Prohibited marriages

Evidently, Si Boru Surbajati and Si Boru Deak Parujar had to leave the upper world because nothing good could come of their betrothal to their cousin, Raja EndepEndep. Batara Guru and his brother Soripada had concocted a highly inappropriate marriage and they knew it. When making the proposal Soripada urged his older brother as follows: ‘let us roll the rock up the mountain, let us make the river flow upstream’, two impossible feats. Batara Guru responded by expressing his worries before agreeing to the betrothal: ‘How can that be, younger brother, perhaps the union will be infertile if contracted that way’. Both deities refer here to the rule that a man and woman of the same marga are not allowed to marry—and if they do, the sanction of the gods might be infertility, the ultimate disaster.³⁰ But apparently both gods felt they must accept the fact that their children had no one else to mate with, and they decided to go ahead with their plans while hoping for the best. After all, without this marriage neither the creation of the earth nor reproduction would be possible. Yet the marriage about to take place was destined to evoke the customary punishment, the expulsion of the transgressing couple from their village of origin, in this case the upper world. The marriage could be consummated only in another world, the middle world, created specifically by Si Boru Deak Parujar to serve this end.

We find a similar course of events in ‘Nan Jomba Ilik’, another popular Batak myth (Braasem 1951:143-182).Nan Jomba Ilik is a girl born to a couple that had been hoping for a child for a long time, and she disappoints them by coming into the world as a lizard. Shortly after

30 In the Hoetagaloeng version of the myth there are a few interesting differences compared to the Raja Darius Sibarani version. Si Boru Surbajati is also betrothed to the son of Debata Sori (Soripada), Raja Indapati, also lizard shaped, but he dies and therefore Si Boru Surbajati, having lost her fiancé, commits suicide, jumping out of the upper world. Si Boru Deak Parujar is then betrothed to her uncle, Raja Odapodap (who hatched from the same egg as her father Batara Guru), and she manages to flee to middle world with the help of her grandfather (Angerler 2009:238). This latter marriage repeats the same theme: is also an ‘incestuous’ (sumbang) marriage.

birth, she asks her parents for permission to leave the house and the village, because she does not want her abnormal appearance to shame them. Her parents give their consent and her father accompanies her to her place of exile in the woods where he builds her a wooden shed in a tree.³¹ There she turns into a beautiful woman. One day she meets a handsome young man passing by, and they fall in love.³² When they return to the world populated by humans, she discovers that this man is the son of her father’s younger brother, so they belong to the same marga and the union between them is therefore a prohibited one, for which the Batak use the term sumbang.

This prohibition accords with the principle that a marriage should take place between a man and woman belonging to different marga. Although advised against it, the young man insists on marrying Nan Djomba Ilik, even after she has pleaded with him not to do so, to prevent bringing disaster on their families. Finally their fathers—all too happy that their children have returned—

allow the marriage to take place, but Nan Jomba Ilik and her husband are commanded to found their own village.³³

In a somewhat different way, the theme of sumbang is repeated in the birth of opposite-sex twins³⁴ to Si Boru Deak Parujar and the man who finally married her, another cousin of hers, her uncle Mangalabulan’s son, Raja Odapodap. The birth of the twins and their subsequent marriage constitute a twofold disaster³⁵, as it is a combination of two forms of sumbang: the children marry someone from their own marga, and besides that, their own sibling. Of course this unfortunate event is again attributable to the sumbang nature of their parents’ marriage.

This time the punishment is even more severe than the fate Si Boru Deak Parujar had to endure.

Already born in exile in the middle world, the twins are forever separated from their divine family as the thread connecting the upper and middle world is severed. Mula Jadi Na Bolon takes this decision, because to him ‘the world had a bad smell’, reflecting his disapproval of the incestuous union between his great-grandchildren and his intention to shield the divine world from the pollution brought about by the monstrous event.³⁶ With the thread cut in two, the exile of Raja Ihatmanisia and Boru Itammanisia is complete and mankind is forever cut off from the divine ancestors and the heavenly village in which they reside. From then on humans can continue to communicate with the gods only indirectly, through offerings and prayers (Stöhr and Zoetmulder 1965:54).

Besides the prohibitions against marrying a sibling or someone from one’s own marga, there are also other forms of prohibited (sumbang) marriages. These prohibitions are to be

31 Being a lizard, she did not belong in the cultured world of humans, but in the wild.

32 Note the analogue with the lizard shaped Tuan Rumauhir who could marry Si Boru Deak Parujar only after he transformed into a handsome man.

