Palu'e - History and Cultural Relations



In 1511-1512, after the seizure of Malacca, Afonso de Albuquerque sent out a fleet to discover the Moluccas. On their way along the Flores north coast the Portuguese ships passed Palu'e. A panoramic drawing was made by the pilot Francisco Rodrigues, picturing the island against the background of Flores. In their mythology, all groups of the island ultimately trace their origins to a place located far away in the west. The final stages of these myths are concerned with the crossing from the Lio region on the Flores north coast. To this day, these groups honor long-standing alliances in warfare with a number of ethnic groups of central and east Flores. In some cases they retain rights to land use and ritual sites on Flores. In a document dated 1699, the raja of Gowa in South Sulawesi claimed supremacy over the island and stated his intention to reinforce this claim by means of warfare. It is doubtful whether this claim was ever upheld. The lack of drinking water on Palu'e was first noted by the Scotsman Cameron, who visited the island briefly in 1860. Cameron also mentioned the islanders' reputation among the neighboring islands as boatbuilders (Palu'e boats were commonly exchanged for guns and ivory tusks). Nineteenth-century sources mention the island in the context of piracy and slave trade. Palu'e boats were said to be raiding the Flores Sea and well-armed Bugis vessels. Ancestral treasures on Palu'e are often associated with these past activities and ties with Bugis groups of the kingdom of Bone on Sulawesi are still recognized. Toward the end of the century the Dutch military staged several unsuccessful punitive expeditions against coastal villages. In 1906 the island was pacified with the help of an indigenous coastal group and forced to accept the supremacy of the raja of Sika, the Dutch-appointed indigenous ruler of Maumere Regency on Flores. A succession of Sikkanese relatives of the raja became his representatives on the island. They held the title of kapitan and were charged with collecting a head tax and enforcing communal labor. Later holders of this office were recruited from the above-mentioned coastal group and educated by the Catholic mission (Society of the Divine Word, or SVD) on Flores. Only in some cases were members of descent groups holding traditional political offices appointed as village headmen. In 1928 the volcano Rokatenda erupted, killing several hundred people and devastating large parts of the island. In the eyes of the people this eruption had been caused by Dutch attempts to dig for water on the island. Missionary activity by the Flores-based SVD mission began in the first quarter of the century and was mainly aimed at collectively baptizing the population and educating future native administrators and religious instructors. In 1938 the mission established a permanent presence on the island, which was only interrupted during the period of Japanese occupation (1942-1945). During nearly forty years, schooling and medical care were provided by the SVD. At present, approximately 90 percent of the population is nominally Catholic. Schooling and medical care are now provided by Indonesian government agencies, and the two Palu'e parishes are run by priests of the Indonesian Catholic church. In 1966 Palu'e adopted the desa system, whereby groups of traditional villages were united into administrative units (desa). With few exceptions these followed the boundaries of traditional domains, but in some cases the traditional system of political alliance was crosscut by grouping together long-standing enemies. Administratively, Palu'e is now classified as a subdistrict ( perwakilan ) and incorporated into the district ( kecamatan ) of Maumere on Flores. Its remoteness from the administrative center, periodic volcanic eruptions of various intensities, and the notorious lack of water have, for the last thirty years, made the people of Palu'e a target for transmigration to Flores. Since 1982 these efforts by the provincial government have been partially successful, and transmigration settlements have been established on the Flores north coast. To date only one desa has been moved to its new location.

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