Hostname: page-component-6898cfcb55-kwdml Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2026-11-11T20:36:13.525Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Pangeran Dakar’s error: A narration of the events leading to the fall of the Sultanate of Bantén

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  03 September 2014

Robert Wessing

Abstract

An abstract is not available for this content. As you have access to this content, full HTML content is provided on this page. A PDF of this content is also available in through the ‘Save PDF’ action button.

Information

Type
Notes
Information
Journal of Southeast Asian Studies , Volume 45 , Issue 3 , October 2014, pp. 427 - 443
Copyright
Copyright © The National University of Singapore 2014 

In a rather late edition of the Sajarah Bantĕn Kecil (Shorter history of Bantĕn),Footnote 1 a curious tale is interwoven with the historical account of a conflict between the Sultan of Bantĕn, Sultan Abdulfatah Agĕng Tirtayasa,Footnote 2 and his crown prince, Pangeran Bantĕn (the Prince of Bantĕn),Footnote 3 about the distribution of power in the Sultanate, and the proper position to take vis-à-vis the Dutch East India Company (VOC). This tale,Footnote 4 which on the face of it has little to do with events as they are recounted in standard histories,Footnote 5 tells of a sexual encounter between the prince and a spirit, the younger sister of Raja Pandita, the jinn (genie, spirit) who ruled Pulo Putri (Maiden Island).Footnote 6 This encounter causes the prince to delay his return to Bantĕn from Mecca, and has disastrous consequences. This brief essay takes a closer look at this curious tale, and offers an explanation for its inclusion in the historical account.

The Sajarah Bantĕn (History of Bantĕn), of which there are several editions, is especially known from the 1913 study made of it by Hoesein Djajadiningrat.Footnote 7 One major differentiation is between a long version, the Sajarah Bantĕn Besar and a shorter one called Sajarah Bantĕn Kecil.Footnote 8 The latter indeed used the former as its source,Footnote 9 but focuses primarily on a conflict between Sultan Abdulfatah Agĕng and his crown prince, the later Sultan Haji, which was a contributing factor in the Bantĕn Sultanate's defeat by the VOC.Footnote 10 Discussions of the content and philology of the various versions of the Sajarah Bantĕn can be found in the above mentioned studies by Djajadiningrat and Pudjiastuti, and do not need to be repeated here.Footnote 11 The name of the pujangga (court poet, literary magician)Footnote 12 who composed the original work is not mentioned, but the Sajarah Bantĕn Besar seems to have been written between 1660 and 1663, while the Sajarah Bantĕn Kecil was written about fifty years later (1710–1713) or at least prior to 1725.Footnote 13 Pudjiastuti writes that many copies of the Sajarah Bantĕn Kecil are undated, and notes that the dates on those that are range from 1827 to 1906.Footnote 14 Since it contains an account of the defeat of Sultan Agĕng Tirtayasa, it must have been written after 1682.Footnote 15 The copy Pudjiastuti used in her 2007 book must be relatively recent, because in the last part (see below), which feels rather tacked on, after recounting the myth we will examine here, it mentions the names of Sultan Muhamad Muhidin and Sultan Ishaq (r.1801–1802). Between them came Sultan Gemuk, who is not mentioned as such in the genealogies. Sultan Muhamad Muhidin is probably Sultan Muhyiddin Zainussholohin (r.1799–1801).Footnote 16 This would date Pudjiastuti's manuscript to at least the early nineteenth century, some 77 years after the events it purports to discuss.

Encounters between princes and spirit kings and their daughters, usually a naga Footnote 17 king and a nagini, are not uncommon in the historical writings of Indonesia and Southeast Asia generally. They are usually associated with the founding of new states by a prince coming from elsewhere: in the Babad Tanah Jawi Prince Susuruh meets the hermit Cemara Tunggal, who predicts his founding of Majapahit. Elsewhere, prior to founding Mataram, Panembahan Senapati visits Nyai Rara Kidul, the Queen of the Southern Ocean,Footnote 18 while in Cambodia Prince Kaundinya meets a nagini princess, whose father aids him in establishing the realm of Cambodia.Footnote 19 Usually, however, such encounters serve to establish the legitimacy of the state and the ruling house, while in the case discussed here it implicitly leads to the fall of the Sultanate of Bantĕn. What then could have been the reason for the inclusion of this story in this version of the Sajarah Bantĕn?

Narratives

An historical account, Edward H. Carr reminds us, reflects the choices made by the historian concerning the facts that are to be brought to bear on the question being addressed, and the interpretation given them.Footnote 20 This last in turn reflects both the time in which the historian works, and the view the scholar has of the society he or she is part of, which means that as people's appreciation of events changes over time, their account of these events may change as well. ‘History’, Carr writes, ‘is a continuous process of interaction between the historian and his facts, an unending dialogue between the present and the past’.Footnote 21

Some may object that Carr's observations concerned Western academic history, and it has been observed that the pujangga who wrote babad or hikayat (histories, narrations) like the Sajarah Bantĕn, were not historians in this sense.Footnote 22 Merle Ricklefs indeed feels that myths, like the one discussed here, should be compared to other such tales, rather than being related to actual history.Footnote 23 Yet both the historian and the pujangga are tellers of tales that are constructed out of facts selected by the narrator to convey the message he or she has in mind. Seen this way, historical accounts do not differ in essence from other descriptions, being narrative constructions that create realities that correspond to an individual's or group's interests or beliefs. As Walter A. FischerFootnote 24 and John D. NilesFootnote 25 suggest, the reality of communities and their histories is embedded in the stories that the inhabitants tell about themselves and their neighbours: the participants and their histories figure in each other's biographies.Footnote 26 Participation in local narratives and the symbolic objects that validate them marks one as an insider and a member of the community.Footnote 27 This is not to say, of course, that even locally the various narratives must always concur. Individuals and groups may have their own version of events, favouring a particular outlook or interest. Yet, as Jerome Bruner and Walter Fischer observe, these stories constitute people's perceptions of reality and of themselves.Footnote 28 Narratives, then, are performative in the sense of John L. Austin, in that they bring into being the realities depicted in them.Footnote 29 Historical accounts do this as well. They are stories,Footnote 30 narrations from a particular point of view, that create a historical reality, and it is in this light that we must see the tale inserted into the Sajarah Bantĕn Kecil.

