Burning of Meuseugit Raja (1873) — the destruction by fire of the great mosque (Meuseugit Raja, also rendered Meuseugit Raya) of Koeta Radja, the capital of Atjeh, during the First Aceh Expedition of April 1873 — is the event that prompted the Dutch colonial government, some three decades later, to construct a replacement mosque in Byzantine style at a cost of more than f 200,000 (over 200,000 guilders). The replacement mosque, and the Acehnese refusal to use it, are recorded in Prof. Dr. Kernkamp’s chapter De invloed van den Islam in Wat Indië Ontving en Schonk (1946).
Kernkamp’s account
Kernkamp’s text introduces the burning and the rebuilding in a single sentence: “The only more or less pompous mosque, in Koeta Radja, built in Byzantine style, was built by us and offered to the Atjehsche population to replace the Meuseugit Raja, which was shot to fire in 1873. The gesture was grand enough, for it then already cost more than 2 tons. The success was not proportionate. The Atjehers considered the religious exercises in this God’s house built by kåfirs (unbelievers) as worthless. Snouck Hurgronje spoke of ‘an empty monument of our folly’ (een ledig monument onzer dwaasheid).”
Context: the First Aceh Expedition
The burning of the Meuseugit Raja took place during the First Aceh Expedition of 5 April–29 April 1873, in which a Dutch expeditionary force under Major-General Köhler bombarded and assaulted the defences of Koeta Radja. Köhler himself was killed in the assault on the Benteng (fort) of the Sultan, and the expedition was repulsed with heavy losses. The mosque — the principal religious building of the Atjeh capital — was destroyed in the course of the bombardment and assault, whether intentionally or as collateral damage. The replacement mosque, in Byzantine style, was built by the Dutch colonial government at Koeta Radja in the early twentieth century, after the final Dutch subjugation of Atjeh under Van Heutsz.
Significance
For the Atjeh-focused reader, the burning of the Meuseugit Raja is significant as both a military and a religious-symbolic event. As a military event, it marks the destruction of the principal religious building of the Atjeh capital in the first major Dutch assault on the sultanate. As a religious-symbolic event, it sets up the long Acehnese refusal — recorded by Kernkamp in 1946 — to use the Dutch-built replacement mosque, on the grounds that “religious exercises in this God’s house built by kåfirs (unbelievers)” were “worthless.” Snouck Hurgronje’s verdict — “een ledig monument onzer dwaasheid” (“an empty monument of our folly”) — captures the assessment of the colonial government’s own chief Islam adviser that the building of a replacement mosque by the infidel Dutch could not, in Acehnese eyes, undo the religious damage done by the original burning.
Dutch terms used in this article
- Wat Indië Ontving en Schonk — What the Indies Received and Gave
- Wereldbibliotheek N.V. — World Library Ltd.
- invloed van den Islam — influence of Islam
- Meuseugit Raja — great mosque of Koeta Radja
- Meuseugit Raya — great mosque of Koeta Radja
- kåfirs — unbelievers
- kåfir — unbeliever
- Atjeh — Aceh
- Atjehers — Acehnese
- Atjehsch — Acehnese (adjective)
- Acheh — Aceh
- Koeta Radja — Kutaradja
- Kutaradja — Kutaradja
- Eerste Atjeh Expeditie — First Aceh Expedition
- ledig monument onzer dwaasheid — empty monument of our folly
- Prof. Dr. — Professor Doctor
- Dr. — Doctor
See Also
- Wat Indië Ontving en Schonk
- W. J. A. Kernkamp
- Meuseugit Raya
- Kutaradja
- Eerste Atjeh Expeditie (1873)
- J. H. R. Kohler
- Rebuilding of the Meuseugit Raya
- Snouck Hurgronje’s ledig monument verdict
- C. Snouck Hurgronje
- Joannes Benedictus van Heutsz
- Acheh
- 1873
Source
Wat Indië Ontving en Schonk, onder leiding van Dr. C. W. Wormser (Amsterdam: Wereldbibliotheek N.V., 1946), p. 85 (chapter De invloed van den Islam door Prof. Dr. W. J. A. Kernkamp).