Lontar Manuscripts

Of the surviving Buginese manuscripts many are written on paper, but a small number of lontar (palm leaf) examples also exist. These were formed by stitching together narrow strips of palm, on each of which had been written a single line of text, and winding the resulting long strip into a roll, which was put into a wooden frame. The text is read by revolving the roll simultaneously around two pins, so that it unwinds in a manner which has been compared to the tape in an audio or video cassette.

Reference: Tol, Roger. “Rolled Up Bugis Stories: a parakeet’s song of an old marriage calendar”, Presented to the 17th Biennial Conference of the Asian Studies Association of Australia in Melbourne 1-3 July 2008.

This article formerly appeared on ScriptSource.