History

The full details of the conflict between the Sultan of Bantĕn and the VOC can be found in most histories of Indonesia or Southeast Asia.Footnote 31 The conflict had to do with control over especially the trade in pepper, which both the ruler of Bantĕn, Sultan Agĕng (r. 1651–82) and the VOC attempted to monopolise. This was important to the Sultan because this trade was his most dependable source of income.Footnote 32 Since this international trade flowed through Bantĕn's port, and because neighbouring ports competed for foreign trade and for the produce of their common hinterland,Footnote 33 the establishment of a port at Batavia was a direct threat to Bantĕn's position, given the VOC's aggressive attempts to gain control of the trade.Footnote 34 Sultan Agĕng, whom Jan K.J. de Jonge calls a wakker (alert, smart) ruler,Footnote 35 had quickly realised the danger to Bantĕn's position posed by Batavia,Footnote 36 agreeing with Van Diemen's observation that ‘from Batavia's rise, Bantĕn's ruination follows’ and vice versa.Footnote 37 Prior to Sultan Agĕng, Bantĕn's pepper trade had indeed declined significantly due to VOC interference.Footnote 38 At first Sultan Agĕng tried to reestablish Bantĕn's position through war and violence, and when this failed he negotiated a peace with the VOC; finally he resorted to both aggressive trading and more subtle approaches, such as presenting himself as a defender of Islam.Footnote 39 Sultan Agĕng was not opposed to Western traders as such,Footnote 40 and seems to have especially appreciated his relationship with the English East India Company.Footnote 41 He was determined, however, not to let the VOC dominate the pepper trade.Footnote 42

With these troubles with the VOC as a backdrop, there also developed a conflict between Sultan Agĕng and his son, crown prince Abdul Kadir, which had its roots in court intriguesFootnote 43 and the crown prince's dissatisfaction about the way power was divided between himself and his father, with whom he had shared the rule of Bantĕn since the 1670s.Footnote 44 The crown prince desired not only administrative power, but also a share in the profits from his father's trade.Footnote 45 The crown prince proposed making a deal with the Dutch, which Sultan Agĕng opposed. Both had their supporters, though the number of those loyal to prince Abdul Kadir diminished as tensions arose between him and other members of the royal family, and between him and his father's bureaucracy.Footnote 46 The VOC was able to take advantage of this situation and supported the crown prince, promising military aid should this become necessary.Footnote 47 The VOC's offer was important to the crown prince since he had very limited support among Bantĕn's elite; even his brothers were against him,Footnote 48 as were the pious Muslims of Bantĕn who reproached him for being favourably disposed toward the VOC.Footnote 49

The details of the armed conflicts need not detain us here; suffice to say that, in the face of superior arms, Sultan Agĕng finally surrendered, after which the VOC appointed the crown prince Sultan Haji of Bantĕn in 1682 or 1683.Footnote 50 In return for their support the prince had made a bad deal with the Dutch,Footnote 51 and lost effective control over both the state he had long desired to rule and the pepper trade.Footnote 52 The opposition to the alliance between Sultan Haji and the VOC tried to remain active, but in the end they too were defeated, and Dutch influence increased to the detriment of the Bantĕn Sultanate.Footnote 53 Sultan Agĕng died in Dutch custody in 1695, and was buried at the mosque in Bantĕn. His son, Sultan Haji, is buried near him.Footnote 54

The myth

The story as told in the Sajarah Bantĕn Kecil Footnote 55 starts with the tale of Molana Hasanuddin's founding of the kingdom of Bantĕn and converting it to Islam, and continues with the war between father and son, Sultan Agĕng Tirtayasa and Sultan Haji.Footnote 56

Pupuh Footnote 57 1. The genealogy of Molana Hasanuddin going back to the Prophet Muhammad (may Allah bless him and give him peace). Molana Hasanuddin was ordered by his father, Sunan Gunungjati, to convert Bantĕn Girang to Islam. He defeated Pucuk Umun, the ruler of Bantĕn Girang.

Pupuh 2. Molana Hasanuddin was invited by his father to accompany him to Mecca. Upon returning from Mecca, he founded the kingdom of Bantĕn, and was installed as king of Bantĕn by his father. The genealogy of the Sultans of Bantĕn: Molana Hasanuddin had a son named Molana Yusup. Molana Yusup had a son named Abulma'ali Muhammad Syeh Zainulhalimin.Footnote 58 Abulma'ali Muhammad Syeh Zainulhalimin had a son named Sultan Abunashar Abdulquodir. Sultan Abunashar Abdulquodir had a son named Sultan Abdulma'ali Ahmad.

It is told that Sultan AgĕngFootnote 59 had a son who wanted to undertake the hajj to Mecca. His name was Pangeran Dakar.Footnote 60 At first Sultan Agĕng did not give his permission,Footnote 61 but because his son kept pressuring him he finally did so, with the proviso that on his journey he [Pangeran Dakar] was not to stop at Pulo Putri. Pangeran Dakar agreed to his father's condition.

Pupuh 3. Upon returning from carrying out the religious duty of the hajj, Pangeran Dakar's (Sultan Haji's)Footnote 62 ship ran aground on Pulo Putri. There he saw the younger sister of Raja Pandita, the jinn who ruled Pulo Putri. Sultan Haji fell in love, and forgot his promise to his father. He wanted to marry that beautiful woman on Pulo Putri. Raja Pandita gave permission for Sultan Haji to marry his younger sister on the condition that Sultan Haji's pilgrim's robe (jubah haji) be surrendered to him.Footnote 63 Sultan Haji, who was smitten with love, agreed to Raja Pandita's request. Upon receiving the robe, Raja Pandita quickly put it on, and at once sailed for Bantĕn.Footnote 64 Sultan Haji, amidst his happiness only realised his error when he heard from his wife that Raja Pandita was on his way to Bantĕn to usurp the throne there.

At that time, Raja Pandita, who was masquerading as Sultan Haji, had arrived in Batavia. He met with general Idler Semit [sic]Footnote 65 to ask for help, in case Sultan Agĕng should not wish to receive him later on. Idler Semit was willing to help as long as he got paid. Sultan Haji promised he would pay him by giving him half of the kingdom of Bantĕn. Thus, when Sultan Haji arrived at the harbour of Bantĕn, Sultan Agĕng, who knew that the one who arrived was not his son, did not want to receive him.Footnote 66 After waiting for a few days while the gate to Bantĕn remained closed, Sultan Haji returned to Batavia to demand help from the Dutch.Footnote 67

Pupuh 4. The Dutch readied their troops to help Sultan Haji attack Bantĕn. Sultan Agĕng, who was aware of this, then asked for help from the English. The English, however, were not ready to help because they did not want to become involved in a war between father and son. Sultan Agĕng then left, leaving Surosowan and moving to Tirtayasa. Since then he has been known as Sultan Agĕng Tirtayasa.

