeezed to produce coconut milk.14

The best candidate for ‘coconut flesh’ is POc *kanoŋ, a fossilised reflex of PMP *kan-en ‘something to be eaten, food’, itself a nominalisation of the PMP verb ‘eat’, *kaʔen, or *kan in the context of certain affixes. POc *kanoŋ had evidently lost its expected sense and denoted ‘flesh, inner substance, coconut flesh’. The morphology of POc nominalisations is discussed in vol.1 (ch.2, §3.2.1).15

PMP *kan-en ‘something to be eaten, food’
POc *kanoŋ ‘flesh, inner substance, coconut flesh’
NNG Tuam anoŋa ‘seed, fruit’
NNG Malalamai anuŋa ‘coconut flesh’
NNG Lukep kano- ‘fruit (of, e.g., breadfruit), inner substance’
NNG Sio kanaŋo ‘coconut flesh’
MM Tangga kono ‘coconut flesh’
SES Arosi ʔano ‘bulb, tuber, part of tree below ground’
PPn *[ka-]kano ‘flesh, seed’ (POLLEX)
Pn Tongan kano ‘flesh, substance’
Pn Tongan ka-kano ‘flesh, contents or substance’
Pn Pukapukan kano ‘the real or essential part of something’
Pn Rennellese kano ‘flesh or meat of anything; substance’
Pn Samoan ʔa-ʔano ‘flesh; kernel, meat, including meat of coconut’
Pn Hawaiian ʔano ‘kind, nature, character, color, meaning’

PWOc *lamati seems to have designated dry coconut flesh, but has undergone a two-step semantic shift, first a metonymic shift to ‘dry coconut’, then genericisation to ‘coconut’.

PWOc *lamati ‘dry coconut flesh’
NNG Mengen lamasi ‘coconut’
NNG Sissano (new-)lamat ‘coconut meat’
MM Tigak lamas ‘dried coconut meat for copra’
MM East Kara ləməs ‘coconut meat, dried coconut meat for copra’
PT Gumawana (naku-)lamata ‘coconut growth stage: starts turning brown’
MM Lihir lames ‘coconut’
MM Sursurunga lamas ‘coconut, coconut palm’
MM Patpatar ləmas ‘dry coconut’
MM Tolai (Nodup) lamai ‘coconut’
MM Kandas lamas ‘coconut’

The reconstructions below relate to the process of squeezing coconut flesh to produce coconut cream, and of boiling it to make coconut oil. The data point to a POc verb *puro, either ‘scrape coconut’ or ‘squeeze coconut milk onto food’ and a corresponding nominalisation *puro-ŋ denoting the products of this activity. The Admiralties reflexes support reconstruction of *-r- rather than *-R-.

POc *puro ‘squeeze coconut milk onto food’
POc *puro-ŋ ‘coconut pulp; pudding made by squeezing’; ‘grind’ (perhaps)
Adm Lou pɔr ‘coconut cream’
Adm Drehet puroŋ ‘coconut pulp’
NNG Lukep poroŋ ‘taro cake’
NNG Takia furoŋ ‘pudding made of banana/taro and canarium nuts’
NNG Atui pur ‘scrape coconut’
NNG Akolet puru ‘scrape coconut’
MM Nakanai pulo ‘squeeze coconut cream onto food before cooking’ (A. Chowning, pers. comm.)
MM East Kara pur ‘mah: coconut milk’
MM Patpatar polon ‘coconut milk’
MM Ramoaaina pur ‘squeeze coconut milk onto food’

The distinction between ‘coconut cream’ and ‘coconut milk’ is fuzzy. The cream is the first product of squeezing, whereas the milk is the product of further squeezing after water has been added (M. Foale 2003: 87). The POc term for coconut milk and coconut cream was *g(o,u)reŋ ‘coconut milk, coconut cream’, also apparently a nominalisation, but one for which no corresponding verb is known.

POc *g(o,u)reŋ ‘coconut milk, coconut cream’
NNG Bariai goreŋa ‘coconut milk (from dry coconuts, not for drinking)’
NNG Tuam goreŋ ‘coconut milk’
NNG Kapin (ma)goleŋ ‘coconut’
PT Ubir uren ‘coconut oil’
PT Tawala gulena ‘coconut milk’
PMic *ar(e,o)ŋ, *ar(e,o)ŋu- ‘coconut cream, scraped coconut meat’ (Bender et al. 2003)
Mic Kiribati (te)aoŋ ‘scraped coconut mixed with other food’
Mic Marshallese yalᵚ ‘coconut milk’
Mic Ponapean ɛriŋ ‘ripe coconut’
Mic Mokilese ɔriŋ ‘brown stage of coconut’
Mic Chuukese arɨŋ ‘coconut cream’
Mic Carolinian arɨŋ ‘coconut cream’
Mic Woleaian yaẓeŋɨ ‘coconut cream, bone marrow, coconut milk’
Mic Sonsorolese yaləŋɨ ‘coconut cream’
Mic Pulo Annian yalaŋi ‘coconut milk’

Coconut oil, produced by boiling the milk, was apparently regarded as a form of POc *moñak, which denoted fatty, creamy or oily substances which tasted good.

