Southeast of Bali is the island of Nusa Penida, or Pandita (colloquially changed to “Bandit Island”). Under the rule of Central Bali’s former Klungkung kingdom, Pandita was Devils Island to which criminals were banished. Another dynasty of Balinese princes, from Karangasem, crossed Lombok Strait to rule over Lombok from the mid-18th to nearly the end of the 19th century. Lombok adopted Islam during the religion’s eastward spread which missed Hindu Bali.

Bali’s north coast, more than a narrow strip between mountains and sea, did not favour out side contacts reaching farther inland. It is mainly covered by one extensive district, Buleleng. To the west, north of Jembrana, lies Pilaki, a remote strech of country whose cosmological situation is highly unfavorable, located as it is both near the sea and to the west, where the sun sets and death rules. To the Balinese, little could be worse.

On the other hand, a location in the mountains and in the east (where the sun rises and life dominates) is higly auspicious. That is exactly where Bali’s most sacred mountain, the Gunung (mount) Agung or great Peak of Bali, lies. It is also the island’s highest mountain (3,142 meters). The great all-Balinese sanctuary, Pura (temple) Besakih, is on its slopes.

The mountains of Central and East Bali make up the island’s solid core, which resembles a vertebral spine running from the center to the east in a curved line : Gunung Batukaru ( the Peak of Tabanan, 2, 276 meters), Bratan (2,2020 meters) north of Lake Bratan, and, most impressive, Gunung Batur (1,717 meters). From the bottom of an earlier crater-whose enormous caldera wall has axes of 10 and 15 kilometers and encloses the crescent-shaped 5-kilometerslong Lake Batur-rises its secondary volcanic cone. On the lake’s eastern border lies the village of Trunyan, mentioned as early as Hindu Bali’s first inscription. The road along the crater wall provides a most wonderful view of the crater complex. On the wall’s northwestern corner rises Mount Penulisan (1,745 meters), atop which sits a highly sacred sanctuary. The two major roads connecting South Bali with the north pass either the Batur caldera (Kintamani) or Lake Bratan. Mount batur was ascended for the first time in 1906 by the painter W.O.J Nieuenkamp, a pioneer of archaeological research in Bali.

Both Batur and Gunung Agung are active volcano’s, and gave ample evidence of their destructive powers in 1926 and (after along silence) in 1963, respectively. Yet the mountains are auspicious places, inhabited by the gods. There is no mountain without a deity (no more than there is any lake without one). In Indonesian thought, ancestors also dwell in the mountains. The direction where the mountains lie (kaja) is naturally favorable. Mountain springs provide the “holy” water which purifies and assists the soul of a dead person in reaching its heavenly destination, or higher still-final liberation. Priest prepare various types of ritualistic holy water, a sacrament of such importance that the Balinese religion is called agama tirtha,” the holywater religion.”

For North bali, the mountains are in the south, for South Bali in the north. Kaja is thus to the south from Buleleng, and to the north from Central Bali. Kelod, “to the sea,” inversely is south for Central Bali, and north for Buleleng. Relation to actual compass point, how phenomena, and the consequences of this are entire system of auspicious and evil correlation. There are other categories, apparently of divergent origin, which are more directly connected with the compass. There are also vertically opposed directions to be considered: the Upper World of the Gods (worshipped with “light” offerings served in stands) and the Nether World of the Demons (“dark” offerings put on the ground). No one aspect is complete in itself. The world consists, and actually is in need, of both good and evil, which component each other. Only unification of all aspects and element results in the oneness, Totality, or Ultimate Reality is behind the apparent diversity in this “phenomenal world” of relativity.

Between Upper and Nether World in this Universe (for the Balinese identical with the world to which he is directly connected) is the madyapada, the Middle World of man. It is also that part between the mountains and the sea. In a way it is a vortex for all directions and conflicting tendencies. This center is anywhere the action is: in the village, in a temple, but most especially in temples regarded as the “navel” (pura puseh). It is also where during Creation the World Ocean first started to “turn into curd” when churned (pura kentel gumi).

