The Poetics of the Flute: Fading Imagery in a Sepik Society

Abstract

Male initiation rituals used to be of central importance for the Sepik River societies of Papua New Guinea. Among the Karawari-speaking Ambonwari they were characterized by two idiosyncratic song-dances: one associated with the spirit-crocodiles and the other with the bamboo flutes. Hence, the songs of the flute and crocodile were the most secret songs known only to a small number of ‘big men’. Since the Catholic charismatic movement entered the village at the end of 1994, all previously important rituals were slowly abandoned and so were the song-dances of the crocodile and flute. By analysing various transpositions of meanings in the song of the flute one can detect vanishing cultural values and fading social relationships that these verses were meant to sustain.

Introduction

Papua New Guinea has a vast variety of cultural practices that include singing (see, for example, Drüppel 2009; Harrison 1986; Rumse y and Niles 2011; Scoditti 1996; Stewart and Strathern 2005; Wassmann 1991; Yamada 1997). Beside love-songs, laments, and modern songs of Papua New Guinea string bands, the Karawari-speaking Ambonwari from East Sepik Province have had several collective singing and dancing events. The very special songs, dancing steps, carved spirit-beings, and instruments used in initiation rituals belonged to the ‘big men’ and were hidden from women and children. Men believed in the power of singing and dancing, which in their view created not only tough men out of young boys, but also the Ambonwari cosmos. This was done in cooperation with the spirits of the land and the spirits of the men's house. Manbon siria, ‘singing and dancing of the crocodile’, was sung in the men's house for several days and nights before the novices were brought into it (Telban 2008). During the first night of seclusion of boys in the men's house, the men played flutes and performed sanggut siria, ‘singing and dancing of the flute’. The song-dance of a flute was interrupted with wanyakɨr mariawk, ‘talk of the knife’, when the specificities of village clans, and the relationships between them, were reaffirmed.1 The song-dance of the flute then continued. The last time that the Ambonwari organized a male initiation ritual was at the beginning of 1994, just a few months before the Catholic charismatic movement reached the village (Telban 2009; Telban and Vávrová 2010). That was when all customary practices came under attack. In 2003 all men's houses in the village were pulled down and the previously most secret spirit-things were taken to decay in a nearby forest. Song-dances of the men's house were also brought to a halt.

Figurative Speech in Papua New Guinea

Song-poems, which are part of a singing and dancing ceremony, create a powerful unity of words and images, of verbal expressions and bodily practices. Expressive genres, as Andrew Strathern and Pamela Stewart call different forms of aesthetic communication, including body decoration, ritual, dance, song, and music, ‘not only reflect fundamental cultural values but are actively used in order to create, maintain, or alter such values’ (2005, 1). In this kind of situation, tropes are not merely figures of speech playing with similarities and resemblances for the sake of verbal effect, but are active, change-producing transpositions (Jackson 1989, 141; Telban 2008). They are not just symbolic, but also inductive. Michael Jackson (1989, 141) suggests that the focus of figurative talk in initiation ritual is not in understanding and experiencing one kind of thing in terms of another, but rather in creation and confirmation of unity.

Figurative talk does things and creates realities. It is neither just a way of saying things nor a matter of mere language. This conclusion has also been reached by those who see metaphors as a means of structuring our conceptual system and find them in the activity of mind (e.g. ‘body in mind’ in Lakoff and Johnson 2003), as well as by those who take a critical view of cognitive sciences and maintain that we should also take into account ‘mind in body’ and their unity (Csordas 1987; 1994, 20, n. 2; Jackson 1989). Thus a metaphor becomes real when people see parts of two different things collide (Lewis 1980, 197), when boundaries are eliminated, when a cognitive part (Lakoff and Johnson's ‘conceptual metaphor’) incorporates intentions, emotions, and passions, and blurs the distinction between appearance and reality on which an intellectual distinction between the two depends (Lewis 1980, 113–14).

In the Papua New Guinean lingua franca Tok Pisin one speaks of tok piksa, ‘picture talk’, and tok bokis, ‘box talk’, when referring to figurative speech. These expressions are quite descriptive and not easily recognized in the local languages of Papua New Guinea. What is in literary studies and linguistics called figurative speech is among the Melpa of the Western Highlands and the Wiru of the Southern Highlands identified as talk that is ‘bent’, ‘folded’, and ‘crooked’. This kind of speech is glossed by Andrew Strathern (1975, 189) as ‘veiled speech’. The opposite of it is ‘straight talk’. Francesca Merlan and Alan Rumsey (1991, 102–109), who worked among the Ku Waru people south of Mt Hagen, prefer the term ‘bent speech’ for this kind of talk. Kaluli designate figurative speech with ‘turned over words’ (Feld 1990), while the Foi and the Kewa use ‘tree leaf talk’ and ‘pandanus talk’, respectively (Weiner 1991, 27).

Talk among the Huli is a corporeal property, and can be given, stolen, held, carried, and placed; moreover, it can cut, penetrate, hit, spear, and kill (Goldman 1983, 205 and 208). ‘Both talk and illness are said to “strike” people, and the former may cause the latter’ (Goldman 1983, 209). Similarly to the Huli, the Ambonwari too see every talk to be a corporeal property and find a comparison with illness pertinent. Their expression for figurative speech is wapaysur mariawk, ‘climbing talk’. Wapay- as a verb means ‘come up/on/over’ or ‘climb’, as in sɨmari mɨnma wapaykan, ‘the sun rises/climbs up’, or mari ama wapaykan, ‘illness climbs on me’. The second part in the verb compound, su- (‘kill, trash, make sick’), is used in combination with mariawk, ‘talk, speech’, to mean ‘speak out, tell a secret, divulge’.

Wapaysur mariawk is used to make an ordinary talk more potent. When directed towards a person, he or she has to carry such a talk on the skin. If bad, it brings heaviness on a person. If good, it lifts them up. Such a talk penetrates and permeates a whole person or, as the Ambonwari say, holds a whole person like illness, ritual, or custom do. A particular context determines what kind of ‘climbing talk’ is used and its ‘heaviness’. However, it is also a particular ‘climbing talk’ that makes the context and creates social and cultural reality. Thus, just as someone else's talk climbs on people and affects them, so do people use the ‘climbing talk’ to make things happen. The ‘song of the flute’ and the ‘talk of the knife’ produced an anticipated effect—the Ambonwari life-world—which then showed itself in its visible and tangible dimensions. Since this same effect became undesirable under the influence of the Catholic charismatic movement, the song-dances also had to be abandoned. They were replaced by new ones praising God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit.

