Methodology
This study combines Field Linguistics and Language Documentation methods. The team conducted field work, together with a local consultant, Mr Benediktus Delpada, to collect original and ‘first-hand’ data, documented plant species (English and Abui plant names and the scientific name). Besides looking at the medicinal properties and cultural relevance (from the perspective of the Abui people), the team also explored local myths and legends connected with the plants.
Thereafter, the team organised the data in a database which is reflected below.
| Please note that all Abui plant names, reported medical usages of plants and any associated legends or myths recorded below are the intellectual property of the Abui people. |
Collection
Long pepper retrofractum / Luul meeting
| English Plant Name: | Long pepper retrofractum |
| Abui Plant Name: | Luul meeting |
| Scientific Name: | Piper retrofractum |
| Etymological Reconstruction: | TBC |
When someone killed another person in the past, he/ she could not share meals with others or eat/ chew betel nuts together. This is because locals believed the dead person’s warm blood was among them. Hence, to recover or redeem the dead’s warm blood, people chewed the root or the nut of the long pepper retrofractum.Now, people also use the vines of the long pepper retrofractum as a material to make a local alcoholic drink, known as laru.
| Remarks:
Tentative |