In Brief
The Bali Aga ("original Balinese") are the island's indigenous communities, who kept their own customs as the later Hindu-Javanese kingdoms reshaped the rest of Bali. Several Bali Aga villages sit in the Buleleng hills of north Bali, including Pedawa, Tigawasa, Sidatapa, Sembiran, Cempaga, and Julah. They differ from mainstream Bali, and from each other, in architecture, ceremony, social structure, and even death rites: some bury their dead rather than cremate, and the famous (central-Bali) village of Trunyan lays the dead out in the open. Each village runs by its own deep tradition.
Bali Aga at a Glance
- Who: The Bali Aga / Bali Mula, the indigenous, original Balinese
- Where (north): Pedawa, Tigawasa, Sidatapa, Sembiran, Cempaga, Julah, in the Buleleng hills
- What's different: Older customs, distinct architecture, ceremony, and social order
- Death rites vary: Some bury rather than cremate; Trunyan (central Bali) lays the dead out
- The key truth: No two villages are the same, each carries its own tradition
- Visit: With deep respect, ideally with a local guide
- Why it matters: A living window into Bali before the kingdoms
Who the Bali Aga Are
Most of Bali's culture as visitors know it, the caste system, the great cremations, much of the courtly art, came with the Majapahit, the Hindu-Javanese kingdom that reshaped the island from the 14th century. But not everyone followed. The communities who held to their older, pre-Majapahit ways are the Bali Aga (also Bali Mula, "original Bali"), the island's indigenous people.
They live mostly in remote mountain and hill villages, and several of them are here in the north, in the Buleleng highlands behind the coast: Pedawa, Tigawasa, Sidatapa, Sembiran, Cempaga, and Julah, among others. To step into one is to glimpse a Bali that predates the temples and kingdoms most visitors associate with the island.
Why No Two Villages Are the Same
This is the heart of it, and the thing most guides miss: Balinese tradition is intensely local. The deep ceremonial life is run village by village, and the Bali Aga villages especially each preserve their own distinct customs, in:
- Architecture. Distinct house and village layouts, often older bamboo-and-timber forms and stone walls, arranged by their own rules rather than the standard compound plan.
- Ceremony and dance. Their own ritual calendars and sacred dances (some perform ancient Rejang and Baris forms found nowhere else), run by their own customary law (awig-awig).
- Social structure. Many Bali Aga villages reject or downplay the caste system, organising instead by seniority and council, an older, more egalitarian order.
- Crafts. Distinct traditions, Tigawasa is known for its bamboo basketry and the rare cepuk and gringsing-adjacent weaving traditions of the region.
Even neighbouring villages differ. As anyone who knows the coast will tell you, a village like Les runs its customs differently from Lovina, which differs again from the hill villages above them. The diversity is not a footnote; it is the culture.
Village by Village
The generalities only take you so far. Each village holds one or two traditions found nowhere else, and those are worth knowing before you go.
Sidatapa: The Old Houses
Sidatapa, in the hills of Banjar district behind Lovina, is the village of the old house form. Village tradition holds that the settlement goes back to around 785 AD, a date carried by the elders' oral history rather than any inscription.
Its treasure is the Bale Gajah Tumpang Salu, a rare traditional house built on four main posts with a three-tiered inner structure. The whole of family life happened inside one of these houses: the sleeping quarters, the kitchen, the loom, the family shrine, all under a single roof of thatch, with floors and walls of earth and fittings of bamboo. Many of the surviving houses are also built facing away from the road, their backs turned to the path, an old instinct for keeping the household hidden from whatever passed by.
A handful of these houses still stand and some can be visited with a local guide. They are among the oldest domestic buildings on the island, and nothing in south Bali prepares you for them.
Pedawa: The Melaib Marriage
Pedawa is known for its honey, its palm sugar, and above all for Melaib, its marriage custom. The word means "to run": at its heart this is marriage by elopement, done by agreement between the couple and by rules the village has kept for centuries.
The couple meet at an agreed place, a messenger is sent to the bride's family to announce that they have run, and if nothing stands in the way the marriage can be formalised the same night before the village head and customary officials. There are several recognised forms, each with its own name and its own ceremonial requirements. One old variant is no longer practised, set aside by the village itself in modern times.
What reads as drama is in fact structure. Melaib gives the couple, including the woman, a sanctioned way to choose each other, with the village witnessing rather than arranging.
Tigawasa: Burial, Not Fire
Tigawasa keeps the tradition that most sharply separates the Bali Aga from the rest of the island: it buries its dead. There is no cremation here. The dead are traditionally buried on the day of death, bathed first with water steeped in sembung leaves, wrapped in mats rather than coffined, and accompanied by ritual wailing meant to part the subtle body from the physical one.
