Medicine containers from Toba Batak of Sumatra

I am fascinated by the indigenous culture that existed in South East Asia before the coming of foreign traders, about 2000 years ago. Last year, I was lucky to guide some amazing artefacts at the  'Beginning of the Becoming' exhibition that had many rare and beautiful artefacts from the Batak peoples of Sumatra, Indonesia. The collection was from the Mandala foundation that has generously donated some items to our museum.

Here is an article I wrote for the 'Friends of the Museums' Passage magazine back in March 2015.

If you believed that destruction and illnesses are caused by unseen spirits surrounding you, how would you appease these forces?  To the Batak - the indigenous ethnic group living in the northern highlands of Sumatra- spirits could either bestow blessings or cause chaos. They would enlist the services of a learned man who was a healer, fortune teller and above all, a shaman. Such a man was the datu (from Austronesian) meaning 'someone powerful', an influential person in the community mainly owing to his abilities to communicate and manipulate spirits through rituals. 

In order to perform his ritualist duties, the datu personally crafted objects and fetishes. The primary purpose of these scared objects was their magical powers; their artistic appeal was incidental. However, we can’t help but appreciate them for their visual aesthetics adding another dimension to the skills of the datu. Let’s look at containers crafted by the datu to hold his cococtions. 

Figure 1: Guri-guri with wooden stopper shaped as a rider atop a ceramic container. Height 16 cm, 19 CE.

The most sacred containers called guri-guri was used to hold magical portions called pupuk. Guri-guri, meaning earthen ware, were often imported from far-off places like China, Vietnam or Thailand, highlighting the flourishing trade between these countries and Indonesia. Ceramic containers were originally meant to hold oils and ointments from their country of origin but when they reached island Southeast Asia, they were highly valued for their beauty and durability. Perhaps this was the reason why the datu repurposed ceramics, deeming them precious enough to hold his most powerful concoctions.

Figure 2: Guri-guri with wooden rider sporting an impressive headdress. Height 12 cm, 19 CE

The datu put his personal touch on containers by carving wooden stoppers, seen here (figure 1, figure 2) shaped as riders. The equestrian rider symbolizes status and nobility since only the elite could afford horses, but one myth suggests that the rider represents the captive spirit whose essence is trapped inside. The recipe for making pupuk explains this. 

As outlined by J. Winkler in 1907, the ingredients for pupuk were objects which embodied suffering, destruction, hate and anger - rotten heart shaped leaves, uncooked rice from an unfortunate person such as widow, deaf or mute, charcoal, soil from place where animals had fought, itchy part of sugar palm were all roasted and crushed together. Occasionally, another ingredient was added and this was probably what instilled fear in outsiders giving Batak their fierce reputation - body parts of a captive slave who was allegedly under the control of the datu. This was said to ensure that the slave’s soul would perform actions in the spirit world which were prescribed by the datu. 

Figure 3: Guardian fetish with large chest cavity to hold pupuk. Height 78cm, late 19 CE.

Pupuk was the substance that gave objects their magical powers. To animate fetishes, it was usually inserted into the chest cavity, as seen here in a rather menacing guardian figure (Figure 3). The cavity was sealed to capture the spirit inside and to seek its protection, the figure was ritually fed foods and beverages like rice, wine, chicken blood and betel nut.

During the last century, many Batak have converted to Christianity and Islam diminishing the influcence of the datu. Nowadays, few datus practice old rituals and most of their proprietary knowledge which was passed down orally is lost. What has survived are the paraphernalia and sacred objects which are highly sort after and treated as objets d’art.