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THE MALAY - ISLAMIC WORLD OF SUMATRA:
studies in polities and culture
John Maxwell (Editor)
Barbara Leigh
Greg Dall
Jane Drakard
Ken Young
Reflections on growing up in coastal Sumatra:
and interview and discussion
Five lectures presented as the AIA—CSEAS Winter Lecture Series for
1982, at Monash University. The Winter Lectures are presented annually
by the Australian Indonesian Association of Victoria and the Centre of
Southeast Asian Studies, Monash University, to mark Indonesian
Independence Day on 17th August.
MONASH UNIVERSITY, 1982

Copyright ©; No part of this book may be
reproduced in any form without permission
National Library of Australia card number of ISBN
ISBN 0 56746 257 4
Annual Indonesian Lecture Series
ISSN 0729 3623

CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION 1
DESIGN MOTIFS IN ACEH: INDIAN AND ISLAMIC INFLUENCES
Barbara Leigh 3
THE TRADITIONAL ACEHNESE HOUSE
Greg Dall 34
MINANGKABAU AUTHORITY PATTERNS AND THE EFFECTS OF DUTCH RULE
Ken Young 63
THE UPLAND AND DOWNLAND RAJAS OF BARUS: A NORTH SUMATRAN
CASE STUDY
Jane Drakard 74
REFLECTIONS ON GROWING UP IN COASTAL SUMATRA: AN INTERVIEW AND
DISCUSSION WITH
Amy Davidson, Nuim Khaiyath, Sadaruddin Munir, Etty Rice and
John Maxwell (Chairperson) 95

INTRODUCTION
The four papers and panel discussion in this volume comprise the 1982 annual lecture series
on Indonesia sponsored jointly by the Centre of Southeast Asian Studies and the Australian-
Indonesian Association of Victoria.
The Centre of Southeast Asian Studies proposed taking a region of Indonesia as the
theme for the 1982 series and Sumatra was suggested as the possible area. But after I had
agreed to act as convenor for this series it seemed to me necessary to narrow the focus.
Rather than attempting the impossible task of trying to deal with the whole island in three
sessions, I thought that a particular theme would be a more appropriate way of looking at
the rich culture and history of this part of Indonesia.
In making these decisions we were limited by the human resources available to us in
Melbourne, but I believe nonetheless that a case could be made on intellectual grounds for
looking at the Malay-Islamic world of Sumatra. It will be apparent that "Malay" is used
here in its loosest-sense to encompass areas of Sumatra such as Aceh and Minangkabau.
Viewed in this way the Malay-Islamic world covers a large part of the island. Although this
scheme excludes certain parts of the interior it enabled us to concentrate on those parts of
the island where ideas and cultural influences from outside have become an important element
in shaping of these particular societies. Since the large coastal trading centres were a
part of this world, the importance of these regions extended beyond Sumatra throughout the
archipelago.
The first two papers are about particular aspects of the cultural and artistic life of the
Acehnese. Barbara Leigh is currently writing a book on Acehnese arts and crafts. In her lecture
she examines the design motifs which appear in the various decorative arts of the
Acehnese, such as weaving, wood-carving and metal-work. She traces some of the important
external historical and cultural influences, particularly Islamic and Indian influences, which
have affected these designs. Although attempting to account for these dements, she stresses
the way indigenous artists have adapted and modified these external sources to suit the
demands of the Acehnese cultural setting.
Greg Dall generously accepted a very late invitation to participate in the lecture series
when another participant found it necessary to withdraw. Dall had visited Aceh briefly early
in 1982 to collect data on the Acehnese traditional house. This research formed part of his
final year architecture studies at the University of Melbourne. His lecture examines the
various architectural components of the Acehnese house and shows how different levels and
spaces within the house are best understood by relating them to the social and religious life
of the Acehnese. His detailed architectural drawings have been reproduced to accompany
his analysis.
The next two papers deal with different parts of the west coast of Sumatra. Both are
concerned with the evolution of an indigenous political system. Jane Drakard is currently
completing an M.A. thesis in the History Department at Monash University on the Barus
area of Sumatra's north-west coast. Her lecture, using Dutch and indigenous sources, examines
the dual raja system of Barus and brings into focus the relationship between its
coastal and upland people. It is a reminder that pesisir, or coastal societies did not exist in a
vacuüm and that the exchange of resources and ideas between the coast and the interior
forms an important element in Sumatra's history.
1

Ken Young teaches in the Politics Department at Monash University and is currently
writing a Ph.D. thesis for the University of London on the Minangkabau of West Sumatra.
His lecture discusses a problem detected in the course of his research on West Sumatra during
the colonial period. It deals with the nature of traditional authority in the Minangkabau
area and sets out a case for the claim that most Dutch colonial administrators and a number
of early writers misunderstood the nature of traditional authority patterns among the
Minangkabau. In his paper, Young expresses scepticism about the widely held view that
political authority among Minangkabau derives wholly or even largely from customary law,
or adat. He points out that political power in the region was based on territorial control, and
the control of trade.
The final session was a departure from normal practice. It has become customary for
this annual lecture series to include at least one Indonesian participant. While there was
nobody from Indonesia readily available and working on a suitable research topic there were
a number of Sumatrans living and working among us in Melbourne. The interview-panel
discussion was an attempt to learn something of their personal history, particularly during
their childhood and youth. The discussion appears below (pp. — ). As readers will
discover, there were several light-hearted comments when participants injected a particularly
Indonesian brand of humour into the proceedings. We were able nonetheless to range over
many issues related to the lives of our panel members and doing so adds a human perspective
to the series of otherwise rather formal presentations.
It is a difficult task in any collection of lectures given by different people from different
backgrounds and disciplines to achieve a uniformity of purpose. There are a variety of approaches
evident in these lectures but in general they all single out aspects of the Malay-
Islamic world of Sumatra for particular attention. It is unfortunate that we were unable to
solicit a lecture on the Palembang-South Sumatra area as well.
As lectures they were delivered to a mixed audience of people who shared a wide general
interest in Indonesia. I hope that in their published form they will be of interest to an even
wider circle.
I would like to thank the Research Director of the Centre of Southeast Asian Studies,
David Chandler, and its secretary, Pam Sayers, for their support and advice during the
organization and implementation of the lectures and for their assistance in the publication of
this volume. We are grateful also to Mrs Lois Osborn for setting the lectures in type in their
present form, to Gary Swinton and Vicki Tipping for preparing the illustrations and maps,
respectively.
The Hague
March 1983. John Maxwell
2

DESIGN MOTIFS IN ACEH:
Indian and Islamic Influences*
Barbara Leigh
Design motifs used in decoration by any group of people emerge from two major sources,
individual creativity and external inspiration. In this the Acehnese are no exception. The
talent of the individual craftsperson (utoh) and the impact of Acehnese history have combined
to give an abundant range of design motifs which have emerged within Aceh's specific
religious and cultural setting. These have been employed with beauty and precision on the
crafts practised in Aceh.
History
Before the arrival of Europeans in Asia, the two major trading powers in the region were
India and China. The ocean route between these two countries ran through insular
SoutheastAsia. Factors such as favourable wind conditions, a receptive indigenous population
and the bonus of taking on extra merchandise led to the establishment of many port
cities in this region. The far north west of Sumatra possessed such havens along her coasts.
The port at the very tip of the island 1
later became known as Aceh, now the name of Indonesia's
most western province. In addition to this port, at the extremity of the island, the
other nearby major coastal ports were Pidie and Samudra-Pasai on the east coast and Barus 2
on the west coast. From time to time, one or more of these ports rose to prominence. These
coastal cities were part of a trade network strung throughout the archipelago. These cities
were very cosmopolitan. In addition to the Acehnese, Indians, Arabs, Persians, Chinese and
Malays all played a part in Aceh's early trading history.
Traders, travellers, adventurers and pirates visited these ports; Sumatra was known as
"Suvarnadvipa", the "Island of Gold". Camphor, pepper and pine resin (which was used
as a substitute for frankincence) were also to be found on the north of the island. 3
The coming of Islam
Islam came to Aceh over a period of many hundred years. It is the region with the oldest
history of Islamic impact in Indonesia. Although there is some debate (particularly within
Aceh) about when and from where Islamic beliefs and practices arrived, it is certain that by
the 13th century rulers of Aceh's northern and eastern coastal trading centres professed the
Islamic religion (Figure 1). By the 15th century, the Islamic impact was such that the city of
Aceh had become the Gateway to Mecca for Southeast Asia and pilgrims gathered there
before leaving for the Holy Land. Aceh was renowned as a centre of religious study. Indian,
Persian and Arab scholars stayed and worked there as well as Malay and Javanese scholars
on their way home af ter completing their pilgrimage.
What was the impact of this Islamic experience on Acehnese art? Although some
destructive consequences may have resulted, these experiences certainly had positive results
"ï This research on Aceh commenced during our residence there in 1978-79. The Acehnese provincial Department
of Industry under Drs. Ibu Hayutun and the Department of the Museum under Drs. Zakaria Ahmad
provided the initial impetus for my research which took me into every region of Aceh. For the warmtn and
generosity of all those who gave their assistance, I ara very grateful. I am also indebted to many< gurus Lance
Castles and Tony Reid have been particularly helpful in bringing their specialized knowledge of Aceh to bear
on what I*ve written. I would also like to thank Herb Feith, Jim Fox, Hildred Geertz, John Legge Robyn and
John Maxwell and Nena Rieb for reading and commenting on various drafts of this paper. Finally I would liKe
to thank Michael Leigh for his patiënt support and encouragement.
The photographs for this article were taken by Nena Rieb who accompamed me on two field trips to Aceh
in 1980-81 under the sponsorship of Mobil Oil Indonesia.
3

particularly in bringing aspects of art and architecture from abroad to Aceh. Mosques and
prayer houses were needed for the converted and the Acehnese mosque (Figure 2) was first
built in the tiered roof style used in Mughal India (De Graaf, 1963: v). The historian D.G.E
Hall tells us that the Acehnese rulers not only copied Mughal architecture, but they also
copied their gardens, their court dress and even adopted Mughal titles for some of their administratie
officers (Hall, 1968: 219).
The Golden Age of Aceh
The Acehnese look back with pride to the period beginning in the 16th century and continuing
into the first half of the 17th century. During that time the city of Aceh rivalled the cities
of Europe. Its population has been estimated at between 50 and 100 thousand (Reid, 1980:
237), about the same size as it is today.
The Golden Age reached its height under Sultan Iskandar Muda (1607-36) and Sultan
Iskandar Thani (1636-41). The court culture was lavish and the arts flourished under royal
patronage. The court employed hundreds of artisans including spinners and weavers, gold
and silver smiths and wood carvers. One interesting architectural feature of this period mentioned
in an early 16th century Portugese account was the existence in Achem (Aceh) of a
great "heathen temple" which was famous for its gold (Barros, translation by Dion, 1970:
158).
All that remains of that splendour today is a large structure known as the Gunongan
(Figure 3). It has been described as having been built by Iskandar Thani as a pleasure garden
(Bustan as-Salatin, 1900). Ho wever, Denys Lombard suggests that it may have been an example
of a cosmic mountain (Lombard, 1967: 134) and Brakel has taken up this point arguing
that the Gunongan in fact represents the Hindu Buddhist centre of the Universe, Mt
Meru, the "world mountain" (Brakel, 1975). 4
The lotus motif used in the structure's design
is an indication of the ancient historical link between Aceh and various parts of the Indian
sub continent.
Islam
The flowering of Islam occurred at the same time as the expansion of wealth and power enjoyed
by Aceh during her Golden Age. Acehnese writers such as Hamzah Fansuri and Shamsu'l-Din
figured prominently in the Malay Islamic world. The religion of Aceh during the
16th and 17th centuries has been described as "pantheistic mystical Islam" (Encyclopedia of
Islam: 742). Although the element of pantheism gradually decreased in importance, the
practice of sufism or mysticism continued into the early 20th century when Snouck
Hurgronje 5
wrote his epic two volumes on the Acehnese.
The major tenet of Sufism is belief in the unity of existence. When man unites with
Allah this experience is described as 'wajid' or a state of pure ecstacy. Allah is likened to the
ocean while man is but a wave. They are the same in essence, but the wave lasts a moment
and the next is gone whereas the ocean is there (Al-attas, 1963: 25,6). Another analogy
which is used in Sufi doctrine is that the relation between Allah and the Universe is like a
mirror and its reflection.
The symmetry of most Acehnese designs (Figure 4) may be related to Sufi thought or
may be a legacy of Persian Islamic artistic contact; whatever its origins, it is also a design
characteristic which is evident throughout the archipelago in both muslim and non-muslim
regions.
4

Aceh's contact with Turkey
During the 16th century, during Aceh's Golden Age, the Turkish Ottoman Empire was in a
period of ascendency.
Acehnese relations with Turkey probably began during the reign of the Acehnese sultan
Al-Kahar (15377-1571) and lasted formally until 1580 (Reid, 1969). The major motive of the
Acehnese in cementing the relationship was to gain weapons, ships and men. These were to
be used to attack the Portuguese and expand Acehnese control of the lucrative pepper trade
on the west coast of Sumatra. Turkish influence remained evident in the continued Acehnese
use of Turkish military tactics, military engineering and artillery (Reid, 1969: 410). Reid tells
us that culturally Aceh retained a close contact with the Muslim countries of the West. He
also mentions the importance of Arabic and the fact that a knowledge of the language and
script was widespread among the upper classes: "Many of Atjeh's diplomatic letters in the
early 17th century appear to have been written in Arabic, including the one sent to Queen
Elizabeth with Lancaster". (Reid, 1969: 411). The relationship with Turkey was considered
important for many centuries. As late as 1873 the Acehnese requested Turkish military
assistance to repel the Dutch.
Tracing the origins of artistic motifs is a difficult business. However, it is known that
the Turks were held in high regard by the Acehnese. Many high-ranking Acehnese visited the
Caliph and hundreds of men were sent from Turkey to Aceh. That the connection was
regarded as important probably influenced many aspects of design, particularly in relation
to weaponry and other crafts which were practised by men.
The Dutch colonizers and other European traders were regarded in Aceh as infidels.
Where their power touched Aceh it was commercial, not cultural, and their design motifs
have not been copied by the Acehnese.
During the last three hundred years regional power and regional characteristics
developed at the expense of central power. Warfare assumed a prominent role in the lives of
most Acehnese and many art treasures were sold in order to buy food, lost in the flight from
one place to another, plundered or bought by foreigners or deliberately destroyed in acts of
revenge during the civil war. Despite all this, traditional crafts do remain and are still practised
in several centres throughout Aceh.
Rite of passage
The occasions when many of these crafts are most evident occur at those crisis points in
one's life when celebrations call for a display of special, out-of-the-ordinary clothing, decor
and ceremony.
Births. Circumcisions. Marriages. Deaths.
The ritual associated with each of these occasions calls for a display of wealth and a
ceremony or feast or both to which the whole village is invited.
Forty days after birth a baby's hair is shaved. A feast kenduri is held to celebrate the occasion
during which the baby lies in an elaborately decorated cradle (Figure 5). Embroidered
hangings adorn the walls and cover the ceiling.
When a boy is between 8 and 12 years of age he is circumcised. There is usually a group
of 6-8 boys who are circumcised at the same time. One or two days before the actual circumcision
the boys are dressed in traditional Acehnese dress. The peusijeuk ceremony is performed
in which their hands are painted with a fragrant rice water and they are sprinkled
5

with yellow rice. This is essentially a "cooling" act which counterposes the "heat" of the act
to come.
The wedding ceremony marks the point at which a young girl becomes a woman. On
this occasion design motifs may be seen firstly in the main reception room which is decorated
with hangings, so becoming a representation of heaven on earth (Figure 6). Ceilings, walls
and doorways are covered with hangings. The place where the bridal couple are to sit is
elevated and often surrounded by an archway and on either side are the brass trays dalung
which hold food, containers for the psusijeuk ceremony, sirih and cigarettes. Each of these
may be covered with decorated cloths.
Further inside the house is the bedroom for the bridal couple. Suspended from the four
bed posts are further hangings while the bed itself is decorated around the perimeter with
layer after layer of scalloped cloth, the ideal number being seven layers. On top of the bed
stacks of long pillows are arranged, each having a decorated rectangular end-piece. A
description of the bridal couple's room in the early 20th century teil us that:
The sleeping room is the most elaborately decorated portion of the house. The ceiling is
covered with ornamented red cotton, and the floor entirely with mats. Elaborate hangings are
placed on the walls. While actual beds are not used, the married pair sleep on mattresses and
rest their heads on costly pillows. (Loeb, 1935):221)
Decorative motifs are seen not only on the wedding hangings, but also on the costumes
of the bridal couple. The bride (Figure 7) wears gold embroidered black trousers, narrow at
the ankle and very broad at the waist. Her blouse is also embroidered and is usually yellow
or pale green. Her sarong is a kaïn songket a woven silk fabric with supplementary weft of
gold or silver threads, which is held in place with a gold or silver belt. Adorning her head is
an array of golden flowers. Necklaces drip from her neck to her waist, and her arms are
thick with bracelets. Her fingers are laden with rings and in her hand she carries a yellow silk
square which has a conical jewel dropiet attached to each corner (Figures 14, 16).
The groom (Figure 8) also wears gold embroidered black trousers, broader at the ankle
and of simpler design. His shirt is black with touches of gold embroidery and he wears a kain
songket around his waist. Tucked into his belt is a rencong, the Acehnese dagger which is an
integral part of the Acehnese man's ceremonial dress. On his head is a red, yellow and black
hat, kopiah meukeutob, topped with a gold star-shaped ornament, tampol kopiah, and
wrapped round with a gold and silk woven square of cloth. His buttons are often conical and
he may have other pieces of jewellery on the side of his hat or on his left breast.
On the day of their wedding, the bride and groom become queen and king (Figure 9).
They each look perfect. Not a hair or a movement is out of place. In the past this magnificent
array of finery was used only by the sultan and the orang kaya, namely the uleebalang
regional chiefs and the ulama the religious leaders. Since then a certain degree of social
upheaval has taken place within Aceh. Today each household does everything within its
means to depict paradise on earth on the day its daughters come of age. The design motifs
on this splendid array of finery are especially fitting for the occasion.
The last rite os passage is death. When people die, they are wrapped and lain on a bed
where others can come to visit. The room is decorated with the same hangings which would
be used for a wedding. This is in order to show hormat (respect) to the dead person. It also
facilitates the mourners in envisaging their loved one in paradise, for the Islamic religion
reiterates very strongly the presence of life after death.
6