The Dutch forces and Sultan Haji who arrived in Bantĕn found Surosowan empty. They then followed [Sultan Agĕng] to Tirtayasa. At Lebahduyung a quarrel occurred between Sultan Haji and Tubagus Buang, Sultan Haji's military commander.

At that time, Tubagus Buang became aware that the Sultan Haji whom he defended was not Sultan Agĕng's real son. As a result of that quarrel, Tubagus Buang left Sultan Haji, and Ki Boleh and Ki Tabli followed him. The three of them went to Sukaraja, and built up the defenses of that place.

Not long afterward Ki Tapa came to join them. Tubagus Buang and his friends then joined forces to attack Sultan Haji and the Dutch, because they knew that Sultan Agĕng's real son was still on Pulo Manjeti (Pulo Putri).

While this was going on, Sultan Agĕng, who was very sad because his subjects did not follow his orders, left Tirtayasa to go and meditate in the forest of Rancasila. Tubagus Buang readied his troops to attack Sultan Haji and the Dutch at Batavia. A noisy battle ensued. Many soldiers were killed. When the Dutch support troops arrived, Tubagus Buang's forces retreated and halted at Tegal Papak.

Pupuh 5. Sultan Haji and the Dutch attacked Tegal Papak. Fighting flared up again. Sultan Haji's forces were defeated. Sultan Haji quietly ran away, leaving his troops. Tubagus Buang practised a [strategy of] shifting battles, fighting first at Patahiran, then at Kadikaran, and then at Margasana.

There Tubagus Buang's forces were victorious. The troops belonging to Sultan Haji and the Dutch were defeated, but Tubagus Buang was also killed. Ki Tabli and his friends continued Tubagus Buang's struggle. The surviving Dutch forces ran away to Sulakarta, chased by Ki Tabli and Ki Boled's troops. At Sulakarta the Dutch trapped the troops of Tubagus Buang, Ki Tabli and Ki Boled. All died. The war was over. The Dutch had won.

Bantĕn was quiet. At that time the ruler of Bantĕn was Ratu Sarip.Footnote 68 She replaced her husband, Sultan Ambon. When Sultan Ambon died, Sultan Abdulpatah Muhamad Muhidin Abdulqodir followed him. However, he had a very bad disposition, and thus people did not like him. One day Sultan Abdulpatah Muhamad Muhidin Abdulqodir was stabbed to death by Tubagus Ali. He was replaced by Sultan Ishaq.

Pupuh 6. It is told that Sultan Agĕng's son who was on Pulo Putri regretted his actions. He then asked the Almighty that he might return to Bantĕn. God granted his prayer. He was required to first return to Mecca and there meet with Syeh Ahmad. Syeh Ahmad told him that he was allowed to return to Bantĕn, but would have to change his appearance and name. Pangeran Dakar agreed. Syeh Ahmad then ordered Pangeran Dakar to dive into the zam-zam spring.Footnote 69 When he resurfaced, he [found that he] already was in Cibolakan, Cimanuk, and that his appearance had changed into that of an old man named Haji Mansur.Footnote 70

At that time the Sultan of Bantĕn was Muhamad Muhidin, but because he had a bad disposition he was stabbed to death by Tubagus Ali. Sultan Muhamad Muhidin's replacement was Sultan Gemuk,Footnote 71 but he too did not occupy the throne for long because he died. Sultan Gemuk's replacement was Sultan Ishaq.

It is told that during Sultan Ishaq's reign there were two Bantĕn nobles called Mas Tanda and Mas Zakaria. The two of them were accused of having started troubles with the Chinese. Mas Tanda was punished, but because he did not consider himself to be at fault, he did not acquiesce [in this]. He cursed Sultan Ishaq, [saying that] in three years time the Sultan would get his comeuppance for his arbitrary behaviour. Exactly three years after that event a large ship moored at Anyer. A Dutchman came ashore and appeared before Sultan Ishaq.

Pupuh 7. Sultan Ishaq received a letter from Batavia. Its contents requested that the Patih Bantĕn be sent to Batavia because the General wanted to meet him. Sultan Ishaq sent Ki Patih and Arya Soba to Batavia. Upon arriving in Batavia, the General asked the Patih for permission to raise a building at Pulo Merak and at Jungkulon. If the Patih were unwilling, Arya Soba would have to be left in Batavia, because he himself was the one who would be held responsible for the construction of that building. Thus pressured, Ki Patih in the end agreed to the raising of a building on Pulo Merak. Upon returning to Bantĕn they reported these matters to the Sultan.

Not long after the Patih returned to Bantĕn, a commander [kumendur] asked whether the building on Pulo Merak had been finished yet. Sultan Ishaq became angry, and ordered Ki Patih to kill that commander. After that event the Sultan of Bantĕn ordered his subjects to be prepared for war against the Dutch. The Dutch people who were in Bantĕn were killed. As a result the situation became chaotic. The Chinese were afraid and ran away.

When the Dutch troops arrived from Batavia, they were unable to enter because the gate was locked. The general then approached the Sultan's younger sibling,Footnote 72 named Pangeran Ratu. He/she was asked to persuade Sultan Ishaq to open the gate because the Dutch really had not come to Bantĕn to wage war. Rather, they wanted to establish ties of friendship.Footnote 73 When his younger sibling had convinced Sultan Ishaq of the good intentions of the Dutch in coming to Bantĕn, the gate was opened. However, when the gate was opened the Dutch troops stormed in. Sultan Ishaq was captured and was at once taken to Batavia. Pangeran Ratu was stunned to see the trickery of the Dutch.

Analysis

If history is written by the victors, the losers are often also in need of an explanation that both affirms their belief in themselves and their culture, and explains the sequence of events that led to the disaster. I propose that the narrative contained in the above account is an attempt to satisfy those needs.Footnote 74

It might be argued that this would hardly have been necessary. After all, Sultan Haji had won the day and was now fully backed by the Dutch, as long as he kept to the conditions laid down by the Company. Bantĕn even managed to extend its sphere of influence.Footnote 75 Yet, the VOC's conditions were such that Sultan Agĕng's foreign policy in particular was abandoned, and Bantĕn essentially became a vassal of the VOC.Footnote 76 This undoubtedly was a blow to the self-esteem of Bantĕn's elite, which had sided with Sultan Agĕng.

