Ndyuka

By Ineke van Wetering and Bonno Thoden van Velzen

NdYuka, Ndyuka Nengee, Ndjuka, Djuka, Okanisi, Aucaners.

The Ndyuka live in the northern extension of the Amazonian rain forest in the Marowijne (Maroni) river basin which is shared by the Republic of Suriname and French Guiana (South America). The heartland of Ndyuka territory is considered to be the lower part of the Tapanahoni River, a tributary of the Marowijne. Today this area is part of Suriname, formerly Dutch Guiana and independent since 1975. The Ndyuka are one of six Maroon (or "Bush Negro") groups in Suriname. Maroons are the descendants of rebel African slaves who succeeded in building independent communities in the Americas. For cultural and linguistic reasons, Suriname's Maroons can be divided into two groups. The western Maroons include the Saramaka, Matawai, and Kwinti, who are settled along successively more western rivers in central Suriname; the eastern Maroons include the Ndyuka, Paamaka, and Aluku, all of whom have settlements in the Marowijne basin. Ethnonyms for Paamaka are "Paramacca" and "Paramaka." Another name for the Aluku is "Boni."

Although this account focuses on the Ndyuka, much of what is written here applies equally to the Paamaka and the Aluku. They have the same kinship structure, political organization, and religious beliefs. Population size, however, does have an influence. Paamaka and Aluku boast fewer clans than the Ndyuka, and the distinction between clan and lineage is less pronounced among the former. Although both Paamaka and Aluku have significant Afro-Surinamese cults, their social and political impact is far less than it is among the Ndyuka, a point, no doubt, that is also connected with population size. Finally, in every other generation Ndyuka society is shaken by the rise of a new prophet; as far as we are aware such a messianic tradition does not exist among Aluku or Paamaka. Ndyuka are a minority within the multi-ethnic nation of Suriname. Its largest ethnic groups are the Creoles, the descendants of African slaves whose emancipation came with the abolition of slavery in 1863, and the East Indians or Hindustanis, who descend from contract laborers brought to Suriname from the Indian subcontinent after slavery ended. Suriname's third largest population segment are the Javanese, who were recruited from the former Dutch East Indies (now Indonesia). Both Hindustanis and Javanese were shipped to Suriname to replace Creoles as plantation laborers. After the Javanese, Maroons constitute the next largest group, with about 15 percent of the population.

No reliable census data for the Ndyuka, Paamaka, or Aluku exist. The Paamaka and Aluku have each been estimated at 2,000, but in reality their numbers could be double that figure. It is much more difficult to reach a sound estimate of the number of Ndyuka. During Suriname's civil war (1986-1990), some 8,000 Ndyuka fled to French Guiana. In the same period, according to relief organizations, another 10,000 Ndyuka still resided in villages in Suriname's interior. Before the civil war, thousands of Ndyuka settled in Suriname's capital Paramaribo, or were forced to take up residence there in 1986, at the beginning of the armed struggle. Since many neighborhoods of Paramaribo are now populated by Ndyuka, it seems safe to estimate the numbers of those domiciled in that city at 10,000. Finally, a few thousands Ndyuka live today in the Netherlands, concentrated mainly in the cities of Amsterdam, Tilburg, and Utrecht. On the basis of such data and impressions, we would estimate the total number of Ndyuka between 30,000 and 35,000.

The Ndyuka, Paamaka, and Aluku speak variants of a Creole language called "Nengee" by the eastern Maroons. Nengee is closely related to SRANAN TONGO, the Creole of the coast. Much of the NENGEE lexicon, or of NDYUKA TONGO (Language of the Ndyuka) for that matter, derives from various West and Central African languages. Perhaps as much as 30 percent of the Ndyuka lexicon can be traced to English (the language of the original colonists in Suriname), 10 percent to Portuguese (the language of many Surinamese plantation owners), and another 10 percent to Amerindian languages and to Dutch. As with the Saramaka, the grammar resembles that of the other (lexically distinct) Atlantic Creoles and presumably derives from African models.

The ancestors of the Ndyuka escaped from plantations on the Surinamese coast in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. After a protracted guerrilla war, they concluded a peace treaty with the Dutch colonial regime in 1760. They were the first of the Maroon groups in Suriname to be granted semi-independence, more than a century before the abolition of slavery (1863) in Suriname and the United States.

