Afterlife

Bolim

In the totemic traditions of the Mamberamo region and the highlands of what was formerly known as Dutch New Guinea, Bolim is associated with malevolent forces and the realm of the dead. Together with Geru, he stands in opposition to Bimbajo and Sinemi, benevolent figures connected with the celestial world and the forces of good.

Bolim and Geru are portrayed as dangerous, fearsome and potentially destructive beings. Despite their negative character, they occupy a significant place within local religious and cosmological systems and are the object of totemic veneration.

An annual festival is traditionally held in their honour, coinciding with the harvest season. The ritual importance attributed to these figures suggests that destructive or threatening powers were not simply rejected, but acknowledged and incorporated into a broader symbolic order through ceremonial practice.

Geru

Geru is a mythological figure associated with the totemic traditions of the Mamberamo region and the highlands of former Dutch New Guinea. Alongside Bolim, he represents malevolent forces and is linked to the world of the dead.

The pair is contrasted with Bimbajo and Sinemi, benevolent beings associated with the heavens and the forces of goodness. Geru is described as threatening, treacherous and dangerous, yet he remains an important focus of ritual observance and totemic worship.

Ceremonies dedicated to Geru and Bolim are traditionally celebrated each year during the harvest period. Their ritual veneration reflects a cosmology in which destructive forces form an integral part of the spiritual and social balance of the community.

Mate

Mate is the goddess, or female personification, of death in the traditional beliefs of the Indigenous peoples of the Banks Islands. She embodies mortality and presides symbolically over the passage from the world of the living to the realm of the dead. 

As a personified representation of death, Mate reflects a cosmological understanding in which mortality is not merely a biological event, but a fundamental transition within the spiritual order of existence.

Ratu Mai Bulu

Ratu Mai Bulu is a serpent deity and ruler of the underworld in Fijian mythology. Like Ndenge, the primordial serpent associated with the creation of the Fiji Islands, he is traditionally believed to inhabit a cave near Namara, on the eastern coast.

He is honoured through communal rites and ritual offerings, particularly gifts of food intended to sustain or appease him. His association with caves, serpentine form and the subterranean realm identifies him as a chthonic deity closely connected with death, the underworld and the afterlife.

The veneration of Ratu Mai Bulu reflects a wider symbolic relationship between serpents, hidden spaces beneath the earth and the spiritual powers believed to govern the fate of the dead.

Topileta

Topileta is the guardian deity of Tuma, the land of the dead in the traditional beliefs of the Trobriand Islanders. After death, the souls known as baloma are believed to travel to this otherworldly realm.

To gain admission, the deceased must present Topileta with an appropriate payment or ritual offering. Those unable to provide the required toll are said to be transformed into a fish known as vaiba. This motif emphasizes Topileta’s role as a liminal guardian who controls the boundary between the human world and the domain of the dead.

Topileta is described as resembling an ordinary man, except for his extraordinarily large ears, which are believed to move continuously. He is also associated with earthquakes, a characteristic that may preserve traces of an earlier cosmological function connected with the movement, instability or underlying structure of the earth.

Although subject to ageing, Topileta is said to restore his youth periodically through the use of magical potions. This cyclical renewal distinguishes him from mortal beings and reinforces his supernatural status as guardian of the afterlife.