Pantar (; ) is the second largest island in the

Indonesia Indonesia, officially the Republic of Indonesia, is a country in Southeast Asia and Oceania, between the Indian Ocean, Indian and Pacific Ocean, Pacific oceans. Comprising over List of islands of Indonesia, 17,000 islands, including Sumatra, ...

n Alor Archipelago, after Alor. To the east is the island of Alor and other small islands in the archipelago; to the west is the Alor Strait, which separates it from the

Solor Archipelago The Solor Archipelago (; ) is a group of islands in the Lesser Sunda Islands, Indonesia, lying to the east of Flores and the west of the Alor Strait and the Alor Archipelago. To the north is the west part of the Banda Sea, while to the south acr ...

. To the south is the

Ombai Strait Ombai Strait (, , ) is an international strait in Southeast Asia. It separates the Alor Archipelago from the islands of Wetar, Atauro, and Timor in the Lesser Sunda Islands. The strait is also the western portion of a pair of international stra ...

, and away, the island of

Timor Timor (, , ) is an island at the southern end of Maritime Southeast Asia, in the north of the Timor Sea. The island is Indonesia–Timor-Leste border, divided between the sovereign states of Timor-Leste in the eastern part and Indonesia in the ...

. To the north is the

Banda Sea The Banda Sea (, , ) is one of four seas that surround the Maluku Islands of Indonesia, connected to the Pacific Ocean, but surrounded by hundreds of islands, including Timor, as well as the Halmahera Sea, Halmahera and Ceram Seas. It is about ...

. Pantar is about north-to-south, and varies from in east–west width. It has an area of . The main towns on the island are Baranusa and Kabir. Administratively, the island is part of the Alor Regency.

Geography

The island consists of two distinct geographic zones. The eastern zone is dominated by a range of verdant hills which drop steeply to the coast of the Alor Strait. The western zone is relatively flat, consisting of a plain which gently slopes to the west from Mount Sirung, an active volcano. The western zone is characteristically drier and much less densely populated than the eastern zone. Owing to its relatively low elevation, the entire island is drier than neighboring Alor. The dry season is long, interspersed with heavy rainfall during the rainy season, which peaks during January and February.

History

The earliest written reference to Pantar is in the fourteenth-century Javanese poem

Nagarakretagama The ''Nagarakretagama'' or ''Nagarakṛtāgama'', also known in Bali as ''Desawarnana'' or ''Deśavarṇana'', is an Old Javanese eulogy to Hayam Wuruk, a Javanese king of the Majapahit Empire. It was written on lontar as a ''kakawin'' by ...

, which describes the power and extent of the empire ruled by the fourth king of Majapahit,

Hayam Wuruk Hayam Vuruk ( Indonesian: ''Hayam Wuruk'', Sanskrit: हयम् वुरुक्, Kawi: ꦲꦪꦩ꧀ꦮꦸꦫꦸꦏ꧀) (1334–1389), also called Rajasanagara, Pa-ta-na-pa-na-wu, or Bhatara Prabhu after 1350, was a Javanese Hindu emperor fr ...

. Pantar is referred to with the term 'Galiao', which is known in the Alor archipelago. The precise location of the Majapahit dependency within Pantar is a subject of discussion.

Economy

The economy is dominated by subsistence agriculture and fishing. The most common crops are

rice Rice is a cereal grain and in its Domestication, domesticated form is the staple food of over half of the world's population, particularly in Asia and Africa. Rice is the seed of the grass species ''Oryza sativa'' (Asian rice)—or, much l ...

corn Maize (; ''Zea mays''), also known as corn in North American English, is a tall stout Poaceae, grass that produces cereal grain. It was domesticated by indigenous peoples of Mexico, indigenous peoples in southern Mexico about 9,000 years ago ...

, and

cassava ''Manihot esculenta'', common name, commonly called cassava, manioc, or yuca (among numerous regional names), is a woody shrub of the spurge family, Euphorbiaceae, native to South America, from Brazil, Paraguay and parts of the Andes. Although ...