During the closing decades of the eighteenth century the Aluku fought the longest and most bitter of all the Maroon wars against Dutch mercenary troops. In 1793, the Aluku were defeated by an alliance of Dutch troops and Ndyuka volunteers. The Paamaka, who were hiding in forest villages near the central part of the Marowijne River, established relations with the Ndyuka early in the nineteenth century. For the first half of that century, Aluku and Paamaka were in essence Ndyuka vassals. In the second half of the nineteenth century, stability was brought to the region through political agreements between Paamaka and Aluku on the one hand, and Dutch and French authorities on the other. The Paamaka settled on the Dutch side of the Marowijne River, the Aluku mainly on the French side of the Lawa River, a continuation of the Marowijne. Long before 1900, colonial authorities considered the Paamaka and Aluku to be political entities distinct and separate from the Ndyuka. Like the other Suriname Maroons, these three groups continued to enjoy considerable autonomy in their remote forest villages. Outside observers called them states-within-a-state.

During the 1950s, various agencies of the Suriname government began to employ hundreds of Ndyuka, and many of these settled in the capital Paramaribo. During the 1960s and 1970s, the pace of migration to the capital increased. This process was spurred on by the departure of tens of thousands of Creoles and Hindustanis to the Netherlands in the years preceding and immediately following independence (1975). Many Ndyuka bought real estate and other forms of property (taxis, buses, vans) at bargain prices. Since 1970, about one-third of Suriname's population, more than 200,000 people, has settled in the Netherlands. After a small group of young Ndyuka men ambushed a military post in 1986, the military government reacted with collective reprisals against Ndyuka communities in the coastal region. The massacre by the army of the inhabitants of Moi Wana, a small settlement on the coastal road, prompted the flight of thousands of Maroons to French Guiana. Others found shelter with relatives in the capital. A full-scale rebellion of Ndyuka, Saramaka, and Paamaka against the army ensued. Although armed resistance ended in 1990, tensions still flare up whenever international commercial interests threaten to encroach on Maroon lands in the interior. Many Ndyuka assume that they hold corporate ownership rights over their tribal territory, believing it guaranteed by eighteenth-century peace treaties. However, the national government acknowledges and acts only on a presumption of individual property rights.

Two ancestor shrines are central to Ndyuka ritual life: the mortuary (KEE OSU) and the ancestor pole or "flagpole" (FAAKATIKI). Without these two shrines, no settlement can claim village status. A village (KONDEE) is therefore clearly distinguished from a settlement (KAMPU), irrespective of the number of its inhabitants. Some Ndyuka settlements on the Marowijne and Lawa Rivers may have as many as 500 or even a 1,000 inhabitants; some villages have less than 100.

Villages and settlements are built on islands in the river or on its banks and consist of an irregular arrangement of small houses, domesticated trees, shrines, and bushes. Villages appear abandoned for a good part of the year, when most men leave for work elsewhere and the rest of their families withdraw for extended periods to their forest camps. Most Ndyuka own such camps, varying in importance from makeshift shelters on or near their gardens, to full-fledged settlements for groups of kinsmen and their spouses. When asked why they often spend more time in their forest camps than in the village, Ndyuka contrast the freedom they enjoy in their camps with the suffocating village life, where people are believed to be constantly watching their neighbors.

Ndyuka economy has always been based on swidden agriculture, supplemented by hunting and fishing, and participation in the (post)colonial economy. The major garden crop is dry (hillside) rice. Other crops include cassava, taro, okra, maize, plantains, bananas, sugarcane, and peanuts. Domesticated trees include coconut, orange, breadfruit, papaya, and calabash. Garden produce, game, and fish are shared among a small group of kinsmen. There are no markets.

When opportunities for gainful employment decrease, Ndyuka produce the bulk of their material culture. Men build houses, canoes, and carve wooden objects such as stools, paddles, winnowing trays, cooking utensils, and combs. Women sew, embroider, and carve calabash bowls. Other essential goods obtained from the outside include shotguns, tools, pots, cloth, hammocks, salt, soap, kerosene, rum, and salt. Increasingly, with economic expansion, articles bought in local shops or in the city are replacing the locally made, wooden utensils. Gas stoves and electrical appliances have grown much in evidence these last twenty years. Women buy dresses and many household articles. Outboard motors have long been common; transistor radios and tape recorders are also ubiquitous.

