Seventeen Years Among the Sea Dyaks of Borneo / A Record of Intimate Association with the Natives of the Bornean Jungles

by Edwin Herbert Gomes

At the Dyak Head Feast, Singalang Burong—the Mars of Dyak mythology—is specially invoked to be present in the pengap which is sung. In the feasts connected with farming, Pulang Gana, the god of the soil, is invoked, and asked to drive from their farms all rats and birds and insects that may hurt the paddy. And at the feasts given in honour of the dead all the spirits of dead relatives and friends, as well as those of mythical heroes, are invited to partake of the good things provided. Then, again, when the manangs, or Dyak witch-doctors, are called in to cure a sick man, they often walk round and round the sick man, and chant a pengap, invoking Salampandai, the Great Spirit-Doctor, to come to their aid, and make their charms efficacious in bringing about the cure of the sick man.

Some of the Dyak pengap are of great length, and the singing of them occupies the whole night. The singer or singers begin soon after 8 p.m., and go on till early dawn, only resting for about half an hour, two or three times during the whole night.

The song of mourning is among some tribes sung by a professional wailer, generally a woman, who is paid to lament the lost, and by her presence and incantation to assist and guide the soul in its journey to Hades (Sabayan). Her song is begun on the evening of the death, and lasts the whole night. The sum of it is this:—She blames the different parts of the house for allowing the soul to depart, and she calls upon bird, beast, and fish to go to Hades with a message, but in vain, for they are unable to undertake the journey. Then in despair she calls upon the Spirit of the Winds to go. At first the spirit is reluctant, but at the earnest request of the wailer, who calls his wife to her aid, he at length consents to do her bidding. His journey through forests and plains, hills and valleys, across rivers and the sea, is minutely described till night comes on, and, tired and hungry, he stops to rest for the night. He climbs a high tree to see which is the proper road—on all sides there are roads: the ways of the dead are very numerous—but all is dim, misty, and uncertain. In his perplexity, he changes his human form, and metamorphoses himself into a rushing wind. He soon makes his presence in Hades known by a furious tempest, which sweeps all before it, and rouses the sleeping inhabitants. Startled, they ask each other what is the meaning of this great commotion. The Spirit of the Wind answers that their presence is wanted in the land of the living. They must go and fetch a certain man and his belongings who wishes to come to Hades, but does not know the way, and needs someone to guide him. The dead rejoice at the summons. In a moment they collect together, get into a long boat, and paddle hurriedly through Limban, the Dyak Styx. When they arrive at the landing-place, the dead make an eager rush for the house, and enter the room of the dead man. The departed soul cries out in anguish at being thus suddenly and violently carried off, but long before the ghostly party have reached their abode in Hades, he becomes reconciled to his fate. Such in brief outline is the song of the wailer. By her song she has helped to convey the soul to its new home. Without her aid the soul would be lost, and remain suspended in mid-air and find no rest.

The songs and incantations of the Dyaks are not set to any particular melody. They are sung to a kind of chant, and long sentences are often repeated on one note. But they have several distinct settings for the different songs and incantations, and these seem to suit the subject. The song of mourning, for instance, sounds very sad and pathetic even to one who does not understand the language.

The musical instruments of the Dyaks are of a more or less primitive type, but when played together, the result is not unpleasing. Those employed as an accompaniment to the Sword Dance or the War Dance are brass gongs of different sizes and a variety of drums. First there is the deep-sounding brass tawak, the sound of which travels a great distance, and which, when struck in a peculiar manner, is the danger signal in times of war. Next in order of importance comes the smaller brass gong which is called the chanang, and lastly the engkrumong of eight small brass gongs of different sizes arranged in order in a long open box. The player of the engkrumong has a stick in each hand, and strikes these different gongs in quick succession.

They have numerous drums of different shapes and sizes. They are made of different kinds of wood, with deer-skin or monkey-skin tightly stretched over one or both ends.

The effect of all these instruments of percussion played together is inspiring, and not at all displeasing. There is no harsh discordant clanging, as is so often the case in the music of primitive races. There are different ways of striking the drums and other instruments, and each of these ways has a distinctive name. The rhythm of the music of the Sword Dance differs entirely from that of the War Dance, and for each of these dances there are various different arrangements for the musical instruments.

Among their wind instruments is the engkrurai, which is constructed of a number of bamboo tubes fixed in an empty gourd, the long stem of which forms the mouth-piece. All the notes can be sounded together, and combinations of notes or single notes can be produced from it by shutting or opening finger-holes placed laterally at the lower end of the bamboo tubes. There are generally seven bamboo tubes, six of them arranged in a circle round a larger and longer central one. All seven are furnished with a reed at the base, where they are inserted into the gourd. Holes are cut in the six outer pipes for fingering. The central pipe is an open or drone-pipe, the tone of which is intensified by fixing a loose cap of bamboo on the upper end. It is played by blowing air into the neck of the gourd, or by drawing in the breath, according to the effect desired. The volume of sound is not great, and the music produced is not unlike that of the Scotch bagpipes played very softly and very badly.

They have a flute, or rather flageolet (ensuling), made of bamboo, with a plug at the mouth-hole. It is blown at the end, and there are three or four finger-holes, so that different notes can be produced.

Another musical instrument is the serunai, or one-stringed fiddle. The body is half a gourd-shell, the mouth of which is covered up with a circular piece of soft wood, which is thin and close-fitting, the seams being cemented with wax. To this is fixed the stock, an arm about two feet long made of hard wood. The bow is a bent cane, and the string of the bow a split rattan about a foot in length. The string of this instrument is of the same material, and there is a peg at the end of the stock by which the string can be tightened. There is a movable bridge on the belly of the instrument for the string to rest upon. The body is sometimes made of half a cocoanut-shell instead of a gourd. The string has to be wetted before it will sound, and then it gives forth a monotonous, mournful, dismal sound when the bow is rubbed against it.