Orang Rimba people

Kubu people
Orang Batin Sembilan / Orang Rimba / Anak Dalam

A group of Kubu people in the 1930s in Jambi, Sumatra.
Total population
200,000[1]
Regions with significant populations
Indonesia:
Jambi	10,000
South Sumatra	35,000
Riau	N/A
Languages
Kubu language, Indonesian language
Religion
Animism, Islam, Christianity
Related ethnic groups
Malays, Lubu, Orang Asli

The Orang Batin Sembilan, Orang Rimba or Anak Dalam are mobile, animist peoples who live throughout the lowland forests of southeast Sumatra. Kubu is a Malay exonym ascribed to them. In the Malay language, the word Kubu can mean defensive fortification, entrenchment, or a place of refuge. It is metaphor for how the majority and dominant Islamic Melayu villagers believe them to use the interior forests as a means for resisting inclusion in the larger Malay social and Islamic religious world. As is the case with other forest peoples in the region, the term Kubu is associated with very negative connotations.

Following Malay classifications, early Europeans divided the Kubu into two categories: 'tame' or 'civilized' Kubu, who were predominantly swidden farmers, and 'wild' Kubu, who lived deep in the forests, and made much stronger efforts to avoid close relations with the outside world. While closely related to Malay speaking peoples, these peoples represent two separate cultural groups, which have different economic and socio-religious systems.