The inscription

Every time I visit the province of Lampung to meet my in-laws, I usually drive from Pringsewu regency to Kota Agung Beach, a popular tourist destination in the nearby Tanggamus regency. On my way there, I often pass road signs to the Batu Bedil site.

I asked my relatives and friends what Batu Bedil was all about. To my surprise, only my father-in-law could give me an answer. “It’s a prehistoric site in Pulau Panggung subdistrict,” he said. When asked whether he had been there, he said it was almost 15 years ago. He was unsure what it looked like lately. So, I invited my relatives to accompany me there, but they were reluctant.

“Sorry, we are not interested in such old stuff. Although we live close to the sites, we have never been there,” Rusda, 45, said, giggling. Her husband Yanuar added, “We even didn’t even know that such a place existed.” Similar sounds of reluctance came from others.

After doing some research, I was determined to embark on my journey to Batu Bedil. I managed to drag my family along.

The site can be reached by car in one and a half hours from Bandar Lampung, the provincial capital. During the journey, we saw lines of traditional wooden houses known as Lambanon both sides of the road. Once we passed the Talang Padang Market, we turned right to follow the signs to Batu Bedil.

Along nearly 18 kilometers of gravel road we could see cocoa, coffee and vanilla plantations. There were also seasonal crops such as corn and cassava. The air was hot and still.

The road was very quiet. Only a few motorbikes passed, creating an eerie, tranquil atmosphere – as if we return to the remote past. We felt like we were in the middle of nowhere and drove in silence.

Finally, we arrived at a cluster of houses in Batu Bedil Hulu in Tanggamus regency’s Pulau Panggung subdistrict. Here lies the Batu Bedil megalithic site on a hill about 320 meters above sea level, part of the Bukit Barisan mountains.

From atop we could see Mt Tanggamus to the south and Mt Rindingan to the north. No guard was around. So, we asked several local people living next to the site. We were lucky because one of them, PakMursyid, 50, could give us short explanations about the site and even he acted as our tour guide.

Batu Bedil megalithic site indicates the existence of civilization in Pulau Panggung area whose community existed around two thousand years ago. There is also a menhir, around 220 centimeters tall, the highest at the site.

Myth has it that during the Dutch colonial era, there were sounds of the bedil or rifle from the stone. Since then people called it Batu Bedil or the rifle stone. Several smaller menhirs are scattered around the site.

Mursyid told us that the cluster was composed of three sites: The megalithic, the inscription and the statues. The Batu Bedil inscription is located only about 100 meters away from the Batu Bedil megalithic site. An inscription is a history source which provides information on political events, religions or the condition of the community in that time, usually released by an authority.

The inscription was written on a stone 185 centimeters high, 72 centimeters wide and 55 centimeters thick; containing 10 worn out lines of sentences in Sanskrit, and was constructed circa 9th– 10th centuries, when it was under the Sriwijaya kingdom (7th– 10thcenturies). From the letters, several words can still be read: Namo Bhagawate in the first line and Sw'h' at in the 10th line.

The third site, Batu Gajah, lies 4 kilometers away and is located on a narrow road connecting Talang Padang and Air Bakoman villages.

The Batu Gajah site, around 750 square meters and situated in the middle of a residential area, is located at Batu Bedil Hilir . The local administration put barbed wire fence around the area in 1994. In this site there are unfinished statues of Batu Gajah (Elephant Stone), Batu Kerbau (Water Buffalo Stone) and several menhirs.

The Elephant Stone is made of a monolith 94 centimeters tall, 21 centimeters wide and 164 centimeters thick, made of tufamaterial, a kind of limestone. It looks as if the stone is intended to be carved as an elephant head, complete with trunk, tusks, eyes and ears.

To the left and right side of the stone there are scratches made by an elephant’s body and feet. During that era, an elephant was considered as a holy animal in Hindu belief – a symbol of fertility and a charm against bad luck. Later on, an elephant was also believed to be the vehicle of God Indra.  
Next to Elephant Stone lies the Water Buffalo Stone, measuring 100 centimeters tall, 140 centimeters wide and 135 centimeters thick, also made of tufamaterial, carved completely including mouth, nose and eyes.  In the yard there are 12 small menhirs.

“Apart from this cluster, there is still another site called Situs Gelombang (the Wave Site), located across the Ilahan River. If you would like to have a look, I can accompany you there,” Harun, another man we met at the site, offered his help politely. However, we thought that we’d seen enough, beside, the evening had crawled in.

As night fell, I had a new understanding about this piece of land, which at first looked desolate. It  was inhabited a long time ago by a megalithic community whose descendants later on became glorious Sriwijaya Kingdom citizens. Later, I found out that the Batu Bedil cluster was declared a Cultural Heritage Site in 2004.

—Photos by Ani Suswantoro

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