Inside Indonesian Dani tribe

The ‘Dani’ tribe lived uncontacted by the outside world until 1938, when they were accidentally discovered tucked away in the Highlands of West Papua, Indonesia. 

Their homeland in the Baliem Valley was isolated by steep, rugged valleys and dense highland forest and today, the region remains one of the poorest in Indonesia.

Known for their macabre traditions – including the amputation of women’s fingers to appease the dead and greasing the mummified body of a former warrior chief – the Dani are one of the most populous tribes in the highlands.

While the Dani people remain widely uninterrupted by outside forces, their haunting traditions piqued the interest of many curious minds around the globe. Like many indigenous tribes today, their economy relies on tourism – their unique customs, traditional dress and rituals attracting visitors to their remote villages.

But many of the Dani’s customs persist today. 

Rare images shot in the remote location, capturing the lives of the tribesmen and women, leave viewers jaw-dropped as they pose next to the blackened remains of the 250 year old Wimontok Mabel and women proudly display their fingerless hands.

Here, MailOnline takes a look into the 250,000-strong tribe’s traditions and practices that sees babies having their fingers bitten off by their mothers and members smoking the ashes of their ancestors.

Grief: Ritual finger amputation

Emotional pain as part of a grieving process is no strange concept, but for Dani women, sadness is not enough.

When a loved one dies, female members subject themselves to an act of extreme physical pain, believing the physical representation of emotional agony is essential to the grieving process.

Upon attending the funeral of a child or family member, Dani women will cut off the top of their finger as they believe the practice will both gratify and drive away spirits.

The ritual practice is performed by first tying a string tightly around the upper half of the finger for around half an hour, allowing the finger to become numb for what members of the tribe deem a ‘near’ painless removal. 

The finger is then hacked off with an axe or stone blade and the open wound is cauterised using a hot stone or piece of metal to prevent bleeding.

This then forms a new, calloused finger.

However, the amputations can also be carried out without the use of tools.

In these grisly cases, Dani women chew at the knuckles to weaken them before using string to cut off the blood supply to the digit.

Another option is to tie up the joints in order to stop the blood flowing to the area, leading to the death of muscles and nerves due to oxygen deprivation until the dead part of the finger naturally falls off the bone.

The cutting is often carried out by an individual’s siblings or parents, and to further express their grief, the Dani people cover their faces in ashes and clay.

Some members cut off the ears too, while others smear themselves in river sludge for a week without taking a bath as this means the dead have returned to nature, the Guardian Nigeria News reported.

Following the bloody practice, the left-over finger is then dried and buried, or it is burned to ashes that are stored away for safekeeping.

Images from inside the tribal grounds show older female members speckled in white paint and adorned in beads with many of their fingers missing in a display of how many loved ones have departed from their lives.

But it is not only the women of the older generation who face the terror of finger amputation – with even babies not being spared from the practice.

Mothers within the tribe have been known to bite their children’s fingers in half, in the belief that it will increase their lifespan.

The brutal amputation practice has been banned by the Indonesian government, but there are chilling fears that this hasn’t stopped older female members of the tribe carrying out the ritual in secret. 

Mummification

Another ancient practice within the Dani tribe is the mummification of successful warriors and village chiefs.

The tiny, blackened, shrivelled corpse of Agat Mamete Mabel, the chieftain that ruled over one remote village in Indonesian Papua some 250 years ago, is the most sacred mummy of all among the Dani people.

Upon his death, he was embalmed and preserved with smoke and animal oil.

Nine generations on, and Agat’s descendant Eli Mabel is now the current leader in Wogi village – an isolated hamlet in the Highlands area that can only be reached via hike and canoe.

He guards the corpse, which is decorated with pig tusks, a feathered headpiece, and a traditional penis gourd, and lays in a hut called a ‘honai’.

The wide-domed, thatch-roofed hut is tended all year-round by a select few villagers who keep a fire burning to ensure the corpse remains dry and preserved.

The duty of caring for the mummy is Eli’s responsibility, and he spends many solitary nights in the honai ensuring no harm comes to his ancestor.

‘We must protect our culture, including the ceremonies for the mummy, the way we treat it, and maintain and fire for it,’ Eli told AFP. 

Eventually, the duty of caring for Agat will be passed onto another, but the guardian has hopes his children will continue the legacy.

