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MELANESIA

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Originally appearing in Volume V18, Page 90 of the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.
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MELANESIA , one of the three See also:

great divisions of the oceanic islands in the central and western Pacific. It embraces the See also:Bismarck See also:Archipelago, N.E. of New See also:Guinea, the Louisiade, See also:Solomon, See also:Santa Cruz, New See also:Hebrides and See also:Loyalty islands, New See also:Caledonia, See also:Fiji and intervening small See also:groups. The name (Gr. See also:Ohm, See also:black, and *tor, See also:island) is derived from the black See also:colour of the prevailing native See also:race, the Papuan and its allied tribes. Many of these differ widely from the See also:parent race, but all the Melanesian peoples have certain See also:common characteristics which distinguish them sharply from the inhabitants of Poly., nesia and See also:Micronesia. Their See also:civilization is See also:lower. The Melanesians are mostly " See also:negroid," nearly black, with crisp, See also:curly See also:hair elaborately dressed; their See also:women hold a much lower position than among the Polynesians; their institutions, social, polit' 1 and religious, are simpler, their See also:manners ruder; they have fe or, no traditions; See also:cannibalism, in different degrees, is almost universal; but their See also:artistic skill and See also:taste, as with some of the lower See also:African negroes, are remarkable, and they are amenable to discipline and See also:fair treatment. Their See also:languages, which exhibit considerable difference among themselves, have features which See also:mark them off clearly from the Polynesian, notwithstanding certain. fundamental relations with the latter. See R. H. See also:Codrington, The Melanesian Languages (See also:Oxford, 1885) and The Melanesians (Oxford, 1891); the articles See also:PAPUANS and PACIFIC OCEAN; also those on the several island-groups, &c.

End of Article: MELANESIA

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