Royal Eccentricities

A few kilometers outside Cirebon’s city limits stands an architectural oddity – an amalgamation of caves, gapura (narrow, towering gates made of brick), resting huts and canals, held together by what, from a distance, can best be described as melted cheese mixed with coral shrapnel.

Taman Arum Sunyaragi does not wear its eccentricity lightly. This maze-like complex was originally built more than 300 years ago for the local sultan and his wives, a retreat where the royal ones could cool off in bathing pools and meditate. The complex was originally encircled by a moat and at one point was defended by fortifications. These were put to the test in 1787, when the complex became the site of an insurrection against the Dutch, and again during the Java War of 1825–30.

Walking around Sunyaragi today, it’s hard to fathom what the original complex looked like. Destroyed by battles, the site was restored – a charitable word in this case – in the mid-19th century by a Chinese architect, who transformed it into a maze of Taoist grottoes, haphazardly piled up on top each other.

Grotesque? A corruption of Javanese Hindu architecture? Refreshing experimentation? Sunyaragi is all of these things, and a children’s delight. Enter one of these hill-like caves and you will emerge moments later on a small terrace, a few meters higher, with a commanding view of Sunyaragi. Try to wind your way back down the same way you came and you are most likely to end up in one of the maze’s tiny chambers – empty, damp and lonely. In some places here, the silence can be deafening.

Sunyaragi, simultaneously many things and none at all, can be a frustrating experience for history buffs. Piecing together the clues to its history among the discarded plastic bags and the tangled roots is akin to figuring out what’s in your ratatouille. And the impression one is left with is strands of disjointed legends, rather than a feeling of having experienced history.

+ Marc-Antoine Dunais

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