PMP *meñak ‘fat, grease’ (Dempwolff 1938)
POc *moñak ‘fat, oil, cream, coconut cream; tasty’ (Blust 1978b)
Adm Mussau mona ‘fat, tas~y’
NNG Manam mona-mona ‘tasty’
NNG Kairiru moñeq ‘food’
PT Saliba mo-mona- ‘coconut oil, grease, pig fat’
MM Tabar monaki ‘fat’
MM Lihir maniok ‘fat’
MM Lamasong monok ‘coconut cream’
MM Madak monouk ‘fat’
MM Barok manok ‘fat’
MM Tolai monoi ‘fat’
SES Gela mona ‘coconut cream’

4.3. The embryo and the ‘apple’⇫

Distinguishing growth stage 12, the sprouted coconut, from the ‘apple’ inside it is difficult, but the terms reconstructed below all appear to have denoted the apple rather than the coconut. The most widely reflected of these terms is POc *paraq ‘coconut embryo, spongy mass inside sprouting nut; brain’: non-Oceanic cognates indicate that ‘coconut embryo’ was the earlier sense. Its Titan, Bariai, and Sinaugoro reflexes indicate that POc *paraq could also denote ‘brain’, presumably because of the latter’s spongy appearance and texture.

The reconstruction of POc *paraq entails a small phonological puzzle. For PMP Blust (ACD) reconstructs *para ‘coconut embryo’ without *-q because it is not reflected in non-Oceanic cognates. However, Iduna and Kilivila (PT), Tolai (MM) and Southern Vanuatu reflexes all point to its presence in POc *paraq.

PMP *para ‘coconut embryo’ (ACD)
POc *paraq ‘spongy mass inside sprouting nut; brain’
Adm Titan pare-n ‘brain, sprout’
NNG Bariai para [v] ‘sprout’
NNG Bariai pata-ŋa ‘brain’
PT Iduna valaga ‘seed inside coconut; old yam’
PT Kilivila valiga ‘coconut sprout, coconut sponge’ (Malinowski 1935b: 112)
PT Hula vala ‘spongy ball inside sprouting coconut’
PT Sinaugoro vara ‘inner part, brain, inner part of coconut’
MM Tolai varai ‘sprouted coconut’
MM Siar arai ‘young soft coconut’
MM Nehan uara ‘coconut shoot; edible growth inside mature coconut/coconut with shoot, used for planting’
MM Petats hala ‘sprouted coconut’ (see Petats terminology above)
MM Halia hala ‘sprouted coconut’
SES Gela vara ‘a fallen coconut beginning to grow and showing leaf’
SES Longgu vara ‘a coconut seedling ready for planting; the solid, sweet part of an old coconut (where the liquid has become solid)’
NCV Mota vara ‘the shoot, plumule, of the coconut, as it forms first within the nut, afterwards when it shoots outside, and finally as growing up from the radicle’
NCV Raga vara ‘sprouting coconut’
NCV North Ambrym var ‘spongy kernel of a mature coconut’
NCV Lonwolwol vaa ‘the spongy kernel of a mature coconut’
NCV Paamese a-hai ‘sprouting coconut’
NCV Lewo (puru)ve ‘sprouting coconut’
NCV Nguna na-vare ‘sprouting coconut’
NCV Namakir var ‘sprouting coconut’
NCV Nguna na-vare ‘sprouting coconut’
NCV South Efate n-far ‘spongy mass in sprouting coconut’
PSV *na-vəraq ‘sprouting coconut and/or its pith’ (Lynch 2001c: 232)
SV Lenakel (nien-u)via ‘sprouting coconut’
SV Kwamera nu-vera ‘sprouting coconut’
SV Sye ne-vre ‘sprouting coconut’
SV Ura ne-vla ‘sprouting coconut’
NCal Fwâi (dō)vala ‘sprouting coconut’
NCal Nemi (doo)vala ‘sprouting coconut’
NCal Jawe (sep) vala ‘sprouting coconut’
PMic *fara ‘core (of breadfruit, coconut, pandanus)’ (Bender et al. 2003)
Mic Chuukese faar ‘core of a breadfruit’
Mic Chuukese fara-n ‘core of’
Mic Puluwatese faar ‘core of breadfruit, sponge of coconut’
Mic Puluwatese fercæ-n ‘core of’
Mic Woleaian faare ‘core of a breadfruit’
Mic Woleaian fera-li ‘core of’
Mic Ponapean paar ‘spongy centre of sprouting coconut’
Mic Ponapean par ‘to sprout (of coconuts)’
Mic Mokilese par ‘sprouting coconut’
Fij Bauan vara ‘spongy flesh in the kernel of a coconut before it shoots; a coconut in this stage or just shooting’
Fij Wayan vara ‘ripe coconut, germinating; spongy flesh in kernel of ripe coconut’

We observed above that POc *paraq ‘coconut embryo’ was also used to refer to the brain. POc *qutok ‘brain, pith, marrow’ had a similar, but not identical, span of meanings, denoting the soft inner contents of a tree or palm trunk, canes, bones, and sprouting coconuts, as well as the contents of the human head. Glosses with meanings other than brain or head are shown in italics.

