Mosques and Minaretes: Transregional Connections in Eighteenth-Century Southeast Asia

Abstract

The eighteenth century stands as a neglected period in the study of the mosques of Southeast Asia (Fig. 1). The major scholarly surveys of Southeast Asia’s mosque architecture that go beyond description either focus on examples from the fifteenth to seventeenth centuries,[1] or restrict their analysis to Java, where examples from these earlier centuries—particularly the mosques of Demak and Kudus from Central Java (Figs. 2 and 3)—constitute the received canon in examinations of the region’s mosque architecture.[2] The short studies that do include mosques from the eighteenth century and after either still give more extensive treatment to earlier buildings;[3] or are descriptive and limited by present-day national boundaries, such as Indonesia.[4]This article thus departs from tradition by comparing a selection of eighteenth-century mosques from Melaka (Malacca), Malaysia; Palembang, Sumatra, Indonesia; and Jakarta (colonial Batavia), Java, Indonesia. It discusses aspects of their spatial and structural characteristics, including the form of their minarets, in order to shed light on the region’s eighteenth-century history, on the architecture of Southeast Asian mosques, and on the built environment of maritime and littoral regions more generally.