[Note: this transcription was produced by an automatic OCR engine]
MAGIC 679
(moghon nambimdr). When the nest has been built up round the
food or other fragments used by the sorcerer, his enemy begins
to fall ill and eventually dies. In both these methods the illness
is due to the pressure which is exerted on the bundle of refuse.
The counter-magic for this is to make the victim drink the juice
of a particular leaf, which is squeezed out into a coco-nut shell.
While the man is drinking a sorcerer sits beside him and rnutters
a spell. After this the man must observe a number of tabus : he
may drink no water for ten days ; he may not eat cocoanuts for
six months, nor pig for a whole YEAR, and he must refrain from
eating anything which is moist or in any way connected with
the sea. These prohibitions are the same as those which a sorcerer
observes before he practices death-and-sickness magic, and will
be described later in more detail.
Yet another method of killing a man is to place the bundle
of waste fragments in a tree of the variety called nowolah and
then set ï¬Åre to it. This magic is also classed as nambangsian,
and is similar to the Seniang nimbwmm. The effect is to make
the victim's belly swell up and ï¬Ånally to die. Swelling of the
belly can also be brought about by wrapping'the fragments
connected with the victim in a leaf and putting them into a skull
which is then kept in a " tabu place â€ù referred to as wut maul
Zen nï¬Åmbat ghai. (This is not the same as the wut maul or “ sacred
place " of the clan, in which the bones of the dead are preserved.)
As the magician does this he mutters a spell, but the words are
not recorded. A man against whom this is worked will swell up,
excrete profusely, and die. The skull, which is used by the
sorcerer, need not be that of any special person; any one will
serve the purpose.
In Lambumbu, elephantiasis, called namlmr, which in Seniang
seems to be attributed to nimbwunu magic, is not believed to be
caused by sorcery, but there is a practice called Vetong nggor i,
which is used to make a person's legs to swell, This may be worked
in two ways. One of these, like the Seniang nimesian rams, is
to place something on the path along which the victim is passing
so that he steps over it. The other way is to watch as he goes
along, pluck a leaf which has touched his leg, and then work
magic on this leaf. The swelling caused by these means is
called talam.
The Seniang method of killing by rubbing “ poison " on
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