Indonesia's Gunung Padang Pyramid Mystery
By Ar. Nadge Ariffin
The sprawling nation of Indonesia is often overlooked in world issues.
This includes in fields such as archaeology or other aspects of history,
ancient or modern. But together with its ethno-culturally related
neighbours Malaysia and the Philippines, which together make up the vast Malay
Archipelago of Southeast Asia, there are many treasures and much to learn in
this region.
Indonesia itself consists of about 17,500 islands; it is the biggest
archipelagic nation on earth. But it wasn't always insular. As near as around
10,000-plus years ago during the last Ice Age when ocean levels were much
lower, Indonesia and its above-mentioned neighbours were a conjoined continent.
Connected to mainland Asia by the Malay Peninsula, this continent is sometimes
geographically called Sundaland although native Malayic legends call it by a
local name “Benua Mu”, the lost continent of Mu.
Mu was long inhabited as attested by the many bones unearthed of
prehistoric humans in the region. A most famous of whom is the 11,000-year-old Perak
Man, the oldest complete skeleton, found ceremonially buried in a
cave at the UNESCO-listed Lenggong Valley in Malaysia. But various other
evidences of sapient human presence around the archipelago, including
prehistoric tools and paintings, go back tens of thousands of years.
How about pyramids?
Ancient built structures in Indonesia are a contentious issue and still
require much proper research. At present in Southeast Asia the oldest-known
built civilisational site is at Sungai Batu in Kedah, Malaysia. Surprisingly it
was an iron smelting and exporting complex of brick structures, certified
dating back to the 8th century BC (yes, Before Christ). The Sungai Batu site is
part of the old Malay kingdom of Kedah, which still exists today as a component
royal state in Malaysia, making it one of the oldest continuous geopolitical
entities in the world on par with contemporary Greece.
In Indonesia, a main reference point of historic architecture is the
spectacular 9th-century AD Borobudur carved stone temple complex in central
Java. This stepped pyramidal temple-mountain predates Cambodia's Angkor Wat by
several centuries. There are in fact many other historic stone or brick temples
and structures numbering in the hundreds scattered around the region, attesting
to the civilisational power of Southeast Asia. Besides stupa towers such as the
stunning Hindu Prambanan temples, many are pyramidal structures, especially
stepped models. This is the type associated with the Gunung Padang site.
The Gunung Padang Pyramid
Located several hours drive from Indonesia's capital Jakarta inland
at Karyamukti village, Cianjur regency, West Java province, Gunung Padang
is touted as a megalithic site and has become a tourist attraction with basic
facilities.
While “gunung” means mountain, “padang” means bright as in ‘daylight’ or
even ‘bringing light’ in the local Sundanese language. Gunung Padang is almost
900 meters above sea level and at the summit there are five stepped, flat
terraces strewn with some seemingly shaped rocks and stones in rubble or jumbled
rows and walls. While Sunda locals had always known of the “punden berundak”
(stepped terrace) sacred site and legends associated with it, including as a
palace of king Prabu Siliwangi, the Dutch colonials did mention it in
reports from 1914.
In 1979 following local initiatives, studies were begun by the
Indonesian government, and have continued off and on with various teams doing
research. Several surveys including lab-tested dating studies have been done,
but with the resulting controversies and contentions more peer reviews, detailed
studies and verifications are needed. Funds, or lack thereof, are a perennial
issue. Nonetheless, at end-June 2014, the Ministry of Education and Culture
declared Gunung Padang a national Megalithic Site, covering about 72 acres or
29 hectares.
At present, this writer was told that Gunung Padang’s status is in the
process of land acquisition for the whole site to enable more comprehensive
studies.
For now, the announced survey results basically declare that the site is
a huge asymmetric stepped pyramid built in four layers over different eras
covering an extinct volcanic formation. The dates for each layer range from
3000 years BP (before present) at the youngest or top surface, all the way down
to over 20,000 years BP at the lowest claimed man-modified section. Parts of
the summit site are comparable in looks or concept to the ancient
mountain city of Machu Picchu in Peru, or even Nan Madol megalithic lagoon city
on Micronesia's Pohnpei island in the middle of the Pacific Ocean.
Research leader geophysicist Danny Hilman Natawidjaja of the Indonesian
Institute of Sciences suggests that the site is a very ancient pyramid temple
dating as far back as possibly 28,000 years and that there are chambers or
cavities within the hill or pyramid.
Certainly more verification studies need to be conducted, but if the
claims are correct, Gunung Padang will obviously change the entire perception
of prehistoric societies. More so if coming from Southeast Asia, it would
completely overturn the history of the beginnings of human civilisation. For
now, the Gunung Padang pyramid remains a mystery.
Footnote: Internet searches for Gunung Padang would usually bring up information
and images of not one but two other claimed pyramid sites further east, towards
the Borobudur site. These are Gunung Lalakon and Gunung Sadahurip, which are
presently tall hills that when photographed from certain angles look uncannily
like four-sided pyramids. Similarly, both have been claimed as
long-forgotten ancient man-made structures. Thus, even more pyramid mysteries.
Photos and captions:
1. About 400 andesite stone steps of 1.5m wide connect the base to the summit of Gunung Padang.
2. General view of the stone-strewn summit from the lowest terrace. The flat ‘musical rock’ just after the lower line produces sounds when hit.
Visited in February, 2020
Written in March, 2020
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