Involvement with the larger economic world has greatly influenced cultural and social life at different phases of Ndyuka economic development. After the war with the Aluku ended in 1793, most Ndyuka men worked as independent lumberers, felling trees, squaring logs, and floating them in rafts to buyers on the plantations or in Paramaribo. In the first decades of the nineteenth century, hundreds of Ndyuka left their villages in the interior to build settlements in the coastal plain, below the rapids and falls of the Marowijne river, and closer to their customers. As lumbering became more important, Ndyuka settlements on the coast became more permanent and obtained village status with the planting of mortuary and ancestor poles. By about 1850, the Cottica River--one or two days by boat from Paramaribo--was the second most important settlement area after the Tapanahoni.

During the late 1880s, new economic opportunities arose. Rich deposits of gold were discovered in the hinterland. Ndyuka men abandoned the lumber trade to become boatsmen and offer their services to transport goldminers up and down the rivers. They paddled and punted dug-out canoes loaded with miners and their equipment to remote places in the interior of Suriname and (more commonly) French Guiana. Ndyuka and Saramaka boatmen gained a monopoly over river transport in both countries. Demand for their services was strong, especially during the bonanza of the early twentieth century. But even after the euphoria of the gold rushes had spent itself, sufficient placers had been opened up and enough laborers employed to require the regular services of a substantial number of boat crews. In this milieu, swidden agriculture suffered as men were unable to carry out their traditional tasks of felling the giant trees of the rain forest to clear new gardens so that the women could plant in the ashes of the burned undergrowth. Consequently, the output of the swidden gardens could no longer satisfy basic food needs, and visitors to Ndyuka villages reported signs of both affluence and of starvation. This period of prosperity was brought to an end after 1920 with the sudden decline of the gold industry.

Around 1954, when Suriname gained a semi-independent status, the authorities in Paramaribo began to invest money in the exploration and exploitation of the interior. Many Ndyuka, as well as many other Maroons, became employed as boatmen or workers for government agencies. During the 1950s and 1960s, hundreds of Ndyuka families settled in the capital to be closer to their employers. Since about 1985, the newly exploited gold fields of the Sella Creek, a tributary of the Tapanahoni, have formed a mainstay of the Ndyuka economy. Access to these deposits is still controlled by Ndyuka who often employ Brazilian workers. Horticultural production is in steady decline and Ndyuka goldminers buy their food from shopkeepers or from other Maroons.

The task of clearing and burning the fields rests on men, whereas planting, weeding, and harvesting is mainly women's work. Hunting (with shotguns) is an exclusively male activity, as is wage labor outside the tribal territory. After the outbreak of hostilities in 1986, when men had to hide from public view, women from the Cottica River area began catering to the rising demand for agricultural and other products in French Guiana, where the missile basis at Kourou occasioned an economic upturn. Increasingly, Ndyuka women trade in urban goods, traveling by boat to the interior where a new generation of goldminers is active. Men often charter airplanes and women make use of modern equipment like cooler chests and insulated bags to trade in frozen foods, roasted meat and salted fish.

Each matrilineal clan holds title to a section of the forest. Actual land use and ownership are, however, determined by smaller matrilineal groups, lineages or segments of such groups. Every clan member has the right to hunt and gather in the forest owned by his or her clan.

The dominant principle of Ndyuka social organization is matrilineality. All Ndyuka know to which of the fourteen matrilineal clans (LO) they belong. With few exceptions, all Ndyuka villages are "owned" by a clan. Clans are divided into matrilineages (BEE). Each lineage can again be subdivided into matri-segments (WAN MAMA PIKIN or MAMA OSU PIKIN). As usual in matrilineal societies, other principles structure kin relations as well. Bilateral consanguineal kin groups (FAMII) play a fairly important role in Ndyuka culture. Additionally, the priests of Afro-Surinamese cults, or other important elders, are sometimes successful in encouraging consanguineal and affinal kin to take up residence in their village quarter. Such a following (FOLOKU) may gradually assume a corporate identity -- "the People of So-and-So." Generations after their founder died, some of these followings continue to be recognized as corporate groups.

In certain villages, bilateral groups and followings are so dominant that they make the matrilineal dimension of Ndyuka society sometimes difficult to discern. But when the hour strikes for an avenging spirit (KUNU) to manifest itself, matrilineality once again structures life chances. An avenging spirit returns the matrilineage to life by selecting a medium from among the matrilineal relatives of either the offender or victim. Each avenging spirit is a curse that the lineage has brought on itself by killing a human being or an animal, such as a snake, which serves as some deity's "vehicle." Eventually (even generations after the event) the ghost of the slain or the snake deity, will start a war of extermination against the lineage of the offender (see Religious Beliefs).

