The Cultured Rainforest Project: The First (2007) Field Season.
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THE SARAWAK MUSEUM JOURNAL |
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Title :
The Cultured Rainforest Project: The First (2007) Field Season. |
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Author :
Graeme Barker, Huw Barton, Daniel Britton, Ipoi Datan, Davenport, Monica Janowski, Samantha Jones, Jayl Langub, Lindsay Lloyd-Smith, Borbála Nyíri and Beth Upex |
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Abstract:
The paper describes the first season of fieldwork bya team of anthropologists, archaeologists, and geographers investigating the long-term and present-day interactions between people and rainforest in the Kelabit Highlands of Sarawak, East Malaysia. The anthropological fieldwork focused on the collection of genealogies and ethnohistories in Pa’ Dalih, including the identification of‘ apical’ (primary) ancestors and stories about them, and on gathering dara on Kelabit and Penan perceptions and beliefs of their environment. Anthropological fieldwork was closely coordinated with the archaeological fieldwork carried out during the field season, which allowed for informative discussion with locals about finds, aiding identification of artefacts and anthropogenic features of the landscape. It was also possible to record the ways in which people re-engaged with this now archaeological material culture. Some early key findings include the fact that both the Kelabit and the Penan see forest spiritsas protectors of the forest environment that will punish humans who harm it; and new data on the pre-Christian burial of the dead. A range of archaeological sites was surveyed and test excavated, including rock shelters, historically-recent sertlement sites, megalithic sites, and Dragon Jar cemeteries. Cores for sedimenrological and palynological analysiswere taken in peat sequences in the northern and southern Highlands. Radiocarbon dates from the archaeological sites and pollencores hint at settlement in the Kelapang valley stretching far beyond the Metal Age, and further evidence in the later first millennium AD, with widespread evidence for riverside settlement and agriculture through the past 500 years, and for ridgetop settlement through the same period, considerably earlier than reliably predicted by folk memory. Excavations also enable a tentative sequence to be proposed for various forms of megalithic site, with stone jar sites probably amongst the oldest, followed by slab-cist structures.
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| DOI: https://doi.org/10.61507/smj22-2008-7611-06 |
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How to cite:
Graeme Barker et al. (2008). The Cultured Rainforest Project: The First (2007) Field Season. The Sarawak Museum Journal, LXV (65): 121-190 |
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References
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