AI Summary
5 min readIn 1815, the English colonial official Thomas Stamford Raffles traveled across the island of Java, searching for the ruins of a lost empire. He had heard stories of a great civilization that had once ruled the Indonesian archipelago, a Hindu-Buddhist thalassocracy that had built vast temples, sailed ships to Africa, and defied the Mongol Empire. When Raffles finally reached the site of the ancient capital near the village of Trowulan, he found little more than scattered brickwork and broken sculptures buried under volcanic ash and shaded by teak forest. The local people warned him that a curse lingered over the stones, and that anyone who visited the ruins would lose their position within the year. Raffles dismissed the superstition, but within a decade he was dead from a stroke, the Napoleonic Wars had ended his governorship, and the remains of Majapahit faded back into the jungle.
The Island and the Ring of Fire
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What you'll learn
- 1 (00:01) **Introduction: Raffles and the Curse of Majapahit** - Thomas Stamford Raffles, the British Lieutenant Governor of Java in 1815, travels the island fascinated by ancient ruins and hears stories of a great empire.
- 2 (13:12) **Episode Premise: The Empire of the Islands** - The host, Paul Cooper, introduces the episode's focus on the rise and fall of the Majapahit Empire.
- 3 (14:34) **The Pacific Ring of Fire: The Volcanic Landscape of Java** - The geological context of Java is established as a volcanic island born from the Pacific Ring of Fire.
- 4 (33:55) **The Kingdom of Mataram: Temples in Stone** - The Hindu-Buddhist kingdom of Mataram rises in central Java, building monumental temples like Borobudur.
- 5 (50:56) **Javanese Seafaring: Raiders, Traders, and Voyagers** - The Javanese become renowned sailors, building large ships and undertaking voyages across the Indian Ocean.
- 6 (65:46) **The Fall of Mataram: Volcanic Cataclysm** - The Mataram kingdom declines and is abandoned, likely due to a catastrophic volcanic eruption.
- 7 (77:49) **The Rise of Singhasari: The Man Who Overturned Everything** - A new kingdom, Singhasari, is founded by the legendary commoner Ken Angrok.
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Show Notes
Beneath the shade of an Indonesian teak forest, a great brick gateway stands in ruins...
In this episode, I want to tell the story of the Majapahit Empire of medieval Indonesia. I want to show how this empire of the islands grew up on the volcanic island of Java, and how it beat the odds to survive in a world of medieval superpowers. I want to show how Majapahit expanded its influence and dominion to other lands, and undertook voyages that have few precedents in history. And I want to show what happened to bring this empire of the islands finally crashing down...
SOURCES: https://www.patreon.com/fallofcivilizations_podcast/posts/sources-for-21-165265269Voice Actors
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Henry Stenhouse
Michael Hajiantonis
Alexandra Boulton
Simon Jackson
Catherine James
Tom Marshall-Lee
Chris Harvey
Jack Jacobs
Nick Denton
Amrit Sandhu
Paul Casselle
Tim Stephenson
Ameen Taher
Readings in Old and Middle Javanese were performed by Ferry Sanjaya and Kadha Aditya.
Historical advisor: Dr Alex West
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