Rumah Betang Dayak Kanayatn

Pontianak, Kalimantan Barat (West Kalimantan), Indonesia.

(Jalan Sutoyo, Pontianak).

 

A short visit to the Rumah Adat Betang, a vernacular longhouse of the Dayak tribes in Kalimantan Barat. I am not sure the cultural significant of the totem poles placed in the vernacular house compound (I stand to be corrected for any error). The artistic creation of making sculpture is called pantak, and this exceptional specimen is the expression of elements of ancestral worshiping which the tribe believes are intermediary to the supreme being, the Jubata. Pantak is believed to ward off malevolent spirits.

 

This particular replica of the vernacular house belongs to the Dayak Kanayatn (Dayak Kendayan, Dayak Kedayan) political ethnic identity to conveniently referred as Land Dayak- Klemantan. There are claim the grouping includes Dayak tribes speaking the Bakati/ Banyadu, Bajare, Banana, Baahe, Badamea/ Badameo languages, but still unclear and debated. Dayak Kanayatn form the majority among the numerous Dayak tribes concentrating in the districts of Kabupaten Landak, Kabupaten Pontianak, Kabupaten Kubu Raya, and Kabupaten Bengkayang.

 

Ref. and suggested reading:

id.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suku_Dayak_Kanayatn

id.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rumpun_Dayak#Rumpun_Dayak_Kanayatn_...

id.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suku_Dayak

dayak-kanayatn.blogspot.com/2011_01_01_archive.html

kakurakatub.blogspot.com/2009/02/judul-pantak-suku-dayak-...

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