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ETHNOS
SUPPLEMENT TO VOLUME 30 1965
The Popot Feast Cycle
Acculturated exchange
among the Mejprat Papuans
JOHN-ERIK ELMBERG
Stockholm
Published by
The Ethnographical Museum
of Sweden, Stockholm
Funds for research and printing have
been supplied by Kungafonden,
Humanistiska fonden, Sallskapet för
Antropologi och Geografi, Helge Ax:son
Johnsons Stiftelse, Karl-Eric Levins
Stiftelse and Syskonen Wesséns Stiftelse.
Hdkan Ohlssons Boktryckeri, Lund 1966
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Preface
5
I. Introductiion
II. T h e
i.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
p o p o t feast. Case materials
Leaders a n d followers
Reasons for C h a w e r ' s feast
T h e early phases
Building t h e Sepiach house
T a k u - d e m a enter t h e village
T h e Sachafra feast
Exit to the Sepiach house
Sepiach conditions
Last stages of C h a w e r ' s feast cycle
A different entering of Sepiach
6
8
8
10
14
17
20
25
35
45
50
.51
III. Field notes on related ceremonies
1. Pig slaughter at Kawian
2. Tóch-mi initiation at Fuar
57
61
IV. The popot
1. Additional data
2. Popot and wife
3. Popot, followers and d e p e n d a n t s
4. T w o autobiographical accounts
6s
68
72
85
V . Popot feasts and initiation ceremonies - a comparison
1. Function of the "popot houses"
2. T y p e s of Mejprat initiation
3. Fini-mikar, initiation of girls
4. Charit, initiation of boys
5. U o n , a Sawiet type for boys
6. T o c h - m i ; initiation w i t h circumcision
7. Comparison b e t w e e n four t y p e s of initiation
8. Comparison b e t w e e n initiation and p o p o t feasts
9. Conceptual oppositions
Q2
98
102
in
117
122
128
132
134
V I . Conclusion
i37
Appendix.
Four transcriptions from tape-recordings
T w o myths
,
List of some Malay and M e j p r a t t e r m s
References
D i a g r a m of some relations a t C h a w e r ' s feast
M3
166
168
170
171
4
PREFACE
A more comprehensive picture of the "popot feast" has long been
missing in the description of Mejprat culture. The observations of
the feast published now were made on different occasions during
1953-54. They give data for a re-interpretation of this feast and its
purpose, especially when compared to the feasts of initiation, on
which important additional information was obtained in 1957. A
number of Mejprat texts, some recorded during the actual feasts,
are found in the Appendix.
For the first general description of Mejprat culture the reader is
referred to the author's "Field notes on the Mejbrat people in the
Ajamaru district of the Bird's Head (Vogelkop), Western New
Guinea" in Ethnos 1955: 1 and "Further notes on the northern
Mejbrats (Vogelkop, Western New Guinea]" in Ethnos 1959: 1-2.
The spelling of Mejprat words is revised in accordance with current
Knguistic practice and further study of the collected vocabulary.
For the purpose of greater surveyability, the customary sections
of the Mejprat area (see map p. 2, Ethnos 1955: 1] are grouped
here into four divisions: (1] a lake area (roughly the Prat and
Maru sections], (2] a northern area (or: "to the north of the lakes";
the Mara (Marej] section), (3] an eastern area (east of a line
Fan—Kemurkek] and (4] a western Prat area (below a line Framu—
Semetu—Arus), that is of a special importance being the borderland
to the Sawiet area. The observations on the popot feast were made
insïde the traditional Prat section.
The Author
5
I. INTRODUCTION
Below will be described and analysed a ceremonial exchange feast
among the Mejprat Papuans of Irian Barat (Bird's Head peninsula,
Western New Guinea) of a type called the popot feast. It occupied
a central position in Mejprat culture as observed in the Prat area
during i953~54Already its frequency and high attendance shows it to be a dominant concern among the people. During the period of observation
in 1953, each week two or three popot feasts were reported in that
area. The big ones that I saw were attended by more than 200
adults, while a few small ones attracted only some 70 or 80 people—•
still a great crowd by Mejprat standards.
It is therefore reasonable to assume that the popot feast can be
regarded as a cultural focus, i. e. as the most highly developed
aspect of Mejprat culture, and an aspect from which to deduce the
cultural structure or pattern.1
By describing and analysing this feast it seems possible to demonstrate that the popot feast was a reorganisation of certain exchange
feasts into something partly new, and that the organisers stressed
aspects of leadership and exchange that were new and partly alien
to the traditional Mejprat culture. Actually this element of change
is foreseen in the hypothesis of a cultural focus. Herskovits has
pointed out that in the focal aspects of a culture there is the greatest
variation in custom and "this represents either potential or achieved
cultural change".2
Secondly it will be demonstrated through comparisons with other
feasts that the structure of the feast may be perceived as a dynamic
dualism expressed for instance in opposed categories of funeral—
initiation, male—female houses, pile-house—earth-floored house and
1
2
6
Herskovits 1948, 542.
Herskovits 1948, 544.
JOHN-ERIK ELMBERG: THE POPOT FEAST CYCLE
east—west. At the same time there is a cyclical element present.
Each separate feast belongs to a series, symbolically bringing the
participants down to the underworld and taking them back up again.
In the exchange of cloth is emphasized that the once given cloth
should return to the first donor and it is expressed in a special song
recounting the persons handling the cloth during its circuit. This
twofold aspect of the feast may be assumed to reflect cultural
structure.
Before giving the description of such a feast, it is necessary to
mention the lack of unanimity among the Mejprat concerning some
of its fundamental categories. Actually this was already to be seen
from the different names used for it.
Officials and missionaries in Western New Guinea referred to
feasts in the whole Mejprat area as "bobot-feest" in Dutch anid
"pesta bobot" or "pesta orang kaja" in Malay. The two first
mean "popot feast" and the last literally "rich man's feast" albeit
"orang kaja" ( = rich man) is also a titel for lower chiefs in
Indonesia.3
The Mejprat term for such feasts was neku poku, "to augment
the increase".
The foreign expressions seem to mirror the idea that the feast was
mainly connected with or enhancing the prestige of the popot, i. e.
a single person or class of persons.
The Mejprat term on the other hand stressed a fertility promoting character of the feast, by which presumably all participants
benefitted.
As it is known that the most notorious popot in the Prat area,
Chawer Sarosa, was one of the first there—in his own version the
very first—to speak Malay, and also that he became an interpreter
with the first European officer who resided there, it seems possible
that he also contributed towards the idea that feasts were mainly
an achievement by popot or "rich men". It was certainly in the
interest of these men that Malay and European strangers should
have such a notion, and rather confirm their aspirations as leaders
or chiefs, for instance by giving them such official titles as kapitan,
majoor or orang kaja.
3
E.N.I. III, 126.
7
ETHNOS
II. THE POPOT FEAST. CASE MATERIALS
......,,.
I . LEADERS AND FOLLOWERS
The Mejprat of the western Prat area were observed to use the
word popot with at least the following three meanings: a) a leader,
and especially a leader of the series of joint feasts commonly known
to strangers as "bobot feasts"; b] anyone who had kusema, "boys,
followers", whose working power and traditional exchanges were
more or less at his disposal; c) anyone who had performed the main
exchange feasts of the Mejprat life cycle. The information varied
significantly on the number of such feasts. For many years, in official
and scientific writing in Malay, Dutch and English, the term "bobot"
has been current for Mejprat leaders in general. I propose to investigate the contents actually covered by the term, preferring the
revised Mejprat spelling: popot.
No difference in terms was made between followers who were
on a more equal economie footing with the popot (and in turn had
followers), and those who were in various degrees dependent on
him. Allegedly the term of address for the leader was natia, "father".
The popot feasts to be described here belonged to a type of feasts
traditionally performed in a series of successive cermonies and first
said to be connected with four different houses: samu ren, samu
sachafrd, samu sepidch and samu rufdn.
The leader of one such series in 1953-54 w a s Charachawer
(Chawer] Sarosa, and I was present at some of his feasts. He was
also the Government appointed headman in the village of Mefchatiam. Chawer, his younger brother Semer and his brother's
son Akus were then my main informants. The persons figuring in the
preparations of these feasts were above all Chawer's two wives,
Wefo Kampuwefa, the older, and Munach Arus. With Wefo he had
the sons Charachn'tuwit and Junus, and a daughter Muof. The
children were married, Muof with Frarek Chowaj-Sefarari, Junus
with Karet-Tacher Karet and Charachn'tuwit with M'pefato Re•mowk. With Munach, Chawer had four children, who were still
minors. His brother Semer was married to Metowk Chowaj-Sefarari.
The Sarosa people were considered as serim, "immigrants", who
allegedly a few generations ago had arrived through the Sawiet area
from the island of Salawati.
8
As to who were his followers, Chawer—like the other popot I
heard—had extemporized different names on different occasions,
usually adding: sera kusemd a tio, "all men are my followers". The
feast cycle had begun long before my arrival in the area. In the
beginning of October 1953, when I could observe the swiddens
prepared for the Sachafra feast, they were not worked any longer.
Informants usually declined to discuss exchange economy unless
on broad Unes and with no definite details. Chawer was no exception
but once he gave the names of the followers for whom he was going
to make exchanges at the later Sepiach-feast and who called him
"father". They had earlier contributed cloth, vegetables, palmwine
or had worked on the swiddens for the Sachafra feast. Their names
and their traditional terms for Chawer are given below:
Weta Pres
Meritsaw Pres
Pocherit Sarosa
Karet-Puo Karet
Maput Karet
Serosmeri Sarosa
Kawaseker Sarosa
Mafat Sarosa
Mapuk Sesa
Jopuk Karet
natia
netnó
na
senim
nemó
na
na
natia
nemó
senim.
(MZH) 4
[MBS]
(FBS)
(WB)
(MBS)
(FBS)
(FBS)
(FB)
(MBS)
(WMZHB)
Of these ten persons, five were regarded as owners of Sachafra
houses on the joint feast site and can be considered as fellow popot,
viz., Meritsaw, Pocherit, Maput, Serosmeri and Kawaseker, although
all of them together with some of their dependants were said to
have given a hand in clearing Chawer's swidden near Tuwér.
Later I asked Kawaseker and Pocherit whether they were Chawer's
kusemd and called him natia. Kawaseker replied, not without heat,
that he was himself a popot and used na, parallel cousin, not natia.
Pocherit, on the other hand, replied that na or natia amounted to
about the same thing—a unique statement. Of the others in Chawer's
list none, on being asked, considered himself kusesmd except Mapuk
* The systems of abbreviations used here is the same as the one employed
for instance by Needham (1960]; thus: F = Father, M = Mother and so on, the
only exception being Z for Sister.
9
ETHNOS
Sesa, Weta Pres and Mafat Sarosa. These three can be regarded as
dependants, as also their wives had made swiddens near Tuwer,
where Chawer's wife had hers. Weta and Mafat traditionally called
Chawer "father", and Mapuk had no difficulty in substituting "father"
for "cross cousin", though Maput and Meritsaw did not do so. Jopuk
Karet said that Chawer was crazy and his talk about followers was
rubbish.
Jopuk came from Jokwer in the Maru region, and he and his wife
were also to cultivate a swidden near Tuwer. He had sold palm wine
to Chawer against a promise of cloth intended for his own marriage
exchanges. Though he called Chawer senim, "in-law" (through his
wife), and not "father", he seems technically a dependant. Semer
and Charu Sarosa who together with Mapuk Sesa had worked a lot
for Chawer, were not even mentioned, and Karet-Puo was never
observed to turn up.
.
2. REASONS FOR C H A W E R ' S FEAST
Chawer said that he had started his cycle of feasts because his
family had suffered much from sickness and misfortune. He himself
had had a fever and a severe cough for a very long time. Wefo had
suffered from attacks of giddiness and uterine hemorrhages. His
daughter-in-law M'pefato had suffered a deep wound in one knee
and had also had a miscarriage. His brother Semer and his wife had
no children at all, and his daughter-in-law Karet-Tacher's baby son
had had a very severe illness. Frarek, his son-in-law, had had aches
in his injured and shrivelled right arm.
Chawer had various explanations for all this. First mawe, a method
of divining with a boar's tusk, had been resorted to; this had been
attended to by Chawer's cousin Pocherit Sarosa who was ra pdm,
an expert belonging to the Uon society. He found that Chawer's
deceased father, Kawaseker, must be considered as the cause of
these abnormal states, above all those concerning women. But he
had dreamed otherwise, added Chawer, he dreamed like Chawer
did.
Chawer declared that a certain woman, Pochririn Pres, had been
possesssed by kapes fane, a "pig-spirit" and thus became a witch,
who through her influence had brought misfortunes upon the Sarosa
10
JOHN-ERIK ELMBERG". THE POPOT FEAST CYCLE
folk. Chawer had become certain of this on account of her mean
conduct and owing to dreams in which he had thought himself
chased by a pig.
There was, moreover, a dependant, one Imon Semetu, who refused
to deliver what Chawer demanded and whom Chawer accused of
sorcery. Semer and Akus said that Chawer fought against Imon with
fito, "hot medicines".
The above-mentioned Pres woman was killed by relatives and
neighbours near the village af Karet Tupun, and parts of her body
were consumed. The woman belonged to a group expecting cloth
from Chawer in consequence of his father Kawaseker's decease.
Karet Sape, the father's first wife, had a paternal aunt (married to
a Pres man), whose female grandchild was this kapes fane. She considered that at the time of his decease Kawaseker had not yet fulfilled his cloth obligations towards her parents. Chawer had taken
over Kawaseker's obligations by taking charge of his skull but denied
this outstanding obligation.
As a village chief in Mefchatiam. he was taking part in the legal
proceedings against the killers and could see that the authorities
punished severely those who were inculpated. One evening, some
days before the Sachafra-feast, however, under the influence of palm
wine he began to dance around, threatening negligent followers and
holding forth about his power. He said: Netdch tek ra namio kapes
fane—och'. Semer translated the words as "I have instructed my
men to stab the witch". He was brutally silenced by his son
Charachn'tuwit. The latter who had worked for the oil company in
Sorong was evidently aware of what risks might be connected with
unguarded speech. He immediately explained that his father was
speaking of old times when the latter was sentenced to hand labour
on Ternate. Semer presumed that the utterance had been empty
boasting. Ill at ease, those present left the house.
This witch was frequently in Chawer's thoughts. He was convinced that the harmful influence of the spirit that had possessed
her was still making itself felt despite the fact that the witch was
dead. He considered that the spirit turned Woch Chowaj's wife
Majit Naw-Chara against himself. The latter was now charging
that on an earlier occasion she had been cheated by Chawer. She
refused to let Woch lend Chawer some cloth. Chawer hinted that
II
ETHNOS
if he could get European alcohol to drink, his soul would, while he
was asleep, seek out and drive off this kapes fane.
Wefo, Chawer's first wife, considered that she had been the first
to prepare for the feast to be made. She gave as her reason that at
the end of the year 1952 there had been a severe drought with consequent shortage of food. Grubs destroyed the taro leaves. People
became feeble and sick. This was due to the fact that kapes, the
ghosts of persons incompletely buried, were dissatisfied. Of what
avail, asked Wefo, was it that Pocherit and Chawer whipped the
ironwood trees at Mount Mis and Awt with croton and dracaena
leaves? There could in any case be no rainfall until the kapesspirits, were content. She had spoken with her classificatory sister
Focho Awaj and also with her daughter-in-law M'pefato, her daughter Muof and her co-wife Munach. Together with some followers
they had begun a swidden near Tuwer, along the road between
Mefchatiam and Chowaj. They had asked the men to help with the
clearing; and when the harvest was ready the men had built pilehouses and made a Ren-feast, which Wefo termed mikar. Those who
had helped with the swiddens had been remunerated on that occasion. Only when the neche mamas-feast had been held would the
feapes-spirits be satisfied, and then Chawer's cough and fever would
disappear, and the women would get children and all would be well.
That was to follow watum, the traditional rules given by Tu, "the
regional dema".6
Her co-wife Munach and her daughter-in-law M'pefato on the
same occasion were of the opinion that Chawer had not for a long
time made neche mamos, an exchange feast for the recently dead,
and must do this. Semer explained that the ground on which
5
The Marind-anim term "dema" is used here to denote a primeval being that
once created the particular traditional order known by a certain group of people
to govern their world. The dema was sometimes killed and parts of its body were
transformed
into food plants as well as the important living creatures. Jensen
C I 95 I , P- 161) advocates the use of the term as it confers no bias of value.
Tu was one term for such a dema, kapes indicated a "ghost" and nauwian
• a "soul". In the western Prat area ritaku ("what increases, collects") was often
mentioned by Chawer as an "increaser or collector of spirits" or the "collection [?)
of ghosts". Especially Chawer used n'taku and kapes in sweet confusion for
any immaterial agent. The confusion was probably augmented by the initial
ignorance of Mejprat categories on the part of the investigator and by his
familiarity with the Malay concepts n e n e mojang, "ancestral spirits" and
orang m a t i p u n j a djiwa "spirits of the dead". Therefore the term "spirit"
is presently used, if the Mejprat category is not clearly discerned.
12
JOHN-ERIK ELMBERG: THE POFOT FEAST CYCLE
Chawer and his family lived properly belonged to the Pres clan,
and every time he made a feast he had to pay land-rent to the
owners. Death dues were to be given to children of the maternal
uncle of a deceased man, and to children of the paternal aunt of
a deceased woman.
Thus from the outset Chawer had spoken about the misdeeds of
a witch and about sorcery. Such activities were a challenge to his
power and magical knowledge. When the feast took place this
would imply his victory over hostile influences and be a monument
of his superior power and strength. Then he would live as a "great
lord" and people would bring him food while he had his leisure
(see Appendix p. 143). In his utterances he never directly associated Kawaseker's spirit with these misfortunes. He only mentioned that Pocherit had indicated Kawaseker's spirits as the cause.
This implied a not inconsiderable difference.
Pocherit indicated the watum-v?ay out of the sickness and misfortune. The women re-iterated the traditional aspects of the feast.
The witch conception did not appear to be a reality among the
women. Wefo and Munach said only that kapes fane was a bad human being and referred to Chawer for further information. M'pefato
said that it was nonsense, and Focho Awaj did not know anything
about it. Wefo, as well as Munach and M'pefato, also stated that
such a death exchange performance on the part of Chawer and
themselves' was what they considered to be wanting. What they
were endeavouring to do, said Wefo, was to fulfil watum, the traditional rules, and make kapes serdk amu, "the ghosts satisfied with
it
us .
The feasts may be said to have started when in October 1952 a
sajuoch tree was felled and a first swidden was made near Tuwer
on Chawer's mother's ground. Followers and their wifes took part
and later samu ren," the first house was built on the feast site (fig. 2,
page 15] near the village of Mefchatiam. The harvest was then ready
and the helpers were to be remunerated at a feast, where four
young girls were probably beginning their initiation in house no. 1,
e
This term was used only in the western part of the Prat area and seems
to he a translation of the Safiet term boliren, denoting the "hearth-feast" in
a new-built house, corresponding to the Mejprat wochdt.
13
ETHNOS
a house of somewhat larger dimensions than the other houses to
be built.
Chawer's fragmentary account of this Ren-feast was one year later
already distorted. On this single point his wife Wefo, his brother
Semer and his nephew Akus were entirely agreed. He seemed to
pass over in silence, to belittle, to exaggerate or to invent the achievements of different participants. Such alterations or embellishments,
called sioch sack, were considered to constitute a part of the leader's
technique of persuasion and pressure.
To confirm or refute statements referring to such conditions in
the past was a hopeless task. On broad lines Chawer was now preparing to give neche rnamos "death-cloth", due to his father's maternal uncle's descendants—he called them only the Sacharim, i. e.
by the clan name. He would also be giving cloth to the Pres folk,
regarded as majer, the original owners of the ground in the region.
3 . THE EARLY PHASES
The Pres folk helped to build the pile-house no 1, which Chawer
called satnu ren from the outset and later indicated as a house of
initiation for girls. When the harvest on Wefo's swidden was ready,
the Ren-feast was arranged. Reportedly Chawer sat in the doorway
and received the pieces of cloth and the food from the guests. He
handed over everything to Wefo and her group of women, who
were inside the house. Inside was also a supply of provisions collected by the women and Chawer's followers. The guest who contributed a piece of ikat-fabric, received a portion of meat (which the
women gave to Chawer and he handed over to the guest]. A small
piece of cloth fetched two packets of cooked fish and a small portion
of meat, either opossum or fowl. One who brought fish, eggs or
palm wine got twice as much back. Some ikat-fabrics were also lent
to Chawer. They were put into sacks and the collection was called
po iwiak, "the spider cloths". After four days a suwejn-fea.st was
held where these ikat-fabrics were returned to the respective owners
together with meat and vegetables. Some months later when the moon
was on the wane, Chawer fetched his father Kawaseker's skull from
a cave and took it to house no. 2, which had been completed in the
meantime. He promised a senach-feast in four days, when the chilM
15
ETHNOS
dren of the dead Kawaseker's sister and maternal uncle should
receive some cloth. Wefo and Pum Isir called this feast fun, but
Chawer reserved this name only for the funeral of a child.
Then Meritsaw Pres seems to have given a part of the cloth that
he had to exchange for his wife, Chawer's cousin. Some of Chawer's
followers, cousins and brothers had helped to cultivate a field of
maize, and they now distributed the harvest, together with palm
wine and crayfish, among those present. The women had contributed
vegetables. The following morning Kawaseker's remaining bones
were distributed among the guests according to their contributions.
Kawaseker's ghost was considered to dwell in the skull.
Afterwards the building of the other pile-houses was commenced
in preparation for the Sachafra-feast. They were all built on the
eastern side of a gently sloping hill outside the village of Mefchatiam.
In May 1953 eight houses were erected in an irregular circle [see
fig. 2). The two at the top belonged to Chawer and were the first
to be built. House no. 3 was built further down on the slope by
Meritsaw Pres, who was to receive land-rent from Chawer. Just below this and to the right Pocherit Sarosa and Karetaja Karet erected
house no. 4. Pocherit was to return cloth to Chawer. Karetaja was
Pocherit's trade friend, tafoch. House no. 5 was built by Maput
Karet, whose sister was preparing the death exchange for her
paternal aunt, who had been the first wife of Chawer's father. After
this, Jakof Na built house no. 8 to the left of Chawer's house. He
was to lend Chawer some cloth. Serosmeri Sarosa built house no. 6
and intended to hand in cloth for his deceased wife to the Isir
people. House no. 7 was built lastly as serdjn, a "guest-house", and
was finished the night before the feast. Chawer referred to all of
these house-owners and fellow hosts as his followers.
When the seven first houses were completed, their owners jointly
promised a senach-feast four days after they had fetched skulls from
different places. This feast was afterwards hotly debated. Chawer
and Wefo were accused of being mean in the contribution of cloth
and provisions. On this occasion, it had been expected that a number
of ikat-fabrics were loaned out from Chawer's supply for a shorter
period. Such primary exchange gifts were called po fejdk and these
were to be returned with interest in kind before the great Sachafrafeast took place.
16
The Senach-feast probably took place during February-March
1953 and the Sachafra-feast occurred in the period October 4th-yth.
In the meantime the popot attended different feasts in the district
at which they gave or received cloth. By contributing small amounts
of cloth they stimulated exchanges calculated to hasten other series
of feasts and thus free cloth that they themselves counted on acquiring. They were often accompanied by followers and relatives, who
formed a group around them. The popot liked to behave with a
certain nonchalance and self-confidence and to display a ready wit.
They tried to keep the interest alive for what was going to happen
at the next feast in Mefchatiam.
Thus Chawer, for example, went about in the village of Sefachoch
at Tawt Kambu's Ren-feast (27/6), and whatever people were
talking about he said: Mechuw makin tn'samu sachafra a tio, "there's
lots of that in my Sachafra-house". This advertising campaign caused
mixed feelings. Some listeners pointed out the fact that he was
drunk, others that his Sachafra-feast was probably a long way off.
Others, again, observed ironically that a spirit was speaking through
his mouth. When finally Sawit Susim took Chawer's part and
shouted that Chawer in any case owned a Sachafra-house and not
a Ren-house, some shrugged their shoulders. Someone said sotto
voce: clever fellow 1
4 . BUILDING THE SEPIACH HOUSE
On September 26th, when I returned to the area of investigation
and resumed work after three month's sick-leave, Chawer was
building the Sepiach, a ground-house, below the hill where the pilehouses stood. That is to say, the house-owning popot from the hill
and some of their people, in all about 40, were taking part in the
construction. Angle-posts, support for the roof-ridge and all the
cross-beams were already in place. Adults and children were carrying sticks and poles from the woods, where mostly Pres people were
cutting the trees. Chowaj-Sefarari men arrived with rolls of rattan.
In the afternoon the house was ready, 12.6X4.2 m, the height
under the roof-ridge being 1.9 m.
Only part of the roofing and the barking of the walls remained
to be done when Wefo and a group of women came home towards
17
ETHNOS
the evening with taro and spinach for the workers. The women of
the other popot soon started arriving from all directions. Some of
the builders went up to the pile-house, where they prepared the
food received; others went home, while a large number remained
standing before Chawer's house (no. 2).
Inside this house his wives, children and some of his followers
were sitting, among these Wefo's nephew Sawit, Chawer's cousin
Sachorowafat Sarosa, Meritsaw Pres and Jopuk Karet. The latter had
brought a big bamboo-cane of palm wine. Also sitting there was
N'tajes Pres, and an old Pres woman who was called ra sus, a magical
expert, who with red /w/a-leaves had rubbed arnu, the middlemost
post supporting the ridgebeam. N'tajes had buried the leaves at the
post. Chawer produced a wooden jar and bamboo mugs from his
bag and requested N'tajes to take charge of the palm wine and fill
up the mugs. The older men produced mugs from their bags.
From without could be heard rising clamour and loud shouts.
Sawit Susim squeezed in through the door and wedged himself
down between those present on the floor. Chawer rose bellowing
to his feet and prevented more from entering. The tumult outside
grew rapidly. At the same time as N'tajes handed Chawer the filled
wooden jar, the women picked up the smaller children and went
out. Semer and Charachn'tuwit sat in the doorway, the women
retired to house no. 1 and Chawer poured some splashes of palm
wine through the floor-grating to "wet the ground" for rafew-spirits.
Some small children sitting down below to peep ran away shrieking.
Chawer muttered: Taku mama serot-el Nekdch odn, pokekl Mama
serot-serotl "Spirits come quickly! Collect Oan, Pokekl Come very
quickly." He then poured wine into a mug and drank some mugfuls
before pouring out for the others. Last served was N'tajes himself.
The wine soon took effect. All began to talk at once. Semer was
sobbing mostly and shouted that he had been thrashed by Wefo
when he was a little boy. Chawer mentioned an ikat-fabric called
Seranana and how he had built a village, where previously the
Mejprat had lived in darkness. They were now living in the light
and this was his merit. The others improved upon his narrative and
interrupted one another constantly.
By this time those outside had also got hold of palm-wine and
were trying to get a serar-dance under way, but they were soon
18
dispersed. Wefo thrust her head through the doorway and handed
out freshly roasted taro and fish in a bark parcel, which I shared
with Semer. However, he went to sleep while still eating. Chawer's
declaration about Seranana became increasingly incoherent and the
corrections of the others increasingly complicated.
On the following morning, the 27th, the little Sachafra village
seemed deserted. Only N'tajes was sleeping in house no. 2. The
other houses were barred.
On October 1st Semer turned up and explained that more roofing
material and bark were being fetched for the Sepiach house from the
tracts to the south of Chowaj-Sefarari. As a matter of fact most of
the material, exchanged for fish and taro, had already been fetched
and the roofing was almost completed. In the afternoon there was
a shower of rain and work was discontinued. Only on the evening
of the following day the roof was finished.
On October 3rd, however, I was told that the feast was postponed
because samu chaj, a death-house, had been completed some days
previously, a little way up in the woods, to celebrate Oanjen Semetu's death, which had occurred some months earlier. He had been
Akus Sarosa's maternal uncle, and Akus arrived there in the evening.
He told me that on the following day the Sachafra-feast would continue and the popot were going to sawero, a water spirit home, in
the afternoon.
Accordingly, early in the morning of the 4th I went up to
Chawer's pile-house with two sarongs and the intention to make
him promise to take me along. I unfolded them and gave him one
and Wefo the other since they had given me taro and fish. Wefo
assured me that the taro and fish had been md sej, "not calling for
gifts in return", and that she would not accept anything. Semer
intervened and persuaded her to put the sarongs into her bag.
Chawer slowly rolled a cigarette, shrugged his shoulders and said:
Mendnoch, "I give up". Semer smiled cautiously and said I should
doubtless be permitted to go along with them to the water spirit
home.
Wefo finally got up, stuffed some rolls of black bark-cloth into
her bag and went out. Chawer told me that the last time the moon
had been on the wane the women had made bark-cloth that had
been dyed in black mud and that was to be worn at the feast. Not
19
ETHNOS
until the women had embroidered patterns on it would the feast
begin. Then the men would go to the water spirit home. Chawer
thought that it would take more than one day.
I went home to eat and returned two hours later, just before
three o'clock. There was an unnatural silence about the pile-houses
and there was not a soul in sight. A newly beaten path led through
the grass to the south-west. From house no. i could be heard the
whisperings of the women. I was admonished not to talk aloud, all
the men had gone to the spirit water at Mis.
5. TAKU-DEMA ENTER THE VILLAGE
After a quarter of an hour's walk on the newly beaten path I met
the men on their way home with Chawer, Kawaseker and Pocherit
at their head. All were serious and silent. In their hair waved freshly
broken ferns, they wore ornaments and carried shoulder-bags,
spears and parangs. Most of them had painted a large red triangle
on their faces with the base along the chin and the apex between
the eyes and two parallel vertical red lines on the forehead. A similar
triangle or a horizontal line was painted on the chest.
Without looking aside and without taking any notice of me they
continued up towards the Sachafra-houses. The silence was complete, their feet seemed to move soundlessly on the ground, there
was no rattle of weapons, not a word was exchanged. They kept
their gaze straight in front of them, withdrawn and concentrated.
Eighty-one men were moving across the landscape giving an impression of solemnity.
The last stretch up the hill they ran. When all had come to the
feast site, all the paths leading to the houses were rapidly blocked
with thorny plants, already gathered, and with some quickly felled
young trees. All went indoors. In the doorway of Chawer's house
no. 2 Wefo silently handed over a great number of "cigarettes",
which she and the other women had been rolling in the meantime.
At the same time she handed over a glowing stick with which they
made some wooden sticks blaze up the fireplace. She then returned
to house no. 1.
In the house Chawer, his two cross-cousins Chasa and Frarek
Chowaj, and his son Charachn'tuwit were now sitting. Also present
20
were Wefo's brothers Charachnekaw and Meritajok Kanepu.
Bundles of tobacco leaves hung suspended from the roof and eight
bags filled with parcels of cloth stood in the northern corner of the
house. Chawer brought out a cane of palm wine. Charachnekaw
poured out wine in the ironwood vessel and handed it to Chawer,
who mumbled the clan-names: "M'pres, M'Sarosa" and poured a few
drops through the floor-grating near the fire-place with the words:
Taku-o kapes-o "Dema, ghosts!"
Some noisy little girls began to descend from house no. i, but they
were quickly silenced by Chawer and left the place together with
the women. Women and children also left the other houses.
From Meritsaw's house—no. 3—three raw taro-roots and a bundle
of fish were distributed to each house. The taro were big and of the
Sapur kind. From now on the men would prepare the food themselves.
Chawer resumed his place near the fire and emptied his filled
bamboo tumbler four times, each time first pouring a little through
the floor-grating. Wine was now served to Frarek, Chasa, Charachnekaw and Meritajok, who all made libations in the same way as
Chawer. Charachn'tuwit, on the other hand, was not served, and
was decidedly sulky. I had been offered some after Frarek, but I
relinquished the cup to Charachn'tuwit, who emptied it and left
the house. The packet of fish was opened and sent round, together
with the' cigarettes. All was done in silence. An atmosphere of
satisfaction mingled with relief was felt, as if something difficult
had turned out a success. A tension relaxed in the men's faces.
They streched out on their rain-cloaks, and some of them, with
groans of contentment, pressed their small shoulder-bags against
their bodies.
Chawer explained in a low voice what had happened at the
spirit-water and what was in the bags. The bags contained cha fra,
"spirit-stones", egg-like in shape. They had earlier been left lying
in the water and now they were fetched home. One held them on
leaves of fern when sitting by the spirit-water saying: Mama senok
sachafrd mape tiul Mama serot kach po a tio, "Come up to the
pile-houses and you will get palm winel Come quickly and collect
my cloth!" Ant-eggs were thrown in the water and dema names were
pronounced." Tu-o-M'fat and In. A very big fish then swam out of
21
ETHNOS
the depth and palm wine was poured into the water. The fish, also
called Mos, was taku, and came up to the surface to drink. More
fish came, and this presaged that much cloth would be brought to
the feast.