The ‘song of the flute’ with thirty stanzas and 117 lines is slightly longer than the ‘song of the crocodile’ with five stanzas and fifteen lines (Telban 2008). However, it still needs to be seen as a short song compared with three all-night songs of yamɨn siria, ‘singing and dancing of a house’ (with 235, 237, and 372 recorded stanzas, respectively). Yamɨn siria is a public event organized in a private house after a significant achievement of a young man, and sometimes of a woman: killing the first pig, building the first house, or completing Grade Ten in the town of Wewak. Three long songs recount different events from the past. These events are remembered in verses by being attached to named places. Thus, in the ‘song of a house’ the dancers, while circling the house, ‘travel’ from one place to another, covering a wide area between their village and the Sepik River. In contrast to the latter, the ‘song of the flute’ is characterized by its secrecy and semantic wholeness. It recapitulates an entire course of an initiation ritual. During actual singing and dancing in a men's house, each stanza is repeated twice and the whole song is repeated many times. The number and order of stanzas is not fixed, although a general agreement exists about their succession, as presented below. The ‘song of the flute’ demonstrates a consistent syntactic and semantic parallelism of couplets, characteristic also of other Ambonwari songs.

The Song of the Flute

An initiation ritual started with manbon siria, ‘singing and dancing of the crocodile’ (Telban 2008). After several nights of vigorous dancing, the mothers' brothers and the fathers' fathers brought their sisters' sons and patrilineal grandsons to the men's house. Once the boys aged between seven and sixteen years old were seated in the middle of the men's house, and after they had been threatened by the carved spirit-crocodiles, the men began to play flutes. While sanggut or sanggur is a term for a secret bamboo flute, as well as for the flute music, it is also used for a beautifully decorated man (in the case of a woman the female suffix -ma is added, i.e. sanggur-ma). There were eight named flutes and eight flute players each representing a particular clan (Telban 1998, 176–78). These eight flutes match eight talks in the ‘talk of the knife’, which will be discussed later in this article. The dancers playing flutes were organized in two parallel lines; the left one, called kasiarɨnggwar, representing both younger brothers and female ancestors (all flutes on the left side have female names), and the right one, called kupanggwar (from kupan meaning ‘elder brother, ancestor, big man’), representing older brothers and male ancestors (all flutes on the right side have male names). The position of the flutes in the array was based on the order of arrival of the mythological ancestors of individual clans (see Figure 1). Thus, those who arrived first (Crocodile-1, Bird of Paradise) were at the front, and those who came second were furthest back (Crocodile-2, Cassowary). The flutes of those who came later were placed in between. The right side was occupied by those clans (and a lineage in one case) whose ancestors, and consequently their descendants, are considered to be real or classificatory elder brothers of those on the left side.

Figure 1 Arrangement of named flutes in Yanbonman men's house.

In this positioning of the flutes there is not only longitudinal parallelism (left and right), but also horizontal (front and back). This is in accord with the organization of the village, where the westernmost ward belongs to Bird of Paradise Clan and the easternmost ward to Crocodile-2 Clan. All other clans and their flutes in Yanbonman men's house are then situated according to their actual position in the village from the east towards the west: Bird of Paradise, Crocodile-1, Wallaby, Hornbill, Eagle-1, Cassowary, and Crocodile-2.

After playing the flutes the same eight men began to dance and sing the ‘song of the flute’ (see Telban 1998, 177, figure 8 for the movement of the eight dancers). They were led by the lead singer, who started each new stanza but did not dance. The dancers followed his lead. The rhythm was provided by a man vigorously beating a slit-drum. Most of the stanzas in the ‘song of the flute’ (numbered below for clarity) have four lines arranged in two parallel couplets.2 Three stanzas (numbers three, seventeen, and eighteen) have only three lines with parallel semantic triplets. The song recapitulates the entire event from bringing the novices to the men's house to their release as newly initiated men.3

Table

(1) Imbunga pambaymarikɨn	Slit-drum, you carry a lot
Wanggɨna wurimarikɨn	Hand-drum, you carry a lot on your shoulders
Kɨmbɨn imbungmaria pambaymarikɨn	Children's slit-drum, you carry a lot
Wapukɨn imbungmari wurimarikɨn	Boys' slit-drum, you carry a lot on your shoulders

In the first two parallel lines there is a binary set slit-drum/hand-drum, while in the following two lines there is only a slit-drum. This is understandable. Slit-drums are named spirit-crocodiles responsible for initiation and are much more important than hand-drums, which are personal items without names. However, as the men explained, it is the correct drumming of both types of drums that ‘pulls’ novices from their family houses. The slit-drums—in the third and fourth lines explicitly identified as spirits by the masculine ending -mari—will carry the boys throughout the initiation just as mother's brothers will carry them when the initiation is completed. ‘Carrying a lot’, however, also refers to the enormous responsibility of those who organize the whole event.

Table

(2) Manwurin yay waran yay?	Manwurin, cry, why [do you] cry?
Kwarɨmanggɨn yay waran yay?	Kwarɨmanggɨn, cry, why [do you] cry?
Yar wunapi yay waran yay?	Red kina shell, cry, why [do you] cry?
Wakɨn wunapi yay waran yay?	White kina shell, cry, why [do you] cry?

The men tease the boys' mothers—here referred to metonymically as those from Manwurin land/creek and Kwarɨmanggɨn grassland—asking them why they cry. The men say that they took the boys—figuratively addressed as the most valuable large crescent-shaped mother-of-pearl shell, wunapi—but are not going to kill them. The colour of the shells is revealed by the use of the terms yar, ‘blood’, for red and wakɨn, ‘snail’, for white.

Table

(3) Kwandɨng sipin kwandɨng, kwandɨng yakwan kwandɨng	Flowering sago palm, flowering short-thorn sago palm
Kwandɨng apɨr kwandɨng, kwandɨng sipin kwandɨng	Not yet finished sago palm, flowering sago palm
Kankan apɨr kwandɨng, kwandɨng yakwan kwandɨng	Shoot not yet finished sago palm, flowering short-thorn sago palm

The dancers sing about the abundance of sago that has been processed, necessary for all those who will stay for months in the men's house. They sing about the flowering sago, which has to be used before it dies (sago flowers only once in its lifetime).

Table

(4) Mi mi yarɨmanga samɨnga	You, you are a pregnant wife
Mi awkunmanga samɨnga	You are a pregnant woman
Wakɨn mɨna samɨnga	[Your] belly [is like that] of a snake
Manbo mɨna samɨnga	[Your] belly [is like that] of a crocodile

The men sing about women who get pregnant, who get bellies as large as snakes and crocodiles do shortly after they have swallowed their prey. It is these women who gave birth to the young boys who are now in the men's house.

Table

(5) Maray Mɨndapmar maray sanggwan ipa apasɨr?	Water, Mɨndapmar's water, where did you come out?
Maray Kwanmar maray sanggwan ipa apasɨr?	Water, Konmei's water, where did you come out?
Yanda sanggut sumbon sanggwan ipa apasɨr?	This flute's fence, where did you come out?
Yanda manbon sumbon sanggwan ipa apasɨr?	This crocodile's fence, where did you come out?

