How they live in the Angu tribe where they do not bury their dead
An unusual wild tribe called the Angu has been living on the island of New Guinea, located north of Australia for a long time. These isolated people do not recognize civilization, as well as other neighboring tribes, considering all other strangers to be mortal enemies. For a long time, the Angu were famous for their extreme aggressiveness and cruelty: any person who got into their territory did not just die a painful death - he was butchered in cold blood, baked at the stake and eaten.
It is known that today the Angu do not practice cannibalism, but the tribe has preserved other, no less discouraging traditions and rituals.
Evil and unsociable
Angu, or in other words kukukuku, live high in the mountains in impenetrable forests in the southwest of the New Guinea province of Morobe. Members of the tribe are not tall, and 160 cm is already considered a tall indicator for them. However, short stature does not make them weaklings.
Despite the cool mountain climate, the Angu don't bother making and wearing warm clothes. Their entire wardrobe is a cape-cloak made of processed wood bast, a bag attached to the belt and a skirt made of grass.
They are not happy with strangers, even if they come unarmed and with good intentions. Sometimes the Angu still interact with other people, but not directly: having collected shells, small game, honey and other goods, the savages take the valuables to a certain place for exchange and leave. Merchants, for their part, take what is left behind and in return put what Angu needs: spices, salt, matches, paints and much more.
Rumor has it that once they wanted to peep at the members of the tribe from the bushes when they take the exchanged, as a result, after a couple of days, an overly inquisitive person was found dead in the bushes with a poisoned dart in his body.
The dead are not buried
Another amazing tradition of the tribe is to turn the dead into mummies. For this, a dead person is smoked in the smoke of fires for a month. Beforehand, all fluids that can provoke decomposition are removed from his body: his stomach is pierced with bamboo tubes, his knee and elbow joints are cut, hollow sticks are also inserted into the natural openings of the body. The process of mummification is carried out by special people.
The collected liquids are transferred to the relatives of the deceased, so that they apply them to their skin and hair and receive the strength and wisdom of their loved one.
After the drying process is completed, the corpse is covered with ocher. Thus, the mummy is protected from the harmful effects of moisture, as well as from insects and birds. The tribesman is fixed on a special chair made of branches and taken to the mountains, where they are placed next to other mummies facing the village. The Angu believe that those who have gone to the world of the dead will watch over the living from above and protect them.
Over time the mummies deteriorate and break, becoming brittle because of constant exposure to the open air. In these cases, the savages repair the deceased tribesmen with special glue made from a special heated tree sap.