Palm wine had then been poured on the water-edge and more had
been promised in the pile-house, wereupon all returned home in
silence. Taku was now sitting under the house sipping palm wine
"like cats". Now Chawer could be calm, the feast would be a success
and lots of cloth would be brought; ikat-cloth, that the dema had
made and cloth bought from the Europeans which their dema had
probably made in factories. Frarek had come with large quantities
of palm wine and Chawer could now hear the dema drinking under
the house. The dracaena-bushes at the corner posts would wave
their leaves and people would then come with gifts of cloth to
Chawer because the dema were moving the leaves, and he himself
was a great popot.
A woman now showed herself in the doorway and handed over
a pandanus-packet containing cloth and a bark-wrapped bundle of
fish. This was Sori Tuwit and Chawer was to contribute towards
the marriage exchange of her son, Mafat Sarosa. She unfolded the
ikat-cloth in the package, together with Chawer, and it was seen
to be a Pokek of small size. She then put the cloth back into its
pandanus-bag, which was placed in a sack in the corner.
The sacks are all mine, said Chawer. The others concurred: Raro
popot ju rajtl "they are the popot's sacks".
He then told the story of how, in his youth, he was sent as a
captive to Ternate, but returned and became Kapitan of Mefchatiam.
He told the story with digressions about fishing and tattooing and
was obviously satisfied with his reminiscences. "When the narrative
returned to the Mejprat area he returned to the present situation
with a certain irritation. Now, he continued, people really must
come. If they were not willing to hand in the cloth they owed him
he would bring an action against them and have them put in prison.
It was he who had opened up the area and enabled the Mejprat to
live in the light instead of running about in the woods like animals.
Chawer was seized with uneasiness. He spoke now Mejprat, now
Malay. His voice rose menacingly, while the others tried to interrupt, calm down or excite him. Frarek chimed in antiphonally in
22
JOHN-ERIK ELMBERG". THE POPOT FEAST CYCLE
his threats against followers slow in delivering and cried: "Hear the
popot!" and "Rightly spoken, father]" His special emphasis on tatia,
"father" helped to inflate Chawer's popot-feelings to bursting point.
People came running from the other houses. His son Charachn'tuwit and his brother Semer came up into the house. Kawaseker and
Pocherit sat down in the doorway. Chawer calmed down somewhat when he saw his son, but still talked, mixing Mejprat and
Malay. He wanted to buy a hunting-horn I had in my possession in
order to summon all spirits, and he wanted to get hold of European
liquor in order to get at the spirit of a witch.
His son mocked him sotto voce because he, a popot, could not
achieve anything on palm wine. Chawer pretended not to hear,
holding forth to the effect that the young people wanted to get rich
without working. Look at me, I am rich, said Chawer, I talk to taku
in my dreams and learn the right works. I make feasts and become
rich.
Frarek and Pocherit prompted him in Mejprat. Chawer, with a
parang in his hand, embarked upon a dance of wrath: Imon kupawt,
tesd-o; wachia, seta nidch tesd-o, tio raro popot-o, "Imon, you sissy,
I destroy you, slave of your in-laws, wretched slow-coach, I destroy
you, I am popot".—The popot is dancing menari, cried his son.7
Chawer, who seemed quite drunk, suddenly stood erect and spoke
emphatically into the fire: I have charged people to stab kapes fanel
With the help of Pocherit and Kawaseker, the son stopped Chawer
talking, saying that his father was boasting of old times. Semer shook
his head and remarked: Only a big boaster. Chawer lay down and
went contentedly to sleep. The on-lookers speedily left the house.
On the following day, i. e. the 5th, everyone kept for the most
part indoors. Now and then Chawer poured a little palm wine
through the floor. He also crouched down at the dracaena plants
outside the house and muttered: Kach serot, mama, "collect quickly
and come".
He was in a splendid mood and told a number of myths. The
others helped to narrate, smoking and sleeping between. Frarek
whittled a half-finished farok-jar. Meritajok took a rattan armlet
7
An Indonesian dance often performed at feasts among the Ambonese officials
in New Guinea.
23
ETHNOS
from his bag to continue braiding the red-yellow-black pattern.
It was a protracted and subdued occupation, important matters must
nepo rere, "be treated slowly".
Taro was roasted and eaten, crumbs being pushed down to the
spirits through the floor-grating. Food prepared by women was now
m'paw, "forbidden". Nor was it permitted to drink water or eat
anything but fish. Any contact whatever with water was also m'paw,
as was the performance of any kind of work.
No one might leave the cluster of houses since the blocking of
the paths the previous day. The thorny obstacles were intended to
prevent taku from returning to the water. If anyone were to go
away from here a spirit might get away at the same time. A new
light was shed on the spirit category also in his following remarks.
Chawer asserted that n'taku was now content and would stay.
Two taku had come towards him in a dream last night, named
Sefa-ra-m'pres ("outside the Pres people") and Pochatu-Pres ("Presmistress of the cold things or ghosts"). Carrying dracaena leaves
and inherited parangs they had brought palm wine to Chawer and
they had drunk it together. Their names indicate them to be male
and female dema, possibly of different regions. As long as the bones
of the dead had been on the rack in the woods their kapes were
dangerous but now that their skulls had been taken into the Sachafra
house and placed among the sacks of cloth, all was well. When the
ceremonies were completed they became ro n'taku, "of the creating
or collecting dema" or n'setdku, "identic with the dema".
N'tajes raised some objection and the expression feni mika'r
formed part of what he said. Feni mika'r was the (designation for the
women's house of initiation. I did not understand the connection
but it is possible that he wanted Chawer to tell me about what had
been going on in the next house (no. i ) . Chawer who was loath to
focus any attention on the doings of the women, only said that the
previous day was called nikar pokdr "to tie on the body-cord".
On the following morning, the 6th of October, it rained. Everybody had eaten and drunk palm wine when I awoke. The general
mood was irritable. Chawer requested me to go home; it must not
go on raining like this, perhaps my presence was the cause. If I promised to bring my tape-recorder to the feast, he would inform me
of the time through Semer or Akus. At the time I went, some of
2
4
the thorny impediments were taken away from the paths around
the houses.
It rained and thundered the greater part of the day but stopped
at dusk. Akus arrived. On the following morning Chawer was to
distribute ikat-fabrics, but first conch-trumpets were to be blown
so that everyone could hear what was afoot and all spirits should
come. The women had come home angry and wet, and Chawer had
now decided to let the feast begin.
Its first phase was called neche mamos, and this must be seen,
said Akus, not spoken of as it was to turn out a surprise. We went
to the pile-houses.
The site for the feast was full of men, women and children
entering and leaving the houses and garrulously inspecting ikatfabrics in a gay but solemn mood (fig. 3). Summer lightning jagged
across the sky and lit up many unknown faces. Wefo and the group
of women were back in house no. 1. Chawer's house was more
packed than ever, and Chawer told me to sleep in Akus' house in
Mefchatiam. We made our arrangements and went to sleep there
to the accompaniment of a shower of rain.
6. THE SACHAFRA FEAST
Just before four o'clock we were awakened by the booming tones
of the conch-trumpets, which seemed infinitely remote. People came
streaming up towards the Sachafra-houses from all the houses in
the village. Those who were carrying small torches of dry sticks
put them out before going in among the houses. The sky was cloudy
and the moon was on the wane. The feast site between the houses
was a populated darkness, the general mood seemed sleepy and
lethargic and quite different from that on the previous evening. The
four conch-trumpets with their long-drawn-out lugubrious tones
seemed to give the key-note to the atmosphere. Semer and Akus,
relieved each other for a while at Chawer's conch outside house
no. 2. Small boys tried their skill. Chawer's house was empty of
people, the sacks of cloth stood there as before.
All of a sudden there were shrieks and female screams from the
eastern part of the site and the flash light revealed a group of women
with parangs in their hands moving to and fro with little jumps.
25
ETHNOS
The onlookers formed a large circle. In time with the jumps the
women uttered fierce and rhythmic cries of "aw", shook their knives
threateningly with serious and resolute expressions. Some were
painted with red lines, kor aju, on their faces, several wore bird-ofparadise plumes and all wore cloth apparel, though not as sarongs
or as a substitute for the ordinary bark cloth. The majority wore it
slantwise across their left shoulder and tucked inside the girdle in
front and behind. Others were wearing parts of sarongs in arm-rings
or girdles by way of adornment, and poch fen, four little girls were
wearing patola-patterned cloth [fig. 4].
Wefo was dancing with a thick cudgel in her hand, while on her
26
back hung a net-bag containing long wodden poles and pandanus
packets with cloth. A large printed sarong was tied around her
buttocks, hips and belly like some sort of enormous charen nafanstrip. Five sarak, shell-rings, were suspended on her chest from
27
ETHNOS
a cord round her neck distinguishing her as ati, "leader", according
to later information from Semer.
The four young girls, Wefo has pointed out, were led by herself
and Pachpojus Pres, the latter of the ra majr, "owners of the ground".
Each girl had her FZ and her M (true or classificatory) dancing
before and after her. The term for this dance, nesor sachfrd,
associated with (w)or, the regional tunnel said to connect two caves,
Fu and Rajn. Possibly it indicated the Sachafra to be "joined" to
this system. The father of each girl was (or was regarded as) staying
in the Sachafra house: The father of Wefo Karet was Karetaja
(house no 4], of Pokek-charach Karet was Maput (no 5), of Chawe
Serawn was Owa (WB of Sawit Susim in no 3) and of Serach
Chowaj-Sefarari was Chasaserar (B of Frarek in no 2). Like Frarek
was acting for his absent brother, so Sioron Sekerit danced for
Chawe Serawn's FZ because, said Wefo, the Sekerit and the Serawn
were of "one earth", i. e. lived on the same ground. Muof Sarosa
similarly acted as a FZ for Serach Chowaj-Sefarari, being married
to Serach's FB.
Two of the conch-trumpets now fell silent, and people were
crowding before the doors of the houses. Akus had elbowed his way
into the front rank with microphone and tape-recorder. Chawer sat
in the doorway. Wefo and M'Pefato were sitting inside the house
and handed over parcels of cloth to Chawer. Outside, on the
verandah, Charachn'tuwit, Frarek and Nati were sitting at one side
of the door and at the other stood Samito Chowaj and N'tajes Pres.
The guests comprised mostly women crowding in front of the house.
I recognized Chawer's daughter Muof, Focho Awaj and Porokwasi
Kami. The majority were at first completely absorbed by Chawer's
doings.
Similar groups of people were standing before all the houses. In
house no. 3 Pocherit finally climbed up on top of the roof when it
began to grow light amd handed out cloth, but otherwise the darkness
concealed what was going on at the other houses.
Chawer seized a piece of white cloth about 3 m in length, unfolded it and shook it rhythmically in front of him as he chanted an
invitation to a number of dema to come up to the houses. The
names of their abodes constituted the main part of the text, and
every phrase ended with the "a-a" carrying the key-note of the
28
phrase. The content of the first part as translated afterwards by
Semer, was the following:8
"Foreign dema from your regions] Come here! The cloth is
fetched, come up to the houses] I give you cloth to keep] Watch
well the promised lot in-doors. Come forward] I give cloth to you
for the filling up of the Spirit-vagina by the ghosts] Go away, out
of Mono, Chajo. . ." After a further 88 names of watercourses,
rapids and sources—for the most of which Wefo, Frarek and N'tajes
acted as prompters—Chawer said: "Come forth from Bufor, Bugis
and Europe] Dema, fetch] I pay to the Bugis-folk a final payment
to them all]"
Here he was interrupted by a tumult among the listeners. Only
three times in the course of his inventory had Chawer handed down
a piece of cloth to the increasingly impatient women, who had
immediately torn the cloth to pieces and distributed it among relatives. The list had taken practically 15 minutes, and many of the
names were unknown to several listeners or referred to the coastal
area. And now Chawer was moving towards the boundaries of the
Mejprat world. With "Bufor" he was referring to the seafaring
Nuforese and their island of Biak and with "Bugis" to the trading
folk from the southern Celebes who represented the most remote
element in the traditional picture of the world. The audience seemed
to think that Chawer was going too far when including also Europe
in his popot "realm", especially as only the Pres, Sacharim and
Karet had received po tapam, white "earth-cloth"; i. e. those clans
that were "owners of land" in the region where Chawer was now
living. As yet, no death dues had been distributed.
In the darkness I had no precise notion of what was happening,
but on the tape-recording we were afterwards able to distinguish
the cries "popot talk . . . hurry up and throw down the cloth so
people get what is coming to them] . . . there's a different cloth inside
the house . . .I'll go up and have a look . .. one is wrapped up, it is
Meser's . . .". In all the excitement Akus forgot to wind up the taperecorder and the recording was interrupted.
The clamouring listeners seemed to be about to storm the house.
Particularly aggressive, in Akus' opinion, were Kampumawe Moju
8
See Appendix p. 146 for the complete text.
29
ETHNOS
and a number of her relatives, who considered that the Moju was
an agent between Chawer and the Karet folk in the village of Jachir,
and that they therefore had a claim to "earth-cloth". Wefo shrieked
that the people should be silent, and all the others yelled at the top
of their voices outside in the dark. Some Papuan policemen with
electric torches approached from the lower houses and roared to the
people to calm down, but they were led aside by some old women,
who said that everything was all right.
Afterwards Akus opined that Chawer had shown himself to be
"courageous", like a true popot, in his enumeration. Semer, on the
other hand, who was not in the vicinity of Chawer's house during
the first part of the feast, but subsequently heard the proceedings
on the tape-recorder, considered that it was not watum to talk so
that the people became angry, i. e. not to give coverage for one's
words with cloth. Chawer's comment, with a satisfied smile, when
he heard the recording was: Ah, I am popot!
Things calmed down somewhat when further pieces of white
cloth had been flung down and torn into smaller bits by Moju
women and Na-folk. Chawer now appeared with a piece of white
cloth on his head, given to him by his wife.
Chawer unfolded a cloth designated as Sarim Kuruk, and scattered
"oh's" were heard from the listeners when Charachn'tuwit repeated
the name. Chawer shook it out as he had done before, crying,
"M'cherach-M'pres ("she suddenly made the Pres appear"), JuM'pres ("vagina of the Pres"). . . There is no more sago ( = semen)!
. . . Give more water through the leach ( = semen through my
penis)] . . ." He flung the cloth to Chowajfa Sarosa, second wife
of another important "ground-owner", Meritsaw Pres.
Here he burst into tears and his voice failed him. Charachn'tuwit
asked why he was "weeping alone". "Ah", said Chawer, "the bush
of pubic chair is deserted, the penispole does not exist!" He unfolded a couple of sarong-cloths, shook them and continued to cry:
. . . "You dema, fill me up with sago-porridge (semen). Watch me
perform correctly!"
The sarongs were flung out and disappeared in the throng of
guests and the bickering among them, increased. Someone called out:
What sort of cloths are they? as the din grew louder. Chawer was
overcome with weeping.
3O
JOHN-ERIK ELMBERGJ THE POPOT FEAST CYCLE
N'tajes jumped down from the projecting ledge of the house and
thrust his spear into the ground. A Malay official in white clothes
approached and made some critical remark about Chawer's appearance. He stayed for a short time, during which people stopped
crowding and adopted a more subdued tone, though they went on
arguing. Charachn'tuwit said in a dissatisfied voice that Chawer
wept magnificently; Chawer replied weeping that he gave magnificently. He unfolded still another sarong and continued indistinctly: "I want palm wine to cool the lingering heat." Charachn'tuwit observed: "Speak clearly at least, for that thing ( = the microphone) hears you." Chawer let go the sarong, which a half-grown
girl was already tugging at, and unfolded a Topa that his brother-inlaw Meritajok had brought the previous evening. I took a flashlight photograph at this point, which added, if anything, to the
listeners' uneasiness. When everyone saw the cloth in the sharp
light the suspicion arose that it was atnot, the "interest" or extra
gift, which marked the end of the distribution of cloths.
Chawer waved the cloth, tears glistened in his eyes, but he called
out: "Dema of the land and the water, I give for sago-sperm, I belong to the Pres-folk. . ." A prolonged attack of coughing interrupted
him. Charachn'tuwit now shouted: "Careful, you'll be coughing your
wits out of your body!" Afterwards Akus and Semer said that
Chawer accounting himself as belonging to the Pres-folk was "crazy".
As a matter, of fact he lived on Pres' ground and he was also referring
to the marriage of the first clan-father to a Pres woman, mentioned
in the myths. Chawer now flung the Topa to Pachsoras Chowaj.
His voice failed. He unfolded a small Pokek, threw it and said:
"Take this, tear it up and go away!" Some women tried to climb up
on the house and Chawer flung another Pokek and some sarongs
in the faces of the foremost with the words: "Give Meser Pres this!"
Meser's wife, M'pochawiak Moju" was dead; the cloth was connected with the death dues admitting her ghost to the "Spiritvagina".
The confusion seemed great. With some force Frarek and Charachn'tuwit pushed down people climbing up on the house. Wefo
shook her fist in the doorway. Above all the noise Samito Chowaj
9
Chawer's FBDD.
31
ETHNOS
could be heard repeatedly shouting "get down!". N'tajes appeared
once more with his spear. I stopped the tape-recorder, as 3/4 of the
tape had already been used.
After the feast Chawer refused to discuss these interruptions as
32
well as why the cloth was given in each of the observed cases. Wefo
admitted that people had come in unexpected numbers. They had
not been prepared for this, but po wer, "enough cloth", had at all
events been given away.
Tend po wer, "I give enough cloth", was the cry with which
Chawer finally appeared to calm the guests. Samito shouted: Man
jeno u, "to-morrow he gives more". Suddenly Chawer was handed
another bundle of sarongs from inside the house. He unfolded one,
shook it and called upon the ghosts while the tape-recorder was
hurriedly switched on: "Be gone to the Spirit-vaginal . . . Enter
below, go away M'Poch'awiak, Firofat! Remember that I did not
get fish from Imon Semetu, no fish from Wejuk or Krawok, no
fish from Jachaf to Susim's ground! I put a hot spell! I put obstacles
in the turf walls! I give for the water and the cave!"
At a new fit of coughing, he flung the sarong to Sioron Sekerit,
[the wife of Sawit Susim) who was demanding an ikat cloth as a
death due for her husband's mother Semfot Karet. Resentfully she
went off with her sarong.
Chawer bent his gaze in the direction of the swiddens out in the
darkness, displayed the next sarong and cried: "She sees the things
procured secretly to cause my cough. I cough, bespelled in my
voice. Bespelled I nevertheless give cloth to be given to Nefirosa
for the pig's tusk." When he handed over the cloth to Nefirosa
who had be"en sitting on his heels below the house, Wefo's voice
was heard from inside the house: "The cloth up here is finished!"
For a moment there was almost silence in front of the house, and
I then noticed that there was chanting to be heard from the other
houses also. Then a resentful clamour made itself heard, demanding
that the empty bags should first be thrown out as proof that everything was finished. Other voices repeated scornfully watum-o!—
roughly translatable as "there's order for you!" Sawit Susim swung
vigorously about him with a long parang. Man jeno-u, "tomorrow
he gives more", a voice from the house cried again, and Waja Semetu
shouted mesidf po, "cloth thieves".
Some empty old bags were thrown out in front of the house, and
Chawer began to call out the names of the dead persons for whom
he now considered himself to have given the death due cloth:
"M'Pochawiak [FBDD), Semit-afan (FM], my brother [?} of the
33
ETHNOS
Pres people Koju (?], Oanien Na (FBWB), Ferofat (FB), Kawaseker (F], Sachorowafat [FF) ; Werim Schorochek (?}, Semfot
(ZHBW]1 "We of the Sarosa, that is Charachn'tuwit, Muof, Tochkatar, Pocherit, Pochtita, Akus, Mafat, Junus—promise us children
truly".
The last-mentioned were thus denoted as having contributed the
cloth.
When Chawer had finished he jumped down from the doorway
and shouted that those who had not on this occasion got sufficient
would get more in the near future. Most of the guests left. Waja
Semetu shouted that he wanted marriage cloth (his D was married
to Mafat Sarosa, one of Chawer's followers). Waja spat as he trailed
off, saying that here the people could not make neku poku, an "exchange feast". Chawer followed him trying to placate him with
promises. Wefo, who now closed the opening of the doorway and
went after the two men, gave Chawer a bundle of cloth (3 sarongs
and an ikat-fabric], which he vainly endeavoured to get Waja to
accept. Agitated scenes were taking place everywhere about them.
At house no. 5 Sawit Susim called out once again for more cloth,
with his parang in his hand; and at house no. 4 a tremendous
squabble was going on. Waja paid no attention to Chawer, but
smoked and turned his back on him. Chawer stood with the cloth
extended in his hand and with tears in his eyes, his hoarse voice
muttering something inaudible. Finally, a young Moju woman took
the cloth.
It was nearly 5.30 a.m. and it was getting lighter. Little by little
the shouting and quarrelling voices fell silent. Chawer returned
towards house no. 1, took his conch and began to blow. Small boys
soon took over the job. Several conches joined in. At the houses of
Jakof Na (no. 8) and Serosmeri (no. 6} people were sitting on their
heels on the ground. Apparently irresolute, people were standing
before the house of Meritsaw Pres (no. 3). At Pocherit's (no. 4)
people were leaving the site of the feast and making their way down
towards Ajamaru.
When the sun rose all dispersed quickly. Wefo dispatched her
co-wife Munach to fetch vegetables. M'Pefato and some younger
women accompanied Munach to the swidden. Wefo and Focho
withdrew into house no. 1, and in house no. 2 were only Chawer,.
34
Charachn'tuwit, and N'tajes Pres, who lay on the floor smoking.
Charachn'tuwit was upset at his father's weeping for more "sago";
he grumbled wearily and after a time left the two older men, who
went to sleep. At about 10 o'clock Wefo handed in some taros
which N'tajes placed in the ashes. The rest of the day was given
over to idleness.
7. EXIT TO THE SEPIACH HOUSE
Not until 4 o'clock on the following afternoon did the men begin to
leave the Sachafra-house. Semer turned up, saying that in a little
while they would be going to the water spirit home to wash. Chawer
35
ETHNOS
and N'tajes sat down mumbling by the Dracaena-plants at the
corners of the house. They were carrying bags, and Chawer put in
a towel before the men set off in small groups in the direction of
the Mis-water. The younger ones began to run and to leap high
holding their parangs, and the older ones at once cried aw, making measured jumps and stamping hard on the ground. The last
stretch almost turned into a silent race. Some of the younger men
dived into the water head first, the older men waded in carefully
and washed themselves thoroughly. At first there was general
silence. Some produced soap, others razor-blades and mirrors, and
they began to perform their ablutions. Gradually subdued laughter
and cries were to be heard along the water-edge. The younger men
had brought clean garments; the older men carefully washed out
their crotch-cloths and hung them up to dry while they covered their
nakedness with their hands. Chawer said that formerly they used
the white bark-cloth on this occasion.
As the men got ready, they stuck ferns in their hair and powdered
bits of red ochre which they mixed with saliva or urine. Then with
their finger they painted two vertical lines in the middle of the
forehead and one red triangular field with the base running along
the chin and the apex reaching to the two lines on the forehead.
One vertical line was painted on the chest.
Chawer, Meritsaw Pres, Pocherit Sarosa, Maput Karet, SerosMeri Sarosa and Pum Isir withdrew a little from the others and sat
on their heels. No one was permitted to go near them. They spoke
with n'taku and thrust tobacco offerings into the earth so that
ritaku should attract much cloth, Semer explained. In their hands
Chawer and Pum Isir held stones in fern-leaves. They also employed
secret names for n'taku, names that they had dreamed of or had
learned in the Uon Society.
Afterwards this little group of elders led the way on the return
home and a certain distance was maintained between them and
the others: the stones were now strongly charged. When the pilehouses came in sight the long file of men with parangs in their hands
and bags over their shoulders fell silent, but they walked quickly and
with obvious joy up among the houses. Chawer went up into house
no. 2, took out his father Kawaseker's skull, which was lying uppermost in one of the eight sacks on top of an ikat-fabric called Monaku.
36
JOHN-ERIK ELMBERGI THE POPOT FEAST CYCLE
He brought the skull into the light from the doorway, wiped it and
came down, still with his parang and, on its bed of fern, the round
spirit-stone in his left hand.
Below houses nos. 7 and 8 groups were busy building the triangular
and three-legged platforms Chawer referred to as "small canoes".
These rose about 1 1/2 m. above the ground, and upon them the
skulls were to repose. N'tajes and Charachn'tuwit had erected a
rather low platform highest up (fig. 2 a). Chawer placed the skull
on the ground under it, cut o few croton-twigs from a bush and
thrust them in the earth at the base of the three legs of the platform.
He sat down on his heels and placed his right hand on the skull.
In his left hand he was still holding the stone, but the parang was
laid on the ground.
With a tearful voice he muttered in low tones to the skull, N'tajes
sat down and helped him. Akus, who was plaiting an arm-band,
said that the two men were giving kapes instructions to guard the
houses and attract much cloth. Now and then Chawer raised his
voice and one heard the words "collect cloth, come quickly".
On the ground under the other platforms other men were sitting
like Chawer, some with one hand on a skull and stone and ferns in
the other, muttering inaudibly, the while. In a couple of places a
single forked pole or a couple of intertwined sticks served instead
of a platform. In all there were six platforms and three single poles
or plaited 'sticks. Meritsaw and Kawaseker were sitting nearest to
Chawer's platform, and here, too, sat Frarek Chowaj-Sefarari. Two
skulls lay between them, one belonging to Kawaseker's father
Cheracherosa Sarosa, the other to Chapioch Pres (K.'s. cl. FZH)
(fig. 7). For all the skulls that were collected here, cha mamos
had now been performed at the Sachafra-feast.
On the east side of this place of skulls there now assembled a
number of guests to whom Semer referred as "brothers of the wives",
who were expecting to receive some cloth in the marriage exchange.
One or two fish-traps could be glimpsed among them, which angered
Semer. Those bringing them were herewith indicating that they had
so far received too little cloth. A number of them were just returning
form the pach sidto, the dancing ground, where they had planted
twenty young saplings as a sort of irregular boundary-line between
the Sachafra village and the Sepiach.
37
ETHNOS
No woman had been seen in the village since the men's homecoming.Where were the women? Akus replied that it was not seemly that they should still be here when the men came home. They
were to come home afterwards—his tone implied that everything of
importance had then already taken place.
The men sat for a long time, "instructing" kapes. It was getting
on for five thirty. The women now appeared on the road from
38
JOHN-ERIK ELMBERG: THE POPOT FEA.ST CYCLE
Tuwer. There was a certain tension to be noted among the men.
They took their parangs, muttered more zealously over their stones
and adjusted the ferns in their hair and their arm-bands. The women
approached in a long file headed by Wefo and her group. Wefo
and those following just behind her wore new rain-cloaks, folded
up but placed on their heads; many had white bark-cloth around
their waists and fern-leaves in their hair. Nearly all of them had
numerous necklaces. Some of the women wore new sarongs and
a few young girls were clad in clean white dresses. There were
altogether about 120 women marching, and some of them had tiny
tots on their backs.
39
ETHNOS
Semer whispered that the women were coining from a Fu-cave
near Tuwer to fetch sacks of cloth from the Sachafr a -houses. When
the long file of women—who were already carrying sacks with new
white carrying bands—arrived at the foot of the hill, they began to
run up towards the houses.
When Wefo reached the level of the lowest platform the men
rose and placed the skulls in the triangle. The eye-sockets were
turned up towards the houses. Kawaseker and Majok-Remo were
the last to pick up their skulls. Kawaseker was at the critical moment
40
seized with doubt as to which skull was his father's, and conferred
with Fra'rek Chowaj, who suddenly became equally confused.
In the meantime, Wefo and M'Pefato ran up into house no. 2 and
brought out eight well-filled sacks of cloth, which were distributed
to the group that assembled below the house. Wefo, Focho, Munach,
and M'Pefato, were standing there as well as Metowk Chowaj,
Pomak Isir, Pachtocho Sarosa and Sioron Semetu.
Chawer, Charachn'tuwit and N'tajes then ran quickly up into
house no. 2 and left the stones and ferns there. They hastily blocked
the door with a sheet of bark which they lashed to the door-posts.
In front of the door Chawer lowered a home-made Venetian blind
that he was proud to own. It was of the same construction as that
in one of the government buildings in Ajamaru.
At the same time the women before the house placed their arms,
on one another's shoulders and sang lustily and rhythmically: Charachawer jaku-6 jaku-e, sachafra pom per kapitdn (roughly: Chawer
weaves spells, in Sachafra a thing is put in—Kapitani] The song was
called mem chawes and only the women sang it. Similar proceedings
were going on at the other houses. The name of the song indicated
that "the evening star was set free" (fig. 9).
When all houses had been barred, Wefo interrupted the singing
and began to run down the hill towards the dancing ground in front
of the Sepiach-house. She was closely followed by the women of her
group, the full sacks of cloth bumping on their backs. They were
joined by the men from the bride giving group of guests referred to
as "brothers of the wives". With quick parang-strokes they first cut
down a young sapling to hold in their hands. Chawer, Charachn'tuwit and N'Firoch Pres ran beside Wefo, who caught hold of the
latter's arm as they ran onto the dancing ground. Chawer followed
with parang in hand.
Small female caravans with sacks on their backs and surrounded
by men, some with parang in hand, others brandishing saplings,
sugar-canes or fish-traps, were now streaming down from the pilehouses on the hill. On the dancing ground this human tide whirled
round with long strides, some of the men and women with interlocked arms, and all seemed to be moving in a decreasing spiral
towards the centre. Everyone was shouting xuio, a word that they
were later unable to translate. The evening light had waned rapidly,
4i
ETHNOS
and when the movement of the human whirlpool came to a closely
packed halt it was already dark. A number of Sarosa men went up
to the Sepiach-house, among them Chawer and Semer.
Some men detached themselves from the others and, shaking
very large fish-traps, they shouted that the people here did not
know how to make pach. Wefo came panting up to the Sepiachhouse and turned to face the crowd. She shook her fist, stamped,
and shrieked that they themselves were capable of only one thing,
but for that they needed an opening bigger than those of their fishtraps. The Sarosa men behind her laughed derisively. An old man
down in the crowd thereupon raised his parang and began a dance
of wrath, but Wefo danced mockingly towards him, caricaturing his
gestures and getting the crowd to laugh at him until he stopped.
She then went into the Sepiach-house, took off her big sack of cloth
and hung it on the centre-post. M'Pefato and Munach followed her
example, indicating the dense crowd as an wawn.
She produced three small bundles of cloth and brought them to
Chawer. The latter called out in a loud voice to Frarek, saying he
wanted to give him something and assuring him that the feast had
been a success. People came streaming up towards the ground-house
entering through both entrances. In this crush Chawer handed over
the three bundles of cloth—two small Oan Safe and one called
Wastonkek—to Frarek, who gave them to his wife Muof.
In the ground-house the women now lit fires, some beside the two
long walls of the house and others at the three main-posts. Taro
was roasted and bundles of fish distributed, and the food was eaten
in an atmosphere of semi-darkness, heat and smoke, good humour
and friendliness. People pushed past the groups round the fires,
coming and going constantly. All talked at the top of their voices,
laughed and boasted about the cloth transactions. Wefo handed out
some parcels of fish to the house-owners and a number of taros—
some had been roasted previously and were therefore already cold.
She said later that the food had been rather short but that an unexpected number of guests had arrived.
The din was such that I could only hear what someone said if he
shouted right in my ear. However, there was even more of an uproar
when the men served themselves palm wine from the long bamboocanes that were later brought in. By means of holding the micro42
phone of the tape-recorder before Chawer's mouth I was subsequently able to reconstruct how he was now following in his memory
the devious route of the ikat-fabric Seranana between relatives and
friends. He repeated names, was interrupted and corrected; he spoke
Malay all of a sudden, made mistakes and started all over from the
beginning. This was referred to as "singing the praise of the cloth",
and he concluded it with a request to me: "Write in the book:
This is the exchange-feast of Charachawer; I, Charachawer, held
a cloth in my hand and gave to Wefo. She gave to the women
here . . . " At this juncture he was interrupted by Frarek, and was
afterwards unwilling to continue, for Sioron, Pocherit's wife, was
feeling ill and expressed doubts as to whether the feast had been
properly managed. The meaning of the last sentence is obscure.
Chawer was at all events not holding any cloth in his hands on
this occasion.
Such sioch po "cloth-poems" were in the course of the evening
declaimed in several places in the ground-house. In general, only
a few older men and women were listening; and they interrupted,
disputed and gave their own version as often as they lent an ear.
