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2002), however this was before the Truku and Seediq were separately classified. The Atayal traditionally live in the mountainous areas of Nantou, Taichung, Miaoli, Hsinchu, Taoyuan, Taipei, Yilan and Hualien counties. Many Atayal may have moved temporarily or permanently to major urban areas for work or education. How this has affected Atayal identity is a topic that needs further research. This thesis focuses on Atayal speakers who still live on their traditional territories. (Traditional territory is defined later in this chapter.)
3.2 History and culture of the Atayal
The Atayal have been through many changes in the past century. At the beginning of the Japanese era they lived in small communities that were self reliant and they were the only masters of their land. They were conquered by the Japanese in the 1920s and lost their position. However, in present day Taiwan the Atayal are experiencing something of renaissance, rediscovering their culture and reasserting their rights to manage land and natural resources.
Atayal people have historically lived in the mountains at altitudes above 1,000 metres (Kaneko, 2009: 250). They migrated into the mountainous areas of northern Taiwan about 250 years ago (Li, 2004). (More details of the migration are given later in this chapter.) However, they have no ethnic memory of life other than in the high mountain valleys to which they are fully adapted. They practiced swidden agriculture growing millet, dry rice, beans and root crops. They also added to their diet by hunting and fishing. Millet was not only a staple part of their diet but had religious and cultural significance (Kaneko, 2009: 249-250).
Takekoshi (1996: 219-222) provides a description of the Atayal in the early Japanese era. This was a time when the Japanese had yet to establish control over the mountain areas and the indigenous peoples living there maintained their autonomy. He notes the Atayal were “extremely ferocious” and “attach great importance to head-hunting”.
They lived in small tribes which were like one family under the patriarchal rule of a chieftain.
The core belief of the Atayal is the gaga. This is a set of rituals and prohibitions inherited from the ancestors and held by the elders within patrilineal clan groups. The
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clan group that shares the same rituals and prohibitions is known as the qotux gaga (Kaneko, 2009: 252). The gaga is an all-embracing concept for the Atayal and it regulates almost all aspects of Atayal affairs (Piling Yapu, 2009a: 70).
Atayal culture has been described as “acephalous, closed and dominated by rigid standards of conduct.” However, the migration from the homeland, aided by the adoption of firearms, which allowed the expansion of the Atayal into new territory shows that there must have been considerable adaptive flexibility. Gradual adaptation to new locations led to the development of new gaga. The knowledge contained in the quotux gaga was important as it was specialised to the environment in which the community lived. At high altitudes small differences in elevation or location could mean significant changes in the dates of specific agricultural activities Hence the knowledge contained in the gaga was highly specialised and essential for the Atayal to maintain their agricultural systems in the high mountain environment (Kaneko, 2009:
253).
The Atayal believe that humans have an immortal spirit known as the utux. After death the utux leaves the body and sets out on a journey. The journey ends at the rainbow bridge (hogo utux) where the ancestral utux are waiting at the other end. The utux is requested to provide proof that they have lived according to the gaga, making them a true Atayal. For a man this means being a brave headhunter, for a women a skilled weaver (ibid.: 254). Kaneko details the mortuary practices of the Atayal based on field studies in the 1950s and 1960s and Japanese historical records. The in-house burial and associated rituals were abolished by the Japanese in the 1920s (ibid.: 252-278).
Facial tattooing is a distinctive feature of Atayal culture. Although this practice was eradicated by the Japanese in the 1930s, there are still a few elders surviving with facial tattoos. These elders offer a window to the past. Being tattooed marked coming of age and once men or women received tattoos they were able to marry. The tattoos also symbolised recognition by the community that a person was a true Atayal. It was necessary to obtain the approval of all community members in order to receive the tattoo. For men this meant proving themselves as a hunter, for women it meant skill in weaving. The facial tattoos represent “gaga on the face” and the diamond pattern represents the ancestral spirits. They are a bridge for communication between humans
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and the ancestral spirits (Piling Yapu, 2009a: 154-162).
Another key part of Atayal identity is the migration story. This details the migration of the ancestors from the mountains of central Taiwan to the north in search of arable land and new hunting grounds. There are some differences in the details of the stories between places and these create multiple forms of story telling and traditional songs (Tnunan, 2009: 1).
In the middle of the eighteenth century the Atayal began migrating to the north and east from the place presently known as Ren'ai Township in Nantou County. The groups that expanded to the north were the Atayal, while those that moved to the east were the Seediq (Li, 1999: 35). The migration routes are shown in Figure 1 (Li, 2001).
The date of the establishment of the Smangus village as “more than two hundred years ago” (Tnunan, 2009: 2) is in accordance with the date on Li's map.
Information from Smangus provides more detail about the path of the migration.
There are two different origin places in the oral record. One is Pinsbkan (presently Ruiyan Village, Ren'ai Township, Nantou County) and the other is Papak-Waqa (Dabajian Shan in the Shei-Pa National Park). The people of Smangus believe their ancestors came from Pinsbkan. From the southeastern saddle of Dabajian Shan it is possible to see every valley of northern Taiwan. The Atayal call this the dispersal area with people moving to the north and east from this point. One group came to the area on the left bank of the Takechin Creek around the present day village of Cinsbu (Zhenxibao) and expanded out from there. This group is the Mknazi. Another group came to the right bank of the Takechin Creek around the area where Smangus is currently located and expanded to the north as far as Wulai. This group is the Mrqwang (ibid.). Smangus is part of the Mrqwang group and more details of their origins are given in the section “Migration story and origins of Mrqwang group and Smangus” later in this chapter.
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Figure 1: The Dispersal of Formosan Aborigines in Taiwan (Li, 2001).