We report here on field and laboratory investigations motivated by several complementary issues in anthropology and museum studies that began in 1990 along 350 km of shoreline between the Indonesian border and the small village of Kaiep (or Kep) on the Sepik coast of Papua New Guinea. We also draw on additional information gleaned from the ethnographic material culture collections housed at the Field Museum purchased locally by Museum curators and others a century ago at villages on the 710 km of coast between Madang and the international border with Indonesia.