Besides Chawer I saw Sawit Susim, Serosmeri Sarosa and Pum Isir
doing the same. While it evidently gave the performers a feeling of
power and showed the extent of their connections, it was also an
essential detail that a certain cloth kept returning to the original
owner. Chawer's later comments showed that the form was rhapsodic and the contents seemed intended to emphasize certain traditional exchange contacts rather than the perhaps actually significant
ones. Wefo had no place in all this. Nearly half of all the transactions
mentioned were carried out by Chawer or his classificatory maternal
uncle Maro Semetu. The Seranana cloth kept returning to Chawer
via mapuf, his consanguinal family.
Maro was a person of whom I had not previously heard, and who
subsequently appeared to have been dead a long time. Since the
entire cloth-poem may also be said to pivot upon Chawer's relation
to this and some other mapu/-groups the poem may be said to be
a demonstration of the traditional consanguinal family.
Later in the course of the evening the men congregated, with
palm wine in the bamboo mugs, at the centre-post of the house,
where Wefo and the women in her group had hung the bags with
43
ETHNOS
the oldest pieces of cloth [po satoch). The men poured a little of
the wine on the ground and spoke to the dema to the effect that
cloth must come in quickly. Chawer executed some jumps and
stamped several times at the centre-post, and exclaimed: tio safnk,
tio popot, "I am content, I am popot" Even through the prevailing
noise protests were heard from the darkness [the fires were beginning to go out], but Chawer laughed and said: popot-o. With his
hoarse voice he then admonished the smaller children to keep quiet
and go to sleep, while he slowly returned to his own place by the
fire, where there were now only a few embers glowing (fig. 10).
44
The noise gradually diminished and the talkers began to stretch
out on the ground. Chawer lay down on his rain-cloak among the
other sitting and recumbent figures. He woke up Wefo, who had
already fallen asleep at the fire-place in the centre. She gave me
a large rain-cloak to sleep on. However, I left the now almost completely dark Sepiach-house, where the sound of the sleepers mingled
with isolated exchanges of stray remarks. The floor was a dense
mosaic of bodies.
On the following morning everyone stayed in the house until,
towards half past nine, the first group of women sallied forth to
get taro and, later, a few men left the building. Young people went
out with bamboo canes to fetch water. Neither the old houseowners from the Sachafra site nor their wives, left the house for
any length of time the whole day, according to Chawer.
8. SEP1ACH CONDITIONS
The space in the ground-house was disposed as shown in fig. n .
The eastern end Chawer referred to as masd, "opening, doorway".
This also can refer to the "stem of a canoe" or something having to
do with "head". The western end was called m'pet, which signifies
"something coming after, behind" as well as "stern of a canoe". The
northern wall, where he himself had his hearth and his sleeping
place, he referred to as ti matioch tidro, which was translated as
"wall for those who have become grandest in the region". The
southern wall was called simply ti ewok, "the other wall".
Along the most 'aristocratic', northern wall Chawer and Frarek
had their hearths and sleeping places nearest the main entrance,
after which came Meritsaw Pres and Serosmeri Sarosa, then Meja
Pres and Sain Tuwit and, finally, nearest to the short wall in the
rear of the building Maput and Karetaja Karet. Along the other wall,
to the east, were Mafat and Semer Sarosa, Pocherit and Kawaseker
Sarosa followed, then Sawit Susim and Charut Sekerit and, nearest
to the short wall in the rear, Jakof Na and M'Puk Sesa. The hearths
in the centre of the house were allotted to the wives and the children. The wives preferred to prepare the food there. Chawer was
now only permitted to eat taro that he had himself roasted on his
own fire. This might not be used by women and had to burn directly
45
.ETHNOS
on the ground. The same applied to the other house-owners. Vegetables containing anything red were also forbidden, and only fish,
not meat, was allowed. Eggs were refused by Chawer when I later
offered him some.
The following morning, however, it was evident that also women
had been sleeping beside the walls, and men in the centre—even on
the first evening the children had slept everywhere. Many women
were roasting taro for men, Wefo without doubt for Chawer. It was
then explained that it was important that the taro should be roasted
in the ground-house. This stipulation prevented Chawer, for example,
from being present at the great initiation feast in Fuar a week later,
where cooking took place in pilehouses, but not from living for
several weeks at Kambuaja in a Sepiach-house a month later. As
long as he was living in a ground-house everything was in order,
for all ground-houses were "down there". The whole time, moreover, he avoided going near swiddens. If he went out in daylight
he wore the rain-cloak over his head. At this time, he said, he might
not see swiddens, but his followers would supply him with vegetables and fish. In his later stay in Kambuaja, Semer and Akus saw
a sign that Chawer's followers did not take their duties seriously
enough.
On the morning of the day after the entry into the ground-house,
Wefo was working on a net-bag. Other women were embroidering
black barkrcloth or rain-cloth. Many of the men were working on
arm-bands, and Frarek took out his /arofe-jar and pottered with it.
Chawer was plaiting an undyed arm-band of rattan, and now and
then he would allow his youngest son with Munach to intercalate
a loop while he described the transactions that he would carry out
at the Sepiach-feast. He gave the names of the ten followers in
whose marriage-exchanges he would now carry out a phase. First he
mentioned Weta Pres, a son of N'tajes Pres and Wefo's sister Meja.
Weta was to give sipach, a return-gift in the marriage-exchange, to
his brother-in-law Saraf Isir, and Chawer was to supply Weta's
portion of cloth. No. 2 was Meritsaw Pres, who was to give a return
gift to Kawaseker and Akus Sarosa for their sister Chowajfa, who
was his second wife.
As follower no. 3 came Pocherit Sarosa, who was to give a return
gift to his wife's parallel-cousin Sorfi Pres and his sister Pachmorof
47
ETHNOS
Pres. Pachmorof was also the mother-in-law of Chawer's son Junus.
Follower no. 4 was Karetpuo, who had married one of Chawer's
classificatory sisters, Sachseres Sarosa. Here, too, a return gift was
to be given to Sachseres' deceased brother's widow, Sori Tuwit.
Follower no. 5 was Sori Tuwit's son, Mafat Sarosa, who was to give
a return gift to his father-in-law Waja Semetu. No. 6 was Maput
Karet, married to Samia Sarosa, a daughter of Pocherit's brother
Nefirosa. Pocherit was to receive a return gift for her.
No. 7 was Serosmeri Sarosa, who had not yet given a return gift
for his deceased wife Pochife to his brother-in-law Pum Isir. No. 8
was Kawaseker Sarosa, whose father-in-law Schorotrawn Pres was
expecting a return gift for his daughter Pochm'fa, Kawaseker's wife.
No. 9 was Makup Sesa, who was to give a return gift for his wife
Sajer Na to his brother-in-law N'taje Na.
Chawer was also to contribute to the marriage exchange of his
10th follower, his cousin's son Charu Sarosa, for his wife Pochita
Chowaj, which cloth was to be given to Meritsaw Pres. The point
here being that Meretsaw had had her as a "foster-child" (ku mesdn)
in exchange for her father being allowed to borrow cloth from him
in order to make his own marriage exchange.
When later a pig was brought to a pen built outside the groundhouse, Chawer was to give his own return gift for Wefo. When
Meritajok, his brother-in-law, considered he had received sufficient
cloth the pig was to be slaughtered, cut up and distributed in accordance with the precise amount of cloth that had been contributed
by each one in exchange for pork. Chawer was then to paint the
pig's blood on his face and on his chest in the same pattern as at the
spirit-water. After this all had to rush up into the pile-house, take
out the stones and tear down the house.
In the meantime the Sachafra-site was m'baw, "forbidden". Until
this slaughter took place, Chawer and the other popot were to be
ra pin "lords", and live on what their followers delivered to the
ground-house.
From where was the cloth to come? Those whom Chawer had
assisted at the Sachafra must now remember all their obligations to
him. First and foremost the Chowaj-Sefarari must help Frarek deliver his return gift for his wife Muof, Chawer's daughter. From
Meritsaw Pres he was expecting some poro masoch, large pieces of
48
JOHN-ERIK ELMBERG: THE POPOT FEAST CifCLE
cloth; and some items from Meritwoju Kampuskato and from Paulus
Tuwit, who was now in prison, and from Maromotof Susim. It was
not known precisely from where all the cloth came, but the dema
brought them to a Sepiach if one had fulfilled one's obligations and
knew the invocations. The cloth then came flying of themselves or
speeded by In, the monsoon wind that also brought the foreign
traders to the coast and was sent up from the subterranean afterworld.
During the first twenty-four hours the house was filled with
guests and Sepiach-owners, all of whom slept on their rain-cloaks
on the ground. By the the third day some men were already beginning to make, out of sticks, small sleeping gratings about 30 cm
in breadth and one meter in length, and higher at one end for the
head. There were then not many guests left, together with the
house-owners and their families some 60 persons. A week later, on
the 18th of October I counted 24 persons in the house, as a further
company of seven people took their departure in order to attend
the Toch-mi feast in Fuar.
During the past week Wefo and a couple of other women had
fetched some hens that were kept outside the ground-house in the
daytime. They laid eggs and slept in discarded bags hung up on
the inside walls. Wefo had made a big hole in the "superior"
northern wall to allow her hen a free passage. While those about to
depart were, getting ready I made fun of the hen. Wefo got annoyed,
and Semer explained that she considered the hen belonging to the
Sepiach. Wefo called the ground-house Sepiach Sif, and it was "the
hen's own house" and she would eat the eggs herself. This was
watum. Sif connoted the huge nest of the bush-hen (Megapodius]
as well as the heap of branches sometimes collected by the wild
pigs to sleep on.
Semer considered that the house was the nest of the groundkangaroo also. His father had told him about the first Sepiach to be
built near the hill Rachmachan, in the vicinity of the village of
Chamak (see Appendix p. 167).
Chawer then held forth that it was an Uon-canoe, one like that
which the mythical Paw had arrived in, and that Semer was misremembering. Semer got embarrassed at this and we went outside.
A couple of minutes later we were on our way to Fuar. No informa49
ETHNOS
tion over and above what had been said was obtained, but it was
evident that the notion that the ground-house might have a symbolic
character was not alien to my informants.
Ten days later, when we had returned, Wefo had moved to a
brother's place, and Chawer was surrounded by ten persons in the
ground-house. He himself was planning to move with Frarek to Atu
Karet's Sepiach-feast in Kampuaja. Sawiet Susim and Mafat Sarosa,
their wives and M'pefato, Chawer's daughter-in-law, were to look
after the house. The others were now carrying on cloth transactions
at other Sachafra or Sepiach houses. My suggestion that I should
be permitted to accompany Chawer struck such a bad note and
caused such irritation that I abstained. Instead, Chawer promised
to send a message through Semer every time some ceremony was to
take place. He kept his promise, but always sent Semer too late
so that we got there only when everything was over.
9. LAST STAGES OF CHAWER.'S FEAST CYCLE
My contact-men for Chawer's feast herewith more or less disappeared from sight. Chawer betook himself to the Remowk folk
in Sauf and brought Semer along, although the latter had promised
to work for me. Frarek disappeared to Sisusu near Kambuskato,
and Akus went off to Teminabuan. Pocherit made preparations to
clear a field, where he later planted maize and beans to be used at
the Sepiach-feast.
At long intervals I had some news. At the Sachafra-feast Frarek
had been the favourite. Also during the first period in the groundhouse Chawer went with him to collect claims at other feasts, e. g.
in Kawian. Chawer complained later that Frarek made exchanges
with other parties all right, but not with the Sarosa folk. After a
period in Sisusu, Frarek sent a message that Chawer might now
build a guest-house, for he was coming—but he did not turn up.
A fortnight later Chawer was in Chowaj, where he met Frarek.
The latter said that he was only waiting for a couple of pieces of
cloth, then he would come. On January 12th 1954 Munach came to
Chawer's ground-house to fix the date for the feast at the next
new moon, i. e. after the first week in February. On the 14/1 came
the news that Frarek's second wife had run away to the coast with
5°
a lover from Fuok. On the 30/1 Frarek went down with diarrhoea
and was unable to promise anything. The second week in February
Akus related that Chawer was furious because Frarek had erected
a dance-house down towards the coast. In the last days of February
there was discussion of plans to procure one of Frarek's cousins,
Chowajtiso Chowaj, as a second wife for Charachn'tuwit in order
to get the cloth circulating. At the time of my departure Semer
thought that the feast was many months off, as did also Wefo; but
Chawer said cockily: In seven idays we shall slaughter the pig! The
feast appears to have taken place in May. Chawer then tore down
the pile-houses and moved up into a Rufan house of Charit type.
The intervention of the authorities against the exchange of cloth
seems to have cut short further activity. Chawer maintained, however, that he had built four houses and the feast cycle was complete.
1 0 . A DIFFERENT ENTERING OF SEPIACH
By chance I also saw a party entering a Sepiach house in Sefachoch,
a couple of kilometers east of Mefchatiam. The central person was
Maser Na, a powerfully built man of probably 45-50 years of age.
He was entirely against my presence at the feast, but Chawer, who
turned up later, interceded on my behalf and I was permitted to
stay. People were not communicative, except for Safom Isir, a
younger brother of one of Maser's wives.
The site of this feast, situated on top of a ridge, had a different
appearance (fig. 12}. Two newly built houses of kampong type and
two pile-houses built much earlier in the Sachafra style, had been
erected far apart. The pile-houses measured some 4X4 m. on the
bottom plane which was a good meter above the ground. One of the
pile-houses10 was built of stouter material than the other; its floor
level was more then two meters above the ground and the floor
construction was supported by the stump of a tree that had been
cut down to a suitable level. Here lived Meritarof Remowk. His
wife was Kampumaper Kanepu. The other three houses, sometimes
termed samu fenjd fajn, "women houses", were scattered in the
terrain to the west of this. The treestump house was called charit
sefd, which usually indicated a treehouse used for traditonal male
10
See Elmberg 1955 fig. 6 showing this very house.
51
ETHNOS
52
JOHN-ERIK ELMBERG; THE POPOT FEAST CYCLE
initiation feasts. Meritarof Remowk's house might really be termed
a tree-house with its living tree as a floor support and even an extra
floor of poles arranged under the house within a meter of the ordinary
floor. This extra "safety floor" called pes-pes, was considered necessary in all high tree-houses. The name samu serdjn was also applied
to the houses with the exception of the south-western (no. i~) pilehouse—the term indicated "(male] guest-houses". In this second
house of Sachafra type lived a number of women headed by Pum
Isir's wife and daughter though his son Tach was sometimes quoted
as the "owner". The two kampong houses with bark walls were inhabited by Sasu Na and his wife Chowaj Kampuaja, and Kerakensa
Moju and his wife Pochajro Naw. Return gifts were to be given by
every house owner to the families of their wives.
A hundred meters to the south of Meritarof's house the ground
dipped suddenly, and here Maser Na had built his Sepiach Sif,
as he called it, in an east-westerly direction. It had the same appearance as Chawer's ground-house. The eastern entrance was here
referred to as the sisar rita, and the western one sisar jow, \. e. the
"upper or eastern one" and the "lower or western one" respectively.
Twelve men were mentioned as prospective inmates in Sepiach/1
besides the four principals from the Charit Sefa-houses, which made
in all 16, or the same number as in Chawer's Sepiach. It was only
when I asked about this point that it became evident that the term
popot may be used of these sixteen.
Scarcely fifty meters from the eastern entrance oi Sepiach the
ridge sloped steeply down to the south-east towards some swiddens,
and on the yonder side of these the road wound from Mefchatiam
towards Semu. The slope was covered with half-grown bushes and
banana-plants with setting fruit. On the ridge itself stood a fence,
ara mekrd, more than two meters in height. It was constructed of
manioc stems and other sticks with a gate in front of the Sepiach
Sif's main entrance. This fence was supposed to afford protection
against poison arid sorcery.
Inside the house about twenty men, women and children were
assembled around the centre-post, where a couple of sacks of cloth
11
Maser Na, Meritmer Karet, Karetaj Karet, Samamon Na, Kuentake Kampuaja, Pejim Kampuaja, Sepoch-M'pechuw Kampuaja, Nierssfat Karet, Sechoror
Kampuskato, Maum Kampuskato, Sarioch Sarosa, Sa-N'kame Kampuaja. Instead
of Tach Isir, his father Pum was present in the Sepiach.
53
ETHNOS
were hanging. In the midst of the general smoking and chatting
Maser Na, who was sitting nearest the post, was muttering invocations to Jum'pres, "The vagina of the Pres people", a term for the
regional dema. He had croton-leaves in his hand, and with these he
rubbed the post from time to time. Chawer, Remo Pres, Karetaja
Karet and Pocherit Sarosa were sitting on their heels in a circle
about him when I arrived. It was past five o'clock in the afternoon
and a party was going out in the deepening dusk to await the arrival
of Pum Isir and his people. They waited just inside the fence; some
had triton-shells ready for signalling, and Safom Isir, Pum's son,
gave me some information about the feast.
In this connection it should be observed that Safom lived in the
village of Mefchadjam and, regarding me as "Chawer's friend",
made references to Chawer's feast to make clear to me what was
happening here. He said, for instance, that Maser was a popot "like
Chawer", that Maser had followers "like Chawer". He spontaneously
referred to his own father as ra potekif, "medicine man", and used
popot only if Chawer or one of his followers was being mentioned
at the same time. I got a strong impression that he was using terms
that he knew Chawer employed, though he himself was uncertain
of their meaning.
Maser had had eight wives (the first was already dead), and two
of them were of the Karet-Tupun clan. A large number of Karet
folk had now come to help Maser carry out return gift-exchange
with Pum, whose daughter Sirmeser was Maser's youngest wife.
This, however, was only to be the final phase of the proceedings in
Sepiach Sif. In the meantime Maser was to put through certain
stages in the marriage exchanges of different followers.
In this he was to get help from many quarters. The cloth which
Chawer had given at the Sachafra-feast to Remo Pres, the latter,
whose classificatory sister was married to Pum Isir's son Tach,
was to give to Puna as part of the exchanges. With the assistance of
his brother-in-law Mater Karet and his wife's cross-cousin Sasu Na,
Pum was now to 'increase' this cloth and give it to his daughter
Sirmeser so that she might assist Maser with the exchange of his
followers.
While we were talking, some Na and Isir women began to make
16 pyramids of taros, four in each, to the left of the eastern entrance
54
to the Sepiach-house. Almost immediately after this, excited cries
were heard, conch-trumpets began to sound and from the fringe of
the woods to the south a long line of festively clad people, led by
Pum Isir and his wife Pochman Karet, ran into the open. They were
carrying axes, spears and parangs as well as big branches in their
hands. Their arms and heads were decorated with ferns, croton and
dracaena leaves; the women were carrying heavy bags and the party
was coming from Inta and Rochm'pi respectively, water spirit homes
to which they had betaken themselves after individually having set
up skulls on racks in remote parts of the wood. Pum and Pochman
had previously been staying near Inta in an isolated house, which
they called chant sefd, a term also used for the house of male
initiation.
Sirmeser now emerged from the Sepiach-house clad in an embroidered crotch-cloth of black bark-cloth with a parang in her hand.
Sentero Na, the daughter of Maser's maternal uncle, followed her
with a long arrow in her hand and clad in the same way. They were
joined by Wanit Karet, Maser's oldest living wife, with ready rolled
cigarettes strung on a long stick. Together they ran out through the
opening in the fence and down the slope, meeting the long file
emerging from the wood on a dancing ground. Behind them ran
Maser himself, with a snake-skin on his brow, holding broad dracaena-leaves together, and after him came the whole crowd of Na,
Karet and Pres folk. When the two groups met on the dancing
ground the women led the way in a circling running dance in which
all took part except a few young people who tried to fell the banana
plants but were turned away by Chawer and Maser and some Papuan
police in civilian clothes. Safom was indignant at their being turned
away, for if they had felled the bananas Maser would have been
obliged to give them a piece of cloth for every tree as a reward for
their having been natdk, "bold".
During the running dance the participators cried wio-wio, held
there weapons or branches before them and with their free hand
took hold of each other's arms. Some popot danced alone, swung
their weapons before them and stamped hard on the ground. Among
these latter were N'Firoch Pres and Upas Moju, Pum Isir and
Maser Na. After about ten minutes the participants stood closely
packed and the dancing stopped. Pum Isir ran up the slope with
55
ETHNOS
a dracaena-plant in his right hand and his parang and cha fra, a
"spirit stone", wrapped in fern-leaves in his left hand—this latter to
protect himself against sorcery and poison. He rushed into the
Sepiach-house and buried the dracaena-plant next to the centre-post
invoking the dema Sirimpa and Jochmoni with the request that the
cloth should come quickly. Upas and Chawer were not slow to
follow him, and they sat down on their heels at the centre-post and
started muttering.
The others went up from the dancing ground and gathered round
the small taro pyramids. Upas exclaimed with great emphasis that
the taro was rotten and inedible. Maser's oldest wife went over to
him, struck him loosely across the mouth and said laughingly that
in that case it was just fit for him. Upas laughed. Wanit, Sirmeser
and some other women began to distribute taro and bundles of fish,
first to Upas and Pum. After a little while fires were lit in the
Sepiach-house and canes of palm wine arrived, some through Pum's
mediation.
If one abstracts from the fact that Maser and a number of other
popot whom I had not seen before seemed displeased at my presence, there appeared on this occasion to be a generally prevailing
mood that was noticeably much gaier and freer than at Chawer's
preceding feast. I did not perceive any discords of the kind that
occurred at Chawer's ceremony. Safom verified this saying that
those who had not been allowed to fell the banana-plants had received an extra amount of fish instead. And inside the Sepiach taros
were lying everywhere on the ground between the people, and in
a couple of places some small children were playing with them
—something which one otherwise seldom saw. It seemed like a
demonstration of abundance.
Afterwards it seemed surprising that Safom Isir had not once
indicated that Pum was his father, despite the fact that Pum played
a prominent part in the ceremonies. A distance between father and
son, however, proved increasingly common.
On the day of the entry into the Sepiach, Safom said that Maser's
followers were going to return home on the following day and were
obliged to bring taro and vegetables as long as Maser was sitting in
the Sepiach. If allowed to borrow cloth the same evening, they
would bring it back four days later when the dracaena-leaves were
56
dug up and palm wine was drunk. If not they could not borrow
cloth until after the leaves were dug up, and they would return it
when palm wine was drunk on some later occasion. In the meantime
they had in any case to bring taro and fish to the Sepiach until
Maser gave a return gift to Pum, after which Pum would slaughter
a pig when he considered he had received enough cloth. He would
distribute the pork among those who had handed over special cloth
for the purpose, and the cloth would be handed to those who had
reared the pig, i. e. Pum's wife Pochman and her group of helpers.
On the following day I had to set off to Mara, and on my return
three weeks later Maser's Sepiach house was inhabited only by
a few old men and women who were looking after it. Maser lived
then in Seta on the other side of the lake and appeared only on
exceptional occasions to be in the Sepiach. The last stage of the feast
did not occur until after my departure from the district.
III. FIELD NOTES ON RELATED CEREMONIES
I . PIG SLAUGHTER AT KAWIAN
The only pig slaughter on which I obtained some information took
place at Kawian near Kampuaja, when Semer fetched me to a feast
that ought already to have been over when we arrived. It took place
on November ioth. Heavy rain in the morning had led to a postponement of the slaughter, which should have been performed at
dawn. It was concluded just when we arrived att n o'clock, when,
moreover, a temporary stop in the rain was succeeded by fresh
showers. The people quickly scattered, some took their departure,
others sought shelter in the three Sepiach-houses, of which the two
easterly ones were termed Samu-chaj (fig. 13].
Outside the third Sepiach house (with east-westerly orientation
and the main entrance facing east] a square enclosure of vertical
tree-trunks had been built as a pen for a large pig.
Semer had to go on to Seta, and I had only Chawer and Frarek to
turn to as informants, which had certain disadvantages as they had
drunk much palm wine the previous night and were tired and
irritable. The following information was obtained:
Atu Karet, a fair woman who was married to Machajt KanepuIfa, played a prominent role in the Sepiach here. Frarek laughingly
57
ETHNOS
58
referred to her as a "female popot" in Malay. Her son Sentani and
her husband nodded assent. Her brother Uonir, married to Pachsemlt Titmaw was to give po fejdk to his [classificatory?) brotherin-law Urns and sister-in-law Ferit-meja Titmaw—the latter the wife
of N'Firok Pres, who was also present. For Machajt's second wife,
Machowi Chowaj-Sefarari, Atu had given a return gift which Frarek
had accepted: an Oan safe and a Pokek. She and some Isir women
had reared the pig while living in one of the pile-houses on the
feast-site. She called it fini mikdr. My interest in this house and in
the doings of Atu angered Chawer considerably. He suddenly began
using another name for her, calling her Kanepu-tow, "I make Kanepu
low". He shouted angrily and indignantly in Mejprat for a while,
after which it became almost impossible to get any information from
any of those present. Atu herself followed a grumbling old man
outside and spoke calmingly to him, patting him on the shoulder,
and they parted in evident accord. I managed to ask her whether
she was a popot, to which she replied: Tio popot, tio tesi pack.
Chawer jesom sejt, "I am a popot, I give return gifts; Chawer only
plays with words (— talks rubbish)". Her husband Machajt looked
satisfied, nodded and stamped hard on the ground with upraised
parang. He said: teros matdk, "I stand strong". He then went off
with his wife.
Frarek, who had been obliged to come outside, told me at the pigpen how the slaughter had been performed. Some men had climbed
up on the enclosure, snared the pig with a rattan noose, pulled it up
level with the top of the enclosure and banged it on the head with
cudgels. Its throat was then cut, the blood was collected in leafcornets and consumed, either together with mashed taro, in which
case the mass had been "fried" beside the fire, or half raw after
warming it up in the leaf-cornet over the fire. Only men consumed it.
The pig had been cut up [according to the diagram fig. 14],
but I did ryot manage to find out who had received the respective
parts. Eight large portions plus the head, which was later taken by
Machajt, were counted out. The liver fell to Uonir's lot, and he
shared this with some Titmaw and Isir folk. This division of a
slaughtered animal seemed to occur over the whole area.
The cudgels with which the pig had been killed, as well as some
of the biggest trunks in the pig-pen, were of remd-wood. Frarek
59
ETHNOS
remarked that pigs and opossum eat the fruits of the remd-tree.
Those who had slaughtered the pig were ra potekif, "medicine
men", and not ordinary persons. Finally, much maize that had been
planted by Machajt and some other men, was to be eaten in the
immediate future. With this meagre result I eventually returned to
the village of Kampuaja in the rain.
Chawer's intervention, which prevented anyone from giving
further information, was later explained by Semer to the effect that
the women in the district were apt to "think that they were somebody" and were impertinent in their speech, so that one must not
show them too much interest. Chawer always maintained that Atu
Karet as a woman talked nonsense and only a man could be a popot.
It was the men who performed neches mamos, the death exchanges at the Sachafra pile-house, slaughtered the pig and took the
head. Women could at the most make "coolie"-exchanges, and this
was what Atu had done. But it was the men who conducted the
feasts and therefore were popot.
With these elucidations Chawer had brought into relief certain
earlier descriptions of the popot-follower relation and the whole
procedure then seemed more comprehensible. Earlier he had with60
out doubt overstressed features in the popot-follower relation when
the contributions of his followers seemed more important than anything else—i. e. in connection with the preparations for the Sachafrafeast. [Perhaps my interest had been a contributory cause.) Immediately afterwards he expressed his thanks to Wefo for her contribution about which he had previously never wished to speak.
In the present preparations for his Sepiach Pach feast the relation
to the followers was perhaps of more subordinate importance, and
Wefo would bear the main responsibility for the exchanges with
the parents-in-law of the followers, like Atu Karet had evidently
done. Other aspects of the feast were now of major importance:
the contact with the spirits and the slaughter of the pig, which was
probably a sacrifice, since no "ordinary" persons might perform it.
The remo-wood that was used in this context [also observed at a
much earlier occasion of pigslaughter near Kampuaja] connects this
phase with the figure of Siwa, which was spoken of in myths from
Mara and Asmawn.
2 . TOCH-MI INITIATION AT FUAR
A short description of a feast of the Toch-mi society was included
in the first field notes/ 2 By a mistake the arrival of the guests was
then omitted. It is supplied below.
The feast took place near Fuar and began on the 18th of October
^SS- From Chawer Sarosa's groundhouse 7 persons started out
around noon to join the feast, among them Semer Sarosa, Chawer's
youngest brother, and Mtmach Arus, Chawer's second wife. The
latter brought a printed sarong cloth as a gift from Chawer for the
child of Uon-masu Chowaj and his wife Samachuw Naw. Uonmasu was a parallel cousin of Chawer's [MZS), and his child, the
eight year old Setar, was going to be initiated in the Toch-mi society.
We arrived near Fuar about three o'clock in the afternoon. Fires
were kindled in a small clearing, roasted taro tubers were heated up
and pieces of opossum meat—mostly a small opossum of the kind
called tima—were roasted and eaten. Chowaj-Sefarari folk and some
Kampuaja people—altogether some 40 men, women and children—
12
Elmberg 1955, p. 50.
61
ETHNOS
arrived during these preparations. The Kampuaja brought big bamboo containers with palnxwine traded from the Wen of the Seni
village [the Mara area) via some people in the Arne and Jokwer
villages. While the newly arrived were still eating, some medicine
men were busy bespelling especially women carrying small children,
performing some stroking gestures along their arms and shoulders.
Few women seemed to take any notice and went on eating, nursing
or smoking as before. Men offered dracaena leaves that the medicine
men bespelled and later helped to arrange as head dresses. Fragrant
Namo-leaves were also bespelled and stuck inside armlets or body
cords.
Men and women brought out and began to dress themselves with
necklaces, bead-work, brow-ornaments and black and white feathers;
the women also produced katum, bast braids ending in a big tassel,
and torn rags of ikat cloth or red printed cloth. The latter female
ornaments were applied to their armlets. The men placed their
feathers either in the armlets, in their hair or in their rain capes
which they carried in small plaited bags hanging over the left
shoulder.
62
The fires were extinguished. Numerous guests were arriving in
groups, passing our halting-place wearing their ornaments as well as
long spears, a few bows [imported from the coast) and conical fish
traps. The Sarosa company followed suite, the women leading the
way to a nearby cleared place below a hill.
There at least two hundred people were rehearsing a powerful
shout. The people were ordered in groups and every group made
a file facing west-wards toward this hill. On the flat hill top was
the feast site. Along its eastern part ran a fence, partly of maniok
stems, while its northern and western fringes were lined with a
number of pile-houses and one ground-house called sepidch. Its
southern part was limited by a ground-house called is-serd. The
latter was a huge square house (13X7 m and some 9 m high] with
a slanting roof and two doors on the back facing south, away from
the dance place that extended between the houses and the fence.
The drying leaves of its walls were a brown red colour (fig. 16}.
Through an opening in the fence immediately above the lines of
guests who were jumping high and shouting in unison while waiting,
some women danceid out singing. They wore ikat-cloths on their
heads and were brandishing spears, bows and arrows and old parangs
together with fresh branches of the gnemon-tree or of the Namotree—Semer was not certain of which.
They were led by a younger, married woman with a broad,
plaited belt -termed prat across her left shoulder and under her right
breast. Running down towards the guests she stamped the grounid
vigorously, and shouting an invitation she beckoned with her spear
to a waiting file. They at once gave the shout they had been rehearsing and ran up-hill. Led by the armed women they entered
the opening and the dance place where they started milling round in
a counter-clockwise manner.
Carrying branches older women of the hosts came out of one of
the houses along the western fringe, and male hosts poured out of
the is-serd joining in the idance. The armed women led the remaining
files of guests up the hill and into the milling dance until all the
guests were on the dance place, the woman leader conducting the
dancers in narrowing spirals. Then the rest of the guests just stormed
up and joined the dancers. Finally the dancers were so densely
packed that the dance was brought to a standstill around the armed
63
ETHNOS
64
women that were now gently moving their arms and green branches
in the middle. Semer called them po tu tidro, and the woman leader
fenjd mechdr or ati.
It started to rain and the din subsided. The three dance rings that
began to form were disbanded before a real serdr dance was created.
In front of the ground-houses cloth brought by guests was exchanged
for food, mostly palmwine, roasted taro and small pieces of smoked
pork and opossum. Then people retired to the four pile-houses and
the Sepiach ground-house. In one of the pile-houses, the second
from the northern corner of the feast site, a number of unmarried
girls were observed, carrying numerous necklaces and newly embroidered bark cloth. Though it did not strike me then, this seems
now to indicate the house as a house of initiations for girls.
The further ceremonies for the boys started at sitnset. Only four
boys attended since the mother of a fifth boy was sick. This boy
joined his comrades the following day when his mother was getting
better. The watum instruction recorded before the four boys were
carried into is-serd, is found in the Appendix (p. 158].
