Permanent Piercing

Traditional Ampallang Piercings

As practiced by the Dayaks of South-East Asia

This method is not recommended!

At first the glands is made bloodless by pressing it between the two arms of a bent strip of bamboo. At each of these arms there are openings at the required position opposite each other, through which a sharp pointed copper pin is pressed after the glands has become less sensitive. Formerly a pointed bamboo chip was used for this purpose. The bamboo clamp is removed, and the pin, fastened by a cord, is kept in the opening until the canal has healed up. Later on the copper pin (oetang) is replaced by another one, generally of tin, which is worn constantly. Only during hard work or at exhausting enterprises is the metal pin replaced by a wooden one. Exceptionally brave men have the privilege, together with the chief, of boring a second canal, crossing the first, into the glands. Distinguished men may, in addition, wear a ring around the penis, which is cut from the scales of the pangolin, and studded with blunt points.

-- H Fehlinger, Sexual Life of Primitive People, quoted in Love (1992:230).