PMP *hutek ‘brain, marrow’ (ACD)
POc *qutok ‘brain, pith, marrow’
NNG Mapos Buang yuto ‘brain’
NNG Bariai (i)uto-uto ‘brain’
NNG Gitua uto ‘pith, centre of tree (particularly sago)’
NNG Lukep kuto(na) ‘head’
NNG Malasanga koto(na) ‘head’
NNG Mangseng ut ‘brain’
NNG Kis ut ‘brain’
NNG Kaiep uto(ŋ) ‘brain’
PT Saliba uto ‘brain’
PT Iduna uto-na ‘flesh ofcoconut’
PT Misima utu(waul) ‘brain’
PT Motu (au) uto-na ‘pith’ (au ‘tree’)
SES ’Are’are uo(-woi) ‘pith, heart (of tree)’
SES Sa’a uo ‘the inner skin of rattan cane, pith’
SES Arosi uo ‘the flesh, edible part of a yam’
NCV Mota uto-i ‘pith, the inner part, if hard, within the bark’; ‘pith’
Fij Bauan uto ‘heart; pith of a tree’
NCV Mota uto-i ‘pith, the inner part, if hard, within the bark’; ‘pith’
Mic Chuukese ɔ̄t ‘coconut sprout, the soft spongy centre of a coconut’
PPn *quto ‘brain; pith of a tree; inner part of something; spongy mass in sprouting coconut’
Pn Tongan ʔuto ‘(of a coconut) beginning to sprout; soft kernel or “apple” of a sprouting nut; brain’
Pn East Futunan ʔuto ‘brains; sprouting coconut’
Pn East Uvean ʔuto ‘brains; spongy mass in sprouting coconut’
Pn Emae uto ‘sprouting coconut’
Pn Rennellese ʔuto ‘sponge, as of coconut, ivory nut’
Pn Rennellese ʔuto (ʔugu) ‘brains’ (= ‘head sponge’)
Pn Samoan uto ‘spongy substance in old coconut’
Pn Luangiua ʔuko ‘sprouting coconut’
Pn Nukuria udo ‘soft wood around the centre of a tree trunk’
Pn Marquesan (ʔehi)uto ‘sprouting coconut’
Pn Mangarevan uto ‘marrow; spongy mass in old coconuts’
Pn Rarotongan uto ‘germinated coconut; kernel or white spongy substance found inside a germinated coconut’

The less widely reflected terms PAdm *puto-, POc *pʷiras and PWOc *gawa also seem to have had ‘coconut apple’ as their principal denotation. Despite its formal similarity to POc *qutok above, PAdm *puto- ‘spongy mass inside sprouting nut’ appears to be a separate item, the reflexes of which denote only the inside of the sprouted coconut.16

PAdm *puto- ‘spongy mass inside sprouting nut’
Adm Loniu putɔ ‘core, especially of coconut’
Adm Titan ʙuto-n ‘coconut sprout, the soft spongy center of a coconut’
POc *pʷiras ‘pithy ball inside sprouted coconut’ (ACD: *pirV)
NNG Gitua pir ‘white pithy ball inside sprouted coconut’
NNG Tuam pir ‘germinating nut’ (Freedman 1967: 335)
NNG Lukep pir ‘coconut sprout’
MM Roviana piraha ‘sprouting coconut’
SES Gela pira ‘coconut on ground showing leaf’
PMic *pir, *piri- ‘groor lump under the skin, spongy core of mature coconut’ (Bender et al. 2003)
Mic Marshallese pər ‘small sprouted coconut; swelling, tumour’
Mic Puluwatese pir ‘coconut sponge beginning to form; growth or lump under the skin’
Mic Chuukese piir, piri-n ‘hard lump or growth under the skin’
Mic Chuukese piri-(n taka) ‘spore of the ripe coconut when beginning to form’

PWOc *gawa ‘spongy mass inside sprouting nut; sprouted coconut’
PT Gapapaiwa go-go-na ‘spongy centre of a sprouting coconut’
PT Tawala ko-ko ‘coconut sprouted’
PT Sudest ɣaɣə ‘spongy centre of a sprouting coconut’
MM Ramoaaina gawa-ina ‘spongy centre of a sprouting coconut’

4.4. Coconut husk⇫

Fibre from coconut husks (‘coir’ < Malay kayar ‘rope’) is used for floor matting, brushes, ropes and strainers. Husks and shells are used for fuel.17 Most Oceanic languages have distinct terms for the husk of coconuts, probably reflecting its importance for cordage and for fuel (Firth 1985: 369). For example, in Kiribati there are names for all the operations involved in making string from benu ‘coconut husk (for making string)’, namely tao-benu ‘soaking the benu’; tae-benu ‘taking it out of the soaking pit’; tiri-benu ‘beating the benu to clean it’; ake-ake or ake-a te benu ‘to hackle it’; bo-binoka ‘to arrange benu ready for twisting’; kakano ‘twist the benu on thigh to make string’ (Sabatier 1971: 63).

Doublet forms, POc *punut and *pʷenu(t), both ‘coconut husk’, appear to be reconstructable. Blust (ACD) also reconstructs the PMP doublets *bunut and *benut. PMP *bunut is clearly the source of POc *punut, but PMP *benut is just as clearly not the source of *pʷenu(t), as its expected POc reflex would be †*ponut. Instead, *pʷenu(t) reflects a shift of the rounding feature of *-u- forward to *p-. The change is not regular, and perhaps the result of vowel dissimilation. The Nduke, Bugotu, Gela, Longgu and Puluwatese point to an initial labiovelar.

