ORANG RIMBA: FOREST, MARRIAGE, VILLAGERS, DEFORESTATION

ORANG RIMBA

Orang Rimba in 1939

The Orang Rimba have traditionally been animist forest peoples who inhabit the lowland rainforests of southeastern Sumatra, mainly in Jambi Province. Also known as the Koeboe, Orang Darat, Kubu, Orang Batin Sembilan and Anak Dalam, they are largely former hunter-gatherers that embrace a number of distinct groups. They are believed to be related to the forest people of Sri. Lanka. Few even knew of their existence until the Dutch came in contact with them in the 19th century. In 1935 there were 25,000 of them. It is believed that there are less of them now. An estimated 2,500 Orang Rimba continue to practice their traditional ways. Most are settled. [Source: “Encyclopedia of World Cultures Volume 5: East / Southeast Asia:” edited by Paul Hockings, 1993 ~]

The Orang Rimba, sometimes called Kubu by anthropologists, traditionally lived in small, nomadic groups. In their traditional society there were no class distinctions, only divisions based on age. No one acquired wealth or possessions and the forest was maintained in such a way as to ensure the maximum food supplies for all members of the group. Kubu were able to resist efforts by the government to settle them until the forest areas that they lived in were dramatically reduced by transmigration programs and palm oil plantations. The last remaining nomads have been forced to live in a 287-square-kilometer forest reserve. ~

Orang Rimba speak various Kubu languages that belong to the Malayo-Polynesian branch of the Austronesian language family. These language are best understood as closely related languages or dialects of Malay spoken in the upstream regions of South Sumatra and Jambi, and are ultimately related to Malay. The lifestyle of the forest-dwelling Orang Rimba was portrayed in the Indonesian film Sokola Rimba (2013), which brought wider public attention to their way of life.

Traditionally, the Orang Rimba practiced a nomadic or semi-nomadic lifestyle based on hunting and gathering, supplemented by small-scale slash-and-burn (swidden) agriculture. Most live in Jambi Province, with nearly one-third concentrated in the Tembesi–Tabir interfluve, where increasing reliance on swidden agriculture has contributed to rising birth rates. Smaller populations are also found in South Sumatra, as well as in parts of West Sumatra and Riau. [Source: International Encyclopedia of Sexuality, edited by Robert T. Francoeur, Ph.d., A.c.s and Raymond J. Noonan, PhD., Continuum International Publishing Group, 2004, online at the Kinsey Institute \^/]

Orang Rimba Life

The Suku Abak Dalam, an Orang Rimba group, are the original inhabitants of Bukit Duabelas National Park

Group size varies considerably, from small nuclear family units to larger swidden-based camps that may include 100 or more individuals. In smaller residential groups, kin-related families often cooperate by sharing game and gathered foods to offset limited resources. In recent decades, some Orang Rimba communities have adopted more sedentary lifestyles, shifting toward subsistence horticulture and rubber cultivation. While this transition has contributed to higher fertility rates, infant mortality remains high, particularly in areas affected by deforestation, where communities often lack access to adequate healthcare and sanitation during this period of change.

Most forest-dwelling Orang Rimba live in geographically isolated areas beyond the main road networks that connect rural villages and towns, which limits their access to formal education. Only those groups settled near roads are able to reach primary schools in nearby villages. Even then, school attendance is often irregular, as children are needed to assist their families with subsistence activities. In addition, some parents are reluctant to send their children to school, fearing exposure to the “village world,” where Malay customs and the national philosophy of Pancasila are taught. [Source: International Encyclopedia of Sexuality, edited by Robert T. Francoeur, Ph.d., A.c.s and Raymond J. Noonan, PhD., Continuum International Publishing Group, 2004, online at the Kinsey Institute \^/]

This reluctance reflects a broader resistance among the Orang Rimba toward outside cultural influences. Nevertheless, in some accessible settlements, the Indonesian Department of Health (Dinas Kesehatan) has introduced outreach programs. Health workers visit these communities to distribute hygiene supplies and provide information on contraception and family planning.

