A Puputan Tale: "The Story of a Pregnant Woman"

Year

Related Places

Klungklung

Writer(s)

Property "Writer" has a restricted application area and cannot be used as annotation property by a user.Helen Creese

Photographer(s)

Reference

https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/view/UQ:120413

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Description

In English

On Sep 20, 1906, Dutch armed forces launched their final offensive against the remaining independent kingdoms of South Bali. By late afternoon the royal families of both of Badung's ruling houses--the senior house, Pun Denpasar, led by Cokorda Ngurah Made Pamecutan, and Puri Pamecutan, under the leadership of the ailing Cokorda Agung Pamecutan--had been annihilated. Creese talks about a ceremonial ritual of death known as puputan, "or ending," where the rulers--who are dressed in ceremonial white and brandishing their kris--together with hundreds of their followers walked directly into the Dutch fire and fell in a hail of bullets.

In this article, Helen Creese introduces and translates the narrative of a female puputan survivor and witness. The story, reframed by one of the narrator’s descendants, was published in the Bali Post in 1977.

Indonesia 2006

In Balinese

In Indonesian

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