Eclipses as Omens of Death: The Socio-Religious Interpretation of a Cosmological Phenomenon among the Suki in South New Guinea

Abstract

The Suki live in the southern lowland of Papua New Guinea, in the swampy area between the River Fly and the border with West Irian. The population of about 1000 is concentrated in five villages, the sizes of which vary from 360 to 100 people. The Suki are divided into non-localised, exogamous patriclans, which are grouped into exogamous moieties. Their main means of subsistence are agriculture (mainly yam culture and sago production), hunting and fishing. Nothing is produced for the market; a small income is obtained by some by selling crocodile skins and by giving service to the government and the missions. The first contacts with the Australian government date back to the early 1920’s, but pacification of the area only took place in 1931. Ten years later a mission society settled in Suki. The missionaries run a school up to Standard II, a clinic and a store. They have always been the only whites and also the only employers in the Suki area.

The investigation on which this essay is based took place in 1963–65. It was financed by the University of Amsterdam, the Netherlands Organization for the Advancement of Pure Research (Z.W.O.) and the Netherlands Foundation for the Advancement of Tropical Research (WOTRO). When the present tense is used in this essay, it refers to the year 1965.

The erratum of this chapter is available at http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/978-94-017-4902-2_17