The fifth stanza talks about barricades built for fishing during the high waters.4 Barricades and water are very explicit tropes related to the initiation ritual; cognitive linguists would call them ‘container metaphors’. Barricades are a metaphor for a men's house; water is a metaphor for the medium containing the fish-novices. A further synecdoche, sumbon, a kind of fish-trap made of bamboo, is used for the barricades. It is a spirit-crocodile from the men's house that is responsible for heavy rain and rising waters and, in a figurative sense, for making the boys grow. The personal pronoun ipa, ‘you (plural)’, refers to the boys, asking them where they came from and where the women gave birth to them. In this stanza the flute and the crocodile, both in connection with a fish-trap and the barricades, appear in a semantic dyadic set referring to the enclosure of the men's house and the associated initiation of the boys.

Table

(6) Maray Kwanmar maray singa simbɨnsari	Water, Konmei's water, you came to me and then moved away
Maray Mɨndapmar maray singa simbɨnsari	Water, Mɨndapmar's water, you came to me and then moved away
Wan maray kwanggɨn maray simbɨnsarɨm singa simbɨnsari	Muddy water, water with palm sap, you came and held me, you came to me and then moved away
Awun imbɨn kwanggɨn imbɨn simbɨnsarɨm singa simbɨnsari	Cane's dirt, palm's liquid's dirt, you came and held me, you came to me and then moved away

The high waters brought tree trunks, leaves, mud, and foam close to the village. These figures of speech refer to the uncleanness of the boys who are still polluted by the blood of their mothers.

Table

(7) Arɨmɨnggwarian sumbon sɨka sindakra	I left the ancestral place Arɨmɨnggwarian
Yakwanggar sumbon sɨka sindakra	I left the ancestral place Yakwanggar
Yar yapan yambun sɨka sindakra	I bled, I got badly hurt, I left it
Sakur yapan yambun sɨka sindakra	I thought a lot, I got badly hurt, I left it

These verses refer to the members of Eagle-1 Clan who in the mythical past left their ancestral places and joined Ambonwari. The main cause for this, as Bob explained, was that once, when an initiation was being held in the men's house, the porch near the front pole suddenly collapsed and the interior became exposed to women and children. The punishment for unintentional disclosure of the secrets was severe. Many people died and those who survived left the place. This stanza also serves as a warning. The whole ritual needs to be performed with caution.

Table

(8) Sanggut pasakuna pasakuna	Send the flute, send it
Manbo pasakuna pasakuna	Send the crocodile, send it
Sanggur yaua yaua	Beautiful man yaua, yaua
Manbo yaua yaua	Crocodile yaua, yaua

The dancers sing about a man, who put on his nicest decoration and went to the men's house to participate in an initiation ceremony. A mother sends her son to ‘hear the flute music’ in the men's house and become the ‘crocodile’ himself.

Table

(9) Asɨnday kɨmbi mbwan singan	Pull the boys inside and be together with them at one spot
Mamyarai kɨmbi mbwan yapan	At one spot with the boys from Mamyarai, have fun
Sanggɨn kɨmbi mbwan sɨkan	Young boys come together at one spot
Kɨmbi sanggɨn kɨmbi mbwan singan	Boys, young boys, be together with them at one spot

The novices are pulled into the men's house. They are seated at the same spot in the middle of the men's house. As the Ambonwari also used to initiate the boys from Konmei village, their abandoned old place Mamyarai is called up in the song. Boys' mother's brothers (male ‘mothers’) are asked to be with them as their protectors. In this stanza there is a semantic triplet: be together at one spot/have fun at one spot/come together at one spot.

Table

(10) Manbo Ibrismari kamban payngor	Crocodile Ibrismari, I sleep inside you
Wanggɨmakan kamban payngor	Crocodile Wanggɨmakan, I sleep inside you
Andin pandanggɨna kamban payngor	In a hole in the ground, I sleep inside you
Sapɨn pandanggɨna kamban payngor	In a hole in the white earth, I sleep inside you

The singers address the spirit-crocodile Ibrismari, saying that the singer, his group, and the initiates sleep inside him. They sleep in a hole in the ground. The place is equated with the powerful spirit and the hole with his belly (the initiates have been eaten by the spirit-crocodile; see Telban 2008). In the following line, the same spirit is referred to by another name, Wanggɨmakan, ‘snake of a channel’.

Table

(11) Manbo Ibrismari wanggan kɨrapikɨna	Crocodile Ibrismari, [you] dug the channel and went inside
Sandang kɨrapikɨna	[You] dug the source of the channel and went inside
Kɨmbi amɨndɨ manbo wanggan kɨrapikɨna	[You are] the crocodile who eats children, [you] dug the channel and went inside
Wapuk amɨndɨ manbo wanggan kɨrapikɨna	[You are] the crocodile who
	eats boys, [you] dug the channel and went inside

Ibrismari is praised as the one who dug into the earth and made the water channel. He is also the one who ‘eats the boys’—the place ‘eats’ them—during the initiation ritual and, in this way, generates their transformation into Ambonwari men, by enabling their emplacement and empowerment. Once the initiates are ‘eaten’ by the spirit-crocodile, they enter the land on which the village is erected and become identified with both: the place and its spirit-crocodile.

Table

(12) Awaya ama mar	Oh, mother's brother, I died
Asaya ama mar	Oh, mother, I died
Saki Kukusaun inga krar a(w)kwinya ama mar	Spirit Kukusaun cut me, on the [island of] grass I died.
Saki Aranggmai inga krar a(w)kwinya ama mar	Spirit Aranggmai cut me, on the [island of] grass I died

The words in these verses are put into the mouths of novices who cry, saying that they have already died, they have been devoured by two spirit-crocodiles: Aranggmai (the local name of the Karawari River and its spirit-crocodile) and Kukusaun ‘Egret from Kukus’. The connection between the boy and his mother has been cut. The boy is now joining another unity with his patrilineage.

Table

(13) Wandiyang kambonma wandiyang kurapiara	Backwards and forwards, come upriver backwards!
Kandiyang kambonma kandiyang kurapiara	In reverse and forwards, come upriver in reverse!
Awun Ambiamar wandiyang kurapiara	[You are] the sugar cane from the Sepik, come upriver backwards!
Kaman Ambiamar kandiyang kurapiara!	[You are] the bamboo from the Sepik, come upriver in reverse!

These verses refer to the actual movements during the dance. Wild sugar cane and bamboo—and their movements and sounds in either water or wind—in a semantic couplet are tropes for dancing men.

