The Mosque

MASJID

Indonesia is the largest conservatory of early Muslim architectural traditions in wood across Southeast Asia (c. 15th onwards), but its Islamic heritage is also fast disappearing. Only a few wooden mosques built using traditional techniques, such as the Wapauwe mosque, still exist to this day. These mosques exhibit unique architectural knowledge in which Indic, Islamic and local Island Southeast Asian features are blended. They reflect centuries of complex cultural circulation along the spice routes.

Mosque Documentary

General description

The Wapauwe mosque is located in the Kaitetu village, district of Leihitu, Central Maluku Regency, Maluku Province. This mosque, still used as a place of daily worship, is now located on a compound called Teon Samaila in the middle of an old residential area. It lies less than 300 meters from the shore and Fort Amsterdam.

Inside the mosque, a variety of historical artifacts are preserved, including a pulpit, scales for zakat, an oil lamp, two ancient Qurans, an old door with a carved copper plate and a long wooden drum used for the call to prayer. The mosque remains a revered pilgrimage site, attracting visitors and pilgrims from various regions to this day.

While the mosque undergoes regular renovations by the villagers of Kaitetu, it has maintained a singular antique form. Some of the old mosque’s pillars, beams, and ornamental finials, including the old “tiang alif”, have been replaced and are now on display in the Kaitetu Gallery.

The main characteristics of the Wapauwe mosque are its natural materials and techniques, which have been preserved by its caretakers, the Tukang 12 (see booth 5). The lower wall of the mosque was added at a later stage. It is built in coral stone while the upper panels are made of assembled sago palm midribs, and the roof is made of sago palm leaves.

The core part of the Wapauwe Mosque building measures 10 x 10 m (more precisely, 9,70 m x 9,65 m) while the foyer or veranda, a more recent addition, measures 6,35 x 4,75 meters. The ablution area and toilets were also added recently in the early 2000s. The mosque itself is 9,35 meters tall crowned by a 2,26 meters long finial (tiang aliph) in Bintangur wood (Callophylum inophyllum), a specificity of Maluku architecture, extending its height to 12 meters total. The building rests on a 0,57 m river and coral stone platform covered with gravel. This gravel floor was covered with a thin layer of cement in 1959.
While in most cases in Southeast Asia the upper roof of pyramidal (tumpeng or tajug) mosque types ends in a pointy tip, this mosque has a bell-shaped upper roof which gives it an unusual look. Another distinctive element to this mosque is the addition of overhanging paddle-like finials carved in wood covered with fan-shaped roofing in sago leaves and Arenga Pinata palm tree (ijuk/gamutu) fibres. A total of eight paddles can be found at the angles of the upper and lower roofs (see 2).
Another clear hallmark that sets the Wapauwe mosque apart is the roofing combination of the light brown washed sago leaves and the dark black gamutu covering the hip rafters. And finally, a square cavity in the mosque outer compound ground (northwest), filled with various types of stones, serves as a sacrificial pit during the Eid al-Adha celebrations.

History of the Wapauwe Mosque

The history of the Wapauwe mosque still presents uncertainties, more specifically regarding its age. Local accounts agree about tracing the mosque’s origin back to 1414 CE, when it was initially established atop the nearby Mount Wawane, where Kaitetu’s population itself is said to originate. The story usually mentions European merchants arriving in the 1500s, directing Wawane’s inhabitants to relocate to the coast for easier oversight. Consequently, in 1614, the mosque is said to have relocated to the village of Tehala in the mountains, about 6 km from Wawane, and in 1664 it was moved again from Tehala to its present location in Kaitetu. Although the materials have been restored over the years, the Wapauwe mosque could well have been founded in the 17th c. or even in the 15th c. in Wawane, considering the antiquity of the binding and cutting techniques, the types of materials used, the mosque small size/proportions and some local features. It is also likely that the four main posts (saka guru) may be very ancient.

Materials

Other than the Sago tree other wood species were used in the Wapauwe construction.

(1) The upper part of the lower roof is tied to the tie beam with arenga palm (betel palm) black fiber cords. (photos: Hélène Njoto)

(2) The lowest part of the roof is tied also using Arenga palm (betel palm)
black fiber cords to the tie beam and bamboo bindings.

(photo: Hélène Njoto)

A unique witness to modern techniques transition

The tying/binding techniques are unique to this region and are clues to the mosque-building technique’s antiquity. Other clues to the building’s age are the adze traces on the surface of Wapauwe mosque’s four posts in Nani wood. According to Japanese and Indonesian carpentry tools experts Marcelo Nishiyama and Eko Prawoto, these adze and knife marks should have been made before the introduction of the plan later in the 18th-19th centuries and could have been carved any time before that. Before the introduction of metallic chisels, bindings were an essential part of construction techniques. This building is a rare example of the transition from pre-chisel woodwork to joinery techniques using chisels. A few joints in the mosque still bear gamutu cords tied around them but without any binding function.

The main characteristics of the Wapauwe mosque are its natural materials and techniques, which have been preserved by its caretakers, the Tukang 12 (see booth 5). The lower wall of the mosque was added at a later stage. It is built in coral stone while the upper panels are made of assembled sago palm midribs, and the roof is made of sago palm leaves.

The core part of the Wapauwe Mosque building measures 10 x 10 m (more precisely, 9,70 m x 9,65 m) while the foyer or veranda, a more recent addition, measures 6,35 x 4,75 meters. The ablution area and toilets were also added recently in the early 2000s. The mosque itself is 9,35 meters tall crowned by a 2,26 meters long finial (tiang aliph) in Bintangur wood (Callophylum inophyllum), a specificity of Maluku architecture, extending its height to 12 meters total. The building rests on a 0,57 m river and coral stone platform covered with gravel. This gravel floor was covered with a thin layer of cement in 1959.
While in most cases in Southeast Asia the upper roof of pyramidal (tumpeng or tajug) mosque types ends in a pointy tip, this mosque has a bell-shaped upper roof which gives it an unusual look. Another distinctive element to this mosque is the addition of overhanging paddle-like finials carved in wood covered with fan-shaped roofing in sago leaves and Arenga Pinata palm tree (ijuk/gamutu) fibres. A total of eight paddles can be found at the angles of the upper and lower roofs (see 2).
Another clear hallmark that sets the Wapauwe mosque apart is the roofing combination of the light brown washed sago leaves and the dark black gamutu covering the hip rafters. And finally, a square cavity in the mosque outer compound ground (northwest), filled with various types of stones, serves as a sacrificial pit during the Eid al-Adha celebrations.

Gamutu cords with more symbolic function.
(photo: Hélène Njoto)

Main post
Saka guru (photo: Hélène Njoto)