3. Barter consists in the direct transfer of goods against goods. Unlike the gift exchange, it implies agreement as to rates, with the possibility of haggling over quantities and values. A system of barter in certain commodities may co-exist with gift-exchange in others of greater social import, as in the Trobriands, where, as described by Dr. Bronislaw Malinowski, the Kula, or exchange of valuable arm shells and necklaces is conducted along polite, strictly ceremonial lines, while the gimwali, the barter of fish for vegetables, is carried on with haggling as to size and quantity, and even acrimonious wrangling. Barter in abstract form is often sup posed to be typical of primitive peoples. But very rarely in any native community is the rate of exchange for goods determined by purely economic considerations of supply and demand work ing on the principle of rational utility alone.
4. Buying and Selling avoids the awkwardness of barter by the use of some medium of exchange. Much of what is often described as "primitive money" is wrongly so termed, but in various parts of Africa, for instance, cloth, iron, cowrie shells and salt do act as true currency, as also, apparently, do coconuts in the Nicobar islands. (See CURRENCY, PRIMITIVE.) Occasions of trade on a large scale among primitive peoples are provided by expeditions and markets.
Trading Expeditions.—In some areas itinerant traders, as the Hausa hawkers in parts of Africa, play an important role in economic life. In others their place is taken by caravans, as those of the Arabs, regularly equipped and following recognized trade routes. Of great interest, again, as being accomplished by more primitive folk, are such group expeditions as those of the Dieri and other Central Australian tribes, who will travel on foot for 400-50o miles to procure red ochre and the pituri plant. Note worthy also are the trading voyages, in unwieldly dug-out canoes, of the people around the New Guinea coast, as the sailing trips of the Siassi of the North, the hiri of the Motu, in which pots are taken to the Papuan gulf and exchanged for sago, and the Kula of the Trobriands, the ceremonial exchange of valuable orna ments.
Primitive Markets are of varied kind and wide distribu tion. Their great home is Africa, but they have also been de scribed from Guiana, old Mexico and Peru, Hawaii and various Melanesian areas. A typical example at either end of the scale will serve for illustration. The inhabitants of certain small islets off the coast of Malaita, Solomon islands, barter fish with those of the mainland for vegetables and pigs. Almost every day at times arranged beforehand with the bush natives, the islanders resort in their canoes to recognized places on the beach. The men
then stand guard with spears, while the actual bartering is done by the women, who, thus covered, advance slowly towards one another, produce in hand. Disputes at these markets are rare, though at other times the island natives cannot venture ashore without risk. In parts of Africa this institution is more imposing. Among the Akikuyu of the East, markets in a thickly populated district are no more than 3 m. apart, and are of great importance in the life of the people. They occur very frequently in the week, but are so arranged as not to clash with others in the neighbourhood, so that a person may visit them all in turn. About 9 o'clock in the morning the paths begin to fill with natives carry ing loads of corn, firewood, beer or iron to exchange, and between II and I business is at its height, the concourse numbering per haps 4,000-5,000 people. Order is maintained by special officers and no weapons are allowed within the precincts. The main characteristics of a market as a mode of conducting trade are its set time and regular recurrence, the definite place of assembly and the regulations by which order is preserved.
Psychology of the Trading Process.—The motives behind primitive trade are many-sided. The central factor is undoubtedly the desire for rational gain, for securing objects of economic utility otherwise unprocurable owing to variations in natural con ditions or specialized skill. But the psychological background is more complex than this. Trade is often carried on in articles charged with great social and ceremonial meaning, as in ornaments, but of no direct practical interest. Moreover, the desire for re nown and prestige is often a prominent element in the exchange, while the transaction itself may assist in cementing social bonds.
The value of goods, too, is determined by a complex set of factors. Even in the case of things apparently desired merely for their practical utility there is not such an objective standard of valuation as obtains in modern society, i.e., personal factors enter much into the exchange. The extent to which emotional elements lie at the root of value is shown in the case of such objects as tiki and other greenstone ornaments of the Maori, heirlooms of great wealth and the principal articles of ceremonial exchange. Their worth lies in their historical association with dead chiefs and ancestors of renown, in their sacredness and importance as symbols of the tribal greatness rather than in their practical use for adornment.