Interlinearity and Language Studies in Old Javanese

October, 2023

Keiko Kamiishi

 

Many Old Javanese literary works were adapted and translated at the Javanese court in Yogyakarta under British rule from 1811 to 1816. In particular, an epic poem of Indian origin called Bhāratayuddha seems to have appealed to modern Javanese and British readers in Yogyakarta in a different way than other works: while many kakawin works were translated into Modern Javanese only in the kawi miring or macapat forms of poetry, the Bhāratayuddha was translated also in a prose version with the original text appearing along with the translation.

MSS Jav 25 (now at the British Library) is one of the manuscripts that conveys the content of Bhāratayuddha relatively faithfully to the original text by placing the original text alongside the translated text. Along with the original Bhāratayuddha text in black, the Modern Javanese translation is written in red just below it. The original text is written in Balinese script, not Javanese script. In other words, this manuscript consists of two parts, namely, the original Old Javanese written in Balinese script, and its Modern Javanese version written in Javanese script. It seems that this manuscript contains the full text of the Bhāratayuddha as the first page contains its first canto and the last page concludes with the 54th canto which is its final one.

 

Figure 1: A Bhāratayuddha manuscript with Old Javanese in black ink and its Modern Javanese version in red ink, 1812. British Library, MSS Jav 25, ff. 6v-7r. Photo: Keiko Kamiishi.

 

According to the catalogue, the manuscript was written during approximately four months, from the end of April to the end of August 1812, and was owned by the son of Panambehan [Panĕmbahan] of Samanap [Sumĕnĕp] (Ricklefs, P. Voorhoeve† and Annabel Teh Gallop 2014: 61). This indicates that this manuscript was created in Java under British rule. The Panambehan of Samanap, who is called Panambahan of Sumenáp by Raffles in his monumental work The History of Java, was the informant whom Raffles relied on at the time and whom he considered to be a rare Old Javanese scholar in post-Majapahit Java, albeit with limited linguistic abilities. The Panambahan of Sumenáp came from a Javanese family that had specialized in the ancient scripts and in Old Javanese, and Raffles noted that this family had acquired this knowledge through connections with Bali (Raffles 1817: 370).

As Javanese courts had become Islamized, Hindu-Javanese culture and associated traditions of court literature fell into disuse and knowledge of Old Javanese gradually diminished. On the other hand, Bali became, and continued to be, a center of Hindu-Javanese tradition where the manuscripts of Old Javanese literature were copied and preserved in better conditions than on Java.

In his book Raffles writes the following about Bhāratayuddha: “Considering how little was known on Java of the Kawi language, and how likely that little was to be lost for ever, I felt a strong interest in analyzing and translating, as far as practicable, one of the principal compositions in that language; and availing myself of the literary acquisitions of the Panambahan of Sumenáp..." (Raffles 1817: 410). Kawi here refers to Old Javanese.

If we assume that the manuscript MSS Jav 25 was also part of Raffle’s project, then it is most likely a manuscript created on Raffles’ order with the help of the Panambahan of Sumenáp or someone from his family, and its purpose was to attempt to learn Old Javanese and its grammar using stories written in that language.

Another manuscript associated with the Panambahan of Sumenáp is Lor. 2174E which contains the Old Javanese original text of the Rāmāyaṇa with verbatim interlinear glosses below it. What MSS Jav 25 and Lor. 2174E have in common is that Modern Javanese is inserted between the lines of the original Old Javanese text, whether it is word for word or sentence by sentence. Another common feature is that rather than writing the original text in modern Javanese script, the scribes tried to recreate the ancient sounds by using a different script.

The Old Javanese text in MSS Jav 25, written in Balinese script, distinguishes sounds which are not distinguished when writing in modern Javanese script. For example, the long vowel ā is distinguished from the short vowel a by adding the long syllable markers called tedung after a consonant. Also, when writing the long vowel ī, the marker ulu sari is used instead of the marker used for the short vowel i. Also, d in dental and ḍ in palatal, t in dental and ṭ in palatal, s in dental, ś in retroflex, and ṣ in palatal are written in different scripts. These differentiations also occur in Lor. 2174E.

            Such similarities between MSS Jav 25 and Lor. 2174E encourage a hypothesis: the fact that both manuscripts with interlinear glosses are associated with the Panambahan of Sumenáp or his family indicates that he utilized interlinearity as a method of translating Old Javanese in dealing with the tasks commissioned by Raffles. And, if so, the interlinearity in these two manuscripts focuses more on language learning than on conveying the content of the original text because the purpose of the Bhāratayuddha translation as stated by Raffles was the learning of Old Javanese. In addition, reproducing sounds of Old Javanese, which are no longer used in Modern Javanese, by using Balinese script or an ancient Javanese script was an essential option for Raffles, who attempted to preserve the knowledge of the language that he feared was on the verge of being lost at the time. Further research is needed to develop and substantiate this hypothesis.

 

References and image credits:

British Library MSS Jav 25

https://www.bl.uk/manuscripts/FullDisplay.aspx?ref=MSS_Jav_25

Leiden University Library Lor. 2174E

 

Raffles, Thomas Stamford, 1817, The History of Java. Volume One. London (reissued with a new Introduction 1978, Kuala Lumpur: Oxford University Press).

Ricklefs, M.C., P. Voorhoeve† and Annabel Teh Gallop, 2014, Indonesian Manuscripts in Great Britain: A Catalogue of Manuscripts in Indonesian Languages in British Public Collection, New Edition with Addenda et Corrigenda. Jakarta: Ecole française d'Extrême-Orient, Perpustakaan National Republik Indonesia, Yayasan Pustaka Obor Indonesia. Naskah dan Dokumen Nusantara Seri XXXIII.