Two Kinds of Orang Rimba

Following Malay classifications, early European observers divided the Kubu into two broad categories: “tame” or “civilized” Kubu, who practiced swidden agriculture and maintained closer ties with settled communities, and “wild” Kubu, who lived deeper in the forest and made concerted efforts to avoid sustained contact with the outside world. Although closely related to Malay-speaking populations, these groups constitute distinct cultural traditions with differing economic practices and socio-religious systems. [Source: Wikipedia]

Orang Batin Sembilan refer to the “civilized” Kubu. The form the larger population and are swidden-based cultivators living in the central and eastern lowland forests of South Sumatra (approximately 35,000 people) and Jambi (about 10,000). As with other forest-oriented societies in the region, swidden fields serve as base camps from which families range into surrounding forests to hunt, gather, and collect forest products for trade.

Orang Rimba children learn to read and write in Kedudung Muda TNBD in 2022

Orang Rimba —literally “people of the forest” — are a much smaller population, numbering roughly 3,000, living primarily in the upstream regions of Jambi and South Sumatra. Their subsistence economy is highly flexible, alternating between swidden cultivation and a more nomadic lifestyle centered on foraging, especially the digging of wild yams. These activities are combined with hunting, trapping, fishing, and the collection of forest products for trade. In recent decades, forest product gathering has increasingly been supplemented—or replaced—by part-time rubber tapping and participation in logging.

Orang Rimba social life is organized around small, shifting camps. Some camps may consist of a single nuclear family during periods of intensive foraging, while others include extended families or multiple related households during swidden cultivation. Social relations are strongly egalitarian, with authority deriving primarily from age, gender, and knowledge of customary law and religious traditions rather than formal hierarchy.

Orang Rimba Marriage

According to the International Encyclopedia of Sexuality: In many cases, marital unions will occur between first or second cousins, most preferably where their parents are siblings of opposite gender. It is considered a mild form of incest (sumbang) when persons descending from same-sex siblings marry. In such cases, the male suitor must pay a fine to the family of his bride. In cases where a woman’s family approves of the union, the father will fix a brideprice, which will be paid to the father and, in some cases, be distributed to the bride’s male siblings as well.\^/

Loyalty is the most important quality sought in a son-in-law, and the latter’s bride-service is aimed at gaining the trust of the bride’s family. During this period, which can last months or years, the male suitor is scrupulously tested for his honesty and generosity, which he demonstrates by sharing the spoils of his hunting and what ever other resources he acquires, such as coffee, cigarettes, and other products bought with his earnings from fore st-product sales. He is also expected not to be “proud” (banga), which might be revealed through not showing proper respect to the bride-to-be’s family or “saying one thing and doing an other.” If he is unable to demonstrate proficiency in subsistence-related skills, including collecting fore st products, the male suitor will be thought to be either in sin cere in his intentions of marriage or simply in compe tent in his ability to support a family and, consequently, he will be deemed an unworthy candidate for marriage into the girl’s family.\^/

In many cases, after being refused marriage by a woman’s father, and finding no other welcoming host families, a suitor is pressed to either run off with the girl or express his intentions of marriage to her in private, in an attempt to cir cum vent the authority of her disap proving family. In such cases, the union may take place, but only after he pays a fine and possibly endures a beating by the bride’s female family members and younger siblings for his unduly intimacy with the girl (Sandbukt 1988). The bride may also be severely beaten by her mother for her defiance and the consequent shame she has brought upon her family.\^/

Payment of a fine is preferred by the host family, as it does not carry implications of bride ownership as does the out right payment of a brideprice. This type of union, kawin lari (literally, “marrying on the run”), often brings a sense of embarrassment and shame to the family of the groom, but none the less occurs with at least the same frequency as arranged marriages. Elopement of this sort may also occur between first cousins where the bride’s family does not approve of the union.

