Rare Books | Digest Spring 2026 Liz Sinclair

How Palm-Leaf Manuscripts Preserve Indonesia’s Heritage

Courtesy Leiden University Library

Goesti Ngoerah Ketoet Djilantik, raja of Buleleng in Bali, is photographed with his writer Wajan Tubuk, who holds a lontar palm-leaf manuscript (ca. 1865–66).

Palm-leaf (lontar) writing has existed on the Indonesian archipelago for over 2,000 years. It was used by a succession of Hindu-Buddhist and Muslim ruling bodies, most notably the Majapahit empire (c. 1293–1527), to document administrative, agricultural, social, historical, cosmological, legal, and ritual knowledge. As rulers of the last major Hindu-Buddhist empire in Java, Majapahit elites carried their traditions to Bali as they fled the spread of Islam. There, lontars survived as a living practice, preserving historical continuity more completely than anywhere else in Indonesia.

“Balinese manuscript culture is extraordinarily diverse, one of the richest in Southeast Asia,” said Wayan Jarrah Sastrawan, a lecturer at the Australian National University.

Lontars are made from the dried, cured leaves of the lontar palm (Borassus flabellifer). The leaves are cut into long, narrow strips, pierced with holes, bound with string or wooden pegs, and stored between wooden covers. Text is incised with a metal stylus and then rubbed with soot or plant oil to make the letters visible. Lightweight and fragile, lontars require regular oiling and cleaning to prevent cracking, decay, and insect damage. Most are held in private collections and are not always well-maintained.

Courtesy Eka343/Wikimedia

Lontar manuscripts with Balinese script catalogued for Balinese WikiLontar.

Photo by Carma citrawati/Wikimedia

Lontar manuscripts awaiting digitizing for Balinese Wikisource.

Courtesy Eka343/Wikimedia

Participants in the Balinese WikiLontar program cataloguing palm-leaf manuscripts in February 2021.

Lontars show that ancient Javanese and Balinese societies had sophisticated food systems, with detailed knowledge of agriculture, climate, and ecology. They identified plants that could thrive in challenging conditions, including salinity, brackish water, and arid environments. Balinese lontars are closely connected to the natural world, explained Sugi Lanus, a curator at the Lontar Museum in Bali, because “the basis of both ritual and culture in Bali is nature.” He added that lontars maintain this deep connection to nature “as a bridge to the divine.” Lanus also runs the Herbalian Project, which documents herbs and medicinal plants found in lontars.

To explore Indonesia’s culinary past, Helianti Hilman, founder of the heritage food company Javara, hosts curated meals inspired by the stone reliefs of Borobudur, Java’s ninth-century Buddhist temple. The carvings show markets, kitchens, rituals, and feasts, offering a detailed record of food culture. Hilman collaborates with Lanus and chefs to translate the carvings into meals. Lanus observed that the reliefs depict food by class, environment, and daily dishes, not only ceremonial meals. He cross-referenced plant descriptions and recipes in lontars to reconstruct these cooking methods and agricultural practices.

“Through our feasts, we present a narrative sensory experience to spark interest in reclaiming our ancient wisdom on food biodiversity heritage and sustainable food systems,” Hilman said. “It is our call to revive such wisdom, as it is so relevant for today and tomorrow.”

Digitizing and translating lontars is crucial for safeguarding their knowledge, as many are at risk of physical deterioration. Balinese Wikisource (WikiPustaka Basa Bali), launched in 2021, has digitized, transcribed, and translated over 20,000 lontars, making them freely available online. Readers can choose the original Balinese script or transliterations. The Wikimedia Foundation set up the Wikisource Loves Manuscripts (WiLMa) pilot in February 2023 to digitize lontars from Bali, Java, and Sumatra. The WikiSami: Sum of All Manuscripts Bali, funded by the Wikimedia Foundation, is a long-term project documenting all Balinese manuscripts held by institutions around the world, including the British Library and Leiden University Library.

“[Lontars] are an example of how culture can link us to the past and give inspiration to our present and ideas for the future,” said Lanus.