33 There are several other mythical stories involving incestuous marriage between opposite-sex twins. The ancestors of the Lontung and Borbor conglomerates of marga both married their sister, causing the fissioning of their lineage into new independent exogamous ones. Some incestuous marriages resulted in the punishment of the couple who then became mythical ancestors (sombaon) residing in remarkable places in the landscape: a lake, a stream or a mountaintop (Ypes 1932:37, 198, 350-1, 388).

34 There is yet another myth with a similar narrative, the myth of the tunggal Panuluan, the Batak magic staff used by the datu, the Batak expert on divination. In this myth the entwined bodies of the married opposite-sex twins are transformed into the first magic staff. For this and other myths involving opposite twins marrying, see Niessen 1985:80-81.

35 The same theme is found in many Indonesian societies. Opposite sex-twins are considered prone to incest because of their intimate relationship during the gestation period in their mother’s womb and special measures are taken to avoid the disaster this may bring on society. For a discussion of ideas and practices on the islands of Bali and Madura, see, for example, Covarrubias (1937:126-9) and Niehof (1985:283).

36 For other versions of the severance between upper world and middle world, between heaven and earth, see Stöhr and Zoetmulder 1965:54. Warneck (1909:32) gives as the reason for Mula Jadi Na Bolon’s retreat his being offended that humans paid less attention to the gods and more to their ancestors.

understood within the framework of the dalihan na tolu. A woman may not marry into a marga that relates to her own as a bridegiving clan, as by doing so that marga becomes a bridetaking clan. Following the same logic, a man may not marry a woman from a marga that relates to his own as bridetaking marga, as by doing so that marga becomes a bridegiving one. These marriages are not allowed because they would ‘reverse the flow’, upsetting the protocol and terms of address between marga at the time of negotiations about the brideprice (see section 2.7). The practical implications for the seating arrangement at ceremonial events would become impossible to deal with and therefore such marriages are out of the question.

Fortunately young unmarried men and women are ‘warned’ which people of other marga they are not supposed to marry by prescriptions concerning terms of address. In any encounter Toba Batak will first establish the relationship between their marga according to the dalihan na tolu in order to determine the correct term of address for the other person. If a member of the other sex is from the same marga or from another marga whom one is not allowed to marry (according to the prohibition to ‘reverse the flow’) one addresses the person in question with the term iboto. One knows then that one cannot marry that person.³⁷ The customary legal sanction on couples guilty of sumbang was severe. The union was dissolved and a heavy fine imposed, usually consisting of a ceremony to appease the ancestors, on which occasion a buffalo, or at least a pig, had to be sacrificed. The best thing for the man to do was to leave his village after that, whereas in pre-colonial times the woman could be reduced to the status of a slave (Vergouwen 1964:164; Dorpstuchtrecht 1928:67; Nasution 1943:43).

The existence of negative marriage rules limits the choice of marriage partners, although the range of possible marriage choices remains larger than the range of non-acceptable choices (Niessen 1985:90). In practice, when the choice of partners becomes too limited in a given area, the chiefs of the marga may decide to divide the marga into two new exogamous entities with at least one given a new marga name. After this the members of these two entities are allowed to intermarry.³⁸ Such a communal decision cannot be taken without holding a large adat ceremony of the kind mentioned above (Vergouwen 1964:160-1). Today the negative marriage rules are probably less often experienced as a problem than in the past, because greater mobility of young people makes it possible to find a spouse in a much wider circle.

Apart from the negative marriage customs, there is also another rule to be observed. A younger brother should not get married before his older brother, and a younger sister should also not precede her older sister. The following simile is applied: ‘like the vessel hanging under the cut flower cluster of the sugar palm has to be full of sap before the second vessel placed below can be filled with the overflowing fluid’.³⁹ Perhaps it was a matter of fairness that parents had to fulfil their obligations in terms of marriage payments towards the older child before the others could be given their turn. A child desiring to marry before its turn could do so, however, if given permission by the older sibling.⁴⁰

37 For other negative marriage rules see (Vergouwen 1964:162-165; Niessen, 1985:89-90).

38 Some marga branched into two or more new exogamous lineages because the sons of the same father but different mothers wanted to split up (Vergouwen 1964:25-7).

39 Vergouwen 1964:165; Braasem 1951:125. The custom still seems to be adhered to (Lando 1979:81).

40 In line with this prescription was a local custom found in Sibolga: if a young man abducted a girl whose elder sister had not yet married, he had to pay a fine decided upon by the village chief (Dorpstuchtrecht 1928:72).