Orang Rimba women between 1914 and 1926

In one recorded case, a young man threatened to defect to a nearby village and “enter Islam” if his male cousin, whose father was deceased thereby entrusting him by default with the authority to be troth his sister, refused to give her in marriage. This young man was competing with an other cousin and with his own father, who wanted to take the girl as a second wife.\^/

Among some groups, particularly in the southern areas, newlyweds will leave the group to camp alone for several days. In some cases, a week of prohibition on sexual intercourse is observed (pantangan), during which time parents of the bride will bring food to the couple, who are also not permitted to leave their shelter to engage in subsistence-related activities. In all cases, newlyweds will construct a shelter in which they will cohabit, signifying the commencement of their new marital arrangement. Consisting of tree stalks for scaffolding and tied with vine, with logs sometimes overlain with bark for flooring, these temporary shelters are not built with walls and are customarily constructed by women. The birth of the first child symbolizes a stable union, while inability to produce a child is commonly seen as infecundity on the part of the woman and may be grounds for divorce. [Source: International Encyclopedia of Sexuality, edited by Robert T. Francoeur, Ph.d., A.c.s and Raymond J. Noonan, PhD., Continuum International Publishing Group, 2004, online at the Kinsey Institute \^/]

A married male will be required to remain subordinate to his in-laws, continually sharing resources and providing moral support while residing in the same camp. Occasionally, the couple will reside in another camp should resource distributions necessitate, but are nonetheless always required to share any captured game and other resources. They are expected to return eventually to the camp of the bride’s family. This ensures the bride will have sufficient moral support while her family will reap the benefits of her spouse’s labor.

In time, a wife’s loyalty will grow toward her husband, but she will also be expected to devote her loyalties to her blood relatives. Occasionally, tensions arise when nuptial and consanguineous obligations conflict, such as in cases where a woman complains to her father or brothers of maltreatment or insufficient food provided by her husband. In such cases, a husband will feel betrayed and may threaten to kill his wife. It should be noted, however, that homicide among the Orang Rimba is virtually unheard of, and such displays of anger more commonly serve as mere outlets for one’s frustration and/or a strategy for dissuading a wife from further pursuing the matter.

Polygamy and Wife Stealing Among the Orang Rimba

Polygamy is a common conjugal arrangement among the Orang Rimba and second wives are most commonly divorcees, orphans, or lack a father and/or other male consanguines. In the latter cases, a woman’s matrimonial value is decreased and she is also rendered a more vulnerable target because male support is lacking—a situation that males will capitalize on without exception. An upper limit of seven wives has been reported, while at one field site in this author’s study, a man was cohabiting with five wives, the fifth wife being an adopted daughter. In most cases, however, monogamy is the most common arrangement. [Source: International Encyclopedia of Sexuality, edited by Robert T. Francoeur, Ph.d., A.c.s and Raymond J. Noonan, PhD., Continuum International Publishing Group, 2004, online at the Kinsey Institute \^/]

When a second wife is taken, she must first endure a ritual beating by the first wife for the shame that has been caused to her that her husband would seek another spouse, and to assert her seniority in their new residential arrangement. The new wife is not permitted to strike back or retaliate at any time and she is expected to remain subordinate to the former indefinitely. Their shelters may stand as little as three feet from one another, and the husband normally alternates residence with no fixed pattern; his original wife, however, may be given preference. Should a first wife discover her spouse in the act of coitus or other intimate activity with a second wife, the latter may once again undergo a severe beating for arousing jealousies and her perceived insolence in displaying her affection.

Divorce is not uncommon but becomes increasingly rare after the first child is born. Divorce may be initiated by the family of the bride, often when a husband does not adequately provide for his wife and children, or does not share with or show the proper respect to his spouse’s consanguines, particularly her father, but also her mother and brothers.

