Kutai is the traditional name of a historic region in
East KalimantanEast Kalimantan is the second largest Indonesian province, located on the Kalimantan region on the east of Borneo island. The resource-rich province has two major cities, Samarinda and Balikpapan...
in
IndonesiaThe Republic of Indonesia is a country in Southeast Asia and Oceania. Indonesia comprises 17,508 islands. With an estimated population of around 237 million people, it is the world's fourth most populous country, with the world's largest population of Muslims.Indonesia is a republic, with an...
on
BorneoBorneo is the third largest island in the world and is located at the centre of Maritime Southeast Asia. Administratively, this island is divided among Indonesia , Malaysia and Brunei . Indonesians refer to the island as Kalimantan...
, a
DayakDayak may refer to:* Dayak people, an ethnic group native to the interior of Borneo island.* Dayak languages* Troy Dayak, an American former soccer player....
people of the region with a language of the same name and their historic states. Today the name is preserved in the names of three regencys in East Kalimantan, the
Kutai Kartanegara RegencyKutai Kartanegara Regency is a regency of East Kalimantan province, Indonesia. It has an area of 27,263.10 km² and water area of 4,097 km². Population of Kukar are 547,422 . Tenggarong is the capital of the regency....
,
West Kutai RegencyWest Kutai Regency West Kutai Regency West Kutai Regency ( is a regency in the Indonesian province of East Kalimantan. It has an area of 33,052 km² and population 136,161 people.Sendawar is the capital. The regency is subdivided into 21 subdistricts....
and the
East Kutai RegencyEast Kutai Regency or by is a regency of East Kalimantan province, Indonesia. It has an area of 35,747,50 km² and population 169,564 people...
. The major river of the region was and is the
Mahakam RiverThe Mahakam River is a river in Indonesia. It flows 980 km from the district Long Apari in the highlands of Borneo, to its mouth in Makassar Strait....
.
The history is usually divided into two periods, that of the early Kutai Martadipura phase some time around 350-400 and the later Kutai Kartanegara phase beginning around 1300.
Seven stone pillars, or yūpa (“sacrificial posts”), have been found in Kutai, Kaman Estuary, near the
Mahakam RiverThe Mahakam River is a river in Indonesia. It flows 980 km from the district Long Apari in the highlands of Borneo, to its mouth in Makassar Strait....
.
Kutai is the traditional name of a historic region in
East KalimantanEast Kalimantan is the second largest Indonesian province, located on the Kalimantan region on the east of Borneo island. The resource-rich province has two major cities, Samarinda and Balikpapan...
in
IndonesiaThe Republic of Indonesia is a country in Southeast Asia and Oceania. Indonesia comprises 17,508 islands. With an estimated population of around 237 million people, it is the world's fourth most populous country, with the world's largest population of Muslims.Indonesia is a republic, with an...
on
BorneoBorneo is the third largest island in the world and is located at the centre of Maritime Southeast Asia. Administratively, this island is divided among Indonesia , Malaysia and Brunei . Indonesians refer to the island as Kalimantan...
, a
DayakDayak may refer to:* Dayak people, an ethnic group native to the interior of Borneo island.* Dayak languages* Troy Dayak, an American former soccer player....
people of the region with a language of the same name and their historic states. Today the name is preserved in the names of three regencys in East Kalimantan, the
Kutai Kartanegara RegencyKutai Kartanegara Regency is a regency of East Kalimantan province, Indonesia. It has an area of 27,263.10 km² and water area of 4,097 km². Population of Kukar are 547,422 . Tenggarong is the capital of the regency....
,
West Kutai RegencyWest Kutai Regency West Kutai Regency West Kutai Regency ( is a regency in the Indonesian province of East Kalimantan. It has an area of 33,052 km² and population 136,161 people.Sendawar is the capital. The regency is subdivided into 21 subdistricts....
and the
East Kutai RegencyEast Kutai Regency or by is a regency of East Kalimantan province, Indonesia. It has an area of 35,747,50 km² and population 169,564 people...
. The major river of the region was and is the
Mahakam RiverThe Mahakam River is a river in Indonesia. It flows 980 km from the district Long Apari in the highlands of Borneo, to its mouth in Makassar Strait....
.
History
The history is usually divided into two periods, that of the early Kutai Martadipura phase some time around 350-400 and the later Kutai Kartanegara phase beginning around 1300.
Kutai Martadipura
Seven stone pillars, or yūpa (“sacrificial posts”), have been found in Kutai, Kaman Estuary, near the
Mahakam RiverThe Mahakam River is a river in Indonesia. It flows 980 km from the district Long Apari in the highlands of Borneo, to its mouth in Makassar Strait....