In contrast with matrilineal ideology, Ndyuka kinship terminology is remarkable for its symmetry. In what looks at first glance like a standard Hawaiian type of nomenclature, kinsmen on the father's side have the same terms of reference as those on the mother's side. In the ascending generation, for example, kinship terminology does not discriminate between FaBr and MoBr, or between a classificatory FaBr and a classificatory MoBr. All these relatives are called TIU. The same holds true for FaSi and MoSi who, along with all their classificatory equivalents, are called TIA. Like Hawaiian, Ndyuka terminology always indicates the sex and generation of each relationship. But unlike Hawaiian and more like Eskimo terminology, fathers are distinguished from their brothers, and mothers from their sisters.

Older people remember that the matrilineage was exogamous, but for at least the last fifty years marriages within the lineage have been accepted, as long as these did not involve members of the same matri-segment. Marriage to an actual father's sister's daughter is not permitted. Ndyuka regard this as a form of incest; it is "too close." A preferred alliance is marriage to a classificatory father's sister's daughter. People call such a marriage "replanting the seedling." As the Nyduka see it, by taking his wife from his father's matrilineage, a man continues to contribute to that lineage (Köbben 1967).

In Ndyuka society almost one-third of marriages are polygynous. Contrary to anthropological reasoning, polygyny and uxorilocal residence are here found together, though polygyny better combines with autolocality, with spouses living in their own villages most of the time. Rules forbidding a man to marry his wife's (classificatory) sisters are strongly sanctioned. To marry two sisters is unthinkable; to have sexual intercourse with your wife's sister is sinful and will arouse the wrath of the ancestors. Divorce is relatively easy and frequent. Almost 40 percent of all marriages of our 1962 census of three Tapanahoni villages had ended in divorce by 1970.

Marriage is a contract between individuals and kin groups, and involves continuous bargaining. A man has to supply his wives with a house, a garden plot, a canoe and a paddle, a hammock and mosquito net, and various household utensils. A newly-married couple is likely to settle in the wife's village, or opt for an ambilocal solution, namely, to reside alternately in the man's and in the woman's village. Later in life many couples often decide to settle in the man's village, especially if he has attained the status of village headman. In some larger villages, home to political and religious elite, some 25 percent of married couples have opted for virilocal residence. If we disregard marriages within the village, about 30 percent choose uxorilocal residence, while ambilocality is preferred by 28 percent.

The overwhelming majority of men and women have houses in more than one village. House ownership is an individual matter. Upon marriage a man will build a house for his wife in her village, and cut her garden plot, whether he intends to settle there or not. He will also maintain a house in his lineage's village. It is not unusual for him to own a third house in his father's village. In view of the fact that nearly one out of every three men has more than one wife, the number of houses (and garden plots) to be kept in a good state may easily rise above three. People--especially men--have to travel a lot. In the Tapanahoni River area, if we exclude the 15 percent of all marriages which are autolocal, where partners pay only brief visits to each other, then about a third of all adults live polylocally, i.e. have more than one place of residence. For a man this implies that he cannot identify too closely with one particular domestic unit since this would mean a loss of maneuverability in other groups. For him it is imperative to spread his interests over a number of villages, depending on how many wives he has.

Within the domestic unit and local community status differences are apparent. Ndyuka distinguish three classes of co-residents. First, those matrilineally related, the GOON PIKIN or PANDASI; then, those inhabitants for whom it is a father's village (DADA MEKE EN PIKIN), and thirdly, the affines (KONLIBI). These positions enjoin a specific behavioral code. A woman who decides to settle among her man's lineage mates, tries to ingratiate herself with the women of his lineage and grateful for her labor, the host village will treat her with respect. A man staying with his wife is also treated as a respected guest, as long as he does not take sides in local disputes and behaves modestly in public. The highest possible praise for such an affine is "he is living the right way, he tries to make himself small" (Köbben 1967, 44).

When a village headman dies, only a male matrilineal relative can succeed him. The position of a headman's assistant, the BASIA, however, is open to sons as well. The inheritance of goods is not restricted to matrilineal relatives, but divided among relatives. The ideal is that "everyone" should share in the inheritance, the deceased's matrilineal kin, his or her children, and other villagers. In reality the inheritance is shared by the FAMII, the small group of localized consanguineous kin. However, when divination shows that the deceased is a witch his possessions are confiscated by GAAN TATA and his priests (see Death and Afterlife).