It was, after all, the Sultanate of Bantĕn that fell to the treacherous, unbelieving Dutch; this was a realm that had defeated the kingdom of Pajajaran,Footnote 77 and whose ruling house traced its origins to the Prophet Muhammad and to Sunan Gunungjati, the famous proselytiser who first brought the message of Islam to West Java.Footnote 78 Since the founder of Bantĕn, Hassanuddin, had also married a princess of Demak, spiritual successor to the realm of Majapahit,Footnote 79 this ruling line had impeccable cosmological credentials,Footnote 80 and in (cosmological) theory should have withstood the Dutch.

The question was thus: ‘Why did things go wrong?’, the answer to which was found in the crown prince's inappropriate behaviour. His open opposition to and later capture of his father were unacceptable, as was his willingness to enter into an alliance with the VOC. Both earned him the enmity of Bantĕn's court and elite, perhaps especially that of the Muslim clergy.Footnote 81 But, what was the reason for the prince's deviant behaviour? This had to be accounted for, and this is what the myth does.

This myth does not in any case stand alone in pointing to a relationship with a mythical woman to account for the Dutch victories in West Java. Elsewhere, though of a later date, a ‘sick princess’ of Pajajaran is either captured by or married to the Dutch, which gave the Dutch control of the princess's ‘western Javanese heritage’.Footnote 82 Such (re)interpretations are made possible by the fact that, even today, in Java as elsewhere in Indonesia, conditions in the material world are perceived to be influenced or even controlled by cosmic forces,Footnote 83 making it possible for aberrant events to be reinterpreted as ‘falling within the cosmic order’ because they were fated or due to God's will.Footnote 84

To understand this, we must look more closely at some of the details of the story. First of all, there is the protagonist's name, Pangeran Dakar. At first glance one might assume this to be a childhood name, as the crown prince was said to still be quite young.Footnote 85 The name Dakar, however, has a hidden meaning because it is also a Javanese and Sundanese word for penis.Footnote 86 The fact that he is given this name probably indicates that we are to understand that he was driven by his hormones rather than his reason when he became attracted to the jinn maiden.

Given his youth, this is not unreasonable, and probably also accounts for Sultan Agĕng's reluctance to let him undertake the hajj, and the Sultan's condition that the prince was not to land on Pulo Putri, Maiden Island. Women in South and Southeast Asia are, indeed, often seen as distractions from a person's higher goals.Footnote 87 They are depicted as temptresses, distracting even the gods from their meditations,Footnote 88 something that a young prince might well not be able to withstand. Ideally men with a religious calling avoided contact with women.Footnote 89

The next figure of interest is the jinn ruler of the island, Raja Pandita. In Javanese and Sundanese, pandhita means a sage or wise man, one who possesses special knowledge and magical powers, a holy hermit,Footnote 90 which suggests that the devious jinn king belonged with the religious forces that had been displaced by Islam, which would explain why he was so eager to wage war on the Sultanate of Bantĕn.

The present case, therefore, is the inverse of the usual founding role played by the Naga King and his nagini daughter. Pangeran Dakar starts out as a pious and God-fearing son, undertaking the hajj to Mecca; rather than going off to conquer, he sets out to submit to God. While forbidden to land on Pulo Putri, fate brings him there anyway, and this is where things go awry, especially when he sees the beautiful jinn maiden. He falls in love with her,Footnote 91 removes his civic and religious symbols, and marries her.Footnote 92

His divesting himself of his jubbah, symbolic of his status as a Muslim and a haji, is very significant. An informant in East Java once told me that for many JavaneseFootnote 93 Islam is anggonipun, their covering, but also a way of acting and being.Footnote 94 Although the Javanese are Muslim, another informant said, in their hearts they remain Javanese. They see Javanese practices as Islamic; Islam has been Javanised (Islam masuk Jawa). This does not mean, however, that Islam is thereby an irrelevant covering to be put on or taken off at will. Rather, it is like lahir and batin (body and spirit): they are inseparable and are unable to function without each other.Footnote 95 Islam, I was told elsewhere, is part of one's identity, a significant aspect of the self.

Therefore, in shedding his jubbah and marrying the jinn maiden, Pangeran Dakar/Sultan Haji shed his Muslim identity, his anggonipun. In doing so, he exposed what I have elsewhere called the ruler's shamanistic background,Footnote 96 the ability to interact with the spirits that own the land and influence the welfare of the realm.Footnote 97 While this was in direct contravention of his status as haji, he had to do so to marry (interact with) the jinn maiden.

Here the use in the story of Pangeran Dakar's new title, Sultan Haji, becomes both important and interesting. As KawuryanFootnote 98 points out, haji can mean both pilgrim and king, while a related word, aji has the meaning of king, pilgrim and esoteric knowledge (ilmu) or secret doctrine.Footnote 99 The word haji, then, participates both in the world of Islam and in the pre-Islamic world of spirits, condemned by Islam. The haji Pangeran Dakar/Sultan Haji also does so, while at the same time he, in the guise of the jinn ruler, is involved in the affairs of the Sultanate of Bantĕn in its conflict with the Dutch. The result is chaos. Rather than help found a new state — which in Islamic theory is not possible through the mediation of spirits in any caseFootnote 100 — the spirit ruler of Pulo Putri has the destruction of (Islamic) Bantĕn in mind, which, masquerading as his brother-in-law, Pangeran Dakar, now Sultan Haji, he sets out to accomplish.

Conclusion

As we have seen, this narration removes a quarrel between Sultan Agĕng and Sultan Haji, father and son, from the sphere of palace politics to one of opposition in the cosmological sphere, thereby accounting for several things. First, Sultan Haji's behaviour vis-à-vis his father was culturally quite incorrect, sons being expected to defer to their fathers’ wishes. While disagreements do occur, the way that Sultan Haji dealt with the situation was extraordinary, and thus had to be accounted for. Second, the Sultanate of Bantĕn, with its impeccable genealogy (silsilah) fell before the forces of the unbelieving Dutch, which was an indication that something was cosmologically wrong in the state. Once again, Sultan Haji was a convenient scapegoat. Third, there was Raja Pandita, the jinn king of Pulo Putri, whose meddling in the affairs of Bantĕn was said to have caused the disaster.

Referring back to the story, we note that the problems began when Pangeran Dakar landed on Pulo Putri. In Southeast Asian mythology, islands, arising from the surrounding waters, are often seen as the points of origin of states. In the several versions of the Cambodian myth referred to earlier, the protagonist, Kaundinya, lands on an island where he meets the nagini princess whose father subsequently drains the surrounding waters, creating the land he is to rule. ElsewhereFootnote 101 a princess, who is pregnant out of wedlock, is placed on a raft where she gives birth to a son, Raden Segoro. Her raft then lands on a small hill that later expands to become the Island of Madura. There Raden Segoro meets a maiden who came from the Southern Ocean, and marries her. Together they become the ancestors of the Madurese.

