SEVENTEEN
South-East Asia and Indonesia
181
THE RULERS OF MALACCA (MELAKA)
c. 805–1111/c. 1403–1699
The south-western coast of the Malay peninsula
| by 805/1403 | Parameśvara |
| 817/1414 | Megat Iskandar Shāh b. Parameśvara |
| 827/1424 | Śri Maharājā Sultan Muḥammad Shāh, son of Megat Iskandar Shāh |
| ? 849/1445 | Rājā Ibrāhīm, Śri Parameśvara Deva Shāh, son of Muḥammad Shāh |
| ⊘ 850/1446 | Rājā Qāsirn, Sultan Muẓaffar Shāh, son of Muḥammad Shāh |
| 863/1459 | Rājā ‘Abdallāh, Sultan Manṣūr Shāh, son of Muẓaffar Shāh |
| 882/1477 | Sultan ‘Alā’ al-Dīn Ri‘āyat, Manṣūr Shāh |
| ⊘ 893–934/1488–1528 | Sultan Maḥmūd Shāh b. Ri‘āyat Shāh, first reign |
| ⊘ 916/1510 | Sultan Aḥmad Shāh b. Maḥmūd Shāh |
| 916–34/1510–28 | Sultan Maḥmūd Shāh, second reign |
| (917/1511 | Portuguese conquest of Malacca) |
Continuance of members of the Malaccan dynasty in the Riau-Lingga archipelago and in peninsular Malaysia, for example |
|
| 934/1528 | Sultan ‘Alā’ al-Dīn b. Maḥmūd Shah, in Johor |
| 934/1528 | Sultan Muẓaffar Shāh b. Maḥmūd Shāh, in Perak |
The origins of the kingdom of Malacca are obscure; it has been suggested that it was in existence well before the fifteenth century, but the majority view is that it was founded by Parameśvara (literally, ‘prince-consort’, i.e. he was the husband of a princess of the Hindu kingdom of Majapahit in Java) at the opening of the fifteenth century. It grew rapidly in importance as a trading centre and as a nest of corsairs, and from the ability of its rulers to levy transit dues on shipping through the Straits of Malacca. Parameśvara seems to have become a Muslim through a further marriage to a daughter of the Sultan of Pasè or Pasai in the northern tip of Sumatra, Muslim since the fourteenth century. The names of the subsequent rulers of Parameśvara’s line and their regnal dates are known partly from written sources and partly from their gravestones, but the dates in several cases must be regarded as only approximate. In the mid-fifteenth century, the rulers followed a lively expansionist policy, warding off Siamese attacks, extending their power within peninsular Malaya and across the Straits to Sumatra, and entertaining diplomatic relations with the Ming Emperors of China. At this time, Malacca became not only the chief trading-centre for South-East Asia but also the main diffusion-centre there for the Islamic faith. Thus local rulers within the Malay peninsula became vassals of Malacca and Muslims at the same time, while Brunei, in northern Borneo (see below, no. 186), came to accept the faith through its trading connections with Malacca, as did various ports along the north coast of Java.
The end of the line of Parameśvara came from the attacks of the Portuguese under Afonso de Albuquerque, so that Malacca passed into Portuguese hands in 917/1511 and became a centre for Portuguese trade in East Asia. But scions of the native Malayan dynasty continued in the islands to the south of Malaya, the kingdom of Riau-Lingga (whose last sultan reigned until as recently as 1911; now within Indonesia), and still survive on the Malayan mainland in the present-day sultanates of Johor, Pahang and Trengganu.
EI2 ‘Malacca’ (Barbara Watson Andaya).
D. G. E. Hall, A History of South-East Asia, 4th edn, London 1981, 22Iff., 366ff., with a genealogical table at p. 973.
Saran Singh, The Encyclopaedia of the Coins of Malaysia, Singapore and Brunei 1400–1986, Kuala Lumpur 1986.
