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
On my return journey I stopped a few hours at a kampong in the vicinity to
see some stones that, according to Katingan belief, are alive and
multiplying. As my visit was expected, a fowl had just been sacrificed to
these guardians of the kampong, and a fire made from bark was burning near
by to keep the stones comfortable, so they would not be angry at being
photographed. There were two roundish specimens, almost honeycombed with
small cavities, one of them, scarcely twenty-five centimetres high, being
regarded as masculine and the other, smaller and covered with green moss,
was supposed to be of feminine gender. Originally, as the story goes, only
these two were there, but later six "children" appeared, as evidenced by
six smaller stones lying close to the "parents." The domain held sacred to
this interesting family was bounded by four pieces of wood, each about a
metre in length. Over all was extended a small square piece of red cloth
supported on four upright sticks, which had been placed there two weeks
before on behalf of a sick man whose recovery was attributed to this act
of veneration. In front of the small enclosure lay four stones of
inconsiderable size, lying in two pairs and supposed to be attendants; in
the rear was a small house, reputed to be over three hundred years old,
its purpose being to protect the stones, where offerings of food, with
skulls of deer and pigs, were deposited.
Next day we met the _Selatan_ on its way up the river, brought our luggage
on board, and continued our journey. We had a disagreeable night before
arriving at Bandjermasin; in fact, it is risky to travel south of Borneo
in a steam-launch in January. As the wind was strong and the waves were
too high for us to proceed, anchor was thrown and we were tossed about,
the lamps went out, and, according to the captain, the boat nearly turned
over. Mr. Loing, prostrate with seasickness, saved himself from being
thrown overboard by grasping the rail.
After packing my collections I again set out for Sampit with the intention
of revisiting Sembulo by another route, proceeding by prahu up the Kuala
Sampit as far as possible, and then marching overland to the lake. The
controleur was absent, but his native clerk and the kapala together got me
the prahus and the men, such as the place afforded. As usual, the Malay
coolies were late in arriving and began making many difficulties about
various things. To cheer them I gave each f. 1.50 in advance, which made
them all happy, and in buoyant, talkative spirits they immediately went
off to buy rice, dried fish, tobacco, cigarettes, and other things. All
was well, and at ten o'clock in the morning we finally started, with a
native policeman in attendance.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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