After spending its first several years with its mother, a child is raised by an individual man or woman (not a couple) designated by the FAMII, girls normally by women, boys by men. Even when a child is raised by a matrilineal relative, father-child relations are warm and strong. Children assume responsibility for sex-typed adult tasks as soon as they are physically able to perform them. Girls are married by age 15, and boys, not until their twenties. Until the 1960s, only one elementary school existed in the Tapanahoni region, due to Ndyuka opposition against Protestant and Catholic missionaries. The demands of city life and the opening of government schools has made this opposition disappear. However, schools were completely closed down during the Surinamese civil war of the late 1980s.

The Ndyuka, like the other Maroon groups, maintain considerable political autonomy within the Republic of Suriname. Ndyuka society is strongly egalitarian. No social or occupational classes are distinguished. Elders are accorded special respect. Burial societies and spirit medium cults provide cross-cutting ties between greatly autonomous matrilineages and followings. Two associations are responsible for mortuary rites: gravediggers (OLOMAN) and coffin-makers (KISIMAN). All adult Ndyuka men are members of either one or the other sodality. Some women join the gravediggers association, but play narrowly circumscribed roles. The headmen of the gravediggers (BASI FU OLO) occupy strategic positions in the important corpse divination ritual (see Death and Afterlife).

The Ndyuka have a hierarchy of political functionaries, appointed by council meetings and confirmed by the administration of Suriname. Confirmation by the government implies official recognition and payment of a salary. The hierarchy is headed by a Paramount Chief (GAANMAN). Villages usually have two or three headmen (KABITEN). The office of village headman is the property of a matrilineage. Two BASIA assist each headman. Regularly a host of issues is submitted to arbitration in council meetings (KUUTU) that vary in size from a few elders of the small family group to congregations of all the senior men of village or tribe, collectively referred to as LANTI, the citizenry. Considerable power is wielded by priest groups of the main deities. Illness and misfortune bring clients to their shrines, and serve as occasions for thrashing out controversies.

Many important decisions affecting village life are made by a collective of male elders, usually after consultation with senior women. As many elders use these palavers to display their oratory gifts, such council meetings (KUUTU) may take hours before decisions are reached. Other conflicts and disagreements that are felt to be relevant to a small group of kinsmen only are discussed by a few men and women in the seclusion of a house and usually quite early in the morning. Gossip plays its role. Köbben (1967) overheard the saying: "By their mouths they keep us in check."

Before the 1990s physical aggression was strongly condemned and a reason to convene a village council. The party resorting to violence would be fined, irrespective of the rights or wrongs of the case. The only exception to this rule was adultery. A cuckolded husband, assisted by a few brothers, was allowed to give the adulterer a beating. But afterwards the elders would assemble to discuss whether the wronged party had kept to the rules that pertain to such cases: no sticks or other weapons were permitted and no fights on the river or in the fields. All citizens were obliged to intervene and put an immediate end to the punishment. The other fights we witnessed during our field work in the 1960s and 1970s were few in number and mainly between women. When men were involved, adultery was almost invariably the reason. During the civil war (1986-1990) units of the Jungle Commando, the rebel army, took it upon themselves to pursue similar tactics: they intervened in conflicts that threatened to become violent. After 1985, the expansion of gold fields in the central Tapanahoni area brought an influx of Brazilian miners. Physical aggression between Ndyukas and these foreigners, but also among Ndyuka themselves, became much more common. The eroding of the authority of the traditional council meeting, and of village headmen and Paramount Chief, a process already well underway before the civil war, has proceeded rapidly. This development has contributed to the higher levels of physical aggression that the 1990s show.

The Ndyuka worldview encompasses all that is brought under separate headings in Western society, for instance, psychology, philosophy, and even much of art. Religion in Ndyuka culture is embedded in their way of life. This does not imply that people would not distinguish between secular and sacred knowledge. A good part of technology, medicine, history, and art are regarded as purely worldly. However, Ndyuka insist that human knowledge is severely limited, and other ways to the unknown are therefore highly valued. Much of what is "unknown" is the domain of the gods.

