Vietnam or Thailand ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Updated: May 21, 2025
A NGARONG may after a time manifest itself in some new form, but even then the Iban will continue to respect the animal-form in which it first appeared. In some cases the cult of a secret helper will spread through a whole family or household.
Or he may leave the corpse in the jungle and sacrifice a fowl before it there. On the following night he hopes to dream of the NGARONG again, and perhaps he is told in his dream to take the tusks from the dead boar and that they will bring him good luck. Unless he dreams something of this sort, he feels that he has been mistaken, and that the boar was not really his secret helper.
He first said to it, "I don't want to kill you, but the TUAN who is giving me wages expects me to, and the blame is his. But if you are really the NGARONG of my grandfather, make the shot miss you." He then shot and missed three times, and on shooting a fourth time he killed a gibbon, but not the one he had spoken to. Anggus does not think the gibbon helps either his father or himself.
Inquiries made since the publication of the facts reported in the foregoing paragraphs have shown us that the cult of the NGARONG or secret helper is probably not common to all branches of the Sea Dayaks people.
In other cases, again, all the members of a man's family and all his descendants, and, if he be a chief, all the members of the community over which he rules, may come to share in the benefits conferred by his NGARONG, and in the feeling of respect for it and in the performance of rites in honour of the species of animal in one individual of which it is supposed to reside.
So great is their reserve in this connection that one of us lived for fourteen years on friendly terms with Ibans of various districts without ascertaining the meaning of the word NGARONG, or suspecting the great importance of the part played by the notion in the lives of some of these people.
The NGARONG IS one of the very few topics in regard to which the Ibans display any reluctance to speak freely.
Since correcting the proofs of this chapter we have come upon a brief account of the guardian spirits of the Iban, which corroborates our account of the Ngarong. Edm. In this account the guardian spirit is called TUA, and we are told that ,The TUA or guardian spirit of an Iban has its external manifestation in a snake, a leopard, or some other denizen of the forest.
Word Of The Day
Others Looking