182
THE SULTANS OF ACHEH (ATJÈH, ACEH)
c. 901–1321/c. 1496–1903
The northern tip of Sumatra
| c. 854/c. 1450 | ‘Ināyat Shāh |
| ? | Muẓaffar Shāh, d. 902/1497 |
| ? | Shams al-Dīn Shāh |
| c. 901/c. 1496 | ‘Alī Mughāyat Shāh |
| ⊘ c. 936/c. 1530 | Ṣalāḥ al-Dīn b. ‘Alī |
| ⊘ c. 944/c. 1537 | Ri‘āyat Shāh b. ‘Alī, ‘Alā’ al-Dīn al-Qahhār |
| ⊘ 979/1571 | ‘Alī or Ḥusayn Ri‘āyat Shāh |
| 987/1579 | Sultan Muda |
| 987/1579 | Sultan Śri ‘Ālam |
| 987/1579 | Zayn al-‘Ābidīn |
| ⊘ 987/1579 | Manṣūr Shāh, ‘Alā’ al-Dīn, originally of Perak, son-in-law of ‘Alā’ al-Dīn Ri‘āyat Shāh |
| ⊘ c. 994/c. 1586 | ‘Alī Ri‘āyat Shāh or Rājā Buyung |
| ⊘ c. 996/c. 1588 | Ri‘āyat Shāh, ‘Alā’ al-Dīn |
| 1013/1604 | ‘Alī Ri‘āyat Shāh or Sultan Muda |
| ⊘ 1016/1607 | Iskandar Muda, posthumously called Makota ‘Ālam ‘Crown of the World’ |
| ⊘ 1046/1636 | Mughāyat Shāh, Iskandar Thānī ‘Alā’ al-Dīn |
| ⊘ 1051/1641 | Ṣafiyyat al-Dīn Shāh bt. Iskandar Muda, Tāj al-‘Ālam, queen, widow of Iskandar Thānī |
| 1086/1675 | Naqiyyat al-Dīn Shāh, Nūr al-‘Ālam, queen |
| ⊘ 1089/1678 | Zakiyyat al-Dīn Shāh, ‘Ināyat, queen |
| ⊘ 1099/1688 | Zīnat al-Dīn Kamālat Shāh, queen |
| 1111/1699 | Sharīf Hāshim Jamāl al-Dīn Badr al-‘Ālam |
| ⊘ 1114/1702 | Perkasa ‘Ālam Sharīf Lamtuy b. Sharīf Ibrāhīm |
| 1115/1703 | Badr al-Munīr, Jamāl al-‘Ālam |
| 1138/1726 | Amīn al-Dīn Shāh, Jawhar al-‘Ālam |
| 1138/1726 | Shams al-‘Ālam or Wandi Tĕbing |
| 1139/1727 | Aḥmad Shāh or Maharājā Lela Mĕlayu, ‘Alā’ al-Dīn |
| ⊘ 1148/1735 | Jahān Shāh or Pòtjut Auk, ‘Alā’ al-Dīn |
| 1173–95/1760–81 | Maḥmūd Shāh or Tuanku Raja |
| (1177–8/1764–5 | Badr al-Dīn |
| 1187/1773 | Sulaymān Shāh or Raja Udahna Lela) |
| 1195/1781 | Muḥammad Shāh or Tuanku Muḥammad, ‘Alā’ al-Dīn |
| 1209–39/1795–1824 | Jawhar al-‘Ālam Shāh, ‘Alā’ al-Dīn |
| (1230–5/1815–20 | Sharīf Sayf al-‘Ālam) |
| 1239/1824 | Muḥammad Shāh b. Jawhar al-‘Ālam Shāh |
| ⊘ 1252/1836 | Manṣūr Shāh |
| 1287/1870 | Maḥmūd Shāh |
| 1291/1874 | Capture of the capital Kutaraja by the Dutch |
| 1291–1321/1874–1903 | Muḥammad Dāwūd Shāh, ‘Alā’ al-Dīn |
| 1321/1903 | Definitive Dutch conquest of Acheh |
Acheh is the most northerly part of Sumatra, and it became the centre of a powerful Muslim sultanate which at times controlled much also of the coastlands of Sumatra to the south. Sustained Islamic activity in the region, brought from western India, certainly dates from the thirteenth century. Marco Polo found a Muslim town Ferlec (Pĕrlak) on the north-eastern coast of Sumatra and along the Malaccan Straits; Ibn Baṭṭūṭa landed at Muslim ports there some forty years later; and the names of various Muslim rulers, for some of whom there are coins extant, are known from c. 1300.
