Bojongmenje is a 7th-century

Hindu Hindus (; ) are people who religiously adhere to Hinduism. Jeffery D. Long (2007), A Vision for Hinduism, IB Tauris, , pages 35–37 Historically, the term has also been used as a geographical, cultural, and later religious identifier for ...

candi (temple) ruins located in Bojongmenje hamlet, Cangkuang village, Rancaekek subdistrict, Bandung Regency,

West Java West Java ( id, Jawa Barat, su, ᮏᮝ ᮊᮥᮜᮧᮔ᮪, romanized ''Jawa Kulon'') is a province of Indonesia on the western part of the island of Java, with its provincial capital in Bandung. West Java is bordered by the province of Banten ...

Indonesia Indonesia, officially the Republic of Indonesia, is a country in Southeast Asia and Oceania between the Indian and Pacific oceans. It consists of over 17,000 islands, including Sumatra, Java, Sulawesi, and parts of Borneo and New Guine ...

. Bojongmenje is one of few temples ever discovered in West Java.

History

The temple ruins was discovered by locals on 18 August 2002 in a cemetery behind a textile factory. A month later the archeologist team conducted an excavation and successfully revealed the base of the temple pedestal structure, which was the remains of a temple.

Structure

The temple is located on

Priangan Parahyangan ( su, ᮕᮛᮠᮡᮀᮠᮔ᮪; Bantenese: Priangan; Dutch: Preanger) is a cultural and mountainous region in West Java province on the Indonesian island of Java. Covering a little less than one sixth of Java, it is the heartla ...

highland, at an altitude of 698 metres above sea level. The temple was made with

andesite Andesite () is a volcanic rock of intermediate composition. In a general sense, it is the intermediate type between silica-poor basalt and silica-rich rhyolite. It is fine-grained (aphanitic) to porphyritic in texture, and is composed predo ...

stone as building material. The temple have a square base plan with a side length of 6 metres. The shape of the temple building is simple and the walls consist only of one layer without bas-relief and decoration. Geological study of the temple stone estimates that the age of the Bojongmenje temple ranges from the 5th century to the 7th century. Based on archaeological findings on the Bojongmenje site, it is estimated that the temple was built between 7th and 8th centuries. This means Bojongmenje temple is one of the oldest temples in Java island, older than the temples of Central and East Java, or at least in the same period with the

Dieng temples Dieng temples ( id, Candi Dieng) is the group of 7th and/or eighth century Hindu ''candi'' or temple compounds located in Dieng Plateau, near Banjarnegara, Central Java, Indonesia. These edifices originate from the Kalingga Kingdom. The platea ...

in Central Java.

Notes

{{Indonesia topics Hindu temples in Indonesia Archaeological sites in Indonesia Cultural Properties of Indonesia in West Java 7th-century Hindu temples Religious buildings and structures in West Java

History

Structure

See also

Notes