Potteries Lazurite Beads Chiefains’Emblems
Headdress and Eagle Feather Spirits of Paiwan
In the flagstone house, the district of the kasindan is the area of Totem of Ancestor Soul and inner tomb, where the frolic and noise are forbidden.
In front of the Totem of Ancestor Soul, there is a stool linking with this totem, which is used for the priestess in the ceremony. And the priestess is always in the open space of the totem. The way of burial in the house is the embodiment of the Paiwan Tribe’s viewpoint--“being a family forever”. They think that a dead good man may stay in his/her own family, that is the “kind and quiet death”; and a dead evil man may be buried in his/her own field, that is the “evil death”.
The residents in the Old Fawan believe that a naturally dead man must become the kind soul, who can protect the whole family. Moreover, the more ancestors are buried in the family, the more good fortune will be. The way of burial in the Old Fawan is the same as that of the other groups in the Paiwan Tribe. The way of burial which is usually applied in the Old Fawan is named as the “Genuflex Burial”, which means that before the body becomes stiff, people make the dead one’s hands and legs fastened in order to make the body crouched, and then wrap around this body with cloth except for the head. After that, this body will be set near the middle post in the house to be admired by the relatives. One or two days later, the body will be buried upright near the middle post. Each time when the family members have dinner or have a drink, they would scatter some rice grains and alcohol on the ground to make greetings to the ancestors of the family.
During Japanese occupation period, the Old Fawan people were forced to change their way of burial in the house. However, it is fortunate that the ancestors’ skeleton can be remained underground in the house. The process of the outside burial is as follows: first of all, the men of close relative are in charge of digging the grave; secondly, the brothers or sons of the dead man put the corpse in the grave and make it keep crouched on the mat, meanwhile they make sure that the face of the corpse must face eastwards; thirdly, they put a slab on the gave, then lay the earth and finally put another slab on the top; eventually, the elder holds a memorial ceremony for the soul with skins and bones of the pig. After that, the funeral comes to the end.
