The Muntilan area is a district ( ''kecamatan'') in the Magelang Regency,

Central Java Central Java ( id, Jawa Tengah) is a province of Indonesia, located in the middle of the island of Java. Its administrative capital is Semarang. It is bordered by West Java in the west, the Indian Ocean and the Special Region of Yogyakarta ...

. Muntilan is about 15 km south of Magelang, 10 km from Mungkid, 25 km north of

Yogyakarta Yogyakarta (; jv, ꦔꦪꦺꦴꦒꦾꦏꦂꦠ ; pey, Jogjakarta) is the capital city of Special Region of Yogyakarta in Indonesia, in the south-central part of the island of Java. As the only Indonesian royal city still ruled by a monarchy, ...

, and 90 km from the main town of Semarang located on the northern coast of Java. The town of Muntilan is on the old railway route between Kebon Polo station in Magelang and the main Tugu station in

. Tourists on their way to the well-known Buddhist temple

Borobudur Borobudur, also transcribed Barabudur ( id, Candi Borobudur, jv, ꦕꦤ꧀ꦝꦶꦧꦫꦧꦸꦝꦸꦂ, Candhi Barabudhur) is a 9th-century Mahayana Buddhist temple in Magelang Regency, not far from the town of Muntilan, in Central Java, Indo ...

usually pass through Muntilan. Muntilan kerk

Muntilan township is one of the main market centers on the western slopes of Mount Merapi, a major volcano in central

Java Java (; id, Jawa, ; jv, ꦗꦮ; su, ) is one of the Greater Sunda Islands in Indonesia. It is bordered by the Indian Ocean to the south and the Java Sea to the north. With a population of 151.6 million people, Java is the world's mo ...

within the administrative ambit of the regional government in Magelang. The locality is densely populated: in 2020, there was a population of 79,944 people living in an area of 28.61 km², indicating a population density of 2,794 per km².

History

The adjacent countryside has many villages with pesantren and strong allegiances to more stricter forms of Islam. In contrast, villages closer to the Kraton palaces of

Surakarta Surakarta ( jv, ꦯꦸꦫꦏꦂꦠ), known colloquially as Solo ( jv, ꦱꦭ; ), is a city in Central Java, Indonesia. The 44 km2 (16.2 sq mi) city adjoins Karanganyar Regency and Boyolali Regency to the north, Karanganyar Regency and ...

and

tend to more influenced by syncretic views of Javanese beliefs.

Jesuits The Society of Jesus ( la, Societas Iesu; abbreviation: SJ), also known as the Jesuits (; la, Iesuitæ), is a religious order (Catholic), religious order of clerics regular of pontifical right for men in the Catholic Church headquartered in Rom ...

have long had a presence in the town, having a

school A school is an educational institution designed to provide learning spaces and learning environments for the teaching of students under the direction of teachers. Most countries have systems of formal education, which is sometimes compu ...

seminary A seminary, school of theology, theological seminary, or divinity school is an educational institution for educating students (sometimes called ''seminarians'') in scripture, theology, generally to prepare them for ordination to serve as clergy ...

, and a

necropolis A necropolis (plural necropolises, necropoles, necropoleis, necropoli) is a large, designed cemetery with elaborate tomb monuments. The name stems from the Ancient Greek ''nekropolis'', literally meaning "city of the dead". The term usually im ...

containing the remains of many of their earlier members. Petrus Josephus Zoetmulder being a more recent internee. Frans van Lith, a Jesuit priest from The Netherlands, arrived in Muntilan in 1897 and played an important role in promoting Catholicism in the area. Indonesia's first Catholic cardinal,

Justinus Darmojuwono Justinus Cardinal Darmojuwono (2 November 1914 – 3 February 1994) was an Indonesian Cardinal of the Roman Catholic Church. He served as Archbishop of Semarang from 1963 to 1981 and was elevated to the rank of cardinal in 1967, becoming the fi ...

, is buried in Kerkhoof Muntilan, a cemetery for prominent Catholics in the town. During the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...

, Muntilan was the site of a Japanese prisoner of war camp which contained many Dutch families.

Current

The streetscape of Muntilan along Jl Pemuda (Pemuda street) provides one of the more classic street views in Central Java. The line of shop-fronts, and the enclave of Chinese-based businesses in the central area, provide clues as to the nature of commercial development in the town over the last century. The area is at ever-present risk of needing to respond to natural disasters caused by eruptions of Mt Merapi. In 1994, for example, a pyroclastic flow from Mt Merapi killed over 20 people in the Muntilan area.

Notes

External links

{{coord, 7.58, S, 110.298, E, source:kolossus-nlwiki, display=title Magelang Regency Districts of Central Java