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Paper by A. Teeuw, Leiden

Introduction

First of all a few words to explain why and how I have become involved in the study of Old Sundanese, and thus have been invited by my good old friend Mr. Ajip Rosidi to participate in this memorable international conference, the first of its kind, on Sundanese culture. I would like to express my gratitude to Pak Ajip for the opportunity to present a paper on my recent studies in the field of Old Sundanese literature.

Some of you may be surprised at my appearance here. Indeed until recently I never ventured into the study of Sundanese. As a student in Holland, during the second World War, I tried to read modern Sundanese books (Balai Pustaka editions!) but I soon gave up these efforts, as I became frustrated because of the inadequacy of the then available dictionaries. The fact that,  long after my retirement as a professor in Leiden, I became involved in this field of study is due to one of such coincidences as often determine the course of one’s life.

One of my closest colleagues in the field of Indonesian studies, moreover an intimate friend of very long standing, was the late dr. Jacobus (Koos) Noorduyn. After completing his PhD thesis he was sent to Indonesia, as a Bible Translator for the Netherlands Bible Society. There he was entrusted with the task, together with colleagues from the Lembaga Alkitab, to work on the revision of the Sundanese translation of the Bible. However, in the great tradition of the work of Dutch Bible translators Noorduyn did not limit his activities to translating. He found opportunity to pursue his scholarly interest, and he started to explore and exploit treasures found in the manuscript collection of the former Batavian Society, which now forms part of the National Library. The first text with which he occupied himself was the Carita Parahiangan, which had already attracted the attention of earlier scholars, in particular of professor Poerbatjaraka who was the first to edit the text. However, Noorduyn discovered that the folia of the manuscript were in disarray and as a real puzzler he managed to restore their proper order. On that basis subsequently Indonesian scholars have been able to provide a much better interpretation of this text which is so important for the study of medieval Sundanese culture and history.

 

Noorduyn’s work on the poems.

Noorduyn did not limit himself to this one text. He found out that there were more Old Sundanese manuscripts in the collection of the P.N.; two of them, the kropaks 1102 and 625 he transliterated and provided with a provisional English translation. Moreover, Noorduyn discovered that a manuscript which ever since 1627 had been held by the Bodleian Library in Oxford and which had never been properly identified also contained an Old Sundanese text. This one too he transliterated and translated provisionally. However, Noorduyn, who had meanwhile become secretary-general of the KTILV in Leiden, found little time to work on these materials, and he had to postpone his plans to prepare a scholarly edition of these texts until after his retirement which was due in August 1991. Unfortunately, soon after his retirement he fell victim to a fatal disease which prevented him from completing the many research projects in which in the course of the years he had engaged himself. In 1994 he passed away, without having had an opportunity to continue and complete his work on the three Old Sundanese texts which he had unearthed.

Shortly before his death Koos Noorduyn asked me whether I would be willing to prepare his work on the Old Sundanese manuscripts for publication. Even though I was painfully aware of my lack of the necessary expertise, I not only felt compelled to accept Noorduyn’s request as a moral duty to a good friend and colleague, but also in view of the great scholarly importance of his work which deals with unique material and opens up a new field of literary study.

 

The preparation of the edition

So, after finishing my work on a new edition of the Indonesian-Dutch Dictionary, which was completed in 1996, I started to work on Noorduyn’s materials, by familiarizing myself with what he had already done and with the problems involved, reading as much as possible about Old Sundanese literature and setting up a method of working for carrying out what soon turned out to be a major research project which was to result in a voluminous publication. Thanks to the help of another old friend, professor Ekadjati, I received a large amount of additional material which in the last decade or so has been produced by scholars in Bandung and which turned out to be valuable for the study of Noorduyn’s texts. Morover, again with the cooperation of professor Ekadjati and thanks to a grant from the Dutch Organization for Scientific Research,  I was able to invite a scholar from Bandung who in recent years has developed into one of the experts in the fields of Old Sundanese, Saudara Undang Darsa. Last year he visited Leiden for a period of four months and which him I worked through the whole prefinal draft of the book. He also checked Noorduyn’s readings of the manuscripts, wherever possible. A few months ago the final draft of the book was completed and submitted to the KITLV Press which is going to publish it, hopefully in 2002. I also hope that Mrs. Undang Darsa will find time to continue working on the Indonesian translation of the book, so that it will also become available to a larger Indonesia readership.

 

Content of this paper

In this paper I shall briefly discuss a few general problems which came up during the preparation of our book. This primarily deals with the three poems in Old Sundanese, which were discovered, deciphered and edited with a provisional translation by  Noorduyn. One of them is an epic text, containing the story of the resumption of the war between Rama and Rawana by their offspring after the great battle, as described in the classical Ramayana. In this story the sons of Rawana, who have been revived, march out to take their revenge on the sons of Rama.

        The two other texts reflect a typically Sundanese form of the Shiwaitic tradition as it has been popular all over Java in the Middle Ages. One is an allegory, telling the story of a celestial figure Sri Ajnyana who is banned from heaven on account of his illicit relationship with a heavenly lady. By following the lessons of a mahapandita he finally is able to free himself from the consequences of his sinful deeds and returns to heaven. This text and the Rama poem were contained in the collection of the Perpustakaan Nasional. The third one, preserved in the Bodleian library in Oxford, is the story of the pilgrimage of Bujangga Manik, a prince Jaya Pakuan in the palace of Pakancilan, who travels all over Java, and even sails to Bali in order to acquire spiritual wisdom. Ultimately his soul is released from its earthly bonds and reaches its final destination..

In this paper the following aspects of the texts will be briefly discussed:

a. A few characteristics of the Old Sundanese language used in the poems

b. Javanese influence on the Old Sundanese language

c. The octosyllabic line as the basic poetic pattern; the relationship with the pantun tradition

d. The formulaic character and literary quality of the poems

e. The religious content of the poems

f. The local, Sundanese character of the texts

 

a. A few characteristics of the Old Sundanese language

        In general it can be said that the language of the poems is much closer to Modern Sundanese than Old Javanese is to Modern Javanese. Whereas Old Javanese differs systematically from Modern Javanese in phonemic, morphological, syntactical and lexical respects, so much so that understanding an Old Javanese text is impossible for a modern Javanese reader without special study, it is my impression that for a modern Sundanese reader these texts are linguistically accessible. Dr. Adelaar, expert in Malayo-Polynesian comparative linguistics, described the language of the poems as basically an ancient dialect of Sundanese. However, this does not mean that they are easily understandable; the literary idiom, the religious context, the cultural background will provide difficulties for the unprepared modern reader.

        A few typical traits of the language of these poems are as follows:

First of all a few interesting features in the field of phonemics may be mentioned:

a. There are a number of words ending on a voiceless palatal stop, which does not occur in Modern Sundanese. Examples are pauc (MSd paut), parac (MSd parat), aroc (MSd arot), imuc (MSd imut), and two verbal intensifiers rec and boc.

b. An interesting feature is the systematic opposition between OSd and MSd with respect to the occurrence of eu/i in disyllabic words containg an u in the final syllable: OSd teulu vs. MSd tilu, teumu vs. timu, ceundung vs. cindung, deuuk vs. diuk. In some cases the form with eu-u has been retained in MSd dialects.

c. In some cases OSd has initial w- where MSd has b-, e.g., wéntang vs. béntang, wedil vs. bedil, wulan vs. bulan.

d. Sometimes OSd has d vs MSd j: deun vs. jeung; deungeun vs. jeungeun; diga vs. jiga; however, this is no systematic correspondence; in other words OSd corresponds with MSd vs. OJv:  jalan vs. dalan; hujan vs. hudan. An exceptional case is OSD ja vs. MSd da, meaning ‘because, indeed’.

e. There are a number of other incidental phonemic oppositions between OSd and MSd which need not be discussed here.

Other points of interest may be briefly mentioned. As in Old Javanese there is no systematic oppposition between kasar and lemes words in the texts. There are indeed a number of word forms which are typical to Javanese krama, MSd lemes; in a few cases there are even doublets. Examples are: manten alongside manéh ‘self’; anten vs. aya ‘to be’; janten vs. jadi (or jati?); typical ‘krama’-words are konten ‘horse’; gapunten ‘gate’. But nowhere a functional distinction is made comparable to the kasar/lemes opposition.

As far as can be ascertained from the texts, the morphological system is basically similar to MSd, in the sense that nearly all affixes found in OSd also are known from MSd. However, this does not mean that the system as such is identical. It is quite possible that there are functional shifts, e.g. productive forms having become obsolete, or conversely rare forms in OSd having become more frequent in MSd.  In order to get a clear picture of the relation between OSd and MSd in this respect, a much more detailed study would be necessary, which would take into account all available OSd materials, in particular prose texts, as poetic texts by their very nature may contain deviations or particularities of their own.