PMP *bunut ‘coconut husk’ (Zorc & Charles 1971, Blust 1989)
POc *punut ‘coconut husk, fibres on coconut husk’ (Ross 1996d)
NNG Tuam pun-pun ‘coconut husk’
NNG Bing fun-fūn ‘coconut husk fibre; husk a coconut’
NNG Lukep pun-pun ‘coconut husk’
NNG Takia funu(dan) ‘coconut husk’
NNG Mengen putu-n ‘coconut husk’ (metathesis)
MM Vitu vinuta ‘coconut husk, fibres on coconut husk’
PT Motu bunu ‘coconut husk’18
PT Roro punu ‘coconut husk’
MM Ramoaaina punut ‘beard’
MM Nehan pitunu ‘coconut husk’ (metathesis)
MM Halia putunu ‘coconut husk’ (metathesis)
MM Nduke punutu ‘fibrous epidermis round the base of a coconut frond; looks like an open-weave cloth, and used for straining milk from squeezed coconut flesh’
SES Bugotu vunu- ‘outer skin of canarium almond’
NCV Nokuku wun ‘coconut husk’
NCV Kiai vunu- ‘husk, threads, fibre’
NCV Atchin no-un ‘plait,ed string of coconut fibre’
NCV South Efate na-un ‘husk’
Pn Tuvalu funu ‘pubic hair’

Evidence for the word-final *t of POc *pʷenu(t) is indirect. The Nduke and Bugotu forms below both support the reconstruction of a final consonant for POc, but neither is a regular reflex of *pʷenut.

POc *pʷenu(t) ‘coconut husk’ (Ross 1996d)
MM Meramera ven-venu ‘coconut husk’
MM Tangga pinu-ŋ ‘coconut husk’
MM Nduke pe-penete- ‘husk of a mature coconut; thick coir or fibre that makes up the inside of the husk’ (for †_penutu)
MM Maringe pʷetu ‘coconut husk’ (metathesis, followed by loss of final consonant)
SES Bugotu penutu ‘coconut husk’ (borrowed from a NW Solomonic language)
SES Gela penu ‘coconut, outer husk, wound around foot as protection’
SES Longgu penu ‘the outside husked part of the coconut, when it has rotted’
SES Arosi henu- ‘husk; bark; mollusc shell’
Mic Puluwatese (ese) pə̄n ‘shell, peel, husk’
Fij Rotuman henu ‘husk of coconut or large pandanus nut’
Fij Bauan venu(ki) ‘fibres of coconut husk beaten ready for twisting into sinnet’19
Pn Samoan fenū ‘make a join in plaiting etc’
Pn Māori fenu ‘twist, spin a cord, strand of a garment, warp (in weaving); a single element in basketry’

4.5. Coconut shell⇫

There was apparently no dedicated POc term for a coconut shell, but there were a number of terms for the utensils made from them. The following utensil terms are reconstructed in vol.1 (ch.4, §2.2)

  • POc *(b,bʷ)ilo ‘coconut shell used as liquid container’
  • POc *lasa ‘coconut half-shell cup’
  • POc *ubi/*ibu ‘half coconut shell used as a drinking cup’
  • POc *kabu ‘cup, ladle’

5. Parts of the coconut palm⇫

The growing period of a coconut palm from the germination of a nut to the production of new coconuts is 4–10 years. Generally, no use is made of the palm during its growing period, but once the palm is productive, its various parts, like the coconut itself, have a large variety of uses. Understanding the parts of the palm entails understanding how its fronds grow (see Figure 12.2):

The crown of the palm is made up of 20–35 fronds, depending on how favourable the growing environment is. The fronds emerging in sequence from the central bud of the palm conform to a set geometrical pattern of angular separation around the circumference of the palm trunk. … If frond 1 in a series is given the azimuth angle of zero degrees, frond 2 will be located at plus or minus 140 degrees, frond 3 at 280 degrees, frond 4 past the starting angle at 60 degrees on the second circuit … (M. Foale 2003: 48).

A new frond is supported at its base by a netlike brown fibrous epidermis so thick, tough and regular that it looks almost machine-made. It protects the tender growing area from physical injury, supporting the new leaf until it is mature, after which it drops to the ground and is collected for a number of uses. Arber (1922) labelled it the ‘coiffe’ or ‘pellicule’20 - but these terms have not caught on and it is often omitted from western descriptions of the coconut palm - yet its POc names are among the most easily reconstructed terms for a part of the coconut palm. We will call this material ‘frond netting’ in order to distinguish it clearly from the better known source of fibre, the coir of the coconut husk (§4.4).

A new flower bunch (inflorescence), from which coconuts eventually emerge, appears at the base of the frond that has reached the 1Oth to 12th position down from the youngest emerging frond. The flower bunch is encased in a spear-like sheath (the spathe) which protrudes as much as a metre from the inner side of the base of its accompanying frond. The tough skin of the spathe splits and shrinks back somewhat, exposing the inflorescence (M. Foale 2003: 47).21 The multi-branch flower stalk (spadix) becomes the stalk of a new bunch of coconuts.

