Mapping Majapahit: Wardenaar’s Archaeological Survey at Trowulan in 1815
In 1815, Lieutenant-Governor Raffles ordered J. W. B. Wardenaar to survey the site of the ancient royal capital of Majapahit at Trowulan in East Java. The authors recently traced Wardenaar’s Plan of Majapahit in the British Museum. GPS data and georeferencing reveals that the 1815 plan is remarkably accurate. On the basis of Wardenaar’s own descriptions and other supporting evidence, the authors reidentified the locations of the main sites, including the fourteenth-century royal palace, the alun-alun square, Ca??i Mut?ran, Ca??i G???ong, the original site of the Jåkå ?olog statue, the medieval moat around Ca??i Ménak Jinggå, and the place where the Majapahit kings were seated in audience, flanked by four elephants. They conclude that Wardenaar’s plan provides a unique cartographic image of Indonesia’s historic site on the eve of two centuries of site destructions.