Ambelau people

Last updated

Ambelau people
Ambelay
Total population
8,260 [1]
Regions with significant populations
Flag of Indonesia.svg  Indonesia (Ambelau & Buru, Maluku Islands)
Languages
Ambelau language, Indonesian language
Religion
Islam (predominantly), Christianity
Related ethnic groups
Lisela people, Kayeli people

The Ambelau (Indonesian : Suku Ambelau) people are an ethnic group who form the majority of the population of the Indonesian island of Ambelau. They also live on nearby island Buru and other islands. By ethnography, Ambelau are close to most indigenous peoples of Buru island. They number about 8,260, and speak the Ambelau language. [2] [3]

Ambelau people form a majority on Ambelau and each of its settlements and they inhabit the coastal areas of the island. [4] The largest Ambelau community outside Ambelau island is the village of Wae Tawa (700 people) south-east of Buru. Its members maintain their ethnic identity and keep cultural, social and economic ties with Ambelau island. Ambelau minorities also live in other parts of Buru, on Ambon and other Maluku Islands and in Jakarta. [4] [3] During the Dutch colonization in the first half of the 17th century, most Ambelau people were forced to move to Buru to work on the Dutch spice plantations. [2]

The ethnic group speaks the Ambelau language, which belongs to the Central Maluku branch of the Malayo-Polynesian languages. [3] Most of Ambelau people also speak Indonesian or Ambonese Malay (Melayu Ambon), which is a creolized form of Malay. [2] The vast majority are Sunni Muslims with a small fraction of Christians, and remnants of traditional local beliefs. [4]

Most Ambelau people are engaged in farming. The mountainous terrain of Ambelau island hinders cultivation of rice, which is the major crop of the region, and therefore maize, sago, sweet potato, cocoa, coco, allspice and nutmeg are grown instead in the coastal areas. Some residents of Ambelau work at the sago plantation on Buru. [2] Hunting the wild pig Buru babirusa is common, but tuna fishing is mostly localized to the villages of Massawa and Ulima. Traditional Buru houses are made from bamboo, often on stilts. The roofs are covered with palm leaves or reeds, with tiles becoming progressively popular. [4] National Buru costume is similar that of most other Indonesia peoples. Men wear sarong (a kind of kilt) and a long-skirted tunic, and women are dressed in sarong and a shorter jacket. The specificity of Ambelau clothing is the preference of red color in holiday attire, which also includes hats of peculiar shape – a peaked cap with a plume for men and dressing with panache for women. [5]

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Buru

Buru is the third largest island within Maluku Islands of Indonesia. It lies between the Banda Sea to the south and Seram Sea to the north, west of Ambon and Seram islands. The island belongs to Maluku province and includes the Buru and South Buru regencies. Their administrative centers, Namlea and Namrole, respectively, have ports and the largest towns of the island. There is a military airport at Namlea which supports civilian cargo transportation.

Maluku (province) Province of Indonesia

Maluku is a province of Indonesia. It comprises the central and southern regions of the Maluku Islands. The main city and capital of Maluku province is Ambon on the small Ambon Island. The land area is 62,946 km2, and the total population of this province at the 2010 census was 1,533,506 people, rising to 1,848,923 at the 2020 Census. Maluku is located in Eastern Indonesia. It is directly adjacent to North Maluku and West Papua in the north, Central Sulawesi, and Southeast Sulawesi in the west, Banda Sea, East Timor and East Nusa Tenggara in the south and Arafura Sea and Papua in the east.

Republic of South Maluku

South Maluku, officially the Republic of South Maluku, is an unrecognized secessionist republic that claims the islands of Ambon, Buru, and Seram, which makes up the Indonesian province of Maluku.

Ambonese

The Ambonese, also known as South Moluccans, are an Indonesian ethnic group of mixed Austronesian and Melanesian origin. They are majority Christians followed by Muslims. The Ambonese are from Ambon Island in Maluku, an island group east of Sulawesi and north of Timor in Indonesia. They also live on the southwest of Seram Island; which is part of the Moluccas, Java, New Guinea; on the West Papua side and other regions of Indonesia. Additionally, there are about 35,000 Ambonese people living in the Netherlands. By the end of the 20th century, there were 258,331 Ambonese people living in Ambon, Maluku.

