By Marlynda Meraw
IMAGINE a cloth so constant, so devoted that it charts the entire arc of an Iban’s existence.
It begins at the threshold of life; wound gently about a newborn as they are carried to the river for their initial bathing rites, with the water and the weave together welcoming a new soul into the world.
Years later, pua, drapes over two people as they are joined in marriage, its threads binding them the way their lives are bound to one another. And at the very end, when breath and colour have both drained away, it holds you once more—laid over the departed, dressing them devotedly for their final farewell.
Its place was not confined to these passages alone. Ceremony after ceremony called for it, and further back still, in the days when headhunting was practiced, the pua kumbu (ceremonial cloth) had its part in the naku antu pala–the ritual welcoming of trophy heads. To receive a head with bare hands was believed spiritually perilous, so the sacred cloth stood between the human world and the invisible, a barrier woven of thread and distinct patterns where none other would do. And once a pua kumbu had served this purpose, it could serve no other. Its work was done, and its fate like the heads it once received, was sealed.
The weave that greets a newborn is not the same as the shroud of the dead, nor the cloth used to wrap a trophy head. Each pua kumbu is its own cloth, woven for its own moment. But that a cloth exists at all for each of these thresholds: birth, union, death, and the perilous space between worlds, is itself the point.
It means that from the first breath to the last, there is always a thread waiting to hold meaning and sustain an Iban’s life, at every passage that matters.
Terminology of Pua
To truly understand this textile is to first unpack the language within its very name. In the Iban tongue, pua can mean blanket or a piece of cloth to wrap around oneself, while kumbu means to cover or to enfold. Yet beneath this simple translation lies a vast world of technique.
Melia Linggi, the Tun Jugah Foundation’s managing trustee, alongside curator Janet Rata Noel, emphasised a crucial distinction that many often miss: pua kumbu is not a catch-all term, but part of a wider family of textiles, each defined by how it is brought to life.
“The term pua kumbu is so popularised that people would refer to whatever is carrying that design as pua kumbu,” said Melia, pointing out that it is terminologically inaccurate.
By technique, the pua kumbu people have come to associate with the name is more precisely a pua kebat (tie); born of the warp-ikat method, a process of tie-dyeing. Here, the weaver practices ngebat (tying), tightly binding off sections of yarn with raffia string to resist the dye, a painstaking rhythm that eventually reveals intricate motifs upon the loom.
Other cloths demand entirely different movements of the hand. Pua pilih (select or choose) requires the weaver to manually select specific warp threads to build a highly detailed, textured pattern. It is a method that tests the patience, taking the longest of all to complete.
Then there is pua sungkit (hook), which, despite sounding like songket, bears no resemblance to the textile of the Malays. It is a supplementary weft-wrapping method, where coloured threads are individually wound around the warp, yielding a design that is remarkably precise, bold, and distinctive.
Kain (cloth) karap, in contrast, is made with a technique closer in kinship to songket, using string heddles to lift specific warp threads—allowing for a faster rhythm and producing highly structured, geometric patterns.
For kain subak, its creation utilises a method akin to brocade, producing a dense, heavily textured design that feels both elaborate and minimalistic at once. It is most often found on the back of garments reserved primarily for men, though some women wear it as well.
Whether through the tight ties of kebat or the slow picking of pilih, these varied techniques reveal that a pua is never just a single type of cloth. It is a language of thread, where the turn of a weaver’s hand determines the purpose and identity of what is made.
The Women’s Warpath
Just as men once went to war, the weaving of pua kumbu is a woman’s own war: the kayau indu (lit. women’s warpath). Where men ventured deep into the jungle for the hunt, weavers entered the forest in search of the raw materials needed to summon the right colours.
This was true for Tan Sri Dato Sri Empiang Jabu’s grandmother, Nangku Dingat, and for her mother before her—both weavers in their own right. But by the time this inheritance reached Empiang, the rhythm of the loom had skipped her; she never had the chance to learn the way of the shuttle. Even so, the history remains alive within her.
