The traditional Communities of Java

There exists on the island of Java several communities which, without necessarily being in margin of the modern society, endeavor to maintain a lifestyle traditional. One calls them in indonésien masyarakat adat , which means " communities traditionnelles".

An explanation of their existence is the relatively recent expansion of the population on the territory of the island. Raids, lieutenant-governor general of Java of 1811 to 1814, had carried out a census of the population of the island which it had estimated at hardly more than 4 million inhabitants. There is today nearly 120 million.

The first factor which allowed the expansion of the population is an acceleration of the clearing. History of the settlement of Java east that of the clearing of the forest. It is undoubtedly not a chance so in Javanese, the same word, babad , means at the same time " chronicle, récit" and " to cut down (a tree), défricher". Until the beginning of the XIXe century, it is a very slow process. Formerly indeed, iron was rare in Java. There is no iron ore on the island. Iron was traditionally of origin meteoritic. The tools were thus rare, situation which did not allow a fast clearing of the forest.

In 1800, the Dutch government takes again the credits of the VOC (Dutch Compagnie of the Eastern Indies). He undertakes the development of the island. Iron starts to be imported by the Dutchmen in Java. The clearing of the forest can be done more quickly.

However, the forest was not uninhabited. Old inscriptions and Javanese texts mention marginal populations which populate the forest and escape the authority from the kings and the lords. The communities of villagers who cleared the forest, on their side, were often isolated. One can suppose that the meeting of these two types of population allowed the maintenance of a relative marginality compared to the centers of being able.

Baduy

It is most known of these communities. The Baduy (to pronounce " badouille") are an alive group in the forest, the province of Banten in the west of the island of Java in Indonesia, with 100 kilometers in the south-west of Jakarta, the capital. Their traditions prohibit to them to use some form of modern technology that it is and to reject any external influence. They observe the traditional religion Sunda is born, the agama Sunda Wiwitan .

Baduy speak a dialect Sundanais.

Traditional villages of the country Sunda

There exists, in the province of Western Java, in the east of Bandung, the provincial capital, some villages, classified kampung adat (" villages traditionnels"), the inhabitants respect certain numbers of prohibited:

Kampung Naga (the " village of the dragon") is most known of these traditional villages. The inhabitants do not have the right to differently build their house than according to an architecture and with traditional materials (wood frame, partitions of braided bamboo, thatched roof of rice).
In the village of Leles , in the middle of a pond, there is a small island, Cangkuang, whose surface does not reach a hectare. On this small island are a temple restored hindouist which one dates from VIIIe century, falls it from a supposed character being a commander of the army of the Agung Sultan of Mataram which by twice, at the XVIIe century, made without success the seat of Batavia, head office of the VOC in Java and a small hamlet of six houses. The small island is interdict with the " living beings with more than two jambes" : only are thus allowed there the human ones and the birds, of which poultry. It is interdict to build new houses there, and each one of it can shelter only one family: the children who marry must thus leave the small island. As in Kamping Naga, the houses are built according to a traditional architecture and materials which it is interdict to modify in anything. The village of Leles is the framework of the end of a novel of the Dutch writer Louis Couperus, the force of darkness (Editions of the Sorb).
Dukuh , Ciptagelar , Kuta , Sirnaresmi is other traditional villages.

The inhabitants of these villages endeavor to preserve their environment, in particular the forest, of which they are considered the guards.

Kalang

Kalang are a minority group of Java Centers which preserved their traditional religion. Documents going of XIVe century at the years 1850 describe the emergence of this mobile community which live cut, transport and trade of wood on behalf of the courses princely of Java and the Compagnie Dutchwoman of the Eastern Indies. Since the middle of the XIXe century, Kalang are specialized in trades such as the work of wood and leather, the transport of game, musicians of street.

Kalang were a community scorned by the remainder of the Javanese company. Today, their descendants form a dynamic commercial community.

My Huan, the interpreter who accompanies the Moslem Chinese admiral Zheng He in his stopovers in Java in 1413-1415, then in 1432, note that the inhabitants of the wearing of Java are of three kinds: " Hui-hui" (Moslems of the Western regions), Tang (Chinese, a part is Moslem) and of the natives of which it makes a horrible description. As this description contradicts others of the time which show a very refined Javanese company, it is thought that people about which My Huan speaks are of Kalang, whose manners and rites correspond to those that it describes.

The myth of origin of Kalang tells that a beautiful young girl weaving loses her spindle. Thrown into a panic, she promises the marriage with that which will return it to him. It is a dog which finds it. To fulfill her promise, the young girl links herself with the dog, then drives out it. She puts at the world a boy. Later that-cin keep silent a dog, without knowing that it is his/her father. The boy, ancestor of Kalang, are then condemned to carry out a wandering and animated life.

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