Houses of Worship in Central Sulawesi: Precedence, Hierarchy & Class in the Development of House Ideology

ABSTRACT

The social and cultural complexity of the central portion of the island of Sulawesi was well documented by missionary ethnographers at the end of the nineteenth century. Drawing on this extensive corpus of historical material, I sketch out a comparative framework for the analysis of the development of House ideology there. The six coastal kingdoms that encompassed the highlands of central Sulawesi were politically organised in Houses, a kinship strategy first proposed by Claude Lévi-Strauss. Here, I examine the factors that encouraged (or discouraged) the transformation of highland temples associated with headhunting (lobo) into the majestic Houses of aristocrats like the Tongkonan still seen in Tana Toraja. This comparative analysis points to the different political tensions created by the distinct systems of precedence, hierarchy and class in the dualistic Founders’ Cult found across the island as the source of this transformation.

KEYWORDS:

• Sulawesi
• house societies
• precedence
• hierarchy
• class

Disclosure Statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

ORCiD

Albert Schrauwers http://orcid.org/0000-0002-4096-0810

Notes

1. I capitalise the word ‘House’ to differentiate the hierarchical noble institution from a mere dwelling, as suggested by Sellato (1987).

2. In discussing hierarchy, I draw on Rousseau's distinction between caste and estates:

Castes and estates are linked differently to the political structure. Estates constitute the political structure because they define relations of domination and subordination. The caste system defines only the social units involved in the political process, not the nature of their interaction. (Rousseau 1978, 91)

The reference point for members of the comparative Austronesian project is Dumont's analysis of caste.

3. Although this comparative project is based upon a broad range of archival sources, much of the material is infused with racist, evolutionary and diffusionist presuppositions. Kruyt and Kaudern, in particular, engaged in lengthy debate on the historical migrations of the peoples of central Sulawesi, with Kruyt imputing many cultural practices to a ‘superior’ invading race. I have attempted, where possible, to restrict analysis to reports of socially located practices evidenced in the period 1890–1920, and disregarded these conjectural histories.

4. By ‘societies of central Sulawesi’, I am referring to the groups defined as East, West and South Toraja in the Dutch colonial era occupying the current provinces of both Central and South Sulawesi. Only the ‘South (or Sa’dan) Toraja’ of South Sulawesi retain the ethnonym today. Today, the East Toraja are generally referred to as the ‘To Pamona’ and the West and Koro Toraja as either ‘To Kaili’ or by their former village confederacy name. In order to simplify citations, I will primarily cite only the major works of missionary-ethnographer Kruyt (1923, 1938, 1950), always listing them, and indigenous terms, in the order of South, West, East Toraja.

5. I use the gloss ‘potency’ rather than ‘power’ to distinguish the South East Asian conception from secular Hobbesian conceptions of power as control of force, following a long line of scholars analysing the ideological basis of indigenous states (see Errington 2012 for a summary discussion).

6. See Coville (2003) and Aragon (2003) for an application of the model to the South and West Toraja, respectively. See Fox (2006) for a comparative perspective on the Austronesian focus on origins. Domenig (2014) has recently refined analysis of the ‘landtaking rituals’ by which contracts with spirits are made in a variety of indigenous Indonesian religions.

7. I have chosen the terms ‘rites of life’ and ‘rites of death’ as glosses for a wide range of alternate phrases. The South Toraja, for example, also utilise the phrase ‘smoke of the rising sun’ and ‘smoke of the descending sun’ (Waterson 2009). Kruyt did not record a label for these two ritual orders among the East or West Toraja, although he did note their segregation. In the social evolutionist spirit of the time, he interpreted the female focused shamanic tradition in terms of a matrilineal animism upon which a ‘more evolved’ patriarchal ‘spiritism’ had been imposed by immigrant invaders (1906; see 1938 III: 531 for an application).

8. Aragon (1996, 47) points out that the word for ‘owner’ deities and lowland aristocrats was ‘pue’’ in many of the languages of central Sulawesi.

9. The leader of each headhunting troop carried a fetish (gongga) by which the ancestors were carried along to battle. The fetish offered protection, but had to be offered sacrifices and treated with ancestral deference or would cause buto/bunto. If the enemy captured the gongga, it meant capture of the anitu, rendering them powerless and ending the attack (Kruyt 1938, II: 77–82; III: 130–132, 1950, I: 265).

10. Kruyt (1923, 120) notes that these deference behaviours were weakest among the South Toraja, perhaps because the dependency of commoners and slaves was now ensured through nobles control of the wet-rice complex.

11. This ‘disease’ known as bunto is reported throughout Sulawesi, including the Bugis kingdoms to the south (bunto/wunto (Kruyt 1938, III: 130–131); buto (Kruyt 1923, 460, 1950, II: 323); mabusung Bug. (Errington 1989, 62)). Tsintjilonis highlights the importance of ‘place’ (siri’) among the South Toraja and that transgressions of respect results in illness; this term is a cognate of the Bugis siri, transgression of which results in mabusung (Tsintjilonis 1997, 266–267).

12. Kruyt (1923, 99ff, 121ff, 1938, III: 117, 1950, II: 314ff). The South Toraja of the Mamasa and Masupu River basins did give bridewealth, but those in the Sa’dan River basin did not; where it was given, the bridewealth was presented to the married couple (i.e. was a form of indirect dowry). In the Sa’dan area, the couple received land from both sides (1923, 124), but this land was only inherited according to the number of cattle sacrificed at the parents funeral, thus encouraging competition between siblings for a greater share. The shift from swidden to wet wice cultivation was thus accompanied by a shift from bridewealth to diverging devolution/dowry (cf. Goody 1976).

13. Nooy-Palm (1979, 32), Kruyt (1938, III: 27ff, 1950, I: 140). The West Toraja allowed only cross-cousin marriage, i.e. marriage between the children of a sister and an out-married brother, hence bringing back the brother's share of the inheritance.

14. For a discussion of these forms of ‘centripetal marriage’ see Errington (1989, 262ff) and Acciaioli (2009, 75ff).

15. Kruyt (1930, 459, 1938, I: 512). Kruyt records that slavery had only recently been introduced to the To Wana after they were subjugated by the coastal kingdom of the To Bungku. The To Bungku appointed a regional chief (basali) who, in paying the fines of debtors in cases he adjudicated, could enslave them. The basali would then sell them to the To Bungku for the ritual wealth used to pay off debts (largely cotton cloth), which he then used to create more debt slaves in the same manner (1930, 460–461).

16. Kruyt recorded that he had attended funerals with 2500 guests hosted by a To Kadombuku leader, Papa I Melempo (Kruyt 1950, II: 535).