She fondly recalled foraging through the forest as a girl alongside her grandmother, hunting for the plants that would become dye. The engkudu (morinda) roots for the reddish hues, tarum (indigo) for the deeper blues, akar penawar landak (fibraurea tinctoria) for its yellow–all that gives the pua its colour.
To Empiang, these weavers were never merely artisans. They were botanists and chemists in their own right, carrying the precise knowledge of which plant yields which shade, and how those shades are coaxed into being. It is a science easily mistaken by those who don’t look closely, for mere art—as though the craft began and ended with the clatter of the back-strap loom.
The alchemy begins long before the weaving, with a laborious effort known as ngembun (catching the dew) in the Saribas region, or ngar in the Batang Rajang region, which treats the threads so they can properly absorb the natural dyes. The weaver carries massive bundles of treated yarn and lays them out on mats, completely exposed to the open sky. For seven days and seven nights, the threads endure a cyclical transformation—absorbing the midnight dew, then drying under the blazing daytime sun.
Some pua kumbu bypass this trial entirely. Their threads are taken raw, tied with patterns, and dyed directly. Placed side by side with a textile that has undergone ngembun, the difference is stark.
“You can see the difference in its colours. A pua that skips the ngembun process is not as vibrant. We call this kind of cloth pua matak (raw),” Empiang explained.
Once the threads are prepared, the journey moves to the loom through a series of precise, named movements. Melia and Janet traced the choreography of this stage, beginning with ngirit (warping), where the threads are stretched vertically across a long wooden frame. The weaver winds the thread back and forth with great precision to establish the exact width and length of the pua kumbu.
Next comes ngarap, the shed selection. The weaver inserts cross-rods through the stretched threads, separating them into two layers of even and odd threads. This creates the shed—the crucial gap through which a shuttle will later pass.
To ensure this alignment does not slip or tangle, the weaver performs negi, securing the ends. She briefly weaves a solid strip at both ends of the frame, locking the warp threads tightly in position and keeping the tension identical on all sides before any pattern is made.
Then comes muai, sorting the warp threads. The weaver inserts long, thin laze rods between the layers of folded threads, separating the groups of yarn that will form the design.
“In Iban, muai means ‘to throw,’ but in this context of weaving, it means to sort the warp threads,” said Janet. This process divides the threads into equal groups to prepare for tying symmetrical patterns.
The design of the pua is fixed during ngebat. The weaver ties the pattern upon the bundled sections, wrapping them tightly with fibre or raffia so the threads will resist the dye. This is followed by dyeing, where the threads are immersed in natural dyes, such as the brownish-red extracted from the engkudu root.
After the first dip, the weaver performs mampul (cover), shielding the sections that have already turned brownish-red. The uncovered parts are then dyed with indigo. Wherever the uncovered brownish-red yarn meets the indigo, a darker colour emerges—in a shade close to black.
Only after this long devotion to preparation does the weaving itself begin. Depending on the size of the pua kumbu, an experienced weaver’s practised hands will spend a week or two of steady daily work at the loom, bringing the kayau indu to its close.
When Dreams Made Weavers
For many ethnic groups in Sarawak, dreams often carry messages—and for pua kumbu weavers, it is no different. When a dream so inspires, planting its muse in a weaver as she falls into slumber, the pattern revealed to her is carried forward into the pua kumbu she goes on to make.
Empiang remembered this of her grandmother, Nangku, who worked ceaselessly, moving from one dream-born piece to the next. When a dream offered her a pattern, she began weaving; before long, another dream would arrive, and she would begin anew. It was a rigorous, lifelong rhythm.
Over her lifetime, Nangku wove more than 70 pieces, and not a single one was repeated. She strictly observed a superstition specific to herself which was never to berteladan (copy) another weaver’s pattern. Every design that passed through her hands was hers alone.