Table 4.1 of Chapter 4 shows part of the coconut terminology ofTikopia, which is typical of Oceanic languages in its coverage. The parts of the coconut palm that are typically named are:

  • the frond and its parts (§5 .1)
  • frond netting (§5.2)
  • the spathe and the infloresence (§5.3)

Coconuts 3 79

Figure 12.2: Parts of a coconut palm

Some parts of the palm are labelled with terms that are used for parts of plants in general. For example, Oceanic languages do not have a distinct name for the trunk of a coconut palm and nor presumably did POc. Instead, POc *puqu(n) ‘base of tree, source, origin’ (ch.4, §2.1) was apparently used, and the trunk of a coconut palm-and by metonymy the palm as a whole-was probably *puqun ni niuR (ch.2, §7.1.3). The coconut trunk is sometimes used for flooring and bearers, but it is difficult to trim and by no means the best material for these purposes (O’Collins & Lamothe 1989, Kwa’ioloa & Burt 2001: 192). The young leaf shoots of the coconut palm, which are sometimes eaten (French 1986: 31), have a distinct name only in Central Pacific languages (PCP *tō-rau, where the second element reflects POc *raun ’leaf; ch.4, §2.5, cf. Table 4.7), but are otherwise labelled with whatever term is used for leaf-shoots (ch.4, §2.6).

5.1. The frond and its parts⇫

Coconut fronds are 4–6 m long and have a thick stalk (petiole) which narrows into a central spine or midrib (rachis) from which grow leaflets (pinnae) 60-90cm in length. Fronds serve as roofing material for shelters. Their leaflets are used to make baskets, and the dried ribs of the leaflets are bound together to make brooms.

As noted in ch.4, §2.5, Oceanic languages tend to have more than one term for the coconut frond, distinguishing between the green frond on the palm and the fallen, dried brown frond.

5.1.1. Green fronds⇫

Whether there was a single POc word denoting a green frond is debatable. Scattered languages use compounds meaning ‘leaf of coconut’ (Titan lau-niw, Anejom neri-neañ, Niuean lau-niu, each literally ‘leaf-coconut’ ) or ‘branch of coconut’ (Nehan raŋ-kuen, literally ‘branch-coconut’). There is thus some evidence for reconstructing *raun ni niuR ‘leaf of coconut’ and/or *raqan ni niuR ‘branch of coconut’.

Possible candidates for this meaning are POc *usiri and PWOc *pagal. However, the Tuam and Ramoaaina glosses of reflexes of *pagal suggest that it may have denoted the midrib of the frond or the broad base of the midrib. The Lihir reflex suggests that the denotation may have included palm fronds other than the coconut. The Vaghua, Varisi and Ririo reflexes are irregular in reflecting -r- for expected †-l- and in their denotation: ‘branch’. The meaning of POc *usiri is just as problematic.

POc *usiri ‘palm frond or midrib of a frond’ (?)
MM Nehan usiri ‘backbone; backbone of the small leaves of the coconut frond, sago palm, all palms’
NCV Paamese o-usil ‘frond’
NCV South Efate sēr ‘frond’
cf. also:
PT Iduna didi-na ‘coconut frond’
PWOc *pagal ‘palm frond’ (?)
NNG Kove paɣa-paɣa ‘coconut frond’ (A. Chowning, pers. comm.)
NNG Tuam peleŋga-n ‘base of a coconut frond’ (metathesis)
NNG Mangap (pal)paaŋga, (sul)paaŋga ‘palm frond’
MM Bulu pagal(i) ‘frond’
MM Lihir palaŋ ‘sago leaf’
MM Ramoaaina pagal ‘coconut leaf stem’
cf. also:
MM Vaghua pagar(a) ‘branch’
MM Varisi pagar(a) ‘branch’
MM Ririo pagar(eve) ‘branch’

Ross (1996d: 204) reconstructed POc *[pa]paq[a-], apparently denoting the frond of any palm. It reflects PMP *pa(q)paq ‘frond of a palm’ (Blust 1989). There is reasonable evidence that POc *[pa]paq[a-] occurred, but its meaning is unclear. Only the Arosi and Ellicean reflexes mean ‘palm frond’. Its Meso-Melanesian reflexes simply mean ‘leaf’, whilst its Polynesian reflexes imply that PPn faʔa meant the stalk of large leaves of various plants.

PMP *pa(q)paq ‘frond of a palm’ (Blust 1989)
POc *[pa]paq[a-] ‘frond of a palm’ (?) (Ross 1996d)
MM Bola paga ‘leaf’
MM Lavongai pa ‘leaf’
MM East Kara paka ‘leaf’
MM West Kara faka ‘leaf’
MM Nalik fəkə ‘leaf’
MM Tabar (paka)paka ‘leaf’
MM Sursurunga pəkə ‘leaf’
MM Patpatar paka ‘leaf’
MM Label paka ‘leaf’
MM Siar paka ‘leaf’
MM Teop paka ‘leaf’
SES Arosi haha-na ‘palm frond, branch of a palm or tree that has no branches, as sago palms, coconut, cycad, screw palm’
Pn Tongan faʔa ‘lower portion of leaf stalk of banana, taro, or giant taro (Alocasia macrorrhiza)’
Pn Niuean fā ‘(plant) stalk’
Pn Tikopia fā ‘leaf stem of fleshy plant’
Pn Rennellese haʔa ‘(taro, banana, papaya) stalk’
Pn Samoan fā ‘stalk, stem of taro, banana and certain other plants’
Pn Tuvalu fā ‘base end of a coconut midrib’
Pn Nukuoro hā ‘coconut palm frond’
Pn Hawaiian hā ‘stalk that supports the leaf and enfolds the stem of certain plants, as taro, sugarcane, layers in a banana stump’