In Indian cosmology there is yet another very different center of the Universe. The archipelago’s hinduized peoples were well aware of Mount Meru (Meru), Mahameru, or Semeru, the world’s central point and axis. In Indian cosmology this Cosmic Mountain was situate on the central continent of Jambhudvipa, where India itself was located. The mountain’s appearance was variously described. According to one view its peak was surrounded by four additional tops on a lower level. Sometimes another foursome was added still lower down. The Javanese naturally wanted Mount Meru closer, and proposed that it had been removed from the central continent to East Java. During Transportations, Mount Meru crumbled, and the main body and its top were separated. Interpreted in terms of modern Javanese topography, the main body became East Java’s Mount Semeru, the island’s highest (and still active) volcano. Stutterheim quite plausibly identifies Mount Meru’s top with Mount Penanggungan, an extinct volcano of medium height (1,653 meters), rising as solitary landmark from the plains of Surabaya. It is remarkable for its arrangement of 1+4+4 tops, which corresponds exactly with Mount Meru; Penanggungan therefore seems the best candidate for being the Cosmic Mountain’s broken – off top.

The Importance which the Javanese attached to this specific mountain corroborates this proposal. Besides two sacred watering places, as many as 80 terraced sanctuaries are spread over Penanggungan’s slopes. The story of Mount Meru’s removal from the central continent was likewise known in Bali, and was naturally translated into Balinese terms: Mount Meru was the Gunung Agung. It is curious that the Balinese connected this transfer with the historical Majapahit period. This was actually a mythological stage Balinese history; their relations to Majapahit marked the beginning of everything. During that period, God Pasupati moved Mahameru’s top from the Indian continent Bali, simultaneously sending his children Mahadewa and Dewi Danu to the island. Previously, however, the saintly hermit Sang Kulputih had arrived from Majapahit to establish the Besakih sanctuary. In away this story, told by the Balinese mytical and legendary history Usana Bali, stresses Bali’s double relation with India as well as Java . Most important in the Mahameru transplant is Bali’s direc connection with the Cosmic Mountain because of the Gunung Agung. The arrival of a new religion and its way of life is some what explained by the interference of Pasupati’s children. Their struggle against indigenous powers, demons and giants took place in the sacred land between the pararel rivers, Pakerisan and Petanu. Certain antiquities of an apparently unusual Hinduistic type, such as the colossal head in the Pura Gaduh temple at Blahbatu, are ascribe to giants antagonistic to the new way of life.

There are also various versions of another mythical event regarding Bali’s geography, its former connection to Java, and the final separation between the two islands. One version contains an exact date for this event, corresponding with A.D 202. Curiously enough, the same year is recorded in the Old Javanese panegyric Nagarakertagama (13650 for a similar geological occurrence – the separation of East Java and the island of Madura. Another legend puts the bali-Java separation much later, during the Kediri periode of Javanese history (1042- 1222). It was affected by a certain Brahman, Mpu (the Lord) Sidimantra, who was forced to banish one of these sons to the Gunung Agung region, at that time still at Java’s extreme end. To prevent the exile from returning, he drew a line with his finger a cross the isthmus connection Bali and Java thus creating an island.

Where North Bali does not invite entry, Central Bali offers ready access once past the dangerous Lombok Strait. Here most of the remains of Hindu – Balinese kingdom were found. Between Jembrana in the west and Karangasem in the east are the district former kingdoms of Tabanan, Badung,Gianyar, Bangli, and Klungkung. The district of Mengwi was divided Tabanan Badung and Gianyar in 1891.

Most of the south’s former kingdoms are comparatively narrow strips of land, often reaching from the coast far into the mountains, following the upstream course of certain important rivers. Divided over each of these domains were there different officially-related state temples; one in the mountains, one in the plains (the middle country), and one on the coast. Early immigrants able to obtain footholds in Central Bali eventually penetrated the interior by following river courses. Yet none of these mountain torrents are in any way navigable; their violent waters, from the mountains the coast, cut deep ravines into enormous layers of tuff-or paras –the gray conglomerate of volcanic ashes turned into soft rock through contact with rain and flowing water. Tuff is found all over the island under the surface humus layer, and the shape and boundaries of Balinese kingdom were determinate by the course of the ravines carved into it. Most important historically and archaeologically was the region between the two major rivers, Pakerisan and Petanu. The rivers ran parallel, farming a strip of hinduized land stretching far in land.

Except for a few motor roads for which bridges have been constructed, all roads still parallel the rivers. If you do not want to cross the ravines, you must often make detours to reach a place only a short distance awayas the crow flies. Even to the sure –footed Balinese who easily walk up and down the ravines [or so it seems], the rivers and their valleys have always been unrelenting landmarks. Rivers coursing through the tuff layers occasionally undermined and brought down rock masses. To early peoples this seemed to be supernatural manifestation requiring magical counteractions. It is understandable that sanctuaries, cloisters, hermitages, and monuments for kings and their retinue-all of these themselves concentrations of mysterious powers-were situated near these waterways. finished.

Photo by Dimas