British North Borneo~folklore,religion & custom.

The collection of Dusun,Bajau and Illanun stories was made in the years 1910 and 1911,during parts of which Ivor H N Evans was stationed in two adjoining districts of Tuaran and Tempassuk ; while material contained in the paper ,that on customs and beliefs of the 'orang dusun' , was collected partly at the same time as the folk-stories ,partly on a short visit by Ivor to the Tempassuk district in 1915.
The Tempassuk is inhibited by three different peoples ,the Dusuns,the Bajaus and Illanuns , and it is chiefly from the first of these that the tales have been collected ; for , since both Bajaus and Illanuns are Mohamedans , their folklore is not nearly so extensive as that of their Dusun neighbors , who are pagans. The Mohamedans, roughly speaking , form the coastal and estuarine population, while the Dusuns, with the exception of those of a few large villages on the plains, which border on the Bajau zone, are confined to the foot hills and mountainous portion of the area. The Tuaran district is divided between Bajaus and Dusuns , but here Illanuns are wanting.
It would seem that the Dusuns are the original inhabitants of the country ,and that the Bajaus and Illanuns ,are later arrivals who have driven the first named inland. This is known to be a fact in the case of the Illanuns ,who are a tribe of Mindanao in the Philippines ; of whom small roving parties have settled in Borneo. The origin of the Bajaus ,[in Tempassuk they call themselves "Sama"], unknown , but they are widely spread along the coast of North Borneo. However , as far as the Tempassuk is concerned, tradition asserts that they first came in trading boats from the direction of Kudat , and eventually fought the Dusuns and formed settlements in the country.
It is often said by Europeans resident in North Borneo , without ,sufficient evidence ,that the Dusuns have a large admixture of Chinese blood . 'Orang Dusun' , which literally means 'people of the orchard' , is a name originally used by the Malays to denote large sections of natives population of British North Borneo, which they considered to be of similar habit and culture . The term is loose but useful and has consequently been adopted by Europeans.
Ivor H N Evans noted that in those parts of the country he had visited , the Dusuns ,cannot be said that they have any tribal organization, the village community being the unit .In the Tempassuk district,the Dusuns style themselves 'Tindal', while that the upcountry Tuaran natives do the same . Around Tuaran settlement,however, they seem to call themselves 'Suong Lotud',[people of the country; i.e. the developed country as opposed to the jungle]. These Tuaran villages differ somewhat in their customs from the Tempassuk natives.
It must be understood that in these writings , i merely deal with Ivor H N Evans notes of the Tempassuk district and with the villages immediately surrounding the Government post at Tuaran back in 1910 till 1915.

Nabalu ,or [peng-alu-an], the Dusun afterworld

In the past, the Dusuns, as do some of the tribes and people in North Borneo , believe that the souls of the dead ascend a mountain , and , as Kinabalu ,or better ,Nabalu, towers up the height of about 13,500ft, dominating the whole Tempassuk District and indeed ,the country many miles beyond it ,what could be more natural than for them to choose this magnificent mountain for the resort of departed souls ? They believe however ,that the ghost of the dead may linger near their former homes before undertaking their journey , for, in the lowland villages of Tempassuk [Kota Belud] ,when a death has occurred,the old women weep and cry aloud to the spirit of the deceased ,since they are afraid that if the ghost were to loiter near the village it would do the survivors some mischief. With an object of preventing the soul's return , the bamboo bier on which the corpse has been carried is sometimes cut to pieces at the grave side , while that in some lowland villages mourners on returning from a funeral slash with their chopping knives at the step of the house and the door of the room in which a death has occurred.
Since Nabalu is the home of the dead, a ceremony has to be performed ,and offerings made, before its ascent can be undertaken by human beings. In addition ,those who climb the mountain must not use its ordinary name while on it, but must refer to it as 'agayoh ngaran' ,which means 'big name'.
Whilst in the interior part of the Kinabatangan [William B Pryer ,1898] ,the most objectionable custom practiced by the dusuns was that of human sacrifice or "surmungup" as they called it ; the ostensible reason seems to have been to send messages to dead relatives , and to this end they used to get a slave ,usually one bought for the purpose , tie him up and bind him round with cloths,and then after some preliminary dance and singing , one after another they would stick a spear a little way -an inch or so- into his body , each one sending a message to his deceased relatives/friends as he did so. There was even more difficulty in getting them to abandon this custom than there was to leave head hunting. Down in the south-east of North Borneo ,the Tidong way of managing "surmungup" is for a lot of them to subscribe till the price of a slave is raised , he is then bought , tied up , and all the subscribers grasping simultaneously a long spear , it is thrust through him at once. Another custom worth mentioning were of the Tunbunwhas ,that was embalming of the dead. ; this is done with the valuable Borneo camphor ,abundant in the woods in their neighborhood ,more particularly on the Kinabatangan; the coffins are hewn out of a solid piece of 'billian'.