In other respects too it is difficult to reach any conclusions on the basis of the limited material of three poetical texts. For instance, it is remarkable that plural forms with infix -ar-  (or -al-) which are so common in MSd are relatively rare in these texts. Similarly there are only a limited number of occurrences of verbal intensifiers, again a feature which is quite frequent in MSd. Whether such phenomena are due to systematic differences between the two languages or are caused by the specific character of the poetic idiom of the OSd texts again is a question which can only be solved on the basis of a much broader study of all the available materials.

With respect to the pronominal system, similar things can be said. Dr. Noorduyn has given a useful survey of the pronouns employed in the three poems. From this it is clear that OSd shows deviations from MSd; but again it is difficult to say whether these reflect differences between two linguistic systems or at least a historical dimension in the development of the Sundanese language, or whether they are due to the particular poetical idiom in texts in which only epical heroes and celestial figures occur and hardly any mention is made of ordinary people.

Similar thing can be said with respect to the lexicon. The vocabulary of the poems is unmistakably Sundanese, a great many words occurring with forms and meaning which are identical with MSd. There are also a number of words in the texts which according to the dictionaries of MSd are ‘archaic’, ‘obsolete’ or ‘dialectal’, often without further specification; a few examples are piri-piri ‘offspring’; ambu ‘mother’; aré’ ‘outsider’. In other cases OSd words seem to have a meaning which is different from MSd, e.g. pacundang and the active verbal form macundang ‘to defeat’. Furthermore, in the poems a fairly large number of words is found which are not mentioned in modern dictionaries. However, that does not mean that they no longer exist, either as dialectal forms or as obsolete words, occurring, e.g., in pantuns. Here again the available data are insufficient to reach any definite conclusions. In fact, one of the urgent research tasks for the future would be to compile an Old Sundanese dictionary, on the basis of as many critically edited texts as possible. Initial useful efforts in this direction have been made by various scholars in West-Java, but a systematic joint effort will be necessary to reach a satisfactory result.

 

b. Javanese influence

In this connection some attention should be given to the influence of the Javanese language on Old Sundanese as found in the three poems. Below we shall speak about Javanese influence in a broader literary, cultural and religious context; however, it is impossible to discuss the language of the poems without mentioning the relation with Javanese or Old Javanese. The Bujangga Manik texts itself already testifies to the importance at the time attached by Sundanese nobility to knowledge of the Javanese language and literature. In the poem featuring Bujangga Manik it is told that prince Jaya Pakuan (the original name of Bujangga Manik) from Pakancilan says goodbye to his mother because he wants ‘to go east’ (aing dék leumpang ka wétan). After his first trip he returns; the first one to see him is Jorong Lompong; she is a servant of lady Ajung Larang Sakéan Kilat Bancana and she immediately reports to her mistress about the arrival of an exceedingly handsome man (latara teuing nu kasép), an ideal match for the lady. In addition to all his other qualities she tells that he can speak Javanese (bisa carék Jawa), knows the scriptures and is acquainted with the sacred Law (sanghiang darma).  Later on, during his second, much longer trip, Bujangga Manik, when returning from Bali, tells that he spent more than a year in Rabut Palah, a holy place or the religious centre (kabuyutan) of Majapahit – which is now known as Candi Panataran. There he studied Javanese texts: the Pandawa Jaya (i.e. a version of the Bharatayuddha or Bratayuda) and another text so far unidentified, the Darmawéya. ‘After this my curiosity was satisfied, I could speak Javanese and was able to translate’ (aing bisa carék Jawa, bisa aing ngaro basa). This is a remarkable proof how Sundanese intellectuals in this period considered the study of Javanese language and literature as a most desirable achievement. There are other indications which point in the same direction. To mention just a few facts, there are a number of Old Javanese texts preserved in West Java together with Old Sundanese texts, such as the Serat Catur Bumi and the Serat Déwabuda. Other texts show strong linguistic influence of Old Javanese, such as the Kawi Paningkes, the Jatiniskala and  the Sang Hyang Raga Déwata. And the Old Sundanese poem of Purnawijaya, published by Pleyte in 1914, is unmistakably a Sundanese adaptation of the Old Javanese text on Kunjarakarna.

Small wonder then that the Old Sundanese poems contain a great deal of (Old) Javanese words, many of which are not mentioned in modern Sundanese. These words can be divided into two main groups:

a. First of all there are a large number of words which are known from Old Javanese, but which are no borrowings from Sanskrit. To give a few examples from this group: ganal ‘coarse’; atos ‘hard’; alot ‘hard, stubborn’; hulun ‘servant; I’; karas ‘chest’; hawan ‘road’; isuh ‘to wash, polish’; linglang ‘pure’; lupa ‘forget’; menur ‘jasmine’; mrebuk ‘fragrant’.

It is in many cases difficult to see whether such words in OSd are borrowings from OJv, or whether they belong to a common lexical stock of Sundanese and Javanese,  Certain cases are unmistakably borrowings, as e.g. wot gonggang ‘the wobbling bridge’, in the description of the road to heaven, is a clear case of borrowing from OJv; another interesting case is hana, OJv ‘to be’, which occurs first of all in the expression tan hana ‘non-existence’ as a philosophical term; tan itself is also a borrowing from OJv, even though it is also found in certain expressions in MSd. Furthermore there is kahanan used with the OJv meaning ‘abode, residence’; it is also mentioned in MSd dictionaries, probably as a borrowing from  OJv. In the OSd texts there is also ngahanan which is obviously a verbal derivation from kahanan, meaning ‘to reside, take residence’. Finally we find ngahanakeun na pamali ‘practising what is prohibited’, a Sundanese derivation from hana corresponding with OJv anghanâken; it is curious that this form ngahanakeun as a sole derivation of hana is mentioned in dictionaries of MSd as meaning: ‘on purpose doing a forbidden thing even more badly, ngahajakeun ngalampahkeun perkara, nu dilarang’.

There are also several cases of OJv derived forms or compounds borrowed in OSd: walangati ‘anxious’, also in a derivation with pa- and (or?) pi-; pasuk tapa ‘to become an ascetic’; padangan ‘kitchen’; kalepasen ‘release’; pamanggahan ‘scaffold’; pamunuhan ‘place of execution’; pamasaran ‘grave, cemetery’; sakayogyana ‘whatever is proper’ looks like a borrowing from OJv, even though yogya is still in use in MSd (‘archaic , literary’); also pakatonan ‘appearance’, OJv derivation from (ka)ton (Z 2029). A typical borrowing from OJv is the expression batarubah in the verbal derivation (di)batarubahkeun ‘to charge all at once’, lit. ‘like falling bricks’. Another interesting borrowing from OJv is ngamasih in ngamasih dosa ‘to atone for one’s sins’, from OJ mas: ngemasi ‘to pay one’s debts’. It survived in MSd ngemasi (pati) ‘pay with one’s life’.

Of particular interest are particles, pronouns and similar words, such as ning, dén, déning, ikang, téka(ng)and tika(ng), ira, pukulun, kadiangganing, tan, mangkana, ngirika, aja and sampun (‘don’t’), tanpa, tucap. Such Javanese elements especially occur in verses indicating a change of scene in the story. Apparently Javanese literary models influenced the creation of such formulas by the Sundanese poets.

        b.There are also a large number of words in OSd which ultimately come from Sanskrit. Some of these borrowings have survived in MSd, many other are not mentioned in modern dictionaries. Here too some examples must suffice:

1) first of all a few cases of words which have survived in MSd: agama ‘doctrine, customs, MSd religion’; bakti ‘devotion’; carana ‘betel-tray’ ; jalma/janma ‘human being’ (Skt OJv janma, MSd jalma; both forms occur in the poems);  kerta ‘peace, safety’; mandala ‘hermitage, religious community’ (in many toponyms); malanti ‘jasmine’ (MSd malati, OJv mâlatî); murka ‘infatuated’; nagasari ‘kind of flower’; siksa (in OJv OSd the dominant meaning is ‘instruction’; however, in MSd as in MJv, Mal the meaning is ‘punishment’).