Ndyuka recognize numerous gods (GADU). They are believed to be powerful and immortal beings, though few of them are considered omniscient or omnipresent. The Ndyuka pantheon has a three-tiered structure. At the top of the supernatural hierarchy is MASAA GADU (The Lord God), the fountainhead of creation. Immediately after MASAA GADU, but definitively at another level of spiritual power, are the Great Deities: GAAN GADU (Great Deity) or GAAN TATA (Great Father), OGII (Danger) and GEDEONSU. These divine beings intervene directly in human affairs, take sides in conflicts, and punish humans for their sins. Unlike MASAA GADU, who accords all of humankind his protection equally, the Great Deities are tribal or national gods. It is said of GAAN TATA that he was so indignant about the injustice done to his people, the Ndyukas, that he led them out of slavery, fighting alongside his people like Yahweh among the Jews. Even today, GAAN TATA is primarily seen as a staunch defender of the Ndyuka people against their enemies, the most outstanding among these being witches (WISIMAN). The deity is also pictured as a defender of traditional Ndyuka culture, upholding menstrual taboos, persecuting thieves, adulterers, and homosexuals. OGII is the King of the forest spirits, a critical agency, ambivalent towards gods and humans and, unless appeased, an enormously destructive force. GEDEONSU is considered a shielding, comforting deity. In their prayers to him Ndyuka say "When we are hungry we know where to run to; You will always be there to take care of us, to offer us solace." During the civil war, a delegation of guerrillas had asked and obtained the support of GEDEONSU and important medicine men (OBIAMAN) associated with this deity.

Most gods of the third tier, the minor deities, are potentially invading spirits. Until about 1970, Ndyuka recognized four main pantheons: the YOOKA (ancestors), PAPA GADU or VODU (Reptile Spirits), AMPUKU (Bush Spirits), and KUMANTI (spirits residing in celestial phenomena such as thunder and lightning, carrion birds, or other animals of prey. These minor deities present a spiritual realm full of variety and color. They are depicted as human beings endowed with specific supernatural powers. These divines control particular domains and have distinctive interests, predilections, and frailties. Also like human beings, many deities mate, procreate, and thereby produce hybrid types. They exhibit great differences in supernatural power, and their relations with humanity vary from benevolence to outright hostility. Except for the KUMANTI spirits, all can turn into avenging spirits (KUNU) when offended.

Of all invading spirits BAKUU (demon spirits), classified as subsidiary to the forest spirits, are the most numerous these last two decades. Their provenance can often be traced to Suriname's capital Paramaribo, or to the coastal towns of French Guiana. In the first stages of BAKUU possession the human carrier can expect help from the demon. But gradually the demon will corrupt its human vessel and become a threat to the lives of the medium's relatives. Missionary efforts have been made by both Protestants, mainly the Community of Evangelical Brethren, or Moravians, and the Roman Catholic church, but the results have not been impressive. Recently, some Nyduka have responded to various nonconformist or Pentecostal initiatives.

There is no formal cult for MASAA GADU. Worship for the Great Deities (GAAN TATA, OGII , and GEDEONSU), however, has an organized frame. Shrines are dedicated to these powers, and priests officiate there. These institutions have a marked impact on social and political life. All major problems facing the Ndyuka are discussed at the oracles of these deities. When a new medium seeks legitimization, his or her first trip will be to one of these oracles. The importance of these Afro-American cults for the social and cultural life of the Ndyuka people can hardly be exaggerated. The oracular priests are specialists. The cults of the minor deities are led by medicine men. Every generation a prophet emerges that pronounces on the unsatisfactory state of social routines, governance, and public morals in Ndyuka society. Some of these have had great impact on religious institutions and daily life in general.

Nearly all spirits first manifest themselves at New Year's Day (YALI). The return of hundreds of migrants from Paramaribo, and even from the Netherlands creates a climate favorable for decision-making. The anti-witchcraft ritual which is so characteristic for the GAAN TATA cult takes place regularly, but has no fixed dates. Ceremonies to further the well-being of all Ndyuka are held every two or three years by GEDEONSU's priests. The minor deities are sometimes summoned to add luster to the worship of the major powers, but mostly have their own specific rituals directed by leading mediums. Those Ndyuka men and women who are mediums of snake, forest, or sky spirits form rudimentary organizations. For particular occasions (New Year's Day) or the death of a fellow medium, they assemble to perform their dances under the direction of renowned medicine men (BASI), who are especially knowledgeable of the of spirits being honored.

