The legend of Lamòling : Unwritten memories and diachronic toponymy through the lens of an Abui myth

Cacciafoco, Francesco Perono; Cavallaro, Francesco

doi:10.1016/j.lingua.2017.04.006

Cited by 7 publications

(13 citation statements)

References 7 publications

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“…Another story behind the naming origins of Wata Meelang was that a local religious leader used to live under one of the few coconut trees in the village. Both toponymic stories relate to religious people and practices and share similarities to other stories of how religion in the Abui culture influences place names and who they are as a people, i.e., their foundational myths (Perono Cacciafoco & Cavallaro 2017;Perono Cacciafoco & Cavallaro 2018). Locals also use legends to explain how etymologically obscure places are named.…”

Section: 3mentioning

confidence: 84%

“…Such observations are also supported in Lim & Perono Cacciafoco (2020a), who highlight the transparency of Abui toponyms; they are named after plants cultivated in the area with the topmost toponymic sources being mea 'mango' , wata 'coconut' , and kanaai 'canarium' . Kratochvíl et al (2016a) also note that Abui toponyms serve important social functions, such as affirming kin relations, staking out land claims and rights, and verifying the veracity of certain ancestral myths such as the legend of Lamòling as noted elsewhere (for instance, Perono Cacciafoco & Cavallaro 2017).…”

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confidence: 86%

“…This led them to conclude that Lamòling was responsible for abducting and killing the child and the villagers plotted revenge on the god. The Abui people can indicate the exact position of this village today, which hitherto did not have a name before the event, in order to link the village to the monstrous act which they believed really happened there (Perono Cacciafoco & Cavallaro 2017). Perono Cacciafoco's and Cavallaro's 2018 study follows up on the legend of Lamòling.…”

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confidence: 99%

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Toponyms as a Gateway to Society

Lim¹,

Cacciafoco

2021

Old World J. Anc. Afr. Eurasia

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Abui is a Papuan language spoken in Alor Island, South-East Indonesia. Although there are rich studies on the Abui language and its structure, research on Abui toponymy, which aids the understanding of language, culture, and society, deserves greater attention. This paper analyzes features of Abui society through Abui toponyms collected using Field Linguistics and Language Documentation methods. It finds that, because place names communicate valuable information on peoples and territories, Abui toponyms reflect the agrarian lifestyle of Abui speakers and, more broadly, the close relationship that the people have with their landscape. Furthermore, Abui toponyms express positive traits in the Abui culture like kinship ties and bravery. Notwithstanding, like other pre-literate and indigenous societies, oral stories are commonly used to explain how places are named. This paper augments the existing Abui toponymic studies on the connection between names and the places they name and provides a deeper understanding of the Abui language, culture, and society.

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Section: 3mentioning

confidence: 84%

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confidence: 86%

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confidence: 99%

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Toponyms as a Gateway to Society

Lim¹,

Cacciafoco

2021

Old World J. Anc. Afr. Eurasia

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“…Moreover, numerous landscape features are reflected in toponyms. These include the topography and settlement of ethnic groups [32][33][34][35], some with a focus on the meaning imputed by local people to their physical and cultural surroundings [36] and migration of people, religious and cultural traditions and local language [37][38][39][40]. In sum, the study of toponyms enables one to better understand the landscape, be it the Topography, Geography, History, Society, Culture, Religion or Language.…”

Section: Toponymy Landscapes and Linguisticsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Discovering Unwritten Stories—A Modular Case Study in Promoting Landscape Education

Lim¹,

Cacciafoco²

2021

Education Sciences

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Landscapes have been and are an important aspect of any society, culture, economy and environment. Besides the role of landscape and Landscape Sciences in these arenas, there have been increasingly greater calls to incorporate landscape into the curriculum. Moreover, Landscape Education is beneficial in developing important foundations in students, particularly that of active citizenry. While the benefits of Landscape Education are evident, current research remains focused on Western, especially European, contexts. This article discusses how a leading Singapore public University incorporates Landscape Education within a relatively new module on Toponymy offered in the Linguistics and Multilingual Studies Programme. While the links between Linguistics and a course in Toponymy or even the links between Toponymy and Landscape may not be immediately apparent, an analysis of the content covered in the module demonstrates congruence to existing frameworks and principles in teaching Landscape Education and, at the same time, provides a case in point in interdisciplinarity, drawing from diverse disciplines such as Language, Linguistics, History, Geography, Landscape Sciences, Anthropological Linguistics, among many others. This study provides useful references for educational institutions in incorporating Landscape Education into their curriculum.

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“…This paper presents a parallel version and, therefore, a completion of an Abui oral legend, the Lamòling founding myth. The original version was analysed (Perono Cacciafoco and Cavallaro 2017) in the context of it being the origin and explanation for a number of toponyms and micro-toponyms still existing in the Abui territory on the island of Alor (South-East Indonesia, Alor-Pantar Archipelago) shown in Figure 1. Right up to today, the Abui believe that the tale of Lamòling is true and they claim that it is a historical episode dating to before the arrival of the Portuguese and Dutch colonizers and, therefore, concurrent with the arrival of Christianity.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Lamòling Bèaka: Immanence, Rituals, and Sacred Objects in an Unwritten Legend in Alor

Cacciafoco

Cavallaro

2018

Religions

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This paper recounts a parallel story of the Lamòling myth. The original analysis of the legend addressed the relationship between two gods, Lamòling and Lahatàla, from the Abui traditional religion. The myth evolved from ancestral times to the arrival of Christianity in Alor, with the resultant association of the 'bad' god as a demon and, finally, as the devil. This paper completes the myth as handed down from traditional 'owners' of the narrative and storytellers by telling a parallel version centered around an Abui 'prophet', Fanny, who was the only person able to travel to Lamòling Bèaka, 'the land of the Lamòling gods/servants'. We also focus on a number of sacred objects and rituals associated with this religious myth and on their symbolic meaning for the Abui. This account tells a different version of the killing and eating of an Abui child by these gods/supernatural entities and of how Fanny came upon the gruesome feast. The paradoxical absence of Lamòling in this version of the myth depicts him as an immanent being, pervading and sustaining all that is real and created in nature, existing anywhere and nowhere at the same time.

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The legend of Lamòling : Unwritten memories and diachronic toponymy through the lens of an Abui myth

Cited by 7 publications

References 7 publications

Toponyms as a Gateway to Society

Toponyms as a Gateway to Society

Discovering Unwritten Stories—A Modular Case Study in Promoting Landscape Education

Lamòling Bèaka: Immanence, Rituals, and Sacred Objects in an Unwritten Legend in Alor

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