While browsing the internet and looking for folk art of Indonesian Nagas, I came across an art dealer's site which displayed this little woodcarving of a "Dwarf" (Pygmy)from the Banyuwangi region of Java: and the Banyuwangis claim to have been the ancestors of Balinese art.
Here is the link to the page but the dealer is clearly only guessing as to the actual nature and meaning of the piece: http://www.mcdurieux.com/indostan/indo/f033.html
Actually, after looking over this carving I was struck by several similarities to the famous description of the Sedapa (Orang Pendek)by Van Heerwarden in 1918, especially in the detailed description of the facial features. I have always felt from Van Heerwarden's description that there were populations of human pygmys involved in the sightings on Sumatra as well as more than one type of unknown apes. There are supposedly populations of Pygmies in the Andaman Islands, Malaysia, elsewhere in Indonesia and in the Phillipines, and from this wood carving's appearance, the Pygmies of Sumatra are of a very similar appearance.
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