Sembiran and the first Indian contacts with Bali: an update.

Ardika, I. Wayan ; Bellwood, Peter ; Sutaba, I Made 等

Further fieldwork at Sembiran, on Bali in the Indonesian archipelago, tells more about the eastern end of the exchange network running across southern Asia about 2000 years ago.

This brief note provides an account of recent excavations undertaken by Universitas Udayana and the Indonesian National Research Centre of Archaeology (Bali Branch) at the site of Sembiran in north Bali, Indonesia. The significance of this site is a very considerable one for Southeast Asian early history. It has yielded the first securely stratified evidence of Indian trade contact with Indonesia, dated to c. 2000 years ago, during the period of Rouletted Ware manufacture and Roman trade in southern and eastern India as represented by the famous site of Arikamedu in Tamil Nadu (for details and references see Ardika & Bellwood 1991; Ardika 1991).

The earlier (1987-9) excavations at Sembiran were first reported in the pages of ANTIQUITY in 1991 (Ardika & Bellwood 1991). At this time, the evidence for Indian trade contact came in the form of 79 sherds of rouletted and closely related wares of Arikamedu type (Wheeler et al. 1946: figures 12, 14), one sherd of an Arikamedu type 10 vessel, one black-slip sherd with a graffito in Brahmi or Kharoshthi script, and other black slipped sherds which might be of Indian origin (Ardika & Bellwood 1991: 2245). Neutron activation analysis showed that the Sembiran specimens of Rouletted Ware have identical pastes to samples from Arikamedu and other Indian sites (Ardika et al. 1993). All this material came from the close-set excavation squares numbered IV, VI and VII on the plan [ILLUSTRATION FOR FIGURE 1 OMITTED]. During this first excavation period a single sherd with rouletted decoration was also found in the square labelled Pacung I, about 250 m southeast of the Sembiran excavations. Indian trade wares were clearly present at Sembiran in quantity, but during this first excavation period it was unclear just how extensive the site was, or where it was located with respect to the coastline of 2000 years ago.

Since 1990 a further nine excavation squares have been dug by Indonesian archaeological teams in various locations in Sembiran (interim reports: Suastika & Yuliati 1993; Tim Peneliti 1994; Ardika et al. 1995). The squares are numbered individually in FIGURE 1 (Roman numerals IV-XIV and TPI-II). Four squares (VIII to XI) dug within 100 m of the modern beach produced no evidence of Indian pottery at all, only younger materials. This circumstance, together with the configuration of the contours on the coastal plain in the vicinity of the Sembiran excavations (Ardika & Bellwood 1991: figure 1 lower map), indicates that the archaeological site was at the head of a small sheltered embayment which no longer exists, the coastline being almost straight today. Squares XIII and XIV, both excavated to basal sterile beach sand a little below the artefact-bearing layers, indicate that the beach was over 200 m inland from its present location just prior to the ancient occupation.

Rice phytoliths have been identified by Doreen Bowdery in the Sembiran sediments; it is possible that rice agriculture was carried out inland from the site during the period of occupation. This could have led, through soil erosion and consequent alluvial deposition, to the encroachment of the coastal plain seawards by about 100 m during the occupation phase, from at least the vicinity of the inland squares XII and XIV to a well about 25 m seaward of TPI (i.e. across the extent of the area of Indian pottery distribution outlined in [ILLUSTRATION FOR FIGURE 1 OMITTED]).

The greatest density of Indian pottery covers an area about 130 m long by 100 m wide, perhaps located on the western side of a former small stream which once ran through the coastal plain in the vicinity of square XIV, which apparently shows signs of fluvial disturbance in its sediments. The greatest density of Indian sherds still comes from squares IV, VI and VII, but TPI produced a further 13 Indian sherds, square XII 4, square XIII 19, and square XIV 1 only. The well 25 m north of TPI also produced at least i Indian sherd. Except for the single sherd from Pacung I, no Indian pottery has been found outside this area, although the one-time presence of a stream between square XIV and Pacung I could have led to a dispersal of former archaeological deposits.

As well as the Rouletted Ware (Arikamedu type I of Wheeler et al. 1946, together perhaps with rims of related vessel forms shown in its figure 14), which clearly dominates all the collections, other Arikamedu types found during the more recent excavations at Sembiran include a further example of type 10, two of type 18 and one of type 141. Total sherdage of known Arikamedu types is now at least 120 pieces. The black-slip ware excavated in 1987-9 (not counted in the above total since it is not definitely from India) still appears to be localized to squares IV, VI and VII, and these squares still have by far the greatest density of Indian sherd-age, indicating that trading/warehousing activities might have been concentrated there.

Further details of the layout of the site are not available and no architectural features have been found. But we do have a picture of a settlement located inside a small and shallow embayment in the coastline, possibly adjacent to a stream. The settlement was peopled by native Balinese with a rich tradition of pottery-making and bronze-casting, presumably in contact with visiting traders who were able to bring in large amounts of Indian trade pottery some-time between 200 BC and AD 200. Whether these traders were ethnic Indians as opposed to Indonesians we may never know, except that the graffito found in 1987-9 (Ardika & Bellwood 1991: [ILLUSTRATION FOR FIGURE 4 OMITTED]) suggests an involvement of someone who could write in an ancient Indian script. The first historically recorded Indianized kingdoms were not to appear in Bali for another 800 years, but as the furthest-flung identified node in a world trade network which took Indonesian spices to China, India and Rome by the 1st century AD, Sembiran deserves a good deal of future systematic research. Large-scale area excavation should help to illuminate some of the uncertainties which still surround the site.

References

ARDIKA, I.W. 1991. Archaeological research in northeastern Bali, Indonesia. Unpublished Ph.D dissertation, Australian National University, Canberra.

ARDIKA, I.W. & P. BELLWOOD. 1991. Sembiran: the beginnings of Indian contact with Bali, Antiquity 65: 221-32.

ARDIKA, I.W., P. BELLWOOD, R.A. EGGLETON & D.J. ELLIS. 1993. A single source for South Asian export-quality Rouletted Ware?, Man and Environment (Pune) 18: 101-9.

ARDIKA. I.W., I.G.P. DARSANA, I.W. PATERA, I.K. SETIAWAN & I.N. WARDI. 1995. Ekskavasi arkeologi di situs Sembiran, Kecamatan Tejakula, Kabupaten Buleleng 1995. Unpublished report. Denpasar: Fakultas Sastra, Universitas Udayana.

SUASTIKA, I.M. & C. YULIATI. 1993. Ekskavasi situs Sembiran, Kecamatan Tejakula, Kabupaten Buleleng. Denpasar: Balai Arkeologi Denpasar. Laporan Penelitian Arkeologi 4.

TIM PENELITI JURUSAN ARKEOLOGI, FAKULTAS SASTRA UNIVERSITAS UDAYANA. 1994. Ekskavasi arkeologi di situs Sembiran, Kecamatan Tejakula, Kabupaten Buleleng 1994. Unpublished report. Denpasar: Fakultas Sastra, Universitas Udayana.

WHEELER, R.E.M., A. GHOSH & KRISHNA DEVA. 1946. Arikamedu: an Indo-Roman trading station on the east coast of India, Ancient India 2: 17-124.