5.1.2. Dried fronds⇫

One of the main uses of dry coconut fronds is as torches, and in a number of languages there is a polysemous term meaning ‘dry coconut leaf and’(coconut leaf) torch’ (e.g. Misima wita ‘(go) fishing with a lamp; dry coconut leaves; light made by burning dry coconut leaves’ and NE Ambae here ‘dry coconut leaf; dry coconut leaf lit and used as a torch’). Milke (1961) reconstructs *sulu(q) ‘dry coconut leaf torch’ for POc (see also vol.1, ch.6, §2.3). On the basis of the reflexes of this form it seems likely that as in the case of NE Ambae here, ‘dry coconut leaf’ was a secondary meaning. Thus, languages like Lukep, Ramoaaina, Uripiv, Mokilese and Tongan have reflexes with both meanings, and in other languages such as Longgu and Southeast Ambrym it is only the coconut leaf meaning which has been retained.

PMP *suluq ‘torch’ (Dempwolff 1938)
POc *sulu(q) ‘dry coconut leaf torch; dry coconut leaf’ (Milke 1961)
Adm Lou sula-n ‘dry coconut leaf’
Adm Titan cul ‘torch made from coconut fronds for scorching canoes or for fishing at night’
NNG Lukep sul ‘dry coconut leaf; torch, traditionally made of dry coconut leaves’
NNG Takia sul ‘a torch made from dried coconut fronds’
MM Ramoaaina ulu ‘leaf of a coconut palm; coconut leaf or torch’
SES Longgu sulu ‘leaf, especially of coconut’
NCV Uripiv na-sul ‘coconut frond (especially a dry one); a light (the traditional use for dry coconut fronds)’
NCV Southeast Ambrym o-sil ‘coconut frond’
NCV Paamese (ou-i-)silu ‘coconut frond’ (ou ’leaf)
NCV Nguna na-sulu ‘torch, flashlight, lamp, light’
SV Lenakel (nə-kou-i-)səl ‘coconut frond stalk’
SV Anejom̃ ni-sel ‘coconut leaf midrib’
Mic Kiribati rin ‘dry coconut leaves used for torches’
Mic Mokilese til ‘dry coconut frond, torch’
Fij Rotuman sulu ‘coconut spathe; coconut spathe torch; fish by light of burning coconut spathe’
Pn Tongan hulu ‘dry coconut or banana leaves; show a light or give a light, with lantern or torch’
Pn Niuean hulu ‘torch (traditionally made of wooden fibres); to shine, give off light’
cf. also:
Fij Bauan suluka ‘dry leaves, generally of bananas for rolling cigarettes’
Pn Samoan sului ‘dry banana leaf (used as wrapper for a Samoan cheroolt); cheroot’

PWOc *daki had a similar meaning.

PWOc *daki ‘dry coconut leaf torch’
PT Iduna daki ‘dry coconut leaf torch’
MM Sursurunga dək ‘dry coconut leaf torch’

POc *ramaR ‘coconut leaf used as a torch when fishing’, reflecting PMP *damaR ‘resin, torch, light’, is also reconstructable (Ross 1996d: 205; vol.1, ch. 8, § 8).22 All reflexes indicate that this term denoted a torch - and specifically a torch used for fishing - rather just a coconut frond. The Lou and Tongan reflexes suggest that the *ramaR may also have been used as a verb.

PMP *damaR ‘torch, light’ (Dempwolff 1938)
POc *ramaR ‘coconut leaf used as a torch when fishing’ (Capelll943)
Adm Lou (ka)ram ‘torch’
Adm Lou ram-ram [v] ‘fish at night by torchlight’
MM East Kara lamak ‘coconut leafused as a torch’
Fij Bauan rama ‘cast light on’
Fij Bauan rama-rama ‘lamp of coconut shell filled with oil’
Pn Tongan ama [v] ‘fish at night by torch-light; torch made of coconut spathes bound together’
Pn Niuean ama ‘search for crabs, etc. with a torch’
Pn Tikopia rama [N] ‘torch of dry coconut frond’; [v] ‘fish with torches’
Pn Samoan lama ‘torch (made of dry coconut leaflets +); fishing with torches’
Pn Māori rama ‘torch; eeling with torches’
cf. also:
PT Misima dam ‘coconut leafused as a torch’

– FIXME: errata –

PWOc *bita appears to have the same range of meaning. Although there are only two known reflexes, the probability of a chance correspondence in form and meaning is so low that we can have reasonable confidence in the reconstruction.

