According to the Suma Oriental, written in 1512–1515 by Tomé Pires, a Portuguese explorer, it was reported that the port of Banten still belonged to the Hindu Kingdom of Sunda, while Cirebon had been established as an Islamic state.

Although at first well received by the Sunda authorities, once news of the Portuguese-Sunda alliance in 1522 became known, Gunungjati asked the Demak Sultanate to send troops to Banten, starting the Demak-Sundanese war.

One of his earliest decisions was to travel to southern Sumatra (today Lampung province), which had traditionally belonged to the kingdom of Sunda, and from which the bulk of the pepper sold in the Sundanese region came.

He was keen to assure himself of the loyalty of these agriculturally wealthy areas as soon as possible and to guarantee supplies of pepper for his ports, since it was on this spice that all international trade was based and, hence, in which the wealth of his kingdom lay.

Hasanuddin tried to invade multiple times during the reign of Ratu Dewata, however his efforts failed due to the strong defense employed by the Sundanese army.

During this venture, the Demak Sultan lost his life, and it is likely that Hasanuddin took advantage of his suzerain's death and the troubles which ensued to free his kingdom from any further obligations to this royal house.

[9] The sacred stone (watu gigilang) that was serving as the sovereign's throne of the Sunda Kingdom was taken away and placed at the street intersection in the royal square of Banten, thus marking the end of the Sundanese dynasty.

When Hasanuddin died in 1570, the royal kingdom of Banten comprised all of Sunda, except for Cirebon and Sumedang Larang, and all of southern Sumatra, as far as Tulangbawang (modern-day Lampung) and Bengkulu.

The tension increased and almost broke into a war of succession, yet being undone in the last minute due to the reversal of the Prime Minister who withdrew his support for Pangeran Japara.

Feeling confident of the wealth and the power of his kingdom, the youthful 25 year-old King Muhammad in 1596 launched a military campaign against the principality of Palembang — both by naval fleet and by land army marching through Southern Sumatra.

Inspired by his illustrious grandfather Hasanuddin and his valiant father Maulana Yusuf, that conquered the pagan kingdom of Sunda, Muhammad was eager to find fame of his own by expanding his realm.

By 1596 the siege of Palembang was set in place, and when victory seemed within his grasp, a sudden tragedy happened as a cannonball struck and killed the king on his ship when he was sailing on the Musi River by the city.

Sultan Abu al-Mafakhir implemented the decentralisation policy that allowed merchants to acquire commodities directly from Sumatran ports colony of Banten; such as Bengkulu, Silebar, Semangka, and Lampung.

Streams of Banten small boats sailing to Batavia supplying the Dutch city with agricultural products, from coconut oil, rattan, eggs to sugar.

As its wealth restored, Banten has established diplomatic relations with neighboring kingdoms; from Palembang, Aceh, Johor, Indragiri, Mataram, Bali, and Makassar as far as sending envoy to Coromandel coast.

The Sultan of Mataram tried once again to impose his suzerainty, albeit this time indirectly: he proposed his son the heir apparent be betrothed to Ageng's daughter, while actually intending her as a royal hostage.

Banten adopted rather indirect guerilla warfare, attacking Dutch ships on the high seas by sending fireships, also launching raids and harassing farmlands around Batavia.

[2]: 42 Starting in 1656, the Chinese merchants of both Banten and Batavia brokered peace talks between two cities that led to the agreements three years later with the kingdom of Jambi acting as intermediary.

The second phase of the project in 1670-1672 was the development between Tanara and Pontang, including the construction of two canals and dams to irrigate new paddy fields being worked by ten thousand new settlers.

The scale of the project was quite enormous, spanning from outskirts of Batavia to Anyer on the west coast of Java; 40 kilometres of canals were dug, at least 3 dams were built, more than 40,000 hectares of lands were transformed into sawah, about 30,000 people were resettled and large numbers of villages created, and two new towns were planned.

Banten was able to trade directly with Mecca, Gujarat, the Coromandel coast, Bengal, Siam, Cambodia, Vietnam, China, Taiwan and Japan, and also set up factories in Surat and even London.

Official letters were exchanged with the rulers of England, Denmark, France, Portuguese Goa and Macao, Arabia, China, Japan, Siam and Cambodia.

Old Sultan Tirtayasa to demonstrate his support for his son, and in an effort to avoid any conflict, agreed for the exile of his political mentor, only to learn that several weeks later his loyal long standing friend has been murdered.

In 1808 Herman Willem Daendels, Governor-General of the Dutch East Indies in 1808–1810, commissioned the construction of Great Post Road to defend Java from incoming British invasion.

Daendels ordered Sultan Aliyuddin II of Banten to move the capital to Anyer and to provide labour to build a new port planned to be built at Ujung Kulon.

Indeed, it was pepper that attracted foreign traders to Banten; from Chinese, Moors, to Portuguese, Dutch, English and Danish merchants has established their export-import business in the port city.

[2]: 24  Although, a more pragmatic reason was more possible; a geopolitical move to prevent Muslim's rival; the Catholic Christian Portuguese in Malacca to ever established their base in Java.

At that time, Islam also benefited as being the predominant faith of the Asian merchant class, that established their trading network from the coasts of Arabia, India, all the way to Indonesia.

However, to suggest that Islam spread within Western Java as an entirely peaceful process is inaccurate as the capture of Banten Girang, Kalapa, and later Pajajaran of Sunda Kingdom was achieved by military means.

Nevertheless, the kings of Banten demonstrated their tolerance by not interfering and forcing the native inlanders Baduy people to convert to Islam, thus allowing these former Sundanese subjects to retain their ancient faith and way of life up until today.