Mbaru niang

Wae Rebo, Flores, East Nusa Tenggara

A mbaru niang is the house of the Manggarai people in the highlands of Flores, and Wae Rebo is the village where the form still stands and has been rebuilt. The plan is round, the roof is a cone, and the thatch reaches the ground — so the whole exterior is roof: no wall, no face, no ridge. Inside are five stacked floors, each named and each for something, from the living floor to the loft where offerings are kept. The parts named on this screen — mbaru niang, niang gendang, lutur, lobo, lentar, lempa rae, hekang kode — are Manggarai words. The sun in this model is computed for Wae Rebo, 8.72° S and 120.29° E.

This model is one house the rules permit, not the house. Wae Rebo has seven mbaru niang and no two are identical; almost every figure here is the author’s estimate, and what is most certain is not the numbers but the arrangement — round, five levels, one drum house.