The Importance of Dutch and German 19th-century Sources
Author(s): Martin Baier
Source: Anthropos , 2015, Bd. 110, H. 1. (2015), pp. 206-210
Published by: Nomos Verlagsgesellschaft mbH
Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/43861901
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206 Berichte und Kommentare
The Importance
(Pijnappel 1860: 305, 343; Riwut 2003). Theof
vas- Dutch
salage and dependence uponSources
19th-century the ruling house of
Banjarmasin and Kotawaringin began with the ap-
Martin Baier pearance of a certain Raja Tanga (before 1680 a.D.;
Pijnappel 1860: 282, 304). He was of princely birth
from Johor and tried to rule Seruyan2 and Sampit
The most recent publications on the Kaharingan re-in the Kotawaringin area. Raja Tanga had only one
descendant, the Princess Putrì Bui. She married a
ligion in Central Kalimantan insist that the origi-
Banjarmasin prince. Therefore, the Kingdom of
nal tribal religion of the Dayak Ngaju is the oldest
religion of the world and the most original, ortho-Banjarmasin got influence over the western part of
dox, and standing religion of mankind. The belief southern Borneo and the independence of the Dayak
is that God himself manifested this religion as thetribes ended (Pijnappel 1860: 278, 304). The influ-
world religion, that is the "compass," the guiding ence of Banjarmasin in Southwest Borneo is a his-
line for human life; and that in the future Kaharin-
torical fact, but the part of Putrì Junjung Buih is
gan will probably spread to the whole of mankind.1legendary. Nevertheless they are the earliest hints to
Thus many educated Dayak from Central Kaliman- the famous Putrì Junjung Buih, the ancestress of the
tan are convinced that the Kaharingan religion is anBanjar Kingdom.3 In many Malayan and Indonesian
equally monotheistic and as important a religion princely
as chronicles one finds Putrì Junjung Buih as
are Islam and Christianity. The former pastor andan ancestress of regional kingdoms, at least from
lecturer with the theological academy STT-GKE Sumatra/Malaya
in as far as the Celebes Sea.4 Accord-
Banjarmasin, Dr. Marko Mahin, urges the churches,ing to Overbeck's translation, the Sejarah Malayu
especially the GKE Church, to do penance and con-narrates: "Once upon a day a mass of foam came
fess their fault of discrimination against the Dayakfloating down from the upper waters of the river.
religion and culture. The Gereja Kalimantan Evan- Inside the foam there was a nice small girl, who
gelis (GKE) is a result of the missionary work of was adopted by the ruler 'Sang Si Perba of Palem-
German and Swiss missionaries beginning 1853. bang' It who called her 'Putrì Tunjong Bueh'"5 Sang
is the biggest and most ineradicable church of the Si Perba had four children. The emperor of Chi-
Dayak tribes in Central Kalimantan. But is this kindna sent a delegation to Palembang to ask the hand
of religion, Kaharingan, really a homogeneous doc- of one of his daughters for marriage. The envoy of
trine from the very beginning of mankind? Educated this delegation got the ruler's assent that his old-
Dayak in southern Borneo only know the oral tradi- est daughter would become the emperor's wife. She
tions from their ancestors. The only written sourcesailed to China, but the ruler gave Putrì Tunjong
they know about is the dubious book "Ngaju Reli- Bueh in marriage to the young envoy. Many authors
gion" from 1963 by the Swiss missionary Schärer. tell that the young Chinese who married Putrì Tun-
In fact, much older written sources give a quite dif-jong Bueh, was appointed by Sang Si Perba as the
ruler of Palembang's inland and of all Chinese in
ferent origin of the Ngaju tribal religion. Here, I se-
lect two sources only, a Dutch and a German one.Palembang. All rulers of Palembang are descend-
ed from him up to this day. Also, the saga of Ban-
jarese Putrì Junjung Buhi (or Buih or Bueh) shows
I the same characteristics: the princess in the foam,
floating down from the upper waters of a river, her
The Dutch historian on "Indies" history, J. Pijnap- husband from a kingdom beyond of the sea, from
pel, - actually the German geologist and metallur- Majapahit, emerging sitting in a gong at the mouth
gist H. von Gaffron, whose language and writings of B arito River.
confused the Dutch scientist - wrote a very pro- The more ancient the source and tradition about
found essay on southern Borneo (1859). In 1853,
H. von Gaffron travelled in the western part of 2 Formerly known as "Pembuang," because Raja Tanga was
expelled from this area as well as some time later he had to
southern Borneo and collected important facts/ma-
flee from Sampit to Java (Pijnappel 1860: 304, 311).
terial about nature, people, history, and religion. 3 Eisenberger(1936: 4); Schwaner( 1853/1: 46 f.); Rees (1865/1:
He reports, that before 1846 the Dayak were politi- 14f.); Cense (1928: 14f., 125-128); Ras (1968: 27, 29, 60-
cally and economically independent and with their 62, 93 f.).
own ships bartered with the Malays in Singapore 4 Sejarah Melayu: Overbeck (1927: 131 f.); Mees (1935: 34 f.);
Ras (1968: 86).