It should be added that transvestite dances33 and actions were
carried out inside a wide ring formed by other feast participants,
steadily moving counter-clockwise until the end of the performance.
IV. THE POPOT
I . ADDITIONAL DATA
Though some observations in the above descriptions (written in
1954 soon after the events] are necessarily incomplete and some
feast belonged to different series, they show some recurring features.
To make them more clear, a few additional notes are necessary,
especially on the position of the popot, on the house-building
activities and on the role of the women.
Perhaps first of all should be noted that the Mejprat differentiated
traditionally not only between "pile-house" and "ground-house" but
also between samu, denoting a complete, "closed" house with four
walls and a roof, and "shelters", in different parts called akd, wores,
charit and pidch of various models (p. 99). Thus pidch chaj was
the traditionally correct term for a wall-less funeral shelter, but samu
13
Elmberg 1955, p. 50-52.
65
ETHNOS
chaj was in 1953 the preferred Prat term for it. Again, se-pidch
(chaj) indicated there [amd was) a "closed" pidch shelter with bark
walls, and therefore it was classed as samu, a "closed house". The
terms for this shelter, that was called a house or was being made
into one, indicates an increasing value of "closed houses" in ceremonial contexts.
The material for a house was brought by different groups of which
the bride-givers, supplying the thatch, was one. The houses could
only be built after the harvest of an appurtenant swidden producing
the food with which to remunerate the builders. The popot feasts
were in parts only the [distribution of traditional exchange lots
connected with the main events of the life cycle. In other parts of
the area no such exchange feast-—with the exception of the initiation
—was necessarily bound up with the erection of a stable house.
Even in the Prat area where Chawer's feasts took place, exchanges
may as well take place—and often did so—at certain trees called
titd, fajt or totor.
It would thus seem as if the popot series was a sort of ceremonial
complication, and an extension of certain exchange phases under
the leadership of a popot. It is precisely the sequence of these phases
which is covered by the Malay term "pesta bobot", and for which
sequence there is no adequate expression in Mejprat. In Mejprat
every single phase in the exchanges is neku poku and needs no popot
as a leader, though it does call for a medicine man, ra potekif, or
fenjd mapi, "an experienced woman" (usually indicating a fenjd
mechdr or fenjd mafif, leading the female initiation).
One glimpses in the material the important role played by women
in the actual exchange. It is perhaps not so well illustrated as it
deserves, but it does show the tendency. It is the women who after
the trumpet signals start the feast with the dance, who bring in the
white "earth-cloth", and who hand cloth from inside the house to the
men distributing it. They also lead the exit from Sachafra and the
circling dance preceding the entering of the Sepiach. Atu Karet and
Sirmeser Isir distributed cloth in their husband's marriage exchanges.
Wefo did the same thing, after I had left the district. The role played
by the women will be further illustrated by the conditions connected
with the ownership of the ikat-fabrics.
It is remarkable that female contributions in such a high degree
66
make possible the male ceremonial distribution. When I made sure
that a woman (Atu Karet) made exchanges for the popot's followers,
Chawer was no longer willing to attach any importance to the exchanges, but spoke of neche mamos and pig-slaughter as the essential
feature, i. e. the specifically male activities. The term neche mamos
does not signify "exchange" but connotes with "show what belongs
to Mos", and this the men did: they held the cloth and displayed it.
Immediately after the entry into the Sepiach, Chawer refers, however, to Wefo's contribution at the feast as her "opening the Sachafra" and releasing him, which must be conceded to be an essential
contribution, although before the feast he had assured me that the
women's role was insignificant.
One should also pay attention to the two different categories of
explanation given for the starting of the feast. On the one hand the
stressing, especially by the women (and by Pocherit officially) of the
watwm-aspect, and on the other hand Chawer's (and Pocherit's)
dreams of a threatening witch and his conviction that Imon Semetu
was trying to destroy him. Chawer (desired a demonstration of power
in order to assert himself outwardly and force certain independent
groups to cooperate on his "fatherly" conditions, which obviously
also implied that he should be allowed to live as rapin. The women
desired in the first place to fulfil watum and to satisfy the ghosts
and dema. Chawer's son Charachn'tuwit sneered at him for being
unable to'live up to his ideal; his guests accused him of not being
able to conduct the feast properly; and Wefo reproached him afterwards of having ruined the watum way of life with his popot chatter.
The instrument for Chawer was of course the traditional feasts
which, organized into a greater unity, he had been unable to master
to the satisfaction of all.
The implication of this was that his popot-prestige hereby ought
to have suffered. As long afterwards as 1957 it was difficult to
observe such a circumstance, more especially as the government
and the mission had in the interim intensified their efforts to abolish
the "old order". Akus used an image from the recently concluded
combatting of yaws: it had received a lethal injection. In the year
1957 the time of the popot was past, said Chawer; now he was
Kapitan, a chief in the service of the government. This was what
he could now take his stand upon.
67
ETHNOS
Our attention now may profitably be concentrated to three main
aspects:
The situation of the popot a] in relation to his wife, b) in relation
to his followers, c] in the autobiographical accounts by two popot.
2 . POPOT AND WIFE
Regarding the popot leader concept a distinction should be drawn
between the role of leader for a feast and Chawer's personal interpretation of this. The role of feast-leader generally implied more of
a primus inter pares than did Chawer's popot ideal. Neither Maser
Na nor Machajt Kanepu was heard to call himself a popot, nor were
they observed to act in a dominating or arrogant way. It was Frarek
Chowaj who jocularly referred to Machajt's wife Atu Karet as
a popot. Neither her husband nor any other male took offence at
this—except Chawer, who at once made a nickname for her. She
took no notice of Chawer's behaviour, and the question is what
the term popot actually signified to her.
For Chawer it was important to be recognized as a popot and to
be called natia by people whom he referred to as kusemd. His outbursts of rage may be understood as a demonstration of popotpower; on several occasions he wound them up by saying: "I am
popot". In the feeling of his popot-power he summoned the spirits
of the remote Nufor and Pukis as well as of the Europeans.
I received my earliest impression of this power from Akus and
Semer Sarosa in Malay. I did not then realize that both had for years
been strongly influenced by Malay linguistic habits; Akus also by
the notions of the mission and Semer by the military life in police
barracks. Both had thus a certain non-Mejprat ideal notion of power
and authority.
The essence of their description was: The word of the popot was
law. When he commanded, all obeyed. He distributed his cloth in
vast quantities to satisfied followers—what would people do if there
were no popot?
But on the first meeting with Charachawer at his Sachafra-house
this picture suffered a rude shock. At my request Chawer was to
show some fabrics, and we entered the second house of the Sachafra
site, where his wife Wefo and son Charachn'tuwit were. Chawer
spoke his wife's name and she nodded a greeting. He pronounced
68
his son's name as Kratuet, but was sneeringly interrupted by the
latter, who ridiculed Chawer's pronounciation. The son pronounced
the name slowly for me and added in Malay: He can do nothing,
not even speak Mejprat. Just a big boaster. Typical popot (itu
matiam popot) 1 A spiteful altercation ensued between the two in
Mejprat. Chawer tried vainly to turn his son out of the house, but
not until Wefo had silenced them both and pointed to the door did
Charachn'tuwit sullenly leave the house. Akus, who was there to
introduce me and serve as interpreter, gave an embarrassed laugh
and said that Charachn'tuwit was right. Chawer spoke as he liked
and one did not always know what he meant.
After this Wefo took out some folded fabrics from her pandanus
bags. She handed one end of a bundle of cloth to Chawer, and together
they unfolded and held up the piece of cloth. Wefo grumbled when
the fabric got crumpled as they folded it again. Chawer then
hastened to smooth out the creases, talking incessantly the while of
what a great popot he was, and how many fabrics he would distribute at the impending feast, his feast!
Some days earlier I had seen a fabric decorated with gold-like
threads, and I asked if he had any such. Wefo bit her cigarette hard
and listened to Akus' and Chawer's appealing explanations with
disapproving grunts. Finally she cut off all further discussion with
the word mendnoch, "have done!" Akus and Chawer translated
apologetically: Another time!
Tiny, thin and with a quiet and very set expression in her face
the popot's wife had dominated my first meeting with a popot. It
might have been incidental. Each day, however, it became increasingly evident that a very dynamic relation obtained between the
popot and his wife (or wives), and that also his sons were coldly
indifferent to him, often making him the butt of rather supercilious
jokes, using the term popot ironically in this connection. The popot's
wife had complete control of the fabrics of the family and had to
give her assent to every cloth transaction. She refused to agree to
those she considered unfavourable.
Some time after the above-described meeting Chawer wanted to
exchange one of his fabrics for an Indonesian ikat fabric I had in my
possession. When I agreed, the exchange could nevertheless not
take place—despite the fact that there were several bidders—until
69
ETHNOS
a few weeks later, as Wefo was far away in a swidden, according
to Chawer. She finally came, together with Chawer, she carefully
inspected my cloth, silently, but sure of herself. Chawer said jokingly in Malay that I was a great popot, that I must attend his great
feast and that I should get a very beautiful and old piece of cloth in
exchange, in other words nisoch-soch, "sweetening-up" chatter, to
keep me in a good mood. Wefo remarked drily that there were holes
in my fabric and that some sojs (a certain pattern) were missing,
whereupon she took out a little packet of cloth from her pandanus
bag and handed it to Chawer. He and I opened it and finally folded
it up again. When I refused the exchange he turned once more to
Wefo and in a confidential nisoch-soch tone informed her of my
refusal. His wife's demeanour softened somewhat and she listened
thoughtfully to Chawer's flood of words. After a brief exchange
with Chawer she said with finality: To-morrow I will bring another
cloth! She rose and went away.
Chawer was a little uneasy lest I should take this amiss, and
assured me that Wefo would bring a much better fabric the following day.
The next day both of them came back. Wefo took out another
fabric after once more inspecting mine. Chawer kept up a running
commentary during the inspection, telling me in reassuring tones
that my cloth was mof teni, "of the best quality". After the exchange
Chawer informed me that he and Wefo were very satisfied. Wefo
confirmed this: serdk-och, "pleased and content". During my subsequent stay in Ajamaru she sent me roasted taro-roots every third
or forth day.
During these negotiations it seemed to me as if Chawer exercised
above all the function of a broker or a mediator. One thing, however, was clear: the picture of a more or less masterful popot,
cherished by Chawer and his confreres, was an ideal picture that
could not be upheld in the presence of the wife. Her right to decide
in the matter of the fabrics was indisputable, and this applied not
only to the wives of the popot but to the Mej prat women in general.
The men exercised a certain right in this connection too, but one
which was as a rule not exempt from the possibility of the wife's
refusal to commit herself to a new transaction. However, owing to
7°
the practical necessity of maintaining good relations within the
family both parties endeavoured to agree.
This meant, for instance, that Chawer did not put forward proposals that he knew Wefo would find unacceptable, and that he
presented the proposals that he did put before his wife as diplomatically as possible. With respect to the wife's role all Mejprat were
agreed on the point: naive awt ma, "one does not force her".
Concerning Chawer's role in the cloth exchanges mentioned,
Wefo's opinions in the year 1953 were markedly cautious. She was
an aging woman, Chawer had a younger second wife, Munach, who
had borne him four children, and it was obviously in Wefo's interest
that Chawer should be happy in Wefo's and his own joint arrangements. To my enquiry through Semer, she answered that Chawer
helped the exchange with his popot talk.
The situation in 1957 was different. Government measures had in
the meantime "abolished" the old fabrics as a species of exchange.
Wefo had aged noticeably in her appearance and was in many
respects thrust aside in favour of the younger Munach and her halfgrown children. Wefo and I conversed on this occasion several
times without needing to consider any listeners. She was both sad
and bitter when she finally asserted that the eternal chatter of the
popot, raw popot n'kespo-kespo-kespoje, had annoyed the government so that the Mejprat must now forget their traditions, kepe
semi watum. When I asked why there were popot near the lakes
but evidently not to the north in Mara, she answered that popot
were raw rit.
Later Chawer declared that raw rit signified "sequestered human
beings", people who no longer lived in their own original region.
The Sarosa men, for instance, were raw rit; they "paid" here for the
soil they used and lived on. Not without pride he added: raw rit
m'pe ku wana; ra mo sej. Literally this meant: "men who (are)
sequestered have their own children; men take (things) on their own
account". The phrase n'pe ku was also the usual way of saying
that the woman "bears" or "gets children", and he used it in a provocative way. And "men take (things) on their own account" also
implied: men can get along by themselves—women are not needed.
Chawer meant that raw rit procured other people's children as
71
ETHNOS
followers, i. e. the popot entered into a self-created paternal relationship. Other ties were herewith established than through ordinary
kinship and marriage.
Thus Wefo took as opposites "the popot chatter" and walum,
the traditional rules, which undeniably agreed with Chawer's explanation that the popot—kusemd relationship was in some way outside the landowners' traditional concepts.
3 . POPOT, FOLLOWERS AND DEPENDANTS
My first informants, Akus and Semer Sarosa, talked from the very
beginning of the three kinds of people among the Mejbrat: popot,
kusemd and ra kdjr. The first kind were chiefs who made feasts,
the second were "the coolies" of the chiefs, and the third were poor
people of no concern who stayed out of feasts and only minded
their own food production. However, no man ever called himself
ra kdjr or contemplated to stay out of the feasts of the life cycle
that also made up the popot feasts. Ra kdjr was actually only a term
of abuse.
As an example of a popot, Akus gave his paternal uncle Chawer
Sarosa who was about to make the big feast just described. There
Chawer would give "plenty of cloth" to his kusemd, who in turn
would "pay" him and the other Sarosa popot so that the Sarosa
would be living like "great lords" (see text IV). The feast was called
Sachafra or Nechemamos.
Akus, Semer and Sawit Susim even agreed on a long list of persons
belonging to the three different kinds of people. Chawer and some
other popot laughed when I later read the names to them and
declared that all of those were popot. You were a popot, they said,
if you had completed one series of feasts which they called SachafraSepiach. The difficulty seemed to be that Chawer and a number of
people in the western parts of the Prat area used the word popot
in so many different ways. It functioned as a synonym for "leader"
in general. More specially it was used for a leader of certain feasts
connected with the erection of stable houses, a leader who had
followers working on his swiddens. Finally they considered popot
as a term for anyone who had completed a series of customary exchange feasts whether as a leader or not.
72
It appeared that only as leaders did they consider themselves to
have kusemd, here rendered as" followers", but literally meaning
"male children, boys". Chawer even drew the parallel with government officials having their anak-anak, "children", who paid them
taxes and made roads or carried burdens. He thus alluded to a not
uncommon simile used by government and missionary people speaking in Malay that the Papuans should consider themselves to be in
a bap a—anak ( = father—child) relation to the respective officials
who of course represented the "father". It is in the capacity of
"fatherly leader" that the popot will be studied in this section.
THE POPOT LEADER. Linguistically the composit po-pot does not
have much in common with the noble aspirations westerners like
to see expressed in fathership but rather indicates something in the
nature of a "cloth grabber".
Po, the first part of the word, connoted "a thing" but especially
"cloth". The stem pot occurred in connection with bark, e. g. in napot ( = to strip large pieces of bark from the trunk of a tree).
Ne-pot signified "to take lock, stock and barrel, to catch or possess
oneself of everything". Rd-pot, a certain stone ring, was considered
to attract fabrics and objects of value and was kept in the bales of
cloth. The word appears to mean "to loosen and take everything".
The composit ko-pot, signified "clitoris". It consists of ko, "wood"
and pot, "lock-stock-and-barrel taker". Ko connoted not only "wood"
but also "penis" and "bride-taker", like tafoch, "fire", was associated
with the vagina and connoted "bride-giver". Pot appears to be a
specialized form of not, "to suck" or "to draw" (with or without
suction-tube), which occurs e. g. in the expression mot mo sar,
"she draws (the sperm) and begins to wax like the moon". Ko-pot
then associates to concepts like "penis-attracter" and "in-law catcher".
Popot would signify someone who "appropriates all cloth", a
"cloth catcher or cloth grabber". The more complete Mejprat expression "raro popot" was used as a self-glorification by those who
considered themselves powerful ("men who can procure all the
cloths they desire" = rich men), but as a vituperation against these
popots ("men who skin people to the bone") by those who thought
themselves unjustly treated.
Around Ajamaru some seven people were mentioned more often
than others as leaders of big feasts: Chawer Sarosa, N'Firok and
73
ETHNOS
Meritsaw Pres, Sawit Susim, Karetaja Karet, Pum Isir and Maser
Na, and perhaps also Meritwoju Kampuskato and Uontaki Kampuaja. Pum,, Maser and Meritwoju would not use the word popot
of themselves unless my interpreter or I had done so. They seemed
not quite sure of its actual contents until Chawer Sarosa was quoted
as an example of a popot. When asked about what made him popot
two phrases recurred in his answers: ra memdt popot, "people see
me to be a popot", and teros matdk, "I stand made strong".
There were, however, no outer formal sign of the popot dignity.
Some, it is true, wore hats that in police-Malay were called topi
bobot, others wore a boar's tusk. Such wetaw, as the hats were
called in Mejprat, were however generally manufactured in the
Mara area, where especially female initiates were reported to wear
them. The occasional use of them or of the boar's tusk in the Prat
area was certainly not restricted to popot. Only Chawer and a
number of Sarosa folk accounted a circle-grown boar's tusk as the
badge of a popot. The popot Pum Isir and Maser Na, on the other
hand, always appeared, when I saw them, without hat and boar's
tusk, whereas less important men in their retinue might be wearing
both. The popotship was thus not to be inferred from any such
external criteria. What people saw was what the popot demonstrated
with the series of exchange feasts, viz. his capacity to "attract" po,
"cloth", which was implicit in the term popot. This capacity was
expected to show itself as a generous dealing out of cloth. It is
remarkable that a popot used to mention such generosity only when
talking about himself. There is one sole observation of a popot
acclaiming the generosity of somebody else (page 42).
Matdk, "made strong" on the other hand, pointed to the popot's
relations with the Powers of the Mejprat cosmos. He used medicines
like croton leaves and red clay when he adressed the dema or the
ghosts or went to saworo, the water spirit home. Different names
of the dema were referred to. Chawer was very partial to In, the
dema-wind and to medicines of the Uon society, while Meritwoju
Kampuskato mentioned coastal dema of the Toch-mi society and
Pum Isir talked of the Mos and the Tu-dema of his land's waters and
caves.
The result of the applied medicines called po tekif would "soften"
the hearts of debtors and followers, while the effect of "hot" medi74
cine called fito, would make them ill, anyhow forcing them to contribute generously to the feast. This would enable the popot in his
turn to discharge a great number (though they always phrased it
"all") of exchange obligations of his followers and of his own. The
dema were content as a result and the popot would be looked upon
in favour by them and in respect and contentment by his fellowmen.
Or at least, that was what the popot's own description said. Matdk,
meaning "strong, hard, lucky" implied health and superiority.
FOLLOWERS. Chawer explained that the sons of men staying in
traditional uxori-local marriages "followed their mothers". The father
had only daughters, the sons "fell away".
Traditionally a man was expected to be active inside the mapufunits where he belonged and later also to cooperate closely with his
mother-in-law.
For certain reasons this was not enough for the popot. In the
mapw/-units a balanced interaction of exchanges between males and
females was foreseen. But the popot wanted "boys" to ideal with,
men who should called him natia, "father" (which a number of
them actually refused to do); men who should work for him and
whose exchanges he would handle. Whatever the reasons for this
may be, the strained or aggressive Mejprat relation between father
and son seems hardly to be taken into account. The popot held up
an ideal that did not seem to agree with the social structure.
One reason for doing this was expressedly stated: they wanted
to be rich, mape po makin, "to have many things". All younger informants like Akus, Semer and Safom, stressed the necessity of
becoming rich and discussed the difficulties. They found generally
that they were not enough matdk, "hard" in their dealings with their
relatives. Otniel Tuwit stated that a married man, who as a rule
borrowed cloth from his mother-in-law for his exchanges, could not
get very rich that way. Even if amot, "interest", was added in kind
to the lot returning to him, he too had to add "interest" on the lot
he returned to his mother-in-law. But how could the popot get rich,
who always talked of how they were helping people to discharge
their dues, I asked.
Some said that the dema of the spirit-home told them where
to find cloth. The Sarosa people mentioned that the Uon spirits
appeared in dreams and gave them secret advice. Safom Isir said:
75
ETHNOS
On this earth amu nam po, "we live by the things in it". He continued :
[I die, I pass away. What about my things, do they go away with
me? The things remain left behind, yes, the things remain left
behind. Soon people will give them in exchanges and the things
follow the living left behind. There are men who fetch cloth at
exchanges but do not return it. Such a man is stealing and indeed
a popot}.
He continued cynically that of course the cloth that the popot
called theirs really belonged to other people—was there any other
way of getting rich? But they could not "steal" from other people
than those who were to some degree dependent on them and that
was where the kusemd came in.
If young men needed a bride as well as cloth to be able to marry
they could go to a popot and work for him during a year or more.
Then the popot arranged the settlement with the future parents-inlaw. He then became a guarantee for the subsequent exchanges of
gifts with the in-laws which had to be made at the birth, initiation
and marriage of the children. Naturally the exchanges were effectuated only after adequate periods of more work on the popot's
swiddens for the dependent family. The popot thus became a middle
man between the bride-giver and the bride-taker.
Sawit Susim especially pointed out that the bride-giver would
then find it more profitable to spend on the popot some kindness
76
traditionally reserved for the bride-taker, like sharing the first fruits
of a certain swidden or fish obtained at a trade meeting. And both
the popot and the bride-giver would make demands on the services
of the bride-taking man to clean their swiddens, press him for contributions to feasts and so on. Every exchange feast of his own would
send this man and his family deeper in debt as already the first
return gift from the bride-givers had to be shared with the popot,
and the amount of cloth staying with the newly wed couple would
be inadequate for the following exchanges. They would then have
to rely on a close cooperation with the popot and to work for him
until finally [and ideally] the popot would marry off for instance
one of their daughters to a son of another of his followers who
was in a similar plight. Then the popot would reap benefits of the
exchanges in both directions and have at his disposal the major
amount of cloth and the working power of the two families in
question.
As an example of this, Sawit mentioned the marriage between
Pochtita Chowaj and Charu Sarosa. Pochtita's father had borrowed
cloth for his own marriage from the popot Meritsaw Pres, then a
young man. This debt had grown with the years until Pochtita
worked for and was entirely taken care of by Meritsaw, whose
mother was a Sarosa. His MB's classificatory son was Chawer, who
at Meritsaw's marriage exchange made contributions, so generous that
Chawer had Come to count Meritsaw among his followers (page 9)
and Pochtita as a personal asset. Chawer also had a male cousin,
Seut Sarosa, whose marriage exchanges with the Sefaniwi were largely
taken over by Chawer, allegedly because of some affliction rendering Seut unfit for work during long periods. Seut's son Charu moved
over to work for Chawer as a "compensation" and was married to
Pochtita. Through this arrangement Chawer was reasonably assured
of a short circuit for the circulation of cloth and the cloth would
"return" quickly to him. That implied that he could use the separate
pieces for further lending transactions on short terms, and that he
would receive more amot, "interest", in return than if the circuit
had been a long one.
A similar case was demonstrated in the marriage of Semer Sarosa,
Chawer's younger brother. Semer pointed out that his MB, Natisiri
Chowaj, had been a violent and quarrelsome person who was in77
ETHNOS
volved in many cases of abduction and fighting as well as the robbing
of valuable cloths. He was fined at the local court and Chawer paid
for him there and also outside the court to exasperated adversaries.
Natisiri seemed to take this for granted and never made any retribution but rather made pronouncements on the preposterousness of
Chawer's cooperation with the Government. At Natisiri's death
Chawer therefore made his claims to a considerable amount of cloth
and finally obtained a promise to have Natisiri's granddaughter
Metowk as a bride for Semer, his brother, and to receive a certain
discount in the marriage exchange. However, Chawer had in 1953
already given some 54 pieces of cloth (a high amount) and the
Chowaj people were not yet satisfied.
A third case finally was indicated by Chawer himself. Mapuk
Sesa, a man whose mother was a Sarosa from Framu and whose
father was dead, had been helping Chawer to make swiddens for
some time before the later sponsored Mapuk's marriage with Sajer
Na. Her father Mikir had earlier become heavily indebted to Chawer
who had finally come to expect a great share in her marriage exchange. This made for a third short circuit.
It is worth observing that a true or classificatory cross cousin
relation obtains between Chawer and Meritsaw, Chawer and
Metowk's father and Chawer and Mapuk, while Chawer and Seut
were parallel cousins. Normally the reciprocal kinship term would
have been nemo, "cross cousin", or even na, "brother", and help to
make exchanges was enjoyed between such relatives on an equal
footing.
When Chawer now found this insufficient and instead held forth
the "father—child"-relation, he obviously wanted to stress this element of inequality and possibly also his ability to arrange short
circuits for a swift circulation of cloth. Chawer himself (as well as
Akus, Semer and Sawit] agreed that the good method was ne rere,
nawe kusemd serot naru, "to give slowly (but) order the boys to
make a quick circulation". This meant that he was slow to discharge
any exchange obligations through his own kinship and marriage but
hurried his followers to return what they owed him.
While these three cases were quoted in 1953 as ideal to the intentions of a popot, Semer in 1957 found it significant that the three
kusema in question had bolted. The husband in the first case, Charu,
78
JOHN-ERIK ELMBERG: THE FOPOT FEAST CYCLE
joined the Papuan police-force before the feast in 1953 and in 1957
was reported as living in Teminabuan. Semer himself, husband of
the second case, tried successively to work for the hospital, the
agricultural station and the forestry station and finally found a
job in Sorong as a privately employed hunter. Mapuk, who figured
in the third case, seemed unusually dissatisfied at the Sepiach feast
of Chawer's and soon afterwards signed a contract to work as a kuli
on the coast and went away. Whatever the complete motivation was
for leaving their traditional life and work, a great portion of it was
attributed to the fact that they were so completely in the hands of
a clever popot that they were reduced economically to a state of
childlike powerlessness also contained in the term kusemd.
There might also have been cases of a fairer cooperation between
popot and followers, but such cases were not referred to. The popot
seemed always to talk of getting more services and cloth from their
followers, and these invariably seemed to counter with tactics of
procrastination or asking for more cloth first, before delivering what
was demanded.
Part of the explanation for this behaviour can be found in the
strong female dominance in decisions about cloth. The man alone
could not decide on the dispositions of family cloth. This fact was,
however, often omitted by the men when talking to strangers. Another reason seemed to be that loans received from the popot were
not always -regarded as primary or as important as others secured
through channels considered more traditional. Chawer's tug of war
with the Chowaj people in the second case quoted above also indicates that the Chowaj had not acknowledged the very obligations
that for Chawer was the inducement to Semer's marriage.
Traditionally the popot would in similar cases turn to medicines
and finally to violence. A spell cast on the refractory person was
considered to make him ill until he changed his mind or else died.
He or some relative of his might also be captured by the popot and
released against a number of cloths—or "sold" to coastal traders for
cloth.
The popot schemes certainly were upset now and then. But the
one to smart for e. g. a popot's non-delivery of exchange lots to
a follower's bride-givers, was of course immediately the follower,
who was then pressed for more service against more promises that
79
ETHNOS
soon, really, the exchange would take place. And when Chawer did
not want to comply with the demands of the Chowaj, the direct
bride-givers, Semer's wife refused to live with Semer. Semer who
hoped that putting his faith wholeheartedly in Chawer should resolve
all the difficulties, was then sent by Chawer all across the Prat
area to remind slow delivering followers of their duties and of
Chawer's power. The easy-going Semer was, however, easily put off
the track. He joked, got happy over a present of food or a show of
friendliness and talked ifatwm-rules with the old women. He was
laughed at behind his back and rather made people wonder what
had happened to Chawer to send abroad such a soft-hearted person.
The result was no deliveries to Chawer who did not deliver anything to the Chowaj. Semer was after some three months of additional service to Chawer worse off than before. His wife was still
away, Chawer did not care for him, and, worst of all, he had no
swidden growing. He was now struck by the afterthought that in the
very time he had been running errands for Chawer, he might have
prepared a swidden that soon would have given harvest.
He declared that he would give up the popot cooperation, got
two printed sarongs from me which were handed over to the
Chowaj, and started together with his reluctantly returning wife to
make a swidden. However, his mother-in-law to whom he now
should have turned for exchange assistance, was a classificatory sister
of Wefo, Chawer's wife, and in good understanding with her—
Semer thought—declined to cooperate. He therefore left the area
and took up work on the coast.
His brother Chawer, the popot, did not seem to feel very "fatherly" for Semer, though the latter diligently talked of his brother as
bapa Kapitan, "Father Kapitan", in Malay and as tatia, "father",
thus also formally putting himself at his brother's hands as kusemd,
a "male child". The question is what connotations the latter term
had. Alternatively the popot used some other terms about his
followers: kudtio, "my own children", ra woti, "men that I possess,
prisoners of war" and the Malay kuli, "workers, subordinates", as
well as anak-anak, which means "children" and may also indicate
different forms of serfdom and slavery.
The difference between these expressions ranging from "prisoners
of war" to "my own child", was great, but may be said to correspond
80
to two extreme forms of behaviour that a popot would commonly
use with his followers. When, for instance, Chawer prevailed upon
some follower to supply something he happened to need, he used
a remarkably friendly and confidential tone, joked, held forth promises or described himself in sentimental terms as an old father who
needed a little help and who would richly reward the helper-son
in the future. This was critically characterized by many women as
sendmu-u "like a mother's brother—only more so".
This way of asking very nicely for something was generally called
nisoch-soch, "to make dainty-dainty", and was the contrary of
nawe, "to demand firmly". It was nawe when in different ways
a popot demanded the return of fabrics he had previously loaned to
a follower. It was sometimes done with many onlookers, usually at
a feast. The popot might suddenly break into serdr kenu, "a dance
of wrath", and with parang in hand shriek terms of abuse and threats
at one or several followers who were not present. Their relatives
and friends on the spot took care that the threats of the popot came
to their knowledge. Chawer generally called the neglectful ones
seta nidch, "spawn of tardy toads", ku paivt, "milk-sops", and tesioch
nio najt, "dung-eaters". He threatened nami, to "stab" them, nesa-o,
to "poison" them, or fenjd mend safo, that "women should make 'hot'
medicines" suspending fertility.
After such violent diatribes some popot said in Malay that they
had delivered nasihat, an admonition. The Majprat word they
used was watum, which signified "ancestral prescription, adat". But
the popot seemed alone in opining that their stream of invective and
menaces had to do with watum. Watum was generally equated to
kespo mof, "to talk nicely", and contained the good advice and
assurances of support that for instance a maternal uncle or mother
commonly gave before a boy was to be initiated, to go on trading
trips or to work for the Oil Company in Sorong. In the eastern part
of the Prat area the expression kespo popot, "to speak like a popot",
was the equivalent of speaking agressively and being furious.
So while informants stressed the over-nice and the very harsh as
characteristic of a popot, no man talked of him as he would of a
brother-in-law or compared him to his maternal uncle, relatives
who in the Mejprat society had what a westerner would term a
"benevolent, fatherly role". Therefore it is all the more probable
81
ETHNOS
that the habitual popot complaint of his followers' negligence
had more than the essence of truth. Both parties clearly took what
advantages they could of one another. A popot who termed himself
"father" was necessarily, to most grown-up men, and according to
traditional Mejprat categories, a potentially hostile, and in the best
of cases unreliable entity in family matters, with whom a dynamic
opposition mostly obtained—the more so as he also belonged to the
opposite ceremonial group. In contradistinction to the maternal uncle
he was not a primary source of help in matters of cloth and exchange.
A popot—follower relation that gave both parties satisfaction and
certain advantages seems reasonably to obtain only between people
of similar resources; where excessive momentary egotism was
checked by prospects of concrete future advantages and where a
fairly great reciprocal independence prevailed. There a show of
generosity could evoke a like answer and could therefore be enjoyed.
That is to say: between popot and popot.
That this was actually the case, can be inferred from certain conditions at the great feasts. There the popot-leader who built the first
house called all the other house-owners his followers, though at
other feasts they were popot-leaders themselves and though they
had followers who were as dependent on them as Semer, Cham and
Seut were on Chawer Sarosa.
Between two such fellow-popot a favourably received exchange lot
would be acknowledged by the recipient next time returning two
additional pieces of amot, "interest" cloth. The competitive element
in the situation was always kept within this limit (though the quality
of the given pieces varied) and the "interest" was never additively
counted as "capital". According to critical information at several
popot feasts such generosity was shown only between bride-givers
and bride-takers, not among all partners. This is in accord with
observations of Chawer Sarosa's feast: only his DH (Frarek ChowajSefarari) was favoured.
