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the attacks of the burōng by means of a strip of rattan (awé) slung round the steps on one side; this is first consecrated by a tangkay or incantation. Sometimes an arèn-rope (talòë jōʾ) to which the burōng is equally averse, is used in place of this. Seven or thrice that number of filaments of the arèn-bark (puréh jōʾ), charmed in a similar way, are also placed under the pillows or sleeping-mat of the mother, or else fixed in the ground beneath the stairs.
The burōng (like the kunti of the Sundanese) is generally believed to be much afraid of palm-leaf fibres (Mal. lidi) and old fishing-nets, yet these are not used in Acheh as charms[1].
Under the stairs and also under the guha (the hole in the floor of the back verandah, which serves as a latrine for sick people and young children) some thorny twigs of pandan (duròë seukè) are laid on the ground to scare away burōng.
The burōng[2] of Achehnese superstition has much in common with the kunti or kuntianak of the Sundanese and the sunděl bolong[3] which is an object of dread in certain parts of Java. Like the latter the burōng is conceived of as having the form of a woman with a great hole in her back, showing the vital organs. It is supposed that many of them are the spirits of women who have led an unchaste life and come to an unhappy end in consequence. It is also believed that the number of this malignant race of spirits is added to by the ghosts of women slain by a burōng in childbed, and who then become burōngs themselves.
The means resorted to for protection against the burōng are also to a great extent the same as those employed to drive away the kunti. The incantations used to exorcise the burōng are essentially identical with the jampe or japa customary in Java. Recourse is also had to abuse of the burōng, and she is driven away by being shown that her
- ↑ In the West of Java on the other hand, they are universally so employed.
- ↑ The word is exactly identical in sound with the Malay burong = "bird." But "bird" in Achehnese is chichém, and their expression for the spirit inimical to women in childbed has no connection in the mind of the Achehnese with the Malay word.
- ↑ Compare also the Arabian Umm aç-çibyān or qarīnah (see my "Mekka" Vol. II. pp.123–24).
The Malays also believe in the pontianak; but even more dreaded is the pěnanggalan, a sort of second self of certain living persons who have the mysterious power of detaching their heads and pulling out their entrails so as to hang loose in front. These dread beings are supposed to visit at night houses where women in childbed lie, so the midwives often fasten strips of méngkuang below the steps to catch in the protruding entrails and bar the entrance of the pěnanggalan. (Translator).