. The plinths bear an inscription in the Pallava script of India reading "A gift to the
BrahminBrahmins have historically been the class of educators, scholars and preachers in Hinduism. They are considered as belonging to the "forward castes" of the four varnas of Hinduism....
priestA priest or priestess is a person having the authority or power to administer religious rites; in particular, rites of sacrifice to, and propitiation of, a deity or deities. Their office or position is the priesthood, a term which may also apply to such persons collectively.Priests and priestesses...
s". The style of the script has been dated to the last half the fourth century. It is believed these religions were brought to Indonesia around the second and fourth centuries, respectively, when Indian traders arrived on the islands of
SumatraSumatra is an island in western Indonesia, westernmost of the Sunda Islands. It is the largest island entirely in Indonesia , and the sixth largest island in the world .-Etymology:Sumatra was known in ancient times by the Sanskrit...
,
JavaJava is an island of Indonesia and the site of its capital city, Jakarta. Once the centre of powerful Hindu-Buddhist kingdoms, Islamic sultanates, and the core of the colonial Dutch East Indies, Java now plays a dominant role in the economic and political life of Indonesia...
and
SulawesiSulawesi is one of the four larger Sunda Islands of Indonesia and is situated between Borneo and the Maluku Islands.- Etymology :...
.
The names of three rulers are known from the inscriptions. The first ruler mentioned is Kuṇḍungga, the “lord of men” (narendra), his son Aśwawarman, styled the “founder of the dynasty” (vaṇśa-kartṛ) and grandson of the first and son of the later, Mūlawarman called the “lord of kings” (rājendra). As Kuṇḍungga does not seem to be a name of Sanskrit hinduistic style while the other two are, it is presumed he was a leader of local origin and it was his son Aśwawarman that adopted the hinduistic belief. It was Mūlawarman who let these inscriptions be made. While nothing of the military actions of his two predecessors is known,
"Raja" Mūlawarman is stated to have conquered his neighbours in battle. The name of his kingdom is not mentioned on the inscriptions nor do any other documents in other countries relate to a kingdom at this time in this region. It is not known what became of the kingdom after these pillars had been erected. It may be possible that the name Kutai, as in Tuñjung Kute of the 1365 Javanese Majapahit poem
NāgarakṛtāgamaThe Nagarakretagama or Nagarakrtagama is an Old Javanese eulogy to Hayam Wuruk, the ruler of the Majapahit Kingdom. It was written as a kakawin by Mpu Prapanca in 1365 . The Nagarakretagama contains detailed descriptions of the Majapahit Kingdom during its greatest extent...
is as ancient and reflects the original name used a thousand years earlier.
Kutai Kartanegara
Around the end of the 13th century the kingdom of Kutai Kartanegara was established in the region of Tepian Batu or Kutai Lama. The first known ruler is Aji Batara Agung Dewa Sakti, who is thought to have ruled from 1300 to 1325. Aji Pangeran Sinum Panji Mendapa, who ruled 1635-1650, was able to conquer the kingdom of Kutai Martadipura and merged the two realms thus Kutai Kartanegara Ing Martadipura.
In 1667 the Dutch
V.O.C.The Dutch East India Company was a chartered company established in 1602, when the States-General of the Netherlands granted it a 21-year monopoly to carry out colonial activities in Asia. It was the first multinational corporation in the world and the first company to issue stock...
attacked
MakassarMakassar, is the provincial capital of South Sulawesi, Indonesia, and the largest city on Sulawesi Island. From 1971 to 1999, the city was formally named Ujung Pandang, after a precolonial fort in the city, and the two names are often used interchangeably...
on the island of
SulawesiSulawesi is one of the four larger Sunda Islands of Indonesia and is situated between Borneo and the Maluku Islands.- Etymology :...
leading to the downfall of the
BugisThe Bugis are the most numerous of the three major linguistic and ethnic groups of South Sulawesi, the southwestern province of Sulawesi, Indonesia's third largest island. Although many Bugis live in the large port cities of Makassar and Parepare, the majority are farmers who grow wet rice on the...
Kingdom of
GowaGowa is a region in the province of South Sulawesi, Indonesia. It is a "level 2 district," with an area of 1,883 km² and a population of approximately 500.000 people...
