Mataram Sultanate
The Sultanate of Mataram (/məˈtɑːrəm/) was the last major independent Javanese kingdom on the island of Java before it was colonised by the Dutch. It was the dominant political force radiating from the interior of Central Java from the late 16th century until the beginning of the 18th century.[1]
This article is about a historic kingdom on Java in what is now Indonesia. For other uses, see Mataram (disambiguation).
Sultanate of Mataram
Mataram reached its peak of power during the reign of Sultan Agung Anyokrokusumo (r. 1613–1645), and began to decline after his death in 1645. By the mid-18th century, Mataram lost both power and territory to the Dutch East India Company (Dutch: Vereenigde Oost-Indische Compagnie; VOC). It had become a vassal state of the company by 1749.
Etymology[edit]
The name Mataram itself was never the official name of any polity, as the Javanese often refer to their realm simply as Bhumi Jawa or Tanah Jawi (lit. 'Land of Java'). Mataram refers to the historical areas of plains south of Mount Merapi around present-day Muntilan, Sleman, Yogyakarta, and Prambanan. More precisely, it refers to the Kota Gede area, the capital of the Sultanate on the outskirts of southern Yogyakarta.
A common practice in Java is to refer to their kingdom by metonymy, specifically by the location of its capital. Historically, there were two kingdoms that have existed in this region and both are called Mataram. The later kingdom, however, is often called Mataram Islam or "Mataram Sultanate" to distinguish it from the Hindu-Buddhist 9th-century Kingdom of Mataram.
Historiography[edit]
The key sources to uncover the history of the Mataram Sultanate are local Javanese historical accounts called Babad, and Dutch accounts by the Dutch East India Company (VOC). The problems with traditional Javanese Babad, are that they are often undated, obscure and incorporate non-historic, mythological and fantastic elements because these Javanese historical accounts were used as a tool to legitimize the authority of the ruler. An example of a mythical element is the sacred bonds between Panembahan Senapati with mythical Ratu Kidul, the ruler of Java's Southern Seas as his spiritual consort, as claimed in the Babad Tanah Jawi.[2]
The dates for events before the Siege of Batavia during the reign of Sultan Agung, the third king of Mataram, are difficult to determine. There are several annals used by H.J. de Graaf in his histories such as Babad Sangkala and Babad Momana which contain list of events and dates from the Javanese calendar (A.J., Anno Javanicus), but besides de Graaf's questionable practice of simply adding 78 to Javanese years to obtain corresponding Christian years, the agreement between Javanese sources themselves is also less than perfect.
The Javanese sources are very selective in putting dates to events. Events such as the rise and fall of kratons (palaces), the deaths of important princes, great wars, etc. are the only kind of events deemed important enough to be dated, by using a poetic formula chronogram called candrasengkala, which can be expressed verbally and pictorially, the rest being simply described in narrative succession without dates. Again these candrasengkalas do not always match the annals.
Therefore, the following rule of thumb is suggested: the dates from de Graaf and Ricklefs for the period before the Siege of Batavia can be accepted as best-guesses. For the period after the Siege of Batavia (1628–29) until the first War of Succession (1704), the years of events in which foreigners participated can be accepted as certain, but – again – are not always consistent with Javanese versions of the story. The events in the period 1704–1755 can be dated with greater certainty since, in this period, the Dutch interfered deeply in Mataram affairs but events behind kraton walls are, in general, difficult to date precisely.
Javanese kingship[edit]
Javanese kingship varies from Western kingship, which is essentially based on the idea of legitimacy from the people (Democracy), or from God (divine authority), or both. The Javanese language does not include words with these meanings. The concept of the Javanese kingdom is a mandala, or a centre of the world, in the sense of both a central location and a central being, focused on the person of the king (variously called Sri Bupati, Sri Narendra, Sang Aji, Prabu). The king is regarded as a semi-divine being, a union of divine and human aspects (binathara, the passive form of "bathara", god). Javanese kingship is a matter of royal-divine presence, not a specific territory or population. People may come and go without interrupting the identity of a kingdom which lies in the succession of semi-divine kings. Power, including royal power is not qualitatively different from the power of dukuns or shamans, but it is much stronger. Javanese kingship is not based on the legitimacy of a single individual, since anyone can contest power by tapa or asceticism, and many did contest the kings of Mataram.