Such islands, therefore, the home of spirit-maidens, are cosmic centres, living forces that bring about and sustain the stateFootnote 102 founded by the prince who was fated to land there. But, these centres of power are part of a cosmology that belongs to a religion in which naga and earth spirits play a central role, and which Islam replaces. From the point of view of the Sultanate, therefore, the forces perceived to be present on Pulo Putri were a formidable challenge, and it is understandable that Sultan Agĕng forbade his son to land there.

At a time of cosmological change, when Islam was progressively trying to replace India-derived beliefs and the spirit veneration that had preceded it, while Bantĕn at the same time faced the economic and military threat posed by the VOC, Pangeran Dakar's behaviour was both culturally and cosmically improper. This made him an unfit ruler, whose installation led to a cosmic misalignment and inevitably to the downfall of the Sultanate.Footnote 103 The state, after all, can have only one source of authority, and in a Sultanate this is God, who rules through His Shadow on Earth, the Sultan. To have a jinn, even a Raja Jin, take the ruler's place, or try to do so, is clearly inappropriate. The ruler, at the centre of the state, what GeertzFootnote 104 has called the exemplary centre, had ideally to be pure, and be able to maintain order and promote the welfare of his subjects. In the tale Sultan Haji clearly does not do so, though there he is partially exoneratedFootnote 105 by remaining on Pulo Putri, in the arms of his jinn maiden, while Raja Pandita did the actual damage. Written between fifty and seventy years after the events, this cautionary tale gathers the relevant historical and social facts and creates a reality, a framework in which the events can be placed and understood.

Footnotes

1 Lit. ‘Small history of Bantĕn’. See Pudjiastuti, Titik, Perang, dagang, persahabatan: Surat-surat Sultan Banten (Jakarta: Yayasan Obor Indonesia and Toyota Foundation, 2007), pp. 261–5.

2 Also just known as Sultan Agĕng and later as Sultan Agĕng Tirtayasa.

3 He is also known by the titles Sultan Haji, Sultan Muda — see Ricklefs, Merle C., A history of modern Indonesia since c. 1200 (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2008), p. 96; Guillot, Claude, Banten: Sejarah dan peradaban abad X–XVII, trans. Setiawan, Hendra et al. , ed. Perret, Daniel (Jakarta: Kepustakaan Populer Gramedia/École française d'Extrême-Orient [EFEO], Forum Jakarta–Paris, and Pusat Penelitian dan Pengembangan Arkeologi Nasional, 2008, p. 65) — or Sultan Abunashar Abdul Qahar (Pudjiastuti, Perang, p. 219). His given name was Abdul Kadir (Reid, Anthony, Southeast Asia in the age of commerce 1450–1680. Vol. 2. Expansion and crisis (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1993), p. 294.

4 The inserted tale is quite similar to the nineteenth-century Sejarah Haji Mangsur (see Drewes, Gerardus W., ‘Short notice on the story of Haji Mangsur of Banten’, Archipel 50 [1995]: 119–22), which Djajadiningrat, Hoesein, in Tinjauan kritis tentang Sajarah Banten: Sumbangan bagi pengenalan sifat-sifat penulisan sejarah Jawa (Jakarta: Jambatan, 1983, p. 15), dismissed as both recent and of little historical value, which may be why it has been somewhat neglected. It has recently attracted attention, however, and will be the subject of a thesis entitled ‘Wawacan Sejarah Haji Mangsur: Kajian filologis’ by Eva Syarifah Warah at Universitas Pajajaran, Bandung.

5 See, e.g. Reid, Southeast Asia, vol. 2, pp. 28–81; Ricklefs, A history, pp. 95–8.

6 Pulo Putri is one of the Kepulauan Seribu (Thousand Islands) in the Java Sea just north of Jakarta. It is also known variously as Pulo Mejeti (Drewes, ‘Short notice’, p. 119), Pulo Manjeti (Pudjiastuti, Perang, p. 263), or Pulo Majeti (http://humaspdg.wordpress.com/2010/04/20/mitos-mitos-yang-beredar-di-masyarakat-di-banten-kidul/ [last accessed 29 Oct. 2013]).

7 Djajadiningrat, Hoesein, Critische Beschouwing van de Sajarah Bantĕn: Bijdrage ter kenschetsing van de javaansche geschiedschrijving (Haarlem: Joh. Enschedé en Zonen, 1913). Djajadiningrat's Tinjauan is an Indonesian translation of this work.

8 Djajadiningrat (Tinjauan, p. 218) calls the latter the Sajarah Bantĕn Rante-Rante, which he characterises as a collection of traditions. The two are also called the Sajarah Bantĕn Mayor and the Sajarah Bantĕn Minor (Pudjiastuti, Perang, pp. 218–70). See also Pudjiastuti, ‘Letter reading ceremony in Sajarah Banten text’, http://www.docstoc.com/docs/22206200/Letter-reading-Ceremony-in-Sajarah-Banten-text (last accessed 2 Oct. 2013).

9 Jannes H. Talens, ‘Een feodale samenleving in koloniaal vaarwater: Staatsvorming, koloniale expansie en economische ontwikkeling in Banten, West Java 1600–1750’ (Ph.D. diss., Universiteit van Utrecht, 1997).

10 Pudjiastuti, Perang, p. 219.

11 See also Ekadjati, E. Suhardi, Wawacan sejarah Galuh: Naskah dan dokumen Nusantara II (Jakarta: Lembaga Penelitian Perancis untuk Timur Jauh; Bandung: EFEO, 2004) and Suryadi, ‘Review of Titik Pudjiastuti, “Perang, dagang, persahabatan: Surat-surat Sultan Banten”’, Bijdragen tot de Taal-, Land- en Volkenkunde 164, 4 (2008): 569–72.

12 Gonda, Jan, ‘Bhujanga’, Bijdragen tot de Taal-, Land- en Volkenkunde van Nederlandsch-Indië 89, 1 (1932): 253–60; Berg, Cornelis C., ‘Geschiedenis en geschiedschrijving van Mataram’, Indonesië 8 (1955): 232, 240, 246.

13 Bruinessen, Martin van, ‘Shari'a court, tarekat and pesantren: Religious institutions in the Banten Sultanate’, Archipel 50 (1995): 165–200; Talens, ‘Een feodale’, p. 22.

