Ritual object for fertility "balum kemepe" ·  Western New Guinea - Central Highlands, village of Moknerkon · ID: 3052374

Description

wood, natural colours, on both sides decorated with alternating stone-carved signs and emblems, signs of age and wear

“Balum kemepe” is the mythical name for the penis in Eipo language. The carved projection “munkaba” has been smoothed away by decades of contact.

An absolute rarity, this ritual object also comes with a completely documented provenance. It originates from the collection of the ethnologist Professor Dr. Thomas Michel, who spent several years living in the villages of the Eipo and Nalumin in the Central Highlands of New Guinea, peoples once notorious for their practice of cannibalism. He recalls: “I always had my own hut there, which I shared with a pig and a dog, and I was fully integrated.”

This object was created prior to the first encounters with Europeans and missionaries, that is, before 1970, in Eipomek, in the central highlands of West New Guinea. It was kept in the village of Moknerkon within the “wilik” men’s house. Out of fear of missionary influence and the potential destruction of the piece, it was concealed from around 1970 onwards. In 2016, however, Michel received it as a gift from a man named Bimbim, whom he had first met as a youth during his initial field research in 1976 and with whom he had developed a close friendship over the years. Bimbim’s decision to hand over the object was likely still motivated by the concern that the younger Christian generation might destroy it.

According to Michel, no comparable object has been found in this or neighbouring regions to date.

From 2001 to 2009, Professor Dr. Thomas Michel served as Director of the State Museum of Ethnology in Stuttgart.