The pagan tribes of Borneo - Get a Free Blog Here

DECORATIVE ART 245
the body. A paper embodying most of the facts
hitherto ascertained has been published by one of
us (C. H.) in conjunction with Mr. R. Shelford,
formerly curator of the Sarawak Museum, who has
paid special attention to the subject ; we therefore
reproduce here the greater part of the substance of
that paper/ with some slight modifications, and we
desire to express our thanks to Mr. Shelford^ for
his kind permission to make use of the paper in
this way.
The great diversity of tribes in Borneo involves, in a
study of their tatu and tatuing methods, a good deal of
research and much travel, if first-hand information on the
subject is to be obtained. Between us we have covered
a considerable area in Borneo and have closely crossquestioned
members of nearly every tribe inhabiting
Sarawak on their tatu, but we cannot claim to have
exhausted the subject by any means ; there are tribes in
the interior of Dutch Borneo and in British North Borneo
whom we have not visited, and concerning whom our
knowledge is of the scantiest.
The practice of tatu is so widely spread throughout
Borneo that it seems simpler to give a list of the tribes
that do not tatu, than of those who do. We can divide
such a list into two sections : the first including those tribes
that originally did not tatu, though nowadays many
individuals are met with whose bodies are decorated with
designs copied from neighbouring tribes ; the second
including the tribes (mostly Klemantan) that have given
up the practice of tatu owing to contact with Mohammedan
and other influences.
A. I. Punan.
2. Maloh.
3. Land Dyak.
^ "Materials for a Study of Tatu in Borneo," by Charles Hose and R.
vShelford, J. R.A.I, vol. xxxvi. Here also we have to thank the Council
of the Royal Anthropological Institute for permission to republish part of
this paper, and to reproduce the plates and figures accompanying it. The
reference figures of this section refer to the bibliographical list at the end of
this chapter.
^ Since these pages were printed we have had to mourn tlie loss of our
friend and fellow-worker, cut off in the early summer of a life strenuously
devoted to scientific research.