Tradition · oral epic tradition · Philippines
Maharadia Lawana
Also known as Maharadia Lawana — the Maranao Ramayana
A Maranao epic from Lanao in the southern Philippines, sung rather than written, in which the Ramayana's plot survives in a Muslim community that has had no Hindu institutions for centuries — recorded and identified only in 1968.
- Function
- Text & inscription
- Confidence
- Not assessed
- Location
- 7.950, 124.300
Worth knowing
It is the furthest east the Ramayana travelled as a living oral tradition, and it arrived before Islam did, through the Malay Hikayat Seri Rama and the Javanese trade. The names are worn down almost past recognition: Rama is Radia Mangandiri and Ravana is Maharadia Lawana.
Connections (2)
- TransmissionSingapore
The Maranao Maharadia Lawana reached Lanao through the Malay world — the Hikayat Seri Rama and the trade that carried Javanese and Malay literature through the Sulu and Celebes seas — and it got there before Islam did, which is why a Muslim community in the southern Philippines sings a Ramayana. Juan Francisco recorded and identified it only in 1968. It is the furthest east the story travelled as a living oral tradition.
- TransmissionKakawin Rāmāyaṇa
Maharadia Lawana is the last link in a chain that runs Java to the Malay peninsula to Sulu to Lanao, and the names show the wear: Rama becomes Radia Mangandiri, Lakshmana becomes Radia Mangawarna, Ravana becomes Maharadia Lawana and is the title character. The Javanese Kakawin is the literary ancestor several removes back, and nothing in the Maranao version was ever written down until an anthropologist wrote it.
On these journeys
Sources
Wikipedia, “Maharadia Lawana”. Paula Richman (ed.), Many Rāmāyaṇas (1991); Santosh Desai and the standard Southeast Asian Ramayana literature.
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