A re-formulation is then brought about concerning the ceremonial
undertakings of Chawer. At his neche mamos feast, it was implied
that Chawer had previously committed himself to a show of unusual
generosity. He had evidently received different forms of assistance
(cloth, palm-wine, work and food) from a great number of persons
82
—all of which he regarded as followers—against his promise to
assume their responsibilities to give death dues for certain dead relatives. The enumerated caves and water courses were technically the
entrances to the afterworld, where those ghosts had to be admitted.
His promising had been going on for many years, and I fail to see
how anyone could think it possible to supply that much cloth: over
90 pieces if he were to give just one piece for every entrance.
Ordinarily the death dues consisted of six major pieces of cloth/4
two of which at least were handed over soon after the death, and
the rest—ideally—in connexion with the /wn-funeral. Chawer's selfassumed responsibilities then seem as much out of ordinary Mejprat
proportions, as do his aspirations of some influence over the Numfor,
Bugis and "European" territories.
Traditionally the death dues were a part of the bride-taker—bridegiver's responsibilities, with more possibilities to control the relation
between promise and fulfilment. In this sphere the incentive was
definitely a potlatch desire to put oneself "before the public eye"15
and at the same time to lay "some claim to social distinction",16
witnessed by the spectators and guests. The term (nepo) wer for
"giving enough, generously" acknowledged a competitive element,
as wer also connoted "by-passing". The traditional form for this
competition was the bride-giver's bestowing of po fejdch, "out-going
cloth", and the bride-takers returning it as po sipdch, "in-coming
cloth", which contained the same amount of cloth + amot, "interest"
(never reported "higher" than two pieces). The handing over of such
lots sometimes occurred at Samu-ren feasts where "guests" had first
presented items of food and/or cloth to the "hosts" who immediately
returned a larger amount of food and drink, and gave back the cloth
together with more food four days later. The hosts tried to make
as many such feasts in a row as possible.
Chawer evidently wanted to count as a show of sufficient generosity the partial fulfilment of a number of self-assumed responsibilities for which he had already received the traditional return
performances in advance. He was virtually treating all men as bridetakers irrespective of the traditional order of the performances—"all
15
la
Barnett 1938, p. 351.
Barnett 1938, p. 351.
83
ETHNOS
men are my followers", as he said in his own terminology, equating
bride-taker and follower.
While even his son hinted that he was only crying generously
(but not giving generously], he himself opined that he was overgenerous and needed to check himself. A number of people seemed
violently dissatisfied and shouted for more cloth, openly deriding
his way of applying the traditional rules of exchange and even calling
him a "cloth thief".
Since such behaviour was not observed at other feasts, the realized
popot ideal of Chawer clearly created conflict, if more through his
broken promises than through the reversal of the traditional exchange order, is however not to be ascertained from the present
material.
Thus we have found that in relation to the popot leader there
were two kinds of followers: fellow popot and dependants. Together
with fellow popot, common exchange tactics and transactions were
planned and carried out, transactions that might have phases of
internal strife or hostile cunning, but which were all the same carried
out on a par. Attempts were observed in substituting the "superior"
role of a "host" for the traditional alternating roles of bride-giver
(superior) and bride-taker (inferior).
With dependants the popot's feeling of superiority was marked.
The dependant had to work for the popot before he had access to
the cloth required. "Soft", i. e. confiding or unlucky dependants
could even be used until they were left high and dry. Less "soft"
dependants would try to work the situation to their own advantage,
extracting in a tactical situation from the popot what cloth or favour
they could against whatever promise, for instance at the preparation
for a feast. Proofs are lacking of a thriving dependant expressing
contentment with his follower-ship, or of a popot lauding the efforts
of a dependant.
From the above can be judged that the salient features of the relations between popot and followers were the following: The popot
wanted to administer the work, marriage-partners and exchange of his
dependents with a strong view to further his own ends which avowedly
were to become "rich". Of course he could not nowadays work them
unduly hard, for then they would leave him. He had ideally to
84
maintain a delicate balance of friendliness and firmness. He definitely
had to work them both ways though, because the role of a popot was
not founded on ordinary kinship relations and behaviour. Instead
a more or less new relation of father—son was invoked, a relationship charged—for a man—with tensions and notions of debatable
father superiority; in some respects even an anti-image of the benevolent figure of the mother's brother.
The popot's attempts at "fatherliness" was commonly branded
among dependants as over-nice and over-harsh, thus: unbalanced.
As a leader he can be seen trying to make leadership into something
more permanent and all-embracing than was usually prevalent among
the Mejprat. The designation popot, finally, connotes with cleaverness, power and superiority.
With his two kinds of followers, the fellow popot and the depenidant, the popot leader showed a different behaviour. A limited
and traditional show of generosity was not excluded between some
fellow popot. Fellow popot did not usually call a popot leader
"father".
Some dependants, though, were game to remain disobedient or to
plot active counterschemes. It is hardly probable that this was a
healthy course to pursue for any length of time before the arrival of
Government officers in the area.
Summarily it can be said that what ultimately created a dependant's need' of assistance was his lack of support from near relatives.
It is conceivable that for instance the spread of polygyny, the coastal
slave trade and epidemics may have played a part in developing
such conditions on a major scale. The later contract work on the
coast or elsewhere may also have contributed to create or maintain
a social un-balance, so widely spread that it gave the popot their
chance.
4 . TWO AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL ACCOUNTS
It has been mentioned earlier that some people who were regarded
by Chawer and the Sarosa people as popot, did not use this term
about themselves. This difference was evident when Chawer and
85
ETHNOS
Pum Isir consented to tell how they had become ra mdse, "great
II 17
men .
Chawer immediately equated it to being a popot and drew a
picture of himself as a powerful sorcerer, witch-killing and finally
triumphant over relatives and adversaries. Even the government had
recognized the fact and appointed him village chief. On a few
points of this account, Semer, Chawer's youngest brother, commented afterwards.
Pum told of a series of events where the dema gave advice to his
mother and himself and played a key role. He finished his story
quoting the twenty-four feasts that he had made altogether in his
life and which persons had got which cloth on these occasions. His
son Safom interjected his comments while Pum was still talking.
While the feats that Chawer stressed were of a more individualistic
order, Pum underlined more the aspect of the "traditional rules".
Chawer's account started in the beginning of the nineteen thirties,
when he was leaving his mother's people at Tuwer near ChowajSefarari. There used to live Wasi Sarosa, a woman who was married
to Schoromanak Tuwit. Schoromanak had a previous wife, N'wof
Safokawr.
Between Wasi and N'wof there was bitter enmity and N'wof had
refused to help Schoromanak to procure the rest of the marriage exchange cloth for Wasi. Wasi's brother Meriara had promised to
help Chawer with some cloth while Chawer was staying in a pilehouse outside Mefchatiam, preparing his first popot feast.
One day Meriara and Chawer went together to the Safokawr
village, where a pig feast was being celebrated. To his disappointment, Meriara did not get there the expected instalment in the
marriage exchange for his sister. However, N'Wof's brother, Frakeren
Safokawr, dropped a little bit of food on the ground during the
feast. Without being observed, Meriara picked up the piece of food
with his foot and put it in a bamboo-cane.
" In an effort to maintain a degree of distance to the information received,
I used the term ra mase, "great man" [introduced by Usia Charumpres}, instead
of popot, employed by my Sarosa informants. I finally accepted popot, as all
Indonesian and European officials were continually using this term. Chawer
had told parts of this story earlier and gave this complete version in Malay on
New Year's day 1954, Semer offered his comment the following day and, in
1957, Pum gave his account in Mejprat which by then I could follow without
much effort.
86
Chawer claimed that it was only on the way home that he heard
Meriara say he had tried in vain to destroy Frakeren by putting a
spell on this piece of food. When he got home Meriara put the food
near the fire, but Frakeren remained healthy. Finally, he mixed
derris-root with what was left of the food. According to Semer's
version, the poison was sent to Frakeren and mixed with his food;
according to Chawer's, his own spells made its cha, "cold force",
active at a distance. Just after this, news came from Sauf, where
Frakeren was living with his wife's family, that he had fallen ill and
died. Meriara then told the Safokawr folk that Chawer had instructed him to destroy Frakeren [and that the responsibility was
therefore his]. Some representatives went to Mefchatiam, where
Chawer was staying in the Sachafra house together with Schoromera
Pres. Chawer managed to convince them that he had no part in the
deed, but that Meriara alone was responsible, and the Safokawr
folk marched home, trying to make Meriara hand over the "deathcloth".
The situation soon came to a head, however. Chawer had already
been suffering from sores all over his body for a long time. At first
he thought that dissatisfied ancestral spirits were the cause of his
trouble. Although he had erected a pile-house and the spirits showed
themselves in a dream and assured him that they were content, the
sores obstinately refused to heal and he considered himself the
victim of kapes fane, a witch. Wasi was pointed out as the very
culprit, she was then forced to drink a poisonous liana decoction
and confessed to what she was charged with.
Together with her little child she was compelled to live alone in
the woods under a wind-screen until Chawer would recover his
health. Her husband gave her no food, and in the evenings she
hunted for sustenance in an old swidden belonging to Chawer's
mother and wife. When Chawer heard about this he sent a kusema,
"follower", named Om, who slew Wasi with an axe early one
morning. Her sister Franemojo, who arrived shortly afterwards with
food, took the little child to Tuwer. An excited crowd immediately
set out thence to Mefchadjam to kill Chawer. The latter answered
threateningly that if they wanted a "settlement" for a witch his party
would exact a "settlement" in their turn.
In order to get the better of Chawer, the Safokawr and Sarosa
87
ETHNOS
folk addressed themselves to "Bestuur Osman Sian", an Indonesian
in the service of the Dutch government who was staying at the coast.
The latter betook himself to Framu at the western end of the lake,
seized Chawer and took him to Woramge on the coast, where he
was cross-examined with the help of an interpreter and sentenced to
several year's deportation to Ternate in the Molucca Islands. After
31/2 years, however, he was allowed to return. He had aquired
a knowledge of Malay, and thus became an asset to the Dutch
officer, Captain van Duin, who in the meantime [1937] had been
stationed at the lakes. He now started referring to himself as
"kapitan" and was accepted as a village chief, because he was
popot and had power over people.
Pum Isir's story of how he started his career, in which the term
popot was never used, was told in 1957. His son Safom was my
interpreter and informant at this time. Not once did he use the term
"father", when he spoke of Pum but always referred to him by name.
Safom was usually caustic about his father's behaviour. This is
also shown in my notes of Pum's account which, although told by
Pum, got a heavy taint through Safom's interruptions.
Pum: When I was not yet married, I was digging near Inta to
make a small water hole big enough for my fish trap. In the hole
was much fish. Suddenly my hand felt a big one, and I drew out
my arm of the hole and saw a Safach shell-ring on it. Mos, (the
water dema) had followed from Isir's water spirit home and given it.
Safom: Lately Sirmeser (Pum's daughter) got it and finally smashed
it, when her child diqd. Pum: I got scared and put it back in the
hole together with the fish trap. The following day I found the trap
full of fish, big ones like my thigh. Tumena (the regional dema)
had led them there. I carried the fish and the Safach-ring to the
Charit-house on my mother's swidden. The same day my mother
(Sachajt Na) was thirsty and went to the hole to drink. She saw
Mos coming out of the hole. She became scared and yelled to me
and my eldest brother. We ran back to the house but Sachajt tripped
and fell and did not know where she was. Safom: She remained on
the ground and Mos went into her body. Pum: Mos talked to her
and gave her some potent spells and finally woke her up. Safom:
Mos went back to the water. Pum: She started giving advice. She
88
four, she augments thing-increase; days four more, something small
C= The Tu-dema is ordering an exchange-meeting {mesim = on
mesitri); Sachafra initiation for girls in four days and she will "augment the increase", four more days and then a small feast).
I made a pile-house. Four days later the feast began when the Triton
shell-trumpets boomed. The dema heard them and came up in the
house. After three days everything was prepared. In the middle of
the day I sat alone in the Sachafra-house when Sirim'pa ("The one
source of the moieties"), Chapoaka ("The re-birth shelter of the
ghosts"), Taf-Taf ("The bee nest"), Jochmoni ("Brings arriving
ghosts to the Conjoiner"), and M'san-san ("Her pet") appeared.
The three first are female names, the two last are male ones of the
dema or mati, the leaders (also FZ or FFZ) of the Isir people.
Safom: But also from all other waters come spirits, numerous as
the grass.
Pum: One entered by the ladder, and one slipped through the
floor grating. I fell on the floor. Safom: They entered his body.
Pum: They said: If you want to achieve an exchange-meeting, take
Sera-, Fuja-, Itji-, Charios- and Panach-plants, Chajaw-bark or
Futioch-bast when using spells to make men soft. They gave red
earth which must be applied to a person's chest after seeing a dema.
Four days afterwards I made another small feast for Tu (and
received cloth), promised to return (cloth) four days later. Through
the spells I attracted all the cloth. In Sarajn . . . Safom: . . . the guest
house which Pum made . . . Pum: . . . the cloth was heaped up and
I sat there alone drinking palmwine . . . Safom: though Mesioch,
Pum's elder brother, and N'Tam, Pum's father-in-law, had helped
him. Then (he went) down to a Sepiach Sif-house and Pum made
a special house for the cloth of Oan-size. Pum: After four days
there I returned the cloth . . . Safom: a few cloths to some people
while others had to wait for a very long time. But he slaughtered
a pig all the same . . . Pum: . . . because Tu was satisfied and I re89
ETHNOS
turned the rurd lot (of the marriage exchange) to the people of my
wife.
Safom: Since that time Tu comes into Pum and Pum hears when
other people make "softening-spells". Pum: Tu also showed me fu,
its big place, and four days after making a feast I must go there
and talk to them, then they come. I give them birds' eggs, ground
kangaroo and palmwine and especially I carry palmwine to the
water spirit-home. I gave death exchange and marriage exchange
first at Opu near Semu. (Then followed short descriptions of 23
more feasts.)
This account obviously mixes the proceedings of two feasts, one
when Pum, not married, took part in a neche mamds-exchange,
and one when he was married and made a fejak, primary gift exchange, with his wife's people. This mixing up was partly brought
about by Safom who had a tendency to press everything into the
categories of the Sachafra-Sepiach procedure which he admired.
Literally, Tumena in the first place had ordered an "exchangemeeting" which Pum quickly made equal to a Sachafra-feast, seemingly to make the story go with Safom's interpolation about a
Sachafra-house.
The main differences between the two accounts seems to lie in
Chawer's stressing of his own resourcefulness and power, landing
him at the top of his society, and enabling him to eliminate two
persons standing in his way; while Pum seemed to stress the regional
dema and its "messenger" as the source of his mother's secret knowledge, that, later bestowed on himself, enabled him to perform 24
successful feasts when cloth was traditionally exchanged.
The five names he mentioned seem to be aspects of one female
and one male dema, also called Tu (or Ratu or Tumena) and Mos
respectively. Since the "name" of a dema was often shown to be
a description of one of its special functions, the appelations Pum
used for Tu alluded to her as the origin of the social classification
in moieties, as the haven of the dead ghosts, and as the origin even
of the mythical bees from which all the coastal peoples were regarded as descending—and especially the Sarosa of the Prat area.
The designations for Mos referred to the role of this dema as a guard
at the entrance of the subterranean world of Tu, as a messenger and
as a "lover" or sexual partner of Tu.
90
Pum may be said to have seen his own performance as essentially
integrated with the traditional cosmic forces and social categories
of the Mejprat world.
His son indicated that at the first feast Pum had not acted to the
satisfaction of everybody. Since this was a situation parallel to that
of Chawer at his Sachafra feast {neche mamds), I asked Pum what
he regarded as the main difference between himself and Chawer.
Pum answered that because he had made so many feasts and also
had reared pigs to be sold, he had soon been able to give everyone
his share. His son concurred in this: Pum now was known as the
man who concluded his exchanges in the shortest time, because his
wife was a highly successful pig-breeder. Through selling pigs dearly
they acquired much cloth and could always render the cloth due
to their relatives. Therefore Pum would have a tree planted at the
Totor clump when he was dead—Chawer would not.
Pum declared eagerly that this was the true difference. Chawer,
like Maser Na, had only twice made neche mamos and altogether
ten feasts in two series. But at least 20 feasts were necessary, he said.
This explained what had seemed before a pointless play with
words. Earlier I had noticed that according to a common estimate in
the lacustrine area and north of it, your feasts must number ra sejt
machdj (the term for "20" meaning "one man dead"] before you
were ra po machdj^ "a man with a completely finished work or1
task". The form machdj did not only convey "dead" but also something "completely finished". That was why Pum had enumerated
all his feasts of exchange.
Maser Na and Chawer flatly refused to enumerate their feasts
in Pum's fashion when later asked about it. Chawer maintained
that one series of popot feasts had been enough to secure a tree;
his second series just showed how big a popot he was. Chawer also
used the terms popot and kusetnd while Pum did not.
Thus: Pum demanded 20 feasts to get a tree at the spirit home,
Chawer regarded 5 as sufficient. Chawer seems a champion of an
ideal different from that of Pum, and Pum's ideal was regarded as
traditional by different informants both in the lacustrine area and
in the northern parts.
9i
ETHNOS
V. POPOT FEASTS AND INITIATION CEREMONIES—
A COMPARISON
I . FUNCTIONS OF THE "pOPOT HOUSES"
While Chawer and Wefo said that their number of "houses" was
four [a complete series), others like Pum Isir and Firoch Pres have
pointed out that at least five "houses" were being built: rufdn,
denoted by Chawer as the fourth and last house, should have
wores as its complement. Words was a term indicating a shelter or
a house built of stakes with the bark removed and common types
were akd, sepidch maku, and sepidch word. The two first types
were also used as houses for a new-born and its mother. As will
be demonstrated later, this seems to fit well with the indicated
function of this house.
If we then assume five different houses in a series instead of four,
and the fifth as a complement to the fourth, how were the first
four related?
The first house of a series was definitely fini mikar, a type of
house for female initiation. Only my own preconceived idea that
such a house should be entirely separated from other houses, and
from males, made me blind to the fact. In retrospect Chawer called
the whole first phase "Fini-mikar-Sachafra" and Pum had used the
term "Sachafra-mikar". The application of a body cord was a feature
of all Mejprat forms of initiation and since po kar an, "body cords"
were given to four girls at Chawer's feast, there seems hardly room
for any doubt. Also the presence of a Fini-mikar house on all the
other feast sites observed in the material points in the same direction.
The following points carry similar indications: The ren feast was
said to be "the same" as the ochdt feast at the beginning of an initiation [p. 104); the small, dancing girls appeared suddenly in the
eastern part of the feast site (p. 25], wearing the blood tattoo of "the
Sun" and the "cooling" patola-patterned cloths; they were led by
some women who had bared their right breast and covered their left
breast (or: who had long, shell-stitched loops hanging down on the
right side of their body, but short loops on the left: see fig. 5) and
who were showing male attributes like old bush knives, and pearlstitched head gear and plumes of birds of paradise and consequently
were posing as bisexual beings as did also mechdr, a leader of initia92
tion. Finally, the four small girls had their fathers and brothers staying in the Sachafra houses. The earlier points may later be compared
to the collected information of initiation (p. 98) and the last point
associates to the function of the other houses treated below.
The second type of house was thus called by Chawer samu
sachafra. The above Pum and Firoch have called it serajn, "guest
house" and it was usually built opposite a house of female initiation
(p. 106). On the Mefchantiam feast site it was built lastly (no. 7]
and housed the "brothers of the wives" who lived inside the Finimikar. Those "wives" were the mothers of the four young girls who
had received their body cords, and the inmates of house no. 7 were
thus MB of the girls and belonged to the fa mapuf group (the girls'
B; M; MB and MBD) that produced the exchange gifts handed over
to the girls' FZ, FZS and F {ra mapuf) At a female initiation the
latter group manufactured the bark cloth and decorations necessary
and supplied the needed amount of taro (p. 104). Since the fathers of
the four girls lived in the Sachafra houses and such houses at the
other feast sites were called serajn, one function of the Sachafra
house is thus to house the people not allowed in the Fini-mikar but
concerned with the goings on there. Another function was connected
with the final disposal of the dead.
The traditional term for the disposal of the skull and bones of
a dead Mejprat was fun. Through it his ghost was regarded as joining
the regional dema. Chawer did not want to use this term but called
it sendch. The name of the house, however, seems only to connote
with the Sawiet phrase uon sachd majs mach "demanding fervently
the descent of a spirit in a stone". By uttering potent spells, it
was explained, a spirit could be made to enter an egg-like stone.
The owner of the stone could then make it appear at will in the
shape of a snake, lizard or centipede, and it would bite or crawl into
the mouth of a stunned or sleeping enemy, who would die some days
afterwards. Such stones, called cha fra mawf in Mejprat, were left in
the Sachafra house by Chawer. They were observed only in the
western part of the Prat area. In all other Mejprat parts the men
known to use this technique to kill somebody, were denoted as ra sd,
they were always considered to be non-Mejprat and were feared
and hated more than anything else. Towards the northern and
eastern fringes of the Mejprat area they were spontaneously men93
ETHNOS
tioned during the tracing of genealogies as outside influences brought
in through some Mejprat woman marrying for instance an Asmawn
man or one from Karon or Sawiet. As an "inverted" counterpart
may be regarded the conception of kapes fane, the soul-devouring
witch, spotted only by the immigrant Sarosa people in the western
Prat area.
Sacha-fra in Mejprat may be understood as derived from sechd,
"completely cold, spirited" or from the above Sawiet word with
similar contents + fra, "stone", and is evidently an adapted Sawiet
idea. The stones were supposedly found under a dead body and containing some of its cha, "cold energy". Their presence may be regarded as a protective measure against an overdose of "hot energy"
employed in the female initiation and figuring in the term for the
body cord given to them: po kar an, "thing attaching hot energy".
In the traditional form of initiation, a male house of initiation was
erected soon after the establishment of the female house, and may
have served also a similar "cooling" purpose. The Sachafra houses
were however partly functioning as "guest-houses" and partly as
living quarters for people waiting for death dues that would enable
them to terminate certain funeral ceremonies, designed also to stop
their own sufferances and diseases. Since Chawer (and other Sarosa
informants], who during my first visit refused to translate the name
of this house, confirmed during my second visit that its name meant
"the same"18 as the Sawiet phrase uon sachd majs mach quoted
above, it seems evident that to a majority of Mejprat people the
term for this house contained a kind of threat associating with
foreign sorcerers. As such the name was unequalled among the
names for other ceremonial houses.
Sepidch, the name of the third type of house may be analysed as
se, "entire, complete" + pidch, "pandanus (palm)". North and east
of the lakes pidch denoted a temporary shelter made of a few light
stakes and thatched with pandanus leaves. The Sepiach was indeed
more "complete", as it had also walls.
In Mefchatiam a myth was told19 about the introduction of the
Sepiach house. The impression was conveyed that a regional tunnel
18
Po sejt was rendered by Chawer as "sama-sama" in Malay, connoting
identity as well as only essential similarity.
18
See Appendix p. 167. A short summary was printed in Elmberg 1955, p.
82-83.
94
termed wor was to be entered through its lower cave (rajn) and
left through its higher cave {ju), and that the stay in the Sepiach
ground-house was in a way likened to a stay inside this tunnel,
possibly near the abode of the regional dema.
The exit through the high and "hot" Fu cave seems paralleled by
the rush up the Sachafra hill where the Fini-mikar stood ("too hot")
and where skulls were brought for a funeral usually called fun,
containing the morpheme fu.
The long shape of the Sepiach house, the stress on having a fire
on the ground and sleeping on the ground—in contradistinction to
the conditions of the high pile-houses—and people being covered
by a raincape when going out, are also indications to that effect.
Further, the central post of Koch-wood (also a name for the subterranean world], being prepared by a woman belonging to ra major,
"the original owners of the ground", seems to indicate the important
position of the Sepiach. Finally, the references to hens and eggs as
well as the additional name of sif—term for a) the subterranean
nest and mound of the bush hen, b) a mythical ceremonial house,
where dancing animals were transformed to the first human beings
by the bush hen—associate directly to the important role attributed
by the Mejprat to the Megapodius bird.
This bird was an important female form of the regional dema said
to send up a wild pig as her "messenger" to punish those who did
not keep the watum rules. From the second Sepiach house a pig was
brought, slaughtered and cut up and its head was put at the central
Koch-post of the first, and it associated to a) the above mentioned
bi-polar relations, b) mythical statements about trees growing out
of pig's heads and feeding new pigs with the fruit produced. The
burning of the pig's bones are paralleled by the same treatment
of the bones of an opossum in a myth of the Sacharim people, by
which the animal was considered to be re-born in the subterranean
world.
The "regional tunnel" was in the Mefchatiam area supposed to
connect all the cave, water, tree and stone "spirit homes" of tidro,
"a home-region". This term for a "region"20 occurred in the name
for a wall in the Sepiach (page 45). Since the number of 16 main
20
More material about this "region" will be presented in a publication shortly
forthcoming.
95
ETHNOS
guests occurred in two Sepiach and the heaps of taro outside one of
the houses was also 16, while 8 main sub-groups of a home region
were each divided in two moieties and the number of strands contained in all body cords was 2 inner and 8 outer strings, the number
16 seems to represent an aspect of the Mejprat socio-cultural totality.
Also in other respects the Sepiach represented a totality, combining
features of subterranean dema abode and dema polarity (bush hen—•
pig; transvestites, thus bi-sexual beings, leading the guests on; p. 49,
55/ 63) with the presence of the social bi-polar concepts of bridegivers and bride-takers. A total representation was also achieved by
the circling dances ending in one densely packed group of all people
before they entered Sepiach houses (p. 42, 55, 63).
Finally there seems to exist some points of similarity with the
Samu-chaj house. Chawer and Pocherit often talked of the Sepiach
as sepiach chaj; explaining that only the Koma-koma, Sarosa and
Kami people were allowed to build it. Therefore the two women at
Kawian were said to have made "everything wrong" and theirs were
no proper Sepiach houses. However, those houses were pointed out
by the occupants as Samu chaj, where string games and transvestite
pranks21 were played while waiting for the bodies of some dead
people to decompose. It seems possible that the Kawian houses were
acculturated forms of the wall-less, oblong shelters (properly termed
pidch), as they might be said to be se- ("complete", thus also "completely closed") -pidch. The point is that Chawer perceived them as
sepiach chaj, albeit built by the wrong people.
Though neither the string games, male neophytes or transvestite
pranks of the Samu-chaj were observed in Sepiach, there were a
number of play elements. The young girls were told to compete in
mapek, carrying the greatest number of children piggy back. Young
boys were exhorted to play asxa, trying with a spear to hit a ring of
coiled lianas, rolling down a slope. Some sort of formal plays were
thus taking place at the direction of the ceremonial leaders. In Fuar,
outside the Sepiach, girls and boys were even made to start a game
of football with the inflated bladder of the ceremonially killed pig,
and croton and dracaena branches were their goal posts. In both
Samu-chaj and Sepiach elements of play and competition were pres21
Galis (p. 16] mentions that already v. d. Hoeven CI9493 observed this
transvestite character of the performances.
96
ent, as well as expressions of totality. Such expressions in the Samuchaj were the transvestite acts, male and female sexual symbols
used in string games and put up at the main post as well as the
presence of male and female neophytes, singing sexual songs and
inciting "the hot energy" in one another while waiting for the body
of a dead person to decompose—in a word: the presence of life and
death. Both houses seem to express the Mejprat cultural and social
totality in different ways.
The fourth house, samu rufdn was reportedly a pile house built
on a tree stump. Its name—rarely mentioned—may be understood
as indicating certain results attributed to the "bride-givers' [ja]
totem animal (7w)". The house was mentioned as a house of male
initiation where taro halves were fed to young boys, whose scrotch
cloth and bags were destroyed and to whom new items were
given. There the dema Tuo-m'fat of the Pres people and In of
the Sarosa watched over the young people, the region and its
swiddens. Since tu-o m'fat means "the venerable Mistress who opens
(the ground]" and is a term for the regional dema producing souls
and animals and in is the "messenger"-wind being her male complement also connected with death, it seems certain that Samu-rufan
was a place for ceremonial ideath and re-birth; especially as a bridegiver unit called fa mapuj usually managed the initiation of a boy
(p. 113). Chawer and other ceremonial leaders may well have wished
this house to escape the notice of government servants and mission
people as the reported early efforts to stop initiation included the
burning of houses and the confiscation of cloth.
The words may have been a Kra house "for a new-born", a field
house or both as some informants have stressed "at least (paling
kurang) five houses". In the last case Samu rufan and Kra were
probably directly connected with the initiation, and the field
house (s) served as samu fenjd fajn, guest house (s), a common
arrangement on sites of male initiation (p. 112, 118).
In short, a functional analysis shows the series of popot feasts as
a cyclic process: from the high, "hot" pile house of female initiation
and houses connected with Fu (the female, "hot" cave), a descent
followed to the "subterranean" Sepiach ground house, from where the
participants returned tearing down the earlier built pile houses and
moved up to a new hill. There followed the Rufan-Wores phase in
97
ETHNOS
which elements of death and (re-)birth seemed to confirm its character of male initiation.
This will be made clearer by a} a survey of the ceremonials
expressly stated to be connected with different forms of initiation,
amd b] a comparison between their functions and those of the popot
feasts.
2. TYPES OF MEJPRAT INITIATION
The main features of the Mejprat initiation seem rather clearly
discernible when the information received in 1957 is added to what
was already known.22 Pum Isir as ra potekif, "softening-medicine
man" and Chasurut Chowaj as fenjd mapi, "experienced woman",
or fenjd mafif, "woman of preparations", described what was regarded as the traditional forms of initiation, while Pocherit Sarosa as
ra pam, an "axe-man" related the main points of the initiation of the
Uon. The term "secret society" has been rather loosely used about
the groups of Mejprat people practising Toch-mi and Uon initiation.
True, the contents of some ceremonies were secret to non-members,
but to a certain extent non-members are also indicated as participating in the feast. The information about women being forbidden to
see or to know anything of the male initiation often goes down well
with Europeans but is contradicted by actual descriptions and observations of the ceremonies. The dichotomy sacred [man]-profane
[woman]aa seems irrelevant to the Mejprat while the complementary
opposition of "hot" and "cold" seems of fundamental importance.
The traditional form of initiation applied to both boys and girls.
The misconception that not all boys were initiated24 was created,
it seems, through the early contact of European agents with people
22
Elmberg 1955 p. 43, 67. Massink (1955] does not seem to realize the degree
of adjustment to European ideals that the account by his informant on Samu
Uon is showing, but comments on its "puritanism".
E3
The oppositions spiritual—worldly (Galis p. 50), as well as the "dualistic"
concepts (idem p. 42] sacred—profane, is presented by Galis (p. 45, 50}.
The correlation sacred man—profane woman seems to follow from the table
of tentative classifications (idem p. 55] where concepts like man, dark, death
are opposed to woman, light, life and from the factual arrangement describing
how the noises from the house of Uon initiation (associating with death elements, blackened initiates and men] are intended to scare the women (idem
p. 50), classified as "outsiders" (p. 49], seemingly not even possessing a form of
initiation.
s
* Galis, p. 48.
98
practising the Toch-mi and Uon initiation; which agents were living
in the very western and southern parts, through which access was
later gained to the central lake area. A number of the early lacustrine informants were reportedly of the Sarosa people. Strongly
influenced by Sawiet ideas and ceremonies they were in 1957 still
using the phrase nek uon, "to give 'uon'" signifying "to give initia99
ETHNOS
tion" and were calling the appurtenant house samu uon, "the 'uon'~
house" and associated it with the Sawiet bol kauon [bol — "house",
kauon — ?).
However, the traditional Mejprat house of male initiation had the
name of charit, and n'per dxarit sefd signified in the lake area "to
introduce somebody in the house of initiation". The administration
as well as the mission kept on watching and checking the use of
"Uon houses". The eager denials in many parts that such houses did
not exist there, were evidently understood to signify the complete
lack of any male form. When at last I found the Mejprat term nauon being used for "to demand passionately" as well as "to use
potent spells", the phrase "to give 'uon'" seemed to cover the
activities reported also from the Charit-houses f" instruction in love
charms, flute playing [to attract sexual partners], and the manipulation of spells and medicines to facilitate the exchange of cloth—
thus converging on love life and marriage activities. There even
existed a certain connexion between female and male houses of
initiation, as will be demonstrated.
In the lake area the house of initiation for girls was called fini
mikdr (or nukir) samu, rendered as "house of Hot Conjoiner that
makes attaching". The expression seems to allude to the ceremonial
application of the body cord termed po kdr (or po kar an) "tiling
attaching (or: thing attaching the fertile heat]", whereby the initiate
was probably given the power of kdr or kit, "attaching the passion of
a man'?' North and west of the lakes the girls' house of initiation
was called fini mikdr or akd ru dch, "shelter of the frog-animal (or:
?bird]". To the east fini mikdr was observed together with samu
fenjd meroch, "house of secluded women". West of the lakes also
the Uon people had introduced it as nehri meriet, Sw, and the leaders were reportedly Mejprat women.