Motifs
When asking about designs in Aceh, the most frequent response received was zaman punyah
— "the desing belongs to the past". Other responses said the same thing in different ways:
Bentuknya dari dulu — "the motif comes from the past"; Nenekpunyah — "grandmothers
(in reference to old women generally and including their progenitors) own the design".
These designs of the past fall into five major categories. We see an intricate proliferation
of plant life — both floral and leafy, a range of birds, but particularly the peacock,
some other creatures including the lion, an abundance of geometrie motifs and finally
specific Islamic motifs including the star and crescent moon, the bouraq and the artistic use
of Arabic calligraphy. Depiction of the human form is absent on all decorative motifs used
on Acehnese crafts.
Motifs from within these categories may be found decorating such crafts as the woodcarving
on the traditional Acehnese house, the gold and silver work on precious containers,
jewellery and daggers, the gold thread embroidery used for the room hangings and the
woven silk items which are worn on special occasions.
Depiction of plant life is a very early form of decoration used by societies throughout
the world. In Aceh, this form of decoration has often assumed religious symbolism where
plants portrary the moslem garden of paradise in which stylized floral, leaf and vine motifs
wander with beauty and ease (Figure 10).
IN many cases these flowers and vines are non-indigenous. 6
The women from Pidie
name their embroidery designs after the jasmine bunga melati and the rose bunga maway
and produce intricate floral forms, composed of hundreds of separate parts. Each unit of
the design is individually padded and couched (Figure 11). Couching is a method of securing
the gold threads into position on the surface of the base cloth by the use of anchoring stitches.
The tulip and the lotus are also portrayed, either in conjunction with other flowers on
singly (Figures 12, 13).
In addition to plant forms which have their origins in Acehnese historical contacts
abroad, local plants have also been used as a source of inspiration. The ornamental drop
(Figures 14-16) gains its name from the casuarina seed pod. This long conical shape with
folds resembling a lotus bud, is named in Aceh boh ru, literally a casuarina seed pod. The
upper squat shape is referred to simply as a bead boh euntoee. The local keladi taro leaf is
the inspiration for an embroidered cushion cover (Figure 17).
Vines and floral motifs may also be seen on Acehnese weaponry. A bulbous-hilted
siwah is covered with embossed silver on which leaves and vines and flowers are intricately
depicted (Figure 18). A recently made silver rencong Acehnese dagger is ornamented at the
base of the hilt with new bamboo shoots pucuk rebung which form a chevron design when
viewed in reliëf (Figure 19).
Plants from Aceh's past and elements of the surrounding flora are both used as design
motifs and their depiction is often within an Islamic framework where gardens and plant life
have associations not just with paradise, but with the continuity of human existence and the
flowering of human potential. At other times, a particular leaf or flower may be incorporated
just because of its artistic appeal to the craftsperson.
Sitting within these beautiful floral forms, birds are often to be found (Figures
20 — 26). The peacock is the most prominent (Figures 20, 21), but the phoenix (Figure 22),
the parrot (Figure 23) and the dove (Figure 24) are also present. The garuda is a well-known
7

Indonesian motif and sometimes a stylized bird is described by an Acehnese as a garuda.
It is likely that the depiction of birds dates back to Hindu times, for in Hindu
mythology the bird represented the upper celestial ethereal world, Father Heaven. (By contrast
the serpent represented the lower world, Mother Earth) (Zimmer, 1972: 72-76). Within
Islamic religious symbolism the bird represents the soul or spirit. The peacock is a particular
symbol of immortality for the feathers on the peacock's tail renew themselves, an allusion to
resurrection or rebirth.
The Acehnese have used birds in their epic stories or hikayats. The parrot bayeuen is
very popular (Hurgronje, 1906: 140, 148, 155). This bird can rescue heroes as well as become
a princess in disguise. The original source of the use of the parrot may be Persian. For instance
Tales of a Parrot along with many other Malay stories told in Aceh were direct
translations from the Persian (Winstedt, 1961: 75).
Parrots were not the only birds used in Malay literature. In one hikayat a golden dove
came from paradise to teach a princess the creed of Islam, the power of prayer and ultimately
the way of union with her lover (Hurgronje, 1906: 134 ff). These stories, although not
usually represented in Acehnese design, may have inspired the incorporation of certain
birds.
The use of storks or swans near the marriage bed is said to symbolize fertility however
in many cases the original reason for the depiction of the bird has been lost. Craftswomen
say only that they were taught to draw them by their mothers. Often they copy the bird's
form from an old hanging onto the new only with the knowledge that the motif is part of
their heritage and that the omen is positive and propitious.
Unlike birds, other creatures are not very common in Acehnese design. Motifs which
usually relate to the earth and the underworld such as serpents and dragons are not depicted
(or if they are, their forms have been completely disguised beyond recognition). The Islamic
prohibition on the representation of humans may have extended at times to all living
creatures, so that now very few animals are included in Acehnese design motifs. Given the
role which elephants have played in Acehnese history, that is a creature which one might expect
to see, but which is completely absent.
Fish (Figure 27) and also the stylized lion may be seen occasionally. Stamp collectors
will be familiar with the early Persian stamps in which the national emblem shows the
heraldic lion brandishing a sword before the rising sun. In Aceh, the lion (Figure 28) is
shown in the same posture but carrying a flag rather than a sword, and one can only surmise
that its origins were Persian.
Geometrie patterns are frequent in Acehnese design although often it is impossible to
teil whether they are scrolls, spirals or stylized plant forms (Figure 30). Weaving lends itself
to the creation of geometrie forms such as the rhomb and key motifs which may be found in
gold supplementary weft on silk weaving, and spirals, crosses and chevrons which can be
seen on weaving from reeds (Figures 31, 32). Intricate spirals which are hand embroidered
using a fine chain stitch and silver thread may be seen on a pair of purple silk trousers
(Figures 33 — 35) which were dyed and woven in Pidie at the beginning of the 20th century.
The triangular tumpal motif, so commonly seen on Javanese batik is also employed on
embroidered hangings (Figure 36) and older Acehnese silk textiles (Gittinger, 1979: Figure
73, 110).
These geometrie motifs are common throughout the archipelago and links may be seen
8

with the impact of the Dong-son Culture. That culture probably reached Sumatra before or
about 300 B.C. from northeastern Indo-China and South China (Heine-Geldern, 1935: 329).
The S-shaped doublé spiral (Figure 37) is characteristic of that ancient bronze age culture.
A relatively recent geometrie motif which has been used extensively on Acehnese
jewellery is the pintu Aceh, literally the Acehnese gate (Figure 38). Ordered by a Dutch
military officer in the early 1930's, the talented goldsmith, Utoh Mud of Banda Aceh first
created the design; a design which he said was based on the ancient remains of the gateway
to the royal palace, the Pintu Khob. This motif is now used on the gateway of the pendopo
governor's official residence.
The use of Islamic motifs or those with a particular Islamic connotation is increasingly
characteristic of Acehnese design. The creative use of Arabic calligraphy with its flowing
lines and the embodiment of meaning in both words and form is one example (Figures 39,
40). The star and crescent moon is another (Figure 41). The bouraq, that mythical creature
with the head of a woman, the body of a horse and the wings of a bird, and which carried the
prophet Muhammed to heaven is another Islamic motif used in Acehnese design (Figure 42).
In addition to the specific use of Islamic symbols, the designs themselves show evidence
of being Islamicized. Creatures have had their shape abstracted so as not to appear 'pagan'
(Figures 43, 44), and Islamic motifs and older patterns are sometimes combined in the one
design (Figure 45). We see birds in a garden paradise topped with a royal or sacred crown
above which sits the star and crescent moon flanked on either side by stylized Arabic script
whilst the triangular form and square below may have had their origins in the lotus flower
and bud.
Conclusion
This exploratory examination of Aceh's design motifs shows a rich and varied history of external
influences but we must be careful not to see the designs as merely the sum of these influences.
Rather they are unique creations expressing the inner thoughts, feelings and
perceptions of the Acehnese people. They are desings which belong not only to the past. For
the people of Aceh, they also belong to the present.

Figure 1. The gravestone of the Islamic Sultan Malik al-Saleh (d. 1297)
Geudung, North Aceh.
Figure 2. Mosque of Atcheh. Watercolour detail of the Mosque of Atchin
about 1650; in the collection Vingboons (Rijks Archief, the Hague).
from de Graaf, 1963, p.v.
10

Figure 3. The Gunongan. An imposing structure of approximately
30 metres in height, Banda Aceh.
Figure 4. Wall hanging. 193 cm X 72 cm. Private collection,
Prof. Dr. I'smail Suny, Jakarta.
11

Figure 5. The baby's cradle,
Home of Ibu Halimah Hamid
Meulaboh, West Aceh
Figure 6. Kamar lengkap. A room fully decorated for a wedding
12

Figure 7. Syarifah Faridah on her wedding
day. Meulaboh, West Aceh.
Figure 9. Bride and groom seated in
position. Meulaboh, West Aceh.
13
Figure 8. Ali Muddin on his wedding day.
Meulaboh, West Aceh.

Figure 10. Intertwined scrolls combine with enclosed rosettes (possibly full blown
lotus forms) on this sturdy roof beam. Awe Geutah, North Aceh.
Figure 11. Cushion cover 43.5 cm square. Padded couching using gold threads on a red
velvet background. Stylized rose and jasmine motifs. Garot, Pidie.
14

Figure 12. Tulip motif. Embroidered fan. Made before WW II.
Banda Aceh.
Figure 13. Heavily sequinned, golden full-blown lotus, glitter on a rich, red
background. Detail of a bed-hanging from South Aceh.
Private collection, Prof. Dr. Ismail Suny, Jakarta.
15

Figure 14. Keumalawaty Ismuha on the
day of her wedding. Banda Aceh. Note the
euntoee and boh ru which fall
from her hands.
rigure 10. ^arvea ornamentai arop
from the corner of the house. Length 30 cm.
Awe Geutah, North Aceh.
Figure 16. The form is seen again in the silver or gold
arnaments which hang from each corner of the yellow
kerchief held by the bride on her wedding day.
16

Figure 17. The motif of the keladi taro leaf (right) is padded and couched with gold
thread onto a dark green velvet background. Cushion cover 54 cm X 34.5 cm.
Made in Banda Aceh.
17

Figure 18. Siwah. Wooden scabbard, ivory hilt and silver decoration.
Length, 37 cm. Museum, Banda Aceh.
Figure 19. Hilt of a silver rencong. The V-shaped ornamentation, pucuk rebung, at the
base of the hilt refers to the new bamboo shoots coming up from the ground.
Private collection, Harun Keuchik Leumie, Banda Aceh.
18

Figure 20. On a lavish maroon background these peacocks, couched with a chevron
pattern, sitproudly amidstthe foliage. Central detail of a wall hanging, 193 cm X 72 cm.
Private collection, Prof. Dr. Ismail Suny, Jakarta.
Figure 21. Traditionally from South Aceh, this makota crowu of gold is worn
by the bride on her wedding day. The central protruding peacock is flanked by both
a lion and a bouraq on each side. Private collection, Prof. Dr. Ismail Suny, Jakarta.
19

figure 22. Phoenix motif. Detail of a bed hanging from South Aceh.
Private collection, Prof. Dr. Ismail Suny, Jakarta.
Figure 23. Possibly a parrot motif Detail of a wall hanging.
Private collection, Ibu Haja Cut Bungsu, North Aceh.
20

Figure 24. Doves in flight. Detail of a wall hanging from South Aceh.
Private collection, Prof. Dr. Ismail Suny, Jakarta.
Figure 25. Bird with a crown. Detail of a wall hanging from South Aceh.
Private collection, Prof. Dr. Ismail Suny, Jakarta.
21

Figure 26. A bird looks up serenely from a facade of an Acehnese
traditional house in Garot, Pidie.
Figure 27. Embroidered cushion cover showing fish motif. Gold thread on blue
background. Made in South Aceh. 43 cm X 21 cm.
Private collection, Prof. Dr. Ismail Suny, Jakarta.
22

Figure 28. Detail of a wall hanging showing lion motif. Made in South Aceh.
Private collection, Prof. Dr. Ismail Suny, Jakarta.
Figure 29. Detail of a winged creature from a wall hanging made in South Aceh.
Private collection, Banda Aceh.
23

Figure 30. Detail of decoration on ivory sheath of a rencong Acehnese dagger.
Museum collection, Banda Aceh.
24

Figure 31. A sitting mat which has been woven in pandan with some of the reeds
dyed a deep maroon. 50 cm square. North Aceh.
Figure 32. Detail of a Gayo sirih bag made from a very fine reed grown
in Central Aceh known as cike. Museum collection, Banda Aceh.
25

Figures 33—35. Hand woven Acehnese trousers of rich purple silk with fine
smbroidered chain stitch. Made in Pidie at the beginning of the 20th century.
Length, 92 cm. Width at waist, 57 cm. Private collection.
26

Figure 36. Hanging showing tumpal motif. Gold thread on black velvet,
made in Garot, Pidie. 3m X lm. Home of Bpk Dahlan Lubis, Banda Aceh.
Figure 37. Flowing spirals and simple crosses from the design on the porch
gableboard of the mosque at Beuracan, Meureudu, Pidie.
27

Figure 38. The motif of the pintu Aceh is used extensively on modern
Acehnese jewellery. Gold pendant.
28

Figure 39. Stylized painted Arabic calligraphy on the gable-board of a meunasah
men's house at Kampung Bayu, Lhokseumawe, North Aceh.
Figure 40. A gold pendant made from an old Acehnese coin.
Private collection, Harun Keuchik Leumie, Banda Aceh.
29

Figure 41. Embroidery work for the centre of a ceiling cloth. Gold thread on red
backing. Private collection, Prof. Dr. Ismail Suny, Jakarta.
Figure 42. This bouraq forms part of the upper panel of a wall hanging.
Made in West Aceh. Private collection.
30

Figure 45. Wall hanging which shows how Islamic motifs
and older patterns are sometimes combined in the one
design. Made in South Aceh. 70 cm X 170 cm.
Private collection, Prof. Dr. Ismail Suny, Jakarta.
Figures 43, 44. These creatures with wings, legs and tail
show the abstraction or stylization of the original motif.
A wall hanging from South Aceh. 75 cm X 160 cm.
Private collection, Prof. Dr. Ismail Suny, Jakarta.
31

NOTES
1 The country called P'o-lu in Chinese sources was probably in Aceh (Wolters, 1967) For many centimes a port
' known variously as Ramni, Lameri, Lambri etc. is mentioned in Middle Eastern, Chinese, European and Indonesian
sources; its site is unknown but evidently in the general region of Banda Aceh. The name Aceh tirst
appears at the beginning of the 16th century. Under Dutch rule the capital was called Kutaradja.
2 Barus is now in the province of North Sumatra, not Aceh, but its historial links have been to the Sultanate of
Aceh. Wolters (1967:192) refers to the port at the tip of Sumatra as having been known as the port ot Barus
Later, during the 16th and 17th centuries, Aceh's power extended well beyond Barus down the west coast ot
Sumatra (Kathirithamby-Wells, 1969), so continuing Acehnese control over Barus.
3. The Acehnese pine bears legacy to this early period in being the only Sumatran pine having a name derived
from Sanskrit (Wolters, 1967:108).
4. The historical origin of the Gunongan needs further research. The most comprehensive work on the topic has
been undertaken by Lombard, 1967 and Brakel, 1975.
5 As part of the Dutch effort to conclude the Acehnese war, the famous Islamicist, Christian Snouck Hurgronje
' was sent to Aceh. The comprehensive document, The Achehnese (1906), is still an excellent source ot
Acehnese ethnography.
6 An examination of the gardens of Mughal India could throw some light on the origins of the use of these
flowers but given the extensive use of floral motifs in Chinese decorative art as well, and the ditticulty ot
determining such things as whether a motif is a full-blown lotus or a rose, when the craftsperson has seen
neither and in many cases names the motif as merely bunga flower, it would seem fruitless to try and assert
origins.
REFERENCES
Al-attas, Naguib, 196^ o f S u f i s m a s understood and practised among the Malays. Singapore, MSRI.
Brakel, L.F. 1975 ^ S t a t e c r a f t i n i 7 th century Aceh." in Reid, A. and Castles, L. (ed) Precolonial
State Systems in Southeast Asia. MBAS. Monograph No. 6. K.L .
de Graaf, H.J. 1963^ ^ ^ j aVanese Mosque", JSEAH. Vol. 4, No. 1, Mar.
Dion, Mark, 1 9 7 0 t h r o u g h P o r t u g u e s e e y e s : e x c e r p t s f r o m Joao de Barros' Decadas da Asia."
Indonesia. No. 9.
Encyclopedia of Islam 1960. Leiden, Brill.
Gittinger, MattiebeUe, L979 ^ ^ W a s h i n g t o n ) D. C., The Textile
Museum.
Hall, D.G.E. 1968 . ...
A History of South East Asia. London, Macmillan.
Heine-Geldern, Robert, 1935
The Archeology and Art of Sumatra. Vienna.
Hurgronje, Snouck, 1906
The Achehnese. Leiden, Brill, 2 Vols.
Kathirithamby-Wells, JM969 ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ Q f p a i n a n Q f 1 6 6 3 „ J S E A H V q, x
No.3. Dec.
Loeb, E.M. 1935 ^ & p e Q p [ e V e r l a g D e s Insti tutes Fur Valkenkunde der Universitat Wien.
Lombard, Denys, D > M j e h A u J e m p s D> I s k a n d a r M u d a. 1607-1636. Paris, Ecole Francaise D'Ex-
treme Oriënt.
32