When the sultanate of Acheh was established in the early sixteenth century, it rapidly gained control of much trade with Gujarāt and with China, and in this expansionist phase confronted the Portuguese in Malacca and such Malayan states as Johor and Pĕrlak, with its sultans soliciting and receiving aid from the Ottoman Turks. A three-cornered struggle ensued between the Portuguese, Acheh and Johor, complicated in the seventeenth century by the appearance of the Dutch and English. By then, the sultans of Acheh were dealing substantially with the Dutch over the export trade in tin from Pĕrak, but in the later seventeenth century Acheh declined in power under the nominal rule of a series of female rulers, with the real authority exercised by the great chiefs. Acheh nevertheless remained a strong religious and cultural centre for Indonesian Islam, with such famous scholars as Ḥamza Fanṣūri (flor, in the later sixteenth century) as proponents of an Indian-type Ṣūfī mysticism in Indonesia.
In the nineteenth century, tensions became acute with the Dutch government, by now controlling southern and central Sumatra, largely because of Achenese piracy and slave trading in the waters around northern Sumatra. These led to a lengthy and costly guerilla war extending from 1873 to 1903, by the end of which the Acheh sultanate was swept away and the last claimant to its throne exiled; members of the family still survive, however, in contemporary Indonesia.
Zambaur, 308.
EI2 ‘Atjèh’ (Th. W. Juynboll and P. Voorhoeve).
Jan M. Pluvier, A Handbook and Chart of South-East Asian History, Kuala Lumpur 1967, 25–7 (recent period only).
T. Ibrahim Alfian, Mata ugang emas kerajaan-kerajaan di Aceh, Aceh Museum, Aceh 1977.
D. G. E. Hall, A History of South-East Asia, 4th edn, 367–72, 618–22, with a genealogical table at pp. 973–4.
M. C. Ricklefs, A History of Modern Indonesia since c. 1300, 2nd edn, London 1993, 32–6, 133–8.
c. 983–1168/c. 1575–1755
Central Java
| c. 983/c. 1575 | Mas Ngabehi Sutavijaya Senapati, son of Kjai Gede Pamanahan |
| 1009/1601 | Panembahan Seda Krapyak, Mas Jolang |
| 1022/1613 | Tjakrakusuma Ngabdurrahman, Sultan Agung, after 1034/1625 with the title Susuhunan |
| 1055/1645 | Prabu Amangkurat I, Sunan Tegalwangi |
| 1088/1677 | Amangkurat II |
| 1115/1703 | Amangkurat III, Sunan Mas |
| 111 7/1705 | Pakubuwana I, Sunan Puger |
| 1131/1719 | Amangkurat IV, Jawa |
| 1137/1725 | Pakubuwana II, Kombul |
| 1162–8/1749–55 | Pakubuwana III, Swarga |
| 1168/1755 | Division of the kingdom into the states of Surakarta and Jogjakarta (Yogyakarta) |
Mataram was the third Muslim sultanate to arise in Java after those of Demak in north-central Java (917–57/1511–50) and Bantam at the extreme western end of the island (932–1228/1526–1813). It was centred on what is now Surakarta, and was founded by the father of Senepati (literally, ‘commander’, i.e. of his original overlord the Sultan of Pajang), around whose origins a cloud of legend grew up in an attempt to connect him, probably speciously, with earlier royal families such as those of Majapahit. With his grandson Sultan Agung, the dynasty produced one of Indonesia’s greatest rulers, who captured the rival city of Surabaya and extended his power as far as the island of Madura and Borneo; in 1625 he assumed the title Susuhunan (literally, ‘royal foot’, i.e. placed on the head of a vassal paying homage, not very felicitously rendered by the Dutch as ‘emperor’, since the term has more a religious connotation, being associated with the legendary walīs or saints who are said first to have brought Islam to Java).
The Dutch in Batavia were in fact becoming a power in Java, and were opposed to Agung’s strongly Islamic policies of forging closer links with Arabia and of reviving the former Javanese empire of Majapahit. Agung’s weaker successors eventually came to terms with the Dutch, and a treaty of 1684 made the sultanate practically a dependency of the Dutch East India Company (VOC), which now controlled a block of territory in western Java cutting the island into two parts. In the early eighteenth century, the Dutch were called into the internal quarrels of Mataram, the so-called First and Second Javanese Wars of Succession (1116– 17/1704–5 and 1133–4/1721–2), and further disputes led to apartition of Mataram between rival claimants in 1168/1755, with two subsequent sultanates at Surakarta and Jogjakarta (see below, nos 184, 185).
EI1 ‘Java’ (A. W. Nieuwenhuis), ‘Surakarta’ (C. C. Berg).
