The names gate
Soldiers' names inscribed.
Rachmat04 — CC BY-SA 3.0 · Rachmat04 — CC BY-SA 3.0 · Rachmat04 — CC BY-SA 3.0 · Rachmat04 — CC BY-SA 3.0
A Dutch military cemetery in central Banda Aceh where some two thousand Dutch soldiers and archipelago troops who fought in their ranks lie, killed in the long Aceh War from 1873 into the early twentieth century, one of the longest and fiercest colonial wars, as the Acehnese resisted invasion for decades. At the entrance a white gate is inscribed with the names of the fallen, and among the trees stand nineteenth-century headstones and tombs, some of senior officers. The cemetery also holds the grave of Meurah Pupok, son of Sultan Iskandar Muda, whose father, the story goes, ordered his execution in the name of justice, a tale told in Aceh to show that the law stands above all. Entry is free, and the place is quiet and shaded; half an hour is enough. The cemetery adjoins the Aceh Tsunami Museum, so combine them and read two pages of Aceh's history: the war and the disaster.
Soldiers' names inscribed.
Aceh's tale of justice.
Decades of resistance.
Next to the Aceh Tsunami Museum, central Banda Aceh
Aceh Tsunami MuseumA museum commemorating the Indian Ocean earthquake and tsunami of 26 December 202 minutes walk
Gunongan Historical Park and Putroe PhangThe remains of a seventeenth-century royal garden, once known as the pleasure ga3 minutes walk
Kandang XII Royal Tombs of AcehA royal cemetery of Aceh's early sultans in central Banda Aceh, known as Kandang7 minutes walk
Aceh Museum and the Rumoh AcehOne of the oldest museums in Indonesia, which began as a traditional Acehnese ho9 minutes walk
Baiturrahman Grand MosqueThe emblem of Aceh, the land Indonesians call the Verandah of Mecca because it w10 minutes walkBecause it bears witness to Aceh's long resistance to colonial rule and holds the grave of Sultan Iskandar Muda's son with its famous story; it is a page of Aceh's history, not only of the Netherlands'.