Reid, Anthony, 1969
"Sixteenth Century Turkish Influence in Western Indonesia." JSEAH. Vol. X. No.3. Dec.
1980
"The Structure of Cities in Southeast Asia, Fifteenth to Seventeenth Centuries." JSEAS Vol
XI. No. 2. Sept.
Wilkinson, R.J. 1899; 1900
(ed). Bustan a's-Salatin. Books I and II. Singapore, M.P.H.
Winstedt, Sir R. 1961
A History of Classical Malay Literature. Monograph on Malay Subjects, No. 5 Singapore
MBRAS. '
Wolters, O.W. 1967
Early Indonesian Commerce. Ithaca, C.U.P.
Zimmer, Heinrich, 1972
Myths and Symbols in Indian Art and Civilization. N.J., Princeton Univ. Press.
33

Figure 1. Schematic Representation of ViUage Planning
Figure 2. Plan of Traditional Acehnese House
34

THE TRADITIONAL ACEHNESE HOUSE
Greg Dall
As part of his encyclopedie account of the Acehnese published in 1906, the Dutch scholar
and Islamicist C. Snouck Hurgronje included several measured drawings of an Acehnese
traditional house (Snouck Hurgronje, 1906). These drawings — a plan, two elevations and a
section' — appear to be the only ones published to date, and together with several early
photographs, 2
they provide a useful historical record of the Acehnese house at the end of the
nineteenth century. Nevertheless, they do not constitute a complete record of this important
structure.
The present study 3
is an attempt to fill in the gaps in Snouck Hurgronje's work by providing
a more detailed set of measured drawings and a description of the traditional house
and of its principles of construction. It is also an attempt to describe the total architectural
scheme, explain the relationship of the structure to Acehnese society and family life and account
for some of the traditional beliefs and customs which have influenced its development.
The Acehnese village consists of several smaller units or hamiets. Each hamlet usually
consists of a cluster of houses owned by sisters and aunts (mother's sisters) sharing a well.
The size of the cluster depends, of course, on the size of the families and the availability of
land, but commonly consists of three to five houses.
The approach to an Acehnese village reveals no obvious principles of building orientation.
4
There appears to be no order to the way houses are sited at the outskirts of the village.
There is no main street, as in a Javanese village, or central communal space, as in a Toba
Batak village. An apparently arbitrary system of winding footpaths leads from one house to
another. The footpaths often vary in width, widening indiscriminately at certain points and
narrowing at others. Ho wever, this gradually changes at the village centre where the houses
are more regularly aligned along north-south and east-west axes, with access paths between
them of uniform width and length (Figure 1). A fairly rigid grid plan in the heart of the
village, with an east-west house orientation, reflects religious functions in a number of ways.
In pre-Islamic Aceh it appears to have been the practice to avoid orienting the house
entrances towards the setting sun. Sunset marks the coming of the darkness and black symbolises
death. In the Hindi sphere, which had early influences in Aceh, east is the direction
of new life and west is the direction of death.
The entrance of an Acehnese house today is usually located on the long side of the
building. Since it is considered dangerous to oriënt the doorway towards the sunset, the
house is almost invariably aligned north-south. The ridge of the extended gabled roof is thus
aligned east-west so that the planes of the roof confront the high noonday sun, providing
maximum shade when it is either in the northern or southern skies between the June or
December solstices.
However this orientation is also meaningful for an Islamic household and has become
an important consideration in the construction of the house. The gable end of the house
faces Mecca. This knowledge and direction is very important when performing daily prayers
with family members or in congregation with other people at religious functions.
An examination of the village grid reveals not only an east-west house orientation. The
individual east-west access ways also express social segregation. In general we find male access
ways and female access ways clearly defined (Figure 1). The male verandah section of
35

the house opens onto the front path which is generally wider and planted out with shady
trees and fragrant flowering plants. On the other side, the female avenues have more productive
functional plants such as vegetables and fruit-trees. Rubbish is deposited directly
here from the female section of the house and the kitchen area. The male access ways are used
on formal occasions while the female approaches are generally work areas. There is an
evident breakdown of the village plan according to male-female divisions which is reflected
in the planning of the traditional house, as explained below.
One further important aspect of the layout of an Acehnese village is that the boundaries
between house lots are not clearly demarcated. Even residents find it difficult to point out
the exact shape of the plot of land on which a house is built. Neighbouring owners attach importance
only to the rights to coconut palms and fruit trees, and precise boundaries do not
seem to have great significance.
Besides family dwellings, there are two other buildings in an Acehnese village which are
of importance, a mosque (masjid) and a men's house (meunasah). 5
Mosques are often
shared by several villages and often lie mid-way between them. Since the traditional
Acehnese mosque has no minaret, the usual Islamic method of the call to prayer cannot be
used. The Acehnese use a drum (tabuh) which is kept outside each mosque. It is made of
palmwood and the hollowed-out side is covered with hide.
The men's house (meunasah) is a structure of pre-Islamic origin. Similar traditional
buildings are evident throughout Indonesia such as the bale of Java and Bali. Formerly the
meunasah was the place in which mature youths gathered after sun-down. However it is now
not often used for this purpose and in many villages the meunasah are deserted. The
building serves instead as a house of prayer, school, village guest house, meeting place or occasionally
as a place to formalize important ceremonies such as the signing of marriage
contracts.
Although the original Acehnese men's house probably had an open roof and detached
walls, after the arrival of Islam the men's house assumed the basic structure of an ordinary
house. It ostensibly became a house of prayer, and was called by the Arabic name meunasah
(Hurgronje 1906:61). Although it is usually situated within the village and is constructed like
an ordinary house, it has no windows and does not have the customary interior tripartite
division. The furniture of the meunasah is sparse, consisting simply of a large lamp only lit
on the nights of the fasting month (Ramadan), sleeping-mats for visitors and the occasional
mosquito curtain.
The best way to appreciate the meaning of the Acehnese traditional house 6
is to study
the individual sections of the house in turn, from the space underneath the building to the
most sacred space in the roof of the dweiling where the family heirlooms are kept (see
photographs, Figures 3 and 4, and four elevations, plan and section, Figures 8 — 14).
The Acehnese house is built on timber columns which support the main body of the
structure. These columns rest on stone footings (see Figures 8 — 11 and Detail A). This is
common practice throughout the Malay peninsula and the Indonesian archipelago and is advantageous
for a number of reasons. The use of the piles raises the house above monsoon
flood waters in low lying areas, while in jungle areas it affords more protection from wild
animals such as tigers. During the rainy season the space under the dweiling becomes a
valuable work and storage area.
Thermally it is advantageous to raise the house in a hot climate. Cool moist air is drawn
36

up through the slatted floor (see Detail A, B and G) by convection currents created within
the heated roof space. This upward draught has a dramatic cooling effect on the inhabitants
sitting on the slatted floor. The rising hot air passes up and out through the perforated eaves
(see Detail I).
The natural ventilation system allows the house to be fumigated against mosquitoes
each evening by burning rubbish with wooden twigs and damp leaves. This smokes out the
whole interior through the perforated floor and well ventilated eaves, preventing insects
from breeding in the underside of the roof thatch. 7
The space underneath the house (bawah rumah) is a versatile utility area. Firewood for
cooking, a press for extracting oil from decayed coconuts and the see-saw rice pounder can
be found here. Newly harvested rice is stored here in cylindrical plaited coconut-leaf containers
while plaited bamboo barrels contain unhusked rice after threshing. Should the space
beneath the house flood during the rainy season, the rice containers are, of course, removed
indoors.
Animals kept by the family (hens, ducks, goats, sheep, dogs and water buffalo) are also
tethered underneath the house, protecting them from predatory wild animals and deterring
thieves.
The bawah rumah is also used as a temporary resting-place. Women set up their loom
to weave cloth and perform other household duties here, while men mend fishing nets and
perform other chores. During festivals this space becomes an extension of the house proper
and guests are accommodated there. An important and culturally significant role of this
nether section of the house is during funeral ceremonies when mourners receive the condolences
of relatives and friends. Thus it can be seen that the bawah rumah is an intrinsic
and important space with great versatility and a wide range of functions.
On approaching the house compound, the formal entry into the house is via the main
flight of stairs (tangga), and above the bawah rumah leading to the male section of the house
(see Figures 2, 9 and 10). Even though the steps are quite steep, they normally do not have
any handrails. There is no landing either; the stairway leads directly to the main enclosed
verandah (serambi) of the house. Acehnese superstition demands that there be an odd
number of steps in the stairway. According to the ubiquitous precedence of right over left,
the correct customary way to leave the house is to lead with the right foot on descending the
steps so that the right foot is the first to reach the ground. If this occurs, Acehnese believe
that luck will accompany the person and make his journey safe. (For a detail of the stairs see
Detail K).
At the bottom of the stairs is a flat piece of timber or a slab of stone where visitors may
leave their footwear. Nearby is a water vessel (tempayan) with a gourd dipper (gayong) with
which visitors splash their feet before ascending the stairs.
This practice of washing before entering the house has both hygenic and religious
references. No footwear at all is worn inside the house and an individual who fails to wash
his feet is considered kasar (rude and uncultered). The house interir must be kept very clean,
also, because the Acehnese perform their daily prayers within the house.
A comparison of the schematic plan of the Acehnese house (Figure 2) and the floor plan
(Figure 12) shows the male-female segregation in the use of the spaces inside it. The main entrance
at the front is used by male visitors while the rear entrance through the kitchen
(dapur) is used by women and children. The dapur and female verandah (serambi) is the domain
of women while the male verandah is the domain of men. Usually female visitors enter
37

Figures 3 and 4. A Fine Traditional House
38

Figure 5. An Ornately Carved Skirting Board
Figure 6. A Carved Gable Screen, tebar layar
$9

the house by the rear entrance while their husbands are received in the front serambi by the
host. Such an Islamic segregation of males and females is not exclusive to Acehnese society,
but in Aceh it is usually strictly observed.
The main entrance provides direct access to the front verandah, the almost exclusive domain
of the males. This space is separated from the rest of the house by a timber partition
with a door placed centrally leading to the dalam, the inner sanctum of the dweiling. If
visitors are not very close friends or not members of the family, they are not invited past this
serambi area into the dalam.
Most of the social and religious ceremonies of village life take place in the serambi area
including religious feasts, meals and prayers, in which non-family members are invited to
take part. Weddings, circumcisions, funerals and the five daily prayers are performed here.
Sometimes this area is also used as a sleeping place for young unmarried men of the house or
other male house guests.
This area of the house incorporates the most elaborate architectural embellishment,
usually in the form of exquisite timber carving or fret-work in geometrie and floral patterns.
Part of the floor is covered with matting, usually in the west corner where daily prayers are
held. On ceremonial occasions carpets are spread here and each guest finds an ornamentally
worked square 'sitting mat', placed ready for him. Aside from these mats, no furniture is
found in the serambi.
The female verandah is a similar structure though there is a lack of decoration on the
female side. The passage (lorong) through the centre of the dalam is entered only by men
and women of the household as it gives access only to the female verandah, where women
perform their daily household tasks. Some provisions may be stored in the lorong — for instance,
an earthenware jar full of decayed coconut for making oil, and a jar of vinegar made
from the juice of the nipah palm.
The kitchen (dapur) is normally located in a separate annex with direct access to the
female verandah. If the owners are poor, the female verandah sometimes incorporates the
kitchen. The dapur is mainly the cooking area. However, often a section of it is set aside for
eating. It is usual in an Acehnese household for family members to have their meals
separately and at different times. The furniture in the dapur consists of a sitting mattress
covered with a decorated mat, especially for the use of the male head of the house when he
comes to eat his meals, while a low bench similarly covered with a mat serves as a restingplace
for small children. Shelves or racks are fixed against the wall for plates, earthen cooking
pots, circular earthen or brass saucepans in which rice is boiled, earthenware frying pans
with handles for frying fish, a stone mortar and pestle for grinding spices and earthenware
or brass lamps. Small woven nets, neatly plaited from rattan, hang from the rafters at intervals,
suspending dishes of food out of reach of insects.
The cooking area consists of a simple arrangement — an open wood fire surrounded by
a partially enclosed circle of large rocks on which a wok (kuali) sits. Sometimes a crude
wooden box forms a frame for the kuali to rest on. The smoke escapes through a hatch in
the roof directly above the fire, which can be raised or lowered according to the weather and
time of day. It is normal to have a small opening in the slatted kitchen floor through which
left-overs or waste foods can be thrown to feed the hens and ducks below. Through this
opening, also, young children and invalids are allowed to defecate.
Since the depur opens onto the back of the house compound it normally is adjacent to
40

the well. Women gain quick easy access to this washing and bathing area by means of a stair
which joins the depur (see Figures 9 and 11).
The most important room in the house is the one leading off the lorong on the Mecca or
west side of the building. In this inner sanctum, the married couple sleeps and the first
meeting of the bride and bridegroom often takes place here. This room is seldom entered by
any save the parents and children of the couple.
The floor is usually entirely covered with matting. The roofing is hidden by a white
cloth and the walls are also covered with hangings. In the other parts of the house such
decoration only is used on festive occasions. On a low bench or platform a mattress is placed
with a mat over it. The couch usually has a canopy of mosquisto net and beside this there is
spread on the floor a sitting mattress of considerable size which is intended only for the
man's use. On both mattresses are piles of cushions shaped like bolsters and adorned at
either end with elaborate and often costly embroidery and trimming. Clothing and personal
items are kept in a chest which stands in the corner.
The room on the east side of the lorong is the bedroom (bilik tidur) for the first married
daughter. This space is furnished in a similar manner to the main sleeping room, although
less ostentatiously. If the family does not have a married daughter, this area may be used for
storage.
The high pointed gables of the house are fitted with gable sereens (tebar layar, see
Figure 6) which provide protection from driving rain and also allow thorough ventilation.
The gable sereens slope upwards and inwards from a shallow platform (undan-undan, see
Detail I) extending across the base of the gable. This is probably the most important space in
the Acehnese traditional house and is used to store precious family heirlooms (pusaka) as
well as cakes and other special foods used on festive occasions. Usually the most elaborate
decoration of the house is applied here and the tebar layar are exquisitely carved or woven
(Figure 6).
Most old traditional Acehnese houses are made of chengal, a dark hardwood which can
last for many years under harsh tropical conditions. The task of acquiring chengal from its
remote jungle source is a difficult, expensive process. Formerly, the Sultans and Acehnese
traditional aristocracy used elephants to feil and haul this timber from the jungles.
Because of the great expense of obtaining chengal today, many houses are now constructed
from cheap local or imported hardwoods. All the main beams, columns and wall
planks are made from this timber and are often decoratively carved. The floor however, is
often made of split bamboo slats spaced at regular intervals to allow for the passage of air
(see Details A, B and G).
In fact bamboo may have been the original building material for the whole house. In
1811 William Marsden noted:
For the floorings they lay whole bamboos (a well known species of large cane) of four or five
inches diameter, close to each other, and fastened at the ends to the timbers. Across these are
laid laths of split bamboo, about an inch wide and of the length of the room, which are tied
down with filaments of the 'rattan'. This sort of flooring has an elasticity alarming to
strangers when they first tread on it.
This versatile material is still used for modest houses (Figure 7).
The steeply pitched roof of the Acehnese house is commonly made from palm leaves.
The thatch (atap) is usually made from the sago palm (Metroxylon) if the house is remote
from tidal waters or from the nipah palm (Nipah fructicans) if the site lies near brackish
41

