Lot 144 D α

Such posts, aisuari, were freestanding carvings erected in the homes of important men. They were tutelary images, providing spiritual guidance from the ancestral world.
The post depicts the marine deity, Karemanua, half man and half shark, one of the most powerful figures in Eastern Solomon Islands mythology. It was said
he could overturn canoes and devour fishermen and could hurl deadly arrows of pointed garfish at his enemies. His benevolent acts included leading fishermen to schools of bonito. This post represents an early creation myth, that of Karemanua devouring his human brother, Kakafu.
With the conversion to Christianity and the decreasing population in the area many inhabiitants relocated to the coast and such posts in
villages in the interior were abandoned to the elements. Neil MacCrimmon was a timber merchant with a sawmill on Malaita between 1910 and the early 1930s. It seems probable that he found this post in an abandoned village while searching for large trees in the interior of the islands of Eastern Solomons.