2) There are numerous Skt words in the OSd texts which are not found in MSd: ajnyana ‘knowledge, reason’; atita (and tita) ‘exceptional’; bayangkara ‘military corps’; bancana ‘deception’; danapunya ‘pious donations’; déwaguru ‘prior’; duriasa ‘disgrace’; drebia (drawya) ‘possession’; hareca ‘statue’ (Skt arca; MSd arca is probably a recent borrowing from BI); kroda ‘anger’; madyapada ‘world’; pataka ‘disaster’; manyura ‘peacock’; méru ‘pagoda’; mirah ‘red’; (ka)moksa(han) ‘release’; nirtresna ‘free from desire’; palangka ‘couch’; petra ‘spirits of the dead’ = OJv pitara; pretapa ‘asceticism’ Skt OJv pratâpa; mretiaksa ‘to appear’ (Skt pratyaksa);  purusa ‘sage, eminent man’;  rajatamah ‘passions’;  roma ‘hair’ in roma hiang; sada with the meaning ‘always’; sakakala ‘memorial’ cf. OJv šakakâla;  samida ‘fire-wood’; sanghara ‘destruction’; sari ‘powder’ (Skt etymology not certain); sembawa ‘magic force’; taal ‘lontar (palm)’ corresponds with OJv tal; however, the double vowel aa reminds of Skt tâla; tiagi and téga ‘hermit’ (MSd téga ‘indifferent’ under MJv influence?); (ka)upadésa(an) ‘teaching’; wacana ‘words’; wilasa ‘friendly’; In the case of pamyaktaan ’proof’ and kawaranan ‘obstructed’  we have direct borrowings from OJv, based on the Skt byakta and warana. OSd malina ‘lost’, also in MSd, probably is a borrowing from an OJv ma- derivation: ma-lîna. Sometimes words of Skt origin are said to be ‘literary’, ‘Kawi’, or ‘Javanese’ in MSd dictionaries, e.g. akasa ‘sky’.

        It is an intriguing question whether all words of Skt origin occurring in OSd have been borrowed from OJv, or whether there are also direct borrowings from Skt, without the intermediary of OJv. So far no clear cases have been found, but it is quite possible that further research will uncover examples of direct linguistic influence from Skt on OSd . After all, the oldest Sanskrit inscriptions in Java come from West Java and prove that already at a very early date there were people in the area who had knowledge of or access to Sanskrit materials.

        For completeness sake it should be mentioned that in the poems we also find a limited number of words which look like borrowings from Malay; in a formulaic expression saur satu sabda tunggal ‘unanimous’ the Malay word satu is used instead of the Sundanese sahiji which occurs elsewhere. The expression kiri kanan is found once, alongside the common Sundanese words kénca and katuhu. A remarkable case is kasiangan ‘overtaken by daylight’. Malay words also occur alongside Sundanese/Javanese words in the geographical descriptions, especially pulo vs. nusa, bukit vs. gunung, and the words of compass timur (alongside wétan), barat (rarely kulon). (In passing it may be mentioned that in modern Sundanese dialects the use of terms of compass is rather complicated as has been demonstrated by Nothofer in his Dialect Atlas of West-Java. In this connection it should be observed that rivers are always indicated by the Sundanese Ci-, even in cases where reference is made to rivers in the Javanese speaking area. The words kali and  sungai are never mentioned in these cases.

        There are also some words of non-Indonesian provenance, which may have entered OSd through Malay: Most important, in view of the dating of the poems are three words which ultimately come from Arabic, viz., dunia ‘world’, kertas ‘paper’ and the toponym Mekah ‘Mecca’. A few other words may also come from continental Asian languages: aér mawar ‘rose-water’ probably comes from Malay air mawar; the second part of the compound is of Persian origin. This is probably also the case with sarunai ‘clarinet’ (Pers. surnai, Mal sarunai, MSd saruni) which does not seem to occur in OJv. OSd wedil ‘gun’ corresponds with OJv MSd Mal bedil. It is difficult to say through which language it reached OSd. Kalakatri ‘areca-scissor’ according to Van der Tuuk ultimately comes from Tamil caulakatti, through which channels is not clear; a more common form of this word in other Indonesian languages is kalakati; the OSd variant may be some kind of popular etymology.

        A few doubtful cases are the following: for (e)long ‘chest, coffin’ we have the nearest parallel in Mal elung, elong ‘coffin’; the word looks Chinese, but no Chinese origin is mentioned. Is there an etymological connection with OJv larung ‘bier’? A word which probably entered OSd via the language of interinsular traders is masui in kulit masui, ‘masui bark’; its refers to the aromatic bark of an East-Indonesian tree, especially in New Guinea, a well-known commodity; it is originally probably a local name. The etymology of narawastu ‘spikenard’, which is known from Mal and MSd but does not occur in OJv or Skt, is not clear.          

        Finally there is one word where one might think of European influence. In R 514 we find the word roronda; it means ‘playmate’; if this is the same word as (nga)roronda mentioned by C and Pleyte as a Baduy word for ‘young men playing music or singing alternately’, and if this is originally Portuguese ronda as suggested by C, this would give a terminus a quo for R, as such a borrowing from Portuguese can not be dated before the beginning of the 16th century. However, as long as no other data of this type are found no definite conclusion seems possible.

 

A few provisional conclusions may be formulated:

                1. The Old Sundanese vocabulary of the three poems corresponds largely to Modern Sundanese.

        2. There are some more or less systematic differences in the phonetic form of Old Sundanese words vs. their Modern Sundanese equivalents. The opposition between the vowel pattern OSd eu-u vs. MSd i-u is the most remarkable of these.

        3. There are a number of words in the texts which are unique in the sense that they have not been recorded either in modern Sundanese or in (Old) Javanese.

        4. There are many specific similarities between the OJv and OSd vocabulary. This concerns both words of an Indonesian origin and words ultimately deriving from Sanskrit. The latter largely concern religious and philosophical terms relating to popular Shiwaism. It is often difficult to say whether such correspondences testify to a common OJv/OSd core or are due to borrowings from OJv.

                5. No clear cases of Sanskrit borrowings have been found which are specific to Sundanese.

                6. There is some influence of Malay in the vocabulary of the texts.

        7. Influence of other languages is sporadic; there are a few Arabic words which may have come through Javanese; and there is one (doubtful!) case of a Portuguese word in the poem on the offspring of Rawana.

 

c. The octosyllabic verse pattern; the relationship with the pantun tradition.

        The Old Sundanese poems are characterized by a verse structure of their own, distinguishing them, e.g., from Old Javanese poetry. The basic pattern is the octosyllabic line which is maintained strictly throughout the poems. Deviations from this pattern are rare, and are usually due to specific factors. In some cases there is metrical ambivalence, especially when a consonant is followed by an r; in such cases r may also be read as re, e.g.,  prebu or perebu, brenang or berenang. Sometimes there is linguistic variation, e.g. in certain positions the disyllabic full pronoun first person aing can be replaced by the monosyllabic suffix -ing. Metrical errors are rare, and may sometimes be explained by mistakes in the manuscript tradition. Therefore it may be assumed that for the poets the requirement of creating octosyllabic lines was absolutely binding.

        Octosyllabic verse structure is a fairly common phenomenon in oral poetry in various areas in Indonesia. For example the most common types of Bare’e verse as described by Adriani (1914) are strictly octosyllabic. Octosyllabicity is also the main formal characteristic of a major part of Bugis poetry, e.g. in the famous epic I La Galigo; another good example has been published by Roger Tol (1990). In other forms of Indonesian oral poetry one often finds, sometimes predominantly, lines containing eight syllables, but octosyllabicity is usually not a structural requirement. We may refer, e.g., to Malay and Minangkabau poetry, to various types of Dayak poetry, and also to the poetry from marginal areas such as the island of Nias, to the west of Sumatra, documented in the writings of W.L. Steinhart, and of  the islands of Timor and Roti in southeast Indonesia, investigated by P. Middelkoop and J.J. Fox respectively.

        It is an intriguing question how the written form of poetry in Sundanese came about. The most obvious explanation seems to be that originally there was an oral form of poetry, based on an octosyllabic verse pattern, comparable to the ones mentioned above, and that at some point in history poets started to write such poetry down. Yet, the transition from oral to written poetical conventions is by no means a self-evident development. One only needs to think of the endless academic discussions about the poems of Homer. There is general agreement that these epics originally were created by bards who sung them without having recourse to a written text and that subsequently these poems have been put down in writing and so have been preserved for posterity in the form in which they were created by Homer, as one of the major treasures of world literature. Most probably some form of literary culture in a neighbouring civilization induced the Greeks to have the texts as sung by those bards written down.