PWOc *bita ‘dry coconut frond, dry coconut frond torch; fish at night’
PT Misima wita ‘dry coconut leaves; light made by burning dry coconut leaves; (go) fishing with a lamp’
MM Nehan bita ‘dry coconut frond, dry coconut frond torch; fish at night’

5.1.3. Midrib of the frond⇫

Modern languages tend to have a distinctive term for the midrib or spine of a coconut frond, e.g. Iduna domoluluna ‘(main) stalk of coconut leaf’, Nduke kilikava- ‘stem of coconut frond, especially at thick end’, Wayan Fijian bālotu ‘a coconut frond stalk stripped of its leaflets; the stem of the coconut frond, used for firewood and torches’. There are two candidate terms for this meaning, POc *bala(p,b)a(q) and POc *sasaRi. Both may have denoted both the palm frond and the midrib - unsurprisingly, as a midrib is accompanied by its leaflets until they are stripped off.

PMP *p⟨al⟩a(q)paq ‘midrib of coconut frond’ (Dempwolff 1925)
POc *bala(p,b)a(q) ‘palm branch; midrib of palm frond’ (Ross 1996d: *palapa(q))
Adm Loniu palapa ‘branch, especially of palm tree’ (for †palaha)
PPn *palalafa ‘stalk and midrib of a coconut frond’ (POLLEX)
Pn Tongan palalafa ‘stalk (or stalk and midrib) of a coconut leaf’
Pn Emae pararafa ‘base of fallen coconut frond, still attached to tree’
Pn Pukapukan palelawa ‘midrib of coconut leaf’
Pn Tikopia pararafa ‘stem of coconut frond, used as small stirrer for liquids, tiny mallet in tattooing’
cf. also:
Fij Rotuman parafa ‘midrib of coconut leaf’ (loan from Polynesian)

The Fijian reflex of *sasaRi makes the reconstruction of its meaning somewhat unsure.

POc *sasaRi ‘midrib of coconut frond’
NNG Kove sasali ‘midrib’
NNG Bariai sasal ‘midrib’
NNG Mangap sasar ‘midrib of a coconut leaf’
SES Longgu sali-sali ‘rip a leaf along its midrib’
cf. also:
Fij Wayan sāsā ‘dry coconut frond’

5.1.4. Spine/stalk of leaflet⇫

Our sources often do not distinguish clearly between the frond and the leaflet (both are labelled ‘leaf’). The main use of coconut leaflets is that their dried spines are very commonly bound together to make brooms, and terms for the spine or stalk of leaflet typically relate to this use. Thus Manam sinoka ‘spine of coconut leaves, used for making brooms’, Ramoaaina noko ‘broom, coconut leaf spine’ and Carolinian sow ‘spine of the coconut leaf (used in weaving, making brooms)’. POc *no(k,g)o evidently denoted both the spines and the broom.

POc *no(k,g)o ‘midrib or spine of coconut leaflet; broom made therefrom’ (Bender et al. 2003: 61)
NNG Lukep noŋ-noŋ ‘spine of a coconut leaflet’
NNG Sio noŋgo ‘centre strip of coconut leaf (used in brooms)’
MM Ramoaaina noko ‘midrib, small leaf stem; coconut leaf spine; broom’
MM Tolai noko ‘midrib of the leaflets of a coconut branch; broom, especiallly one made from these leaflets’
PMic *noko ‘midrib of a coconut frond or leaf’
Mic Kiribati noko ‘midrib of side leaves of coconut palm’
Mic Marshallese nᵚɔkʷ ‘midrib of a coconut leaf’
Mic Kosraean nɒk ‘midrib’
Mic Mokilese nok ‘coconut leaf midrib’

5.2. The frond netting⇫

The protective netting at the base of the new coconut frond has the appearance of an open-weave cloth and is used in Oceanic societies for straining liquids, and particularly for wringing coconut ‘milk’ out of coconut flesh.

Two POc terms are reconstructable. The first, *kaka seems to have denoted the netting material itself, or perhaps the young frond within it. The second, *Runut, perhaps denoted the material in its function as a strainer.23 In vol.1 (ch.6, §5.6) a metathesised form *nuRut is also reconstructed on the basis of the Motu, Tolai and Mota reflexes. It is possible that this form did indeed occur, but it is also possible that metathesis occurred independently in two or three locations. Misima lulusi and Tawala luluhi are borrowings from a Suauic language like Saliba: the addition of -i after final consonants is unique to Suauic. These two forms and Saliba lulusi all display consonant assimilation (the expected Saliba form is †lunusi) and it is impossible to tell whether they reflect *Runut or *nuRut.

