Erik Petersen, 2000, Jukung-Boats from the Barito Basin, Borneo.

Erik Petersen, 2000, Jukung-Boats from the Barito Basin, Borneo. Erik Petersen, 2000, Jukung-Boatsfrom the Barito Basin, Borneo.With a Preface by Tinna Damgird Srrensen (Director, Viking Ship Museum).Roskilde: VSM. Hardback, no price listed, no dust jacket. 156pp. ISBN87-85|80-40-8. Tables, figures, maps, photographs, illustrations,bibliography, glossary. At the end of the second millennium AD the Barito Basin had aflourishing boat-building industry which provided a livelihood foraround two thousand artisans engaged in the production of jukung,constructed on the foundation of dugouts which had been expanded overfire. The purpose of this book was twofold: first, to provide a"systematic and comprehensive description" of the varioustypes of jukung; and, second, to consider whether vessels of this naturecould have been used by the Ma'anyan people for their migrationfrom Kalimantan to Madagascar around 1,300 years ago (p. 9). Erik Petersen, an architect-planner born in 1930, worked inDenmark, East Africa, and Indonesia from 1956 until his retirement in1992. He then settled in southern Borneo. His field work was carried outat three locations: first, along the Mangkutup and Muroi Rivers; second,at Manusop and Sungai Dusun villages; and, third, at Alalak (pp. 9-10).He also visited Borobudur and is able to use as evidence some of thedepictions found there (pp. 124, 146-7). The introduction is datelined"Banjarmasin," December 1998. The Viking Ship Museum, whichhad already (1991) published a book on tribal canoes from northernBorneo (Building a Longboat by Ida Nicolaisen and Tinna DamglrdSrrensen), encouraged the project and promised to publish the materialwere the author able to complete it as planned. It is known that theVikings also used hollowed-out tree-trunks for their boats, made higherby the addition of planks at the sides; but the oldest constructionprocesses are not documented. The VSM was supporting a series ofethnographical projects around the world, therefore, in the hope thatboat-building traditions elsewhere might shed some light on this matter(p. 7). Jukung is an umbrella term covering everything from the simplecanoe to much larger catamarans, fishing boats, ferries, and cargovessels. There are two fundamental categories:jukung sudur, which areconstructed over half a tree trunk, and Barito jukung, which are basedon a full one. The core of the book (Chapter Three, pp. 25-74) identifies thevarious types of jukung, describes their general characteristics andfunctions, their market value (sale prices started in the mid-1990s at250,000 rupiah and proceeded to anything up to eighteen million for amotor boat and thirty million for a jukung raksasa), their historicaldevelopment, and their prospects. Not just this chapter, but the wholebook is illustrated with photographs, but more particularly withexquisite drawings (both cross-sections and overviews), theauthor's architectural training clearly coming into its own here. Chapter Four examines the three phases of the production process.The broad pattern (there are variations) is as follows: The trees arecut down in upriver forested areas, notably along the Mangkutup andMuroi Rivers, tributaries of the Kapuas. The second stage, which takesplace downstream at Manusop Village, involves the final hollowing out ofthe logs to make them thin enough for the mamaru, or 'expansionover fire.' The final stage of production occurs off Banjarmasin atAlalak Island, also known as Boat-Builders' Island, where theskilled workers buy the jukung coming from upstream, perform the finaltasks, and afterwards sell the vessels to the buyers, most of whom arefrom the Barito Basin (p. 75). Chapter five deals with the buildingmethodology, while Chapter Six looks at the tools and types of woodused. The industry is flexible. Although production dates back more thana thousand years, several models date only from the post-war era inresponse to changing external circumstances and new demand. It isstated, however, that the hardwoods are now becoming more difficult toprocure (p. 116); so production of the larger jukung "must die outwithin ten years" unless the government shall have made radicalchanges in its forest policy in the meantime (p 151). In the last part of the book (Chapters Seven and Eight), Mr.Petersen places Barito boat-building in historical perspective andpresents a plausible case for supposing that Ma'anyan migration toMadagascar peaked around 700 AD. The push-factor was population pressurein the early Iron Age coincident with the rise of Srivijaya (pp. 13740).At the same time, new tools facilitated more advanced types ofjukung-construction. A sea-going people with a knowledge of traderoutes, some Ma'anyan began looking for new land outside theBarito. Their first landfall was Bangka Island; but, under furtherpressure from Srivijaya, they migrated from there to Madagascar. Thereviewer lacks the expertise to comment in detail on this theory. Mr.Peterson notes, however, the close similarities--linguistic, funerary,agricultural--between the Ma'anyan people of south Borneo and thoseof Madagascar. The boat-building techniques also reveal parallels. Hesuggests that both small and large boats might have been used to crossthe ocean towards Africa. The small ones would have been"canoe-like double outriggers, constructed over dugouts, and with arig similar to the one seen on the vezo canoes of Madagascar";while the larger ones "were probably ship-like, double outriggers,based on heavily built-up dugouts, like those seen on reliefs at theBorobudur Temple" (p. 151). Overall, Jukung-Boats from the Barito Basin, Borneo, plainly alabor of love, is a definitive piece of original research. Similar inquality to the work of Professor Adrian Horridge on the prahu, the bookhas many strengths, notably the comprehensive coverage (little ornothing appears to escape the author's attention), the completemastery of the subject matter, and, not least, the drawings. A good signis that Mr. Petersen is not afraid to say when data are lacking or whenhe does not know the answer. He demonstrates courtesy in hisdisagreements with other scholars and advances his own dissenting viewsin moderate fashion. On the other hand, an index is lacking; and thereare some typographical/orthographical errors which would need to becorrected in any future edition. Given that a decade and more haselapsed since the book was published, perhaps it will now be possible tofill in some of the gaps and to say whether the dire predictions havebeen justified. The reviewer would also have liked more information asto how much the findings from Borneo have helped the VSM to understandearly Viking construction processes; which was, after all, one of theirjustifications for publishing this book. (1) (AVM Horton, Bordesley, Worcestershire, UK). (1) The Editor would note that some materials from Jukung-Boatsfirst appeared in a Brief Communication by Erik Petersen. "TheSouth Kalimantan Jukung: A Study," BRB 28(1997): 15766.