People in between: the Matawai Maroons of Suriname

[p. 153]

Photographs

[p. 155]

Areal view on an upriver village. New style houses with roofs of corrugated iron contrast with the traditional ones.

[p. 156]

Traditional house built on piles, with a palm-leave roof. In the background a modern house with a roof of corrugated iron can be seen. The room under the piles of this house is used for cooking purposes. Most houses have a separate cooking house.

[p. 157]

Communal help at the building of a new style house. The house in the background was finished shortly before.

[p. 158]

The planting of rice on a recently cleared garden is done with a hoe. At this time the watermelons (seen in the background) can already be harvested. In the front the cassave, which was planted shortly after burning.

[p. 159]

A woman in front of her garden.

[p. 160]

Butchering and dividing a tapir by the river side. The pieces of tapir meat are then sent to the surrounding villages.

[p. 161]

Attendants of a ‘giving’ ceremony (marriage) listening to the speeches from a nearby cooking house.

[p. 162]

Playing cards at a whole night wake (booko di dia).

[p. 163]

The preparation of peanut candies for a funeral festival; the sticky substance is stirred with a large spoon.

[p. 164]

Kinsmen assist a widower who has spent the mourning period in his wife's village in carrying his goods to his own house.

[p. 165]

Part of the mourning proceedings. The widower who has spent the mourning period in his wife's village, is returned to his own village. The relatives of his deceased wife present bottles of salt and calabashes to his kinsmen.

[p. 166]

Libation to the ancestors. In the foreground is a tin of rum and a pile of used cloths (see p. 266-8).

[p. 167]

Ritual washing at an obia wosu built especially for this purpose, after a case of drowning. From the large earthenware pots (agban) herbal water is sprinkled on the heads and shoulders of the villagers. People who happened to have seen the corpse line up in another row (on the right); their heads are tied with white kerchiefs and they are given a separate treatment.

[p. 168]

Village officials dressed in their uniforms have assembled at the ancestor pole, for the installation of a number of new basia in Posugunu, village of the gaaman.

[p. 169]

Libation to the ancestors on the occasion of the inauguration of a headman in the village. At the foot of the ancestor pole, water and other drinks are poured on the ground.

[p. 170]

Portrait of our late friend Petrus, captain of Makajapingo.