        Has a similar thing happened in the Sundanese culture? One could think of kings or priests who were interested in having the texts as performed by bards documented in written form. In view of the strong impact of Javanese culture and literature on Sundanese culture as indicated earlier, it would seem plausible to assume that the Javanese tradition of writing poetry has induced the creation of this typical Sundanese form of literary art. In particular one could think of the kidung poetry as providing the model for this cultural innovation. It is true that there are important differences between kidung as we know it and Old Sundanese poetry: kidungs are written in various metres, each of them consisting of stanzas with a required number of lines, fixed final vowels at the end of each line and a fixed number of syllables per line, whereas the only requirement of Sundanese poetry is octosyllabicity; there are no stanzas, no compulsory forms of rhyme, no variations in metre. Yet it is interesting that also in kidung octosyllabicity is a dominant feature; this is even more so in Javanese poetry from Banyuwangi, as it has recently been studied by Ben Arps. In the Banyuwangi metrical system of kidung singing which is probably an archaic form compared with kidung from Central Java there are only four different metres, three of them largely consisting of octosyllabic lines. So one could think that at some point Sundanese literary figures who had become acquainted with Javanese poetry (see Bujangga Manik’s reference to his study of the Bratayuda!), were creatively inspired to start writing down their own local poetry.

        In this connection one has of course also to keep in mind the Sundanese pantun. It is a typically Sundanese form of oral poetry, and from testimony in the 16th century Siksakanda Ng Karesian we know that already at that time there were singers of or experts in pantun (prepantun). The texts also mentions the names of some pantuns, e.g. Langgalarang, Banyakcatra, Siliwangi, Haturwangi. At first sight it would seem obvious that our written poems are nothing but pantuns which were written down. However, the matter is not so simple. First of all we know, from the information which has become available since the 19th century, that octosyllabicity, although being indeed a dominant charactaristic of pantuns, was apparently no strict requirement. Secondly from the titles of the 16th century pantuns it is clear that as far as concerns their content they all belonged to the same genre as modern pantuns; they all seem to have dealt with local legendary heroes. The three poems in Old Sundanese which we are dealing with have altogether different subjects: one belongs to the classical epic Rama-tradition, the two others are religious texts dealing with subjects belonging to Shiwaism as it was popular in Java during the Middle Ages. Moreover, the transition from oral to written literature is not a simple process, as is known from other parts in the world. So the conclusion should be that although there is unmistakably a close link between traditional Sundanese pantuns and written Old Sundanese poetry as we have it in our texts, the exact historical relationship between these two traditions needs further investigation.

 

d. The formulaic character and the literary quality of the poems

        In this connection it is also important to observe that these poems, although belonging to a genre of written literature, have an important element in common with oral literature, which again underlines how close they are to oral tradition. One of the characteristics of the texts is the frequent occurrence of all kinds of repetitions; the same verses or sequences of verses reoccur throughout a text, sometimes in identical form, in other cases with variations in wording, length or order. Ever since Albert C. Lord published his book on The Singer of Tales (1960) this typical trait of a large number of oral and early written texts has been called formulaic. In his book Lord published the results of the fieldwork which he carried out, together with his professor Milman Parry, among Yugoslav bards. Their primary interest was directed to the problem as to how the Homeric poems had been composed and performed by the ancient Greek singers, who were supposed to have been illiterate. The investigators collected a large mass of data of sometimes quite lengthy epic poems as performed by the Yugoslav bards and they studied the way these poems were performed. Their findings led them to the conclusion that such texts were not learnt by heart; each time they were performed the singers created them anew, by employing a special technique of composition; in this way the performance could be adapted to the situation, the length of time available, or the interest of the audience. The technique of composition was based on the availability of a large number of what Lord calls ‘formulas’, ‘formulaic expressions’ and ‘themes’: a formula he defined as ’a group of words which is regularly employed under the same metrical conditions to express a given essential idea’; a formulaic expression is ‘a line or half line constructed on the pattern of the formulas’;  themes are ‘the repeated incidents and descriptive passages in the songs’. For ‘theme’ Koster (see below) introduced the terms ‘type-scene’ and ‘topical scene’. Each performer had at his disposal a ‘stock-in-trade’, a large number of formulas, expressions and themes which he could apply at liberty, but which also left him great freedom for variation and extension.

        Lord’s theory has strongly influenced most research on oral poetry after 1960, even though his idea that oral poetry all over the world was created in the same way has not been substantiated by subsequent research. In the field of Malay/Indonesian poetry several researchers in recent years have applied the ideas of Lord, each in his own way; reference may be made to the publications by Amin Sweeney (1987, 1994), Nigel Phillips (1981) and Will Derks (1994).

        However, the results of Lord’s work turned out to be not only relevant for oral poetry; soon it was established that in particular early written texts in various languages, e.g., in medieval Europe, showed the same formulaic character as the purely oral Yugoslav poems. In the field of Indonesian studies Koster in a chapter ‘Variation within identity’ of his Ph.D. thesis studied the application of formulaic devices for the construction of narrative by the writer of the Malay Syair Ken Tambuhan (Koster 1997: 35-52). Such findings had, among other things, important consequences for the philological study of early written texts. In many cases it seemed plausible that ‘copyists’ of older manuscripts had behaved like creative oral narrators, feeling free to ‘recreate’ the texts according to their own taste or to adapt them to supposed audiences or readers, rather than faithfully copying their Vorlage. Thus, in Indonesian philology the classical tradition has come under severe criticism from scholars who emphasized the creative activity of copyists of manuscripts.

        It is not possible, within the framework of this paper, to deal in detail with this problem. However, there can be little doubt that these texts show the typical formulaic character of oral poetry as this has been described by Lord, and as we find it until today in pantuns. These medieval writers too made use of hundreds of formulas and formulaic elements, and employed fixed scenes, ‘type scenes’ in the creation of their work. In this use of formulaic elements there is like everywhere else also variety, the possibility of adapting the text to specific requirements of the context or the situation, a certain freedom within limits. In our book this has been analyzed in great detail.

        In this connection I would like to say a few words about the literary quality of the poems, although I am quiter aware of the precariousness of pronouncing an aesthetic judgment on works of literary art  from a period long ago or from a culture quite different from one’s own. And this problem becomes even more difficult in connection with the formulaic style of the poems involved.

        Yet I dare to say that these poems in many places are of a high value. I think that no present-day reader can fail to be struck by the poetic quality of certain fragments and (sequences of) verses. A few examples must suffice. In the following verses Bujangga Manik takes final leave of his mother:

642     A(m)buing karah sumanger.       My mother, therefore, farewell.

        Paw(e)kas pajeueung beungeut,   This is the last time we see each other face to face,

        a(m)bu kita deung awaking.      you, mother, and me.

645     Sapoé ayeuna ini,       This one day, today,

        pajeueung beungeut deung aing.  you see me face to face.

        Mo nyorang pacarék deui,        We shall speak to each other no more,

        moma ti na pangi(m)pian,        except in our dreams,

        pajeueung beungeut di bulan,    we shall see each other’s face in the moon,

650     patempuh awak di [awak di] angin.’      we shall feel each other’s body in the wind.’

 

In Sri Ajnyana the protagonist speaks as follows about the sacred  kabuyutan, the heirloom which is the sanctuary:

270            Kéna a(ng)geus katariwal,        For once it has been lost,

                hanteu nu murian inya,                                     no one is able to retrieve it,

               samar geusanna ngaha/nan.                                   uncertain are its whereabouts.

                Leutik ti siki sasawi,                                             It is smaller than a mustard seed,

                samar manan tapak kumbang,                                 elusive as the trail of a bumble-bee,

                ngalé(ng)gang di awang-awang,                      transparent in the air,

                tapakan kuntul manglayang,                                 the track of a soaring heron,

Nor can the type-scene giving vent to feelings of sorrow and misery by the old patih Sombali (R 105-123) be denied poetic value by any standards, even though most of the lines recur in other contexts as well:

105     Aki patih (sang) Sombali,       The old vizir Sombali,

        kawilet déning t(e)resna        overwhelmed with affection,

        gadebug ni(n)dihkeun manéh. = 280, 821  threw himself down.

        Handeru nerusan gunung, = 285, 825      His crying echoed through the mountains,

        ngocéak maracan désa,   = 284, 824      his wailing resounded through the country,

110     ngajerit maracan langit.  = 286, 826    his screaming resounded through the sky.

        Sabuat di tengah tegal, As he was in the middle of the fields,

        huma(n)deru nguwung-nguwung,    he cried loud and deeply,       

        midangdam humariwangwang,       wailing and lamenting,

        handeru sada wawangku,  = 287, 830      crying like a wawangku-bird,

115     ngocéak sada toléak,   = 288, 833       screaming like a toléak-bird,

        ngadengék sada dederék,   = 289, 832    screeching like a dederék-bird,

        sada talantang buana,    = 290, 834     like ‘surveyors of the world’,

        héman ku na pa(n)ten tandang,   because he loved his mistresses,

        katineung basana haat,  remembered their kindness,

120     basana eukeur nyarita,  when they were still alive,

        di kadaton Léngkapura.  in the palace of Léngkapura.