Table

(14) Saki Kanggismai sɨmbu kurangora sunggwana	Spirit Kanggismai, they blow a whistle
Manbo Kanggismai sɨmbu kurangora sunggwana	Crocodile Kanggismai, they blow a whistle
Ay mariamari sunggwana kambɨs mariamari	Hey, lots of whistles, lots of grass
Sɨmbu kurangora sunggwana ay sunggwana ay sunggwana haaa haaa yi	They blow a whistle, hey, whistle, hey, whistle, haaa, haaa, yi

This stanza makes the dancers laugh. When hunters want to attract a turtle to the surface of the water, they whistle. Here, however, the practice is applied to a spirit-crocodile that lives in a creek. After being called by a whistle, the spirit-crocodile is expected to appear on a dense mat of floating grass. This stanza is related to the previous one. It ‘whistles’ to the men, who may be sleepy and tired, and urges them to be more energetic during the dance.

Table

(15) Sambɨn simbɨn warwari Mambaya	Mambay broke sambɨn [shrub, and tied its flowers together with] a feather
Sambɨn simbɨn warwari Mambaya	Mambay broke sambɨn [shrub, and tied its flowers together with] a feather
Aypan simbɨn warwari Mambaya	Mambay broke aypan [tree, and tied its flowers together with] a feather
Warwari Mambaya yarwari Mambaya haaa haaa yi	Feather, Mambay, feather, Mambay, haaa, haaa, yi

Mambay is a forest spirit of Cassowary Clan who collected the flowers of two plants (appearing in a binary set in parallel couplets) with a pleasant smell and attached them to a long white feather. He decorated himself for the dance. The singers ‘turn around’ the word warwari (feather of a white cockatoo), and change it into yarwari (which is meaningless). In this stanza, Mambay is a trope for the whole Cassowary Clan.

Table

(16) Aringmarin kasɨmɨnɨnggi kimar	At Aringmarin, Malay apple fruits are dark ripe
Wanjarmarin kasɨmɨnɨnggi kimar	At Wanjarmarin, Malay apple fruits are dark ripe
Wasɨnmɨndia kimar	Sisters are dark ripe
Akimɨndia yimarinjinya kimar	Father's sisters, brother's daughters are dark ripe

Malay apple fruits are metaphors for breasts and vaginas, which in a figurative synecdoche refer to the ripe single women who are waiting for the newly initiated young men. The state of the fruits/young women is expressed with the term kimar, used for overripe fruits, which are already dark red and need to be consumed. The terms for female relatives in these verses can be used only by women. Thus, a woman refers to her older sisters by wasɨnmɨndi, while yimarinjinya, ‘brother's daughters’, is used only by father's sisters, akimɨndia. The whole stanza is put into the mouths of the women.

Table

(17) Aringmarin panjay imbia sakas-amɨngor	[We are] ginger tubers from Aringmarin, they remove our skin and eat us
Wanjarmarin panjay imbia sakas-amɨngor	[We are] ginger tubers from Wanjarmarin, they remove our skin and eat us
Wasɨnmɨndia wasanmɨndinya imbia sakas-amɨngor	Older sisters, younger sisters, they remove our skin and eat us

A similar use of kinship terminology takes place in this stanza. When referring to the sisters, the singers employ terms that are otherwise used only by sisters among themselves: wasɨnmɨndi, ‘older sisters’, and wasanmɨndi, ‘younger sisters’. The young men are identified with a type of ginger that has rosy tubers. This stanza implies a sexual encounter between the young men and their girlfriends.

Table

(18) Apia imbungbiambri pinja nggrumɨndar	We beat two slit-drums
Apia wanggɨnbiambri pinja nggrumɨndar	We beat two hand-drums
Suwan marɨnggɨna pinja nggrumɨndar	In the forest at the land's point near the grassland we beat the two

Through their reference to two slit-drums and two hand-drums, these verses enforce a dual structure of the dance and two dancing partners in particular.

Table

(19) Akia mambu sɨpasɨngor	Father's sisters, they come down
Yimaria mambu kwariangor	Brother's daughters, they get old and fall
Saun inying mambu sɨpasɨngor	Egret's feathers come down
Yakwan inying mambu kwariangor	Fowl's feathers get old and fall
(20) Akinji kupurma	Father's sisters, new soft feathers
Yimarinji kupurma	Brother's daughters, new soft feathers
Warɨpan sanggwandi kupurma	The women from Eel [clan], do you see new soft feathers?
Yakayn sanggwandi kupurma	The women from Eel [clan], do you see new soft feathers?

These two stanzas talk about decoration. The words are put into the mouths of father's sisters and brother's daughters. After several days of dancing, the feathers begin to fall down and the women (who are in any case absent) tease the dancers that they did not decorate themselves well. So the men replace their old feathers with the new ones. In the twentieth stanza the father's sisters and brother's daughters are identified with the women from Eel Clan. In the mythical past Eel Clan was adopted by Crocodile-2 Clan, the ancestor of which was Mamanggamay, the middle brother of Kapi (the founder of Crocodile-1 Clan) and of Akɨmbrɨkupan (the founder of Bird of Paradise Clan). Therefore, the members of the two latter clans can refer to the male members of Eel Clan by the terms for father and brother, and to their sisters and daughters by the terms for father's sisters and brother's daughters.

Table

(21) Kandɨn arɨma	Branch of kandɨn tree
Kaynggran arɨm	Branch of kaynggran tree
Kandɨn waran kandɨn arɨm?	Which kandɨm tree has a branch?
Kaynggran waran kaynggran arɨm?	Which kaynggran tree has a branch?
(22) Yuwania imbruma	Leaves of trees
Ambaniyan imbruma	Leaves of vines
Yuwan sɨmɨna	Tree with vines
Amban sɨmɨna yuwania imbrum	Dense forest with vines, trees' leaves

These two stanzas are also connected. In the former, two different names are used for a large tree called erima in Tok Pisin (Octomeles sumatrana): kandɨn and kaynggran. The men say that women are unaware of the second name. The last two lines of the twenty-first stanza pose a question: ‘Which erima tree has a branch?’ The next stanza talks about trees and vines by using generic terms for a tree (yuwan) and a vine (amban). However, the emphasis is on leaves, by which trees can be identified. While these leaves refer to children, branches refer to lineages and a tree to a clan.

Table

(23) Saun yakwayma maringora wurumbɨn sɨpasra	[You] white fowl, who are dying laughing, come down!
Sɨrɨmbɨn yakwayma maringora wurumbɨn sɨpasra	[You] black fowl, who are dying laughing, come down!
Yuwan sɨmɨna maringora wurumbɨn sɨpasra	[You] who are dying laughing on a tree with vines, come down!
Amban sɨmɨna maringora wurumbɨn sɨpasra!	[You] who are dying laughing in a dense forest with vines, come down!

The wild fowl are metaphors for young women who used to laugh at the boys before they were initiated. Now the singers ask them to come out of their houses and see the new men.