Figure 7. An Old Traditional House Constructed From Bamboo
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water. Details C and D clearly show the method of attaching the palm leaves.
Throughout its construction no nails are used and the whole building is held together by
dowel joints and wedges (see Details A, B, E and F). This eases the task of taking the house
to pieces and setting it up again elsewhere. There is another great advantage in this type of
construction, also, namely that because of the dowel and wedge jointing technique, the
structure has considerable flexibility and can survive the destructive force of earthquakes. 8
Many aspects of the planning, erection and decoration of the Acehnese house have been
directly influenced by beliefs associated with a number of religious incursions from outside
the region — Hindu, Buddhist and Islamic. Unfortunately, it is difficult to determine the
origin of many of these influences. Few written records have been kept in the Acehnese
world and to determine what is pre-Hindu, or Hindu-Buddhist, is made even more difficult
because of this. The arrival of Islam has further complicated the issue and both Hindu-
Buddhist and Islamic teachings have become fused with autochthonous animist beliefs in a
syncretic system which has produced its own unique adat (customs, tradition).
All available evidence suggests that the form of the traditional house has not changed
radically over the last two hundred years and probably retains the form which existed when
Islam arrived in Aceh in the thirteenth century. In the Acehnese world the house is not seen
as a shelter from the sun and rain. It is regarded as a refuge from evil forces and influences.
In most Southeast Asian societies, elaborate rituals and ceremonies accompany the construction
of a house. The Acehnese regard their own house as a sanctuary not only because it
restricts access to outsiders, but also because it has been cleansed of malign influences
through the performance of religious rituals and accompanying ceremonies during its erection
and upon its completion.
The procedures for building a traditional Acehnese house are elaborate. The erection of
the main frame is normally done communally under the supervision of village elders,
religious leaders and a master builder. At this stage the religious aspect is a central consideration.
It is considered crucial to spiritually prepare, cleanse and bless the new site and house
structure in order to ensure the well-being of the occupants. The rituals are basically animist
in origin, but are cloaked with the sanctifying mantle of Islamic ceremony.
A favourable time for the commencement of building is carefully chosen. The work
always begins with the erection of the two principal posts and the cross-beams that join
them. While this is in progress appropriate prayers from the Koran are recited. These two
posts, when the house is completed, stand in the most important sacred house space (the
main bedroom) and are called the raja (prince) and the puteri (princess) posts. They are
made from the soundest and most refined wood. The raja is erected first followed by the
puteri. At a wedding ceremony the bridegroom takes his place in the room seated next to the
'prince' post, while the bridge occupies a seat beside the 'princess' post.
Should the cereomonies at erection of the principal columns prove propitious the rest of
the building will proceed. As soon as the house is completed an auspicious day is again
chosen for moving in.
On this occasion a religious feast is given, to which the village head (tengkü) of the
meunasah is invited. After this gathering a customary 'cooling' 9
period commences. This
consists of sprinkling all the posts with floor and water using a broom made of plants and
twigs. These 'cooling' ceremonies are intended to dispel evil or malign influences. The same
process is repeated whenever there have been any special feasts or ceremonies in the house
50

since such occurrences are believed to set the 'hot' powers of evil in motion. Of all the
pillars, the raja and puteri receive most attention on such occasions.
The two royal pillars and sometimes other important columns are covered at the top
with three pieces of coloured cloth (red, white and black) during building. The use of these
sacred colours is not unique to Aceh as many ethnic groups throughout Indonesia use the
same three colours. 10
It has been suggested that according to Acehnese animist beliefs the
colours white and black are symbolic representation of good and evil, the upper world and
the lower world, day and night. To the Acehnese, the black night symbolises the arrival of
the time when evil spirits are free to roam and is the most dangerous period of the day.
Clearly nightfall sees a sudden change in the activities of people, and involves some tension
and constraint. Later in the evening, after the last prayer of the day (Isja), life gradually
returns to normal. The main door of the Acehnese house never faces the sunset as this would
be tantamount to inviting evil night spirits into the building. The Acehnese believe that evil
spirits will enter a house through any openings, especially near the roof. This belief may explain
the positioning of the cloths at the top of the columns, immediately under the roof.
The cloth's protective power is further reinforced by the placement of verses from the Koran
between each layer. The main window and door entrances are further protected by the placement
of Koranic verses above them.
A schematic section through the Acehnese house (see Figure 14) reveals the breakdown
of the building into three main sections. The upper section is the most sacred one within the
house where the family valuables (pusaka) are stored in the undan-undan. The middle section
is where human activities, isolated and protected from the external influences of everyday
living, take place. Under the house is where shelter and protection is provided for
domesticated animals, and where household rubbish (including human faeces) drop through
the floor. The tripartite breakdown of the house into sacred, human, and nether worlds,
occurs in many ethnic groups throughout Indonesia. It is very pronounced, for example, in
the neighbouring but formally distinct houses of the Toba and Karo Batak.
Another concept which may be discerned in the form of the Acehnese house is that of
the Hindu symbol Mount Meru. Rassers (1959:63), in discussing a range of Indonesian
house forms, refers to the vertical and structural hierarchy expressed in the religious context
of the symbolic mountain. That is to say, the gods dweil on the highest points on earth — the
mountains, human live in the middle world, and the nether spirits live in the oceans below.
Architectural detail in the traditional house clearly differentiates between the sanctified
upper spaces where humans live and the open and profane undercroft where malign forces
may range freely. This boundary is represented by an ornately carved skirting board which
surrounds the whole building at upper floor level (see Figure 5). It is a carved timber addition
with no structural function. However it is never forgotten in the construction of the
house.
The aesthetic effect of the house raised on columns is not easily appreciated in the
photographs but is worth emphasising. From a distance, the upper semi-enclosed part of the
building, protected from the unruly forces of nature, appears to float suspended high above
the ground. The effect of viewing several buildings in the one village is of seeing ships
levitating above a shadowed world below,
Inside the house, this vertical differentiation is taken even further, indicating a hierarchy
and a subtle inter-relationship of individual living spaces.
51

The most important space, as previously mentioned, can be found in the most elevated
position of the house — the undan-undan (see Figure 6). The dalam, the inner sanctum
where the connubial bed is found and where the bodies of the dead are prepared for burial,
is elevated by two steps above the less important serambi areas (see Figure 8).
The serambi areas themselves are important spaces for performing daily prayers and for
holding formal social gatherings, and thus are elevated above the depur. The kitchen — the
washing and cleaning room — is closest to the undercroft because it is the least important in
the spacial hierarchy (see also Figure 8).
The most important horizontal division in the Acehnese house is the wall separating the
male verandah from the rest of the building. This wall is always heavily embellished with carvings,
indicating the importance of stepping up from the male verandah into the dalam. This
carving however, gives the male verandah the appearance of an especially important space
— more so than its female counterpart beyond. It is possible to regard the male serambi as
being somewhat detached from the main body of the house — the domain of the female
owners. Perhaps this male/female segregation and the importance of the more elaborately
decorated male verandah, mark a hierarchy super-imposed on to the original structure.
Perhaps there were changes associated with the modification of a matrilineal society through
the teachings of Islam.
The carving on the main timber members, predominantly in the male verandah areas,
are generally geometrie or floral in nature. This is due to the proscriptions of orthodox Islam
which prohibit the depiction of humans or animals in religious art (Seobadio, 1974:108).
However carvings of monkey figures, snakes, birds and Kala heads (monstrous animal heads
of Hindu-Buddhist iconography) are still to be found in many traditional homes. Floral patterns
are dominated by the lotus flower in its many different forms. Occasionally influences
from animism, Hinduism and Islam can be found existing side by side with carved and fretted
timber panels depicting verses from the Koran.
As in several other Sumatran societies the house and rice land are generally owned by
married women. Inheritance in Aceh is matrilineal. When a daughter marries, her father
provides her with a separate dweiling. If there are insufficiënt funds to build a separate
house in the neighbourhood, an extension of the parental house is made at the eastern end
with a doorway leading to a new back gallery. Acehnese children are thus born in the house
of their mother. The idiomatic expression for a wife is "the one who owns the house" —
njang po rumah (Hurgronje, 1906).
Women acquire a house, or at least a portion of one, at the time of their marriage. The
house is a gift from the women's parents. From marriage until the birth of the first child, or
sometimes for a period of three to four years depending on prior arrangements, a bride does
not legally own the house. It still belongs to her parents and during this period she is fully
supported by them. At the end of this period there is a small feast {chanduri) at which it is
announced that the woman is now "separated" (geumeukleh) from her parents. She is given
full possession of the house and, if the parents can afford it, a rice field as well. At the birth
of every child thereafter, the parents give their daughter another rice plot if circumstances
permit.
Girls grow up in their mother's house and remain there or in the neighbourhood, for the
rest of their lives. Parents build a new house for themselves and the rest of their family when
their first daughter marries. If possible, the new house is built in the same yard as the old
52

one; otherwise it is located close by. When the next daughter marries the parents move
again, leaving the second house to her. They occasionally are found living in a shack surrounded
by the houses of their daughters.
The anthropologist James Siegal has commented:
Acehnese women envisage paradise as the place where they are reunited with their children
and their mothers; husbands and fathers are absent. (Siegal, 1969:54)
This emphasises the Acehnese woman's view of the family which according to Siegal
... consists of people who occupy the house compound — themselves, their sisters, mothers,
and children. Their husbands have no place, and hence no right to make decisions.
At the time of their marriage, men belong neither to their family's home, nor to their
wife's home, to which they come empty handed. They are thought of as belonging to the
meunasah. Even when a husband fulfils his material obligations, he has little place in his
wife's home. It appears that this situation has not changed much since Snouck Hurgronje's
time when he wrote
... although men tried to create a role as husbands and, especially as fathers, women thought
of them as essentially superfluous. They allowed men no part in raising children and tolerated
them only so long as they paid their own way and contributed money for goods that a woman
could not obtain through her own resources. (Hurgronje, 1906)
It is anomalous that the planning of the village, the house compound and the house
itself are designed in favour of men, though the house and land are ion the ownership of
women who appear to make the major decisions regarding the family. Although there seems
to be a conflict between Acehnese adat and islamic social mores, social conventions are not
isolated in the Indonesian setting. Similar customs prevail amongst the Minangkabau of
West Sumatra, for example.
Admittedly, the male verandahs are the most heavily embellished with carvings.
However, perhaps the house owners (the women) make the male areas more comfortable in
order to keep their 'guests' happy. I say 'guests', because it appeared to me as it did to Siegal
that "the men were like guests in the houses of their wives". (Siegal, 1969:55) Snouck
Hurgronje in a footnote written fifty years before Siegal's comments, also remarked that "a
man feels like a guest in his wife's house". (Hurgronje, 1906) Thus to fully understand the
building, seeing it through the eyes of women is essential. I saw the house only through the
eyes of males, and as human nature would have it, they stressed the importance of their own
sections of the house. 11
NOTES
1. Snouck Hurgronje's drawings were based on sketches provided by a Mr M. Donk and were supplemented by a
set of explanatory notes prepared by a Dutch engineer, M.L.J.C. Van Es.
2. A number of early photographs of traditional houses appeared in works by Kielstra (1883-1185) and Meiier
(1883).
3. This article is based on fieidwork in Aceh during February and March 1982. The main purpose was to obtain
detailed measured drawings and a photographic record of the traditional Acehnese coastal village house.
4. Several brief descriptions of Acehnese villages dating from 1602 are given in Reid (1975).
5. All words in italics in the text are in Bahasa Indonesia. The measured drawings have been labelled in Indonesian
and English. Snouck Hurgronje's work includes a useful list of Acehnese language terms for the different
parts of the house and its structural members.
53

6 The traditional house which I measured is located in Kampung Mon Tasie approximately 20 küometers
southeast óf Banda Aceh just off the Banda Aceh-Sigli Road. The only differencebetween this buüding and
he archetypal Acehnese house is in the position of the main male entrance sta.r. Usually the; stair s centrally
placedionthe male verandah. Apart from this detail, the dweiling is typical of traditional buildings
throughout coastal Aceh from Meulaboh to Lho' Seumawe.
7 Abdullah Munshi observed during his visit to the area in 1838 "... some people lit smudges every day under
the house to smoke out mosquitoes, - if one went into these houses, one at once had a choking feel.ng and
one's eyes watered ..." (Coupe A.E., 1894:62).
8 Marsden noted this lack of regidity in the structure: "... but in Sumatra the frequency of earthquakes is
alone sufficiënt to have prevented the natives from adopting a substantial mode of building' . (Marsden,
1811)
9. It is interesting to compare this with the English 'house warming'. To the Acehnese the warm climate's
coolness, and not warmth, is what is desired.
10. This use of colours was noted by one researcher in an article on the Bugis people of South Sulawesi (Errington,
1975:8).
11 One problem I encountered with my research was that my interviews with the village inhabitants were ex-
'clusively with men. In a strict Islamic society segregation of women from a male stranger is a natural but
frustrating problem.
REFERENCES
Coupe, A.E. The Voyage of Abdullah, London, 1894.
Errington, Shelly, Asia magazine, Jan. — Feb. 1975, p.8.
Hurgronje, C. Snouck, The Acehnese, Leiden, 1906.
Kielstra, E.B., Acheh Province Sumatra, Leiden, 1883-1885.
Marsden, William, The History of Sumatra, Longman and Hurst, London, 1811.
Meijer, H., Acheh Sumatra, P.B. Nieuwenhuijs, Breda, 1883.
Rassers, W.H., Panji, the Culture Hero, Mertinus Nijhoff, The Hague, 1959.
Reid, A.J.S., "Structures of Cities in Southeast Asia", Canberra Conference Paper, 1975.
Seobadio, H, Dynamic in Indonesian Literature, 1974.
Siegal, J., The Rope of God, University of California Press, 1969.
54

-JU
60

MINANGKABAU AUTHORITY PATTERNS AND THE EFFECTS OF DUTCH RULE
Kenneth R. Young
Introduction
Among the rich diversity of peoples and cultures in Sumatra, indeed in Indonesia, the
Minangkabau of West Sumatra have attracted a lot of attention among scholars. There are a
number of reasons for this, such as the prominent role played in the formation of the
Indonesian nation by outstanding individuals from Minangkabau, or the social organisation
of Minangkabau village society, which still today incorporates social and property relationships
regulated by the categories of matrilineal adat ('custom' or 'customary law' in which
descent and inheritance is traced through the mother's line).
It is the latter subject I want to take up here, in particular the question of political
authority derived from Minangkabau adat. Under Dutch colonial rule, adat became the only
officially sanctioned source of indigenous political authority. Absorption into the
Netherlands East Indies had a number of effects on political structures in West Sumatra. I
do not intend to say much about these changes in general, but to concentrate instead on one
particular effect. The effect of Dutch rule that I want to discuss, and show to be problematic,
is one that still lingers in the way we think about the Minangkabau past. The early
colonial rulers had a particular perspective on Minangkabau society, and, partly for political
reasons, insisted that this view, in which adat was the sole legitimate basis of indigenous
political authority, prevailed for most of the nineteenth century. It is a view which deserves
to be questioned.
I do not intend to offer conclusive arguments about the nature of political authority in
Minangkabau. In spite of the proscription of historical speculation 1
by the British founders
of my discipline, social anthropology, I intend to be speculative, offering reflections about
what Minangkabau society might have been like in the past. I will raise problems well
beyond the immediate concerns of my own research into Minangkabau society in the late
nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. 2
I have chosen to risk a little speculation to bring
into question the scope of the political functions of adat institutions, since their place as the
outstanding source of indigenous political authority in this society is rarely queried. I will
argue that it is necessary to look beyond these institutions in order to understand the full
range of political possibilities in Minangkabau society. This does not entirely correspond
with the received view among scholars of Minangkabau, nor of the people's perception of
their own past.
Many introductory texts convey the impression that the form of political authority
characteristic of Minangkabau is to be found in the institutions of adat. 3
The domestic and
communal authority patterns discussed in these texts are real enough, and are not at issue.
However, they do not extend in their application beyond the boundaries of village communities
(nagari). My argument will be that, if we are to understand the basis of those forms
of political authority which had a wider territorial scope, we must look elsewhere. The institutions
of matrilineal adat are unsuited to this type of political authority. Adat institutions
may have to adapt to territorial political authority (and vice-versa), but in doing so, they
serve not only as a barrier but also as a complement to power which derives from other
sources.
63