        Ceurik ngaléah ngalangkub, cf. 276, 282 He wept deeply miserable

        awak bitan tataruhan.  = 283    his posture like one engaged in betting.

 

        In ascribing beauty to such pasages one involuntarily brings up the matter of originality of the poems. For modern readers tend to associate poetic value with individual craftmanship of poets. In the examples given, especially the last one, it is obvious that we have a stereotypical description of the expression of human suffering, belonging to the stock-in-trade of the poet. Therefore, such a passage most probably is not his ‘original’ creation. In the case of unique ‘poetic’ passages in our material one might suppose that they are original creations, but even here chances are that we are dealing with formulaic material which poets had at their disposal, but which we do not recognize as such through lack of sufficient comparative data. In view of the probably large amount of formulaic material one may assume that originality in the modern sense of individual creativity on the part of the poets played only a minor role in the composing of these poems. The poets were assemblers, rather than creators of the texts. Their individual role was restricted to applying the ‘variation’ withing the fundamental ‘identity’. This, of course, does not detract from the poetical value of their creations, the difference from modern poetry being that this value has to be ascribed to the anonymous literary tradition rather than to the individual authors, who by the way are also anonymous and themselves form part of that tradition.

 

e. The religious content of the poems

        Two of the poems bear a typically religious character. The Sri Ajanyana text has a markedly didactic character; employing the form of an allegory about a celestial being who has committed a grave sin and is therefore expelled from heaven. It shows how evil deeds lead to suffering, misery and finally to hell, unless the sinner in time repents and by following religious instruction and carrying out asceticism and worship may find the way back to heaven and eventually reach deliverance from the misery of earthly existence. The protagonist who passes through this painful process is a celestial figure called Sri Ajnyana. Obviously the name of the protagonist symbolises what he strives to achieve. The word ajnyana is frequently used, with a variety of semantic distinctions. A central meaning is ‘(essential) knowledge’ in expressions such as sari ning ajnyana ‘the essence of knowledge’; there is also an expression éndah ajnyana hiang Wisésa ‘beautiful is the knowledge of the Supreme God’; but ajnyana also means ‘mind’, ‘soul’: several times it is told how demons (buta) assume power, ‘mingling with and defiling the mind (soul)’ awor ka na ajnyana; similarly it is said that ‘beautiful forms and appearances defile the mind’ nyalimur di na ajnyana; the instructions of the great sage ‘pervade the mind’ paracna ka na ajnyana.  

        So the protagonist by his very name represents the originally pure mind or soul, which has become defiled by his sin so that the demons get access to it and may carry out their destructive work; but thanks to his remorse and obedience to the instructions which he receives he is able to reach deliverance from all the impurities (often called mala) and reach the state of pure knowledge (or a pure mind, ajnyana nirmala); the ultimate goal of the instructions is said to be suka ajnyana sunia ‘the joy of an empty mind’, in the sense of the Indian šûnya ‘empty, void, in a state of immateriality’, with the corresponding noun šûnyatâ, ‘the absolute Void’.

        The nature of SA’s ‘original sin’ is not specified, but from the discussion which he has in the beginning of the text with his ‘little sister’ it is clear that this sin is a sexual relationhip with the celestial girl Puah Aci Kembang, and that they have to descend to the ‘middle world’ to atone for their sin (ngamasih dosa). About the girl no more is told, but SA is painfully aware of what awaits him: ‘to suffer as a human being and to be punished in the world’ (kasangsara/ awaking jadi manusa/ kapataka di buana). After descen-ding to earth in order to become a human being (manu-sa) he adopts the shape of a creature (man-grupa janma), assumes a bodily form (ngayuga raga sarira), taking on a body with lower passi-ons (mipan-gawak raja tamah). The panca (maha)bu-ta, the five elements (e-arth, water, fire, wind, ether)- become associated with the panca indri(y)a, the five senses correspon-ding to these ele-ments. The next step in the process of demo-nicization of the body is that various demons (butakala) over-powe-ringly (ngawisesa) mix up with and con-tami-nate the (pure) mind (ajnyana), and settle in the body, thereby bloc-king the life-giving soul (atma pre-mana, Skt. Ojv. pra-mâna). This way the supreme meaning (rasa wisésa) disappears, knowledge is effaced by oblivion, and the pure (nirma-la) spirit is replaced by a dirty (mala) one.

        The protagonist becomes painfully aware that ‘regret never precedes but is bound to follow later’ (na ngeureuy hanteu ti heula/ purah nuturkeun peundeuri, cf. the Malay proverb sesal dahulu pendapatan, sesal kemudian apa gunanya, ‘repentance always comes too late’), and that by his situation he has become a warning example of the consequences of sin: by the overpowering force of lusts and passi-ons (raja tamah) the demons have made him into an evil human being: gluttonous, jealous, hot-tempered, angry, selfish, in short sinful and destined to go to hell (lumebu ing kawah). This is the inevitable fate of his birth as a human being.

        The basic philosophy of the text is clear. It is essentially the message of the major Indian religions, in particular Shiwaism, as it had become popular in Java during the Middle Ages, with all kinds of variations: human existence on earth is ‘an ocean of suffering’; inevitably it goes from bad to worse, eventually leading man to punish-ment in hell. In this particular case the whole process is set in motion by a specific sin. What follows in the text is a purely verbal and mental pro-cess: we hear of no concrete sins or specific evil deeds which SA in his earthly existence commits; in fact we hear nothing about his life on earth: by beco-ming a human being he is ipso facto destined to lead a miserable life and to become a morally bad person who irrevocably will go to hell.

        In this stage of awa-reness of his inevitable fate SA has a vision, a memory from the past: the content of the sacred texts, the lessons of an eminent sage. Only these can bring him deliverance from his impure state. When he finds a great sage (mahapandita) willing to instruct him, this teacher explains to him that ‘evil is man’s innate nature’ (hala na tuah eureunan), and that he should avoid all the vices of which he himself in fact has already become aware. The teacher stresses how this evil nature creates in man a ‘self-seeking (egotis-tic) spirit’ (cipta hangkara, the Sanskrit word ahamkâra), making him ‘ill-disposed towards his fellow-men’ (salah rasa pada janma), ‘full of anger, hot-tempered’ (keroda panas bara). There is only one way to reach deliverance from the impurity (the words mala and nirmala, ‘im-pure’ and ‘pure’ return several times): he has to ‘mas-ter the secrets of asce-ticism’ (sandi tapa, Ojv. sandhi ning tapa). By devo-ting himself to asce-ticism he will find the libera-ting insight of hiang wisesa, ‘the supreme one’.

        Sri Ajnyana then realizes that he is able to master the instructi-ons, however difficult to grasp, the words of the teacher will cure him from his sinful existence, and will bring him eternal clarity of mind and joy, and the ‘mea-ning of eternal voidness’ (rasa langgeng sunia; for sunia see above). In fact, the essence of know-ledge (sari ning ajnyana), the jewel of truth (manik wastu) is to be found within oneself. Step by step one will achieve his final liberation through ‘the essence of knowledge’: the perfect jewel (manik pre-mana), the su-preme essence (aci wisesa, aci being the Sundanese equivalent of Java-nese sari ‘quintes-sen-ce, the finest part’), the eternal voidness (langgeng sunia), the crucial mea-ning (rasa jati), the holy true insight (sanghiang ajnyana sidi, Skt. siddhi). The bliss of achieving this final goal is evoked in extatic terms.

        The essential elements of the poet’s Weltanschauung are clear: man’s nature is basically evil; by yielding to his evil nature he will not only inevitably live a miserable life, behaving badly to his fellow-men, but he is also doomed to end up in hell. It would seem that this basic philosophy is representative of  the religious culture in Java in medieval, pre-islamic times as it was adhered to and promulgated by the numerous religious centres and schools all over the island. The same basic creed is found in texts such as the Old Javanese Kunjarakarna, and its Sundanese adaptation, and also in all kinds of Javanese tutur, religious manuals.