5 Literally translated from ancient Malayan: The princess, the
1 Lembaga Pengembangan (2003: 15; 2002: 27, 30); Baier lotus in the foam, in modern Indonesian: The princess, lifted
(2008: 44 f.); Mahin (2009: 217f., 334 f.). up by the foam.
Anthropos 110.2015
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Berichte und Kommentare 207
this mouth of
ancestress, thethe river. There
moreshe met the male ancestor
it is dom
of Southeast Asia, the
"Manyamei Tunggul nearer
Garing Janjahunan Laut, Sa- it is
duism. Thus, Ras insists
hawung Tangkuranan Hariran," freelyon
transcribedthe
as con
Indian goddess Lakshmi
"The Great-Grandfather, (1968:
the stump of the ivory-tree 4
According towhich
Rachel
emerged from the sea, theStorm
godlike Sahawung (200
from the milkfromocean
the manifold treasures of the sea." This an-it
when was
vas (gods) and cestor entered the world
the in the sea and sailed with
Asuras (demon
reports that a boat
Lakshmi to the coast, where he met the Kameloh.7 in a
sitting
from the water and selected Vishnu as husband. Thus, when we consider sources and their informa-
Palembang and Johor, which dominated Easttion
Su-about the past, we are able to widen our ho-
matra as far as the frontier of Minangkabau in rizon
the and would be saved from one-sidedness and
faults.
16th and 17th centuries (Cribb 2000: 80 f.), are re- We see that this stands also for the knowl-
gions from where the legend of Putrì Junjung Buih edge of one's own culture, especially when there
entered Borneo. Because there are several other im- are no written sources about the past of religion and
portant names of deities originating from Hinduism, culture of the Dayak Ngaju.
such as Mahatara, Dewa, Dewata, Jata, Naga, and
others, it is obvious that some of the main notions
do not originate from the Dayak but are adoptedII
from Indian Hinduism. The tradition is still alive
that the Tumon Dayak from the Delang River and The second kind of sources only gives short notices
about an established custom which belongs to the
the Blantikan River immigrated from the Minangka-
service of the priestesses (blian or baliari) of the
bau area (Mallinckrodt 1924: 399; Kato 1997: 620).
It is a fairly obvious inference that these influencesDayak Ngaju religion: to be available as "hierod-
from India and western Southeast Asia began to en-ules" (in ancient Greece and India temple slaves and
ter Kalimantan during the thalassocracy of the Srivi- prostitutes) during their ritual feasts. The German
jaya Empire and its non-islamic succession states.missionary Denninger reports in 1853: The widow
Now then, we find the Putrì Junjung Buih leg- of a chief in the Paju Epat village Murutuwu (Hud-
son 1976: 27 f.) arranges a cultic feast "and called
end and its characteristics in many so-called "high
cultures" of the coastal kingdoms in the Malay Pen-for a blian from Ja-ar in Patei because the people of
insula, Sumatra, and Borneo. But do we find them Sihong [formerly identical with Paju Epat] . . . don't
have prostitute blians " (Denninger 1854: 341). That
also in tribal oral cultures? Hans Schärer was prob-
ably the only scholar who tried to find the Dutch is true, the priestesses of all Ma'anyan tribes are
structuralism of ancient Javanese and Balinese cul- married women who live in their families with their
tures (in the first half of the 20th century popular own children.
in the Netherlands) in a tribal culture, in the Dayak In the 1840s, these bilians (according to Schwa-
Ngaju culture.6 But Schärer failed totally in his en- ner 1853) were working as common prostitutes in
deavor. The repeated ritual verses with other words the Ngaju area (Lower Barito, Pulau Petak, Kapuas
do not relate to two moieties of the Ngaju tribe but River, and Kahayan River) besides their tasks in
to the art of recitatives of Ngaju ritual poetry (Baier the cult prostitution. They were respected, even es-
1987: XII, XV; 2003: 69; 2008: 31). Otherwise we teemed, in society (Schwaner 1853/1: 185 f., 1853/11:
find the mythology or the Putrì Junjung Buih leg- 1 14; Commissie voor het Adatrecht 1917: 132). The
end exactly in the myth of origin of the Ngaju. earlier German missionaries (before the Banjarese
The Ngaju name of the ancestress in the ritual lan-War) compare them with the Javanese ronggings .8
guage ( Bahasa Sangiang) is: "Kameloh Putak Bu- Ronggings are singing and dancing girls in Java who
lau Janjulen Karangan, Limut Batu Kamasan Tam- perform in village and family festivities. Apparent-
bun," freely transcribed: "The Princess in the gold- ly, they were available as prostitutes during these
en foam which came from the upriver rubble," - the festivities in the 19th century. The Christian retired
second phase of the ritual name with other words: teacher Ikat in Kuala Kapuas-Dahirang told me in
"of the grease which came from the jeweled stones 1969, that in his younger days he was seduced by
from the Naga-dragon." This ancestress really en-
tered the world on the rocks at the upper waters of
the river, then floated downriver with a boat to the 7 Simpei and Hanyi (996: 26-34); Baier (2000: 67; 2008: 46-
51); Lembaga Pengembangan (2003: Kelas I: 31-33, Kelas
III: 37).
