Adoption entitles an individual to all the privileges of the family, and as the writer and his wife were adopted into a family possessing the right to all the ceremonies, they became at once participants in all the events which are here described. In this way it was possible to obtain information and instruction on many points which observation alone could scarcely afford.
The Pala-an ceremony is the first round on the social and religious ladder. It is here given in some detail, and is then followed by others, in the order of their importance.
Pala-an.—The Pala-an is held when some member of the family is ill, or when the structure of that name needs repair. Many spirits visit the people during this rite, but the one chiefly interested is Īdadaya, the spirit of the east. He and his ten grandchildren wear in their hair the notched tail-feathers of a rooster, which are known as īgam. From time to time these lose their luster, and they can only be refreshed by having some mortal celebrate Pala-an.
When it appears that these ornaments need attention, the Īdadaya will notify some family, either through a medium or by sending illness to them.
A family having received such a notification summons a medium, and she at once begins to gather saklag (Justicia gendarussa L.) and sikag (Lygodium sp. near scandens) and a grass known as bildis, while the men secure the bamboo and other materials used in building the spirit structure. One corner of the living room is screened off with a large white blanket called tabing, and behind it the medium places unthreshed rice and jars which she has decked with vines and leaves.
While she is thus engaged, the men are busy building the pala-an (Plate [XXIV]). This consists of four long poles—three of bamboo and one of a resinous tree, anteng,[16] set in a square and supporting, near the top, a platform of bamboo.
A number of women have been invited to assist the family, and they now proceed to beat out sufficient rice to serve the guests. When the pounding is finished, a rice-mortar is set out in the open, and a little rice is placed in it. The women, armed with long pestles, gather Page 327around and, keeping time to the music of copper gongs, they circle the mortar contra-clockwise, striking its edge three times in regular beats of 1, 2, 3; on the next beat the leader strikes the bottom of her pestle against that of her neighbor, on the first and second beats, but on the third she pounds the rice in the mortar. This is repeated by the woman on her right and so on around the circle. Then the leader strikes the top of her pestle against the top of the one held by the women next her on two beats and on the third pounds rice, and this is repeated by all. The music now becomes much faster, and, keeping time with it, the leader strikes first into the rice, then whirls clear around and strikes the pestle of the woman on her left; again she turns and strikes that of the woman on her right. Each follows her in turn, and soon all are in motion about the mortar, alternately pounding the rice and clashing pestles. This is known as kītong, and is the method prescribed by the great spirit Kabonīyan for the breaking of a part of the rice to be used in this and other ceremonies (Plate [XXXI]).
As soon as the pounding is finished, the medium places some of the newly broken rice in a bamboo dish, and places this on a rice winnower. She also adds a skirt, five pieces of betel-nut, two piper leaves, and a little dish of oil, and carries the collection below the pala-an, where a bound pig lies. The betel-nut and leaf are placed on the animal, then the medium dips her fingers in the oil, and strokes its side while she recites the following dīam:—
“The spirit who lives in Dadaya lies in bed; he looks at his īgam, and they are dull. He looks again, ‘Why are my īgam dull? Ala, let us go to Sudipán, where the Tinguian live, and let us take our īgam, so that some one may make them bright again.’ After that they laid them (the īgam) on the house of the Īpogau, and they are all sick who live in that house. Kabonīyan looked down on them. ‘Ala, I shall go down to the Īpogau,’ He truly went down to them, ‘What is the matter with you?’ ‘We are all sick who live in the same place,’ said those sick ones. ‘That is true, and the cause of your sickness is that they (the spirits) laid down their īgam on you. It is best that you make Pala-an, since you have received their īgam, for that is the cause of your illness,’ After that they made Pala-an, and they recovered from their sickness, those who lived in the same place. (Here the medium calls the spirits of Dadaya by name and then continues.) ‘Now those who live in the same place make bright again those īgam which you left in their house. Make them well again, if you please’.”
As soon as she finishes her recital, the pig is stabbed in the throat, Page 328its blood is collected, and is mixed with cooked rice. The carcass is singed at once. Five men then carry it to the top of the pala-an, where it is cut up. The suet and the hind legs are handed to the medium, who places them behind the screen in the room, and the family may then rest assured that the spirits thus remembered will free them from headache and sore eyes. After the flesh has been cut into small pieces, most of it is carried into the dwelling to be cooked for the guests, but a portion is placed in a bamboo tube, and is cooked beneath the pala-an. When it is ready to serve, the five men again go to the top of the structure and eat it, together with cooked rice, then they take the bamboo cooking tube, tie some of the sacred vines from behind the curtain about it, and fasten it to one pole of the pala-an. The men in the house are free to eat, and when they are finished, the women dine.