The Batak - Peoples of the Island of Sumatra - Achim Sibeth
The Batak, an ancient people indigenous to the modern Republic of Indonesia, live in the fantastic volcanic highlands of northern Sumatra, around the great Lake Toba which holds the sacred island of Samosir venerated for centuries as the Batak ancestral homeland and kept hidden from foreign eyes. Feared as savage headhunting warriors, the Batak were shunned by their neighbours, and kept only the most tenuous contacts with the outside world.
Batakland’s ancient isolation was broken first by missionary activity in the mid-nineteenth century, then by Sumatra’s incorporation into the Dutch colonial empire. The Batak were pacified, their warrior customs prohibited, their witch-doctors rendered outcasts. Yet today they are a large and important minority in Indonesia; active in public life, wealthy and industrious.
Achim Sibeth offers a splendid record of the Batak cultural achievement. Over 650 items are illustrated: wood carvings, bronze objects, jewelry, textiles and weapons drawn from ethnographic museums and various private collections in Europe. Historic pictures from the Linden-Museum Stuttgart and the Amsterdam Tropical Institute, hitherto little seen, as well as pictures taken in the course of the last five years, show the customs and daily life of the Batak since their first contacts with Europeans. Altogether this is an unrivalled appreciation of a fascinating, inventive people.
Thames and Hudson 1991
ISBN: 0-500-97392-X/9780500973929
Condition: Excellent, some yellowing on edge of pages
MB (Travel)
The Batak, an ancient people indigenous to the modern Republic of Indonesia, live in the fantastic volcanic highlands of northern Sumatra, around the great Lake Toba which holds the sacred island of Samosir venerated for centuries as the Batak ancestral homeland and kept hidden from foreign eyes. Feared as savage headhunting warriors, the Batak were shunned by their neighbours, and kept only the most tenuous contacts with the outside world.
Batakland’s ancient isolation was broken first by missionary activity in the mid-nineteenth century, then by Sumatra’s incorporation into the Dutch colonial empire. The Batak were pacified, their warrior customs prohibited, their witch-doctors rendered outcasts. Yet today they are a large and important minority in Indonesia; active in public life, wealthy and industrious.
Achim Sibeth offers a splendid record of the Batak cultural achievement. Over 650 items are illustrated: wood carvings, bronze objects, jewelry, textiles and weapons drawn from ethnographic museums and various private collections in Europe. Historic pictures from the Linden-Museum Stuttgart and the Amsterdam Tropical Institute, hitherto little seen, as well as pictures taken in the course of the last five years, show the customs and daily life of the Batak since their first contacts with Europeans. Altogether this is an unrivalled appreciation of a fascinating, inventive people.
Thames and Hudson 1991
ISBN: 0-500-97392-X/9780500973929
Condition: Excellent, some yellowing on edge of pages
MB (Travel)
The Batak, an ancient people indigenous to the modern Republic of Indonesia, live in the fantastic volcanic highlands of northern Sumatra, around the great Lake Toba which holds the sacred island of Samosir venerated for centuries as the Batak ancestral homeland and kept hidden from foreign eyes. Feared as savage headhunting warriors, the Batak were shunned by their neighbours, and kept only the most tenuous contacts with the outside world.
Batakland’s ancient isolation was broken first by missionary activity in the mid-nineteenth century, then by Sumatra’s incorporation into the Dutch colonial empire. The Batak were pacified, their warrior customs prohibited, their witch-doctors rendered outcasts. Yet today they are a large and important minority in Indonesia; active in public life, wealthy and industrious.
Achim Sibeth offers a splendid record of the Batak cultural achievement. Over 650 items are illustrated: wood carvings, bronze objects, jewelry, textiles and weapons drawn from ethnographic museums and various private collections in Europe. Historic pictures from the Linden-Museum Stuttgart and the Amsterdam Tropical Institute, hitherto little seen, as well as pictures taken in the course of the last five years, show the customs and daily life of the Batak since their first contacts with Europeans. Altogether this is an unrivalled appreciation of a fascinating, inventive people.
Thames and Hudson 1991
ISBN: 0-500-97392-X/9780500973929
Condition: Excellent, some yellowing on edge of pages
MB (Travel)