The problem in view will be elaborated further shortly. Firstly, I should say a little
about the region for the benefit of those of you who are not already familiar with it. After
doing this, and expanding on the problem itself, the lines of argument that could be
developed to challenge the received account of political authority in Minangkabau will be
discussed. Among the points raised are some taken from an important article published in
1927 by the eminent Dutch sociologist B.J.O. Schrieke. 4
The Region
The language, culture and forms of social organisation of the Minangkabau people
predominate in the administrative area known, in colonial times as West Sumatra
{Sumatra's Westkust), and today as the Indonesian province of Sumatera Barat. Along the
lowland coastal littoral and other borderland (rantau) areas, within and adjacent to West
Sumatra, these cultural forms have mixed with influences from other Sumatran peoples
(such as Acehnese and Bataks).
Within a short distance from the coast rises the broad mountain chain, extending the
length of Sumatra, called the Bukit Barisan. The geographic and cultural core of
Minangkabau (the darat or heartland), where the pure cultural forms are found and are said
to have originated, lies in the mountainous highlands. In fertile highland rice-plains, no
more than fifty kilometres inland, are the three core districts (Agam, Limapuluh Kota,
Tanar Datar) of the Minangkabau heartland. 5
When mention is made here of the
Minangkabau region, the reference is to the location of a socio-cultural entity rather than to
a unified political structure based in West Sumatra. The pure socio-cultural forms are those
of the heartland, and it is these three districts that are indicated here when 'Minangkabau' is
used is a territorial sense.
The most distinctive territorial unit within the Minangkabau heartland is the nagari. A
nagari is simply the most developed form of settlement in Minangkabau. It may be thought
of as a village, provided one recognises that it is large and made up of a number of sections
(jorong). Nagari populations of several thousand are common, so it is quite a large village by
Sumatran standards.
Each nagari has its own mosque and balai. The balai adat is the council hall of the settlement.
In it meet the 'governing' adat council of the nagari. 6
The majority of its assembly
consists of the clan or lineage leaders of the village, men with the titlepanghulu. A panghulu
is the senior male in a Minangkabau lineage or clan. Each nagari regulates affairs within the
balai according to one of the two Lareh or adat traditions — neither according to Bodi-
Caniago or Koto-Piliang adat. 7
The term 'nagari' is sometimes translated, from its Minangkabau context, as
'autonomous village republic'. If one treats matrilineal adat as the only source of political
authority, then this translation makes sense. However, I will be arguing to the contrary that,
even before the arrival of the Dutch, many Minangkabau nagari were either economically
autarchie, nor free from wider political linkages. These wider connexions, moreover, were
mostly organised through institutions other than adat. To discern them we must free
ourselves from preconceptions about the political role of adat, and be prepared to discover
authority patterns that do not correspond to the received idealisations of village autonomy.
When I refer to political authority, I am talking about something which unifies two
significant elements — power and legitimacy. Authority must combine the capacity to bring
64

about a state of affairs with the acceptance by those subject to that power that its exercise is
morally justified. Therefore if adat, or anything else, is seen as a locus of authority, it is
necessary to show that it functions both as a source of power and as a source of legitimacy.
Adat encompasses many important political functions regulating life within
Minangkabau communities. It has strong legitimacy for these functions, though its norms
rest heavily on ideals of reciprocity and consensual decision-making. It has a capacity to impart
sanctions by communal pressure, and especially through lineage control over subsistence
(wet-rice) land. Authority derived from adat is significant, but, as I will argue,
limited to domestic and communal matters. It is not functional beyond very definite limits as
a coercive authority with disposition over land, labour or resources.
The limited scope of clan-based political authority is not by itself the decisive point. It
cannot be taken for granted that organised power of wider extent prevailed as well, since the
kinds of hierachies we are familiar with in modern societies by no means existed universally
in pre-capitalist societies. One hypothesis that could be considered concerning the past
organisation of Minangkabau society is that it did not have any structures of political
significance beyond the boundaries of each nagari. This possibility, however, returns this
discussion to the question of the nature of political authority in Minangkabau. I will say a
little more about that, and then set out some grounds for skepticism about the received
account (which tends to find political authority exclusively in adat institutions).
The Problem
The stimulus for the problem is the lack of attention that has been given to the kind and
variety of political forms which may have operated historically between nagari settlements
and on a wider territorial level in the Minangkabau heartland. 1 am sure neglect of this question
can be accounted for in good measure by the paucity of evidence available to resolve it.
The problem itself, however, is not that the answer is difficult to arrivé at, but that the question
itself is rarely asked, and that the reason for that may be the residual influence of the
colonial perspective on Minangkabau authority patterns, a view which promoted and gave
exclusive recognition to the adat of village matriclans. If this assumption is correct, it can be
overcome by showing that this colonial view needs to be treated with skepticism.
The hypothesis implicit in the colonial perspective is not entirely implausible.
Minangkabau may have been like certain other pre-capitalist societies (especially kinshiporganised
segmentary societies) in which there was an absence of central authority, i.e.
where there was no domination by an overarching organisation of the territory occupied by a
culturally homogeneous people. The only sources of authority in these systems tends to be
located within descent groups. The political characterisation of such societies, however, is
not accomplished by labelling them 'stateless', 'acephalous' or 'tribal'. It requires as well
elucidation of how social stability is achieved without purposive institutionalised direction.
Anthropologists faced with this task have frequently emphasised the role of lineages
and clans in these segmentary systems. Some have discerned a balanced opposition which
produces stability from processes of conflict and competition at all social levels from small
descent groups to larger social aggregates. 8
Others have emphasised systems of alliance and
exchange, particularly in systems relying on inter-marriage between otherwise autonomous
groups. 9
Such societies may be bound together beyond the level of the immediate community
in a variety of ways, so that normally some social mechanism can be found which pro-
65

duces stability and unity in the wider (seemingly anarchie) society. In Minangkabau there are
no obvious signs of a supra-nagari segmentary system.
Minangkabau nagaris are endogamous (i.e. in-marrying), so inter-marriage does not
appear to have provided the crucial inter-communal bonding. Perhaps 'mechanical solidarity'
was achieved from conflict and competition between settlments, but that has yet to be
demonstrated. The degree of intercommunal conflict was unlikely to have been too severe,
because there was a significant flow of goods and services within and beyond the region. 10
This economie interdependence points to but does not explain patterns of stable social interaction
between nagari. It poses difficulties for, but do not make impossible, a pattern of
mechanical solidarity. These considerations do not eliminate the case for a segmentary
political system in Minangkabau, but as things stand that case remains unproven, and
should be argued for rather than assumed.
Other factors which might be seen to favour this case were the rugged terrain, open
frontiers and poor Communications, all conditions which work against the political unification
of a territory. However, the greatest difficulty for this view is in naming a time when
this putative state of affairs existed. I can't point to a time when such a situation was true of
the whole heartland. There was the Minangkabau kingdom based at Pagarruyung; there
were the territories controlled by the Padris," or, more recently, the various phases of the
colonial administration. Now there is the Government of the Republic of Indonesia. In any
period it is possible to point to territorially based political institutions in the region. In each
case it is necessary to investigate the links that existed between the territorial power(s) and
the clan-based government of the nagaris. The point that emerges, it seems to me, is that
adat political functions were not an alternative to these larger political formations, but
rather functions that co-existed with a variety of territorial regimes. Further, as I will argue
below, the nature of adat institutions was such that they could not without modification be
readily expanded to take on functions of territorial sovereignty or to adapt to the early stages
of endogenous State formation.
The early Dutch Governors believed otherwise, and tried to shape adat authority to
their own purposes. Their ambitions were guided by their familiarity with Javanese patterns
of territorial power.' 2
Javanese political structures possessed functioning hierarchies which
linked territorial notables with the systems of village government. In Minangkabau the
Dutch tried to force an alien political hierarchy into the adat framework, 13
in order that adat
would absorb and legitimise functions of tribute extraction, territorial control, and the coercive
direction of the population. At the same time they moved against alternative bases of
authority, notably the influence of independent Islamic teachers.
The Dutch colonial state established its sovereignty in Minangkabau in the first half of
the nineteenth century, after intervening in 1821 in a protracted civil conflict which had
disrupted life in the Minangkabau territories since 1803. They did not defeat the last of their
Padri opponents until 1837. 14
The main objective of the Dutch at this time was to win control of the lucrative coffee
trade. After the elimination of Padri opposition, they hoped that, by adopting a political
strategy of indirect rule, they would be able both to consolidate a trade monopoly in this
commodity, and to maintain their command over the Minangkabau region. The model of
commercial advantage and territorial control was based on their experience in Java. 15
The
local political institutions which, the Dutch hoped, could be integrated into their structure of
66

government were those of Minangkabau adat. However, they discovered that political
authority derived from this source did not function well within a hierarchical State apparatus,
and was not well suited to the long term management of the system of forced
deliveries of coffee either. 16
As Governor Michiels commented in 1832: 'Sumatra's people
are not the people of Java and shall never be made subservient to our interests by the same
means'. 17
Nevertheless, Dutch efforts to build a system of government exclusively on adat institutions
persisted into the twentieth century. Eventually, arguments were raised, most cogently
by Dr Schrieke, that the bureaucratie civil service that was being developed by this time
would have to break with the ascriptive authority of adat institutions in Minangkabau.' 8
Although Schrieke was looking ahead to the future needs of the State, many of the
arguments he raised about the nature of adat authority could be turned (this was certainly
not his intention) to question its suitability for any form of territorial political power.
Some Grounds for Skepticism
Schrieke's points will be considered now along with other reasons for questioning the completeness
of any account of Minangkabau authority which deals only with adat institutions.
The grounds for exercising skepticism about such claims (which were promoted by the
colonial State as part of their support for adat notables) can be grouped as follows:
1. Arguments based on the content of adat prescriptions;
2. Historical and linguistic evidence for the existence of political and economie ties
beyond nagai boundaries, and
3. The application to the past of the arguments put forward by Schrieke in 1927.
There is not the scope here to develop these points fully. Rather, lines of argument capable
of more extensive development are set out.
Adat Prescriptions
The term 'adat' refers most broadly to the Minangkabau people's own perception of their
customs and practices, their way of doing things. It is a notion without the boundaries implicit
in western ideas of law, religion, economy and politics. It remains something different
from a formalised set of rules, or the prescriptions of a legal system such as the colonial
Government tried to build out of it through their codification of adatrecht.' 9
Nevertheless, like any body of discourse, it can be shown to have developed the greatest
precision and elaboration in those areas where it was most heavily utilised. Conversely, in
areas where it was little used, one can expect that its admonitions will be more vague and
generalised.
I suggest that a careful analysis of the content of Minangkabau adat will reveal a pattem
of this kind — a pattern which is highly elaborated in matters of property, inheritance,
and matters bearing on marriage, residence and local dispute settlement. On the other hand,
the guidance adat provides for relations beyond the nagari are confined to some very general
aphorisms. There is little that is specific. Most of the adat that 'does not rot in the rain or
crack in the sun', the 'adat that is truly adat' 20
concerns domestic matters. Additionally, the
procedures for decision-making and settling disputes involve lengthy consultations of those
involved (musyawarah dan mufakat).
On these indications there is little to show that adat institutions were involved in the ex-
67

ercise of territorial authority. I suspect this has encouraged the view that no such authority
existed.
However, what I am stressing, is that adat is not the basis of this kind of political
authority. It is only one of a number of legitimising rationales that have existed in
Minangkabau society (e.g. Islam, nationalism, secular modernism, communism etc.) each
having their own socio-economic constituency. The socio-economic foundation of adat
authority, as Schrieke repeatedly emphasises, is lineage control over wet-rice land. 2
'
Schrieke observes, in his 1927 article, the way in which adat authority is limited even within
the nagari. Developments, recent at the time he was writing, had led to a situation in which
... in the last ten years outsiders had been able to become the spokesmen of grievances within
the nagari, and not only did leaders of the people with no adat connexions influence them, but
they had also managed to gain a hold over the adat authorities themselves. This is not a wholly
new phenomenon. Already van den Linden pointed out [formerly in 1833] that sometimes
there could be found people who were not adat leaders who had more influence than the
panghulu themselves. 22
Historial and Linguistic Evidence for the Existence of Extra-N agari Ties
The content of adat suggests its predominantly domestic and communal roles. 23
1 want now
to indicate briefly that there were significant political (and economie) ties beyond nagari
boundaries. I am not referring here to territorial power een tres such as the Royal Court at
Pagarruyung might have been. I refer rather to the numerous nagari federations which
covered the Minangkabau landscape. 24
The Dutch tried to graft onto village adat the acceptance of new political offices — a
village head, and above him localised territorial authority over several villages vested in a
notable entitled Tuanku Laras. These positions were rightly seen to have no real indigenous
basis. 23
Also, the districts the Tuanku Laras were put in charge of grouped nagari according
to the Government's administrative convenience first of all, and according to long association
only secondarily. These districts of colonial administration were called laras.
The artificiality of these arrangements should not obscure the recognition that real
nagari federations of greater or lesser scope had always existed in the Minangkabau
heartland. A common pattern was for a group of related nagari settlements to lie along the
banks of a river, having been established historically from new settlements set up under the
protection of an original 'mother nagari' (induk nagari). 26
Some degree of economie
specialisation and exchange may have developed between these settlements. Wider trading
unions existed too, products being exchanged on an orderly basis through markets. 27
In fact,
market communities could unite not just a number of nagaris, but a group of nagari federations.
The luhak Limapuluh Kota, the one furthest to the East, once was a confederation of
fourteen separate laras., 28
Politically, these higher territorial unions appeared, at the beginning
of the nineteenth century to have limited political cooperation to measures designed to
guarantee their collective security, under the leadership of a man (titled Datuk berenam or
bertujuh etc. depending on the number involved) appointed only for the duration of the
conflict or other emergency. 29
Hence, even without involvement with a centre of territorial
power such as the Minangkabau kingdom, the boundaries of the nagari frequently did not
terminate all significant political and economie processes, even though they may have set the
limit of the authority of lineage leaders {panghulu).
Another piece of evidence (and potential avenue for further investigation), which suggests
the importance of units of greater territorial scope than single nagaris, is linguistic in
68

character. Differences in dialect and in adat are found to cluster around nagari federations.
Dr Khaidir Anwar has written about his own home district of Situjuh (south of Payakumbuh
in Kabupaten Limapuluh Kota). He has identified a distinct dialect in the Situjuh area.
Situjuh is made up of five nagari. 30
It is a laras in the Dutch sense. 31
However, of the five
nagari, only four (those which presumably formed a long-standing federation before the colonial
Government joined the fifth, nagari Tungkar, to their group) speak the distinctive
Sitajuh dialect. 32
These four are probably the original pre-colonial laras. Variations in
speech of this kind are further evidence of close associations of long standing between
nagari. These linguistic data further support the historical evidence that the political and
economie structures of Minangkabau extended beyond the confines of the nagari.
Schrieke's Arguments Against the Use of Adat Authority in the Twentieth Century
Lastly, I want to draw on Schrieke's case, made in his 1927 article. 33
He argued then that
adat-derived authority was entirely unsuitable to the rational-bureaucratic functions of a
modern State, and to the political functions appropriate to the capitalist mode of production
that had become established in West Sumatra. 34
His argument is developed cogently and at
substantial length. His purpose at that time was to argue tor the formation of a professional
bureaucratie civil service, and for the abandonment of attempts to found regional government
on the authority of adat leaders. His case is persuasive, but (probably against his intention)
it also demonstrates, not only that adat authority was unsuited to this purpose, but that
it had always been unsuited to the exercise and legitimation of territorial authority. From
this I conclude that historical enquiry into the sources of political authority should look
beyond adat institutions.
Schrieke observes how movements of opposition and reform, such as the Padris or
various other nineteenth and twentieth century movements, had always drawn on some
organisational basis other than adat. The Padris grounds for legitimation too, based on
religion, had a wider authorative basis than adat. 35
He notes how energetic efforts by the
Government to mobilise the prestige of adat authorities after 1924 had little effect in slowing
the spread of communism in West Sumatra. 36
Furthermore, established pre-colonial
political authorities, in particular the Minangkabau kingdom, did not depend exclusively on
adat for their authority. Those titled persons within Minangkabau villages who represented
the King were not rulers or administrators in the modern sense. Further, he notes, the Kings
and courts themselves stood very largely outside of the adat-system of the nagaris. 37
His argument contains more points than can be reviewed here. The present case will rest
with one of his most telling points — that of bringing out the nature of adat authority, to
show its unsuitability as an element in a structure of territorial power. The fact that he had
to turn to an ethnographic parallel to make this clear, probably indicates how wellentrenched
misunderstandings about the nature of adat authority in Minangkabau had
become. Citing contemporary ethnographic studies (by Kruyt and Adriani) of Toraja society
in Sulawesi, Schrieke emphasises the consensual foundations of Minangkabau adat authority,
and the fact that lineage or clan heads had neither the power nor the legitimizing rationale
to enforce the demands of territorial government on their dependents. If that was to
be done, the sources of both power and legitimacy would have to be found elsewhere. The
similarity he is drawing attention to is exemplified by the following passage from Kruyt and
Adriani:
09

The decisions of the [Toraja] leader must be wholly in accord with the feelmgs of the
viliaaers else the head would probably forfeit his authority. Therefore no leader will choose a
path other than that desired by his fellow villagers ... Toraja leaders have never been ad­
ministrators [bestuurders]. 3
'
There is probably no need to spell this out for the authority of panghulu in
Minangkabau, to mention again the importance of musyawarah and mufakat, or to point
out that the legitimization of sanctions exercised by panghulu are restricted to particular domains
agreed to be in the interests of the lineage, clan and community, and to the protection
of their rights.
In more abstract terms this is the contrast between, on the one hand, customary
authority deriving from association, consensus, and reciprocity and, on the other, territorial
authority deriving from political or economie concentration of power, social rank and
tribute.
The colonial Government was, in this respect, not that different from any other territorial
power that had existed in the region. However, they acted with the hope that
Minangkabau adat could be transformed into a traditionally legitimized system of domination
such as they had adapted to the government of Java. The colonial Government persisted
in trying to convert adat authority in Minangkabau into something that it wasn't. It is
not surprising that the system of administration didn't function as they had hoped. They
persevered for a long time. Their efforts were always directed at portraying the adat leaders
as the sole possessors of political authority in Minangkabau (besides, naturally, themselves).
We will follow them in that error unless we recognise that territorial power in Minangkabau
had to base itself on resources, organisation and ideologies other than adat.
Conclusion
The adat institutions of the Minangkabau nagari are largely limited to the internal selfregulation
of these communities. They were not adapted to further political functions,
because the nature of their authority was such that it could not be simply expanded to take
on territorial rule or the early stages of State formation. That doesn't mean that territorial
power could not exist in Minangkabau. It had, to some extent, existed for a long time.
However, whenever any group established control over territory, population, resources or
trade routes, their authority functioned alongside, or over and above, adat-based authority.
This is not that remarkable, in that the common pattern in the Sumatran region was the
rise and fall of small states under leaders who succeeded temporarily in concentrating power
in their courts, most frequently drawing resources from control of water-borne trade. These
states tended to be unstable, enduring while the political flair of their rulers lasted, ever
vulnerable to internal intrigue and external attack. 3
' The village communities that feil within
their sphere of influence commonly adopted political offices to fit in with these evanescent
kingdoms. They did so usually without losing control of their domestic affairs, even though
they might have been obliged to pay a relatively small tribute to the central authority. When
the kingdom declined, they sloughed off their external connexions and reverted to more
local, kinship-based patterns of self-government, patterns that were never entirely lost when
they were incorporated into the larger political unit. Minangkabau adat institutions were
well suited to this kind of continuity within shifting and oscillating patterns of territorial
power. But they existed as its complement, not as its manifestation at the local level.
My concern is that the received account of authority in Minangkabau communities has
70