14 Pudjiastuti, Perang, pp. 305–7.

15 See also Suryadi, ‘Review’, p. 571, and Ekadjati, ‘Melacak naskah-naskah kuno sejarah Banten’, http://humaspdg.wordpress.com/2010/05/13/melacak-naskah-naskah-kuno-banten/ (last accessed 2 Oct. 2013).

16 Roy [sic], http://serang-banten.blogspot.nl/2009/08/silsilah-sultan-banten.html (last accessed 5 Nov. 2013). Djajadiningrat (Tinjauan, p. 15) only mentions Sultan Muhyiddin Zainussalihin, claiming him to have been killed in 1804. Accepting this would eliminate the reign of Sultan Ishaq from 1801 to 1802, and that of Sultan Gemuk, and still places the writing of Pudjiastuti's manuscript in the early nineteenth century.

17 Mythical serpent guardians of the wealth of the earth; Stutley, Margaret and Stutley, James, Harper's dictionary of Hinduism: Its mythology, folklore, philosophy, literature, and history (San Francisco: Harper and Row, 1984), p. 198. In the current myth, the India-derived naga has obviously been transformed into an Arab-derived jinn.

18 Olthof, Willem L., Babad Tanah Jawi: Javaanse rijkskroniek (Dordrecht: Foris, 1987), pp. 16–17, 80–82. Jordaan, Roy, ‘The mystery of Nyai Lara Kidul, Goddess of the Southern Ocean’, Archipel 28 (1984): 99–116; Wessing, Robert, ‘A princess from Sunda: Some aspects of Nyai Roro Kidul’, Asian Folklore Studies 56, 2 (1997): 317–53.

19 Gaudes, Růdiger, ‘Kaundinya, Preah Thaong, and the “Nāgi Somā”: Some aspects of a Cambodian legend’, Asian Folklore Studies 52, 2 (1933): 333–58.

20 Carr, Edward H., What is history? (London: Macmillan, 1961), p. 2.

21 Footnote Ibid., p. 24.

22 Berg, Cornelis C., ‘De zin der tweede Babad-Tanah-Jawi’, Indonesië 8 (1955): 368; Pudjiastuti, Perang, p. 282.

23 Ricklefs, Merle C., Jogjakarta under Sultan Mangkubumi 1749–1792: A history of the division of Java (London: Oxford University Press, 1974), p. 407.

24 Fischer, Walter R., Human communication as narration: Toward a philosophy of reason, value, and action (Chapel Hill: University of South Carolina Press, 1987), p. xi.

25 Niles, John D., Homo narrans: The poetics and anthropology of oral literature (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1999), pp. 3, 8.

26 Geertz, Clifford, Local knowledge: Further essays in interpretive anthropology (New York: Basic Books, 1983), p. 157.

27 See Wessing, Robert, ‘Telling the landscape: Place and meaning in Sunda (West Java)’, Moussons 4 (2001): 33–61.

28 Bruner, Jerome, Making stories: Law, literature, life (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2002), p. 7; Fischer, Human communication, p. xi.

29 Austin, John L., How to do things with words (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1975).

30 See the German Geschichte or the French histoire, which mean both history and tale or story. Also historier, to recount, to narrate.

31 See for instance, Reid, Southeast Asia, vol. 2, pp. 280–81; Ricklefs, A history, pp. 95–8.

32 Colombijn, Freek, ‘De vroege staat Banten in de zeventiende eeuw’, Antropologische Verkenningen 8, 3 (1989): 9.

33 Hall, Kenneth R., Maritime trade and state development in early Southeast Asia (Honolulu: University of Hawaìi Press, 1985), pp. 13–14; Colombijn, Freek, ‘Foreign influence on the State of Banten, 1596–1682’, Indonesia Circle 18, 50 (1987): 20.

34 Colombijn, ‘Foreign influence’, p. 23.

35 de Jonge, Jan K.J., De opkomst van het Nederlandsch gezag over Java, vol. 3 ('s-Gravenhage: Martinus Nijhoff; Amsterdam: Frederik Muller, 1872), p. lxxvi.

36 ‘Especially considering the way the town Jacatra, which stood where Batavia was to arise, had been conquered and demolished’ (De Jonge, De opkomst, vol. 1 [1869]), p. cxiii.

37 “… uit Batavia's opgang volgt Bantam's ruïne”. De Jonge, De opkomst, vol. 3 (1872), p. lxxvi.

38 Earlier conflicts had occurred in 1619 and between 1633–1639. Atsushi, Ota, Changes of regime and social dynamics in West Java: Society, state and the outer world of Banten 1750–1830 (Leiden: Brill, 2006), p. 17; Colombijn, ‘De vroege’, p. 10.

39 De Jonge, De opkomst, vol. 3 (1872), p. lxxvi.

40 Atsushi, Changes, p. 17.

41 Talens, ‘Een feodale’, p. 204.

42 Kathirithamby-Wells, Jeyamalar, ‘Banten: A West Indonesian port and polity during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries’, in The Southeast Asian port and polity: Rise and demise, ed. Kathirithamby-Wells, J. and Villiers, John (Singapore: Singapore University Press, 1990), pp. 117–18.

43 Talens, ‘Een feodale’, pp. 1, 75; Atsushi, Changes, p. 17; De Jonge, De Opkomst, vol. 4 (1873), p. cxiii.

44 The dates given for Sultan Haji's reign vary. Colombijn, ‘De vroege’, p. 4, writes that he was co-ruler from 1671 while Van Bruinessen, ‘Shari'a’, p. 171, gives 1680 as the advent of his rule, and Rosidi, Ajip et al. , Ensiklopedi Sunda: Alam, manusia, dan budaya, termasuk budaya Cirebon dan Betawi (Jakarta: Pustaka Jaya, 2000), p. 614, maintain as a starting date his appointment by the Dutch in 1682, following his father's defeat. Talens, ‘Een feodale’, pp. 75, 101. This last date is in any case when he became sole ruler of Bantĕn and is also the year that Bantĕn lost its autonomy (Colombijn, ‘De vroege’, pp. 4, 11).

45 De Jonge, De opkomst, vol. 4 (1873), p. cxiii.

46 Footnote Ibid., p. cxii; Talens, ‘Een feodale’, p. 75. Sultan Agĕng is said to have given the co-rulership to the crown prince's younger brother while the former was away on the hajj (Rosidi et al., Ensiklopedi, p. 614). Whether this is true or not, the rivalry between the two brothers seems to have been stirred up by the VOC; De Jonge, De opkomst, vol. 4 (1873), pp. cxxxi–cxxxiv.

