Metamorphosis of the Cassowaries by Alfred Gell

Author:Alfred Gell [Gell, Alfred]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Social Science, Anthropology, General, Ethnic Studies, Reference
ISBN: 9781000320947
Google: 4GQPEAAAQBAJ
Publisher: Routledge
Published: 2020-10-09T05:04:25+00:00

x. THE ‘ABA’ DANCERS AND THE ‘YIS’ CEREMONY

As the early hours of the morning draw on, the spectators keep an ear open for the call of the small bird kib whose singing is the first warning of the imminence of dawn. At length, it is heard, and shortly after a breath of wind, a hint of pallor in the east, and the sounds of the dawn chorus in the forest, bring the night of the Cassowary to an end. A cry goes up ‘haibudiiime!’ (‘it is finished!’) - and the cassowaries depart for a well-earned rest. In the grey, misty atmosphere of the dawn they are replaced by the dancers playing the aba or ‘sago’ roles. These dancers have been waiting in the enclosure in readiness to take over from the departing cassowaries, who transfer their masks to them, according to their moieties. While they wear the same ageli masks as the cassowaries, their body-paint is in sharp contrast. Instead of the all-black paint of the night dancers, the aha are painted in broad horizontal polychrome bands, in yellow, red, white and black, with black markings on their joints, as can be seen in the figure illustrating the aha (Fig. 25). Like the cassowaries they wear pedasuh and oktek. Their dancing continues while the sun comes up. Meanwhile the women depart to their own hamlets since they should not see the yis (cooked sago) ceremony which is about to take place. While the aha dance senior men are preparing a fire by the popau (fence). Cooking stones are heated on this fire, over which, when it is going strongly, the aha dancers must take it in turns to leap. The stones are being heated to boil water to make sago jelly, which is done in the following manner. Two buckets made of limbum spathes are needed, one to hold the dry sago fl.our (aha) one to hold the boiling water. All the men have contributed a handful of their own sago fl.our to make the yis on this occasion. When the stones are red hot they are dropped into the limbum bucket which has been filled with water, which rapidly comes to the boil. The boiling water is then poured over the sago fl.our in the other bucket, which bubbles and hisses. The mixture is stirred vigorously. In a few moments the liquid mixture starts to solidify, or as the Umedas put it, it ‘dies’ (yahaitav). All the men crowd round the newly made sago, with the aha dancers at the centre. There is considerable commotion as the aha dancers are jostled by the throng of men, and their hands are seized and plunged into the near-boiling jelly in the bucket. Each dancer grasps a handful of the hot yis and casts it in the air over their heads. Then all the other men follow suit, crying ‘ehm bah alehah!’ meaning: ‘its head rises up’ (referring to the sago palms). The air is filled with flying fragments of hot jelly, which fall to the ground and are subsequently trampled in.

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