The Central Maluku languages are a proposed subgroup of the Central–Eastern Malayo-Polynesian branch of the Austronesian language family which comprises around fifty languages spoken principally on the Seram, Buru, Ambon, Kei, and the Sula Islands. None of the languages have as many as fifty thousand speakers, and several are extinct.

Moluccans are the Austronesian-speaking ethnic groups indigenous to the Maluku Islands, also called the Moluccas, which have been part of Indonesia since 1950. As such, "Moluccans" is used as a blanket term for various ethnic and linguistic groups inhabiting the islands.

Buru people

Buru people is an ethnic group mostly living on Indonesian island Buru, as well as on some other Maluku Islands. They also call themselves Gebfuka or Gebemliar, which literally means "people of the world" or "people of the land". Buru people are related to the eastern Indonesian anthropological group and from an ethnographic point of view are similar to other indigenous peoples of the island Buru. They speak the Buru language.

Lisela people

Lisela or Rana people is an ethnic group mostly living on Indonesian island Buru, as well as on some other Maluku Islands. They belong to the eastern Indonesian anthropological group and are sometimes referred to as northern Buru people. From an ethnographic point of view, Lisela are similar to other indigenous peoples of Buru island. They speak the Lisela language.

Kayeli people

Kayeli people is an ethnic group mainly living on the southern coast of the Kayeli Gulf of Indonesian island Buru, mainly from the Kaiely Gulf. From an ethnographic point of view, Kayeli are close to other indigenous people of Buru, such as Lisela and Buru.

Ambelau is an Austronesian language; in 1989, it was spoken by about 5,700 Ambelau people, of whom more than 5,000 lived on the Indonesian island Ambelau and most others in the village Wae Tawa of the nearby island Buru.

Buru or Buruese is a Malayo-Polynesian language of the Central Maluku branch. In 1991 it was spoken by approximately 45,000 Buru people who live on the Indonesian island of Buru. It is also preserved in the Buru communities on Ambon and some other Maluku Islands, as well as in the Indonesian capital Jakarta and in the Netherlands.

Kayeli is an extinct Austronesian language once used by the Kayeli people of the Indonesian island Buru. Two dialects were recognized, namely Leliali (Liliali) and Lumaete.

Lisela, also called Li Enyorot, is an Austronesian language; in 1989 it was spoken by about 11,900 Lisela people mostly living in the northern part of Indonesian island Buru. It is also preserved among the small Lisela community on the Ambon Island.

Ambelau Island and district in Buru Selatan Regency, Maluku Province, Indonesia

Ambelau or Ambalau is a volcanic island in the Banda Sea within Maluku Islands of Indonesia. The island forms an administrative district which is part of the South Buru Regency of Maluku province, Indonesia. It has a land area of 201.7 km2, and had a population of 6,846 at the 2010 Census. The administrative center is Wailua, a settlement located at the south of the island. About half of the island's population is composed of indigenous Ambelau people who speak the Ambelau language; the other half are mostly immigrants from the nearby Maluku Islands and Java.

Tobelo people

Tobelo people is one of the northern Halmahera peoples living in eastern Indonesia, in the northern part of the Maluku Islands and in the eastern side of North Halmahera Regency.

References

  1. "Ambelau people in Indonesia". Joshua Project . Retrieved 17 September 2014.
  2. 1 2 3 4 М. А. Членов. Амбелаунцы (in Russian). Encyclopedia of peoples and religions of the world. Archived from the original on 19 August 2011. Retrieved 3 November 2010.
  3. 1 2 3 Ethnologue: Languages of the World. "Ambelau: A language of Indonesia (Maluku)".
  4. 1 2 3 4 "Local knowledge and fisheries management" (PDF). Center for Coastal and Marine Resources Studies, Bogor Agricultural University. Archived from the original (PDF) on 23 July 2011. Retrieved 3 November 2010.
  5. "Ambelau". Ohio University. Archived from the original on 25 April 2012. Retrieved 3 November 2010.