All Ndyuka men practice woodcarving. House fronts, stools, paddles, and winnowing trays used to be elaborately decorated, in some cases with DOO-DOO TEMBE (through-and-through) designs, and often embellished with copper nails and small buttons. Houses and utensils made in the first half of the twentieth century easily convince one that this period was marked by an explosion in artistic mastery. Gainful employment, however, has been detrimental to Ndyuka art. Decorations became less labor-intensive and simpler in design. Nevertheless, a new wave of prosperity gave an impetus to the arts: from the 1950s on, house facades, canoe prows and sterns, and paddles were painted in bright colors. The results are often spectacular: especially the intricate, multicolored, and geometrically-patterned house fronts. However, when thousands of Ndyuka began to reside permanently in Paramaribo around 1970, few home owners were still interested in having their house fronts done in any elaborate way. Like Saramaka women, Ndyuka women carve calabash bowls and spoons. They also sew narrow-strip garments, and in the 1970s they started cross-stitch embroidery. In general, Ndyuka styles seem to be less intricate than those of the Saramaka.

Illness is usually, but not always, considered to be caused by the displeasure of an ancestor or a deity. Through divination specialists seek to understand which spiritual agency is involved and the reason for its displeasure. Quite often dissatisfaction with divination induces Ndyuka to consult other mediums, medicine men, or oracles. If the minor spirits are considered responsible for illness and misfortune, they are placated by food offers, libations, and specialized drumming and dancing. Patients and their relatives will also visit clinics and hospitals to get Western medicine and treatment. Recourse to Western medicine is rarely seen in conflict with Ndyuka medicine.

In the Ndyuka worldview the dead are always present among the living. Nearly every day, village elders will congregate at the "flagpole," the main ancestor shrine, to speak with the ancestors, to pour them a generous libation, and, above all, to solicit their help in cases of illness and misfortune. These daily prayers are not monopolized by the elders of a matrilineage, but are considered the responsibility of every permanent adult male resident in the village. Note that the elders address themselves to the ancestors who once belonged to the village's permanent residents.

A death in the village initiates a long string of rituals that take at least a year, and often longer, to complete. These funerary rites are supervised by the association of gravediggers, a responsibility they sometimes share with the coffin-makers, the other burial association. Until the early 1970s, the obligatory opening ritual is the inquest, the "carrying of the corpse," an ancient West African tradition. The basic idea is that a ghost, if properly cross-examined by gravediggers and other elders, will have to reveal its secrets, and that its newly-acquired omniscience may prove of inestimable value to the living. Over the last ten years, a number of Ndyuka villages has resumed corpse divination.

During the inquest the interrogators' first priority is to establish whether the deceased was a witch or sinned in other unforgivable ways. If this turns out to be the case, the corpse must be removed from the village at once and brought to an unhallowed locale in the forest. There a shallow grave awaits the sinner, and the ultimate humiliation of being left unburied awaits any dead witch. Witches and sinners are GADU DEDE, "Killed by God;" and are not entitled to a coffin or to the elaborate funerary rites. Those are reserved for the upright, a category of dead called "Gathered by the Ancestors" (YOOKA DEDE).

Any deceased who is "Gathered by the Ancestors" will be honored by the community with an elaborate burial. The corpse will be placed in a painted coffin and filled to the top with clothes, gifts of the deceased's relatives. During the day, members of the deceased's spirit medium association will dance for their departed colleague. At night a wake will be held with dancing, drumming, and storytelling. More ritual will follow at the cemetery when the grave is being dug. The ghost will be honored with ritual on the third day after interment. The surviving spouse then takes up residence with the deceased's relatives, and will honor the ghost with submissive behavior towards them. Three months later, another ritual marks the end of the period of most intense mourning. The surviving spouse is now allowed to drop some of the most onerous mourning restrictions. A widower is sent to the coast to earn money for the BOOKO DEE, a major celebration that usually takes about a week and terminates the mourning period. If the surviving spouse is female, she is allowed to pay visits to her own kin. If the deceased had been married to more than one wife, the obligations for the widows are the same. But witches and sinners get quite different treatment. During the 1960s, two out of every three deaths were classified as GADU DEDE, "Killed by God," or to be more precise, "Killed by GAAN TATA." These people's inheritances were confiscated, cleansed, and redistributed by GAAN TATA's oracle. Some of the goods would be pocketed by the deity's priests, another part of the inheritance would be left in GAAN TATA's sacred forest dump, and finally the rest (usually about one third of the deceased's estate) was returned to the surviving relatives. In 1973, a rebel prophet from the OGII tradition attempted to eradicate these practices. He was successful in stopping GAAN TATA's priests from appropriating inheritances and abandoning a considerable part of this wealth at the site of the deity's forest shrine. However, the prophet could not persuade the Ndyuka to give witches and sinners full funerary rites. Although in most Ndyuka villages corpse divination is no longer performed in public, other forms of divination allow people to pass posthumous judgment on the moral stature of the deceased. Those singled out as witches and sinners are still denied a decent funeral. They are buried in a shallow grave, at some distance from the respectable dead. In urban milieus, hairs and nails of the deceased are carried on a plank by two specialists. This form of divination is considered as efficacious as corpse divination.

