Rice planting customs in the Baram District, Sarawak
E. Banks, a British colonial administrator in Sarawak, published this ethnographic record in 1940, compiling pantang (lali) prohibitions governing rice cultivation among the Kayan, Kenyah, Kalamantan, and Punan peoples of the Baram District. The article documents the extensive periods of enforced retreat that these communities observe at each stage of the rice-growing cycle, arguing that while these customs carry social and spiritual significance, their agricultural consequences—particularly the ten-day harvest pantangs during which crops are left unattended to animals and birds—represent a serious material cost to the communities themselves.
Summary
Banks frames the pantang as a form of ritual retreat in which the people of a longhouse withdraw to their homes, cease all farm work, and refuse entry to strangers, invoking the aid of spirits for the success of their crops. The occasions are typically tied to the clearing, planting, and reaping of rice, and a forfeit is levied on any outsider who breaches the prohibition. Banks draws a sharp typological distinction between the groups: the Kayans are “far and away the most fanatical,” announcing pantang dates in advance and refusing even trusted friends once the period has begun; the Kenyahs are “much more philosophical” and accommodating to chance-bound strangers; the Kalamantans are “comparatively very vague,” often constructing their customs retrospectively from what they remember of other peoples; and the Punans are “wandering” in their observance.
A central thread of the article is Banks’s critical assessment of the agricultural irrationality of the longest pantangs. He describes with evident frustration how both Kayans and Kenyahs, “whether they have plenty of food in store or are almost starving,” solemnly shut themselves in for ten days while their ripening rice is being consumed by deer, pigs, rats, and birds. He notes that Kayan men of sense acknowledge the absurdity in hard times but are overruled by “hide-bound conservative” women who rarely speak Malay and whose influence erases any daytime progress made with the men. The Kalamantans, he observes, are “slightly more sensible,” tending crops by day while observing the pantang only at night.
Banks also situates the Bornean lali within a broader comparative framework by drawing an extended parallel with the genna ceremonies of the Sema Nagas of Assam, as recorded by J. H. Hutton (1921). The correspondence is close in sequence—clearing, burning, sowing, weeding, ear formation, harvesting, and bringing home—but the Naga gennas each last a single day whereas the Bornean pantangs stretch from three to thirty days. Banks concludes the comparison with the observation that “the Naga is the wiser in keeping them of short duration.”
Key Findings
- The Kayan Uma Poh spend a total of 117 days in pantang retreat over the course of their rice farming cycle, not counting additional pantangs for births, deaths, and other events (p. 85).
- The Kayan Uma Paku observe a sequence of at least ten distinct pantangs from felling to first pounding, with individual durations ranging from four days (Pantang Parei Agit) to twenty days (Pantang Nyihow), and forfeits including gongs, pigs, fowls, knives, and beads per door (pp. 86–87).
- The Kenyah Leppu Tau observe a one-month pantang at the start of the cycle, with a stranger’s intrusion forfeiting three pigs, five fowls, and a knife; their harvest pantang (Pantang Lunoh) lasts twelve days (p. 91).
- The Kalamantan Batu Blah impose a pantang of only half a day for one stage, with an intruder forfeiting a gong, a large pig (four hand-spreads round the waist), a knife, and a stewpan; their mourning pantang lasts a full month (p. 102).
- The Kalamantan Orang Bukit fine widows and widowers $31 for sexual intercourse within forty days of a partner’s death, payable to Government, in addition to a gong to the deceased’s relatives (p. 103).
- The Sema Naga genna system, used as a comparative benchmark, comprises at least twelve named ceremonies each lasting one day, covering the same agricultural sequence as the Bornean pantangs but at roughly one-tenth the duration (p. 86).
Conclusion
Banks’s definitive takeaway is that the pantang system, while possessing genuine social and spiritual value as a mechanism for communal cohesion and spiritual propitiation, imposes a disproportionate agricultural penalty on the Baram peoples—particularly the Kayans—whose rigid observance of multi-week harvest retreats directly undermines food security. His implicit argument, delivered in the measured tone of a colonial administrator, is that these customs are not immutable: the Kalamantans have already modified them, the Kenyahs observe shorter periods, and the Kayan men themselves acknowledge the irrationality when pressed. The article thus functions as both a descriptive record and a quiet case for administrative encouragement of reform.
Context
- Banks compiled this article from information provided by Native Officers and Upriver Agents at the direction of Mr. F. H. Pollard, indicating it was produced as an administrative reference document for the Sarawak government’s engagement with Baram communities rather than as an independent scholarly inquiry (p. 83).
- The article’s framing reflects the colonial administrative concern with understanding native customs that might obstruct government operations upriver—Banks repeatedly notes the friction caused when Kayans refuse entry to government officers during pantang periods (pp. 83–84).