The Mask and the Myth

In the Vnauatu, there are different beliefs in the different area. For example, there is the Matijiki in Futuna but in Ambrym there is not such or similar belief, myth, or kastom story asin Ambyrm.

We can see the recorded article. K. Muller (1970:6-7) described that:

“Except for the fabrication of the banana truck fibers for the hair and beard of the rum mask which is some times done by women, the construction of the rum mask and other accoutrement is an exclusively male affair. Nevertheless the legendary origins affair of the rum attributes the first rum outfits to a woman. There are serial versions of legend but the essence is similar. There was once a woman in love with a man who was not at all interested in her. In order to win his attention she made a rum mask and outfit which she put on to see her man, she did not reveal her identity but became for him to follow her. When they were in the bush she took off the outfit to the mask amazement as he had thought that it was a spirit of some kind. He asked her to show how she had made the mask and other accessories. When she had done so he killed

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her so that only he would possess and be able to sell his knowledge of the fabrication of the outfit.”

There exists the similar story in the contemporary time, the chief in Ambrym delineated that in the fieldwork:

Bifo wan a wan ladi she is dating the Tamake (Tamate) wan of her son. lady was making the Tamate and give to her son and he was plae the Tamake.wan of hol man plae the yaya and finis. Wen he come to the village and hold the woman or hold the lady tok the boy was the Tamake and raeli wan dat Tamake. So, he trae the woman or lady. he tol how dat making the tamake to give to her son. And the wan sweet the lady and why she lay the Tamake with the man. he was making the lord then lady so poson gat her and kilim her. She has dead. She was the man befo she was dati the lady, Tamake.

(English Translation: Before this event, a woman does Tamake (Tamate) for her son. A woman makes Tamate to her son and her son play the Tamake. One man plays Tamake and finish. Then one man comes to the village and meets the women to ask the things that a boy plays Tamate and how to do Tamate. So, one man tries many ways to the woman. One man tells how to make Tamate for giving to her son. One wan appreciates on the woman and the woman shows the Tamake with one man. One man becomes the chief or leader and puts the poison to kill the woman. The Woman is dead and she is a person before one man to make Tamate.)

Making Rom mask must cost much time and several days. They, the makers, always prepare food and leave far away from the village. They secretly make the mask in a hidden bush, a forest and a small hut. Until finishing the process of manufacture, they just come back the village and the mask will be preserved in a secret place or a secret hut. We see this historical article as the result in the fieldwork:

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In addition, they must submit to a physical trial. A tunnel some 3’ high and 20’s long is constructed with a frame of burao branches and transversal bamboo lengths.

Branches of nangalade are bent in the middle and draped over the cross pieces of bamboo. So, the stingting leaves reach to the ground.(K. Muller 1970:7)

So, secret making adds the authority on this knowledge. From these stories, it shows a man has the power through the Tamate though Tamate begins from the woman. And it means the skills of mask-making come from women. The technique of mask’s hair and beard can be traced back to the women’s knowledge on the textile. It shows the mask has the relic and the character of woman.

Levi-Struss has the opinion that (1969 [1964]:341):

by the mind that generates them and, by the myths of the image the world which is already of the mind though.

We use the method of mythology on Structuralism. Levi-Strauss(1976:146-197) analyzed the story of Asdiwal that the famine region in the Skeena Valley. There are a mother and her daughter, whose husbands have died. One day, a stranger visits the young woman.

Soon later, she gives birth to a son, Asdiwal. Asdiwal makes use of the magic objects his father gave and goes to hunt. Suddenly, he disappears in the mountain and leaves a series of the unresolved oppositions: low and high, earth and heaven, man and woman, endogamy and exogamy, mountain hunting and sea hunting, land and water, East and West, North and South. Even with historical process, the myth and legendary is eventually preserved as same as Murcel Henaff’s thought (1998:181):

To perhaps the same extent as myth, rite offer a domain for savage age thought. Can it not be said that their modes of organizations, their symbols and their unfolding are govern by determinate logic and exhibit. in actually, it presents the categories of the mind?

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Levi-Strauss (1963:207) described that:

Myth are still widely interpreted in the conflicting days, as collective element as the logic figures are considered as personified abstraction.

We can analyze the kastom story of mask in Ambyrm. There are two editions.

Levi-Strauss thought the myth is widely interpreted in the conflicting and two editions still preserve the high similarity which represents most islanders can identify with the content. A man owns the power on Tamate and Tamate origins from the woman. Man can speak as yam but woman keeps silence. So, we can divide the unresolved opposition as the following:

Man Woman Tamate Un-Tamate Power Non-Power

Speak Silence

Later, we will explore the kinship in power and the cycle of ancestor’s spirit in Ambyrm in detail.