The Tegal was the Javanese term for a rain-fed rice-field — that is, a rice-field dependent on rainfall rather than on irrigation. In Atjeh, the great open rice-field of an Atjehnese landschap is called the blang, but on Java it would be called a tegal. Broersma uses the Javanese term to gloss the Atjehnese for his Javanese reader: ‘op Java zou men het noemen tegal, dus van regen afhankelijk rijstveld.’ There are in all Atjeh very many tegals, but one gladly wishes to know of true sawahs. The Atjehnese tegal is, however, in the wandeling (colloquially) called sawah — a usage Broersma deplores.
See Also
Source
Verkenningen in Atjeh, by Dr. R. Broersma (De Locomotief, October 1923), chapter V, ‘Perlak, land van peper en olie’, p. 28.
Source
Verkenningen in Atjeh, by Dr. R. Broersma (De Locomotief, October 1923); Atjeh Patchouli-Olie, by Ir. W. Spoon (1932), where applicable.