D. G. E. Hall, A History of South-East Asia, 4th edn, 303–8, 337–8, 341–2, 346–54, 359–60, with a genealogical table at p. 972.
M. C. Ricklefs, A History of Modern Indonesia since c. 1300, 2nd edn, 39–48, 69–93.
184
THE SUSUHUNANS OF SURAKARTA
1168–1368/1755–1949
Central Java
| 1168/1755 | Pakubuwana III, Swarga, of Mataram |
| 1202/1788 | Pakubuwana IV, Bagus |
| 1235/1820 | Pakubuwana V, Sugih |
| 1238/1823 | Pakubuwana VI, Bangun Tapa |
| 1245/1830 | Pakubuwana VII, Purbaya |
| 1274/1858 | Pakubuwana VIII, Angabehi |
| 1277/1861 | Pakubuwana IX, Bangun Kadaton |
| 1310/1893 | Pakubuwana X, Wicaksana |
| 1358/1939 | Pakubuwana XI |
| 1363–/1944– | Pakubuwana XII |
| (1368/1949 | Republic of Indonesia proclaimed) |
In the course of the Third Javanese War of Succession (1162–70/1749–57), a partition of the Mataram territories was made in 1168/1755. Pakubuwana III continued as ruler of the eastern half of the kingdom, with Surakarta as his capital and with himself and his descendants bearing the title of Susuhunan, one higher than that of Sultan. A portion of Mataram, Mangku-Negara, went to a third claimant, Mas Said, now styled Mangkunegara, the nephew of Pakubuwana II and his brother, Mangkubumi, this last now sultan in Jogjakarta. These were in effect vassal states of the VOC and then of the Dutch government, but the two rival states of Surakarta and Jogjakarta had to work out a system of living in harmony and administering the divided lands within a Javanese political tradition which had known only a sole ruler. Once this understanding was achieved, both states survived the nineteenth century, with its bursts of violence such as the Javanese War of 1825–30, into the twentieth century, through the Japanese occupation of 1942–5 and into the constituting of the Indonesian Republic after the Second World War. The long-reigning Susuhunan Pakubuwana XII still retains his social position at Surakarta within contemporary Indonesia.
EI2 ‘Surakarta’ (O. Schumann).
Jan M. Pluvier, A Handbook and Chart of South-East Asian History, 29, 31.
D. G. E. Hall, A History of South-East Asia, 4th edn, 359–60, 502ff., with a genealogical table at pp. 972–3.
M. C. Ricklefs, A History of Modern Indonesia since c. 1300, 2nd edn, 94–103, 110–11.
1168–1368/1755–1949
South-central Java
| 1168/1755 | Abdurrahman Mangkubuwana or Hămengkubuwana I, Swarga |
| 1206/1792 | Abdurrahman Mangkubuwana or Hămengkubuwana II, Sepuh, first reign |
| 1225/1810 | Abdurrahman Mangkubuwana or Hămengkubuwana III, Rājā, first reign |
| 1226/1811 | Abdurrahman Mangkubuwana or Hămengkubuwana II, Sepuh, second reign |
| 1227/1812 | Abdurrahman Mangkubuwana or Hămengkubuwana III, Rājā, second reign |
| 1229/1814 | Abdurrahman Mangkubuwana or Hămengkubuwana IV, Seda Pesiyar |
| 1237/1822 | Abdurrahman Mangkubuwana or Hămengkubuwana V, Menol, first reign |
| 1241/1826 | Abdurrahman Mangkubuwana or Hămengkubuwana II, Sepuh, third reign |
| 1243/1828 | Abdurrahman Mangkubuwana V, Menol, second reign |
| 1271/1855 | Abdurrahman Mangkubuwana or Hămengkubuwana VI, Mangkubumi |
| 1294/1877 | Abdurrahman Mangkubuwana or Hămengkubuwana VII, Angabehi |
| 1339/1921 | Abdurrahman Mangkubuwana or Hămengkubuwana VIII |
| 1358–1408/1939–88 | Abdurrahman Mangkubuwana or Hămengkubuwana IX |
| 1368/1949 | Republic of Indonesia proclaimed |
| 1408–/1988– | Abdurrahman Mangkubuwana or Hămengkubuwana X |
The sultanate of Jogjakarta arose out of the partition of Mataram in 1168/1755 (see above, nos 183, 184). Relations with the sister state of Surakarta were at times strained, with the respective rulers endeavouring on occasion to use the Dutch and, in the early nineteenth century, the British, as their allies. Leadership in the Javanese War of 1825–30 came from a prince of the royal house of Jogjakarta, Dipanagara, who himself claimed the title of sultan and protector of Islam. Like its sister state, the sultanate of Jogjakarta has endured until the present day and the constituting of the Republic of Indonesia. Sultan Mangkubuwana IX played a role in resistance to the Dutch attempts at reimposing their colonial rule after the Second World War and was a member of the first Indonesian cabinet after independence; his son Mangkubuwana X has succeeded him, retaining his social position in Jogjakarta at the present time.