In all reported cases of female initiation a "male house" (of
initiation] was also erected in the neighbourhood. Charit was the
common term for it, to which was sometimes added mlo, "very high"
(fig. 18], sefd, "all hot, dangerous" or ru puoch, "of the Hidden
2r
'
a
Elmberg, 1955, p. 68.
* Compare the Indonesian "tunank", "to attach", tunang-an, "fiancee"
with Mejprat kar, "attaching", fenjd kar, "finacee". Ara mekdr po m'paw, "stakes
making attached the dangerous medicines" were tied together in a circle round
a feast site or a KrS-house, to arrest evil influences.
IOO
IOI
ETHNOS
One's animal [or bird)"; the last expression referring to the totem
animal closely connected with the regional dema. In the north, an
alternative term was amach ord "swidden house" and in the east sur
wonaw, translated as "pole (house] of the under-world".
Houses of female initiation were always reported to be fourcornered and perfectly "closed", while the men's houses were said
to consist of a four-cornered floor with a roof and "open walls".
The three houses for female initiation observed by me were all barkwalled pile houses of the ordinary type with its floor about one
meter above the ground. However, remnants of alleged female
houses of initiation built on very high poles of some 7-8 meters,
were pointed out to me near Roch-m'pi. This type was reported to
have been common earlier, especially south of the lakes.
The male Charit-houses were always built in a tree, as high up
as possible. In contradistinction to them, the herd or krd house of
the Toch-mi society was built directly on the ground while the
charen masoch"7 house of the Uon society was reportedly built like
a Sachafra pile house with "open walls".
3. FINI-MIKAR, INITIATION OF GIRLS
North of the lakes Mafif was said to have instituted the female
initiation in the capacity of ati, which has been variously rendered
as "king, the most excellent leader" and also "that which is united".
Mafif—the name was translated "she prepares everything"—still was
reported to order the house of initiation to be built and the girls to
be brought in. The spears and knives carried at dances by the unmarried girls of that area were regarded as original gifts from Mafif
to the women creatures of this world (fig. 19).
Of the term for the house, fini was explained by Chawer as an
other name for Tu, the regional dema of creation. The name meant
that the dema was "the hot cause of everything". Since Mafif in the
current tales about Siwa and Mafif was also credited with the
creation of man, and was exhibiting female, dema-like features
(living in the underworld, receiving the dead, cultivating taro], the
27
The incidental form cheldn matoch was erroneously quoted in the 1955
paper, [p. 44].
I02
concepts of fini ( = Tu) and Mafif seem to be converging, especially
as one of the female leaders of initiation was termed fenjd mafif.
Like the dema of the Mejprat myths and tales were achieving
transformations by just blowing on a thing or a being, this and other
leaders of initiation accompanied every act of feeding the initiates,
handling or protecting them by nefi, "blowing" and n'tekif, "uttering
a spell". The spells often contained a name of the dema, which name
was a functional term, thus alluding or associating to a function or
a habitual act of the dema. The specific knowledge of the dema,
of her forms of manifestation, her ways of action and her watum
rules was regarded as the very foundation of this leadership. This
knowledge was probably a secret shared by the leaders inside the
region called tidro. As the term n'kif connotes with both "to haggle"
and "to moderate" and its radical is also the radical of n'te-kif "to
utter a (certain] spell", the tone and attitude of this spell seems to
be more of an "appeal" than that of pofit or fit-6, spells connoting
with fit, "biting, burning, fretting".
The whole process started by planning and planting a swidden
usually near the place of the FZ of the girl to be initiated. Close
to the swidden the Fini Mikar house was erected on a hill just before
the time when the taro could be harvested. Some new taro was exchanged for fish, after a fire had been burning on the central fire103
ETHNOS
place for some time and leaving a thick enough deposit of ashes.
The following phases may be observed in the subsequent run of
events:
a] Ochdt (also wochd-at) called a "hearth feast", was announced
four days in advance, by fenjd mechdr, a woman well versed in
matters of the spirit world, and fenjd mapi (or mafif] who had led
the swidden work generally.
Fenjd mechdr should have her left breast "small" and her right
breast "big", which was reportedly achieved through offering only
her right breast to her children (fig. 20}. Certainly the mission nurse
at the Ajamaru hospital had noted some mothers who refused to
feed their infants with both breasts in order to avoid getting "too hot".
It seemed that three categories of women were actually concerned
with the initiation: the initiates proper (often young girls of 7 or 8
years], a number of nubile, unmarried girls (already initiated anid
classified as "siblings" of the initiates) and a few married women
(the FZ of the initiates and the two leaders]. They all carried out
the work on the swidden occasionally helped by the mothers of the
initiates. Brothers of the initiates as well as their mothers, MB and
MBW were expected to appear as guests at the hearth-feast. FZS
(and occasionally FZH] would try to bring in some eggs and small
game because to celebrate this feast was termed semdm soch mam
ochdt, "to eat the hearth feast in deiiciously 'live' food". Red fuja
leaves (Coleus) and green pandch, fern branches, had earlier been
placed under the stones of the fire basket to attract as many guests
as possible. The food was distributed through the door and eaten
outside when first po worar, "small gifts", had been handed over by
the guests in exchange. These gifts were again distributed among
those men and women who had helped in making the swidden and
the house. In the western lake area such a feast was called ren or
senechdt when held by a popot or an immigrant from the Sawiet
area.
On this occasion any bride-giver who might like to attract a
favourable attention would give some cloth as po fejdk, a lot in
the marriage exchange, to the bride-taker's party. This would spur
the hosts to promise another feast in, say, ten days time, to show
that they were good providers and that they had good friends and
helpers. This would attract more people, stimulate the dealings in
104
JOHN-ERIK ELMBERG; THE POPOT FEAST CYCLE
cloth and bride-takers would discharge the subsequent dues of
sipdch. This feast would simply be called on, "exchange" or neku
poku, "to augment the increase", the common terms for a feast. The
hosts would try to make as many such feasts as the supply of taro,
fish and game allowed, if possible three or four.
b) The interior arrangements of the house were started immediately afterwards. In each corner a square space was closed off
by two screens made by majn, "fern tree (branches)" or remo leaves.
Each little hut thus created was called po km or akd remo, the very
105
LTHNOS
terms also used about the house for a new-born child. Necklaces,
bark cloth and huge pandanus capes (to be slept in] for the initiates
were accumulated in the house and ra po-tekif, "a man knowing
spells", was sent for. Together with the Mechar-woman he pronounced spells over the things to be used by the initiates. Those
things were put in four heaps each lying on a pandanus cape. Dema
names were used like N'sirimpa (denoting "the one source of the
moieties") and Chapoaka ("the re-birth shelter of the ghosts") to
protect the leaders and the initiates, and to keep disease away,
c) A few shelters or houses called serdjn had been erected near
106
the house of initiation. Friends and families of the initiates stayed
there for longer or shorter periods. The FZS of the initiates were
supposed to be on hand there each day to carry the special taro to
the initiates and the shelters or houses were also referred to as "the
houses where the men stay". The initiates lived there until the day
after the necklaces and the other objects were be-spelled.
In the evening they were admonished by their parents of the
proper behaviour during initiation. Sitting astride the shoulders of
their FZ they were carried like small children into the house of
initiation. Their old body cords, armlets and prat, fletched body
bands, were taken off and burnt and the Mechar-leader started
massaging their bodies, reciting spells and invocations to make the
initiates grow up and become productive. Some sort of penetration
or defloration was effected, for which, later, an amount of cloth was
due, called "the blood rain", to the MB. The initiates were lying
naked in their small huts beside a fire, mainly kept going with po
chi, damar resin.
d) Before sunrise, at the cry of the Charok bird, the initiates were
led away to a cave termed Fu, supported by FZ and the aforementioned "older siblings". The medicine man was accompanying
them and at the cave he took part in dressing them with the necklaces he had earlier treated. The female leaders applied sum, a body
cord made by FZ and consisting of two gnemon bast strings [/on]
wound rotlnd by 8 twined strings of grass [uto]. This cord, also
called po kdr, "a thing attaching" held the red bark cloth in place,
that was now applied to cover the genitals of the initiates. Their
bodies were daubed with red paint, and they were alluded to as ku
mes-m.es, "the red-red children", a term employed for unborn
children.
e] Brought back to the house of initiation—the last part of the
way they were carried by FZ-—-they were put to sleep in the rain
capes inside their respective huts. For a certain time they were given
red-coloured taro brought by the r?ZS. The Mapi leader, reciting
charms, cut each taro in four pieces and fed each initiate half of it
in the morning and half of it in the evening. During this time they
were told about Fini, that was the underworld dema, being the
origin of the unborn children and dwelling in the "hot Seku cave".
This period ended with the initates being paraded outside the house,
107
ETHNOS
wearing the necklaces and the red bark cloth and being helped
( = supported?) by the FZ and the unmarried girls. Cloth coming
from the father, FZ and FZS of the initiates was given as mes om,
"(for] the blood rain", to her MB, MF and MBD, to prevent her
from falling ill and dying. One special piece of cloth was put aside,
for each initiate to be offered to the regional idema. They were,
together with some minor pieces added later, collected by the three
leaders.
Finally the initiates were brought inside the house again. For each
child four pieces of cloth were torn (or: one piece was torn in four
parts?) which was called mechdch po and known to be a part of the
death ritual.
f) The initiates were put into their separate huts and sitting with
their legs doubled up in front of them and each with her chin resting
on her knees, they were completely covered by three sheets of bark
cloth: one around the head, another covering her necklaces and
breasts and a third her legs and genitals. From her forehead a bag
was suspended on her back containing am merits, the four torn
pieces of cloth put inside small pandanus bags; further fire tongs,
a peeling knife for taro, some empty bamboo containers (for
water) and one containing plants regarded as medicines. North of
the lakes she was reported to wear her hair in small tresses and
wetaw, "the round cap", on top of it. For four days she was still fed
the same amount of taro, but it was no longer coloured, and she
received no water. Instead big pieces of ginger was given to be
chewed with the taro. Gardening spells and advice called sus were
expected to be given during this time by Tu-awiak, "the Mistress
of Taro" (another name for the regional dema) and the Serajn
houses were abandoned for four days. The two female leaders were
reciting spells and blowing on the bodies of the initiates to make
them mesa, "opened".
g) On the fifth day water was fetched in small bamboo containers, the people returned to the Serajn houses and the medicine
man went into the house of initiation to take part in the be-spelling
of the water. Each closed bamboo tube was then turned upside down
four times above the head of each initiate, then broken to let the
water flow down along some cha fetdch leaves to the mouth of each
girl, that was now allowed to (drink. About one month had elapsed
108
since she first was introduced in the house. All her armlets, barkcloth and body bands were burnt and she was given new items that
were all black. Charcoal and soot were used to blacken her face and
body. She kept up the diet of white taro and ginger as before, with
water added. The taro was mostly half raw being roasted on a fire
in a parcel made of its own leaves. The girls had to eat it silently
and alone in their huts and having finished they rapped on their raincapes to allow the older girls and the leader to return.
h) Another month went by spent in learning more about spells
and techniques for taro cultivation, love affairs and the manufacture
of bark cloth, string-bags and other useful things. The older girls
composed songs and the two leaders expounded watum, the traditional rules and especially the myths and spells pertaining to social
interactions and the handling of cloth. Then it was time to introduce
atd, "the cray-fish". The medicine man put cray-fish wrapped in
the usual chafetdch leaves, on the fire and after careful incantations
pressed a cooked animal against the forehead of the initiate, then
against her mat nvxto, i. e. the space below the sternum, against her
shoulderjoints and her knees, whereupon she was fed it. She was
not to see or meet men until all foods had been introduced to her,
but she was allowed out under careful supervision after sunset. She
was also allowed to eat a little fish.
i) After another month certain vegetables called po pat were
introduced • to her: gnemon leaves, certain hibiscus leaves and a
bamboo species called repun. Some steamed leaves (wrapped in the
cha fetdch leaves) were held to the same parts of her body as the
cray-fish. A few kinds of such vegetables—not containing any red
colour—were given during the following month.
j) Finally the ordinary kind of taro (a non-white kind), was introduced in the same way after yet another month. The initiates
were now called fenjd m'paw, "dangerously charged women", and
were only allowed into their own swidden near the house of initiation,
which swidden they extended if possible or otherwise a new one
was made nearby. Slowly during four more months they were expected to return to a normal diet, though "fat" foods like sheat-fish,
pork or meat from the big kangaroo or opossum were not regarded
safe until they were married and had a child. The "fat" food would
make them "too hot" and eventually kill them, it was believed.
109
ETHNOS
Sugar cane and honey, were, however, considered to be safe to
be used in restoring them after the meager diet of the first four
months.
k] When all together twice the time had elapsed necessary to
make and harvest a taro swidden (each span somewhat optimistically
reckoned by the Mejprat as four months) the girls were regarded as
fenjd mikdr. After a final visit to the Fu cave they returned to the
site of initiation to make a last gift of cloth and food to FZ and FZS.
This feast was called n'take kit, "to compensate for the bark cloth".
It was said that the women from the former Serajn houses returned
together with the neophytes from, the sacred Fu cave and a well
where they had been washing themselves and donning new, white
bark cloth, and red, yellow and black armlets, while the men were
tearing up the delapidated Serajn houses to cool their anger over
the "disappearance" of the initiates. The initiated girls, their faces
decorated with patterns drawn in blood and called kor aji'i, "the
pattern of the sun", compensated their leaders and helpers with
cloth and food collected by their mothers and brothers. The neophytes and "elder siblings" were expected to be fair of complexion,
healthy and sexually very attractive, which seems thus to be important results of the initiation [fig. 20).
1] From the house of initiation the neophytes and "elder siblings"
moved to a samu chaj, "death-house", erected on the death of a
married man or woman, or to the dance house called taro [fig. 22].
In both houses they would meet the corresponding male neophytes,
"elder siblings" of both groups would play string games and sing songs
with a disguised sexual content. The courting and the other activities
enjoyed there were termed kan anja, "to fire one another", andtransvestite pranks and dances were executed, allegedly to show the sexual
knowledge acquired by the neophytes. The name of the dance house
may be analysed as tar-o, "great erection". It was expected that
sexual relationships there formed, would eventually lead to marriages
and thus to an intensive employment of the relations, strengthened
through the initiation, between the girl and the group of people that
was also going to act as bride-givers to her future husband. If such a
love affair miscarried, the girl seemed to demonstrate a strong feeling
for revenge, demanding plenty of cloth as po nisoch, "cloth for healing; smart-money". This was perhaps natural as she had probably
110
been banking proudly on the prospect of marriage exchanges, discussing vaguely the possibilities of future loans of cloth to FZ,
making plans with FZS for her swidden work, on which depended
so many other things; i. e. she had begun trying out her social role
as a Mejprat woman. If the man lost interest in her, the role would
not come true, and she was made chara-nefit, "empty of 'cold' and
smarting". Such cases had led to suicide, if the man was unwilling to
pay. Afterwards he was forced to supply the death dues.
4.
CHARIT, INITIATION OF BOYS
All the boys that in 1953 were put into the house charit sefd, built
with its entrance facing west near the Charumoch cave of Mef111
ETHNOS
chatiam, had mothers belonging to the same clans as the fathers of
the girls in the Fini-mikar house earlier "built on the feast site of
Chawer Sarosa:
There were two old male leaders, Sekiach Karet, who acted as
jokwen or ra potekif and N'tajes Pres, who was called ra pofit.
Sekiach—still a bachelor— occupied himself more with plants and
medicines connected with love charms, while N'tajes was often said
to be away on some secret errands to the Fu cave. Sapur's MM,
called Tafon, visited the Charit during certain periods and was stated
to be a fenjdrn.ech.ar.As N'tajes, who was not conducting any cloth
business with Chawer, was present also on Chawer's feast site and
stayed for certain periods in the house next to the female house of
initiation, and was dressed up for ceremonial purposes when the
other men were not, it seems probable that the two houses of initiation were indeed connected through this leader. The relations between
the persons mentioned in each horisontal line of the above table
constitute a group structure similar to that of mapuf, "the consanguinal family" consisting of female ego, F, FZ, FZS. The classificatory character of the F—FZ relation in the table is the only
difference.
Three categories of male persons were connected with the construction of the Charit, the preparation of an adjacent swidden and
with the initiation: young boys about 7 years, to be initiated; young
unmarried men called mera, already initiated and classified as
"siblings" of the initiates; married men: MB of the initiates, and two
leaders. These men helped building the house as high as possible for
"protection by the sun" against sorcery. They also assisted in the
erection of fenjd fejn samu, houses built near the Charit for "the
mothers and MBD" of the initiates, and of course for his sisters
and other relatives as well.
The initiates referred to the period of initiation as te&om temd-na,
112
JOHN-ERIK ELMBERGI THE POPOT FEAST CYCLE
"I enter the forest of my mother-people". The swidden was first
laid out by the mother, sister and MBD, and the initiates took
part in the making of fences and the clearing of the place. When
the harvest time was near, the construction of the house of initiation
was speeded up: the old men were splitting up rattan vines to be
used as strings, the MB cut stakes to be used and finally the kain,
pandanus thatch, was applied. Ceremonially the thatch was referred
to as wa~chum, "what comes from the ground owners". What
followed afterwards may conveniently be (divided in paragraphs
similar to those of the female initiation. Acts and ceremonies common to both initiations were described similarly, but spells and
medicines were said to differ.
a) Notice was given 5 days in advance of ochdt, "the hearth feast".
MB and the unmarried young men brought in mam, "live food" such
as lizards, birds and small oppossums and, if possible, some palm-wine.
The food was distributed below the Charit. Father, sister, FZ and
FZS were expected as serim, "guests", and wordr, their "gifts" to
mother, the "elder siblings", MB and MBD were considered as naren,
"to remunerate" them for their efforts to make the swidden and
build the Charit. The "guests" as well as the mother and MBD
stayed for some time in the nearby houses and a number of on, exchanges, were arranged for people to exchange their dues contained
in marriage.
b) For each initiate a complete set of armlets, neck pendants or
necklaces (animal teeth], red cloth, huge pandanus capes termed
ampetdr and sum, "a body cord", was brought together by the
"mother people". The two leaders uttered spells for some time over
the objects, arranged in four heaps on four capes. Finally main,
"fern tree branches" were brought in for the initiates to sleep on
and possibly to close the open sides of the house occasionally. Sometimes such temporary walls were also said to be made from gnemon
bark.
c) One evening the initiates-to-be were assembled in the fenjd
fejn houses, where "the women stayed". The mother of each initiate
gave watum instructions for his behaviour during the time ahead.
She hugged him, cried and said good bye. Carried up the ladder on
the shoulders of MB, he entered the Charit house of initiation. Anything he was wearing was taken away and burnt. He remained
113
ETHNOS
immobile in the dark, being fed, massaged, blown on and bespelled
by the MB and the leaders.
d) Early one morning some time later—some say one day, others
five days—the initiates were led away to cho-tum, a cave, the name
of which indicates "a cave coming from Tu", the dema of the region.
They were dressed by the leaders in the newly prepared red cloth,
armlets and so on, and sheltered in the big pandanus capes, they
were ushered back to the Charit. They were decorated with red
dracaena leaves and painted with a red ochre called koch.
e) Below the house, MB arid other "mother-people" received po
ritos, "cloth for fattening food", which cloth was supplied by the
father, sister and FZ and FZS. The "mother-people" arranged the
food offered to the guests and now received presents in return. After
the food was consumed, a serdr dance was started during which
ambiguous songs were sung similar to the songs heard in samu chaj,
"the death house". Mechdch po, "the tearing of cloth" was effected,
somehow connected with the dance, and according to one informant,
the mother of the initiate tore one cloth of the po ritos lot to be used
as a cover for him.
f) The initiates having returned to the Charit house, were placed
on the fern tree branches where they had to remain for four or five
days. Some say they were sitting with their legs drawn up in front
of them, others that they were lying down on their backs with raised
knees and covered by the torn cloth—both positions occur as death
postures, the former regarded as the original Mejprat form especially
connected with the mummification of the body above a fire practised by the Pres and other "ground owners".28 The initiates were
covered by am petdr, big pandanus capes, and told to remain motionless. The white taro that since the beginning of the initiation had
been carried to the Charit by the MBD of each initiate, was still
fed to him by the his MB after being cooked in its own cha jetach,
"leaves", by the two leaders. During the present period no water
but plenty of ginger was given together with the usual morning and
evening meals, each consisting of two quarters of a taro. Mother and
sister also desisted from using water during these days. The initiates
were finally expected to see Suse-chor and Suse-mur and to hear
28
114
Elmberg 1955 p. 80.
strange sounds, while the house was shaking and swaying from the
jumps of froglike but hairy and red coloured performers (the
"siblings") smelling strongly of charif, "massoi-bark". The platform
beneath the floor was regarded as a kind of safety net, especially
necessary during this performance if the floor should give in.
Through different spells called mon, sus and fito the initiates received su tend, "a new body" from the red coloured beings. The two
first kinds of spells were observed to be exclusively connected
with Mechar leaders, thus with women, which indicates a female
agent to be present also. The people were removed from the female
houses during this period.
g) On the appointed day, supposedly when the new moon was
appearing, water was fetched in small bamboo containers and fed
to the initiates in the same way as was described in the female
initiation. Then the necklaces were removed and the rest of each
boys' attire was burnt while cho mus, "charcoal", was applied to
his body. For another month they were instructed in love charms and
ways to acquire cloth. The white taro called awiak atdr, "taro for
erection" was eaten half raw in the same quantities as before, together with ginger and water. Watum, "traditional rules and myths"
were recited in their proper forms and explained.
At this time a hole was made in the nose septum, an operation
regarded by many as very painful. The initiates were given difficult
tasks to perform or tasks usually performed by girls or women
(weeding, fetching water). Some people told that they had been
beaten and badly treated during this period, which they called po
trifa-fa, especially by their father, then termed jti mof, "empty of
good".
h) After this month atd was introduced and fed to the male
initiates as described for the girls. Towards the evening they were
let out under the supervision of MB to fish, but were supposed
to die if they met a girl or a woman, as they were not yet matdk,
"made hard, strong".
i) Similarly, vegetables were introduced a month later, and vegetables not containing red were included in the diet. In the beginning
these species were only of the wild growing kind, like repim, "bamboo" and edible fern leaves.
j) The final introduction of the ordinary taro occurred when some
"5
ETHNOS
four months had elapsed since the first introduction of the initiates
into the Charit. Like the girls, the boys were also fed additional
sugarcane and honey during some four more months to make them
"strong". MB taught them to hunt and fish during this time, the elder
siblings helped them to make and play peref, pairs of "Jew's harps",
koro-ni'pi, "bamboo zither" or or, "a nose flute", to attract the attention of the opposite sex. The two leaders showed them plants
posessing cha, "the cold energy" of strong smells that travelled like
the winjd and made a woman into a willing sexual partner. Chat,
"tattoo" or chapiis, "scarification (through burning damar resin]"
were also applied by elder siblings or MB.
k) The last ceremony began when a second swidden that had
been prepared after the introduction of the ordinary taro, was
yielding a full harvest. The neophytes were now called sana or tend,
"the new ones", and the leaders had also found a new name for
them. After being taken to the Fu cave they washed themselves at
a water spirit home and were given new bark cloth or white cloth,
necklaces and armlets. The people formerly staying in the Fejn
houses had returned when the neophytes natir tof, "ceremonially
dressed" re-entered the Charit site, feigning not to recognise their
mothers and sisters. Father, FZ and their people had collected the
cloth necessary for the compensation of those that had assisted
during the initiation, and this lot was called po atdr, "cloth for the
erection". The neophytes and elder siblings were said to be highly
attractive to girls, when they appeared at the site of the Charit. In
the western part of the Prat area (the villages of Wehali, Sauf and
Koma-koma) the dance performed afterwards was called taro, while
the site itself was referred to as the norok place. This dance consisted
in a continuous jumping and the name of it seems transferred to the
(allegedly) introduced house with a rattan floor, where the same
type of dancing was practised. The name of the house was understood as tar-o, "great erection" and the swinging pole attached under
the rattan floor and jutting out several meters at one end of the
house was called ka-tar, "the tree of erection". In the eastern and
northern parts this type of house was built much larger29 and was
called Mos, which was also the name of the male water dema.
29
116
Elmberg 1955, p. 117, fig. 5.
1] The neophytes and older siblings settled in the "death house" or
a Taro dance house where they played string games or danced and
took part in the transvestite pranks and the singing of songs with a
disguised sexual contents.30 However, the formal standards for a girl
partner in these games did not mention the erotic elements. She
should be m'samuoch, "diligent", planting taro, roasting it and offering it, she should draw water and fetch firewood to her house—pir
mechuw ro fenjd n'samuoch, nechaj sera, rnawe poch sej, "men like
to stay with a diligent woman, one dies of hunger (if) she is inactive".
5 . UON, A SAWIET TYPE FOR BOYS
Since information on this initiation is already published31 its main
points will be shortly summarized together with some later, additional explanations. There were probably many forms for the Uon
initiation. In the form known at Mefchatiam, a number of Sawiet
terms were employed e. g. for the two leaders: natemdk, "axe-man",
and nasebe "sorcerer", called in Mejprat ra pam and ra sd respectively. Of the two, the axe-man figured in several Mejprat myths
and the supposed founder of Uon and bringer of its secrets was
termed natemdk even when Mejprat informants retold the myth.22
Such axe-men were supposed to have traded steel-axes to the inlanders and were held somewhat in awe, as they retained a certain
domination over their customers, demanding their fees once a year
as long as the axe lasted. If the client failed his obligations, the axeman was supposed to make the axe cut its present owner. The
Mejprat jarok, pouring vessel for palm wine, was called the Sawiet
qomd, denoting "canoe" and one of the important secrets known by
the Uon members was referred to as the Sawiet uon sachd majs
machf "fervently asking a spirit to descend in a stone". The leaders
and older initiated men were also called simply (w)ofle', Sw, "big
ones".
The swiddens and the house of initiation were prepared by the
sister, mother, MB and MBD, aided by the father of the initiate.
30
31
32
A pair of such verses are quoted in Elmberg 1955 p. 70-71.
Se Appendix p. 167.
"7
BTHNOS
The pile-house, satnu uon, had only a square floor and a roof but
no walls. In the middle was a post, arnu of a wood variously called
Koch, Farir, and Kofa. The three categories of male occupants were
also present here: the initiates (called sand), initiated unmarried
men ("elder siblings of the initiates"] and MB.
a] After a ren feast—corresponding to ochdt—when the MB and
mother as well as other helpers were remunerated for house building
and swidden work, cloth was borrowed from the "owner of the
ground" to remain in the house for four days. Afterwards it was
returned together with some taro. On, "exchanges" were promised
and given like on all other feasts. During this time at the very latest,
the houses called peroch ati were build to shelter the women and
non-initiated men.
b] The ceremonial outfits of necklaces, armlets, body cord, cloth
etc. were collected for every initiate and placed on rain capes called
am atdr. They were be-spelled and fern tree branches were brought
in and placed in four heaps round the center post, to serve as beds.
The entrance of the house was towards the west.
c] At some distance, peroch ati, "the houses of the women", were
erected to shelter not only the women but the non-initiated males
as well. Those houses were included in the feast site proper, referred
to as (j)ase', denoting "wholeness, totality" and depicted as wor
m'paw, "tunnel dangerously charged" by some informants (fig. 23].
One evening, the four initiates were carried into the Uon house by
their MB, their mothers cried and bade them farewell after having
given them watum, rules of behaviour. Naked on their fern beds,
they were told to be perfectly still and quiet. The leaders recited
spells, massaged them and blew on their bodies. The MB fed to the
initiate the bespelled white taro brought by his daughter. A Sawiet
term was sometimes used for this feeding: ware metak, translated
as "feeding the dog" and the initiates were then referred to as n/fl
metdk, "small dogs". The taro was divided in four parts and two
parts were feid in the morning and two in the evening, like in all
other forms of initiation. They were told that the secret name of
the house was charen masoch, "vaginal orifice". The initiates were
not allowed to sleep during the first night.
d] The following morning they were dressed in new things by
the cho turn cave, also designed asrn.as.uf,"the middle".
118
e) They returned dressed in their big rain capes, wearing the bodycord, and being decorated with cassowary plumes inside their armlets, with red ochre and different red leaves. They distributed gifts
to their mother, MB and MBD in exchange for the body-cord and
other articles they were now wearing. They were helped, carried
and supported during this phase and supposed to be po mes-mes,
"blood clots" but also called sawar, denoting "cassowaries' chicken".
Trembling and staggering about, they m'ririn, "danced as new hatched
chickens", and spat out blood from a cut in the tongue, and were
finally carried indoors while their mothers cried and lamented and
tore up some cloth.
f] The initiates were told that they were now inside charen
masochj "the vaginal orifice" of Komean (or Akomean). Silent and
motionless they were fed ginger and taro for four days in the dark,
but no water. Simultaneously their mother and sister abstained
from the use of water. The initiates were told of Baw(q] or SefaM'paw(q) who had arrived long ago through the air in a canoe of
stone and taught the Sawiet people to travel to ku-anf the place of
the female morning star, Komean. Oron was m'komot "her guardian"
soon to appear and Paw had taught the "axe-men" these true names
[implying affinities with the dema Suse-chor and Suse-murJ. The
voices of Komean and Oron were produced on Triton shells and
119
ETHNOS
with a bull roarer, and one of the "elder siblings" danced, dressed
in cassowary plumes and po ni, a masque, tied to his face. The
effect was one of gruesomeness.
g) Water was fetched and introduced to the initiates as in the
other forms of initiation. It was celebrated with some special food
for the initiators and made an occasion for exchange of cloth pertaining to the marriage |dues, as were also the conclusion of the
following phases, spaced about one month apart. The initiates were
blackened with charcoal, instructed in hunting, gardening and the
management of cloth. They were taught the use of numerous medicines and spells for achieving success in love, warfare and fishing.
h) After the time of about another month, cray-fish was introduced and then i) vegetables and j) ordinary taro.
During this time they met with a number of difficult or terrifying
experiences among which were mentioned one or more rides (blind
folded] in the spirit canoe, hoisted in the top of a tree, the application of tattoos and scarifications as well as more encounters with the
masked performer to the din of triton shells and bull roares. The
initiates were also made to run home through the bush if on the
point of meeting with a woman; they were deliberately urged on
by the leaders through thorny thickets, deep marshes or up steep
hills to escape a rain shower, that would stop them from growing up
if they were wet by it, or so they were told. Po jeni, "hot beeswax",
was applied to their hair and they were fed plenty of ginger to make
them "hot" enough to stand the nearness of the chasd, "coastal spirits"
that the leaders called up. After the introduction of the ordinary
taro, a swidden was laid out and a richer diet was set in. Also here
honey and sugar cane were important items.
k) When the time came for harvesting the swidden after some
four months, a new house was built called krd uon or terdch krdA
Krd was the term for the leaf-walled house or shelter where a mother
stayed with her new born baby immediately after birth.33 The second
term denoted such a house having a longitudinal slot along the ridge
of the roof to let out smoke (and "the heat"?). In this house the
initiates were prepared for their final appearance in white bark cloth
made by MB or in white cotton cloth. New names were found for
them by the two leaders withdrawing to ju, "the bag, vagina", an
33
I2O
Elmberg 1955, p. 63 and p. 23 where terdch krd is shown on fig. 9.
alternative designation for the Fu cave, dwelling place of the regional
dema.
Conches were blown and bull-roarers droned the last day and night.
On the appointed day, the noise suddenly stopped and the "women"
stormed into the male part of the initiation grounds. The boys were
horded out simultaneously at the opposite end and circuitously
brought back through the bush into the middle of the site. From the
very beginning of the initiation quickgrowing shrubs and trees had
been planted in front of the houses of initiation. Now they were
supposed to have grown into a real thicket that the "women" (and
men?} were savagely cutting away, looking for the initiates and
tearing down the buildings. Uon tend, "the new Uon-members", thus
appeared behind them and n'td "to the east". They were not to be
touched as they were an wer, "too hot" and their mothers and sisters
had to be pointed out to them as they were entirely "new" and
different to what they had been before. "Komean's picture" was
painted on their chests with white chalk (fig. 24) by the MB, the
leaders and the "siblings" were given pam, to, chajoch, "axe, string
and cooling fruits" for which the neophytes had also to pay some
20 pieces of cloth, mainly brought together by the father and FZ.