        Not only in the religious teachings the Indian/Shiwaitic element is strongly dominant. We also recognise many elements of Indi-an cos-mology in the names of the heavens and their gods as well as in the kind of human beings who after their death come to reside in these heavens: the four heavenly abodes in the four quarters are familiar, wara), namedíe.g. in the east there is the heaven of the god Isora (Î Jambudrasana, the place where all true ascetics go. The sout-hern hea-ven, in accordan-ce with Ojv. cosmology, is called the Brahmaloka; this heaven is the place for people ‘who burn incense and fire-wood’; in the Korawâšrama (Swellengrebel 1936: 78-79) it is indeed the heaven destined for those who faithfully bring the requi-red -of-ferings. And there are many more names of gods, heavens, and people residing in those heavens which are familiar from Indian and Old Javanese mythology. It is indeed remarkable that in the philosophy of this text there is apparently room for a ‘third way’, an alternative to either hell and damnation as a consequence of a sinful existence, or release and absolute voidness as a result of asceticism. Each of the four heavens has a certain category of meritorious persons as inhabitants. The first group (the ascetics) is called satia di sabda ‘loyal to the word’ (of the teacher, or of the book); the second have to be satia di laksana ‘loyal in the implementation’ (of their vows and worship); those who earn their merit by pious donations have to be satia di suka ‘loyal in the pleasure’ (of  giving away their earthly possessions); whereas war heroes have to be satia di guna ‘loyal in their (military) service’ (unconcerned for their physical well-being).

        There are yet other passages in the text where it is explained that those who have earned special merit will be given places of their own in heaven. In the final part of Sri Ajnyana’s journey, after his return from the ‘golden house’, he visits a number of heavens. To mention only a few, after having passed the four worlds (caturloka), he reaches the Meukah world which is the Siak heaven (buana Meukah); this proba-bly is a reflection of Mekah, the holy town of Mecca. From there he arrives at the heaven called the holy (sanghiang) Len-gis; its most important inhabitant is familiar: she is Manondari, the wife of Rawana, also in the Rama poem. She lives there with Nilasita, the wife of the holy Surugi-wa, in whom we recognize Sugriwa, another figure prominently present in the Old Sundanese Rama story. Another heaven is called Manarawang; this is derived from tarawang Ojv. and MSd., meaning ‘pier-ced, wide open, transparant’; its inhabitants are sanghiang Sri and the goddess Satiawati. Satyawati in Skt. and Ojv. is identified explicitly as as the wife of king (maraja, from maharaja) Salya, an ally of the Kaura-wa’s; she volun-ta-rily follo-wed her husband as béla in his death on the great battlefield of the Mahâbhârata, or Bratayuda. Thus, even though the text is focussed on the story of the ascension to heaven of the male protagonist, whereas his former beloved in absentia is pictured is as an incurable sinner, it is clear that women can also reach a heavenly state by their faithfulness, virtue and courage; they are provided with celestial abodes of their own.

        The Bujangga Manik text belongs to the same culturo-religious sphere as the Sri Ajnyana, however, there are marked differences. Sri Ajnyana is a celestial figure and the whole story is set in heaven and deals with its divine inhabitants, with the exception of a short period where SA is doomed to dwell on earth – it is even said explicitly that he descends at Mt Damalung (= the Merbabu) in the district of Pantaran – until he has received instructions from the mahapandita which set him free from the earthly bonds. Conversely the Bujangga Manik story is about a human being who is recognizably earthly. He comes from the kraton in Pakancilan, travels all over Java, hundreds of identifiable place names, rivers and mountains which he visits or passes are mentioned, he meets various people, and he crosses by boat to Bali. Only in the end when his soul has been liberated from the earthly kurungan, due to his strict adherence, for many years, to the requirements of asceticism, does it ascend to heaven.

        Consequently there is also hardly any mention of heavens or heavenly figures, nor are there explicit theological or moral lessons by various figures as they abound in the Sri Ajnyana poem. The story is rather an exemplum of individual renunciation of the world as the road to liberation of the soul. Bujangga Manik systematically rejects any form of wordly honour of glory; he is even averse to communication with his fellow-men, except for practical reasons, e.g., when he approaches the captain of a ship which he wants to board to travel to Bali. This attitude of his, which comes close to misanthropy, is expressed most poignantly when he breaks for good with his mother as she tries to persuade him into accepting a marriage proposal by a beautiful lady of the highest standing. He makes her the most severe reproaches that she wants to keep him from fulfilling his intention ‘to go with the ascetics, to walk with the hermits, to follow the abbot, the wise men and the sages’ His final words are a bitter farewell: ‘My mother, therefore, farewell. It is the last time we see each other face to face, you, mother, and me. This one day, today, you may still see me face to face. We shall speak to each other no more, except in our dreams, we shall see each other’s face in the moon, we shall feel each other’s body in the wind.’ After these harsh words he departs, never to return.

        Bujangga Manik’s negative or inimical attitude towards his fellow-men stems from a pessimistic view of human nature. He declares this explicitly when his soul before entering the heaven is interviewed by the gatekeeper Dorakala, who askes him: ‘did you love all people in the world, in the past when you were living in the middle world’. Bujangga Manik’s reply, although he tries to restrain himself is unambiguous:

        Mumul misaksi na janma, I refuse to call to witness human beings,

        pangeusi buana ini,     the inhabitants of this world,

        janma di madiapada.     the people of the middle world.

        Sariwu saratus tu(ng)gal,       Among the one thousand one hundred and one,

        kilang sahiji mo waya,  there is not even one,

        janma nu teteg di carék.        one person whose word can be trusted.

Such a pessimistic view of human nature was apparently characteristic for the religious circles from which a text such as this one and the story of Sri Ajnyana emanated. Man is essentially sinful, the world is a cesspool of vice and impurity, and the only way left to escape from this doomed earthly existence and to reach release is by following a path of asceticism, devotion and abstinence.

It may sound paradoxical that, after this lofty aim of deliverance from earthly bounds has been achieved by fulfilling the strictest demands of asceticism and abnegation, the heavenly world which the soul of Bujangga Manik enters is depicted as a place of the utmost wealth and luxury, where a fantastic bathing-place awaits the newcomer, with all kinds of glamorous toiletry, and where he is received with the greatest honour in a celestial palace, the beauty of which defies all description. However, ‘what is bred in the bone will come out in the flesh’: for the poet the only means of adequately evoking the blissful reward for the pious pilgrim is a glorification of heaven where his ‘self’ will stay. Even Bujangga Manik’s soul (atma) is vested with a body and with corporeal beauty by the guard of the heavenly gate (twice the word awak is used, referring to BM’s soul!). It would seem that in this respect the text is far from unique in world literature: there is hardly any way of poetically representing the happiness of the soul in the hereafter, other than with images derived from earthly greatness, beauty and glory.

 

f. The local, Sundanese character of the texts

        From what has been said above it might seem as if the poems, although written in Old Sundanese, are essentially foreign texts, representing Indian or at best Old Javanese culture: the Rama text as an offshoot of the Greater India Ramayana tradition, the other two as manifestations of popular Shiwaism as it developed in ‘Greater Java’ on the basis of Indian religious and philosophical systems. However, this impression is one-sided, if not completely wrong. In the final part of this paper it shall be pointed out that we are dealing with literary products of a typically local, i.e. (Old) Sundanese nature.

        First of all the Rama poem. It has already been explained that its plot: the resumption of the war between the sons of the two protagonists Rama and Rawana is unique. Dr. Noorduyn has carried out extensive research with respect to the Ramayana tradition in Southeast Asia, but he has not been able to find a trace of this particular story. Furthermore, the text abounds with typically local elements. Some examples may be given. A characteristic phenomenon already referred to by Noorduyn is the many personal names and toponyms which are indigenous, often specifically Sundanese. It is true that in particular the main personages are identifiable by their names as figures from the general Ramayana tradition. But even the name of one of the protagonists Manabaya, Rawana’s son, commander of his father’s army, is not known from elsewhere. Similarly Hayam Canggong, the hermit who plays an important role in the story, as he finds Sita and brings her children up, is typically a local name. The same holds good for the names of the hermitages and monasteries mentioned at the beginning, which are visited by Sombali (Subali in the Ramayana) before settling down in his own hermitage. Also Sundanese are the name of the place where the body of Manondari is found, pasir Simiri-miri as well as most of the toponyms connected with the earlier battlefield, visited by Manabaya. Similarly most of the names of Rawana’s warriors are unknown from the Ramayana tradition, even though some of them would seem to be Sanskrit.

        Many details of the plot of the poem could also be said to be typical of a local, popular story. It should be observed that the borderline between Ramayana tradition and popular stories is not sharp. In the Ramayana, even in the classical texts, much more so in the popular Rama stories, all kinds of traits and motifs occur which are sometimes widely known from folk literature in general. In our text we find numerous motifs of this kind. The protagonists on both sides have a miraculous background. Manabaya is born from the wounds of his mother; he still has blood in his mouth and his mother’s intestines hang around his neck when Sombali finds him. This miraculous birth gives him magical power, a theme which throughout the text keeps turning up. Rama’s son Bujanggalawa is born thanks to the fact that Sita’s life is miraculously saved. The story that she is put in a chest and thrown in a river, in order to be found by the hermit Hayam Canggong, is typically a story fitting in popular Indonesian tradition, although the motif of Sita being thrown in the sea is also known in the Ramayana tradition. Similarly, the story of the magic creation of Rama’s second son, Puspalawa, is also not unknown in the Rama corpus, although his creation from the holy Sundanese book Watang Ageung is of course local.

