The Seductive Warp Thread: An Evolutionary History of Ibanic Weaving by Michael Heppell (review)

The Ibanic might be but a blip on the world map of textile art but their textiles illustrated in numerous books and articles present ample evidence that, artistically and technically, they constituted a very impressive blip, pulsating with artistry, meaning and sexuality like a firefly displaying for a mate (p. 147).

In poetic fashion the aforesaid quote, the last sentence of The Seductive Warp Thread: An Evolutionary History of Ibanic Weaving, author Michael Heppell concisely sums up the contents and at the same time pays high tribute to Ibanic textile accomplishments. Published by the Borneo Research Council as its Material Culture Series No. 1, this 189-page coffee-table style book is a detailed narrative of the historical development of Ibanic weaving that scrutinizes and seeks answers to the many critical ‘why’s’ and ‘how come’s’ of household textile designs, patterns, and their very production. The volume was born of protracted fieldwork in Sarawak and West Kalimantan amongst the many Dayak communities (referred to as Ibanic) that argues convincingly that Ibanic textile production was undertaken by the womenfolk to entice the menfolk as marriage partners, thereby ensuring the sustainable propagation of the community. The threesome interrelatedness or ‘cyclical trinity’ between headhunting, rice growing, and fecundity was the engine of motivation for Ibanic weaving to produce textiles for primarily functional purposes and secondarily possessing aesthetic attraction. This symbiotic relation of the ‘trinity’ is succinctly worded simply as: ‘Rice fed the people making them strong. Men took heads which in turn fertilised the sacred rice and the women to produce more Iban’ (p. 88).

In order that the men succeeded in battle and brought home heads as trophies and ensured the success of the swidden rice crop necessitated that the attention of the deities was attracted and subsequently favourable extraterrestrial intervention would contribute to successes. A single material—home-produced textile—is crucial to heads, rice, and deities.

Every successful warrior needed a head he had just taken to be received in a lebur api owned by his household. … Every warrior wanted a powerful figure of a guardian spirit to be emblazoned on the back of his war jacket to accompany him into battle. Every warrior wanted a blessed sword belt to attach his principal killing weapon to his body.

Every warrior expected to hold major gawai to celebrate his exploits, to advance him in the male ranking system and to ensure his continued good relations with the deities.

For that, he needed high ranking, powerful pua’ to drape the altarpiece erected at the festival; to line the walls around his part of the gallery and partition his part of the verandah; to serve as a cloth on which an effigy like a kenyalang would be placed throughout the festival … to serve as a cloth on which offerings were assembled or livers of sacrificial pigs were examined to decipher what they revealed about the future, and to cradle a severed head for a climax of the festival when it was sundered in two to reveal the newly fertilized sacred rice. Every Iban male needed cloths celebrating fertility in their designs to accompany him to his swiddens for each agricultural ritual … Every Iban male needed to wear an appropriate loincloth when he trumpeted his invocations to the deities so that they would be pleased both with what they saw and the respect given them and respond actively to assist the communicant (p. 113).

To fulfil the various rituals and obligations to ensure successful survival it was mandatory that an Ibanic warrior seek a consummate weaver as his wife to produce the essential cloths.

Women were fully actively conscious of the fact that their success in life and to bear successful offspring were dependent on marrying an accomplished warrior. Women therefore needed to be skilful weavers. Simply put, champions attract champions; the most skilful weaver had the pick of...