absorbed some misunderstandings of the early Dutch rulers on this point. With their experience
of the hierarchical Javanese patterns of territorial power which reached down into
village political organisation as their guide, Dutch officials undertook the procrustean
labour of trying fit Minangkabau adat onto the bed of an alien political hierarchy, so that it
would absorb and legitimise functions of tribute extraction, territorial control, and coercive
direction of the population. One of the lasting effects of their efforts has been the tendency
to see village adat as the most significant authority structure in indigenous society. It is
hoped that the arguments presented here will encourage skepticism about that view of the
Minangkabau past.
NOTES
1. Both Malinowski and Radcliffe-Brown broke with earlier (evolutionist, diffusionist) schools of thought, and
argued against speculation and 'conjectural history'. cf. I.M. Lewis, (ed.) History and Social Anthropology,
London, Tavistock p.xiif; A. Kuper, Anthropologists and Anthropology, Harmondsworth, Penguin 1975,
pp. 16-17, 84-87. This aversion to historical investigation was later corrected by Evans-Pritchard (amongst
others), who observed in 1961 that 'the functionalist critics of both evolutionists and diffusionists should
have challenged them, not for writing history, but for writing bad history'; E.E. Evans-Pritchard, 'Anthropology
and History' 1961 in Evans-Pritchard, Social Anthropology and Other Essays, New York, The
Free Press, 1964, p.173.
2. Even in contemporary and largely synchronie field studies, anthropologists can be faced with similar problems
in evaluating the status of particular institutions, notably that of the nature of a society's own view of
its past. See I.M. Lewis, op. cit., p.xvii.
3. See, for example, H.W. Bachtiar, 'Negeri Taram' A Minangkabau Village Community' in R.M. Koentjaraningrat
(ed.), Villages in Indonesia, Ithaca, New York, Cornell University Press, 1967. Note also C.
Dobbin 'The Exercise of Authority in Minangkabau in the late Eighteenth Century' in A. Reid and L.
Castles (eds.),Pre-colonial State Systems in South-East Asia, Kuala Lumpur, Monograph of the
M.B.R.A.S., no.6, 1975. The existence of the Minangkabau Kingdom is recognised, but it is its ceremonial
and symbolic functions that are stressed. cf. P.E. de Josselin de Jong, Minangkabau and Negri Sembilan,
The Hague, Martinus Nijhoff, 1952, pp.13-14, 107-111. The Royal Family was weak in the immediate precolonial
period (to the extent of largely being exterminated in a civil conflict early in the nineteenth century)
since its economie strength (based on the nearly exhausted gold trade) had greatly declined. That does not
mean that it was always weak.
4. B. Schrieke, 'Het probleem der Bestuursorganisatie ter Sumatra's Westkust' ['The Problem of the Organisation
of Government on the West Coast of Sumatra'], Koloniale Studiën, 1 (1927): 57-106.
5. The core cultural region is usually designated by the Minangkabau people themselves in partly spatial, partly
social terms, as 'Luhak nan Tigo, Lareh nan Duo', i.e. the three districts, or luhak (Agam, Limapuluh Kota,
and Tanah Datar), and the two politico-legal adat traditions, or lareh (Bodi-Caniago and Koto-Piliang,
about which see below). cf. T. Abdullah 'Modernisation in the Minangkabau World', in C. Holt (ed.)
Culture and Politics in Indonesia, London, Cornell University Press, 1972, pp.l83f.
6. The adat council still exists to-day and functions alongside the local village authority structure created by the
Indonesian State.
7. Koto-Piliang means 'chosen words' and Bodi-Caniago 'valued character'. The main difference between
these two traditions is that lineage leaders {panghulu) within a settlement are all of equal status in Bodi
Caniago villages, whereas the Koto-Piliang tradition recognises certain panghulu as being first among
equals. The hierarchical tendencies in the latter may indicate a past connexion with the political system of
the Minangkabau Kingdom. cf. P.E. de Josselin de Jong, op. cit.
8. For a classic example see:
E.E. Evans-Pritchard, The Nuer, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 1940, chs.4 & 5.
9. C. Levi-Strauss, The Elementary Structures of Kinship, Boston, Beacon Press, 1969.
10. I will develop the argument for this elsewhere. There is strong evidence for the existence of a well-established
trade-based division of labour within the region, a pattern of economie specialisation that almost certainly
preceded Dutch political control. The evidence comes from numerous souces including:
A.L. van Hasselt, Volksbeschrijving van Midden-Sumatra, Leiden, E.J. Brill, 1882.

P.J. Veth et.al, Reizen in Midden-Sumatra 1887-1879 door de leden der Sumatra-Expeditie, Leiden, E.J.
A^W.P^Verkerk Pistorius, Studiën over de inlandsche huishouding in de Padangsche Bovenlanden, Zalt-
Bommel, J. Noman en Zoon, 1871.
H.G. Nahuijs, Brieven over Bencoolen, Padang, het Rijk van Menangkabau, Rhiouw, Sincapoera en Poelo-
Pinang, Breda, Hollingerus Pijpers, 1826.
11 The Padri movement was led by an elite of religious scholars who wanted to reform the practice of Islam in
Minangkabau. It began peacefully in the eighteenth century, but shifted to a phase of armed mihtancy atter
1803 See C Dobbin, 'Islamic Revivalism in Minangkabau at the turn of the Nineteenth Century , Modern
Asian Studies, 8,3, (1974): 319-356, and C. Dobbin, 'Economie Change in Minangkabau as a Factor in the
Rise of the Padri Movement 1784-1830', Indonesia, 23, (1977): 1-38.
12. B. Schrieke, op. cit., p.94.
13. Ibid., p.67f.
14. M. Joustra, Minangkabau: overzicht van het land, geschiedenis en volk, 's-Gravenhage, Martinus
Nijhoff,1923, p.50f. „ m
C. Dobbin, 'Tuanku Iman Bonjol (1772-1864),' Indonesia, 13 (1972): 5-35.
15. 'De vrije arbeid en het soekoebestuur op Sumatra's Westkust' Tijdschrift voor Nederlandsch Indie, 17,
2C1855V 92
(Governor van Swieten) 'De invoering en werking van het Koffiestelsel in het Gouvernement van Sumatra's
Westkust', Tijdschrift voor Nederlandsch Indie, 25, 1 (1863): 216.
C. Lulofs, 'Koffiecultuur en belasting ter Sumatra's Westkust', Indische Gids 26, 2 (1VU4): loJb.
16. C. Lulofs, ibid., p.1639.
17. B. Schrieke, op.cit., p.63.
18. B. Schrieke, ibid., pp.104-106, and passim.
19. G.D. Willinck, Het Rechtsleven bij de Minangkabausche Maleiers, Leiden, E.J. Brill, 1909, and C. van
Vollenhoven, Het Adatrecht van Nederlandsch-Indie, 3 vols., Leiden, E.J. Brill 1918, 1931, 1933.
20. T. Abdullah, op.cit., p.l91f.
21 Schrieke, op.cit., pp.93, 105. See also: F. von Benda-Beckmann, Property in Social Continuity, The Hague,
Martinus Nijhoff, 1979, and J.S. Kahn, Minangkabau SocialFormations, Cambndge, Cambndge University
Press, 1980.
22. Schrieke, op.cit., p.92.
23. Ibid., pp.83-84.
24. Ibid., pp.80f.
25. Ibid., pp.67f.
26. Ibid., p.69. - , . T v.
E. Graves, The Minangkabau Response to Dutch Colonial Rule in the Nineteenth Century, Ithaca (N. Y.),
Cornell University (Modern Indonesia Project Monograph series no. 60) 1980, p.14.
27. A.L. van Hasselt, op.cit., p.360f; P.J. Veth, et.al., op.cit., pp.99, 104-106, 197-198; D.G. Stibbe, 'Beschrijving
der onderafdeeling Alahan Panjang', Tijdschrift voor het Binnenlands Bestuur, 21(1901) pp.510,522.
28. B. Schrieke, op.cit., pp.68, 81-84; A.W.P. Verkerk Pistorius, op.cit., p.83; L.C. Westenenk, De
Minangkabausche Nagari, Encyclopaedisch Bureau Aflevering VII, derde uitgave, 1918 pp.118-119.
29. B. Schrieke, ibid, pp.68-69.
30. Khaidir Anwar, 'Language Use in Minangkabau Society'. Indonesia Circle, 22 (1980) p.57.
31. Dr Khaidir Anwar, personal communication.
32. Khaidir Anwar, ibid.
33. B. Schrieke, op.cit.
72

34. Ibid. pp. 105-106.
35. Ibid., pp.93.
36. Ibid., p.92.
37. Ibid., p.93; E. Graves, op.cit., p.12; J.P. de Josselin de Jong, op.cit.
38. B. Schrieke, op.cit., p.96.
39. cf. D. J. Steinberg (ed.), In Search of Southeast Asia, New York, Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1971, ch.9.
73

UPLAND — DOWNLAND RELATIONSHIPS IN BARUS:
A NORTHWEST SUMATRAN CASE STUDY
Jane Drakard
The main focus of this lecture series is the study of coastal Sumatra. The present paper,
however, départs in some degree from that emphasis in order to examine an example of
interaction between the coastal Malay-Islamic world of Sumatra and the inland, non-Malay,
non-Islamic, Batak world. My purpose is to illustrate the interrelationship between coast
and interior in one part of northwestern Sumatra.
It is not unusual for observers to distinguish between Sumatra's coastal flat and her
hilly interior. Physically the landscapes look very different and there are many ethnic, social
and economie differences too. The earliest outside reports of north Sumatra stressed the
distinction between the Batak people of the interior and the mixed Malay population of the
coast. And from the time when Dutch observers first wrote detailed descriptions of the northern
part of west Sumatra this theme was emphasised. Van Bazel, whose description of west
Sumatra in 1761 formed the basis for many later surveys, wrote of the original, inland,
pagan inhabitants of the island who brought their goods to the shore to barter and who occasionally
became more tractable and civilized as a result of their intercourse with the people
of the coast and with the foreigners living there. The coastal population, he said, included
Chinese, Siamese, Javanese and Malaccans as well as local, Sumatran Malays and Bataks
who had accepted Islam.'
In the scholarly literature which has developed, these "worlds" have tended to remain
distinct. Batak studies have become a specialised field, particularly for anthropologists and
linguists, while the coastal world, the pesisir, has for long been regarded as a cultural and
religious entity, a Muslim trading world of mixed population and with a marked propensity
to accept ideas from outside. As other papers in this series demonstrate, there is obviously
much that can be gained from an appreciation of pesisir culture and society per se. When it
comes to the historical consideration of pre-modern Sumatran states, however, an excessively
coastal interpretation has recently been called into question. In the famous search for
Srivijaya, for instance, scholars have been obliged to review their categories of enquiry and
rethink their approaches to Sumatran institutions.
Recent studies have stressed the geographical, economie and political relationship between
coast and interior. An example is O.W. Wolters' essay reviewing the history of Srivijayan
studies. 2
Wolters suggested that, in view of the absence of archaeological evidence of a
large coastal emporium on the Musi estuary at Palembang, a useful category for expanding
our understanding of kingdoms such as Srivijaya might be to think in terms of riverine
neighbourhood networks rather than large immobile capitals. He pictured a situation in
which shared spiritual values could link a ruler with the riverine landscape surrounding him
and enable him to secure loyalty and mobilise manpower. 3
Riverine traffic, Wolters suggested,
would unite the scattered inhabitants of a region and encourage neighbourly obedience.
The task he suggests for scholars is the discovery of those networks; to enquire further
into neighbourhood Communications within a region and to search for the routes along
which men and ideas travelled. 4
In an article published in 1981 J. Micsic took up Wolters'
point and further suggested that a search for "clues to the social bonds that rulers were able
75

to manipulate" in order to mobilise a region should begin in the hinterland and along traditional
communication routes. 5
Micsic's own research, based upon archaeological
evidence.suggests that Sumatran ceremonial centres tend to be situated apart from coastal
areas of habitation and commerce; rather they often occur inland in positions which may
mark traditional transport routes and where they may have served to "regulate and
safeguard" intercourse between highland and lowland peoples. Inscribed oath stones, such
as those found at Palembang and elsewhere in south Sumatra, may be evidence of this. 6
Another scholar who has used written scources to make a similar point is K.R. Hall. In two
recent articles he has pointed to the role of the hinterland in helping to legitimate the claims
of coastal rulers. Hall has illustrated the point with an episode from the north Sumatran
chronicle, the Hikayat Raja-Raja Pasai, where a prince called Mera Silu was acknowledged
as ruler in the interior and then used that authority to gain control over the coast and the
kingdom of Semudra. Such group acclamation, Hall suggests, was an important feature of
Sumatran political tradition. 8
These searches for a better understanding of so called coastal Sumatran states and their
relationship with the interior have concentrated so far on the large and well known centres
of the north and east coasts. There remains a need for information from more isolated
regions. Barus, in northwest Sumatra, may serve as one example. As a camphor-exporting
port in earlier centuries Barus was kept closely in touch with its hinterland and the inhabitants
of the hills surrounding it. The Bataklands were of vital economie significance and
they mattered greatly in the political life of the state. Tonight I will use Dutch and local
source materials from the seventeenth to nineteenth centuries to demonstrate the importance
of the interior, and of relations between inland and coastal dwellers as they were perceived in
Barus.
Barus is situated some sixty kilometres north of Sibolga in the region known as
Tapanuli. The port lies against the palm fringed, sanded strip of beach which skirts the
Sumatran coastal flat from north to south. At various points on the coast the central
Sumatran spine of mountains (Bukit Barisan) reaches closer toward the sea, for instance at
Sibolga where the steep descent from the hills around the Toba plateau provides, for the
tourist, one of the most spectacular views in Indonesia. But at Barus some ten kilometres
depth of flat land now lies between hills and beach. Barus consists of two principal kampungs,
both lying on the Batu Gerigis river. 9
There are the upstream (mudik) and the
downstream (hilir) settlements. A distance of approximately two kilometres separates the
two and although the modern commercial and administrative centre of Barus is now located
in Kampung Hilir at the river mouth, in the past Kampung Mudik was of equal importance
in Barus af fairs. Surrounding these two settlements lie numerous other small kampungs
which are marked, as is usual in Indonesia, by the palms which surround and hide them, and
which stand like islands in the sawah. Visitors to Barus are often surprised by the attractiveness
of the spot. On a trip through north Sumatra in 1915 M. Joustra described the
Barus coastal flat as one of the prettiest sawah areas he had seen on his journey. 10
Little has
changed since then and, to the distress of local residents who favour development, Barus is
still much as Joustra found it almost seventy years ago. The hilir kampung which he described
is still part trading and part fishing settlement. On the shore one finds the fishing community
with boats, tackle and dried fish spread along the beach where, occasionally, one
may also come across coins, Arab and Dutch, and small pieces of gold which serve as
reminders of Barus' past. Standing on the shore and looking away from the southward
76

coastal sweep of curved beach, the island of Morsala can be seen lying off the bay of
Tapanuli, and to the right is a long, thin, palm-covered promontory called Kepala Ujong.
Further still, and out of view, lies Nias.
To understand the past of Barus it is vital to store in the mind's eye a picture of the lie
of the land. Her geographical position is a key element in Barus history, for behind the flat
and cultivated lowlands stretch forested hills which produce the camphor and benzoin resins
for which Barus became known to traders over several centuries. Behind these again is the
high plateau which forms the centre of the Toba Batak lands. The hinterland of Barus, as
Joustra noted, offers a natural path to the southerly part of the Toba highlands. 11
Modern
roads now connect Sibolga more certainly with the uplands, but in the past, when the
journey was done by foot down the gloomy forested gorges and steep inclines, the Barus
route to and from the highlands was most important. Behind Barus, in the valleys of Rambe
and Tukka, the various hinterland paths converge and lead the traveller gradually down to
the foothills bordering the Barus flat. It is important to note that in this part of Sumatra
pathways, not waterways, link the coast and interior. Numerous small watercourses and
some larger rivers exist, but because of the steep gradiënt of the hills they are often too fast
and too shallow to allow navigation.
The Barus area is usually mentioned by historians in connection with early Indonesian
history. Known either as Barus or as Fansur it is thought by some to have been a famous
camphor port which was visited from the seventh century onwards by foreign traders from
such distant parts as China, India, Persia and Egypt. Because of the difficult nature of early
Chinese and Arab source materials, however, the seventh to fifteenth century history of
Barus is still obscure and problematic. It has yet to be established with certainty that the port
of Barus mentioned by early Chinese traders did in fact refer to the modern place of that
name. 12
By the sixteenth century, though, we do know that Fansur/Barus, as it was then
called, was a busy and prosperous port. According to the Portuguese travelier Tomé Pires, it
was the most important source of camphor in the whole of Sumatra. Pires linked Barus with
the kingdom of Minangkabau, whose goods it exported. 13
However the rise of Aceh in the
same century, and its expansion over the old coastal territories of the weak Minangkabau
empire, soon affected Barus. By the middle of the century Barus appears to have been incorporated
into the sphere of Acehnese influence and, as with other of the larger west coast
ports, an Acehnese Panglima (governor) was stationed there to monitor trade. 14
This was
still the situation when the Dutch East India Company (VOC) began to challenge Aceh's
hegemony over the west coast in the 1660's. 15
Although some support for continued
Acehnese overlordship and trading ties seems to have existed within Barus, the Company implemented
its anti-Acehnese policy there and soon sought out those locals who wished to
1 6
swap Acehnese monopoly trade for that of the VOC. In 1668 a contract was signed between
the Company and the Rajas of Barus in which the VOC was granted preferential
trading rights and all Acehnese loyalties were, in theory, abandoned. 17
Despite opposition from pro-Acehnese elements on the north west coast, and sporadic
forays by Acehnese traders and insurgents into "Company territory", the VOC maintained
a trading establishment at Barus until 1778. The reports of VOC servants, traders and
administrators, during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries provide a first glimpse of
circumstances inside the kingdom of Barus. These Dutch sources are not easy to work with;
they offer a picture which is filtered through layers of ignorance about indigenous culture
and prejudice towards local people. Most of the seventeenth century Dutch assessments of
77