        The initial part of the poem is also relevant in this connection. It begins with a prologue which is comparable to what in traditional Sundanese pantuns is called the rajah, the introduction in which the narrator invokes supernatural beings. Even some of the names mentioned here are the same as those found in pantuns, especially batara Nagaraja, the king of snakes in the underworld known from Skt and OJv, and sang Rumuhun (‘the Initial One’, a local word), the personification of the ancestors or of the origin of things. A difference from a traditional rajah is that in the present text natural phenomena such as day and night, moon and sun, sky and earth are invoked as witnesses as well as two figures of unknown status, Nusia Larang and Nusia Awak Larang ‘the holy Forbidden One’ and ‘the holy Forbidden Body’; what or who is meant by these names is not clear. The figure Nusia Larang also occurs in Bujangga Manik, where the traveller from the top of Mt. Papandayan sees all the  paninggal Nusia Larang, the ‘remains of the holy Forbidden One’. Nusia Larang is also mentioned in other OSd texts.

        The names of the capitals of the protagonists also deserve our attention.. Throughout the poem the capital of Rawana to which his sons return is called Léngkapura, the é being a unique characteristic of our text. Usually the a from Skt. Langkâ(purî) is maintained, e.g., in MJv wayang and in the Malay Hikayat Seri Rama. For the residence of Rama and his sons two names are employed. The usual name in the poem is Léngkawati; the other one is Pancawati, referring to the palace a in the Skt. Râmâyâna is the forestð(kadaton) of Rama. Pancawa where the banished Rama resided. It is curious that this toponym occurs in our text as the name of the palace of Rama, as it is not known as such from other sources. Léngkawati which seems to be used as a synonym of Pancawati is apparently also unique to this text. Is it a blending of Léngkapura and Pancawati? The common name of Rama’s palace Ayodhya (Ayudya in wayang) is lacking in the poem.

        We shall now discuss a few other characteristic elements of the text. The narration proper starts with the former minister of Rawana, Sombali (Subali in the Javanese Rama stories): after he left Léngkapura he lived in a number of hermitages and finally settled in a hermitage on Mt. Kukulan, the name of which is later mentioned as Mandala Pasikulan. Sombali is made aware of horrible things which have happened by terrifying natural omens, and he immediately knows the explanation of these phenomena: the death on the battlefield of Rawana and of his two consorts who had declared that they would follow their master in his death (béla). Sombali finds a new-born baby lying near the body of  Manondari, whom after some hesitation he recognizes and takes home as his prospective master: ‘he is full of magic power (wisésa) since he came forth from a wound’. Sombali gives him the name of Manabaya.

        The second episode deals with the birth and youth of the children of Sita. It begins with Rama’s decision to repudiate Sita  because she is accused of having committed adultery with Rawana while kept prisoner by him. This story, which does not belong to the classical Ramayana traditon, is widely known in South and Southeast Asia. A typical feature of the Old Sundanese poem is that Sita is sentenced to death by Rama, but thanks to the intervention of Laksamana, Anggada and Hanuman her life is saved and she is put in a chest and thrown into the river. Throughout this text Laksamana is the wise old man and adviser to the sons of Rama.

        This motif of putting Mandodari in a iron chest and throwing her into the sea is also known from the Malay Hikayat Sang Rama. There it is told that Rawana is married to Mandodari, who gives birth to a beautiful daughter. However, when the astrologers predict that the future husband of this girl will become king of the whole world, and that even Rawana himself will die at his hands, Rawana decides to do away with this girl. In fact, the motif of a baby put in a chest or basket and thrown into a river is widespread in Indonesian literatures and elsewhere (the story of Moses in the Old Testament!).

        A final scene to exemplify the special character of this poem is found at the end of the text. Rama who died soon after the great battle and who then resides in heaven is apparently not aware of what has happpened on earth; he even does  not know that he has two sons. When the siege of Rama’s capital by the army of the enemy reaches a critical phase Bujanggalawa apparently feels the need for acknowledgment by his father Rama and decides to go and visit him in heaven. His mother is doubtful whether he will succeed (‘perhaps you will not be acknowledged’). Nevertheless he sets out to carry out his plan. The stage then shifts to heaven, but what happens there is very worldly. When Rama refuses to acknowledge his son a violent battle is fought between the two, ending in a victory of the son, who is then acknowledged by the father ‘lest it bring disaster on earth, the world be destroyed’, as sons should not defeat their father. The most curious element of this scene is perhaps the fact that heaven, the residence of  the deceased, is so directly accessible to men living on earth; it is no more than an extension of the sublunar world, and the usual worldly actions and attitudes are continued there. In this respect we are again in the sphere of popular, local religious beliefs and far from the classical conception of heaven and earth. These few examples may suffice to show that the Old Sundanese text, while belonging to the general Southeast Asian Rama tradition, has marked, local characteristics of its own.

        Comparable things may be said of the other two poems. It has been explained above that in the case of the poem of Sri Ajnyana we have a recognizably Shiwaitic setting. The text is dominated by philosophical and religious teachings, concepts and values which originate from Indian/Sanskrit culture, even though many of these ideas and terms had for centuries been incorporated and assimilated in the culture of ancient Java as we know it from Old Javanese literature. However, local elements, in the sense of non-Indian cultural features, words and concepts are far from absent.

        Even in religious expositions and terminology we come across local words or phrases; a good example is the crucial line, repeated several times: ‘evil is man’s innate nature’ (hala na tuah eureunan) which consists of three local words, two of them Sundanese only. During Sri Ajnyana’s trip to heaven together with the heavenly messenger Déwa Laksana, they have to pass the slippery and wob-bling golden foot-brid-ge (cukang omas, qualified by some nine local Sundanese words), in order to reach the road that is impas-sable for monks, asce-tics, nuns, etc., whose behavi-our has been blame-wort-hy. Only faithful monks and nuns are able to pass this road. A number of terms for various kinds of religious people are mentioned, the majority being non-Sanskrit (guruiang < guru hiang, ebon-ebon, indang-indang, (pu)putut, ameng; only tiagi is of Skt provenance); these are also well-known from Old Javanese. The celestial ladies whom Sri Ajnyana meets in the golden house and afterwards, however, bear typically local names: Puah Aci Kuning and Puah Lakawati; in fact the central gods from the Hindu pantheon themselves hardly play a role in the text; some are mentioned in passing, e.g., Isora Guru (Κwara) as the lord of the eastern heaven, Sumara(dana) as the god of erotic love, sang Yama(dipati) as the god of death and hell, Brahma in the name Brahmaloka of the southern heaven. The only one who is rather prominent in the religious speculations is Kala, the god of annihilation. Similarly the detailed description of the heavenly abodes and of the golden house belongs typically to the local culture. It is remarkable that certain materials or textiles used are explicitly qualified as foreign: the heavenly abodes make abundant use of Chinese and Indian (and even Khorasani) iron, silver, copper, gold and textile. The text also mentions camphor from Barus.

        Most typically Sundanese is perhaps the long list of all the flowers, many of them with Sundanese names, which draw the attention of Sri Ajnyana while walking up the road to heaven . He also observes how a great variety of bees, wasps and other insects busily enjoy sucking the nectar of the flowers, their buzzing giving the impression of a complete Sundanese orchestra playing in concert. Here we are unmistakably in the local world of the writer of the text.

        In conclusion, it can be said that the Sri Ajnyana text presents us with a typical example of such a localized Indian religious, philosophical and cosmological system. There are a large number of Indian words and concepts, nearly always in their Old Javanese form, but they are localized, in the sense which Noorduyn, following Wolters, used in another context: ‘Indian materials tended to be fractured and restated and therefore drained of their original significance by a process which I shall refer to as “localization”.’ Sri Ajnyana forms part of a large body of all-Javanese pre-Islamic religious texts which contain basically the same system, with all kinds of variations. At the same time it is a typically Sundanese manifestation of this localized culture, not only in its language and the poetical form of an octosyllabic verse structure, showing a close relationship with Sundanese oral tradition, but also in various specific elements, which are not found in texts in Javanese. Clearly it is a  typical document of ancient Sundanese literature and culture.

