"Babad" redirects here. For the talmudist, see Yosef Babad

Yosef Babad

Yosef Ben Moshe Babad was a Rabbi, posek and Talmudist, best known for his work, the Minchat Chinuch, a commentary on the Sefer Hachinuch. He studied under Chaim Halberstam, the Sanzer Rov, and enjoyed close relationships with the various Hasidic leaders of Galicia...

Java

Java

Java is an island of Indonesia. With a population of 135 million , it is the world's most populous island, and one of the most densely populated regions in the world. It is home to 60% of Indonesia's population. The Indonesian capital city, Jakarta, is in west Java...

nese literature has a very large historical component. In all sorts of texts, such as laudatory poems, chronicle

Chronicle

Generally a chronicle is a historical account of facts and events ranged in chronological order, as in a time line. Typically, equal weight is given for historically important events and local events, the purpose being the recording of events that occurred, seen from the perspective of the...

s, and travelogue

Travel literature

Travel literature is travel writing of literary value. Travel literature typically records the experiences of an author touring a place for the pleasure of travel. An individual work is sometimes called a travelogue or itinerary. Travel literature may be cross-cultural or transnational in focus, or...

s, writers have interpreted the how and why of certain circumstances.

These texts are important for the knowledge of Javanese perspectives on the past. Scholars of Javanese history have paid much attention to theoretical questions, aiming at a balanced evaluation of Javanese historiography

Historiography

Historiography refers either to the study of the history and methodology of history as a discipline, or to a body of historical work on a specialized topic...

 next to Western historiography. In doing so they focused on Old and Modern Javanese sources, drawing both on written sources and archaeological and epigraphic material. The debate continues up to the present.

Babads

Babads as a genre belong to the traditional literature. Characteristic for this kind of literature is that it is written in metrical form and is governed by a set of strict conventions. Anything written in prose (gancaran) was in traditional Javanese society not considered as belles letters, but merely served as a kind of note-book or aide-mémoire.

This is connected with the way in which literature used to be presented: it was not usually read in silence, but was recited or sung to an audience. Every metre had is own particular melody or melodies to which it was sung, in harmony with the contents of the story.

The word babad means 'a story about past events', 'text on the clearing of (the land...)', i.e. 'story about the origin of this or that settlement'.

The Babad Basuki relates the clearing of the jungle and founding of a new settlement in Besuki (East Java), while the Babad Dipanegara relates the events connected with the insurrection of Diponegoro

Diponegoro

Diponegoro , also known as Dipanegara, was a Javanese prince who opposed the Dutch colonial rule. He played an important role in the Java War...

.

Kakawin and kidung

Kakawin

Kakawin

Kakawin are long narrative poems composed in Old Javanese, also called "Kawi", written in verse form with rhythms and metres derived from Sanskrit literature. Poets used a formalized literary language, rather than the vernacular...

 are long epic poems in a defined metre inherited from Sanskrit

Sanskrit

Sanskrit , is a historical Indo-Aryan language and the primary liturgical language of Hinduism, Jainism and Buddhism.Buddhism: besides Pali, see Buddhist Hybrid Sanskrit Today, it is listed as one of the 22 scheduled languages of India and is an official language of the state of Uttarakhand...

 poetic forms. Kidung

Kidung

Kidung is a form of Old Javanese poetry. They differ from kakawin in that they use Javanese meters instead of imported Sanskrit ones, and mostly appeared later. The subject matter is based on historical events. Like kakawin, they later became an important source of inspiration for pictorial art...

 are epic poems in Javanese metres

Javanese poetry

Javanese poetry is traditionally recited in song form. The standard forms are divided into three types, sekar ageng, sekar madya, and tembang macapat. All three types follow strict rules of poetic construction...

.