. Some of the Bugis under the leadership of Lamohang Daeng Mangkona or Pua Ado I immigrated to Kutai on neighbouring Borneo(Kalimantan) and the ruler of Kutai allowed them to settle in Kampung Melantai around the Karang Mumus River, now known as Kampung Selili. This settlement eventually developed into the modern town of
SamarindaSamarinda is the capital of the Indonesian province of East Kalimantan on the island of Borneo. The city lies on the banks of the Mahakam River...
.
IslamIslam Islam Islam ( al-’islām,
[There are ten pronunciations of Islam in English, differing in whether the first or second syllable has the stress, whether the s is or , and whether the a is pronounced as in father, as in cat, or (when the stress is on the i) as in the a of sofa...]
took hold in the region since the 17th century (most of the Bugis where moslems) and Aji Muhammad Idris, ruling 1732-1739?, was the first ruler to have an Islamic name.
After a civil war Aji Imbut, after finally becoming the ruler as Aji Muhammad Muslihuddin in 1780, moved the capital in 1782 from Pemarangan to Tepian Pandan. The name of the capital city eventually developed from Tangga Arung to its present form of Tenggarong.
In 1844 the Dutch defeated the Sultan Aji Muhammad Salehudin, forcing him into exile, and took direct control of Kutai.
The
Japanis an island country in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, People's Republic of China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...
ese invaded the region in 1942 and acknowledged a "Kooti Kingdom", that was a subject of the
TennoTenno may refer to:* Tennō, Emperor of Japan* Tenno , Italian comune and city...
. In 1945 Kutai joined, along with its neighbours, into the East Kalimantan federation.
In 1949 Kutai finally became part of the United Republic of Indonesia.
The Kutai Language
The traditional language of the region is referred to as Tanggarong Kutai Malay and is considered a
local malay languageThe Malay languages are a group of closely related languages that developed from Malay outposts across Malaysia and Indonesia. They include Malay proper , Bacanese Malay, Bengkulu, Berau Malay, Cocos Islands Malay, Jambi Malay, Kedah Malay, Kota Bangun Kutai Malay, Loncong, Pattani Malay,...
, such as
BanjareseBanjar language is the native language used by the Banjarese people of South Kalimantan, Indonesia. As many Banjarese are travelling merchants, they brought their mother tongue wherever they went all over Indonesia, even all over the world....
and Bukit Malay to the south, Kota Bangun Kutai Malay to the west,
Berau MalayThe Berau language, also known as Berau Malay, is an Austronesian language which is spoken by the Berau people in Berau Regency, East Kalimantan, Indonesia....
to the north and others more distant. As such Tanggarong Kutai belongs to the large
Austronesian familyThe Austronesian languages are a language family widely dispersed throughout the islands of Southeast Asia and the Pacific, with a few members spoken on continental Asia. It is on par with Bantu, Indo-European, Afro-Asiatic and Uralic as one of the best-established ancient language families...
of languages. It is part of the
Sunda-Sulawesi languagesThe Sunda-Sulawesi languages are a putative branch of the Austronesian family posited in Wouk and Ross...
branch, together with
MalayMalay is a group of languages closely related to each other to the point of mutual intelligibility but that linguists consider to be separate languages. They are grouped into a group called "Local Malay", part of a larger group called "Malayan" within the Malayo-Polynesian branch of the...
and
IbanThe Iban language is spoken by the Iban, a branch of the Dayak ethnic group formerly known as "Sea Dayak" who live in the Malaysian state of Sarawak, the Indonesian province of Kalimantan Barat and in Brunei. It belongs to the Malayo-Polynesian branch of the Austronesian language family, and is...
as well as
BugineseBuginese is the language spoken by about four million people mainly in the southern part of Sulawesi, Indonesia.-History:...
from southern Sulawesi that is also spoken in Samarinda. It is somewhat less related to the
Borneo-Philippines languagesThe Borneo-Philippines languages are a putative branch of the Austronesian family which includes the languages of the Philippines, much of Borneo, the northern peninsula of Sulawesi, and Madagascar.In this classification, the previously posited clade of Western Malayo-Polynesian ,...
branch that can be found upstream of Kutai such as the
Kenyah- The Kenyah people :The Kenyah are an indigenous, Austronesian-speaking people of Borneo, living in the remote Baram , Data Kakus, Data Surau,Sg...
and
KayanThe Kayan are an indigenous tribe from the island of Borneo. The Kayan people are categorized as a part of the Dayak people of Borneo.Being an indigenous tribe in central Borneo, Kayans are similar to their neighbors, the Kenyah tribe, with which they are grouped together under the Bahau ethnic...
language groups.
External links