Feasts in Ancient Java as evidenced by inscriptions

Abstract

The paper discusses feasts, food stuffs and food offerings offered to deities during the ceremony of free-hold establishment-sima-in the Mataram Kingdom in Ancient Java according to inscriptions in the Old Javanese language of the 9th 10th centuries. Food stuffs and goods listed in the text may reveal a common cultural tradition of offerings and/or be formulae fixing a certain amount of these offerings. Not only Ancient Javanese words were used to refer to animals, but also Sanskrit borrowings. The term kumol may mean “a lamb dish”. H.B. Sarkar’s and A.V. Zavadskaya's translations of Old Javanese epigraphy wrongly translate the terms v3as pada and bras pada as ‘unpeeled rice’ but the correct meaning is “husked rice”.