POc *kaka ‘young coconut frond; coconut frond netting protecting young frond’
MM Patpatar kaka ‘new coconut frond that has not opened yet’
NCV Nakanamanga kak ‘coconut mat, mesh formed by the coconut palm, used for straining liquids’
NCV South Efate kak ‘coconut mesh’
PPn *kaka ‘clothlike fibre surrounding base of coconut fronds’ (POLLEX)
Pn Tongan kaka ‘fibrous integument at the top of coconut palms’
Pn Niuean (lau)kaka ‘the fibrous wrapping round the base of a young coconut frond’
Pn Tikopia kaka ‘fibre of base of coconut palm (not sago palm) used traditionally to make filter sheet in turmeric extraction etc’
Pn East Futunan kaka ‘brown fibrous material that grows on coconut tree’
Pn Samoan ʔaʔa ‘coarse fibrous material found at the base of coconut leaves and used for strainers etc’
Pn Nukuoro gaga ‘fibrous sheathing (at the base of the petiole sheath of the flower) of the coconut tree’
Pn Tahitian ʔaʔa ‘brown fibrous membrane at base of coconut fronds; similar substance at base of leaves of sugarcane, bamboo and reeds’
Pn Hawaiian ʔa-ʔaʔa ‘coconut cloth, vascular bundles in taro corm, chaff; fibrous’

PMP *Runut ‘plant fibres’ (Blust 1983–84a)
POc *Runut ‘sheath around base of coconut frond, used as strainer’ (Ross 1996d: 203)
NNG Gitua run ‘sheath around base of coconut frond, used as strainer’
PT Misima lulúsi ‘fine matting growing around base of coconut leaves, used as a sieve’ (Suauic borrowing)
PT Tawala luluhi [N] ‘sheath around base of coconut frond’; [v] ‘strain, purify, improve’ (Suauic borrowing)
PT Saliba lulusi ‘coconut tissue, used as a strainer’
PT Motu nuru ‘fibrous substance that grows around base of coconut frond; the stipule; coarse cloth; a sack’ (metathesis)
MM Tolai nirut ‘leaf-root mesh of coconut tree’ (metathesis and vowell dissimilation)
NCV Mota nir ‘fibrous spathe of coconut frond, used to strain sago’ (metathesis and vowel dissimilation)
NCV Paamese (ä)un ‘cloth-like material at top of coconut tree’
NCal Pije uñ ‘fibrous spathe of coconut frond; husk of coconut’
Mic Kiribati iŋ ‘fibre enveloping base of palm leaf and attaching it to the trunk, used as a filter’
Mic Puluwatese (ese) wɨn ‘coconut cloth’
Mic Ulithian ɨl ‘coconut cloth’
Fij Wayan unu ‘strainer for kava, in earlier times made of bark cloth, now usually muslin or any fine cloth’
Pn East Futunan unu ‘kava strainer made of bourao fibres’
Pn Samoan unu ‘woven wringer, used to extract dye from shreds of Bischofia tree bark etc’

5.3. The spathe, the inflorescence and the spadix⇫

Figure 12.3: Coconut blossom and spathe), Flower bunch (inflorescence)

There was perhaps no separate term in most Oceanic languages for the inflorescence of the coconut. Some languages do have separate noncognate terms for coconut blossoms, e.g. Gapapaiwa sisina, Gumawana niyola, Misima lámun, Paamese voha, Anejom nacomʷ, but far fewer than have a term for ‘spathe’. Perhaps they were simply ‘flowers’, labelled by the general term POc *puŋa ‘flower, blossom’ (ch.4, §2.7).

Terms for the boat-shaped spathe, shown in Figure 12.3, and for the spadix (the branching flower stalk which becomes the stalk of a bunch of coconuts) are more common, although some languages do not distinguish between the two, whilst others have more than one term. The spathe is used for firewood and as a bowl or tray. Sugary sap can be tapped from the flower stalk (French 1986: 31). Sample terms are listed below. PPn had a term *loso-loso ‘coconut spadix; coconut spathe’ (POLLEX), reflected in most Polynesian languages.

Adm Titan páⁿrol ‘sheath of flower of the coconut palm, when dry; used as firewood’
NNG Numbami wawanziŋa ‘sheath over coconut blossoms (used as tray)’
PT Iduna lelewaka ‘(split) pod of coconut; covers kakaiyona’
PT Iduna kakaiyo-na ‘twigs, hand on which coconuts grow’
PT Tawala kena ‘sheath covering new coconut flowers’
MM Nduke rereto- ‘spathe of the coconut, the “boat” that accompanies the flowers and baby coconuts’
MM Nduke baɣutu- ‘stem that supports the flowers, and later the fruit, of the coconut’
SES Gela mbagona ‘spathe of coconut flowers’
SES Gela tu ‘spathe of coconut flowers’
SES Gela liliki ‘flower case of coconut’
Fij Wayan sāmoa ‘hard sheath or calyx enclosing flower of coconut (used as torch); coconut flower before sheath bursts’
Pn Tikopia taume ‘coconut spathe, when dry used for fuel’

The Wayan and Tikopia terms above reflect POc *jamu((q)a) which, however, evidently had the more general sense ‘cluster of flowers or fruit, usually palms’ (ch.4, §2. 8). If there was a dedicated POc term for the coconut spathe and/or spadix, we have been unable to reconstruct it.

6. Conclusion⇫

The importance of the coconut in POc culture is attested - as we might expect - by a substantial collection of terms for its growth stages, especially for those that are salient to its consumers (green drinking coconut, ripe coconut with hardened flesh), for its parts (its water, its flesh and coconut cream/milk, the ‘apple’, the husk) and for certain parts of the palm (the frond and its midrib, the spines of the frond’s leaflets and the frond netting). Not surprisingly, some of these terms are inseparable from the functions for which they are used (shells and cups made from them; dried fronds, frond torches and torch fishing; leaflet spines and brooms; frond netting and strainers).

Notes⇫