Goa Gajah in Bali Island
Name,
The Name Goa Gajah was derived from Lwa Gajah which was found in an old Transcript called Negara Kertagama written by Empu Prapanca during the glorious perioud of Mojopahit Kingdom in East Java. Originally Lwa Gajah was the name of a river in front of Goa Gajah which is today called river Petanu.
Historical back – ground
Goa Gajah was built in the eleventh century during the reign of king Dharma Udayana Warmadewa together wit his beloved wife, Gunapriya Dharmapadhi. As evidence of this, on the wall at the right – hand side of the entrance gate of the cave is found a style of writing called kediri Kwadrat mentioning KUMON SAHE WANGSA which may be interpreted as “please go in the holy man “ along the river bank in front of the cave, there are some relief’s of stupas – and a relief of a statue of Buddha – which were probably carved around tenth century , the same period of the old transcript of Blanjong in Sanur which dates back to 913 AD.
