Sarawak is a region of north Borneo that was awarded to a British adventurer by the Sultan of Brunei. That lead to the region passing to the British government and then on to modern Malaysia. One can imagine the fun of people far from home interacting with the local tribes, picking favorites, and trying to avoid nightmares. When you imagine such a thing the modern people of Sarawak would like to remind you of the moral distinction between headhunters and cannibals. The maneaters in Sarawak are the alligators. So slip on your smoking jacket, fill your pipe, take your first sip of your adult beverage, and sit back in your most comfortable chair. Welcome to todays offering from The Philatelist.
For this near the end of colonial times stamp issue, the colony decided to feature the culture of two of the smaller tribes in the area. In this case we have the ceremonial carving of the smaller Kenyah tribe that exist both in Sarawak as well as over the border in Indonesia. It is understandable why the colony featured the Kenyah tribe. They are a peaceful, untatooed people who were early converts to Protestant Christianity and active in agriculture. Modern Malaysia has not stopped featuring the Kenyah people. Miss World Malaysia 2020, Francisca James, is from the Kenyah tribe in Sarawak.
Todays stamp is issue A24, a 10 cent stamp issued by the Crown Colony of Sarawak in 1955. It was a 15 stamp issue in various denominations. According to the Scott catalog, the stamp is worth 25 cents used.
The area of Sarawak was awarded to British adventurer Sir James Brooke as a reward for assisting the then Sultan of Brunei. The rule of a different race was awkward but mostly peaceful and the economic future of the area was secured by the discovery of oil. The Brooke’s were dislodged by a Japanese occupation during World War II and the British government took over directly post war as better able to handle post war reconstruction.
The interaction of ruling or just resident whites made for some trouble in their depiction of some inland tribes as head hunters. It was true that some among the Iban tribe were headhunters. Naturally this is pretty exciting stuff back in the home country. In her last years back in Britain, Silvia, the last Brooke era Queen wrote a popular autobiography “Sylvia, Queen of the Headhunters”. Like most primitive tribes, practices like head hunting became less common over time.
You might have expected such controversies to pass into history as the area became under Malaysian rule. Instead it has intensified as there is a new popular video game called Borneo, Jungle Nightmare. In it your character can fight pirates and Brooke style white rajahs. You also face jungle attacks by iban tribe head hunters that can go beyond head hunting into the consumption of human flesh. The towns are displayed as more modern. The critics would have preferred the game to be less place and people specific. The makers of the game state that it is just a game and is made more intriguing by including real places and realistic characters. They also point to documented cases of cannibalism in the area during post colonial insurrections.
Well my drink is empty. It will be up to the many gamers of the modern Sarawak to decide if they want to start the game and live out a local nightmare. I expect they will line up to do so. Come again soon for another story that can be learned from stamp collecting. First published in 2021.