47 Talens, ‘Een feodale’, pp. 75–6.

48 Talens, ‘Een feodale’, pp. 76, 80, 126.

49 de Graaf, Hermanus J., Geschiedenis van Indonesië ('s-Gravenhage and Bandoeng: W. Van Hoeve, 1949), p. 230.

50 Atsushi, Changes, p. 226.

51 See De Jonge, De opkomst, vol. 8 (1883), pp. 206–17.

52 Ricklefs, A history, pp. 95–8; Reid, Southeast Asia, vol. 2, pp. 249, 280; Talens, ‘Een feodale’, p. 1.

53 Talens, ‘Een feodale’, p. 134; Van Bruinessen, ‘Shari'a’, p. 172.

54 http://humaspdg.wordpress.com/2010/04/20/mitos-mitos-yang-beredar-di-masyarakat-di-banten-kidul (last accessed 29 Oct. 2013).

55 Pudjiastuti, Perang, pp. 261–5.

56 English translation by Robert Wessing.

57 Pupuh is a type of metre used in poetry recitation (Hardjadibrata, Rabindranat, Sundanese–English dictionary, Jakarta: Pustaka Jaya, 2003, p. 648). The story is divided into seven pupuh.

58 Footnote 20 and other footnotes in the original text give alternate names for some of these figures. Since these are not relevant to the current analysis they are omitted here.

59 Pudjiastuti consistently writes Sultan Agung, which is not correct.

60 Note the change from Abdul Kadir.

61 According to Rosidi et al., Ensiklopedi, p. 614, Sultan Agĕng told his son to undertake the pilgrimage in 1674.

62 Note the switch from Pangeran Dakar to Sultan Haji. Drewes, ‘Short notice’, p. 119, has him change his name to Pangeran Haji at the start of his pilgrimage.

63 Drewes, ‘Short notice’, p. 120, calls the robe Pangeran Dakar's dowry.

64 Drewes, ibid., writes that they were identical, like ‘two peas in a pod’, causing the jinn to be mistaken for Pangeran (Sultan) Haji.

65 Footnote 23 in Pudjiastuti's text says that Adlher Schmit is meant. An anonymous reader has suggested the possibility that this was Edelheer Smit.

66 In the story related by Drewes, ‘Short notice’, p. 120, the jinn had himself ‘acknowledged as Sultan Agung’, which does not make sense since Sultan Agĕng has just closed the port to him.

67 See the picture of the gate to Bantĕn in Guillot, Banten, p. 168.

68 In this and the last two pupuh, the Sajarah Bantĕn Kecil introduces a number of new characters. These, while part of the original text, are not relevant to the story analysed here, and will thus not be explained further. They do, however, show the recent date of this recension of the Sajarah Bantĕn Kecil.

69 The sacred spring at Mecca's mosque, whose water is attributed to have purifying and healing powers. Hurgronje, Christiaan Snouck, Verspreide geschriften van C. Snouck-Hurgronje, vol. 3 (Bonn and Leipzig: Kurt Schroeder, 1923), pp. 37, 39–40; vol. 4 (1924), p. 191. Compare http://hafizamri.com/kelebihan-dan-keajaiban-air-zam-zam/ and http://www.imtiyaztravel.com/khasiat_air_zam_zam.htm (both last accessed 1 June 2012).

70 Djajadiningrat, Tinjauan, p. 14, mentions that Sultan Haji returned to Cimanuk in Bantĕn under the name Haji Mansur (or Mangsur), but does not include the return to Mecca and the dive into the zam-zam spring. Drewes, ‘Short notice’, p. 121, has Pangeran Haji trying to return to Bantĕn, but instead ending up in Egypt where a haji gave him ‘his own simple clothes’. After a long stay in Egypt Pangeran Haji returned to Mecca where he entered the zam-zam spring which returned him to Bantĕn. Feeling ashamed, he did not stop at his father's house but went on, eventually reaching Cikaduön where he changed his name to Haji Mangsur.

71 The fat or chubby sultan.

72 The Sultan's adik, which could be a younger sibling, or even a cousin from a junior line.

73 Persaudaraan, lit. brotherhood or family.

74 This is borne out by the time of its production. The conflict between Sultan Agĕng and Sultan Haji occurred in the late seventeenth century, and the above account was written in the Bantĕn dialect of Javanese on paper that was first produced in the first half of the eighteenth century (Pudjiastuti, Perang, pp. 226–7, 278). As observed earlier, however, the narrative contained in the final three pupuh suggest an even later date for this version. A slightly different version of these events can be found in http://humaspdg.wordpress.com/2010/04/20/mitos-mitis-yang-beredar-di-masyarakat-di-banten-kidul (last accessed 29 Oct. 2013). Here the jinn maiden is just said to be a pretty girl, and it is she who demands to be given Sultan Haji's clothes and insignia, which she then gives to her older brother to carry out his nefarious plans. Djajadiningrat (Tinjauan, p. 14) also does not mention that the person masquerading as Pangeran Dakar was a jinn. He characterises him as a foreigner from Pulo Putri.

75 Kathirithamby-Wells, ‘Banten’, p. 115.

76 De Graaf, Geschiedenis, pp. 230–31.

77 See Van Bruinessen, ‘Shari'a’, p. 166.

78 Wessing, Robert, ‘A change in the forest: Myth and history in West Java’, Journal of Southeast Asian Studies 24, 1 (1993): 1–17.

79 According to Schrieke, this was a princess of the West Javanese kingdom of Pajajaran, which Hassanuddin had defeated. Since his father, Sunan Gunungjati, had also married such a princess, this gave him and his descendants a claim to the (cosmological) legitimacy of Pajajaran. Schrieke, Bernard, Indonesian sociological studies, part 2: Ruler and realm in early Java (The Hague and Bandung: W. van Hoeve, 1957), p. 14.

80 Kathirithamby-Wells, ‘Banten’, p. 109.

81 De Graaf, Geschiedenis, p. 230. This is not to say that Sultan Agĕng was a ‘better’ Muslim than Sultan Haji, but only that they accessed their relationship with non-believers differently. Appearing to be ‘more Muslim’ than the other seems to have been a political strategy; See De Jonge, De opkomst, vol. 3 (1872), p. lxxvi; vol. 4, p. cxiii.

82 Schrieke, Indonesian, p. 12; Berg, ‘De zin’, pp. 375, 378. Ricklefs, Jogjakarta, pp. 369–408, relates a myth in which the Dutch became the heirs to the cosmological legitimacy of the Sundanese kingdom of Pajajaran by having one of their number marry the daughter of a Pajajaran princess and a holy man (ajar). Ken Dedes-like, this daughter was marked by flaming genitals, making intercourse with her impossible for anyone not destined to be a ruler. She did become pregnant by the Dutchman who bought her, and gave birth to a son, Mur Jangkung, a pseudonym for the hard-handed governor-general, Jan Pieterz. Coen, who is remembered for, among other things, his conquest of Jakarta (Batavia). De Jonge, De opkomst, vol. 1 (1869), pp. cxiii–cxiv.