Table

(24) Asapi simung paykɨnma	Asapi, [help her] carry a coconut shell
Yarɨmay simung paykɨnma	Wife, [you] carry a coconut shell
Wakriarmarma simung paykɨnma	Woman from Wakriamar, [you] carry a coconut shell
Sɨmaringorma simung paykɨnma	Woman from Lake Virginia, [you] carry a coconut shell
(25) Asapi konggian krakɨnma	Asapi is tall
Yarɨmay pambian krakɨnma	Wife is short
Yar mambɨn konggian krakɨnma	Red leaf for a skirt is long
Sanggwan mambɨn pambian krakɨnma	Sanggwan tree's leaf for a skirt is short

In these verses a man by the name of Asapi helps his wife to fetch water and carry it home. We learn that he is tall and she is short. Tender leaflets of the sago palm, used for a skirt, are dyed red by being cooked together with the sanggwan leaves. Mambɨn is a leaf that, after being wrapped in the flower sheath of a palm and heated over glowing embers, is attached to a woman's skirt before dancing. It emits a pleasant smell. These verses tell the women to prepare their skirts for a final celebration that will follow initiation. The twenty-fifth stanza is a rare one where antonyms are used in parallel verses: short/tall or short/long and Asapi (man)/wife. The use of antonyms is justified by opposition between boys' habits before and after initiation. After initiation they can start thinking about getting married.

Table

(26) Kambɨs akapari mapmbaya	Press down another grass
Wuriang akapari mapmbaya	Press down another [type of itchy] grass
Kambɨsa sianga	Grass, thick grass
Wurianga sianga	[Itchy] grass, thick grass

Men laugh when singing about a couple who went to catch fish. When they cut the grass near the creek the itchy seedheads got attached to their skin. On the way back they were scratching themselves all the time.

Table

(27) Kawinjima saria	Face of a [large] parrot
Wapandɨma saria	Face of a [red] parrot
Kawinjima kawinjima	[Large] parrot, [large] parrot
Wapandɨma wapandɨma	[Red] parrot, [red] parrot

This stanza, which also makes the dancers laugh, talks about the young women (parrots) who are potential future wives of the newly initiated men. These young women hide in their houses and secretly look through the openings in the walls.

Table

(28) Sungguri yuway mi mar	Flowering wild sugar cane from Sunggur, you are beautifully decorated
Pasɨk yuway mi mar	Flowering wild sugar cane from Pasɨk, you are beautifully decorated
Yarɨkawi mi mar	Yarakawi, you are beautifully decorated
Kamakawi mi mar	Kamakawi, you are beautifully decorated.
(29) Apanay wambung marikɨn	Apanay, my interior has died
Maringay sɨndak marikɨn	Maringay has left me and died
Wakriamarɨmɨndi wambung marikɨn	Women from Wakriamar, [my] interior has died
Sɨmaringormɨndi wambung marikɨn.	Women from Sɨmarin Kambi [Lake Virginia] [my] interior has died.
(30) Sanggura mi mar	Nice man, you are beautifully decorated
Yakara mi mar	Bird of Paradise [man], you are beautifully decorated
Sawin andi sanggura mi mar	Nice man, you are decorated beautifully with white clay
Aran andi sanggura mi mar	Nice man, you are decorated beautifully with bright clay.

These last three stanzas were added during the fieldwork in 2011, when I was recording all of the songs with a small group of singers led by Francis Kwandɨkan Andari.5 The twenty-eighth stanza equates nicely decorated men with a plenitude of flowering wild sugar cane at the edge of Sunggur grassland and Pasɨk forest near the old border between Ambonwari and Kanjimei villages. The last, thirtieth, stanza also speaks about decoration of those who dance at the end of initiation. However, the one in between, the twenty-ninth stanza, is probably the funniest in the eyes of all Ambonwari. The verses are put into a woman's mouth. She is crying over her husband Apanay (in a parallel line he is called maringay, ‘man whose child has died’) from the area around Lake Virginia. He caught a pig with a dog and brought it into the house where he began to cut it. The bark floor had wide fissures and the blood was dripping down on the ground. While Apanay was squatting over the pig, a dog jumped up from below the house and bit Apanay's testicles. His wife got scared (‘her interior has died’), thinking that he would die. This stanza is often told as a story during casual gatherings in private houses, making everyone laugh.

The Talk of the Knife

Wanyakɨr mariawk was sung during the break between several repetitions of the whole ‘song of the flute’. The men stopped dancing and sat down in two lines. The talk could be sung by either one or two men. The title of this ‘talk’, besides referring to a sharp and aggressive bluster when teaching the novices in a men's house, has several other connotations: first, the knife refers to the ‘cut’ into the ‘singing and dancing of the flute’; second, it refers to the process of initiation when boys are cut off from their mothers; third, it refers to the boys who after initiation become warriors; and fourth, it refers to the cuts on their backs made with a bamboo knife or a razor blade by initiators at the completion of the initiation.

The whole talk has nine component ‘talks’, eight of them associated with a particular clan or, in the case of Eagle-1 Clan, with two lineages. They are connected to eight flutes: the flute belonging to a particular clan has a corresponding talk belonging to that same clan. The ninth part, the ‘talk of Wuringgay’, connects the ‘talk of the knife’ to the spirit who taught Ambonwari ancestors how to dance (see Telban 2008). The parallelism of semantic couplets can be found throughout the ‘talk of the knife’.

Talk 1: Yamakara (‘bird of paradise’), Bird of Paradise Clan

• Yamakara kɨmbinya wurunggɨna apmbi

• Sɨpmbi parikɨna minya panjaya

• Akasaymbɨn nggun kambanma wusɨkiakɨpɨkɨr yamakara

• Kambukuru mɨnggri kambra mɨna kiapi-parkiakɨkana

• Mapar mɨnggri kambra mɨna pmbɨn-parkiakɨkan

• Yamakara kran krandɨma

• Sanggut krandɨma kambra mɨna sangguri wurumɨnggiakɨkan krandɨm

• Manbo krandɨma kambra mɨna sanggurin sipanggiakɨkan

• Yamakara mi ambungor

• Bird of paradise, I put you into a lime container and into a bamboo tube

• I put you up under the roof and you sleep

• When I pull you out, I will put you down there, bird of paradise

• I fasten cordyline leaves and replace those that had cracked

• I fasten mapar leaves and replace those that had split

• Bird of paradise stands really nicely

• Flute/a beautiful man stands really nicely and just makes fun and laughs

• Crocodile stands really nicely and just makes fun and swims

• Bird of paradise, you stand all the time in the middle of water

On one level, this talk prizes the beauty of a bird of paradise. Its feathers are valuable decorative objects for the dancers. They are carefully wrapped in a soft bark, put into a bamboo tube or some other container, and stored under the roof until the next celebration. When the time comes, the men carefully unpack the bird of paradise and cassowary feathers and prepare them for their headdresses. They find new cordyline and mapar leaves, which are then stuck at the back of the dancers' belts. In the above lines a dancer is identified by several metaphors: bird of paradise, flute, and crocodile referring respectively to his beauty, his singing and dancing, and his strength.

