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Updated: June 6, 2025
A = TUSHUN TUVA, tuba root; B = JALAUT, fruit of PLUKENETIA CORNICULATA; D = KOWIT, interlocking hooks. From a tatu-block in coll. C. Hose. Kayan design for front of thigh of woman of high class. A = TUSHUN TUVA; B = DULANG HAROK, bows of a boat; C = ULU TINGGANG, hornbill's head; D = BELILING BULAN, full moons. From a tatu-block in the Sarawak Museum.
For their languages seem to be closely allied; but in each region the nomads seem to have adopted many words from their settled neighbours, with whom they trade; and instances are known to us in which the men of the settled tribes have married women of the nomads and have adopted their mode of life, and others in which children of nomad women, married into Kenyah, Kayan, or other villages, have gone back to their mothers' people.
Of these people, as of so many others, the melancholy tale of disappearance of tatu amongst the present generation and replacement of indigenous by Kayan designs was told, and it seems only too likely that within the next decade or two none will be left to illustrate a once flourishing and beautiful art.
Distances between villages are always expressed in terms of the average time taken by a boat in ascending the stream from one to the other. In order to describe the size of a solid object such as a fish, a Kayan would compare its thickness with that of some part of his body, the forearm, the calf of the leg, the thigh, or head, or the waist.
We shall now treat of those tribes that have a distinctive and original tatu, but it is well to bear in mind, that amongst many of these people also the Kayan designs are coming into vogue more and more, ousting the old designs. No tatu-blocks are employed for the indigenous patterns, all the work being done free-hand.
Although the women use these patterns in beadwork and in tatuing, they rely in the main on the men for the patterns which they copy; these being drawn on wood or cloth for beadwork, or carved in low relief for tatuing. A Kayan expert may carry in mind a great variety of designs.
A few days later, the chief having early in the morning taken omens from a small bird, the inhabitants with few exceptions departed on a tuba-fishing expedition to the Pipa, a small tributary to the Kayan River farther north.
The foregoing description of the relations of a Kayan chief to his people applies in the main to the Kenyah chief. But among the Kenyahs the position of the chief is one of greater authority and consideration than among the Kayans.
The best is known as Kayan gutta, because it is gathered and sent to the bazaars by the Kayans in a pure form. The trees are felled and the stem and branches are ringed at intervals of about eighteen inches, a narrow strip of bark being removed at each ring. The milky viscid sap drips out into leaf-cups, which are then emptied into a cylindrical vessel of bark.
The modes of warfare of the other tribes are similar in most respects to that of the Kayans described above; but some peculiarities are worthy of note. Kenyah warfare is very similar to Kayan, save in so far as their more impetuous temper renders their tactics more dashing. While the Kayans endeavour to make as many captives as possible, the Kenyahs attach little value to them.
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