LEGENDARY characters are never free. They are fashioned and targeted at a particular time, and occasionally turned upside down.

Chronicle writers know that every era is a time of lack. The Damar Wulan legend, so well-known in East and Central Java, grew and flourished in the post-Majapahit period in the 14th century, when – as the chroniclers depict – ‘sirna ilang kertaning bumi’, all peace was gone from the world. There