tugas sejarah SMA-Waruga

Waruga is a coffin made from stone that is used to bury the corpse in Minahasa at the past, and it’s only found in Minahasa, North Sulawesi. The archeologist told that waruga isn’t only one of ancient cemetery, but also a historical object and a monument with Meghalitic’s tradition when Indonesia hasn’t been touched by a foreign culture.

The word waruga came from the word ‘wa’ that is the changing from the word ‘ma’ and in Indonesian ‘ma’ means the prefix of ‘me-‘. And the word ‘ruga’ is got from the original word in Minahasa that means limp or liquid. Maruga means ‘boiling’ or ‘be boiled’. Called ‘limp’ or ‘be boiled’ because if someone’s corpse that was put in waruga, would be swollen up, like being boiled, be limp and liquid.

Dr. J. G. F. Riedel, an anthropologist from Holland suggested that waruga has been there since the 10^th century.

Waruga are made from stone and be divided on 2 main part, the corpse’s place and the cover. There are many kinds of waruga‘s shape and size. On the inter part, there is a blank room size 50 x 50 x 100 cm with height for about a half until 1 meters. This blank room is used to placing the corpses that be enter into this at sit or squat position. In each waruga, there usually more than 2 corpses.

Each waruga is decorated by relieves that consist of many kinds of motives and be matched with the deceased’s profession when they were living.

The corpse burial process in waruga, usually done with a traditional ceremonies that add with ancient and holy philology, the poems are consist of a request about protection and also about the deceased’s biography. As a provision for the corpse, each corpse is together with a pack of tools, like eating and drinking utensils, knife, until a heritage sword.

Thomas B. Ataladjar

The National Indonesian Encyclopedia 

sumber gambar : http://www.maschaendave.nl/manado.htm