The village differs in other ways too. It speaks its own dialect, with vowel sounds closer to old Javanese and Malay than to standard Balinese, and even its Galungan offerings are made from different leaves than the young coconut fronds used everywhere else. Its craft is the sokasi, the woven bamboo basket used across north Bali for carrying offerings.
Sembiran: The Deep Past
Sembiran, in Tejakula district east of Singaraja, is where the Bali Aga story reaches furthest back. Archaeological finds in and around the village include stone and iron tools attributed to a settlement some two thousand years old, along with a set of bronze inscriptions that record the village's early history. For archaeologists, Sembiran is one of the most important sites in Bali, evidence of ancient trade contact on this coast long before the kingdoms.
Sembiran's village square during a Dutch colonial visit, early 20th century. Photo: W. Smit / KITLV via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY 4.0)
The village keeps its sacred dances and its old ceremonial order, and an old-form house has been maintained to protect and present the finds.
Cempaga and Julah
Two more deserve a line. Cempaga, a clove-farming village near Sidatapa and Tigawasa, holds the Mecacar ceremony in its village temple in the small hours around 1 AM on Galungan and Kuningan, and preserves sacred dances of its own, including a Jangkang war dance and an old form of Baris. Julah, on the coast near Sembiran, has megalithic remains, a village temple said to be unchanged since its founding, houses protected from remodelling by customary law, and a weaving tradition whose cloth is made nowhere else.
The Different Ways of Death
Nothing shows the diversity more starkly than how different villages treat their dead. Mainstream Bali cremates in the great Ngaben ceremony, releasing the soul through fire. But that is not universal:
- Some Bali Aga villages bury their dead rather than cremate, keeping an older practice. Tigawasa is the clearest example in the north, with the same-day burial rites described above.
- Trunyan, the famous Bali Aga village on the shore of Lake Batur (in central Bali, not the north), does neither: it lays the dead out in the open, in bamboo enclosures beneath a great sacred tree (the taru menyan) said to neutralise any odour. It is the most striking funerary tradition in Bali.
This is not strangeness for its own sake. Each rite reflects a village's own ancient understanding of the soul, the ancestors, and the land, held faithfully for centuries. Approached with respect, it is humbling rather than macabre.
Visiting the Bali Aga, Respectfully
These are living communities with their own customary law, not open-air museums. To visit well:
- Go with a local guide who knows the village and can secure a proper welcome, this is essential, not optional.
- Follow the village's rules, which may differ from the rest of Bali, on dress, photography, and where you may go. Ask first, always.
- Be a humble guest. Don't treat ceremonies, and absolutely not death rites or cemeteries, as a spectacle. Some places welcome respectful visitors; others are private. Honour the line.
- Support the village by buying its crafts or paying a fair guide, which sustains the tradition.
The hill villages sit inland from the north coast, reachable from Lovina and the Singaraja area. They pair with the wider history of north Bali and the living culture covered across these guides, and they deepen the picture of how a Balinese village works.
FAQ
Who are the Bali Aga? The indigenous, original Balinese (also called Bali Mula), who kept their pre-Majapahit customs as Hindu-Javanese kingdoms reshaped the rest of the island. They live mostly in remote mountain and hill villages, several in north Bali's Buleleng highlands.
Which are the Bali Aga villages in north Bali? Pedawa, Tigawasa, Sidatapa, Sembiran, Cempaga, and Julah are among the Bali Aga villages in the Buleleng hills. Each preserves its own distinct customs.
What is each Bali Aga village known for? Sidatapa for its rare Bale Gajah Tumpang Salu houses, Pedawa for the Melaib elopement marriage, Tigawasa for burying its dead and speaking its own dialect, Sembiran for archaeological finds some two thousand years old, Cempaga for its midnight Mecacar ceremony, and Julah for its megalithic remains and a weaving tradition found nowhere else.
Do all Balinese cremate their dead? No. Mainstream Bali cremates in the Ngaben ceremony, but some Bali Aga villages bury their dead instead, and the village of Trunyan (central Bali) lays the dead out in the open under a sacred tree. Death rites vary village by village.
Why are Bali Aga villages different? They held to older, pre-kingdom customs, so they differ in architecture, ceremony, social structure (often without the caste system), crafts, and death rites, both from mainstream Bali and from each other.
Can you visit Bali Aga villages? Yes, respectfully and ideally with a local guide who can arrange a proper welcome. They are living communities with their own customary law, so follow the village's rules on dress, photography, and access, and never treat ceremonies or death rites as spectacle.
Is Trunyan in north Bali? No, Trunyan is on Lake Batur in central Bali (Bangli), though it's the most famous Bali Aga village for its open-air funerary tradition. North Bali's Bali Aga villages are in the Buleleng hills.