The Maranos were one of the first people to live in Sarawak and are the fifth largest ethnic group in Sarawak. Hair source in mu gum. Before 1853, they had settled in a longhouse in Kampung Nangka. The Maranos worship pantheons, believing that life and environment are one, and originally believed in Liko (river tribes). Most of today are Christians or Catholics or Muslims.
Society is hierarchical
The Maranos once had their own glory, combined with fragmentary records and folklore of the Marano dynasty in ancient documents from various countries, the Marano dynasty is the oldest dynasty in Borneo, which grew during the 11th century and fell into decline in the 15th century. After the fall of the Marano dynasty, it was long reduced to the side of colonial rule, and the Maranos gradually lost their beliefs, customs, language and culture, and even identity.
Lamindana homestay.
Although the Marano dynasty declined in the 15th century, society still adhered to a hierarchical system, divided into royalty, nobility, freedmen, and slaves. Hidden in the Marano community is a complex traditional method of calculation to distinguish the class of a family, which is based on the "Pikul" (Pikul) unit. It is divided into five, seven, nine, twelve, and fifteen "bigu". Five and seven "bigu" were free men; nine, twelve, and fifteen "bigu" belonged to the aristocratic class; above fifteen were royal families, and below the five Betirih (Dipen gak luer) were slaves. When we visited the Sapan Puloh Mini Marano Museum in the village, the owner explained: "'Bigu' refers to the bending of the waist knife, and the more bends there are, the higher the social class. "But there are also sources that say that Pikul refers to a unit of measurement, and one Pikul is about equal to the weight of 60 kilograms of copper.
Diana Rose, the owner of the Lamindana homestay where we stayed, has a very special identity, she is the last generation of royal descendants. But she rarely mentions her identity to anyone else, because slavery in the past was a dark scene in history.
Male and female slaves accompanied their masters to the burial
In the downtown area of Mujiao, as well as in the village of Dillyan, we see no less than three pillars standing tall, made of Sarawak's famous ironwood (Kayu belian, scientific name Eusideroxylon zwageri), which is the so-called "Jerunai" pillar. When a member of the royal family dies, his body is not buried directly, but after the body is decomposed, the bones are collected in the urn and placed in the "Jerunai". At this time, a pair of male and female slaves between the ages of twelve and thirteen will be martyred, the male slave will be thrown into the pit, and the female slave will be hung on the "Jerunai" pillar, so that she will starve to death. According to tradition, the male and female slaves who accompany the burial become the guardians and attendants of the deceased in the afterlife. When we looked at a "Jerunai" pillar in the village, there were many marks of knife slashes near the land, which were said to be the families of slaves, who could not bear the cruel killing of children, and vented their anger in their chests with knives!
Labor in the workshop of Shuoguo.
This extremely inhumane system of burial ended when the Kingdom of Brunei handed sarawak under the administration of the white Brooke Family, and the second generation of Rajah Charles Brooke (1868) ended it.
There is always a shadow behind the light, and along with the glory of history, there will be darkness that cannot bear to look directly! For those laborers who work at sunrise and rest at sunset in the village of Di lian, the rivers and the mountains compose the song of their lives. They may not have expected that a quiet life would intrude into many snoopers. Time, like the smoke of their roasting of giant curd particles, they always return a warm smile, revealing both bitterness and frankness.