. Crops are harvested annually in April and stored for consumption throughout the dry season. Excess production is sometimes traded for fish or to help support school children studying in the district capital of Kalabahi. Recently, commercial production of

seaweed Seaweed, or macroalgae, refers to thousands of species of macroscopic, multicellular, marine algae. The term includes some types of ''Rhodophyta'' (red), '' Phaeophyta'' (brown) and ''Chlorophyta'' (green) macroalgae. Seaweed species such as ...

has been promoted along the north coast. A limited craft industry focused on

ikat ''Ikat'' (literally "to bind" in Malayo-Polynesian languages) is a dyeing technique from Southeast Asia used to pattern textiles that employs resist dyeing on the yarns prior to dyeing and weaving the fabric. In Southeast Asia, where it is th ...

weaving is centered in Baranusa. Tourism remains underdeveloped, though a small dive resort was recently established on the northeast coast.

Transportation

Until 2021, access to the island was by water only. Pantar Airport was opened in March 2021, near the village of Kabir. It has a single paved runway 2,950ft in length. Small wooden power boats ply the route between Alor and Pantar daily, serving numerous communities. The state-run ferry serves Baranusa weekly between Kalabahi (Alor) and Larantuka (Flores).

Administrative Districts

The island comprises five

districts A district is a type of administrative division that in some countries is managed by the local government. Across the world, areas known as "districts" vary greatly in size, spanning regions or counties, several municipalities, subdivisions ...

(''kecamatan'') of Alor Regency, tabulated below with their areas and their populations at the 2010 census and the 2020 census, together with the official estimates as at mid 2024.Badan Pusat Statistik, Jakarta, 28 February 2025, ''Kabupaten Alor Dalam Angka 2025'' (Katalog-BPS 1102001.5305) The table also includes the locations of the district administrative centres, the number of villages (rural ''desa'' and urban ''kelurahan'') in each district, and its post code. Eight small offshore islands are included within these districts. Notes: (a) includes just the northern part of Pantar Island. (b) includes the ''kelurahan'' of Kabir. (c) includes offshore islands of Pulau Kura and uninhabited Pulau Batang and Pulau Lapang.
(d) includes offshore Pulau Treweng. (e) includes offshore islands of Pulau Kangge and uninhabited Pulau Kambing, Pulau Rusa and Pulau Tikus.

Languages

At least eight different languages are spoken on Pantar. These include at least five (dependent on classification)

Papuan languages The Papuan languages are the non- Austronesian languages spoken on the western Pacific island of New Guinea, as well as neighbouring islands in Indonesia, Solomon Islands, and East Timor. It is a strictly geographical grouping, and does not imply ...

belonging to the Alor–Pantar family ( Western Pantar, Sar, Blagar, Nedebang, and Kaera) as well as the Austronesian language Alorese. A small community of

Bajau The Sama-Bajau include several Austronesian ethnic groups of Maritime Southeast Asia. The name collectively refers to related people who usually call themselves the Sama or Samah (formally A'a Sama, "Sama people"); or are known by the exonym ...

speakers is located north of Kabir. Local varieties of Malay and more standardized Indonesian are used as languages of wider communication.Klamer, Marian. 2010. A Grammar of Teiwa. Berlin: Mouton.

References

External links

Regency of Alor website

Van Galen's Memorandum on the Alor Islands in 1946, part 1

Van Galen's Memorandum on the Alor Islands in 1946, part 2

Hans Hägerdal (2010) "Cannibals and pedlars: Economic opportunity and political alliance in Alor, 1600-1850", ''Indonesia and the Malay World'', 38 (111).
{{Coord, 8.41667, S, 124.117, E, source:kolossus-dewiki, display=title Alor Archipelago Landforms of East Nusa Tenggara Lesser Sunda Islands Populated places in Indonesia