the west coast people they met were highly uncomplimentary and it is therefore surprising to
find one Company servant who remarked in 1669 that the Malays of Barus were more civilized
than others he had encountered on the west coast; they behaved he said, "more like Chief
Rabbis than brutal people". 18
But unless there was some particular issue or dispute which affected
trade, the VOC had little interest in local culture or manners and wrote primarily
about commerce. So it is in that area that most can be discovered about seventeenth century
Barus. In particular, due to the commercial importance of the resins produced in the interior,
the VOC records offer insights into the relationship between Barus and her
hinterland.
Tapanuli has been described as the camphor and benzoin growing area of Indonesia par
excellence. 19
From the seventeenth century onwards information is available concerning the
areas in which these resins were produced and the means by which they reached the coast. A
number of studies suggest that geographical and climatic conditions make the hills behind
Singkel, Barus and Sibolga particularly suitable for the growth of productive camphor trees
and benzoin bushes. 20
In the past resin and oil extracted from these plants were used variously
as fumigants, medicine and perfumes and it is only in recent times that they have been
replaced by chemical substitutes. Camphor and benzoin collection in the Barus region has
traditionally been the preserve of Batak hill dwellers who brought their produce to the coast.
Benzoin gardens may have been kept in some areas, but camphor trees do not take well to
cultivation and resin-bearing trees had to be sought out on the hillsides. 21
By the seventeenth
century the most fruitful camphor trees appear to have grown in the eastern part of upper
Singkel, in the Dairi lands along the banks of the Sungei Cenendang in the region known as
Kelasan. According to van Vuuren, a Dutch administrator who worked in the area during
the early twentieth century, this stretch was particularly suitable because of its warm climate.
The camphor tree, he wrote, was more likely to produce resin when growing on warm, lowlying
hills. 22
.
From the growing area, the camphor was brought overland to Barus through Kelasan
and Rambe. Some was also taken to Singkel, but even as late as the twentieth century the
Batak collectors were keen to bring their produce to Barus, "lest it be thought anything less
than the famous Camphor Barus". 23
Seventeenth century Dutch sources suggest that a certain
amount of benzoin was also collected in the Dairi region. The most important benzoin
territory, however, appears to have lain to the north east of Barus in the general area covered
by Si Manulang Taruan, Parbutihan, Si Bulan, Bonan Dolok, Si Tapongan, Sanggaran,
Huta Tua and in the westerly areas of Rambe and Pusuk. 24
Also, in the seventeenth century,
the VOC sources reported large quantities of benzoin brought down to Barus and Sorkam
from the upland valley of Silindung which is bordered by these eastern hills. 25
Links between
this region and Barus were strong. Benzoin on its way to Barus was usually brought through
Rambe and down to Tukka which acted as a collecting centre. In the late nineteenth and early
twentieth centuries, when Dutch administrators began to move into the interior, there was
considerable local disquiet when it was proposed that areas such as Si Manulang Taruan
should be linked administratively with the Toba lands instead of the coast. 26
When VOC merchants first entered the kingdom of Barus in 1668 their aim was to
counter Acehnese influence over the northern ports and also to trade. They found that the
camphor and benzoin resins they sought were brought down from the producing areas by
the Bataks of the interior. Nineteenth and early twentieth century evidence suggests that
resins transported to the coast through certain intermediate Batak areas of the hinterland
79

were subjected to taxation by the inhabitants of these places. The collectors were also frequently
denied passage and were forced to sell their produce in the upland markets from
whence it was brought downhill by the purchasers. 27
The inaccessibility of the mountainous
interior meant that those groups which were able to control the valleys and key access
routes, such as Rambe and Tukka, might profit from the intercourse between hill and coast.
Seventeenth century sources, however, rarely state which upland groups actually carried the
resins to Barus, merely that they were Bataks.
Company servants soon realised that contact and influence with the inland people was
important for the success of their trade in Barus, but since the Bataks were unwilling to
travel past the foothills and cross the coastal flat, direct contact was difficult. 28
They were
forced to rely on the local population and the rulers of the port who acted as intermediaries
with the hill people. Early Dutch descriptions of Barus illustrate the manner in which such
trade and intercourse between hill and coastal dwellers took place. According to one Company
servant, these Barus grandees purchased the resins which had been brought down by
the Bataks and, because the hill people feared to take their goods to the sea-shore
themselves, the Rajas and their followers arranged the transport of resins to the beach where
the goods were sold for a modest profit to foreign merchants. 29
The rulers of Barus had the
first opportunity to buy cloth and other merchandise from foreigners and to some extent
they appear to have participated in selling cloth, salt and iron to the Bataks among whom
these products were much in demand. 30
Likely meeting points between hill and coastal
peoples are places such as Aek Husor on the edge of the foothills where the narrow highland
road from Rambe and Tukka opens onto a broad and fertile valley and where a fast and
wide river must be crossed before the onward journey to Barus.
Dutch reports on the Barus situation, and letters from the rulers which were sent to
Padang, suggest that the pathways immediately surrounding Barus were often made unsafe
for the Bataks by the threat of plunder, and at such times, for long periods, trade stood still.
To some extent the coastal rulers seem to have been responsible for ensuring the safety of the
Bataks, for securing the pathways and protecting them from rapacious merchants. The Rajas
also sent messages inland to inform the Bataks when ships had put into port and resin
supplies were required. The hill people had to be tempted to come to port and it seems that
they did have some cause to fear mistreatment on the coast. Frequent small wars in the interior
also hampered the flow of goods. Nevertheless the Dutch sources show that this was a
reciprocal arrangement. The Bataks needed an outlet for their goods and it was their link
with Barus and her rulers which ensured their safety on the roads and the sale of their
goods. 3
' In later years, when friction between the local rulers and with the VOC caused
political unrest within Barus, it was often reported by the Company's servants that the
disturbed state of the kingdom and the eclipse of a particular Raja had led to the pathways
becoming unsafe and the Bataks refusing to descend from the hills. According to one official,
writing in the early eighteenth century, the Rajas of Barus had much more authority
and influence among the inland Bataks than among their own people on the coast. 32
In order to emphasise the importance of this relationship between the rulers of Barus
and the hill Bataks it is necessary to employ a degree of historical imagination and to picture
how it might have feit to have been an inhabitant of hill or coast engaged in intercourse between
the two. Observers of Malay culture have often mentioned a Malay dislike for the
jungle, regarded with superstition as a dangerous place where spirits lurk and people are exposed
to harm. Today the forested hinterland is still thought of as an unknown and slightly
80

forbidding area by the coastal population of Barus. When travelling in the area during 1981
I was warned of keramat places deep inland from which people did not return; it was regarded
as adventurous and slightly inappropriate for me to travel inland to the hilly area which
many on the coast had never visited. In much earlier times the cannibal reputation of the
Bataks must have also served to ward off interlopers and preserve the isolation of the hill
people.
For the Bataks who came down from the hills, it would have been no less frightening to
pass down through the dark, steep forested paths and gorges and emerge eventually at the
open coastal flat. This exposed stretch was inhabited not only by Malays and foreigners, but
also by what the Dutch described as beach or coast Bataks who engaged in plunder and warmaking
in the coastal area. They frequently rendered the roads unsafe. Nineteenth century
sources also suggest that the Malay population despised the Bataks, numbers of whom were
made their slaves.
In these circumstances, then, not only would the sheer geographical contrast between
upland and downland have been alarming; but conditions on the shore must have appeared
uninviting to the hill people, and it is understandable that some arrangement should have
developed whereby the Bataks need come no further than the border villages and could
depend upon the mediating role of the Rajas and their followers.
A distinctive and unusual feature of the Barus situation in the late seventeenth century was
the existence of two local rulers. These were the Raja di Hulu and the Raja di Hilir — literally
the Raja in the uplands and the Raja in the downlands. 33
Despite the geographical distinction
implicit in these titles both of the Rajas lived on the coastal flat, though in separate
kampungs, Kampung Hulu (or Mudik) and Kampung Hilir. The existence of two rulers is
extremely unusual in Indonesian/Malay principalities, but despite being ruled by two kings,
Barus was nevertheless considered to be one kingdom 34
and the two princes became joint
signatories to the first contract with the VOC concluded in 1668. VOC servants seem to have
appreciated the oddity of the situation and their initial reports from Barus attempt some explanation
for the existence of a dual Rajaship.
The Raja di Hulu was said to derive from Batak/Malay antecedents, while the Raja di
Hilir and his chief minister, the Orang Kaya Balai, were Malays who claimed to be descended
from the first Raja di Hilir of Barus, a refugee prince from Tarusan, south of Padang. 35
According to one VOC account the dual Rajaship was created by the Sultan of Aceh who
had bestowed the title Raja di Hulu on that prince or on one of his ancestors in order to conciliate
the Batak population and promote trade with the interior. 36
Certainly when the Company
arrived at Barus, it was the Raja di Hilir who encouraged their presence while his colleague
wished to remain loyal to Aceh; 37
however, Dutch sources are vague concerning
details of the origin of power-sharing in Barus and no dates are offered for the inception of
the dual Rajaship. The Rajas do not appear to have divided their duties and responsibilities
in the government of the kingdom. Rather they had different areas of geographical influence.
One of the earliest Dutch descriptions of the port, written by Johannes Meiman in
1670, identifies the distinct spheres of authority implied in the Rajas' titles. Raja di Hulu, he
said, ruled over the upland and most distant areas of the kingdom and in those which were
81

separated from Barus by impassable hills. Seventeenth century Barus spread over a wide
area and the Raja di Hilir is reported to have ruled both the closest lying settlements and also
those stretching down the west coast as far south as Batahan. All of these small portages
produced resins which were transported to the coast from the hills lying behind them. 38
In
theory then the Raja di Hulu was responsible for the inland groups and the Raja di Hilir ruled
over the mixed Malay populations of the coastal area. This initial picture is, however,
somewhat misleading. Reports from the years which follow Melman's make it clear that
both rulers had contact and influence with different parts of the Batak interior and that, to
some extent, they competed for control over the trade with these people.
The Dutch noticed friction between the Rajas at an early stage. Even during the
negotiations undertaken prior to the first contract, the rulers complained to Company servants
concerning each others' lack of faith and trustworthiness. 39
VOC sources emphasise
competition and hostility between the Rajas; but it is hard to know if this pre-dated the
Company's arrival since the Dutch presence appears to have driven a wedge between the
rulers. The issue of whether to support the Company or Barus' old overlord, Aceh, had
divided them in the 1660's, and during the latter part of the seventeenth century there was
usually one or other royal family on the VOC's side in Barus affairs and one who was
alienated from the Dutch and from his co-ruler. This friction manifested itself in competition
for control over the upland paths and the produce of the interior. To a considerable extent
the hostility was able to endure because of the support each Raja and his family received
from different sections of the upland population.
When the Company first established its trading post in Barus and began to demand
resin supplies, the Raja di Hilir worked hard to satisfy their needs. Reports reveal that he
had considerable influence with the inland Bataks of Silindung and the Pasaribu Bataks living
in the intermediate areas to the northeast of Barus. Through his links with the Rajas of
these areas he was able to secure large amounts of benzoin for the Company. 40
The Raja di
Hilir also claimed that he was sending daily messages to the ports of Sorkam and Korlang
and had high hopes of receiving significant shipments of resin by sea from these places. 41
This Raja di Hilir, however, died shortly after the Company's arrival in Barus and according
to the VOC servants his successor was less influential and less well liked. 42
The Hulu Raja
continued for some time to oppose the presence of the VOC and to be hostile to the Hilir
family. 43
In 1671 the Raja di Hulu was reported to be stopping the movement of trade by
controlling certain pathways and upland centres, in particular a settlement called Sintuamas
through which the Dairi Bataks had to pass on their way to port. 44
The Raja di Hulu and his
family was said to have particular influence with the Dairi who collected and transported
camphor from the Kelasan region. 45
In 1673 a new contract was signed in which the Rajas
were enjoined to live in peace with each other and promote Company trade with Barus.
Hostilities, nevertheless, continued sporadically over the next twenty years. During this
period both Rajas frequently assured the Company, by letter and in person, that it was they,
both jointly and individually, who had influence with the Bataks, to whom the Bataks
brought their goods and through whom Barus's trade would prosper. 46
Clearly the Rajas of
Barus had cause to fear that their positions might be undercut by an established Dutch
presence in Barus, and it was not in their interests that the VOC trade directly with the
Bataks as its officials desired. But although these statements by the Rajas concerning their
influence with the Bataks must be read critically, in the light of their own self-interest, they
82

are, nonetheless, supported by the available evidence. They reflect the special relationship
between coastal rulers and inland producers described above. Moreover we shall see that the
loyalties offered to the two ruling families of Barus by the Bataks of the interior were not
mere transient alliances, but bonds which lasted well into the nineteenth century.
The Company soon tired of the competition and delays in trade caused by friction between
the two ruling parties in Barus. VOC policy in the Indonesian archipelago often
favoured the isolation of one indigenous authority with whom the traders could deal and
through whom they could influence affairs in their favour. The situation at Barus was irritating
and impractical from the Company's perspective and by 1681 it had become an explicit
part of Company policy in Barus to eliminate one of the ruling families, preferably
with the help of the other. 47
By 1694 this aim had been achieved. Following an attack by the
Hulu family on the VOC post, in which a number of Company servants were killed and a
military force had to be sent to Barus, the Company forced the Rajas into an agreement to
abolish the dual Rajaship. Henceforth, the Company decreed, there should be but one Raja
called Raja Barus who was, on this first occassion, drawn from the Hilir family. The leading
member of the Hulu family, Raja Minuassa (Menawar Shah?), grandson of the old Raja di
Hulu, went into temporary exile in the hills behind Singkel. 48
Despite these disastrous consequences of Dutch interference, the royal claims of the
families of Hulu and Hilir and their relevance for the Batak population of Barus, persisted.
Indeed, the Company soon found that it could not manage without the services of the Hulu
family and, shortly after the abolition of the dual Rajaship, Raja Minuassa was called back
to Barus and appointed by the Company as their intermediary with the Dairi Bataks who
had not been satisfying the Dutch demand for resins. Although the Company failed to
restore the royal title of the Hulu family, and named Raja Minuassa bara-antara," 9
or
mediator, the importance of the links between the coastal rulers and the inland producers in
Barus' trade is clearly demonstrated by this incident.
Reports from the early eighteenth century serve to reveal the strength of these loyalties
and the suitability of a system of dual Rajaship in Barus. By 1706 the Raja Minuassa was using
his influence with the Dairi and in Singkel to regain his family's royal status. Trade was
disrupted and the kingdom was thrown into confusion. 50
In 1709 Minuassa's uncle, Megat
Suka or Raja Bongsu as he was also called (he was the youngest son of the old Raja), took
up the cudgels on behalf of his family's rights, and with an Acehnese ally he succeeded in
worrying the Raja Barus. 51
This Hilir prince wrote to the Governor General of the west coast
at Padang claiming that the kingdom was in confusion and was no longer like a monarchical
state; owing to Megat Suka's wickedness, he said, it was as if there were once again two
rulers of Barus. 52
Company officials assessing the situation advised Dutch help for the Raja
Barus because as long as the Dairi supported the Hulu family it would be in a position to
make trouble, and VOC servants foresaw no possibility of Dairi support dwindling because
of the enourmous loyalty these Bataks traditionally owed to the Hulu Rajas. 53
Officials also remarked on the relationship between the Hilir family and the Pasaribu
Bataks (resident in Silindung, Sorkam and Korlang). If the Hulu family were allowed to
overcome the Raja Barus, one wrote, the Pasaribu would consider themselves to be unprotected
and would "fall away" from Barus. 54
During 1709, as the Raja Barus sought to
strengthen his position, it was to the Pasaribu hills that he travelled with a large retinue. He
remained away for some months and sent several letters written on bark to the resident and
83

local government in Barus. 53
In 1689 an official commented that the Bataks of Sorkam and
Korlang considered the Hilir Raja to be "nearly holy". 56
In 1714 the Raja Barus died and,
since there was no suitable successor in the Hilir family, Raja Minuassa was appointed Raja
Barus. In order to appease the Hilir family's supporters, and maintain some balance between
the two rival parties, a nephew of the old Raja Barus was made bendahara.' 1
Despite
the accession of the Hulu family, the resident of Barus in 1720 wrote that the "southern
Bataks", though nominally subjects of the Raja Barus were, in fact, more inclined towards
the Hilir family and its current representative, Raja Ibrahim. 58
As the seventeenth century progressed Company trade on the northwest coast became
increasingly hampered by Acehnese "smuggling" parties and the presence of English traders
in the area. Detailed information concerning the situation in Barus becomes increasingly
scarce. The VOC left Barus for a short period in the 1750's and by 1760 there was said to be
a rotating Rajaship there, with authority alternating between the Hulu and Hilir families. 59
When a Hilir prince acted as Raja Barus the bendahara was drawn from the Hulu family and
vice versa. In 1778 the Company withdrew from Barus permanently and, since the English
East India Company was established further south on the bay of Tapanuli, little information
concerning Barus is available until the nineteenth century when the Dutch, this time the
Netherlands Indies government, returned to the northern part of west Sumatra.
Dutch forces reoccupied Barus in 1839-40 in the final stages of the Padri war. Reports
from this period reveal an incident in the 1820's which serves to confirm the tenacity of dual
royal claims within Barus. According to Ridder de Steurs, a succession dispute in that year
resulted in a renewed division between the royal families. Supported by members of the
foreign merchant community, a Hilir prince, named Sultan Main Alam, assumed the title
Raja di Hilir and declared himself as an independent royal authority in the coastal kampung.
There followed a war between him and the Hulu Raja Barus, Sultan Sailan. Foreign merchants
and Acehnese resident in Barus participated on the side of the Hilir family and the
conflict continued until Dutch forces drove all the foreigners from Barus in 1840. 60
After
that date both princes became salaried officials of the Netherlands Indies government and
questions of royal authority within Barus cease to be an issue in the Dutch sources. The
available Dutch reports make little mention of Batak support for either side during the nineteenth
century Barus conflict. It took place before the Europeans were reestablished and is
only mentioned briefly in reports as part of the background to the Dutch occupation. The
old loyalties between the Rajas and the inhabitants of the interior are mentioned, however,
in the local accounts of these events which will be considered in a moment.
Here then is a brief sketch of an unusual Sumatran polity, a kingdom in which two
royal families were able to derive simultaneous support from different sections of the
population, and where, despite the destructive influence of the VOC, these families maintained
the vigour of their royal pretensions for nearly two centuries. The external, Dutch
sources are not comprehensive or impartial but they do offer glimpses of a situation where
upland producers had an important role in coastal political life and where lines of loyalty
between downland rulers and the people of the interior were crucial not only for the passage
of goods but for the maintenance of royal authority on the coast. In order to pursue these
lines of loyalty or "social bonds" a little further it is neccessary to turn to local source
materials.
* * * * * * * * * * * *
84