[ The Kwijau or Kuijau are an indigenous ethnic group residing in the Interior Division of North Borneo , to the west and north of Keningau.
- A Kwijau grave at Apin Apin , courtesy of the National Archive , U,K.]

[ Dusun grave at Kampong Keranaan, Tambunan , courtesy of the National Archive , U,K.]

Tampulan stone , Tenom

In one of his journals, when he was staying at the northern end of the Tenom plain, Frank Witti wrote ;

"At another such clearing there is a stone block on which the division of skulls is made: these Dyaks are said never to go beyond quartering a bead, smaller shares being made up in kind. On that block could be seen the stains of blood. Nearby is a rude scaffolding which serves to exhibit the trophies. But the queerest feature of that spot was a young sugar plant sprinkled with blood and carefully fenced in -why not a forget-me-not?" He does not mention the name of the clearing, but it is probably a reference to Batu Tampulan—'Tampulan's Stone'—near Melalap. The sugar plant is no longer there; the surrounding jungle is gone and rubber trees have taken its place, but the stone is still there, though the blood stains have long since been washed away. It is a large flat stone slab roughly circular in shape, about three feet in diameter, and apparently hot more than six inches or so in thickness; close by are two or three ordinary looking boulders, and a yard from it another- stone which may be a flake from a round boulder; it stands about two feet high, about a foot wide at ground level rising to a point which is curved over towards the flat block—it reminds one of a cobra head—and is said to be a man who was turned into stone whilst squatting down with his eyes fixed on the trophies lying on the block. A few hundred yards away is another stone, 'Batu Belanoi', a small cone two feet high with a circular depression on the tip of the cone, said to have been made by Tampulan, who used it as a seat and wore away its top. Tampulan was a Timogun hero of ancient, times. One day, when he was a child and had been left alone iu the house by his parents, a Spirit came and carried him off into the top of a tall Aru tree where he kept him and instructed him in the use of weapons and in all kinds of wisdom and in magic.

For several months he lived in the tree top, and finally was restored by the Spirit to his parents, who had searched for him in vain all over the country. Tampulan grew up a wise leader of his people and a mighty man of war. He built a great 'Long House' village called Dapulan for himself and his people, and the flat stone was his hearthstone. One day  a,  party of Peluans from the Bokan district from the Ulu Sook came down to raid Kasiai, a Timogun house not far from Dapulan; the news reached Tampulan who seized his weapons and with a single leap sprang from his own house to Kasiai and attacked the enemy: with every stroke a Peluan fell, and in a few minutes . not a single raider was left alive. He collected the heads and took them home and made a great feast over them. Not long afterwards , he set out on a lone raid up the Sook valley and  in the Bokan country found a large party planting padi on a hill side clearing; he muttered some charms and stroked his .hand down his blowpipe, and transformed himself into the likeness of an old Bokan with a long planting stick in his hand. Thus disguised, he joined the unsuspecting planters, and when in the midst of them once more stroked his staff which became again a spear tipped blowpipe, and with quick stabs right and left he slew every one of the planting party. As he was making off with the heads, help arrived, too late and pursuit was vain, for Tampulan leaped to the tree top and  made his way home over the top of the jungle to Dapulan , where he cleaned and prepared the skulls on his hearthstone.  His fame was never forgotten , and after his death his 'people' always assembled round the stone after a successful raid, and there cleaned their trophies and divided his share to every warrior who had borne a part-in the attack.”

Cult of the Sacred Jar

The Dusuns of Tuaran , Papar , and of some other places commonly worship
certain jars , which are regarded as being sacred . Various kinds of old
jars of foreign manufacture ,most, if not all , of which are of Chinese
origin , are regarded as being valuable property by many of the pagan
peoples of Borneo , but the Dusuns think that certain varieties of them
are tenanted by in-dwelling spirits , and are hence worthy of reverence .
It is to a kind called 'gusi ' in particular that sacrifice and prayer are
made at Tuaran ; and families vie with one another to obtain a specimen
from two or three thousands dollars being no uncommon price to pay for one.
Each member of a family has often a small share in such a jar , and owing
to the frequent and complicated lawsuits which formerly arose in
consequence , it became necessary that such cases should be stopped ; a
notification therefore was issued by the then Governor of British North
Borneo ,which prohibited legal proceedings with regard to 'gusi' , except
with a view to enforcing the rights of the 'waris' [members of the fmailies
of owners] as define in the notification. The 'gusi' is a pot-bellied jar
of a greenish-brown color and has often a cracked skin , but whether this
crackle is due to age or was produced in manufacture are not certain . It
appears to be of Chinese make,and specimens may vary considerably in size.
"Gusi' are often kept in a railed-off enclosure in of the inner rooms of a
Dusun house , and annual sacrifices are made to them at a festival called
'mengahau'. 'Mengahau' is a festival in connection with the sacred jars,
which is performed annually and may take place a few days.