The neophytes and the men connected with the initiation were
regarded as sexually highly attractive, though they were "too hot"
to enjoy their advantage during the next four or five days. They now
finished the ceremony dancing a vigorous dance, in which the rest of
the people finally joined. Its name was noroq Sw, or n'sioch Mp.
One leader-informant, however, also summed up the results of
the Uon initiation like this: He learns to kill a pig, to kill a man, to
cohabitate with a second wife, to handle a quarrel or a dispute
(about cloth), and to use the "hot" plant sera to influence people's
bodies. We help him as the husband of a woman; her ears are deaf
and her Oan-cloths remain in her bag, intended for traditional exchanges only. Then he goes away, hides some medicines and gets
(what he wanted). If she talks about cloth, he can hear. Komean
and Oron belong to Baw's own secrets. I remember them and become strong. I kill people and the others run away, afraid.
1) In the Mefchatiam area the neophytes and older siblings settled
in a Samu Chaj house or Taro, took part in the games and transvestite pranks like the boys from the Charit house. These elder boys
121
ETHNOS
were expected to marry soon afterwards, and were referred to as
katar or toch-katar. Katar, "the tree of erection", was also the name
of the huge pole attached to the dance floor of the Taro house and
swinging vigorously in front of the house to the rhythm of the
jumping guests; toch denoted "penis".
6. TOCH-MI, INITIATION WITH CIRCUMCISION
The local traditions say that the Toch-mi initiation appeared first
near the village of Sauf among the Fan people, who used to live
there. They were chased away by the Uon adherents among the
Tuwit people and introduced instead the Toch-mi penis operation
south of Chowaj and east of Kampuaja. In these traditions the
Toch-mi society was competing with the Uon people and was regarded as a later form of initiation. This does not seem improbable
"when it is realised that the name toch-mi simply means "long penis"
and that the Tuwit people still state the cause of the eviction to be
122
a certain difficulty to keep Tuwit women at home when the Tochmi people celebrated their feasts. Toch-mi members who now had returned after working on the coast, stated that they felt some affinity
with the moslims there and were also accepted by them being katdn,
"circumcised". They showed pieces of paper where spells were
written beginning: "Bismilhah Nabi Muhamat . . ." with odd words
in (often corrupt] Arabic script" (see fig. 25].
Since a Fan-informant has stated that the jukom medicine men
learned their secrets going down to the coast, that the water ceremonially used during initiation was "salt water", and that the name
of one of the houses [sa m'pejf) meant "a part of the coast"; and
since among non-members there was a rumour that coastal live fish,
Si
"Jimat" is the term on Java for similar amulets according to v. d. Kroef p. 29.
123
ETHNOS
crabs and tree branches were shown to the initiates together with
pictures of sailing crafts, some connection seems possible with the
attempts from the coastal (and moslim) villages Ati-ati and Fatagar
to penetrate into the upper reaches of the Kaibus river. According
to Hille35 such attempts were intensified around 1906 thus some
fifty years ago, which time is corresponding well to the two generations that have elapsed since the expulsion from the Sauf area, as
stated by middle aged informers in 1953-54. To-day some sort of
influence from the coast is supposed by the lacustrine members and
non-members acting as informants. This is in striking contrast to the
Uon traditions declaring that the coast "had no secrets", or "had
lost them to the Uon people of the Sawiet area", and in any case
"had to come up" to the mountain dwellers to be initiated. Sawiet
tales about a certain Wamble stressed the necessity for a coastal
man to become initiated by the Uon people.
The houses errected on the feast site at Fuar and described earlier56
were thus of five kinds: 1) one Fini-mikar pile-house for female
initiation, 2) Serajn pile-houses for its "guests", 3) one Sepiach
ground-house where marriage exchanges had been concluded and
a pig had been slaughtered, 4) one huge, four-cornered ground-house
called is-serd or simply krd, "house of the new-born" where the
male initiates were "circumcised", and 5] one four-cornered groundhouse with the floor slightly raised above the ground, a somewhat
vaulted and extremely high roof and an unusually large fireplace in
the middle. Its name, sa-m'pejf, was translated as "a part of the
coast".
The leaders were of two kinds, jukom who bespelled the food
and se-n'ta-ni, which has been rendered as "exclusive husbands of
the conjoiner" who performed the operation of circumcision. Since
35
Hille 1907 p . 631. Massink says (p. i ] t h a t in 1910 governmental protection
was requested b y and given to t h e people living at t h e m o u t h of t h e M e t a m a n i e
and Kais rivers t h r o u g h t h e mediation of t h e Radja R u m b a t t i .
Probably, these people w e r e his agents, and their complaints about assaults
from t h e inlanders during trading trips to secure t h e valuable birds of paradise
and P a p u a n nutmegs formed a strong incentive for t h e foundation on t h e coast
soon afterwards of t h e first government villages (Jahadian, Mugim, Inanwatan,
K a m p o n g B a r u ] , from w h e r e t h e inland penetration could be continued. Since,
however, Fatagar and R u m b a t t i were situated on t h e same peninsula, t h e i r
actions m a y well have b e e n coordinated from t h e beginning.
36
124
See p. 61 and Elmberg 1955, p. 50.
the regional dema was denoted as "the conjoiner" and her male
"guardian" Suse-mur was indicated to enforce the painful piercing
of the nose sceptum37 among the people initiated in Charit houses,
this term seems indeed of the same challenging and competition
offering category as the name of Toch-mi ("long penis") itself.
Most of the components observed in the previous forms of initiation seem to obtain also in the course of Toch-mi events and ceremonies as will be demonstrated in the following survey:
a) The exchange taking place after the introduction of the guests
on the feast site, was later described as a Ren-feast. This has been
observed as the equivalent of ochat, "the hearth feast".
b) All the preparations for the male initiates—viz. cutting fern
tree branches for their sleeping places, collecting body cords, necklaces and rain-capes—-were already concluded and the appropriate
exchanges were partly included in the Ren exchange.
c) The same evening the five initiates were carried into the Isera
on their MB's backs and covered by the huge rain capes. Before
that, the MB had made a lengthy enumeration of pretended acts
of violence to demonstrate the power delegated to the members of
the Toch-mi society. The mother of the initiate had also given
watum-rules of behaviour,38 and cried loudly when the child departed. The operation of circumcision was carried out immediately
after the children were introduced in the Isera house and am cha
tar, " (woo'd from) tree activating erection" was applied to the bleeding member. Transvestite men ("elder siblings" from Isera) and
women danced during the night, mimicking coitus and surrounded
by a ring of guests, steadily stepping in the Serar rhythm.
d) The pranks and the dancing went on till around five o'clock
in the morning, when the female transvestites and the mothers of
the initiates staged an attempt to storm the Isera house, brandishing
branches with green leaves. They were driven off by male transvestites, swinging torches, but only far enough to let out the initiates,
that, covered by their rain capes, were supported by the father and
MB. A few women were dragged along with gentle compulsion anid
the rest followed willingly enough, when the whole train began to
move towards the Sa-m'pejf house to see the initiates for a last time
37
38
Elmberg 1955 p . 66.
See Appendix p. 158.
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ETHNOS
before they were shut up in this house. According to some informants this was also an occasion for nesom mechoj sej, "to enjoy ignoring the rules", which meant "free sexual intercourse". The women
I saw returning to the feast site after some ten minutes did not
however seem to have taken part in any sexual orgy, looking rather
tear-eyed, bereft and anxious after the meeting with the children.
Young men, two or three together, also went up to what has turned
out to be the Fini-mikar house; simulating a penis with a stick,
a rope or a belt they shouted sexual jokes to the four girls sitting
decorated on the narrow space outside the door-way, saying for
instance: "We want our penises back that we forgot last time;" or:
"your vagina is rotten and full of fish hooks."
e} The following day FZ and FZS of the initiates gave some cloth
to the mother, MBW and MBD for the red-coloured taro that the
latter from now on was going to carry to the precincts of the Sam'pejf house. The taro was cut in four pieces and given at morning
and night. After the cloth was handed over, the mother tore up
a cloth and cried.
f] The site was then abandoned by the guests for five days, during
which time the initiate, his mother and sister did not drink any
water. He himself was given plenty of ginger, and had to remain
motionless, covered with red paint, between his father and MB who
fed him. Certain pictures were drawn on bark and showed to him,
he was scared by unexpected sounds and apparitions of cha sa,
"a coastal spirit". Non-member informants from Mefchatiam called
Sa-m'pejf in Malay "the cave of Taku", which term was also used
for the Isera. Afterwards they identified this "cave" as the subterranian Seku locality, where the unborn children (kn mes-tnes)
were kept. After five days the initiates appeared outside the Isera,
decorated with necklaces, body cords and armlets and daubed with
red ochre. Tall, toppy head-dresses of some reddish bark were
placed on their heads, so large as to cover also part of the face,
having two holes or slits for the eyes. They paid for the decorations,
bodycords and cloth they were wearing with some gifts of cloth and
fish to the "mother-people".
g) Returned to the Sa-m'pejf house, the initiates were robbed of
their finery, smeared with mud or charcoal after a ceremony when
they were splashed with water and given sea-water(?J to drink.
126
They were told to walk on all fours, were treated harshly and tattooed
with the thorns of the wild sago palm, which thorns they were made
to climb up and fetch. They were whipped and scratched if they
didn't remember the stories and myths they were told, or if they
returned empty-handed from a hunt using only their bare hands.
h) A month later a cray-fish, mollusc or some coastal sea-food
was introduced with ceremonies similar to those of the other forms
of initiation already quoted.
i] After another month vegetables were introduced.
j) Ordinary taro was introduced after still another month.
k) Informants from the Chowaj-Sefarari village stated that at this
point, three months had elapsed of the initiation. During two more
months, they said, the initiates were taught to catch fish and were
living mainly on fish; informants from Kufajt stated that there were
still four or five more months to go, when especially sugarcane was
of importance from a new swidden, as well as fish caught in secret
waters with the aid of the spells and medicines the Jukom leader
taught the initiates to use. They were also supposed to grow enormously during this period. Finally they plaited trd, the three coloured
cane armlets [red, yellow, black) and the leaders and MB made
their hair in a number of braids along four main si dm, "secret
roads(?), tunnels", also called wor sa, "coastal tunnels". New names
were found for them by the Jukom leader, when they had dreamt
that they were travelling in the "Great Canoe" to the place (?) Siar,
"where all things meet". One evening MBD was given some fish by
the initiates who received in exchange some sago porridge. The
following morning the initiates were dressed in all their finery, and
wearing white cloth and displaying white chalk drawings on their
chests, they appeared carrying fish and game behind the collected
friends and relatives who were already felling trees and attempting
to tear down the Isera house. They were "like newborn" and father
and MB had to tell them who everyone was.
1) The neophytes and "elder siblings" settled over to a Samu-chaj
or Taro house. They were said to be clever at divination procedures
with the boar's tusk, good fisher men, having a long and powerful
penis whereby they would beget many children and have access to
much land.
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ETHNOS
7 . COMPARISON BETWEEN FOUR TYPES OF INITIATION
In the above material the like-named paragraphs (a), b) etc.) point
out certain features common to most or all forms of Mejprat initiation. A sequence is observed of a hearth feast, the bespelling of the
attire of the initiate, the carrying in, the burning of the old cloth
and decoration, the dressing at the Fu cave [or corresponding house)
and the funerary rite of tearing up a cloth for the initiate; the return
as "unborn child," "puppy" or "chicken"; the silence and lack of
water for some days; then water is given, cray-fish, vegetables and
ordinary taro are introduced, and dressed in white cloth or bark
cloth the initiates re-appear as "new-born"; finally they demonstrate
their new and complete knowledge about myths, society and sexuality
in songs, puns and sexual behaviour.
One sequence is stressed of the unborn, incomplete and complete
stage, represented by the red, black and white colour; another in
the abstinence from habitual food and the gradual re-introduction
of food stuffs in four stages; and a third in the stress [in the male
forms) on the erection-inducing elements and the final display of
the neophytes. The presence of young initiates and of "elder siblings"
probably indicates an initiation in two stages, the second of which is
essentially un-observed. It seems certain that the very young neophytes did not take part in the Sarrm-chaj or Taro activities. Finally
the parallelism of initiation and taro-growing seems seriously challenged only by the Toch-mi people who advocate fishing and the
shorter period of only one taro swidden.
Differences are found between on one hand the Fini-mikar—
Charit forms and the Uon—-Toch-mi forms on the other. The two
last were regarded as—and are indicated to be—acculturated forms
in comparison with the two first-mentioned. In the acculturated
forms the houses of initiation were regarded as equivalent to the
sacred caves figuring in the traditional forms of initiation. Yet another difference is found in the type of houses built in each case.
Most of the indoor time in traditional initiation was spent in pile- or
tree-houses, where the initiates were "protected by the sun" from
lethal sorcery, while in the acculturated forms two ground houses
were situated roughly along an east-west axis, seemingly marking
I28
a high (east) and a low [west] entrance of the subterranean tunnel
being the abode of Tu, the regional dema.
Some observations ought to be pointed out about i] some recurring arrangements of ceremonial houses in pairs of opposites,
2) some connotions of the leader terms, seemingly stressing the
opposite aspects of life and death, 3] the roles of fa and ra mapuf;
finally will follow 4) comparison of the above forms of initiation
with those of the popot feast.
1) Ceremonial houses seemed arranged in pairs of opposites and
in a male and a female category:
initiation type
female houses
traditional female
traditional male
Toch-mi
Uon
(orientation: east - south) (west - north)
Fini-mikar
Serajn
Fajn
Charit (-mio or -sefa)
Fini-mikar + Serajn
Isera + Sa-m'pejf
Peroch-ati 4- Fini-Mikar Samu Uon + Kra
male houses
A secondary division seems indicated:
Uon
Toch-mi
Kra (house of new-born) Samu Uon (of death,
un-born state)
Isera (also termed Kra) Sa-m'pejf (of death,
un-born state)
After the members of the different categories had been kept apart
during initiation, they all met in Samu Chaj (or Taro), where thus
the aspect of death and of youth, sexual propensities and mirth
were joined. Tar, the male erection, was everywhere stressed and
especially so in the Taro [tar-o, "great erection") with its penis-like
pole swinging from under the dance floor. The corridor was called
n'pe-ku, "the-bear-child(-place)" or ako, "hollow", both terms connoting with "vagina"89. Thus, like in Samu-chaj, where the bag (female) and the stick (male) of the dead person was on display/0
also in the Taro house the two sexual categories were joined. Both
houses were places, where, as it were, young men and women were
introduced formally into Mejprat adult life.
20
40
Elmberg 1955 p. 17.
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ETHNOS
While a connection was observed in terms of mapuf between a
Fini-mikar and Charit initiation and the same feast site served consecutively both male and female initiation with the Toch-mi people,
the Sawiet-inspired Uon ceremonies comprised the male—female
opposition only in the main arrangement of houses at the feast site.
However, in the Seruwan tract of the Sawiet area at least, this Uon
arrangement is indicated to include the new element of a female
house of initiation that was managed by a Mejprat woman, and
therefore was probably already included in the Uon ceremonies of
the western Prat area. This makes a strong cause for female and
male ceremonies of initiation being thought of as closely interrelated
in the Mejprat area.
2. The leader terms were the following and had the following
connotions:
In Fini Mikar:
Fenjd mechdr
Fenjd mafif
+ Jokwen
In Charit:
Jokwen
Ra pofit
+ fenjd mechdr
In Uon:
ra pam
— also assisting at births
also a term used for woman cutting a dead
man's body cord.
— a male specialist.
— also known to retrieve lost souls.
— knowing lethal and "aggressive" medicines;
alternatively called ra safo, "dangerous
man".
— a female specialist.
keeper of Baw's secrets about the way to
Ku-an, from where the souls of the new
born come; also a term for coastal agent
negotiating an axe [pam) and retaining
a power to hurt or kill client as long as
the axe lasted.
ra safo
In Toch-mi:
jukom
se-n'ta-ni
— his Sawiet equivalent knew allegedly uon
sacha majs, Sw, denoting a spell to bind
a ghost to a small stone and making the
ghost enter the human body and rip it up
from inside, killing the victim.
— some informants used the term also for
the jokwen specialist, indicating the two
to be of a similar function.
— also a term for someone "entirely absorbed
by (the grief over) a dead wife".
One person in each pair of leaders was thus indicated as connected with the category of "new life", the other with techniques
considered as "lethal, connected with death". Categories like "life"
and the red colour seem connected, as well as "death" and the black
colour. The initiation was divided in four phases. The first immobilized the initiates as red kn mes-m.es, "un-born children" and
the second, described as po m fa-fa, "the period of adversities", made
the initiates feel that they were incomplete of knowledge and physical strength. In the third phase they were taught the (complete]
truth and techniques of the phenomena that earlier had made them
scared or 'which they had handled awkwardly. In the fourth and
final they were presented as tend, "new-born" in white bark or
cotton cloth, and wearing as a badge the black-red-yellow armlet
called trd. This phase lasted for some time after the ceremonies and
during the period (or: part of the period) in Samu-chaj, Taro or
Mos.
3. The four kinds of food-stuffs are procured by people counted
to the mapuf of the initiate, thus for a male the mother, MB, MBD,
together termed fa, "the mother-people", and for a female her father,
FZ and FZS termed together ra, the "father-people". In the Toch-mi
ceremonies and in those of Uon, the father of the male initiate is
sometimes mentioned as present, though he was characterized as nd
mof, "empty of good", and as a hard task master. His presence may be
regarded as a result of acculturation and of more patrilineal orientation than was traditional, but it should also be considered that though
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ETHNOS
a man belonged to his "mother-people", his "father people" were
especially active at his funeral; and his father's presence at initiation
might thus also be viewed traditionally as stressing the "black" death
aspect.
8. COMPARISON BETWEEN INITIATION AND POPOT FEASTS
4. If we consider the so called popot feast against the background
of what is known about Mejprat initiation, the arrangement of the
"popot houses" displays similar pairs of opposition:
The houses around which the feasts of the popot cycle were centered may then be regarded as a combination of the female and male
initiation into an order similar to what was observed in the Toch-mi
initiation. Already in the traditional forms of initiation the inmates
of the male and the female houses were linked by a classificatory
mapuf relation and the neophytes of both sexes met in the Samuchaj ground house. One difference of the popot feast seems to be
that in the Sachafra phase the informants had emphasized more the
element of popot behaviour, cloth exchange and neche mamos
funeral than its simultanous character of a feast for the returning
"new", female initiates. The importance was also stressed of the
male role and of death. The popot leader further seemed to order
the traditional feasts and ceremonies into a series much longer than
the time of two swiddens. This would give him more opportunities
for cloth exchanges of a bigger turn-over than the traditional ones.
The Samu-chaj house and its ceremonies contained elements of
"new life" as well as "death". The death elements were first of all
the funeral ceremonies for the dead person and the supporting main
132
post of Koch wood, the name of which indicated also the subterranean after-world. The woman should wear katum, "(a braid] from
the tree of the regional dema", which was made of the thin bast
from aereal roots of a banyan tree. Such aereal roots were regarded
as "returning" to the ground. Since the ghost of the dead person was
also regarded as "returning" to the regional dema whence it had once
come forth; the use of the ornamental braids seems alluding to the
closing of a (life) cycle which was stressed as a positvely satisfactory
event.41
At the main post was also put a young shoot from the dead person's totem tree as if to announce the element of new life. As neophytes, the youths meeting and playing in this house were filled
with an, "hot energy", which was the principle of the vegetative
element in life as opposed to cha, connoting with "cold, death, ghostly". The songs were composed around themes like n'kan ne, "give
your fire" and cho rochia, "penetrating heat of copal resin", which
alluded to sexual congress. Earlier is mentioned the emphasis on tar,
"the erection" indicated as one of the results of initiation, and the
transvestite pranks reported to be similar to those of the Toch-mi
performance; the pranks together with the singing of powi, "songs
of a love-couple" and the playing of string games and other games was
called with one term: kan anja, "to fire one another". The vital heat
is to be augmented, new cycles started (children] to counterbalance the excess of cold energy introduced or developing at the
ocurrence of death.
This double feature of life and death, also expressing a "totality"
of Mejprat existence as it marked the beginning and the end of the
life cycle, associated the Samu-chaj house with the abode of the Tu
or Fini, the regional dema, said to dwell at a certain place in (w)or,
the subterranean tunnel; uniting the polar concepts of Fu and Rajn
caves. Not only did the myth42 indicate the situation of the Sepiachchaj (and consequently of the Samu-chaj) to be in the underworld,
but also the transvestite (thus: bisexual) elements indicate it, as
well as the circling dance ending up, literally, in the heated and
densely packed crowd, to which was applied the expression an wawn,
"the hot energy is issuing forth"—evidently from the dema's abode,
41
42
Elmberg 1955 p. 42.
p. 168.
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ETHNOS
variously termed Fu, Se-ku and Ku-an the last term denoting "increase of hot energy".
The bisexual aspects seems to express a "total" category as did
the number of 16, repeatedly observed in context with the Sepiach
houses and most probably representing 16 divisions of an original
tidro, "home region". The bi-sexuality may also express the complementary character of the male—female opposition.
Some aspects of the two opposite Sepiach houses pointed in the
same direction. The first house was expressly stated to be connected
with hens and eggs, and thus also with the native Megapodius,
(bush-hen] the second with a pig. The Megapodius was mentioned
as "feminine" and as a form of Tu; the pig as a male form, sometimes a "guardian" like Suse-mur, sometimes as mepis, her "messenger", sent out to punish trespassing against the watum rules laid
down by Tu.
The traditional initiation contained two almost parallel, minor
cycles of ceremonies, one male and one female, ending in a joint
Samu-chaj ceremony, whereby a new, lifelong and major cycle was
presumably started and an old major cycle was concluded. At the
popot feast—and the Toch-mi procedure—the minor, parallel cycles
of initiation were put into a consecutive order of a kind of major
cycle. This either presupposed the cooperation of a similar cycle to
meet jointly in the "total" house of Sepiach-chaj or else interpreted
its traditional polarity into terms of bride-givers and bride-takers
and split the house up in two. The traditional one-ness of Samu-chaj
is then changed into a distinct and non-changing status dichotomy.
In conclusion it may thus be noted that the popot feast, like the
Toch-mi procedure, seems to be a relatively new and temporally
drawn-out arrangement of traditional exchange feasts, that expressed
such complementary oppositions as hot—cold; male—female; new
life—death; east—west; high—low; in certain "total" concepts the
opposites merged.
9- CONCEPTUAL OPPOSITIONS
The oppositions noted in the categories of the feasts seem to correlate with certain concepts of a cosmic order.
A certain opposition between east and west seemed expressed in
the arrangement of the feast houses. At Kawian the Fini-mikar
r
34
house and the two Samu-chaj houses lay to the east of a path leading across the feast site. The two ground houses were also denoted
as Sepiach. Sketches of the other feast sites show (fig. 26} the
Sepiach houses to be built to the east or south of the pile-houses.
However, in relation to the other pile-houses built simultaneously,
the Fini-mikar at Fuar, Mefchatiam anid Sefachoch had a southern
position. More precisely: the Fini-mikar (a) and the firstly built
Serajn house (b) were built along a SW—NE axis. When I pointed
out to Safom Isir that the Fini-mikar at Sefachoch seemed to lie in
the western part of the feast site, he laughed and said in Malay that
such a house must always be "diatas", "high up, above", according
to his mother. Since "east" and "south" were translated in Mejprat
by td, also conveying "up, above", the horizon seemed divided in
two sections: one NE-E-SE-S-SW called td, "up", and one opposite
denoted by the term jaw, jow or aw given for "west" and "north"
and also signifying "down, below". Since also the varying positions
of the sun at sunrise fell roughly inside the section of the NE-S-SW
this may be the explanation for this section being "up", and the
correspondingly varying sunset positions the reason for regarding the
NE-N-SW section as "down".
As the connection between "male" and "death" as well as between "female" and "birth" was noted, there seems to be a link also
between the Mejprat concepts of "female", "birth", "east" and "up".
Similarly the female transvestites regarded the right side of the body
as female and the left as male (hiding their left breast), and the
mechdr women wanted their left breast to be small, thus "male".
Entrances of males houses of initiation were facing west, those of
the Fini-mikar were facing east—south.
A number of oppositions may be put down:43
sunrise
east—south (NE-S-SW)
up, high
female
sunset
west—north (NE-N-SW)
down, low
male
43
Galis made an interesting "dualistic" (P- 42] arrangement of some cultural
concepts [p. 55]. He had, however, no access to information on the coordination
between the points of the compass, of the colours, right—left, and "hot"—"cold",
nor to information about the polar character of certain entities.
135
ETHNOS
136
At the same time certain other oppositions have to be properly
correlated to the above relations before a complete system may be
seen to emerge, e. g. the following:
Though female, the Tu dema lived below the earth, bearing new
souls and having as its counterpart the black Mos, connected with
fish and winds, and birds, thus also eminently of the "upper" category. Similarly "cloth" was usually regarded as "hot", but the patolapatterned cloths were "cooling". Fishes were generally "cold", living
in the water, and the cray-fish, termed atd [also the term for "left"],
was mostly of the "cold" category, but pinching with its claws, it was
also termed "hot".
Since the "heat" connoted with "vegetative energy" and the "cold"
with "movement", and similarly the soul-bearing but rather "stationary" Tu seemed complemented by her "messenger" Mos, a complementary nature of opposed categories seems indicated. This
would also imply an inherent polarity of any concept and would
eventually explain why it sometimes was regarded as "hot" and at
other times as "cold".
Concomitant to the Mejprat concept of polarity is the concept of
balance. This does not imply an idea of equilibrium or of something
static, but rather of two forces or energies dynamically balancing
one another according to their varying charges. So for instance the
"life" and "death" elements can be observed to vary in intensity
when present in the Samu-chaj.
VI. CONCLUSION
At all the feasts in the present material, exchanges were made that
pertained to events of the traditional Mejprat life-cycle: initiation,
marriage and death. An element of (institutionalized) potlatch was
137
ETHNOS
contained in the exchanges between hosts and guests, bride-givers
and bride-takers. Thus, the guests received more than they brought,
bride-givers received "interest" when the cloth they had lent was
returned. The ultimate character of the bigger countergift is not
yet ascertained.
The comparative analysis shows that the feasts may be regarded
according to their increasing complexity as reflected in the type of
building and leader and—to a lesser extent—also in the type of
dema.
At the simplest form of feast, which by Sarosa informants of
Mefchatiam was referred to as "market-exchange", the exchange
took place near a certain spirit tree, and no house was built; in case
of rain or darkness only an optional shelter was constructed. Fenjd
mapi or ra potekif— a medicineman or -woman—led each exchange
party. As the dema of the involved spirit tree and its stone was
mentioned a tree form of the regional female dema, often called
Ara-ni, Suse-Chor or Char and its male counter part, termed Mos
or Susemur and supposed to dwell in the stone. The female dema
names associated with the mythical beginnings of a region and with
the dema as a uniting force; the male names with punishment for
breaking watum rules and with death.
More complex was the series of initiation feasts joining two parallel feast cycles (one minor male and one minor female cycle} into
a major cycle. The above mentioned medicine-men and -women led
also these ceremonies, and a female leader took some part in the
male initiation, as also a male leader did in the female initiation.
Two types of stable houses (Fini-mikar and Charit) were built in
the Prat area, while north of the lakes the term for the corresponding
female house (akd) indicates it to be a shelter, and the name of the
male house (charit) denoted there a shelter on piles or in a tree. The
female dema finally, was mentioned as N'siri-m'pa or Chapo-aka,
the male as Jochmoni or Sansan. These names denoted the female
form as the origin of social order ("the one source of the moieties")
as well as the embracing and regenerating force of the Mejprat world
("the re-birth shelter of the ghosts"}, while the male was indicated
as the guide conducting ghosts towards the "unifier" whose sexual
partner he was—ideas stressing a concept of coherence between
social origins, death and re-birth.
138
The most elaborate house building activities were connected with
the feast cycles of the Toch-mi and Uon societies, where no shelters
figured and the collected buildings, of four or five different types
(some of them huge) stood near a central feast site, and some of
them were regarded as representing the cave (dwelling) of the dema.
Both societies were credited with an extra-Mejprat origin. The term
for one of the Uon leaders classed him as an "axe-man", which term
in some Mejprat myths was used for a coastal agent supplying axes
to the inlanders, and expecting a sort of dependency from his customers. Allegedly (some?) Toch-mi leaders were trained down at
the coast.
Dema names especially connected with the Uon were Komean
(female) and Oron (male), while the Toch-mi people were supposed to be aided by "coastal (male?) spirits".
Against this background the popot feast series, as observed and
described in the Prat area may be seen as employing the traditional
house types for female initiation (Fini-mikar) and male (Charit)
and elaborating the appurtenant shelters into "closed" houses (Sachafra, Sepiach and Wores). The semi-circular arrangement of houses
around a central feast site was more prominent in western (Mefchatiam) feasts than in those of the east (Sefachoch, Kawian). Terms
for the leaders may be said to connote with aspirations of an especially aggressive kind of domination: "cloth grabber" [popot), "applier
of dangerous heat" {ra pofit), "deadly sorcerer" (ra sa), and "axtraan" (ra pant; the exchanged axe would also hurt its present owner
if he forgot his obligations).
These terms seem a parallel to the unique threat of extra-Mejprat
lethal sorcery, comprised in the term Sachafra for one of the added
(non-traditional) houses.
There is also a shift of emphasis in the types of initiation houses:
from the traditional types, of which the female house was the only
"closed", and therefore "superior" house, to the allegedly extraMejprat types, of which the male houses were bigger and more
numerous than any other type of house.
In this respect, the popot feast series seems more traditional, as
the Fini-mikar of Mefchatiam was definitly larger than the Sachafra
pile-houses around it.
The emphasis on the male and lethal aspects (e. g. the collection
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ETHNOS
of skulls and the giving of death dues at the house of female initiation] was not observed, however, to include the same overt aggressiveness against women, professed by the Uon-experts teaching male
initiates to dominate their future wives through sorcery. The popot
Chawer Cat the traditional spirit home tree] uttered a rather pious
wish that the wives be satisfied with the work of their husbands—
but at the inception of each of his only two series of feasts, he had
desired very much the elimination of a certain woman who opposed
his plans. Both these women got killed for being witches. Of all
Mejprat people the immigrant Sarosa could pick out such a creature,
and a number of the same Sarosa people were the incessant and
only advocates in the Prat area of the popot-ship and its fatherliness, that has been shown to be contrary to traditional Mejprat
concepts.
The dema form mostly connected with popot feasts was the
regional dema Tu, sometimes apostrophized as Sirim'pa, "the one
source of the moieties", at other times as Ju, "the (world-] vagina"
or as Chapo-aka, "the re-birth shelter of the ghosts". Chawer also
talked—when not using the term taku or kapes for any kind of
spiritual agent—of In, which particularly denoted the trade wind
bringing trade goods to the Papuan coasts and somehow being "the
same" as Mos or Mos-manse, the male dema form active in big
wawes and heavy rain showers.
The popot feast series may thus be considered an acculturated
form of the feasts of the traditional life cycle, as observed in the
Prat area. Sawiet and coastal influences may be seen in the types of
house, dema forms and leader. The aspiration of the popot to be
a "father" to his dependants expressed a patrilineal ideal, evidently
alien to traditional Mejprat mapu/-behaviour. It does not seem improbable that the "fatherly" popot has to some extent been modelled
on the "axt-man", who allegedly had an easy access to the coastal
import trade, and who in Mejprat myths and tales was an extraMejprat agent, expecting from his clients a dependant-like behaviour
over long periods.
The popot feast as Chawer understood it, was limited to the
western Prat area. The extent of local ceremonial variation was not
observed but is indicated in 1953 as fairly great by the simultaneous
presence around Mefchatiam of popot feasts, Toch-mi [possibly also
140
Uon) and traditional initiation, and by the fact that Pum Isir described his ceremonial activity in traditional terms and did not use
the term popot, while Chawer and Pum's son Safom regarded one of
Pum's feasts (at Sefachoch) as a popot feast.
From the comparative analysis is also to be concluded that the
popot feast of the Prat area was justifiably assumed to be the cultural focus as the series contained the important feasts of the Mejprat
life cycle in an acculturated form and as the completed series was
supposed to confer on the principal leaders the right to have a tree
planted at the Totor spirit home."
In the structure of Mejprat culture as expressed in the cultural
focus, two configurations stand out: that of a dynamic balance and
that of a cyclic process. The evidence of a balance between bi-polar
concepts was elaborated in the previous section. A Mejprat emphasis on cyclic patterns seems reflected e. g. in the term ra po
machdj, "a person with a completed task (the series of 20 feasts)";
in the fact that such a person would have a tree planted because of
this feat; in the notion that a human spirit (soul) was born by the
regional dema and returned to it as a ghost; in the Samu-chaj ceremonies comprising both a funeral (termination of a life cycle) and
a stimulation of sexual desire (procreation and new life cycles);
and finally in special recitals describing the "movements" of a particular cloth in closed circuits of recipient relatives, gloriously bringing
the cloth back to the first donor.
