The Aborigines with Modern Gun: An Historical Study of the Introduction, Exchange and Use of Gun in Taiwan Aboriginal Society

There deposits in the National Central Library of Taiwan an old picture which presented a Taiwan aboriginal warrior wearing traditional costume and adornments, but holding a modern gun in his hand like a European soldier. How did the warrior get a gun? How did he use it? This paper intends to collect and analyze such historical images and discuss the meaning of the aboriginal gun in its historical contexts. It examines three topics, the first describing the descriptions and images of Taiwan aborigines with the modem gun based on official documents, records, personal pictorial works, etc. the second exploring the introduction and exchange of guns in aboriginal society from the seventeenth century to the early twentieth century; and the third discussing the role of gun in combat and ceremony in Taiwan aboriginal culture. This paper describes the sorts of gun that the aboriginal warrior possessed as including matchlock, flintlock, caplock, Mauser bolt type, and magazine rifle. The exchange network of modem guns was not a new one. Chinese traders had long sold guns, gunpowder and other commodities to the tribesmen. The use of gun in Taiwan aboriginal community had been obviously affected by its traditional hunting culture and did not, it seems, change the structure of the aboriginal economic and social life.