                The third poem, that of Bujangga Manik, is doubtless the most typically Sundanese of the

three.The protagonist is a Sundanese noble, who lives in the palace of Pakancilan; we hear about his relationship with his mother, her daily life, how she is busily weaving; there is a lengthy scene dealing with the wedding proposal to Bujangga Manik by another noble lady, with extensive description of the presents which she herself prepares and orders her servant to bring to the palace of Bujangga Manik’s mother. There is a detailed description of the various types of  betel quids, and of many other interesting details about life at the Sundanese courts at the time. Then there is the extensive travelogue, presenting us with a realistic picture of medieval Java. No less than 450 toponyms are mentioned, among which are at least 90 mountains and 50 rivers. As a scholarly detective Dr. Noorduyn has traced back Bujangga Manik’s ‘tour of Java’ and established the accuracy of its description. It is also remarkable from a Sundanese perspective that in the text a number of sakakala which Bujangga Manik encounters on his journey are mentioned; these are apparently some form of memorials; there is one of Tuhan Cupak on Mt. Caru, of Silih Wangi at a (West Javanese) bathing place Jala Tunda; Mt. Merapi is called the sakakala  Darmadéwa (whoever that may be); in the neighbourhood of Gunung Agung there is a sakakala of Sangkuriang.; finally, near Mt. Bulistir there is one of Patanjala.

                The journey culminates in a panorama of the world from Sundanese perspective, when the traveller, nearing the end of his journey, ‘ascends Mt Papandayan, which is also called Panénjoan’; the global panorama which unfolds before his eyes is a curious mixture of reality and imagination; not only the surrounding mountainous area is described in great detail, but in his visionary view the traveller’s eye covers the whole known world, including Minangkabau, Malaka, Cempa, even wandering as far as China and India.

                The religious experiences of the protagonist are also depicted in some detail, e.g., the temptations which he has to resist, especially but not only by women. Throughout his poem we learn implicitly how the way of life of a true ascetic should be. He pictures himself as a brusque and short-tempered man who avoids people as much as possible and who always seeks quiet and solitude. Already at the very beginning when leaving the kraton, he rudely ignores the questions of curious people on the street who ask him the most common Indonesian question to start a communication: ‘where are you going?’ He reacts: ‘Thus questioned I did not want to speak’. His need for quiet study and asceticism makes him keep aloof as much as possible from his fellow-men and he avoids places which are crowded, e.g., when he comes to Bali, apparently in order to continue his studies. He is confused by the crowd which he sees there and frustrated he leaves the island after a (relatively) short time. This experience is repeated later on when he visits another centre of religious studies, Rabut Palah, the state temple of Majapahit. There he intensively studies Javanese language and (religious) literature, but he ‘cannot stand the continuous noise’ of all the worshippers and tourists and he leaves the area as soon as ‘his curiosity is satisfied’. In West Java on Mt. Sembung, probably ‘one of the secondary peaks of Mt. Malabar’, he finds a place where he can devote himself to asceticism, but after some time even here his rest is disturbed: ‘Too often I was visited by outsiders, by people who came from below, too often there were temptations’, so that he feels compelled to leave again. This experience is repeated literally once more on Mt. Bulistir, and it is only on Mt. Ratu that he finds the place where his final aim can be achieved.

                This emphasis on absolute solitude and aloofness from one’s fellow-men is obviously a fundamental condition for successfully striving for the ultimate goal of asceticism and religious study. A second remarkable point is that the nature of the asceticism which the protagonist practises is not specified. It is obvious from various references throughout the text that all kinds of manual work, such as sowing and planting, sweeping the yard,  erecting a lingga or a statue, even building a whole settlement, are an essential part of tapa. But no yoga-like physical or spiritual exercises are described. Only in the passage telling about his asceticism on Mt. Sembung are we told that after paying homage he carries out meditation (samadi), contemplating about the aim of his efforts: to become ‘eternal and imperishable with the Supreme Being’ (purusa), in this following the example of the great sage, concentrating on the self and following his essential being, ‘unmoved by outward appearances, full of courage, strong of heart, like a great saint’.

                In this connection the story about the narrator/protagonist’s physical death is remarkable for the information it contains concerning the conceptions about the hereafter. First it resumes what happens: ‘I died without illness, passed away not because of suffering, was released through final liberation’. Body and soul are separated: ‘my body entered the world of the dead (petra), …. becoming a god, the connecting bonds entering the void.’. Petra is the Skt OJv word pitara(h) or the singular pitr ‘ancestors, deceased forefathers’. According to our text the body of a deceased person receives divine status; in OJv cosmology the pitara inhabit a special region. The bonds of the soul which is tied to the five elements by the five âtma are broken by the death of the body, and then they disappear into non-existence (the ‘void’ suwung). So ‘the soul is released from its bonds, the essence is released from the soul’  (atma mecat ti pasambung, aci mecat ti na atma). From these lines it is also clear that what is finally released is not the atma, but the aci which is contained in, or connected with, the soul. This aci is identical to what in Old Javanese is called sari (or in other texts a), the essence of a human being, what remains after the death of the body,îeíwi freed from all the physical connections.

                The text finally says  that ‘my soul dissolved into invisibility, similar to a divine being’ (atmaing dalit ka lentik, sarua deungeun déwata); the word lentik ‘small’ is MSd leutik (lemes alit). Besides ‘small’ the latter in OJv also means ‘immaterial, unsubstantial’, often used in contrast with ganal ‘coarse, material’. Apparently the gods (or a god) have this same quality of unsubstantiality.

                Altogether we have in this passage an interesting summary of the ideas about death, the hereafter, and the continuation of a person’s existence, when he has been released from the earthly bonds by his physical death. They largely concur with what we know from OJv sources; such ideas go back to Indian, especialy Shiwaitic philosophy, but have passed through a process of localization. Further study of other contemporaneous texts would be necesssary in order to acquire a more systematic knowledge of this popular philosophy, which also continued to exert its influence long after Islam had been introduced in Java. In this respect there is a basic correspondence between the two religious poems.

 

Conclusion.

                I hope it has become clear from the brief discussion of the three poems which have been unearthed and opened up by Dr. Noorduyn, that they form a most valuable expansion of our knowledge of Old Sundanese literature and culture. They are first of all interesting from a literary point of view, as they provide us with an original as well as aesthetically fascinating new contribution to the rich and variegated scala of poetical expressions in Indonesian languages. They are another manifestation of the bhinneka tunggal ika which is so characteristic of Indonesian culture.

                Secondly these poems give us a valuable picture of  early religious and cultural life in West Java, which forms part of the broader cultural pattern of medieval Java, but which at the same time is a clear product and manifestation of Sundanese cultural identity. In particular the poem of Bujangga Manik I venture to call an encyclopedia of Sundanese culture, referring to a characterisation by Havelock of the Homeric poems Ilias and Odyssee as an encyclopedia of early Greek society. Of course it is not a modern encyclopedia comparable to what Ajip Rosidi and his colleagues have recently succeeded in providing us with, in their masterly Encyplopedi Sunda, an invaluably rich source on Alam, Manusia dan Budaya Sunda. Yet, in their own time and in their own way those medieval poems, in particular the Bujangga Manik, have provided their contemporary readers with high-level didactic entertainment, making them aware of their Sundanese identity. These texts deserve a place of honour in Sundanese culture as well as in Indonesian literary history.

 

Leiden, June-July 2001

  

Short Curriculum Vitae of the Author

Born 12-08-1921 in Gorinchem; studied at Leiden and Utrecht University. PhD. Utrecht 1946, dissertation ‘Het Bhomakawya, een Oudjavaans gedicht’.

1945-1947 lecturer in Javanese at Utrecht University.

1947-1951 ‘taalambtenaar’ attached to the Universitas Indonesia in Jakarta, author of ‘Indonesisch-Nederlands Woordenboek’ (Groningen-Djakarta 1950) together with W.J.S. Poerwadarminta; 1949-1950 dialect research in Lombok (Sasak language); result ‘Dialect Atlas of Lombok’ (Jakarta 1951).

1951-1955 professor of general and comparative linguistics at Utrecht University.

1955-1986 professor of Bahasa Indonesia and Malay language and literature, Leiden University. Retired since 1986.

Visiting professorships at University of Michigan, Ann Arbor (1962-1963); Gadjah Mada University, Yogyakarta; Peking University (1988); University of California in Berkeley (1990).

Honorary doctorate: Universitas Indonesia 1975.

Many publications in the fields of modern and classical Malay/Indonesian literature and Old Javanese literature, as well as a book on literary theory: ‘Sastra dan Ilmu Sastra’ 1984.

Currently engaged in the publication of the edition of the three Old Sundanese poems discovered and edited by Dr. J. Noorduyn. This book is due to appear in 2002.

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