Lila has painted an important design for the Dahorurajé clan, avino’e, the design of the moon. Lila explains that she was taught this design by her auntie, Joyce-Bella Mujorumo, former Duvahe (Chief) of Dahorurajé clan women. This special design can be traced back to Udu’a, Lokirro’s wife. Udu’a then taught Joyce-Bella Mujorumo.

The border and the irregular square frames are known as orriseegé or ‘pathways’ and provide a compositional framework for the designs. The or’e (path) designs originate from the time of the ancestors and relate to the intricate footpaths that run through food gardens and garden plots. The first mud-dyed barkcloths were simple, repetitive bands of simple vertical lines (either in appliqued mud-dyed barkcloth or painted with dark earth pigments likely to also be river ‘mud’) or representing these pathways through the garden of and are a design that may only be worn by maganahe duvahe (female Chiefs).

The frames of black triangles and zig-zagging triangles are mahuva’oje, the hoofprints of a mischievous and cheeky pig that has wreaked havoc on a garden during the night. The diamond design represents the fruit of the Sihe tree. Sihe is a yellow fruit found in the rainforest and often eaten by cassowaries. In the time of the Ancestors, during times of tribal warfare, the Ömie male warriors had no food while they were defending their borders in the forest far from their villages so they survived by chewing the Sihe fruit, swallowing the juice and then they would spit out the pulp. The siha’e design is sometimes also called vinohu’e, the men’s tattoo design of the bellybutton. The diamond shape was tattooed around men’s navals during the Ujawé initiation rite. The spots within the orriseegé and the moon design is a design known as sabu deje representing the spots which can be seen on the sides of a wood-boring grub. This grub is sacred to Ömie people as it plays an important part within the creation story of how Huvaimo (Mount Lamington) came to be volcanic. It is a traditional sor’e (tattoo design) which was most commonly tattooed running in one line under both eyes. Today it is applied to Ömie people’s faces for dance performances with natural pigments.

Story: THE OLD WOMAN WHO HUNG THE SUN AND MOON FROM THE TREE [1]

A long time ago there lived an old woman who had a large bilum [2] (woven string-bag). She carried the Sun, Moon and stars inside her bilum. She would pull the Sun out from her bilum and hang it high in the branch of a tree to bring the daylight. She would clear the bush from around the tree and the tree fork, keeping the area very clean. At the end of the day she would get the Sun and put it back inside her bilum. She would then take the Moon out from her bilum and hang it on the same tree branch, bringing the night. She took all the stars out from her bilum and spread them across the sky. One day a man saw the Sun. He started watching the Sun closely. As the Sun was rising, he followed it. He saw the old woman hanging the Sun and Moon and then hiding them inside her bilum. He said to himself, “Oh, that is what the old woman has been doing which brings the light and the darkness!” The man went home to his village and told the story to all the people. He explained to them how the old woman was looking after the Sun, Moon and stars and how that was her work. Everyone in the village had thought she was working in her food garden each day, but really she was clearing the bush to make space for the Sun and Moon to be seen clearly and to shine brightly in the sky.

[1] © Lila Warrimou & Rex Warrimou (Sabïo); orally translated by Alban Sare; transcribed by Brennan King at Savodobehi village, 2010.
[2] In Ömie language, a large bilum is called a bojoy.