On another level this talk refers to the whole Bird of Paradise Clan. Two lines of singing and dancing men represent two creeks, and he, the Bird of Paradise, stands in the middle of them. He is the central figure in the dance. He is the father of the village. It is no coincidence that Bird of Paradise Clan is the first to be addressed in this talk. Its members are descendants of Akɨmbrɨkupan, the older brother of Kapi, who, as already mentioned in the discussion following the twentieth stanza of the ‘song of the flute’, was the founder of the village and the first ancestor of Crocodile-1 Clan. Kapi ‘gives’ him precedence in the ‘talk of the knife’. It also follows the spatial organization of the village where the members of Bird of Paradise Clan occupy the westernmost ward in the village. The ward of Crocodile-1 Clan lies next to them.

Talk 2: Sanggur manbo (‘beautifully decorated crocodile’), Crocodile-1 Clan

• Sanggura manbon sanggura

• Mi wasapuka kwanda wasapuka

• Wasa sambis kupa sambisna mi singa san

• Sanggwakamaykana kwandɨkiakamaykana

• Yanbɨna sambasana awi ambɨr awi sɨka singgan ambrɨmba apungora

• Marɨnggɨna sanbɨna awi ambɨr awi sɨka singgan ambrɨmba apungora

• Warɨpan arɨmbɨna singayn arɨmbɨna karara sanggura

• Singayn arɨm manbon arɨmbɨna karara sanggura

• Wapukara Sanggɨmbi kupambamarinji sanggur manbon sanggura

• Beautiful man of a crocodile, beautiful man

• You are a small boy/little brother; you are just a small boy/little brother

• [You look for me with] small eyes [and then] you [look] for me with big eyes

• You look for me trying to find me; you secretly watch trying to find me

• Darkness covered me and I lit the fire, the fire is lit, I put a piece of firewood inside [the men's house]

• In the big forest on the big land I lit the fire, the fire is lit, I put a piece of firewood inside [the men's house]

• The skin of a nice man is [like] the skin of an eel; [his] skin is [like] the skin of a sawfish

• The skin of a nice man is [like] the skin of a sawfish; [his] skin is [like] the skin of a crocodile

• Young man from Sanggɨmbi forest; [every one of] the old big men is a beautiful man of a crocodile, a beautiful man

This talk prizes a beautiful dancer, a crocodile-man, whose skin is black and shiny; it looks like the skin of an eel or the skin of a sawfish. At the same time the dancers have their backs cut to resemble crocodile's scales. As all of the important ritual things are hidden in the men's house, children are unable to see them. The talk ‘plays’ with boys' curiosity: when outside they anxiously look around, trying to see something. With eyes that are tightened and small they try to discover the secrets behind the walls. Once they are inside the men's house, they are still in the dark and their eyes remain tightened. When the fire is lit and they finally see beautifully decorated dancers, and carved and decorated flutes and crocodiles, their eyes open wide in surprise. This talk refers to the youngest of three brothers, Kapi, the founder of the village, and of Crocodile-1 Clan in particular.

Whenever a new men's house was built in the past, a ceremony was organized during which the fire was lit in order to ‘initiate’ the men's house and make it ‘hot’. This practice was also quite common among other Karawari groups (Kaufmann 2003, 50 and 64–65). The smoke from the fire attracted the spirits who recognized themselves in the carved things, inhabited them, and made the newly built men's house into the house of spirits.

Talk 3: Sɨmari (‘the sun’), Crocodile-2 Clan

• Sɨmari amana wasɨnarɨnganga

• Asay amanang singgan sanggun ambakɨna

• Asay waranda Kanjinja Mapaynja

• Ambambɨna

• Parimbɨna

• Waykan sakɨmbi pambaring apisakɨmbi

• Wunung apisakɨmbi wiyak apisakɨmbi

• Sanggut simɨndɨmbi karka waysimimbanbi

• Manbo simɨndɨmbi karka waysimimban yukumbiya

• My brothers of the Sun

• My mother, I feel how she gave birth to my cassowary bone

• Mother, let me think of her name, Kanjinja, Mapaynja

• When she gave birth

• When she laid/put [us] down

• [She] heated the leaves over the fire and rubbed [our] skin and gave [two of us] food, [she] boiled the food and gave it [to us]

• [She] boiled the meat with salt and gave it [to two of us], [she] chewed the food and gave it [to us]

• You talk about the flute, you must speak fast!

• You talk about the crocodile, you must speak fast about the baskets with shells

In this talk, the speaker from Crocodile-1 Clan is referring to the descendants of Akɨmbrɨkupan's and Kapi's brother Mamanggamay, Crocodile-2 Clan, by calling them ‘brothers of the Sun’. Before the arrival of Mamanggamay, Kapi (Crocodile-1) represented the Sun moiety and Akɨmbrɨkupan (Bird of Paradise) the Moon moiety.6 When the third brother, Mamanggamay, arrived, Kapi made him the ‘father’ of the Sun (Telban 1998, 74–75). The singer honours him and his descendants, identifying them with a cassowary bone, a powerful weapon. He says that he can feel how his mother gave birth to this cassowary bone dagger—an image-metaphor of his elder brother and his clan. When asked about her name, he mentions names of two women: Kanjinja (his real mother) and Mapaynja (his mother's junior co-wife and therefore a second mother). The singer then prizes the mother, remembering her caring during the first days and weeks after his birth. The verb waykan means that she heated leaves over the fire and gently rubbed the baby's skin. The mother is the one who feeds the baby first, not only by breastfeeding, but also by chewing food and then putting it into the baby's mouth. The mother boils the food, removes the bones from a fish or heads from the sago grubs, and gives the meat to the baby shortly after its birth. In other words, as Bob explained, the singer in these lines says: ‘Our mother took care of both of us in the same way. We are both crocodiles.’ In the last two lines of this talk the speaker then urges his brother from Crocodile-2 Clan—who talks about the ‘singing and dancing of the flute’ and ‘singing and dancing of the crocodile’—to organize everything necessary for manbon kay, ‘the way of the crocodile’; that is, the initiation ritual. He instructs him to tell those who keep baskets with ancestral shells to bring them out of their houses. There are eight baskets stored in the village containing shells that are used as decoration in Ambonwari ceremonies. They correspond to eight flute players and to the first eight ‘talks of the knife’.

Talk 4: Sapɨsɨr (‘the scraps’), Hornbill Clan

• Sapɨsɨr yangga sɨnggana kurar

• Wasa paruway kupa paruway

• Wasa suway pinja suway!

• Yangga mbana mapɨnɨnggri mɨnang kaya

• Mapɨnɨnggri sakwi mapɨnɨnggri mɨnang kaya

• Wasa suway pinja suwaya!