6 Schärer (1966/11: 434): the cosmos is divided in two moi- 8 Hupé (1846: 142); Hardeland (1859: 35); see also Halewijn
eties: upper world - nether world. (1832: 285 f.).
Anthropos 110.2015
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208 Berichte und Kommentare
a balian It stands to reason that
prostitute.9 nobody likes Indones
The to hear or
leen Azali writes in
read dark and unpleasant the periodic
facts of the history of his
23): "The ronggeng represents
native land. To my knowledge, no Indonesian schol- a
fane dualism: ar mentions sublime
the this sacred fornication in his
andpublica- holy
the tions. That
prostitute." She point notwithstanding,
cites the head of the
Sir Thom
fles and his famous
Southeast Asian archipelago "The
collection of an Histor
Aus-
342): "Ronggengs
trian museum, aare
lady from the dancing
famous conservative gir
in this country . Solo
House of the . Sultanate,
. not seldom
has touched upon the t
sexual servicesbalian
during their
prostitutes, not to give information aboutperfor
this
It is evident that
institution but in
to pillorythe directly
the German missionaries.
boring areas This
of scholarthe Ngaju
writes in one of (east
her newest essays: the
upper Kapuas "ritual
River performances take and upper
the whole night. There- K
entire Katingan fore, they River) there
[these priestesses] were connected by the was
tion. Pijnappel missionaries
(1860: with the 'sacred fornication'
328 and were
f.) emp
prostitution iscalled 'un-christian'" (Kuhnt-Saptodewo
practiced only and Ma- in th
Petak, and Mentangei"
hin 2009: 144). Original Ngaju sources, area. like § 456
The above in Baier (1977: 365 f.) were not
mentioned observed and taken of Ja
village
way" to the in consideration. In addition, shearea
Ma'anyan claims that Schä-
from
the coast. And just
rer interprets there
these nights was
like worship prostitution th
only balian forand from thehis remarksMa'anyan
(1966!) this was adopted in reg
rate did not the anthropological
exist any literature. It was ignored that
relationship
their tribal many non-missionaries,
religion. such as colonial officers
Thus, this av
titute got her and
pattern
military doctors, in the from the
19th century reported co
Hence, we may aboutinfer
these balian prostitutes.
that The "interpretations
the cult
not an original establishment
of the German missionaries are straitened by their of
but was introduced from Java. The more Islam and Eurocentric feelings" and their "religious fancies"
Christianity were propagated in Central Kalimantan, (Kuhnt-Saptodewo 1993: 60, 329). Thus, the cult
the more this sacred fornication declined. It died out prostitution is limited in period and tribally limited
in about the first quarter of the 20th century.10 exclusively in the Ngaju culture. It was introduced
Other sources and hints are found in van Lum- from outside and pent up by the influence of other
mel's book about Borneo. He quotes: foreign religions. To reach these findings, one must
consider the sources of the 19th and beginning of
1. the German missionary Johann Friedrich Be- the 20th century. Alas, there are West-European an-
cker (1836-1849 in Borneo), the first person who thropologists who never consider such sources and
publish especially geographic errors in their publi-
described the death festival Tiwah reasonably in de-
cations. This small essay should give hints that for
tail; important statements are cited in ancient Ngaju
language. Beside the male head priest female priest- a serious scientific publication such sources must be
checked and studied.
esses ( bliangs , "a bad bit of skirt") are reciting "day
and night," when they "act disgracefully, that would
be unmentionable"(van Lummel 1882: 30).
I have to thank Professor F. Andrew Smith (Adelaide,
2. When before 1845 in the Pulopetak area kinsfolk
and chumminesses make a night party ("drinking - Australia) for the correction of the English text of my
essay.
bout"), bliangs ("debauched women") have to per-
form (van Lummel 1882: 56, 60).
3. J. H. Barnstein, the first German missionary in
Borneo (1835-1863), reports that even the Chinese
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