EI1 ‘Djokyakarta’ (A. W. Nieuwenhuis).
Jan M. Pluvier, A Handbook and Chart of South-East Asian History, 29, 31.
D. G. E. Hall, A History of South-East Asia, 4th edn, 502ff., with a genealogical table at p. 973.
M. C. Ricklefs, A History of Modern Indonesia since c. 1300, 2nd edn, 95–104, 109–18.
? seventh century AD onwards
Northern Borneo
Brunei, on the north coast of Borneo, is an old-established sultanate which has survived until today as the State of Brunei. It has been surmised that emigrants from the South-East Asian mainland may have founded Brunei as far back as the seventh century AD, and there are sporadic mentions of it in Chinese sources of the next few centuries, since there were clearly trade contacts with China. Official Brunei wisdom today holds that the Brunei sultanate has been perpetually Muslim, and official genealogies and lore place the first Muslim rulers in the fourteenth or early fifteenth century. In fact, while Islam was doubtless established along the north Borneo littoral from an early time as a result of commercial contacts with Malaysia, Sumatra, etc., there is evidence that the sultans may not have been converted from the indigenous paganism until the early sixteenth century. The chronology for the Muslim rulers followed in the table above is essentially that of Robert Nicholl, what might be called a ‘shorter’ chronology; but, as noted above, official Bruneian historiography favours a ‘longer’ chronology going back 100 or 150 years earlier. It is nevertheless the case that only in the eighteenth century does the chronology becomes more or less certain.
The first Muslim sultans made Brunei the centre of a considerable empire, embracing most of Borneo itself, Celebes (modern Sulawesi) and the Sulu archipelago and even the southern Philippines. It was this empire which was first encountered by Spanish and Portuguese voyagers in South-East Asian waters; their reports and narratives, from those of Magellan’s expedition onwards, are a prime source for the history and chronology of the Brunei sultanate against which the indigenous tradition can be tested. The sultanate was torn by internal strife thereafter and became constricted by European pressures, with its authority confined now to northern Borneo. In 1841, much of this last had to be ceded to Sir James Brooke as Rajah of Sarawak, and in 1877 Brunei’s portion of northeastern Borneo was leased to British trading interests, eventually to the British North Borneo Company, reducing the sultanate to its present size. In 1888, Brunei became a British protectorate, and from 1906 a British Resident was installed. The exploitation of large reserves of oil and natural gas has revived the fortunes of Brunei in the twentieth century. It decided in 1973 not to join the Malaysian Federation; the sultanate became a constitutional monarchy under British protection, but since 1984 has been a fully-independent state known officially as Negara Brunei Darussalam.
The coins of the Sultans of Brunei are (like those of many other Indonesian dynasties) difficult to utilise as historical evidence, since dates are frequently not given on the coins, and titles of rulers are often recorded in an abbreviated or cursory manner, hence applicable to more than one ruler.
EI2 Suppl. ‘Brunei’ (O. Schumann).
D. E. Brown, Brunei: The Structure and History of a Bornean Malay Sultanate, Monograph of the Brunei Museum Journal, no. II/2, Brunei 1970, 130–63.
Saran Singh, ‘The coinage of the Sultanate of Brunei, 1400–1980’, Brunei Museum Journal, 4:4 (1980), 38–103, with a genealogical table at p. 45.
idem, The Encyclopaedia of the Coins of Malaysia, Singapore and Brunei 1400–1986.
Sylvia C. Engelen Krausse and Gerald H. Krausse, Brunei, World Bibliographical Series no. 93, Oxford 1988, Introd., with a genealogical table at pp. xlii-xliii.
Robert Nicholl, ‘Some problems of Brunei chronology’, Journal of Southeast Asian Studies, 20 (Singapore 1989), 175–95.