CHILDBIRTH

After the birth of the child, he and his parents become impure (sebel), the man for three days, during which it would be dangerous for him even to climb a tree, the woman and the child for forty-two days. Offerings are made during this time: when the navel of the child has healed; when he is twelve days old; and at the expiration of the forty-two-day period, when the husband the mother, and the child are restored to normalcy by the priest who blesses them in an elaborate ceremony of purification.

The birth of a freak, whether from a woman or from an animal is an evil omen for the community, the presage of an approaching disaster that can only be averted by elaborate purification ceremonies. But should an unfortunate woman give birth to a boy and girl twins (kembar buntjing) , the entire village falls under the curse of the " child blunder," manak salah, as the dreadful calamity is called. The " incestuous union " of the brother an sister in the mother's womb is a wrong that can only be wiped out by the most complete and troublesome of exorcisms.

As soon as the happening is discovered, the alarm-drum is sounded to declare the village polluted (sebel) ; the temple door are closed and hung with forbidding pandanus leaves, a sign c taboo (sawen) , so that no one will enter. No celebrations of an sort can be held and the entire social life of the village is paralysed until the long crisis that ensues is over and the village is again made normal.

The guilty parents and the baby twins are rushed to some m holy spot, generally the cemetery or more rarely the crossroad, together with the house in which the twins were born, which is dismantled and hastily rebuilt there.. The couple and the twins are condemned to live in exile for forty-two days, guarded by a number of watchmen, who remain with them until the period of banishment is over, when the house is ceremonially burned to the ground before they all return to the village to perform the metjaru, the great ceremony of purification.

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