VanuatuArm guard from Vanuatu, Oceania. Part of the Pitt Rivers Museum Founding Collection. Given to the Museum in 1884.

This finely woven archer's arm-guard is from the central island of Epi in Vanuatu, central Melanesia. It is made by cross-lashing splints of split bamboo stems and overlaying this with some type of flexible fibre, either bamboo again or pandanus leaf. It is a functionally designed object, loosely woven at the wrist and the elbow, and densely woven in the central section, where the greatest proportion of string-impacts and friction would occur.

Traditional hunting or war bows from Vanuatu were self-bows (made of one material) of mangrove or palm-wood, 150-200cm long, with a curved form. Arrows were made of a sturdy grass and tipped with either barbed bone points for land animals or warfare, or carved wooden knobs for stunning large birds. Lighter arrows made from the midribs of palm leaves were used for shooting small birds.