Through Central Borneo; an Account of Two Years' Travel in the Land of Head-Hunters Between the Years 1913 and 1917Lumholtz, Carl
History
Through Central Borneo; an Account of Two Years' Travel in the Land of Head-Hunters Between the Years 1913 and 1917
Lumholtz, Carl
Borneo -- Description and travel; Ethnology -- Borneo; Natural history -- Borneo
Except for a few cases of malaria, among the Penyahbongs there is no
disease. In 1911 the cholera epidemic reached them, as well as the
Saputans. Of remedies they have none. At the sight of either of the two
species of venomous snakes of the king cobra family this native takes to
his heels, and if bitten the wound is not treated with ipoh. Until
recently they had no blians; there were, at this time, two in Tamaloe, one
Saputan and one Malay, and the one in the other kampong learned his art
from the Saputans. One man does not kill another, though he may kill a
member of the Bukat tribe, neighbouring nomads who live in the northeast
of the western division, in the mountains toward Sarawak. Suicide is
unknown. It was asserted to me that the Penyahbongs do not steal nor lie,
though I found the Saputans untrustworthy in these respects.
There is no marriage ceremony, but the young man must pay the parents of
the bride one gong (f. 30), and if the girl is the daughter of a chief her
price is six gongs. About half of the men select very youthful wives, from
eight years up. There are boys of ten married to girls of a similar age.
One boy of fourteen was married to a girl of twenty. Children of the chief
being much sought, one of Pisha's daughters, twenty-three years old, had
been disposed of when she was at her mother's breast, her future husband
being twenty at that time. Upon reaching womanhood she did not like him at
first, and for five years declined to share the mat with him. Recently,
however, she had begun to associate with him, and they had one child. The
children are not beaten, are left to pick up by themselves whatever
knowledge is necessary, and when the boy is ten years old he can kill his
babi with a sumpitan. The parents of young girls do not allow them to be
too intimate with young men.
A pregnant woman must not eat durian which, in falling from the tree, has
broken, or stuck in a cleft without reaching the ground, nor any kind of
fruit that does not fall straight to earth, nor sago from a palm tree
which chanced to become entangled by a branch instead of falling directly
to the ground, nor the large hornbill, nor snakes, nor pigs, nor fish that
were killed by being struck on the head, or by any other means than with
spear or parang, nor land turtle, nor the scaly ant-eater. She must not
make a house or take part in making it, and therefore if a pole has to be
put in place she must call another woman to do it.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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