| Abstrakt: |
This article presents information related to burial jars. Burial jars, some of them dating back to the later neolithicum, are being discovered all over Sumatra, Java, Central Celebes, Minahassa and recently also in the Province of Cotabato, Mindanao. Throughout Indonesia burial sites are often marked by pole and jar, sometimes crowned with a house or a roof. On many burial jars, heads either appear on top of pole or roof, or are integrated into them. The expressions on their faces evidence great satisfaction or even jubilant ecstasy due to the fact that the celebration of the sacrifice has taken place, on account of which the dead are saved from chaos and successful in their attempts to obtain a house. In numerous instances it is difficult to differentiate between face and pole, mountain and roof. A final hypothesis which may be suggested is that the burial jar, like pestle and mortar in the Bagobo myths, is a symbol of the underworld and upper-world, enclosing the surface of the earth, thus pointing to the residences of the dead and the habitat of the living. |