If a woman wishes to remarry, she will be expected to wait at least two to three years in order to avoid being perceived as overly eager in her desire to form a union with another man. If she has been proven guilty of adultery in the past, she may be forever stigmatized and forbidden to remarry, in theory at least. If a woman remarries shortly following her divorce, she will be fined 500 sheets of cloth by her ex-husband and may lose custody of her children. A man is expected to abstain from marriage for at least six months, and a lesser fine, perhaps 20 sheets of cloth, must be paid to the family of his first spouse in the event that he remarries too soon.

Wife stealing is a reported occurrence, and in such cases the woman in question may not be held liable.. The “stolen” wife’s family and spouse may prefer rather to accuse the male culprit of enticing or alluring the woman with sorcery or “love magic.” In one instance, a male was known to have “stolen” four wives, all on separate occasions. The putative punishment would have been severe fines or death by the spear of the woman’s male siblings or husband. In this case, purportedly, no male siblings or husbands were courageous enough to seek retribution, and the fearless offender, aside from being banished from the area, was said to only have endured a physical thrashing by the women’s younger siblings. However, if it were perceived that the woman fled intentionally and was willingly cohabiting with another male, she would also be the subject of death threats made by her male siblings, father, and/or husband for her immoral conduct.

Breaking of Orang Rimban Marriage Custons

In cases where a woman’s father is deceased and her siblings are either too young or unable to assert themselves with an older, more dominant male, the latter may bring enough pressure to bear on the situation that the girl will be taken by coercion, and he may simply pay a compensatory fine to her male siblings. [Source: International Encyclopedia of Sexuality, edited by Robert T. Francoeur, Ph.d., A.c.s and Raymond J. Noonan, PhD., Continuum International Publishing Group, 2004, online at the Kinsey Institute \^/]

Having no father-in-law to provide bride-service for or be subordinate to in an uxorilocal residential arrangement, he may simply adopt the new wife to live in his own group. As such, this sort of marital arrangement is highly undesirable to the family of the bride and, concomitantly, is much sought after by Orang Rimban men, as it provides them with a high degree of personal autonomy that would not otherwise be achieved until the death of a father-in-law.

In another instance, an adult male of approximately 24 years of age (Orang Rimba do not keep track of age or birth dates) violated the above courting and marriage customs on two separate occasions by expressing his intentions of marriage directly to the girl and, later, by approaching another girl’s father and not adequately performing the incumbent bride-service duties or producing the specified brideprice at a later date. In the former case, he was fined five grams of gold, whereas in the latter, he was required to pay 60 sheets of cloth to the offended father. This young adult male, having exhausted all internal options for marriage, eventually defected to a nearby village and adopted Islam, albeit superficially, in order to increase his mating selectivity in a new social environment. In such cases of defection to local villages,

Adolescent Sex Among the Orang Rimba

Ramsey Elkholy wrote in 2001: As camp life is normally public and informal in nature, unmediated by walls or strong notions of privacy, children are free to overhear whatever they may take an interest in. Young children may overhear or see the silhouettes of their parents making love in the same shelter should they awaken in the middle of the night. As married men will always be on alert for any undue attention or sexual overture towards their spouses, they will rarely discuss matters that are sexual in nature with other married men so as to avoid attracting such attention to her. However, boys and young men may discuss sex among themselves, outside the company of women. While uttering the word mengawan (sex) in the company of females is forbidden, young boys commonly discuss young girls, as well as their own sexuality, among their close age-mates. Masturbation and female anatomy may also be discussed, often playfully, by young males. Girls may have similar discussions, albeit in a less explicit manner. [Source: “Growing Up Sexually, Volume” I by D. F. Janssen, World Reference Atlas, 2004]

Almost all sexual knowledge, therefore, is gained in the informal context of the camp, either through overhearing adults or through rehearsal with their same-sex age mates. Such rehearsal or “play” may occasionally lead to homosexual behavior among boys...While girls may overhear the discussions of older women and are well aware of the process of conception, they are generally less experienced in terms of pre-marital sexual exploration, because of the considerable pressures they are under to uphold ideals of chastity. It is therefore most probably the case that women learn the techniques of sexual intercourse only after marriage, following the lead of their spouse. This may simply involve assuming the bottom position, as the act of coitus is always performed in the “missionary” position....