83 See Wessing, Robert, ‘Porous boundaries: Addressing calamities in East Java, Indonesia’, Bijdragen tot de Taal-, Land en Volkenkunde 166, 1 (2010): 49–82.

84 Schrieke, Indonesian, pp. 12–13.

85 Guillot, Banten, p. 213; Reid, Southeast Asia, p. 249.

86 Robson, Stuart and Wibisono, Singgih, Javanese–English dictionary (Hong Kong: Periplus, 2002), p. 172; Hardjadibrata, Sundanese, p. 190. The word dakar derives from Arabic, but the term would likely have been familiar to people who had undertaken the pilgrimage to Mecca.

87 See Mandelbaum, David G., Women's seclusion and men's honor: Sex roles in North India, Bangladesh, and Pakistan (Tucson: University of Arizona Press, 1988).

88 Nihom, Max, ‘On attracting women and tantric initiation: Tilottamā and Hevajratantra II.v. 38–47 and L.vii.8–9’, Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies 58, 3 (1995): 521–31.

89 Reid, Southeast Asia, pp. 162, 178. This fear seems to still exist in certain Islamic circles. Thus the protagonist in Shachree M. Daroini's novel, Para gus (Yogyakarta: Alinea, 2004, p. 223), reflecting a pesantren (Islamic boarding school) point of view asks, ‘Is it not true that women are symbols of desire that must be kept at a distance, be prohibited to every part of the body. … In fact, even their gaze must be avoided, because that gaze is the devil. … Isn't it true that women are a bunch of idols that can turn people into heathens or turn them into polytheists?’ Trans. by Robert Wessing.

90 Robson and Wibisono, Javanese, p. 538; Harjadibrata, Sundanese, p. 588.

91 Or in lust, remembering the implications of the name Pangeran Dakar.

92 In her translation, Pudjiastuti (Perang, p. 262) uses menikah, the usual Indonesian word for marry. However, this word derives from Arabic (Winstedt, Richard O., An unabridged Malay–English dictionary, 5th ed., Kuala Lumpur, Marican & Sons, 1963, p. 245), and has Islamic connotations, which might not have been applicable in this relationship with the jinn maiden, even though, as Prof. Pudjiastuti kindly notes in an email, some jinn have become Muslim. This, however, was not necessarily the case with the jinn Raja Pandita, who was bent upon destroying the Sultanate of Bantĕn. The original manuscript, the email clarifies, uses the words krama and rabi, both of which mean ‘to marry’. Both are polite (krama and krama inggil) words (Albada, Rob van and Pigeaud, Theodoor G.T., Javaans–Nederlands woordenboek, Leiden: KITLV, 2007, p. 856), appropriate to the social status of both Sultan Haji and Raja Pandita, irrespective of their religious orientation.

Especially considering the dubious status of Pangeran Dakar's Muslim identity at the time, having shed his symbols of being a haji and having entered into a relationship with a jinn maiden, I wonder whether kawin, an Indonesian, Javanese, and Sundanese word for marriage, which can also just mean sexual intercourse, would not have been a more fitting translation. This, however, might have run into problems of social status, kawin being a lower status word, inappropriate to the social positions of the parties involved.

93 The informant's words were ‘turut wong Jawa’ (according to the Javanese). This is, of course, not to say that all Javanese adhere to this view: some merely pay lip service to religion, while to others it is a matter of profound faith; even amongst the latter significant differences may be found. Yet I heard the view outlined here stated in one form or another by many of my informants when matters of faith were being discussed.

94 Robson and Wibisono, Javanese, p. 43; Hardjadibrata, Sundanese, p. 26.

95 Robert Wessing, ‘A community of spirits: People, Ancestors and nature spirits in Java’, Crossroads 18 (2006): 78–80.

96 Wessing, ‘A change’, p. 5; compare Winstedt, R.O., ‘Kingship and enthronement in Malaya’, Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society 3/4 (1945): 134–45.

97 Wessing, Robert and Barendregt, Bart, ‘Tending the spirit's shrine: Kanekes and Pajajaran in West Java’, Moussons 8 (2005): 3–26.

98 Kawuryan, Megandaru W., Kamus lengkap Jawa–Indonesia Indonesia–Jawa (Bantul: Bahtera Pustaka, 2006), p. 336. The meaning of pilgrim is from the Arabic haji while the meaning of king is original Javanese. Zoetmulder, Petrus J., Old Javanese–English Dictionary, vol. 1 (‘S-Gravenhage: Martinus Nijhoff, 1982), p. 572.

99 Compare Hardjadibrata, Sundanese, pp. 10, 298. Also talisman or amulet, from the Arabic ‘azimah. Djajadiningrat, Atjèhsch–Nederlandsch woordenboek, vol. 1 (Batavia: Landsdrukkerij, 1934), p. 16. See also Robson and Wibisono, Javanese, pp. 29–30, although they do not gloss haji with king.

100 The case of Mataram would seem to be an exception. But there too an Islamic proselytiser, Sunan Kalijaga, warns Panembahan Senapati to fear God, and to not just rely on the Goddess of the Southern Ocean, Nyai Rara Kidul. Olthof, Babad, p. 82.

101 Marwoto, Ayu Sutarto and Saputra, Heru, Mutiara yang tersisa I: Kearifan local dalam cerita rakyat Madura (Jember: Kompyawisda Jatim, 2010), pp. 10–12, 43.

102 As such they are parallels of Mt. Meru, also a source of fertility and power. See Mabbett, Ian W., ‘The symbolism of mount Meru’, History of religions 23 (1983): 64–83.

103 Compare Ekadjati, Wawacan, pp. xxxi–xxxvii. This idea is not restricted to Islamic states, being found in Hindu ones as well. See Hara, Minoru, ‘The king as a husband of the earth’, Asiatische Studien. Zeitschrift der schweitzerichen Gesellschaft fȕr Asienkunde 27 (1973): 97–114.

104 Geertz, Clifford, Negara: The theatre state in nineteenth century Bali (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1980).

105 Pudjiastuti, Perang, p. 270, proposes that blaming the jinn was an attempt to exonerate Sultan Haji/Pangeran Dakar.

Ibid.
Ibid.