Megalithic Villages in Flores

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Around Bajawa in central Flores, the Ngada people maintain villages built around a central plaza containing megalithic structures: ngadhu, a carved wooden post under a conical thatched roof representing the male ancestors, and bhaga, a miniature house representing the female line, along with stone platforms and dolmens marking clan graves. These are not archaeological remains. They are in use, the villages are lived in, and the arrangement records who is descended from whom.

Bena

The best known, about twenty kilometres south of Bajawa on the flank of Mount Inerie: two rows of high-roofed houses facing each other along a terraced ridge, with the megalithic structures down the middle in a series of levels, one for each clan. The stone platforms and dolmens are graves; the ngadhu and bhaga pairs mark clan lines. Visitors sign in, pay a contribution and are usually shown round; a sarong is provided. It is entirely inhabited and the ikat weaving sold there is made in the houses you are walking past.

The others

Luba, a short walk from Bena, is smaller and quieter and gives a better sense of an ordinary working village. Gurusina, further along, was largely destroyed by fire in 2018 and has been rebuilt. Tololela, reached on a walk from Bena, is higher, harder to get to and consequently almost empty of visitors. Wogo, east of Bajawa, has a large field of megaliths. Belaraghi is a two-hour walk in and takes overnight guests. The cluster is close enough that two or three can be seen in a morning.

Bajawa and the volcano

Bajawa itself sits at around 1,100 metres and is cool, small and pleasant, with a market, a handful of guesthouses and the perfect cone of Mount Inerie — 2,245 metres — filling the southern sky. Inerie can be climbed as a hard pre-dawn scramble of three to four hours on scree from a trailhead below. The Malanage hot springs nearby mix a hot volcanic stream with a cold river so you can find your own temperature, which after a day on the Trans-Flores road is genuinely welcome.

Visiting respectfully

These are homes and the megalithic structures are ancestral graves and shrines. Sign in at the entrance and pay the community contribution, which is what funds the upkeep. Wear the sarong offered. Do not climb on the stone platforms or touch the ngadhu and bhaga. Ask before photographing people, and expect to be shown weaving, which it is reasonable to buy. Go with a guide if you can — the arrangement of the plaza encodes the clan structure and without the explanation it is just stones.

Megalithic Villages at a glance

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