The genitalia of male infants and children are the object of much playful affection. As male children reach adolescence, and often in their pre-pubescent stage, they will begin to explore their own bodies and perhaps even the bodies of their male age-mates. Young boys who have developed intimate relations with one another are extremely uninhibited with their bodies in each other’s presence, and it is not uncommon for young boys to touch and comment on the dimensions, size, and general qualities of an age-mate’s penis. At the site where this author collected data for this report, pre-adolescent and adolescent boys were well aware of which boys could and could not ejaculate through masturbation. And while this was most commonly performed in private, they did not feel any sense of shame or embarrassment when detected by the author of this chapter or their peers.

Orang Rimba do not practice any formal puberty rituals or rites of passage. However, when both genders have demonstrated a degree of self-reliance, which for boys includes proficiency in hunting and forest-product collecting — the former a skill required to perform adequate bride-service and eventually feed a family, and the latter as a means of cash income — they will be accorded relative degrees of respect by their elders. An indication that a child or adolescent has reached a level of self-sufficiency may be when she or he has a personal debt recorded in a villager’s debit book. This implies that debts will be paid for products credited (e.g., rice, cigarettes, sugar, coffee, flashlight batteries, etc.) without the help of the young person’s parents. In some rare cases, parents will wait until the child reaches this degree of sufficiency before giving a name.

Other indications that a child has “come of age” might be smoking cigarettes bought with their own earnings with other males, and for girls, covering the breasts with a sarong. This may occur well before a girl’s very first menstrual period is reached, as the girls become increasingly aware of their sexuality and the appropriate modes of conduct incumbent on them. Marriage, however, is the decisive indication of adulthood, perhaps more so for men than women. A woman achieves the full respect accorded to womanhood when her first child is born.

As noted earlier, adolescents and pre-adults are required to adhere to strict taboos on touching or flirting with the opposite gender, and any act perceived as constituting excessive intimacy is grounds for adults to convene in order to discuss the matter and administer a fine to the accused. Because of such fear of punishment, pre-marital affairs of any sort are uncommon and always secretive. In almost all cases, the male will be blamed for “corrupting” the girl and he will be required to pay a fine (dendo), most commonly in cloth, currency, and occasionally gold. In cases where sex has occurred between the couple, they will be required to marry, but only after the male endures a frenzied beating by the girl’s younger siblings for the shame he has caused her family.

Any sort of premarital sexual activity, therefore, is very rare, as it is considered among the most serious of crimes in Orang Rimban society, and is punished accordingly. In most cases, men also have no sexual experience with a woman prior to marriage. These days, however, pre-adult males are in increasing contact with local villagers and, in one case that was reported to the author, young Orang Rimba men were beginning to seek the services of prostitutes for “unattached” sexual enjoyment....

Male homosexual behavior has been reported in rare instances among adolescent boys and young adult males, whereas it is practically unheard of among married men. The actual form and nature such relationships take is unclear, and in most cases may amount to mere sex rehearsal or exploration. One case, however, has been reported first hand to the author by two married men of their engagement in anal intercourse during their adolescent years. After being detected by an adult, they were each fined twenty sheets of cloth and stigmatized for a brief period”.