The acculturated feasts stress a cycle of 5 feasts instead of the
traditional cycle of 20, they emphasize the cold, male and lethal
aspect and they put into practice the more absolute ideal of a popotfollower (dependant) relation, so different from the traditional and
alternating roles of bride-giver and bride-taker. In the new practices
" This may seem a specific parallel to the Toba batak of Sumatra, planting
a waringin tree on the grave of a man who had completely fulfilled his ceremonial duties (Tobing p. 142]. Galis also points out similarities [p. 45] between certain Mejprat and Toba batak uses of cloth. A vaster knowledge of
many more Indonesian cultures and culture concepts seems however necessary,
before any important deductions can be made. This is also demonstrated in
a recent article by Soejono [p. 6) on prehistoric finds in Irian Barat [Western
New Guinea). There is proposed an identity between the types of kettle drums
[or fragments of them) found among the Mejprat and other people in Indonesia.
If this be accepted as a fact, it does not, however, lend itself to comparisons
between the present cultures of the respective societies, as the difference is not
especially noted between archeological finds and items of a present day culture.
141
ETHNOS
women were formally counted out, and a neutralization was sought
through Uon sorcery and by denouncing resolute women as witches
who were to be killed.
In a following study an attempt will be made to apply the above
structural conclusions to material pertaining to Mejprat social structure and organisation as well as to the Mejprat world order, and to
consider the emergence of the new principles for leadership against
the background of the old coastal trade in cotton goods.
142
Appendix
FOUR TRANSCRIPTIONS FROM TAPE-RECORDINGS
1
3
3
Emphasizing suffix.
Certain descent unit.
First Akus translated it "married", later "big men". However, it connoted
"blunt, not in use" (about tools) and "lazy" (about a husband],
4
The woman Owa, mentioned below.
5
"Mistress of the Fu-cave".
6
Name of a heirloom ikat cloth.
1
The term for the bag indicates the woman to be TAK, "catching fish with her
bare hands".
143
ETHNOS
[The ground around here ... We are the popot people, people who
live permanently around here. Men of the Sarosa "rope[s}" and men
of the Susim "rope(s)" live permanently around here, and are "men
of leisure" around here. The dema of the people from the rivers
8
"Root" may allude to RA MAJER, "the original ground owners of a region"
or may connote "origin".
9
First Alois translated NEMA = NEMI, "(we) stab the pig", later he made
NEMA the equivalent of NAPI, "the mother dema".
144
Erut and Jachir (she) comes and gives away heirlooms to a woman
at the well of Watir-Sejam. At the water belonging to the dema
"Mistress of the Fu-cave", this dema comes and gives away heirlooms
to her. The first time she comes, she gives away cloth for the people
of the Sarosa "rope(s)". She gives away the cloth Oan-Wasis. She
gives away a heirloom, she comes again and stuffs the cloth into the
fish bag of the woman ... Who was this married woman? Fera-Mojo's
mother ... the married woman Owa, wasn't it? Good—she stuffs
the cloth into the fish bag and gives it to that woman owning the
fish bag. Tu-Ni, the high One of the Sarosa people, thus comes, stuffing a heirloom in that fish bag. Thus she comes, stuffing in the very
Oan cloth that from that day until now we are carrying along. She
gives away a boar's tusk along one "rope" to Nefirosa Sarosa (FBS)
to allow him to stay at the Ratu Majer hill. Formerly, the Mistress
of the root gave away a boar's tusk. Thus we have a dema mother
and we are the popot people and remain "men of leisure". People
pay (= give tributes to) the Sarosa people, who remain "men of leisure". People pay their popot.]
II. Text from the chant by Chawer Sarosa at the Neche-mamos feast
in Mefchatiam.
10
Chawer Sarosa's BS, Akus Sarosa, carried the tape recorder and held the microphone during the event. It appears that Akus did not record the actual invocation
fat the beginning of the chant) to the regional Tu dema. As a catechist he possibly
felt it to be his duty to suppress such information like he also refused to translate
the chant. Semer Sarosa, the younger brother of Chawer, then listened to the recording, dictated the text and gave a translation. Chawer repeatedly postponed his
revision of it. In 1957 I pointed out to Semer that some of the composits he had
labeled as "place names" or "names of deceased persons "had definite meanings bearing on the regional dema and on Chawer's request for augmented sexual potency.
While acknowledging the general accuracy of my translations, he refused to discuss
the whole matter referring to "the mission" being against all kinds of feasts and
spirits, and to Chawer feeling insecure if such translations were printed. Chawer
died reportedly in 1963.
Semer had not heard the actual invocation of Chawer but knew that there should
be one. As he felt uncertain of the precise names and terms proper to the occasion,
he only indicated its general contents in his own rendition, here printed in Part A.
11
The emphasiging suffix -o often carries a connotative value of "distant, high,
venerable".
M5
ETHNOS
12
Semer originally said this was a subterranean "water", but JU is the usual for
"female bag, vagina, 'vaginal' cave" and the ghosts allegedly returned to the
"Mistress of the region", later apostrophized as JU of the Pres people who were
the principal groundowners in that region.
13
Informants maintained that M'RUT, "what goes out and returns ( = the voice,
returning as a faint echo]" was probably meant. Chawer was not regarded as a speaker of a particularly faultless brand of Mejprat, but part of the style in ceremonial
language was a preference for short forms and for composites formed by radical
elements without affixes. This rendition is Semer's.
146
JOHN-ERIK ELMBERG: THE POPOT PEAST CYCLE
147
ETHNOS
u
The following 5 sentences were heard above the noise made by dissatisfied
guests.
148
15 u
,
Terms for the regional dema apostrophizing her as the origin of the Pres
people. Such terms may conceivably have been used in the initial invocation.
17
SEMOS, "phlegm, sago porridge"and AWF, "sago", both connoted "(source of)
cold energy", and were specially used in songs containing sexual puns where both
terms stood for "male semen".
18
South of Tuwer ("the generous Mistress" = the regional dema) the Sarosa and
the Chowaj-Sefarari believed a cave called Furomak to be situated where this dema
was dwelling.
19
Initially Semer wanted me to believe that this sentence was an enumeration
of localities where sago palms grew.
M9
ETHNOS
2C
In ceremonial contexts it was not uncommon to speak about oneself in the
third person singular.
21
RUF, "coppice of sago palms", also denoting "the bush of pubic hair" is associating simultaneously to "sago" and "semen".
22
JU, "bag, vagina" seems to be the radical element, and this exhortation seems
I5O
then directed to the ghosts that were to enter the subterranean world and to be
united with the regional dema, above denoted as "Vagina of the Pres", and below
mentioned as "She".
23
These four fishermen had not brought some fish Chawer had expected.
34
Built on the bottom of the lake along the shores and used when fishing from
canoes with big conical fish-traps.
25
Koju and the other un-identified dead persons mentioned, were supposed by
Semer to be called by names used inside the Uon-society.
151
ETHNOS
Part A
[Strange dema from their grounds, come herel The cloth is fetched,
come up closely to the houses! I give you cloth to keep. Watch well
the promised lot indoorsl Come out, I give cloth to you for the filling up of the spirit vagina (by the ghosts)! Go away, out of (the waters) Mono, Chajo ...
Part B
(Chawer:) ... their caves at ... Punkrum! They come here out of
Wefur, come here out of Isima, out of Suar, come here out of Sokejs. (New voice :) It is finished over there, we go up to the outskirts. (Chawer:) Out from there you must come ... out of... out of
Chapioch, Opu, N'ta, Ua'm, Tochm'pi, Arut, Usej, and Watir-sejam. Hear all around, at Jachir, Tepiropat, Teteroch, Era; they come
here from Watir-karet, Watir-senafan, Watir-senema, Muskeras,
Weta, Uwe. Orders for an exchange-meeting; they come here out
of Sesemo, they come here out of Setuwi, come here out of Sachorua, come here out of Korokirjak, come here out of Muskofun. They
come here out of (the hills) Naut, come here out of Seserak, Furomak
Murofuriok, Mis; come here out of Aut, Sawiak; come here out of
Kasim, Nokeuk come here out of Pesawi, Ferachaf, come here out of
Kuruwin, Seruk, Tormo, N'ta. They come here from Frateches,
Sefroton, Semperian; come here out of the waters Tochm'pres,
Watir-mam, Koko, Inta, Sampuok, Charuam, Seteres, Rawafi,
Uam-sor, Sekonam, Sera-uam, Semuna, Ruwiak, Natak, Juchopinati, Korum, Mato, Tesach, Materach, Aj-masu; they come here out
152
of Sachiach-kek. They come here out of "High Uon" come here out
of "Deep Uon". They come here out of Asemachon, Wasiam, Mesiok;
come here out of Tawt, come here out of On-tikaron, Sefiut, Mesiok; come here out of "High place of exchange", "Exchange in a
cave", "Deep place of exchange", Seper, Cho-che, Sikawi, Mataf,
Charmok, Chomuk, "Place of the rotten greens", Kien, Kajen-mataf.
You go away out of Biak, the Bugis country and Europe I Dema, fetch
cloth, I have paid the Bugis people, and a final payment to them all!
(Different voices:] Throw down the cloth quickly, so people get
what is coming to them! ... There is a different cloth in the
house! ... I'll go up and have a look ... I'm angry ... one cloth is
wrapped up, it's Meser's.
Part C
[Chawer:) Ghosts afar! ... You who are called "She-suddenly-made-the-Pres-appear", "Vagina-of-the-Pres", there is no more sago ...
[New voice) She knows how to pound away for sago! [Laughter.
Chawer:) Take it easy! Give more water through the leach ( = more
semen through my penis)! That sago [ = semen) must remain with
Kapitan. Soon I will make fierceful coitus, spouting forth semen!
There is cloth! There I give to my people so she will collect sago,
yonder south of Tuwer. Through the luck-bringing gift from the Tu
dema, I get power to cohabitate and I will produce sperm as potent
spells extract sperm. Here I give for the ghosts so she will prepare
sago. Watch well the cloth ... My penis dies at the smooth opening,
but I'm fetching cloth for him. My GF Semfot ...
[Charachn'tuwit:) Why are you crying alone? [Chawer:) The bush
is deserted, the pole (= penis) does not exist! You [the dema) fill
me up with sago so I increase my sago porridge (semen)! Watch
me perform correctly! ... Keep quiet! ... (Charachn'tuwit:) You are
crying generously! (Chawer:) I am giving generously. I want to
drink palm wine to cool the lingering heat (making me too generous)! (Charachn'tuwit:) Talk clearly, for that thing (the microphone)
hears you!
(Chawer:) Dema of the hills, dema of the water, I give for sago
(semen)! I'm a man of the Pres! ... (His voice becomes almost inaudible, he is coughing heavily; Charachn'tuwit:) Be careful, you will
be coughing your wits out of your body!
J
53
ETHNOS
Part D
(Chawer:) Fetch that cloth, tear it up and go away! You give that
cloth to Meser (cl. ZS) ... Be gone to the Spirit—Vaginal The ghosts
go away outwards! —Enter below, go away M'pochawiak (dead wife
of Meser), Firosa (FB), Firofat (FB) ...
The fish of Imon (I never got, neither) the fish of Wejuk, Krawok
nor the fish of Jachaf... To the ground of the Susim I put hot spells,
down at its root, I put obstacles in the turf-walls. I give cloth for
the water and the caves there ... She sees directly the things they
have put away in a secret place to make me cough. I cough, be-spelled in my voice; be-spelled I give for the pig's tusk to give to Nefirosa (FBS). (Chawer's wife Wefo:) The cloth up here is finished}
(Different voices; one saying:) Hand out the covers first of all!
Part E
(Chawer:) Pochawiak, Semitafan (FM), my brothers of the Pres
people, Koju, Oanjen Naw (oo), Firofat (FB), Kawaseker (F), Sachorowafat (FF), Werim Sorochekf?) Semfot (MF)! We of the
Sarosa people have divided, the names of all are: I myself, Charachn'
tuwit (S), Muof (D), Toch-katar (S), Pocherit (FBS), Pochtita (FBDD),
Akus (BS), Mafat (cl. BS), Junus (S)! Promise us children truly!)
III. The Serdnana song by Chawer Sarosa, performing after entering
the Sepiach house.
26
Actually FBWB but Chawer called him TAMU having broken away
also from his true MB in his youth. "Cl." = classificatory.
!54
37
These cousins of Chawer's seem to have acted as medicine men and killers
of the pig connected with Pomak's marriage exchange. Then the Seranana cloth
was again within Chawer's reach—exactly how he got it back, he never tells.
38
They were of the Serawn people. Wanim's son (Uon) Sufat was married to
Merit Fcrit's DD.
'i9 Chawer spoke Malay in this sentence and the following one.
ao
Probably to Uon-Sufat, her DH who in the next sentence gives it to his FB,
Maro Semetu.
31
The classes of ikat cloth mentioned in this text are Mon (very valuable), Topa
(less so) and Pokek [most common).
32
Commonly a term for D (m. s.]
33
Relatives contributed cloth to the FEJAK exchange gifts and received items
from the countergifts called SIPACH.
J
55
ETHNOS
•** bees me
I56
= visits me.
JOHN-ERIK
ELMBERG: THE POPOT FEAST CYCLE
[The cloth Seranana, I gave at the Sepiach feast as a bridegiver's gift to my MB Maro Semetu, and he gave it to his daughter
Pomak. Pocherit and Kawaseker Sarosa took Seranana for slaughtering the pig for Pomak. I gave it to Sufat Semetu and he to his father Wanim Semetu, Maro's brother. Wanim is now dead but gave
it to Maro, he to his MB Semamo and Merit Ferit Serawn.
Seranana is number one (== the finest]. Merit he took it away,
his daughter Charawin gave it to ... (Uon-Sufat?). Uon-Sufat
Semetu and his father Wanim gave Seranana as a gift from the bridegivers to Maro, using it for Pomak, and Maro gave it to his daughter
Pomak. She gave Seranana to her FMBD Charawin and she added a
cloth called Chor as a small gift.
Three Topa-Senak (funeral cloths) I gave to my MZS Suam, he
gave [them and?} as a small gift Mon-Apat for the gift from the bridegivers to Uon-Sufat, Suam's WZH. Maro gave his own daughter
Pomak a Topa-M'poch, she gave it to Uon-Sufat, her FBS, and the
latter gave it to Maro as a gift from the bride-giver for Pomak. One
he gave Frarek, his ZS, and Frarek flung Seranana away to me.
I gave it to Maro, he gave it to his child Pomak. Her "interest"
to her HF Chosi was the Topa-M'poch, then also the Mon-Apat and
35
Semua is Malay for Mejprat PETA, "all".
157
ETHNOS
a Pokek-Majt. Then he gave it to Iramus, my BS, he gave it to me.
I gave it to my FBS Pocherit, I gave it to my MZS Kajak Kampu, he
gave it to Maro and he to my daughter (his ZSD) Muof, she
to her FZ Keret-Woro, Keret-Woro to Muof, she to her FZ Sachseres. I gave it to my FBSW Saju (and got it back), I gave it to my ZSW
Karet-Mawiak, he to Mejor Kanepu his WF Mejor Kanepu (and
I got it back). I gave it to my WZS Kersajer.
He ( = Chawer) is giving properly. This is to exchange properly,
he ( = Chawer) exchanges ... This is to exchange ... Now she (Muof)
gives ... now my DH visits me. I must compose this song for my
in-laws Sajn (FBDH) and Frarek (DH). I give "interest" to Kanepu,
my wife's people, my Serim-Poch cloth to my DH Frarek. I give to
Saju (FBSW), to the police man Johanis. I give to my (true) MBS
Wejmara. I give all the people here.
Write that into your book: this is the exchange meeting of Charachawer! I, Charachawer held up a cloth, I gave it to my wife Wefo.
She gave cloths and opened the Sachafra houses. She gave the women
here ... Sioron, don't talk"! Pocherit is coming here soon with his
medicines ...)
IV. Setar Chowaj-Sefarari receiving instructions from his mother before entering the Toch-mi house of initiation at Fuar.
36
I58
i. e. "instruction for change".
37
Possibly M B S .
Parents of the beaten children.
NA comprized a person's paternal (CHA) and maternal (FA) relatives. U denoted "plurality", and was translated "and his friends".
40
= classificatory.
41
probably F.'s ZS.
43
In the opposite part of the region.
43
ATI-AT, "dema-feed", denoted a kill by spear in consequence of a breach against
WATUM rules.
38
39
159
ETHNOS
44
45
46
Traditionally the seat of memory and intelligence.
ARAN also denotes "only".
Pictures of sailing crafts were drawn on pieces of bark.
47
Probably from MAKIN, "many" + A, "rope", connoting "descent unit".
48
-o is generally emphasizing.
49
They were called KOCH-A by male informants and described as pieces of
bark, on which were depicted sailing canoes painted with chalk. KOCH was the
underground world,—A indicated "near-ness". As the pieces were hanging on the
walls, "somewhere along the "brim" (of the house)" is also feasible. She does not
want to seem to know to much about it.
160
50
51
52
53
54
N ' T A N - O is also possible: "put u p (on t h e scaffold t o be circumcised)"
- TAWE-OCH
possibly paternal relatives.
Implied: I depart!
Probably FF.
l6l
ETHNOS
56
66
57
58
59
60
162
Probably M F cl.
H e (they) were probably heard in t h e collective background noises.
t h e children.
t h e medicine man.
t h e perfective suffix-OCH implies completed action or established fact.
Remains un-indentified.
61
62
63
64
65
S u s a is a Malay loan word.
Term for h e r BD.
Child's FZ.
Child's FFZSS. H e was expected, b u t did n o t t u r n u p .
Classificatory; actually FFZS.
I63
ETHNOS
JEMAT NIO FA IFO ...
he sees you not wants ...
[Semer: Dead silence1. Instruction1
Mother: Eh ... I set about the secret knowledge. Instruction for
your change1 To make them use their hot energy cleaverly, when angry about ... (as child begins crying:) Don't you cry1 Don't beat the
young, immature children1 Your own people's children are not here 1
If you beat them all the same, then their parents will arise and come
here, surely looking for me.
Your father's crowd, your MB's crowd are here about and they will
come to slay us in the guest house; and your F Frarek with his men
and your FF Suwewajer with his men. People will slay us all here
about, and all people in the opposite direction, as punishment. From
here they will then return the beating until not a trace of the people
is remaining.
If they charge at you when you are put up in the Sampejf house,
you will all be killed. If they charge at us awakening in the guest
house, they'll put arson fire to the roof and everything will be consumed. Whith these things filling younmemory, you must/emember
your nuclear family. You have an adult mind, remember they give
the canoe (a ride in it was sometimes regarded as a punishment),
you have an adult mind and must remember the canoe, a thing that
is secret, dangerous. People will slay our entire set of descent ropes
(?). From here they go away, departing for fathers of mothers (to
kill).
Mothers are forbidden doors, now. If you cry in Sampejf, I still
remain over here and I don't hear. I go away taking up taro. Children
cry, but I don't hear. It's forbidden. Your throat must remember:
even small girls don't cry1
A forbidden thing is to give someone a beating—that's forbidden.
In Sampejf are a kind of high things (?) and it is forbidden for your
mother to listen.
(New voice:) Frarek's father Sewajer is calling1 (Mother continues:)
What happens on the scaffold of lattice work is a thing happening
to all men (penis operation). If threatened to be slain you say: I am
keeping to myself, I'm remaining indoors. I don't play about, I'm
indoors calmly.
164
(The child:) A long time I have heard the rules. (His FM:) I have
instructed my grandson! (Male bystanders:] That was indeed instruction1.
(The child:) My father and his people, my cousins and their people
in the distance, they all remain while I depart. (Child's MB:) He
must come alone, the medicine man is herel Now you must stay
only with your MB. Don't fuss, the ghosts (dema ?) are content.
(New voice) Close around here are things belonging to other people,
and your own house is not around here. Only your paternal grandfather does not come. Your maternal grand-fathers have all command
they hear the things your mother is imparting.
(The child:) Your are instructing, you have been instructing and
you have been instructing solemnly! Don't I understand, do you
think, or are] my ears deaf? (Child's MB:) Hear the things your
mother and your father are instructing you about! (New voice:) Her
brother there is right! Your brother Chonta stays here. The medicine
man will beat his children with a rattan if they are afraid. Here he
comes! Inside are secret things. After a while, he will not beat you.
But don't you run about with that] thing of rattan. Recollect
your brothers, their little boys do not ... (want a beating either?)
You don't run about with that thing of rattan!
(Child:) Yesterday and a while ago I have listened to the rules—I
am tired, I get weak ... (Mother:) Your father and Remak are bringing here that Oan cloth. They don't have any future troubles. To be
sure, they have negociated my cloth and brought it here. I save the
Oan cloth for myself. I don't want putting in more. A while ago my
brother's daughter really brought two small cloths.
Hear the things your MB comes to tell you. Don't fuss, don't get
lazy! People will catch you on the floor.
(New voice:) You say good-bye to him! (Child:) Good-bye, goodbye ... (Child's FZ:) Where do we see you tomorrow? (Child:) Goodbye, good-bye ... (Child's FZ:) The couple Pefato and Charachn'tuwit remember you, they have come here wanting to see the Tuwer
place. The married woman M'pefato with her close one, she comes—
with Charachn'tuwit she comes, wanting to see you. Your sister
says he ( = Charachn'tuwit) is missing. Your MB wants to see you.
Your (classificatory) F Charachawer does not want to come here or
to see you ...)
165
ETHNOS
TWO MYTHS
On Paw [Paq, Pawq).
As told by Teritehon Safrafo in Elis of the Sawiet area.
Paw was a man with small progeny. Pawkoro is the site of his swidden, where he also begged for fire to come out of the Casuarina-tree
(of which torches are made). Sefa M'Paw came from the mountain
and made Kach Ren feast in the east and Biel Seli feast in the west
and in the middle Biel Chochoq feast. The name of the place is
Uon Matine where the first Uon house stood by the water Seoron.
The Safrafo and Karesaw people are now living on Paw's ground and
the name of the stone is Fra Fachajuo. The boat that he brought from
the land of the dead is called Qema Amaq, "the stone canoe", or
Qema Cherak "the canoe suddenly appearing". Komean and Oron
took it and went up on the nightly sky in it and only a small piece
is still left. It lies below the hill Asqorok, south of Elis.
A Wulun man once abducted the girl Karasare of the Baw family
in Elis and killed her father and most of her other relatives. He carried her off to the north-west. After a time he took her back to the
Elis tract, built a house and left her there. Marit Rafo of the Safrafo
family was then living on a hill at Elis. He saw her in the house and
thought she was a ghost. But then he saw her check her child as the
little one was about to go down the steps. The child was a boy, Hok
Rafo. Marit and Karasare got married and had a girl, Bon Rafo. When
the latter had attained marriageable age, Hok married her. Actually,
Safrafo was at first called Sarmok, and came out of the mango-tree
together with Sesa and the others.
As told by Netoron Salmoq in the village of Elis.
There was a man called Sefa M'Paw. He went from the coast up
in the mountains. There dwelt Ureak with his two sisters. Ureak had
no axe, and big trees were still standing on his swidden. Paw (as he
was commonly called) heard the sound of someone breaking rotten
stumps and he went in that direction, because he was Na Temao,
"an axe man" and bent on trade.
He found Ureak looking for grubs in the stumps he was breaking
up with his hands. Paw took out his boar's tusk to see whether
166
Ureak was a human being or a ghost. "Oh,—human beingl Haven't
you anything else to strike with?" asked Paw.—"No," said Ureak, so
then Paw took his axe and split the stump for him. He also felled
the tall trees on the swidden.
Paw asked: "How, actually, do you clear swiddens?"—"With my
hands," said Ureak. "My swidden is large, but I have no axe."—"Lay
a trail to the mountain where you live," said Paw. "Stay up there
with your two sisters when you hear that big trees are falling. Take
good care not to descend!"
Ureak went home and did as he was bid. Paw began to clear a swidden. When he had finished he said: "Bring all the food you have (to
the market place and I will fetch it and exchange my axe for it."
This they did.
After the exchange Ureak said: "My sister will go with Paw and
carry all the food to the mountain opposite. There you can clear
a swidden." They did so, and their mountain is to this day called Paw.
The axe remained with Ureak and the other sister, who lived together with him.
Sachafra majs,66 "The Sachafra descends, comes down",
As told by Semer Sarosa.
Once, on the slopes of the hill Rachmachan or Sachafra—majs,
between Chamak and Komakoma, a pile house was built and food
was collected to make a ren feast (hearth feast) in a new house of
female initiation. A small girl of the "root-people" (owner's of the
ground) was left to guard it. Taku and its animal people came out of
a well near by, made the girl fall asleep and took away the food.
The girl woke up when her own people returned. They became
angry with her, saying that she had eaten the food herself. The girl
resolved to watch out better the following day, when she was again
left alone—but the same thing happened. Her own people beat her,
when they heard the same story a second time. Next day the same
thing happened again.
Finally the girl went up under the roof beams and hid herself. From
there she saw Taku and its people arise out of the water. Having
66
Majs was regarded as a Sawiet word.
167
ETHNOS
their heads covered by one long, white cloth called Siaras, they entered the house and began to eat the food. The girl was afraid but
kept quiet and saw everything.
When her people returned, they could not see her at first. They
looked everywhere and called out for her without result. Finally
someone raised his eyes and saw her sleeping. She went down and
told them what she had seen. Some people believed her, some didn't.
But during the night a medicine man (dreamt that he) saw Taku. This
was the advise he got:
Make a Sachafra (pile) house. In it you keep chafrd stones, making people contribute plenty of cloth; cha nand, "skulls", from
where chapas, "the freed ghosts" come forth; and mamos, "the
cloth that belongs to Mos" which must be shown.
Women are forbidden to enter during this time. You must not
eat with them.
Four days after this feast, make another and go down to a Sepiach
(ground) house, that is to be built in the meantime. Stay down there
til the bride-takers have supplied a pig. When this pig is cut up and
its bones are burned, return to the Sachafra house and tear it down.
Then you may wash again.
Entering the Sepiach you must first go down a cave among the
stones and come out at the other end, and then you enter the Sepiach
house down below.
Afterwards a new house is made; Samu Rufan. There maize seed
is sown and crayfish is given. Therefore these houses are made. Four
bushes of ajd, "giant nettles", have to be passed when going down
to the Sepiach and when returning up afterwards.
L I S T OF S O M E M A L A Y A N D M E J P R A T T E R M S
MALAY:
d a m a r , resin from the copal tree.
i k a t , "to tie". Indonesian cotton textiles produced by the "tie and dye" method
and imported through the coastal peoples, Government agents and Chinese
shops.
I r i a n Bar at, "Western Irian", the official Indonesian term for Western New
Guinea. Already in 1949 the name Irian for this territory was used by
Dutch administrators in Hollandia. It was supposed to come from one of
the languages along the northern coast [Sarmi?], where it allegedly denoted
"green and walkable land" in contra-distinction to "the sea" or "a swamp".
k a m p o n g , "village, hamlet". Houses were required to be built along a main
road or path in officially recognized villages. The common house type there
168
had a square floor (raised above the ground and resting on a few sturdy
poles], bark walls and a ridged roof. They were usually not as well made
as the traditional Mejprat pile houses, that were raised higher, had plaited
floors and were smaller, mostly intended only for a nuclear family.
k e p a l a , "head, head-man". Authorized and paid by the Government; given a
uniform and a badge. He was also called k e p a l a k a m p o n g , "village
head-man". Larger villages had more than one head-man. They were supposed to be responsible for certain sections of the village, for so-called
clans or sub-clans.
k u l i , "worker". He could be employed by private or governmental contract.
t n a j o o r , k a p i t a n ( o ) (introduced by the Portuguese and the Dutch), as well
as o r a n g k a j a , "rich man", and o r a n g t u a , "old man, elder" were
titles given to people that traders or Government agents used as persons of
contact for a variety of purposes. Sometimes they had only honorary status,
sometimes they were paid and if so, were regarded as k e p a l a .
p a r a n g , "bush knife". Imported from or via Indonesia or made and traded by
the Biak papuans.
p a t o l a . Originally a silk cloth imported from Gujerat in India, and used by
court dignitaries and princes in Indonesia. Now a term for any cloth having
the typical pattern of patolas.
s a r o n g ( s a r u n g ) . Indonesian type of skirtlike cloth. The sarong used for
exchange by the Mejprat was, at the time of investigation, made of printed
cotton cloth, usually imported from Indonesia, Japan and Holland.
MEJPRAT:
oka, a lean-to consisting of a slanted roof.
amot, "interest, extra present", given when returning' an exchange lot.
an waum, "hot energy is issuing forth"; used when talking of the sun, coitus
and the abode of the regional dema.
cha mamos, see neche.
charen nafayi, "cover for the buttocks and genital parts (of a woman]". Bark
cloth of a white colour, worn by women on certain occasions.
fejdk, certain exchange lot from the bride-givers. To be returned with "interest"
from the bride-takers.
fejt (also fajt, fajit). Term for Gnetum Gnemon and other trees, standing at
a place where skulls of killed enemies were put, exchange meetings took
place and penis-formed and perforated stones were paraded. Sometimes
connoting with totor.
fun, traditional term for funeral feast.
majer, majr, "root host". The original group possessing a region; then also a
person or a group regarded as domiciled in a region (after a certain number of generations] in relation to strangers.
mechdr, female expert. See section on the Fini-mikar initiation.
mejprat, term used by the people around the Ajamaru lake about themselves
and their own language. In a part of that area the Prat dialect was spoken.
Mejprat is abbreviated Mp.
neche mamos (also cha mamos), funeral ceremony when cloth was displayed
and the ghosts were re-united with the regional dema.
nemo, remo, unidentified tree with spotted bark; its fragrant leaves were used
to create (shamanistic) trances.
ochdt, traditional term for feast inaugurating a ceremonial house.
pofit, "a biting, fretting thing". Used about a certain class of medicines (e. g.
ginger] and one of the male experts. See chapter V: 7.
169
ETHNOS
potekif, a class of medicines referred to as "moderating". Also the male expert
using them. See V: 7.
ren, term also used in the Sawiet area for house feast of inauguration. In the
Prat area the immigrant groups used it.
sawiet. The area and language to the west of the Mejprat. Abbreviated Sw.
sipdeh, pack, a certain return-gift from the bride-takers who have received fejdk.
saworo, entrance to the after-world through water, "water spirit home".
totor. The place for a tree and a stone through which contact was established
with the regional dema. Sometimes synonymous with fajt.
REFERENCES
BARNETT, H. G.: The nature of the potlatch. American Anthropologist, vol. 40: 3,
1938.
ELMBERG, J.-E.: Field notes on the Mejbrat people in the Ajamaru district of
the Bird's Head (Vogelkop), Western New Guinea, Ethnos, XX: 1, 1955
( = 1955:0.
ELMBERG, J.-E.: Further notes on the northern Mejbrats, Western New Guinea.
Ethnos, XXIV: 1-2, 1959 ( = 1959: 1-2).
Encyclopaedic van Nedcrlandsch-Indie [E. N. I.), ed. G. STIBBE, vol. HI, 2nd
edition, 1919.
GALIS, K. W.: Nota Nopens het Ajamaroe-gebied. Gouvernement van Nederlandsch Nieuw Guinea, Kantoor voor Bevolkingszaken No. 66 [Mimeographed) n. d.
HERSKOVITS, M. J.: Man and his works. 1948.
HILX,E, J. W. VAN: Reizen in West-Nieuw-Guinea. Tijdschrift van het Koninklijk
Nederlandsch Aardrijkskundig Genootschap, vol. 24, 1907.
HOEVEN, J. A. v. D.: Tournee-verslag (Mimeographed). 1949.
JENSEN, AD. E.: Mythos und Kult bei Naturvolkern. 1951.
KROEF, J. v. D.: Folklore and tradition in Javanese society. Journal of American
folklore, 1948.
MASSINK, J.: Memorie van overgave van het bestuur over de Onderafdeling
Teminaboean (voorheen Ajamaroe] over de periode van 17 juni 1953 tot
1 September 1955. (Type-script).
NEEDHAM, R.: A structural analysis of Aimol society. Bijdragen tot de taal-,
land-, en volkenkunde, vol. 116: 1, i960.
SOEJONO, R. P.: Prehistori Irian barat. Madjalah ilmu-ilmu sastra Indonesia, vol.
1:1. 1963.
TOBING, PH. L.: The structure of the Toba-Batak belief in the high God. 1956.
171
ETHNOS
Fig. 28. Alphabetical list of some frequently mentioned participants at the
Sachafra feast at Mefchatiam.

Untitled - Stichting Papua Erfgoed

Transcription

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