• The scraps, we-two [left and] walked around together

• [With] a little spear [and] a big spear [that still had scraps]

• We showed them!

• We-two broke sago pith in two pieces. [There was] no [liquid] in it

• [There was] no liquid in it, in two pieces of sago pith

• We showed them!

The two men took the bark of a sago palm, made the spears out of it, and put them over the fire to dry. The spears were new, as there were—after being sharpened by a pig's tooth—still scraps of wood on them. Two men broke sago pith in two pieces and one ate one half and the other ate the other half. As is known from the myths of origin, the ancestor of Wallaby Clan divided his descendants into two groups: Wallaby and Hornbill (Telban 1998, 71). The two men in this talk are from these two clans, where the bigger one (‘big spear’) is the ancestor of Wallaby Clan, and the smaller one (‘little spear’) the ancestor of Hornbill Clan. The two ancestors (i.e. groups) shared the food and they fought together—a potent expression of a tight relationship between them.

Talk 5: Yimarian (‘from Karawari River’), Wallaby Clan

• Yimarianmanga Kokomay

• Kaypakmarɨma Mariambinjay

• Yambi mɨnang Mamanggamay sayia anggam kambra kingɨn kambran

• Yambi mɨnang mari mɨnang mɨnang

• Suwas imɨnggan aparɨnggɨnma narin

• Suwasin imɨnggan aparɨnggɨnma narin

• [You] Kokomay, [you are] a woman from Karawari

• [You] Mariambinjay, [you are] a woman from Karawari

• [You] Mamanggamay, take a paddle and find a clay pot and a shell that we don't have

• Take an old paddle, a paddle, a paddle

• [There is] a woman from a Sepik village, [we] let her be [there]

• [There is] a woman from a Sepik village, [we] let her be [there]

The ancestors of Wallaby Clan arrived from Karawari River. It was Mamanggamay (Crocodile-2 Clan), the third of three ‘fathers of the village’, who was the first to marry a woman from Wallaby Clan. The marriage became the preferred ‘ancestral marriage path’ between two clans. Mamanggamay is asked to give an old paddle to the women of Wallaby Clan so that they can paddle downriver and find clay pots and valuable shells in the villages on the Sepik River. There is an Ambonwari woman, who got married into the Sepik village (the term Suwas, referring to the Sawos, is used for all Sepik people). It is there that they can sleep and get clay pots and shells.

Talk 6: Aranggon (the name of a place at Arkwas), Cassowary Clan

• Aranggonmɨndi awkumba Aranggon yambɨnia yaymapayngangor

• Ipanga ipa sinanma wararapasɨkia yariapasɨkia

• Amɨndɨkwarinmɨndi awkumba

• Yaskwarinmɨndi awkumba

• Anga mɨpɨrmɨndi anga pɨpɨrmɨndi

• Awkumba ambɨpɨrmɨndi

• Awkumba ipanga yaymapayngangor

• Ipa sinanma kurari apasɨkia

• Yambɨndi Suwasɨndi ipa sɨpɨkɨrnganga ipanga

• You, the women from Aranggon, Aranggon grassland stays and sleeps

• You left it and came outside; you don't think about it anymore

• You are the women who always worry about food

• You are the women who always cry

• They did not give you food; they did not give you [food]

• You women did not eat

• You women, [your grassland] stays and sleeps

• You pressed the grass [made a path] and came outside

• Women from the grassland, women from the Sepik River; you [become] old women there and die there

According to the myth of origin, the ancestors of Cassowary Clan came from Manam Island and followed the Sepik River upstream. When they arrived in the region, they first stopped at Arkwas, east of Ambonwari village. It is a conventional way of saying: ‘You are lucky that you came and joined us because you do not starve anymore. Those who stayed at your old place were hungry all the time until they died of hunger’. The motive for a new group's arrival is usually found either in their fear of an enemy or in their lack of food (also a common theme in the myths of origin). Ambonwari praise themselves as those who know how to fight and enjoy an abundance of food. As the women from Cassowary Clan are preferred marriage partners for the men from Bird of Paradise Clan, the latter refer to both the men and the women from Cassowary Clan as ‘our women’. This is especially so in their joking relationships.

Talk 7: Saun (‘egret’), Eagle-1 Clan, Ambayngmari lineage

• Sauna sariya

• Saun kambra awkwi sandakɨna sauna

• Waran kambra kambis sandakɨna sauna

• Saun kambra sandakɨna kawi mɨnang kankanian sauna

• Waran kambra piyan mɨnang kankanian sauna

• Saun kambra kurambi

• Waran kambra yukumbiya

• [Your] face, egret

• Egret, the grass stays empty, egret

• Waran, the grass stays empty, egret

• Egret, you are without food, you shoot fish with your beak, egret

• Waran, you shoot nothing but a piyan fish with your beak, egret

• Egret, you move around without food

• Waran, [there is] nothing in your pouch

In this talk, two birds appear interchangeably: waran, a black and white bird, and saun, a white egret. Both birds, being otherwise images of Crocodile-1 Clan, refer here to the Ambayngmari lineage of Eagle-1 Clan that was ‘adopted’ by Crocodile-1 Clan. As the first ancestors of Eagle-1 Clan were two brothers, who started two lineages, each of them has his own talk (see the next one). As in a previous talk, the verses in this one also speak about the newcomers' hunger.

Talk 8: Arɨmɨnggwarianmari (‘spirit from Arɨmɨnggwarian place’), Eagle-1 Clan, Mɨndapmarpinjing or Mɨndapmay lineage

• Waria Arɨmɨnggwarian waria akakwasakana

• Waria kwandɨnggɨn arɨmbɨn waria akakwasakana

• Akapariakana Maypmarɨnggɨn wari

• Krakmarɨnggɨn wari akakwasakana

• Saki Arɨmɨnggwarianmari wari sakɨn ama imɨnggan sakɨn anja siri akuri sinsaripiara

• Saki Yakwanggarmari saman ama imɨnggan sakɨn anja siri akuri sinsaripiara

• Kwandɨnggɨn arɨmbɨn waria

• The wind of Arɨmɨnggwarian [place], the wind rose there

• The wind rose there on the top of the flowering sago

• The wind of Maypmarɨng [forest] came down there

• The wind of Krakmarɨng [forest] rose there

• I am the bush spirit Arɨmɨnggwarianmari, I am the spirit of the wind, I stand up. You came [and] embraced me, removed the leaves, [and] held me coming up

• I am the bush spirit Yakwanggarmari, I am the spirit, I stand here. You came [and] embraced me, removed the leaves, [and] held me coming up

• The wind on the top of the flowering sago

Several ancestral places of Eagle-1 Clan are called up in this talk, two of them already mentioned in the seventh stanza of the ‘song of the flute’. These places were located near today's Kungriambun village, north of Ambonwari. Two spirits of the wind are present in these verses: Arɨmɨnggwarianmari, ‘spirit from Arɨmɨnggwarian place’ (lit. ‘man who has wind on his skin’), and Yakwanggarmari, ‘rooster-man’. As is often the case, their names correspond to their places of origin. They are responsible for the wind. In verses five and six there is communication between the wind and the eagle (i.e. a member of Eagle-1 Clan). The wind embraces the eagle and becomes an inseparable partner in its wanderings. In these same lines a directional suffix -pia denotes that the wind is blowing towards the singer; that is, towards the eagle.

