Unique tribes of the world-Tribalogy#12 Dani Tribe of Indonesia

In the last article about unique tribes across the world, I posted about Yali tribe which mainly resides in the mountainous Papua province of Indonesia but I did mention that there are certain other tribes too which live in the same very region. The Dani or Ndani Tribe which I am going to discuss is also one of the indigenous tribes of the Papuan region.The total population of the Dani tribes ranges from 220,000 to 250,000 and this tribe speaks a local language called Dani language.

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The Dani language is normally divided into four sub-groups.

Lower-Grand Valley Dani
Mid-Grand Valley Dani
Upper-Grand Valley Dani
Western Dani

Origin

The Dani tribe has no written history of where it originated but is said to be living in the Baliem Valley of the Papua province for centuries. The Dani Tribe was first discovered in 1938 by the American Philanthropist Richard Archbold by chance when he was on a zoological mission. Richard Archbold saw cultivated fields in the area from the plane. Thus, he reached the conclusion there are people in the area who are cultivating these fields. However, no one dared to land there since they can be very dangerous to people from outside world. In 1954, the very first Christian preacher, Loyd Van Stone, parachuted there with the mission to make the Dani people civilize and convert them to Christianity.

Religion

The Dani tribe follows a unique religion of their own in which they believe that the spirits of dead ancestors play an important in bringing fortune or misfortune. They are of the view that the spirits of those people who were good in their actions in the worldly life have a pleasant effect on the Dani people such as they help in keeping and growing the gardens, cure diseases, and ailments, and make the soil fertile.

On the contrary, they believe that bad spirits cause harm to the tribe and are to be kept at bay. In order to protect themselves from bad spirits, they wear mud masks to scare the ghosts or make small houses for the ghosts. When the evil spirits of dead people in the form of ghosts enter those vacant houses, they are locked and hence according to their beliefs, their tribe gets protected.

The Dani people also believe that every Dani person has a soul when he/she borns and the soul develops fully at the age of two. When the soul of a person moves backward toward the backbone, he/she becomes sick and ceremonies are to be carried out in order to ward off the bad ghosts and bring the soul to the front side. Mostly, the ceremonies are headed by a male and if the person is too ill the head of the community is called for help since he is believed to be possessing more magical skills. The ghosts about which we talked in the first paragraph develops from this soul when he/she is no more.

The Dani tribe also believes that the span of the human life was determined by a race between a snake and a bird. The legend says that the birds are mortal whereas snakes are immortal. The bird emerged as a victorious hence humans have to die after living for a particular period of time just like birds.

Tribal Traits

Chopping off the fingers

The Dani people have a very interesting custom and that is to chop-off their body parts in the sorrow of the death of their beloved ones. Mostly, the females cut their fingers in remembrance of their husbands but many men also follow this tradition to honor their fallen comrades in war. The men along with fingers also cut a part of their ears.

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Koteka

The males in Dani Tribe wear a think sheath to protect their genitals. This cover is called Koteka and can be straight or rounded in shape. This Koteka is also considered a sign of sexual beauty.

Keeping ancestors’ mummies

Many of the people in Dani tribe keep their ancestors’ mummies as a symbol of prestige. The mummies are preserved and kept in a room to show their younger generations how great their ancestors were.

Polygamy

The Dani males are allowed to marry multiple times but women are not allowed to have multiple husbands.

Ceremonies

Pig Feast ceremony

The pig feast ceremony is an important part of the Dani celebrations. The Dani people arrange ceremonies on special occasions like on the occasion of the death of an enemy, marriage, cremation or initiation. The pig is slaughtered and served to all people including the guests invited by them. The ceremony also contains mock-fights in their traditional dress.

Baliem Valley festival

All the tribes of the Papuan region under the control of Indonesia celebrate their joint gathering on the independence day of Indonesia. The members of different tribes carry out mock-battles, sings, dance and play archery games. The winners are awarded gifts by the organizers. The Indonesian government provides them security and normally soldiers join them in their ceremonies.

Code of Conduct

No internal medicine

The Dani people rub their body parts against leaves to relieve pain instead of using internal medicines. In case of serious injuries, they draw blood from their arms and chest.

Pig as a symbol of social status

In Dani Tribe, pigs are considered an important symbol of social status. The more pigs an individual has, the more he can contribute to the ceremonies arranged by the Dani Tribe and the higher social status he has.

Pigs are given as dowry

The males have to give pigs to the families of the girls with whom they want to marry.

Living in huts

The Dani people live in hay-roofed huts prepared from the grass.

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Food

The major staple food of the Dani tribe is sweet potato which makes almost 90 percent of the total food they take. Other important foods they eat include sugar cane, banana, ginger, edible grass, and taro. The major protein food is the pig meat but some Dani people also catch fish from the nearby streams.

Clothes

In the Dani Tribe, the males mostly are naked except the Kotekas or penis sheath they wear.The koteka is made up of Pumpkin. The women wear short skirts woven from grasses and orchid fibers with attached bag behind called Noken to cover their butts.

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Music

The traditional musical instrument of the Dani Tribe is called Pikon. The tribe members on special occasions sing, dance and chant on the tune of this ancient instrument. The singing is in their local Dani language. The Pikon is shown in the figure given below.

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