Such taboos and superstitions vary from one weaver to another, but they are never taken lightly. Whatever forms they take, these beliefs are not mere whims to be followed or set aside at will. They are observed because the cloth demands it—a respect owed not to superstition for its own sake, but to the sacredness the pua kumbu carries within its every thread.
Despite these restrictions, copying simple patterns remains an accepted part of the journey for novices wishing to learn. By tracing the established lines of those who came before them, beginners build their foundational skills and, in time, learn to weave patterns distinctly their own.
Forbidden Patterns
When the form of a wild giant takes shape upon the pua kumbu, the air in the longhouse shifts. This is the Gerasi Papa (lit. wild giant), the most formidable of figures, woven only to commemorate the final pole of Gawai Burong, a festival celebrated by the Iban of Saribas to honour the war god, Sengalang Burong.
A specific pattern is woven for each ascending stage of the festival, rising from Kalingkang, Sandong, Sawi, Salangking, Mulong Merangau or Lemba Bumbun, Gajah Meram, Ranyai or Mudur Ruruh, and culminating in the Gerasi Papa.
Only highly accomplished master weavers are permitted to attempt these festival patterns; a regular weaver cannot simply touch them. Empiang noted that a community does not necessarily need to reach that final ninth stage. If they do, and the Gerasi Papa is displayed within the rumah panjai (longhouse), the house becomes a rumah angat (hot house). This presence foretells an inevitable death, a warning so absolute that the entire community must abandon the longhouse and move out to escape misfortune.
“The entire longhouse has to leave once this (Gerasi Papa) pattern emerges, otherwise there will be death,” said Empiang.
Historically, such potent designs were strictly segregated by a weaver’s capability. Novice weavers begin their journey with safe designs, tracing the gentle lines of jungle vegetation. They must never attempt dangerous, intricate patterns carrying powerful creatures like Nabau (water serpent) or Gajah Meram (lit. nesting elephant).
If a weaver allows pride to eclipse her skill and attempts a taboo pattern beyond her spiritual strength, the motif eats away at her lifeforce. She will layu (wilt) like a plant denied water, falling into illness and eventually death.
This spiritual peril dictates the very physical sequence of the craft. With the pattern known as Rang Jugah (Jugah’s jaw), Melia said that once a weaver begins the jaw section, she must finish it completely in one sitting to close the pattern. To leave the jaw halfway finished means the mouth remains open, and an open mouth must eat. It was a danger weavers refuse to court.
Because of these hazards, experienced weavers who are called by dreams to create these powerful patterns must equip themselves like warriors heading into battle. Just as men took up swords and shields, the women arm themselves with protective amulets and charms to shield their spirits, commonly keeping a piece of iron, for instance a parang (machete), a kebuk (small jar) and a sarong close at hand.
Through these rigorous boundaries, the loom remains a place of great reverence. Every thread pulled is a negotiation with the invisible world, where art and spiritual survival are one and the same. To weave a pua kumbu is never to act out of mere vanity, but to move with absolute respect for a fabric that holds the very power of life and death within its weave.
Fabric of Fate
Such is the weight of belief carried within a single piece of cloth. From the first river bath of a newborn infant to the final shroud of the deceased, the pua kumbu remains the lasting textile that binds the Iban people to their ancestors, their land, and the spirit world.
To those unaware, it may be just cloth—admired, perhaps, for its intricate designs. But to the Iban, it is a living account of destiny, a protective shield against the perilous unseen, and a sacred companion through every threshold of existence.
Behind every motif lies a story: of a grandmother who dreamed a pattern into being, of dew gathered under seven nights of open sky, of hands that knew a single design must never be repeated. To weave a pua kumbu is to inherit a language older than any single weaver, one expressed through the entanglement of strings rather than word.
This is the cloth of the Ibans—made, earned, dreamt, and passed down. It does not simply cover the body; it carries the weight of who a person is, where they come from, and what awaits them beyond.
In every fold of the pua kumbu lives the memory of the Ibans who have long understood that some things deserve nothing less than a cloth woven with devotion. — DayakDaily
