Manarmakeri

Manarmakeri, 'the Old Man with the Itch,' whose scaly, scabrous skin conceals a radiant divine body, is the central culture-hero of the Biak-Numfor culture area and the messiah of the Koreri hope. In the myth told across Biak, Supiori and Numfor he tapped a sugar-palm whose wine was repeatedly stolen; keeping watch, he seized the Morning Star as it descended to drink. In exchange for release the star disclosed the secret of Koreri, the state of immortality and abundance won by the 'changing of skin,' and gave him a wonder-staff and a charmed fruit. Manarmakeri cast the fruit at the maiden Insoraki, who conceived though untouched and bore his son Manarbew. Shamed by the villagers and driven out with wife and child, the old man stepped into fire and shed his diseased skin, emerging young and shining. When his own people recoiled from his offer of renewal, mortality remained the human lot, and Manarmakeri sailed westward toward the land of the foreigners, Sup Amber, promising to return; his return will bring Koreri. He is addressed as Manseren Manggundi, 'the Lord Himself.'

Children

• Manarbew

Domains

• messianic return
• immortality
• abundance
• sacred lordship

Powers

• sheds his diseased skin to become young
• bestows the age of deathless abundance
• quickens a virgin with a charmed fruit
• seizes the Morning Star at dawn

Epithets

• Manseren Manggundi

Relations

• spouse: Insoraki
• ally: Sampari

Sources

• Kamma, F. C. (1972). Koreri: Messianic Movements in the Biak-Numfor Culture Area. The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff.
• Rutherford, D. (2003). Raiding the Land of the Foreigners. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
• van Hasselt, F. J. F. (1908). Nufoorsche fabelen en vertellingen. Bijdragen tot de Taal-, Land- en Volkenkunde 61: 477-589.
• Kamma, F. C. (1972). Koreri: Messianic Movements in the Biak-Numfor Culture Area. The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, pp. 15-45.