Orang Rimban Marriages with Outsiders

Orang Rimba are considered only marginal members of the wider rural society and are treated accordingly. During the time of this writing, the aforementioned male had yet to find a spouse, because of what local villagers claimed was the typical Muslim man’s unwillingness to betroth a daughter to an Orang Rimban male for fear of causing shame to the family, or producing “stupid” offspring. This reasoning is based on the assumption that intelligence, or lack thereof, is hereditary, and the Orang Rimba are inherently inferior with limited intellectual capacities. [Source: International Encyclopedia of Sexuality, edited by Robert T. Francoeur, Ph.d., A.c.s and Raymond J. Noonan, PhD., Continuum International Publishing Group, 2004, online at the Kinsey Institute \^/]

In extremely rare cases where marriage occurs between male villagers and Orang Rimba women, the couple will always take up residence in the village. As such, this sort of marital arrangement is deeply resented by the Orang Rimba, in terms of the loss of a female family member, the lost labor power of an in-marrying male, and perhaps most significantly, in the act of making the prohibited cultural crossing of forest and village domains. Consequently, the family will often break ties with the female defector.

Impact of Deforestation and Islamization on the Orang Rimba

Since the 1970s, the Orang Rimba have faced increasing displacement as a result of logging operations, the expansion of palm oil plantations, and government-sponsored transmigration settlement programs. Between 2000 and 2018, Indonesia has lost about 15 percent of its tree cover; in Jambi, losses reached 32 percent according to Global Forest Watch. Although President Joko Widodo announced a moratorium on new palm oil plantations, forest loss has already severed the ecological and spiritual foundations of Orang Rimba life. On top of this Orang Rimba communities have often been subjected to pressure or coercion to adopt Islam by groups like the Islamic Defenders Front, a professed morality force that dresses in white robes and has raided nightclubs and other places deemed un-Islamic. They have engaged in mass conversions of forest people and visit villages settled Orang Rimba to remind them to pray five times a day. . According to the New York Times only about 1,000 Orang Rimba families remain in the rainforest. Temenggung Tarip, a traditional healer who once invoked forest gods with offerings of flowers, says the rituals failed as logging and palm oil plantations destroyed sacred land. Outside the forest, many—Tarip included—converted to Islam, in part because Indonesian identity cards require affiliation with one of six recognized religions. Missionaries and local officials promoted conversion, while traditional animist practices were marginalized. [Source: Hannah Beech, New York Times, October 14, 2018]

Now living in a concrete house far from the jungle, Tarip farms rubber and oil palm on customary land, even as he recognizes these crops helped destroy his former way of life. Hannah Beech wrote in the New York Times, “Tarip lives with his wife, Putri Tija Sanggul, in a concrete shell in Sarolangun, a three-day walk from the wilderness that used to be their home. The only reminder of nature in their new house is a bunch of purple orchids that cascades down a wall. The flowers are plastic. Missionaries, both Muslim and Christian, have tried to ease the transition to what the Orang Rimba call “the outside.” Beyond the obvious differences — concrete walls, processed food, brightly colored plastic — the outside is confounding in other ways. The forest was cool, sunlight barely penetrating the dense foliage. Concrete, by contrast, holds the heat. Sleeping in the stuffy confines of his home is something to which Mr. Tarip is still not accustomed.

Ms. Sanggul, Mr. Tarip’s wife, often claws at the veil around her head and hitches up her dress to air her legs. She is a princess of her Orang Rimba tribe, and her noble lineage meant she could conjure the forest spirits with ease until one day, she said, she couldn’t. “The gods took away my gift,” Ms. Sanggul said. “Nevertheless, Mr. Tarip still respects indigenous traditions. Four of his daughters and three of his sons remain in the jungle, and he knows that by visiting them he could compromise their communion with nature. The list of Orang Rimba taboos is long and includes soap, fried chicken and certain clothes like the Muslim prayer cap Mr. Tarip now wears. Perfume is also prohibited.

Image Sources: Wikimedia Commons

Text Sources: “Encyclopedia of World Cultures Volume 5: East / Southeast Asia:” edited by Paul Hockings, 1993; National Geographic; New York Times, Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, Lonely Planet Guides, Library of Congress, Smithsonian magazine, The New Yorker, Time, Reuters, AP, AFP, Wikipedia, BBC, CNN, and various books and other publications.

Last Updated December 2025