Talk 9: Wuringgay (‘night-man’, the name of a spirit)

• Pandɨnggria sanggut pandɨnggria saki Wuringgay saki amanakɨnggri

• Pandɨnggria sanggut pandɨnggri manbo Wuringgay saki manbo amanakɨnggri

• Manbo pandɨnggri singa sandangarɨnggri

• Pandɨnggria sanggut pandɨnggria saki ama Wuringgay saki amanakɨnggri

• Sanggut pandɨnggri singa sandangarɨnggri

• Awa angasambɨn singa sandangarɨnggri

• Anja kwasangara sanggura!

• Two lines of flutes/beautifully decorated men, two lines; [I am] a bush spirit Wuringgay, two lines are mine

• Two lines of flutes/beautifully decorated men, two lines; [I am] a crocodile, a bush spirit Wuringgay, two lines are mine

• Two lines of a crocodile, my two sitting lines

• Two lines of flutes/beautifully decorated men, two lines; I am a bush spirit Wuringgay, two lines are mine

• Two lines of flutes/beautifully decorated men, my two sitting lines

• They put cassowary's feathers on their heads, my two sitting lines

• My beautifully decorated men, get up!

Pandɨnggri is a dual term that refers to eight men positioned in two parallel lines of four (see Figure 1). This ninth ‘talk of the knife’ is the last of the talks and brings us back to the singing and dancing of a crocodile and the myth of a bush spirit Wuringgay and his human namesake (see Telban 2008, 221–23). The bush spirit is speaking, telling the beautifully decorated men that they are his; that they should get up and begin singing and dancing. He is the one who taught the men how to dance. When delivering this last talk, the men stand up and the dancing and singing of the flute continues.

Conclusion

My aim in this article has been to bring together the ‘song of the flute’ and the ‘talk of the knife’ as they represented a specific stage in the Ambonwari initiation ritual. It was also my aim to focus on their ontology and its embedded semantics (cf. Wheelwright 1968), including figurative speech and semantic parallelism. Throughout the article I have discussed individual lines, expressions, and names of people, spirits, and places—very important in the whole Sepik River area—in order to elucidate the semantic plenitude, interplay of meanings, and creative transpositions in both the ‘song of the flute’ and ‘talk of the knife’. There is no doubt that singing and dancing during initiation rituals were activities significant for the creation of the Ambonwari cosmos and the multiplicity of relationships within it. These relationships included those between the Ambonwari and their neighbours, between clans and lineages within the village, between people and places, between people and animals and plants, between people and spirits, between men and women, between parents and their children, and many more. It was because of the cosmogonic orientation embedded in the ritual that the men were afraid of making a serious mistake and of revealing the secrets to women and children. In their view, any errors could have disastrous consequences for the village, including severe storms, devastating earthquake, or massive death. The spirits of the land and the spirits of the men's house were known to punish any breach of taboos.

Over the past eighty years the Ambonwari life-world began to change. The villagers became exposed to new practices encroaching from the wider Sepik area: the Catholic Church, education, the rubber business, travels, local politics, and so on. The village was collectively baptized in the 1950s, but the missionaries never stayed in the village. However, the customary practices came under question especially with regard to the isolation of the village, the hierarchy based on customary law, relationships between men and women, fights with neighbours, and many unexplained deaths. It was towards the end of the millennium that, under the influence of the Catholic charismatic movement, the majority of villagers agreed in their rejection of major customary practices and of the life-world that they sustained. Today, they do not perceive the ‘song of the flute’ and ‘talk of the knife’ to be merely a part of an innocent entertaining performance. On the contrary, these practices of the ancestors are feared because they could re-install relationships with the spirits and re-create that very past they are striving to abandon. The new Catholic charismatic songs are filled with a new wapaysur mariawk, ‘climbing talk’. This talk not only reflects their expectations, but is constantly repeated in order to create a new world, to embody and emplace its values, and to make the desired things visible and tangible.

Acknowledgements

This article is based on more than three years of fieldwork in Ambonwari between 1990 and 2011. I thank the Research Centre of the Slovenian Academy of Sciences and Arts for financial support. I worked on Ambonwari songs while a Visiting Fellow at the Australian National University (2005), a Fulbright Scholar at the University of California, San Diego (2005–2006), and a Research Scholar at The Cairns Institute, James Cook University (2010). I am grateful to the Firebird Foundation for Anthropological Research, where the recordings of Ambonwari songs are now stored, for a supplemental grant in 2011. I thank Daniela Vávrová and the late Don Tuzin for their generous comments.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Borut Telban

Associate Professor Borut Telban (PhD 1994, The Australian National University) is Research Advisor at the Institute for Anthropological and Spatial Studies, Research Centre of the Slovenian Academy of Sciences and Arts. His ethnographic research among the Karawari-speaking people of the East Sepik Province, Papua New Guinea, has spanned more than twenty years. In his books and articles he has focused on Ambonwari cosmology, ritual, death, poetics, and language.

Notes

¹ In Karawari vernacular, the phoneme [ɨ] sounds like the schwa in the first syllable of ‘about’ or the vowel in ‘sir’.

² The language in the song is to a large extent understandable to everyone. What makes the verses esoteric and unintelligible—in the past mainly to the women and children, but nowadays to the majority of people—is the rich allegory of these verses, various transpositions of meanings, synonyms in parallel lines, and knowledge connected to the names of people, places, and spirits.

³ Many discussions held between 1990 and 1992 with Bob Kanjik Anjapi (now deceased) about the people and places, names, tropes, and verses were extremely important for the elucidation of the song. Subsequent information was gathered over the following years when talking to different people, and most recently in 2011 with Francis Kwandɨkan Andari, the eldest son of Bob Kanjik's younger brother. The elementary school teacher Julias Sungulmari has, since the very beginning of my research, assisted with transcriptions and translations into Tok Pisin.

⁴Kwanmar, ‘creek, stream’, was pronounced by foreign visitors as Konmei, which then became the official name of the river.

⁵ They were not newly composed but were previously unrecorded. The number of stanzas in songs is generally not fixed. The lead singer may also omit some stanzas.

⁶ At the time of darkness a woman gave birth to two sons: the older Moon and the younger Sun. Because of the strong light they were emitting she sent them up into the sky. The members of Crocodile-1 Clan are the owners of the myth and the land where this happened (see Telban 1998, 143–47).