11Story

07 May 2009

The objects of the priest

The Batak

Contents - The history and western discovery of the Batak - Social and political life - Religion and rituals             * The beliefs             * Tondi and begu - The objects of the priest: the datu items - The Death - Synopsis of the exhibition             * The Workd of the Dead             * Singa             * Musical instruments             * The Toba House             * Enclosing the world             * Weapons and associated objects             * The datu items             * The protection - Bibliography

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The objects of the priest: the datu items

 

In many Batak communities ‘there are people who are accepted as having the ability to perform practices of the ancient religion’. These people are called datu (in Toba) or guru (among the Karo), words that can best be translated in English as priests. Below I will continue to use the Toba word datu. Although there are local differences in the role of the priests, within the framework of this book I will not go too much into detail. It is good, however, to realize that not every datu is good in everything. There are clearly specialists for certain tasks and people are well aware of that. As mentioned earlier it is of great importance to recover the tondi of a sick person and to make it return to the body. This is indeed one of the major tasks of the datu. However, the datu can also take care of the well-being of a whole group and can therefore be a central figure in communal rituals. Juara Ginting, a Karo anthropologist, sums up different types of priests among the Karo: healer and preparer of medicines, masseur, healer of mental illnesses, specialist of the lunar calendar to determine good or bad days, fortune teller, the one who reproduces the language of the spirits, the medium between the living and the dead, specialist in magic spells, specialist in singing the magic spells, the one who prepares the magic substances, the master of black magic, the specialist who makes the amulets and finally the priest who is able to follow a begu when it brings disaster (Ginting 1991: 85).

 

 

Datu knife with a singa. A human tooth is on the chest of the character, another one on the head of the singa. This knife undoubtedly belonged to a priest-magician, a datu toba. © musée du quai Branly, photo Patrick Gries 70.2001.27.512.1-2

 

 

The datu use a great variety of objects for ritual purposes. Some of these objects are containers to store medicine or magic substances, others are amulets often with texts inscribed. Datu also use books in which extensive instructions are written, particularly on how specific rituals should be performed. The script cannot be read by ordinary people. It is a specialist job to read the instructions and interpret the drawings. Often it concerns a kind of personalized writing, only comprehensible for the one who wrote it or has been specially instructed to read it. The script itself is probably derived from old Javanese Kawi script. Such ways of writing are not limited to the Batak area only. In some other regions on Sumatra similar scripts occur. The most conspicuous object of a datu is, however, the magic staff. For many outsiders this type of staff has become an emblem of Batak culture and as a consequence they can be found in many Western Museums. Often the staffs are beautifully carved, so it shows that they are indeed important ritual objects. Generally speaking there are two types of magic staffs: the tunggal panaluan and the tunggal malehat. Although the stylistic differences between the two types are clear the differences in function – if there are any - are not well-documented. The tunggal panaluan is longer than the tunggal malehat and is elaborately carved on about ¾ of its length. It is made out of one piece of wood. With the tunggal malehat often only the top is carved and it can be made out of two pieces of wood. The top can, for instance, be separated from the rest of the staff.

 

 

Very present in the ritual objects of the datu, the drugs horns naga mosarang were used as receptacle with the magic substance raja ni pagar. A powerful head of singa is used as stopper.  © musée du quai Branly, Patrick Gries, Valérie Torre, 70.2001.27.195.

 

 

There are indications that the magic staffs also served as emblems for specific groups and that groups or villages could not be officially recognized without having their own staff. The origin of the magic staff is locally explained by a myth, existing in various versions. I will here summarised the myth of origin as given by missionary J.H. Meerwaldt in 1902.   Once upon a time there was a king whose wife gave birth to a twin: a boy and a girl. The boy and the girl grew up together and were inseparable. For this reason the parents became afraid that they would commit incest and decided to secretly remove the girl. The parents told the boy that his sister had died. The boy however asked the other villagers where he could find his sister’s grave and he finally heard that she was not dead; that she was living with a distant uncle. The boy searched for and found his sister and together they ran away. In the forest they fell into the evil which the parents had feared so long. Then the twin saw a tree in the forest with ripe fruits. The girl was thirsty and asked her brother to climb in the tree to fetch the fruit. So he did, but having reached the top of the tree his body changed to wood and became one with the tree. His sister climbed to the top to free him, but she was struck by the same fate. When the father of the twin understood what had happened he successively asked five different type of datu to free his children. However, all these datu, as the children, changed into wood and were stuck forever in the tree. Then an even greater datu was called for advice. His judgement was the following: Listen, king of ours, these people can no longer be called back to life, because they have been struck by the curse of the gods. However, they have all died a sudden death and for this reason their image will be the most powerful magic substance with which to scare the enemy. My advice, therefore, is this: cut down this tree and make its wood into poles, looking like these people. These will scare the enemy and cause lengthy droughts to cease (see Rassers 1998: 60-62).

 

 

	Ceremonial autel with vegetable structure prolonged by three tunggal panaluan planted in the ground. Lumban Tonga village, south of Samosir. © Tropenmuseum, Amsterdam, inv. 10001051.

 

 

 

 

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