Saturday and Sunday to be exact, October 8 and 9 are National Holidays in Indonesia. Yesterday, October 8, we commemorated the birthday of the Prophet Muhammad SAW. For this reason, schools in Indonesia are closed including my school of course and because there are two holidays in a row we planned a trip around Lake Toba which is actually a trip that we have done several times, but because it is in a mountainous area and directly located on the outskirts of Lake Toba which is the largest lake in Southeast Asia so there is no boredom when traveling there.
And even though I have been around Lake Toba many times, but there are several places that I only know but have never been to, one of which is the Tomb of King Silalahi Nabolak. This tomb is very special because it is the ancestor of the Batak tribe who have the Silalahi clan, no wonder the name of the area we visited was Silalahi sub-district because this area has a majority of the Silalahi clan with a Protestant majority. It is necessary to know that the Batak tribe has many clans and each clan also brings certain characteristics in their culture both in the field of architecture or buildings, clothing and the way they mix spices to make a dish all have certain characteristics with their ancestors also being different. One of them is the Silalahi King in Silalahi Village, who became the ancestor of the Batak tribe with the Silalahi surname.
In some of my previous posts I have shared beautiful Bataknese buildings in the form of houses of worship, but it turns out that my knowledge is still very little to understand how deep the meaning of the interior and the meaning of their ornaments are, I think all the ornaments and designs that they have the same meaning, as an example is the existence of the lizard symbol that appears in several typical Batak buildings that I have posted before, but that alone is not enough to understand how deep the meaning of this carving design is, and in the tomb of Raja Silalahi I found a new unique symbol with the Silalahi Marga and their descendants.
The tomb of King Silalahi Nabolak is located in Silalahi Village which has quite an extraordinary view under Paropo Hill and on the shores of Lake Toba. Judging from the architectural design of the building as a whole, this building is almost similar to the building of the Batak Tribe in general, but it turns out that there are so many differences in terms of the carving design. The carvings are complicated and dominated by the black and red colors of the carvings, if we look carefully, the carvings are like forming a slightly creepy human face, the design of the carvings on every carving up to the roof is very neat and very beautiful, the roof This tomb is also made with a unique architecture, the roof design also has a modern touch, namely by using PVC material, because this tomb has undergone several renovations but does not make the meaning of the symbols disappear.
This building consists of two floors, the first floor is left empty and the second floor contains the tomb of the king of Silalahi which not just anyone can enter up there. From the second floor there are several windows and all the buildings on the second floor are made of boards, not wood and on each side of the windows are also given attractive carved designs. In the middle of one side of the window there is already a sculpture, which if we look carefully, the carvings from one to the other until they taper to the ends of the roof are very neat and detailed so that the carvings seem to be parallel to the top.
In the middle of the roof carving design, several irons were supported so that the carvings made of wood did not fall and were still symmetrical in place.
While on the 1st floor, all the supports are made of concrete and given black paint so as not to rust. If asked the meaning of the carving, I'm sorry I don't know the meaning, I am very minimal with that knowledge, what I know is that this tomb was built very beautifully with a high level of precision and accuracy, because the layout of this building material is impeccable so hindering the beauty of the building, some of the modern touches found in this part of the building also do not eliminate the traditional charm of this Silalahi king's tomb. although we don't even know what it means, I'm sure we both agree that this building has its own architectural beauty with its intricately carved designs. Enjoy greetings from us Tomi and Maya from the City of BInjai Indonesia.
