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lacking in decoration but also because they are not
associated with symbolic meanings or a spiritual
identity. A house is deemed to be a tongkonan
only if complex architectural norms are observed
in the building process and an inauguration ritual
has been performed. Furthermore, tongkonan be
longing to noble marapuan differ from tongkonan
belonging to commoners because their surfaces
are covered with paintings and carvings. At the
apex of the façade there is usually a painting of a
cock - symbol of life - and the rising sun. Under
the cock may be found “a carved pattern of betel
leaves” used in traditional rituals as offerings to
gods and a medium of contact with them (Adams
1998: 332). The middle section of the outer walls
often contains drawings of buffaloes and banyan
trees, symbols of the status and rank of the mara
puan. In the lower section plants and animals
predominate, alluding “to the activities of peasants
and slaves” (332).
The link between living and dead symbolized
by the tongkonan is also expressed by complex
funeral rituals which have a basic function in the
construction of the Toraja social identity. Funeral
ceremonies are important both socially and sym
bolically because they are the arenas wherein con
flict or solidarity are acted out.
Funeral rituals, which last several days and are
attended by hundreds of guests, consist of many
different acts. Most significant are; a) the transfer
of the corpse from the house (where it may remain
for many months while kin assemble the resources
necessary for the organization of the funeral) to the
rice bam; b) the procession which transports the
corpse from the rice bam to a specially constmcted
platform in the ritual field (rante). The core of
the ritual process is the distribution of the meat
of several slaughtered buffaloes to the guests; the
distribution, which takes place the day before the
transfer of the corpse from the rante to the grave,
18 both the arena where guests’ status and rank are
displayed and the symbolic device for strengthen-
tng ties of affinity, consanguinity, and any oth
er kind of social relationship as gifts of meat
ntually express “patterns of reciprocity (between
villages, tongkonan, family members, friends, ac
quaintances, and so on)” (Nooy-Palm 1979: 199).
Funeral rituals mark out the symbolic space
w herein “status and personal place in the social
hierarchy” (including three levels: nobles, com
moners, and slaves) are defined because tradition
determines role, behavior, and position of any in
dividual attending the funeral: “who poured palm
wine, who wrapped the corpse and prepared offer-
uigs, where each person could or could not sit ...
what piece of meat would constitute one’s share
and in which order it would be offered” (Volkman
1984: 155). As the number and quality of buffaloes
slaughtered by each relative of the dead person
define the portion of inheritance the relative is
entitled to, the slaughter of these animals stimu
lates controlled competition between members of
the marapuan, which emphasizes hidden conflicts.
Even though funeral rituals represent a piv
otal element of Toraja social organization wherein
cohesion, reciprocity, hierarchy, and conflict are
displayed, in precolonial times they were just a
part of a more complex ritual system which also in
cluded fertility rituals. Ritual practices were dom
inated by two pairs of cosmological oppositions,
“one between upperworld and underworld, and the
other between East and West” (Nooy-Palm 1979:
109). In the ritual context the double cosmological
dichotomy led to the division between fertility
rites, associated with heavenly gods and the north
east and funeral rituals, associated with death and
the southwest (Nooy-Palm 1979: 112); the former
were performed in the morning, before noon and
were labelled ‘climbing smoke,’ the latter were
performed in the afternoon, toward sunset and
were defined ‘laying smoke’” (112).
Missionaries, who began to work in the Toraja
highlands in the 1920s, after the Dutch conquest
(1906), soon realized that “a wholesale condem
nation of ritual practices would not yield many
converts” (Volkman 1984; 156) and that only tol
erance would make conversion easier. Therefore,
they engaged themselves in the task of separating
ritual practices incompatible with the Christian re
ligion from ritual behaviors which they deemed to
be “bearable”: the Toraja were allowed to perform
the latter, that is funeral rituals, while the former
(fertility ceremonies) were strictly forbidden. Even
funeral rituals were modified so they could fit in
with the Christian faith: converted Toraja were
allowed to slaughter buffaloes and distribute their
meat but offerings of meat to spirits were banned,
as was the worship of dead effigies (tau tau) (Volk
man 1990: 92).
As a consequence of this distinction, fertility rit
uals declined while funeral rituals survived and de
veloped. Missionary action, supported by colonial
Dutch authority, aimed at splitting the traditional
ritual system (aluk to dolo): missionaries accepted
customs deemed to be bearable and rejected other
customs as offensive, pagan behaviors. The part of
aluk “revolving around gods and spirits” and con
sequently branded as “animism” was refused while
“neutral” traditional practices were accepted and
labelled with the Indonesian word adat (Volkman