01A temple at the end of an age
By the 1430s Majapahit was weakening and the north coast ports were turning to Islam. Up on Lawu, at about 900 metres, devotees built Sukuh in a form unlike anything else in Java: a truncated stone pyramid on three terraces, closer to the old Javanese punden, the stepped hill-sanctuary of the ancestors, than to the towers of Prambanan. A chronogram at the gateway gives the Shaka year 1359, which is 1437 CE. Within a generation or two the courts of Java had become Muslim, and Hindu temple building on the island stopped.
02Garuda frees his mother
The reliefs tell kathas of release. Three stelae show the Garudeya: Garuda carrying the pot of amrita to buy his mother Vinata out of slavery to Kadru and the nagas, a katha from the Adi Parva of the Mahabharata. Another relief shows Bhima and a smithy with a forge and bellows. The temple is linked with ruwatan, the Javanese rite that frees a person from a curse or ill fate, which is still performed with the wayang today.
The life of this place
- 1437 CE (Shaka 1359)A chronogram at the gateway dates the temple.
- 1815The ruins are recorded for the British administration of Java under Raffles.
About 36 km east of Surakarta (Solo), on the road to Tawangmangu. A sarong is provided at the gate.