‘I have told them they must take care of the mummy at some point in their lives,’ Eli told of his four children, some living in far-off provinces in Indonesia’s more populated centres. 

There are believed to be six or seven other mummies within the tribe.

However, while it was once common among Eli’s forebears, the ritual method of smoke embalming is no longer practised, he explained to AFP.

Christian missionaries and Muslim preachers encouraged the tribespeople to bury the corpses, and the tradition has faded as the centuries drifted by.

Eli said the exact age of Agat Mamete Mabel was not known, but told AFP this ancestor was the last of the village to receive such a funeral. 

Penis Sheath 

Another distinctive feature of the Dani tribesmen is the Koteka, or ‘Penis Sheath’.

Members of the tribe would traditionally wear very little, but the Koteka has long been an important item of clothing for the Dani men.

However, according to tribal scholars, the Koteka – or ‘hilim’ as it is known among the Dani tribe – was not only designed for protection, or to cover one’s modesty.

It also functions as a symbol of social status, and is one of the traditional clothes worn by the people of Papua.

The Koteka is made mostly from dried pumpkin, with members of the tribe planting pumpkins in most yards around their homes.

After several months of growth, the pumpkin is tied with stones to form an upright shape, before one stone is removed to create its hanging shape.

According to scholars, the shape of the Koteka indicates social status among tribesmen, with curved Kotekas being worn by people with the most influence.

Pumpkins that are ready are picked and then dried in a fireplace. Once dry, the contents are removed until only the hard skin of the pumpkin remains.

It is then cleaned and dried again in the fireplace, before it can be worn.

Scholars say the whole process takes between one and two weeks from when the pumpkin is picked, and that several are made in one go.

Kotekas are often decorated with a crest made of chicken or bird feathers, and are tied with a soft string around the waist.

A Koteka is not replaced until it breaks.

In the past, missionaries have tried to persuade West Papua’s tribes to ditch the Koteka in favour of western clothes.

And in the 1970s, Kotekas became a problem for the New Order government, with officials launching ‘operation Koteka’ with the aim of improving the standard of living among the region’s indigenous people.

The programme failed, and some Dani people still wear the Koteka. 

Young people are known to wear them for certain events, and some schools still allow students to wear them.

Pig Slaughter 

The Dani are also famous for their elaborate pig festivals. These see dozens of pigs slaughtered and cooked in an underground pot for hours. 

Such feasts are a key part of Dani culture, and are often held to mark special occasions, including weddings and funerals – along with mock battles.

Traditional pig festivals are still held today, as are many smaller versions.

No political or major event will be marked without a pig feast, which are also often organised for tourists when they make the trek to visit the Dani people.

In general, the pig plays a large part of the Dani culture. 

Men will often insert pig tusks through their noses, and during festivities, will make patterns on their bodies with pig grease, along with soot, clay and mud.

The tribe – which depends on pigs for food – also has a respect for the animal.

They are seen as not just a source of sustenance and wealth, but are also viewed as members of families and community, and are valued deeply.

In fact, pigs can only be slaughtered in the ritual ceremonies out of respect.

Writing for the New York Times in 2016, journalist Seth Kugel described his visit to Wesagalep – another Dani village – and a pig-slaughtering ceremony he saw there.

He wrote that men and women stood in a circle and began to sob, while other villagers brought pigs into the gathering.

Other visitors also arrived to Wesagalep, bearing more pigs, which were handed over to the village children who, he said, ‘seemed to delight in soothing the pigs while also clamping their mouths closed.’

Kugel then described how the attention of the villagers shifted to an enclosure on another level in the village, where the largest pig had been let loose.

There, a ‘grizzled old man’ stalked the hog with a hunting bow, before shooting it in the mid section. The pig took mere seconds to die from the poison barb.

It was then the suckling pigs’ turn, Kugel wrote, which were slaughtered one after the other, before their hair was burned off – ready to be skinned.

Kugel said his party didn’t stay for the rest of the ceremony, but other accounts say that once the pigs are prepared, they are put in a cooking pit lined with vegetables.

A fire is then started with friction to light a pile of wood and to warm heating stones.

Other witnesses have said the men of the tribe tend to eat most of the meat, while the women eat the entrails and the vegetables.