An account of a berhantu ceremony called “perakong” by the Orang Belait of Brunei
H. Hughes-Hallett, a Member of the Civil Service in Brunei, published this first-hand ethnographic account of the perakong ceremony in 1938, describing a pagan harvest ritual performed by the Orang Belait of the lower Belait River near the Sarawak boundary. The article’s central argument is that despite the group’s small size (at most 800 individuals) and its apparent cultural marginality, the extraordinary complexity and antiquity of the ceremony’s material culture indicate a tradition with deep roots in the Baram region of Sarawak, from which the Orang Meting component was expelled approximately 50 to 100 years earlier (p. 102).
Summary
Hughes-Hallett provides a detailed descriptive account of a two-day perakong ceremony he witnessed, which he states was the first European observation of the rite (p. 102). The ceremony is a “berhantu” (spirit-possession) harvest festival marking the successful completion of rice harvesting, whose purpose is to sacrifice to spirits in order to placate them and to terminate the pantang (taboo) on consuming the new rice and fowl flesh that has been in force since the commencement of harvesting (p. 103). The performance involves continuous dancing and chanting to an unvarying musical accompaniment, circumambulation of a central array of sacred objects, the use of a swinging seat (“atowi”) for attaining the state of berhantu, and the treatment of the sick by performers believed to possess healing powers in that state (pp. 103–105).
The article’s analytical value lies not in the description itself but in Hughes-Hallett’s observation that the ceremony’s “infinity of detail” and the “comparative antiquity” of its essential objects—the carved crocodile head and tail, the perakong board, the parang and sumptan, the two-tiered wooden tray—point to a well-established cultural tradition improbable among a group so small and recently displaced (p. 102). He frames the account as a contribution to comparative ethnology, hoping that a scholar familiar with Baram cultures might identify the ceremony’s origin and note divergences attributable to the group’s alien environment over the preceding decades (p. 102). The Orang Belait are described as a fusion of two elements: the original Belait and the more numerous Orang Meting, expelled from the Lemeting River (a tributary of the Tinjar, itself a water of the Baram), who have so intermingled that they present themselves indiscriminately as Belait (p. 102).
The narrative is structured around the two nights of performance. The first night (approximately 8 p.m. to 1 a.m.) establishes the ritual framework: the swinging seat, the penjungun (suspended exhibits including a model house, cloth, and daun berhantu), the brass trays of offerings, and the continuous dance to the perakong tune. The second day is occupied in preparing the jong (a boat-shaped bamboo frame packed with rice flour packets), the decorated bamboo poles, and the jambatan (an open-air extension of the house). The second night (approximately 5 p.m. to 7 a.m.) culminates in the hauling of the loaded jong toward the jambatan, the elders’ tasting of offerings, the production of “manas” (a supernatural bead), the dismantling of the perakong board, and the sacrificial tasting of fowls on the jambatan which formally terminates the pantang (pp. 105–108).
Key Findings
- The perakong ceremony is held approximately once every four years and lasts two or more days, with the same musical tune played without variation or change for nearly 48 hours in total (pp. 103, 106).
- The perakong instrument is a shaped board approximately 6 feet long, suspended horizontally from roof beams about 2 feet above the floor, struck by two players each wielding a peeled rod about 5 feet long and 1 inch in diameter (p. 104).
- The jong, a boat-shaped frame of green bamboo approximately 12 feet long, 2 feet wide, and 2 feet high at the centre, contained about 2 pikuls of rice flour packets (“nyirek”) and was fitted with a massive carved crocodile head and tail of hardwood described as being of “some antiquity” and handed down through the years for this purpose alone (p. 105).
- The ornamental bamboo poles, serving as vantage points for the hantu, were 20–30 feet in length and were pierced with innumerable holes into which were inserted ripe padi, bananas, eggs, areca nuts, a bamboo phial of oil, a cooked sago-palm grub (“embatar”), and a scored fish (“keli”) (p. 106).
- The gong battery comprised eight instruments: five agong and three chanang, accompanied by the perakong board and a drum (p. 104).
- The Orang Belait group numbers at most approximately 800 individuals, and Hughes-Hallett notes that intermarriage with other peoples will “before long submerge their identity” (p. 102).
Conclusion
Hughes-Hallett’s definitive takeaway is that the perakong ceremony, for all its apparent monotony and the small scale of its practitioners, constitutes a living vestige of a substantial and ancient cultural tradition originating in the Baram region of Sarawak. The persistence of antiquated ritual objects and the sheer density of prescribed detail, he argues, cannot be accounted for by the ingenuity of a group of only 800 people recently transplanted to an alien environment; rather, they testify to a deep ceremonial inheritance that has survived the disruption of displacement and the pressures of assimilation (pp. 102, 108).
Context
- Hughes-Hallett held the rank of M.C.S. (Member of the Civil Service), indicating his role as a colonial administrator in Brunei; his account is framed by the administrative ethnography typical of the period, in which European officials documented indigenous customs as part of their governance responsibilities.
- The article draws exclusively on the author’s direct observation and oral information from the Orang Belait themselves; no archival or comparative literature is cited, and the piece functions as a primary field record rather than a synthetic scholarly analysis.