sample (ritual & belief: ritual apparatus)

Magically-removed stone (Bedamuni: igi, fiô niligi). A stone, magically removed from the body of a sick child of approximately two years old.

After the cause of the sickness has been established during a night-time séance, a spirit-medium determines the best way of curing the affliction. In this case foreign bodies had to be removed from the sick person by lobo légéére (literally ‘the laying of the hand’). The medium shows the sick person a shallow basin (like 1982.99) filled with adini drink (Piper domesticum, the same as Polynesian kava). The adini is drunk and the stones, which were supposedly in the sick person’s body, are spat out on a palm leaf and given to the newly-cured invalid.

This example was acquired from the child’s father, Iwanibi.

Collection Information

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