Documents referred to in this section are included in this eHRAF collection and are referenced by author, date of publication, and eHRAF document number. The Ndyuka file contains 16 documents, which mostly cover topics on religion, law, and cultural change. The major works are the geographer Jean Hurault's ethnography of the Boni from the 1940s and 1950s (Hurault 1961, no. 6), Bonna Thoden van Velzen's history of Nyduka religious movements and cults (Thoden van Velzen 1988, no. 1), Kenneth Bilby's doctoral dissertation in which he examines culture change and identity in five Aluku communities, and John Lenoir's doctoral dissertation on Paramaccan religion (Lenoir 1973, no. 12). Thoden van Velzen has also written about Ndyuka manners (1984, no. 2), possession cults during Suriname's civil war (1986-1990) (1994, no. 3), and Ndyuka leadership (1995, no. 4). Other studies of Nyduka religion include two studies of Bakuu possession cults (Vernon 1980, no. 11; Wetering 1992, no. 15) and one on witchcraft (Wetering 1987, no. 14). A. J. F. Köbben has written articles on Ndyuka law and sanctions (1969, no. 7), kinship and social organization (1979, no. 8), resistance and acculturation (1968, no. 9), and classificatory kinship and authority (1969, no. 10). Hurault (1959, no. 5) also wrote a comparative demographic study of the Boni and Oyana Indians (SR12). D. C. Geijskes (1954, no. 16) describes food cultivation and preparation among several Maroon tribes, including the Paramacca and Nyduka.

For more detailed information on the content of the individual works in this file, see the abstracts in the citations preceding each document.

The culture summary was written by Ineke van Wetering and Bonno Thoden van Velzen, July 1997.

• AMPUKA--forest spirits--776

• BAKUU--malevolent spirits--776, 754

• BASI--priest--793, 756

• BONI--war hero--769

• BOOK DEI--mourning ceremony--765, 769

• collective fantasy departmentalization--631, 634

• FOLUKU--residential group--592

• francisation--641

• GAANAM--paramount chief--643

• ethnogenesis--186, 619

• KAPITEN--village headman--622, 631

• KINA--prohibitions--783,784

• KUMANTI--medicine men--756

• KUNU--avenging spirit--775, 776, 769, 613, 627

• LANTI--council of village elders--561,613, 623, 627

• Moravian Church--797, 795

• OBEAH--protective medicine, oracle--755, 778, 789

• ODIN--Aluku tribal god--776

• palaver--clan councils--614, 623, 627

• PUU BAAKA--769

• SWELI--sacred bundle and oracle--778, 787

• WISI--witch--754, 787

• YOOKA--souls of the deceased--775

Bilby, Kenneth M. (1990). The Remaking of the Aluku: Culture, Politics, and Maroon Ethnicity in French South America. Ann Arbor: University Microfilms, Dissertation Information service (2 volumes).

Köbben, A.J.F. (1967). Unity and Disunity: Cottica Djuka Society as a Kinship System. Bijdragen tot de Taal-, Land- en Volkenkunde 123 (1): 10-52.

Lenoir, J.D. (1974). The Paramacca Maroons: A Study in Religious Acculturation. New York: New School for Social Research (Ph.D. Thesis).

Pakosie, Andr (1976). Het Ontstaan van de Bosnegerstam, de Lo, de Bee, Mamaosoe Pikin of Wosoedendoe. Paramaribo: Volksboekwinkel.

Thoden van Velzen, H.U.E. (1995). Revenants That Cannot be Shaken: Collective Fantasies in a Maroon Society. American Anthropologist 97(4): 722-732

Thoden van Velzen, H.U.E., and W. van Wetering (1988). The Great Father and the Danger: Religious Cults, Material Forces, and Collective Fantasies in the World of the Surinamese Maroons. Dordrecht: Foris.

Vernon, Diane (1980). Bakuu: Possessing Spirits of Witchcraft on the Tapanahony. Nieuwe West-Indische Gids 54(1): 1-38.

Van Wetering, Wilhelmina (1992). A Demon in Every Transistor. Etnofoor 5(21): 109-127.