Armband

Throughout northern Vanuatu, an island nation in the Southwest Pacific, men gain political power by participating in a series of complex economic tests. Each achieved social rank grants a man the right to wear specific insignia or ornaments. This armband would have been worn on the upper left arm to signify a particular economic accomplishment and to mark the man as someone of high status.

Starting in the mid-nineteenth century, ni-Vanuatu artists began replacing white and brown beads made from shell and coconut wood with more colorful European glass beads.