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OGAN-BESEMAH The term "Ogan-Besemah" designates an ethnic and linguistic
family of peoples living in the province of South Sumatra, Indonesia.
The Ogan-Besemah area covers most of the province, from the outskirts of
Palembang in the east to the mountainous border with Bengkulu in the west.
Members of the several societies comprising this family consider themselves
more akin to each other than to other peoples inhabiting the province—the
Komering to the south, Malay speakers to the east and Rejang to the north.
The Ogan-Besemah family is sometimes spoken of by residents of the area
as simply the "Ogan" or "Dempo" people, but more often it is broken down
into two subfamilies. The Besemah subfamily or grouping (often written "Pasemah")
is centered in the western highlands regencies of Lahat and Muara
Enim and includes the further ethnic and dialectical subdivisions of Lematang,
Kikim, Besemah proper and Lingtang. The four of these together are often
mentioned by Sumatrans with the acronym LEKIPALI. The Semende (or Semendo)
people speak a distinct language within this grouping. It is estimated
that within this grouping approximately 395,000 people speak Besemah languages.
The Ogan grouping lies immediately to the east of the Besemah area and
includes the sub-divisions of Enim, Musi, Rawas and Ogan proper, situated in
the regencies of Muara Enim, Oku, Oki, Muba and Mura. There are approximately
680,000 speakers of Ogan languages. Ogan-Besemah languages are mutually
intelligible, but each is recognized by speakers as a separate language.
The languages were once written in a local, Sanskrit-derived script (generally
called the Ka-Ga-Nga script), but its use is dying out, and only Latin and Arabic
scripts are taught in schools.
Although Palembang is represented in Malay myths as the site of the early
kingdom of Srivijaya and the origin place of the Malay sultans, the interior Ogan-
Besemah area was relatively independent of Palembang rulers. Dutch rule shakily
commenced in 1816, but was long limited to the capital. In different areas of
Ogan-Besemah, local leaders organized active resistance from the 1840s on, and
formal annexation of Besemah into the Palembang residence was not until 1866.