Two Malay manuscripts are of particular interest here since they record the history of each
of the two ruling families of Barus and appear to have been written from the nineteenth cen­
6 1
tury perspective of those families. These are the Asal Turunan Raja-Raja Barus, Part l,
and the Sejarah Tuanku Batu Badan. The former is a Jawi manuscript kept in the Museum
Pusat in Jakarta. It was probably copied from an original manuscript which, according to
early 20th century informants, belonged to the descendants of the Hulu family living in
Kampung Mudik, Barus. Enquiries locally have revealed that it is only in recent years that
the descendants of the Hulu Rajas of Barus, the Pohan family, have lost track of the original
manuscript. Although the Jakarta MS is undated, the chronicle was almost certainly compiled
in the second half of the nineteenth century." The second manuscript is a history of the
Hilir family. It is still in the possession of the descendants of that house, who live in Barus,
and I have worked from photographs of the MS and a romanized transcription which was
printed by the family in 1973." The chronicle is dated; it was composed by Marah Laut bin
Sultan Main Alam in the year 1871. The manuscripts relate the history of the two royal
houses of Barus. They each acknowledge the existence of the other family and both deal extensively
with the competition between the two houses. In fact this appears to be their principal
concern. The chronicles tracé Barus history from the coming of the two original rulers.
They recount the foundation of a dual Rajaship and the arrival of the Dutch through to the
19th century war between the houses which was described briefly above. Indeed this event,
and their two opposing interpretations of it, could be said to be the climax of each chronicle.
Both manuscripts mention events, such as this war and the arrival of the VOC, which
can be identified in Dutch documents. Much of their content, however, is concerned with
events which took place before the advent of the VOC, or in which the Dutch had little interest.
The chronicles are about an internal Barus world and not about relations with
foreigners. The great value of these texts lies not in their chronological and factual account
of Barus history but in the inside view they offer us of local perceptions of the region's past
as it was viewed in the nineteenth century.
Both chronicles can be divided roughly into three principal sections. Firstly, each contains
an account of the origins of the family with which it is concerned; both of these are
structured around a journey which brought the first rulers to Barus. After the origin stories,
both manuscripts describe, in a similar fashion, the founding of Hulu and Hilir Barus. They
then proceed to chronicle the history of one of the two families in the form of a narrative
genealogy. To some extent the events described in these two genealogies coincide and,
although there are obvious discrepancies in content and in the interpretation of events, the
two texts are concerned with a common past. It is unfortunate that we do not know which of
the chronicles was compiled first and what the actual interrelationship between them might
be. Elsewhere I have argued that the two accounts reflect the friction between the two ruling
houses identified in Dutch sources and they add up to a debate concerning the arrangement
of government in Barus. Section three of the manuscripts concerns the war which took place
between Hulu and Hilir in the 1820s. The then Raja Hulu was called Sutan Sailan, and the
Hilir claimant was Sutan Main Alam. The account of this event offered in the two chronicles
coincides in essentials with the information available from Dutch sources; however two differing
interpretations are contained in the two local sources. The Hulu chronicle treats Sutan
Main Alam as an upstart and trouble-maker, and argues that there can only be one Raja
Barus. The Hilir text on the other hand offers a case for Main Alam's right to rule in the
85

Hilir and for the existence of two Rajas of Barus, a case which is presented in terms of past
history and the original foundation of Barus.
In view of the political nature of sections two and three of the Barus chronicles, the
early part of each manuscript, which deals with the origins of the rulers, might be expected
to fulful a special function within the manuscripts — to offer legitimacy and authority to the
royal claims with which the later sections are concerned. A description of the two accounts
will show that the origin stories are indeed concerned with the royal status of the two
families and with their rights to political authority. Like so many origin accounts in traditional
Malay literature, the stories perform a legitimising function. These origin accounts
are, moreover, of particular interest for the present topic since they are both intimately concerned
with the ruler's relations with the hinterland of Barus. Each account links its royal
family with a particular part of the Barus interior and, in their way, the local sources allow
us to pursue the coastal-hinterland links already glimpsed in Dutch sources. They offer the
opportunity to see how relations between the Rajas and the upland Bataks are described
from a Barus perspective.
It has already been remarked that the two origin stories have a similar structure. In
both, the founder of the ruling dynasty, who is the son of a Raja, leaves his house and
undertakes a lengthy journey which concludes with his arrival, or that of his descendants, in
Barus. The founder of the Hulu family was Raja Alang Pardosi who came from Balige in
Toba. The first Hilir king was Raja Ibrahim, who came from Tarusan in southwest
Sumatra. Each of these princes was accompanied by many followers when he left his
homeland. In both stories, the subject spends a considerable time travelling through the
hinterland of Barus, where he is acknowledged as a Raja and where agreements are made
with the local people. The princes, or in Alang Pardosi's case, his descendants, then moved
to the sea shore, and each founds his own settlement in Barus. To the extent that these two
origin accounts are similar in structure they are also typical of a genre of traditional Asian
literature from many counties. A local example of the same theme is Mera Silu's journey in
the north Sumatran chronicle, the Hikayat Raja-Raja Pasai, to which reference has already
been made in connection with the work of K.R. Hall.
Although the structure of the two Barus origin accounts is similar, there are differences
in the style and content of the stories. In the Hulu chronicle, the Batak origins of the founding
family are emphasized, and in places the manner in which the protagonists behave
reflects familiar features of Batak society. The Hulu account makes an authoritative statement
in which the Hulu family is shown spreading itself over the hinterland of Barus, and in
which land ownership is stressed. The story, briefly, is as follows. Alang Pardosi left his
father's kampung after a family quarrel. With his wife and followers he began to travel in a
westerly direction, looking for a place in which to settle. Their successive moves in the
migration from Toba are described in a formulaic way. The party made a number of stops,
and as they moved from place to place, they opened the jungle, cleared the land and planted
rice (ladang). In time people from elsewhere, often from the original point of departure,
heard about the new settlements and moved there. When the kampung became populous the
Raja's prestige increased and the settlement became a state (negen). Sometimes reasons are
provided for the family's departure from these settlements, sometimes not, but, as the process
develops, the impression offered by the manuscript is of expansion, and the development
of a network of kampungs founded by one Raja and his family. At the beginning of
86

the chronicle, Alang Pardosi is given a clan name which shows that he belonged to a Batak
marga (clan), the name Pohan. Alang Pardosi settled the area of Rambe in the hinterland of
Barus, and the impression of the consolidation of a territory is confirmed when it is said
that, once Kampung Tundang in Rambe had become a negeri, Alang Pardosi fixed the
borders of his lands, which included much of the Barus area. 64
The clan came into conflict with other clans, notable Simamura, which challenged its
rights in the area, but Alang Pardosi was ultimately victorious. His authority is clearly
demonstrated in one incident when he erects a house over the roadway on the border between
Rambe and Tukka Dolok. From this vantage point he was able to control the passage
between these two regions. He also stationed officers (penghulus) in many of the surrounding
areas. Although the chronicle does not say as much, a Barus listener would know that
the movement which mattered was the passage of camphor and benzoin which had to be
brought through Rambe and Tukka on its way down from the interior. Alang Pardosi and
his family achieved great authority by the occupation of this territory. The text declares that
after this, Alang Pardosi's name (his nama) became famous and he was the most important
Raja in the Bataklands {negeri Batak). 65
After the settlement of Rambe, Alang Pardosi's sons split away from their father's
kampung and, "lest they quarrel", parted ways. The younger, Guru Marsakot, travelled
downstream to the coast and settled at Lobu Tua, near Barus. From there one of his descendants
became the first Hulu Raja of Barus. The elder brother, Pucara Duan, moved a step
closer to controlling the all important pathways in the hinterland of Barus by settling Tukka.
The manuscript mentions agreements (perjanjian) of mutual protection made between
Tukka and the coast, and also agreements of loyalty made between Alang Pardosi and his
sons and those whom they had fought and subdued. In this fashion the Pohan clan is shown
spreading itself over the entire region between Toba and the coast. 66
Although the Hulu family was to absorb much of Malay culture in Barus, and the
chronicle itself is written in Malay, their settlement of the hinterland is described in terms
which are Batak rather than Malay. The names of the dynasty's founders are Batak and their
spread over Barus, Tukka and Rambe represents the development of a Batak marga (clan)
network through the area. The basis for the Hulu family's right to establish themselves as
rulers in Barus lay in their development of the hinterland area and the occupation by their
clan and its descendants of the key hinterland routes, routes along which, as we have seen,
the Dairi camphor gatherers had to travel to bring their goods to the coast. Sources such as
W.H.K. Ypes and the reports of other Dutch administrators have described the situation in
which the people of Kelasan in the northwest, where much camphor was produced, were forbidden
by the inhabitants of Rambe and Tukka to pass freely through those areas on their
way to Barus with camphor. Instead they were forced to sell their goods at the borders and
the rezin was brought on to Barus by inhabitants of the intermediate areas. If the Kelasan
folk attempted to cross, their produce was seized at Dolok Marapak on the borders of
Rambe and Tukka Dolok where, according to Ypes, all the footpaths in the hinterland of
Barus met. It is interesting to note that studies by ethnographers working in the early twentieth
century have shown that the Pohan marga and its sub-branch, Pardosi, is one of the
principal Batak groups occupying upper Barus. Ypes, who carried out the most thorough
ethnographic work in this area, reported that the Pohan marga was represented in Tukka
Dolok, Tukka Holbung and Barus Mudik. Members of Pardosi inhabited Tukka Dolok.
87

Similarly Simamura, the Marga with which Alang Pardosi came into conflict in Rambe, was
present in that area in the early twentieth century. Ypes also confirmed that competition
existed between these two groups. 67
The available information concerning Batak social organization in upper Barus during
the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries appears therefore to confirm the existence of the
kind of links between coast and interior which are claimed in the Hulu chronicle.
As for the Hilir origin story, the account of Raja Ibrahim's journey from Tarusan to
Barus is different in flavour from that of the Hulu family. It has more in common with
classical Malay writing about kingship and stresses the recognition of royal authority among
the Batak people rather than the acquisition of land and power gained by force. Raja
Ibrahim's father was ruler of Tarusan and Ibrahim left this country because he had quarrelled
with his father following an attack on Tarusan by a school of swordfish (todak). A
swordfish attack is a motif which occurs in several Malay manuscripts. Raja Ibrahim travelled
up the west coast until he came to Batu Mundam. There he turned inland and, following
the Batang Toru river upstream, he entered the Batak lands. The areas he then chose to visit
were those which had obvious importance from the point of view of a Barus ruler. He first
visited Silindung which, as we have seen, was an important area for the passage of resins
from the hills further inland. Sultan Ibrahim declined the request of the Silindung chiefs that
he become their Raja, but he made an agreement of mutual loyalty with them. And, because
he declined to remain he appointed four deputies, the Penghulu Empat. 6
» In fact the
Penghulu Berempat is a Silindung Batak institution mentioned in many of the ethnographic
works on this area. According to the chronicle, Ibrahim forged similar links in Bakkara, an
area which had less obvious economie significance for Barus, but which is and was an important
centre in the heart of the Toba Batak lands. A similar oath was sworn. The chiefs of
Bakkara promised that when Ibrahim had finally chosen his settlement they would follow
him. Horses were to be sent to him as a form of tribute, as had been agreed in Silindung. 69
The prince moved next to Pasaribu where the people asked him to which suku (clan, or,
in this case, marga) he belonged. On the grounds of his links with Bakkara, Sultan Ibrahim
presented himself as a member of suku Pasaribu. He was accepted as a member of the clan
and was welcomed by the Pasaribu people who made an agreement with him in which it was
promised that, once Sultan Ibrahim was settled, the Pasaribu and their descendants would
come to trade with his people. 70
They also agreed to help each other in times of trouble.
When Ibrahim left Pasaribu, four Pasaribu chiefs accompanied him and remained with him
until he had established himself at Barus, after which they returned home to spread the news
in Pasaribu.
We have already seen that Silindung and Pasaribu were important areas for the Hilir
family. Lying in the northeastern hills, they had considerable economie and political
significance. Both were benzoin-producing territories and, according to the VOC descriptions,
Silindung was officially part of the Raja di Hilir's domain. Strong links also bound
the Hilir family and the Pasaribu Bataks of upper Sorkam and Korlang. Indeed the
geographical scope of Sultan Ibrahim's journey in the chronicle covers the very areas which
the VOC sources report as belonging to the Hilir sphere in the seventeenth century, that is
the coastal regions south of Barus and the northeastern hills. Like the Hulu origin account,
this part of the Hilir chronicle appears, therefore, to define those areas of the Barus
hinterland which, according to external evidence, lay inside that family's particular sphere
88

and which were of prime political and economie significance.
In the Hulu chronicle the Pardosi family established supremacy in a practical fashion.
They opened up new agricultural areas and established an exclusive network of settlements
and their offshoots. Occasionally they met with opposition, but this was generally overcome
because of their skill at political consolidation. In time, therefore, the clan and its subgroupings
came to exercise control over a large stretch of the hinterland of Barus. In the
Hilir chronicle, however, Sultan Ibrahim's authority in the hinterland appears to be portrayed
more in moral than in practical terms. He is described in the Sejarah Tuanku Batu
Badan in a manner which emphasises his qualities as a king. He is referred to as Baginda, a
Malay term used to describe royalty, and by another similar expression, maha-mulia (most
illustrious). When the Sultan meets the Batak chiefs of Silindung, they prostrate themselves
before him and bow at his feet — "menyembah kebawa dulinya", 11
a phrase which
describes the position of a Malay subject in relation to his Raja. On hearing him speak these
Batak Rajas implore him to remain and rule over them. In short, he is recognized as a Raja
in Silindung and the existing Rajas submit to him.
In Bakkara the same thing happens. He is invited to become Raja and the existing,
Batak, Rajas declare their wish that he do so because, they say, there is no Maharaja in Bakkara,
a Raja greater than they." The text refers to Sultan Ibrahim at this point as "Sri
Maharaja.''
The chronicle's description of Sultan Ibrahim's response to these requests emphasises
that, while he declined to remain in the Batak lands, by linking himself with these people he
emanated the qualities of Rajaship as it is understood in the Malay world. In Silindung he
assigned deputies and the people promised to send him tribute. In Bakkara he attempted to
spread Islam and had the Bataks build a mosque for him. Before he left Bakkara he
presented them with an umbrella base (a symbol of royalty) as a sign of kerajaan in the
negeri, that is to say as a sign that the negeri was part of a kingdom which possessed a Raja
and was subject to the authority of a Raja."
A distinction is made in the chronicle between Sultan Ibrahim's identity as a Malay, and
the Batak population he encountered. When Sultan Ibrahim reached Bakkara the chronicle
mentions that the people did not understand the language in which he spoke, and when he
introduced Islam the Bataks of Bakkara declined to change their religious beliefs even
though they promised to do anything else he might command. When he left Bakkara they
offered prayers, the chronicle relates, to the spirits of their ancestors. The distinction between
Batak and Malay is thus emphasised by differences in language and religion. But
despite the Batak's inability to accept Islam, all the Batak Rajas submit to Sultan Ibrahim
and welcome him, recognising his superior quality. They also respond to him in a manner
usually used in Malay texts to describe a Malay subject's appreciation of a Raja. The people
of Bakkara, for instance, experience satisfaction and joy when Ibrahim orders a prayer to be
read. The typical Malay ruler is described in court literature in terms of his sovereignty, his
gracefulness and his piety; descriptions of Sultan Ibrahim in the Sejarah Tuanku Batu
Badan conform to this model. In brief, the qualities attributed to Sultan Ibrahim, and the
Batak response to him are described in the chronicle just as the attributes of Rajas and the
relationship between Raja and subject are dealt with in other Malay texts. The Bataks in this
episode of the chronicle are shown as recognising Sultan Ibrahim's qualities and submitting
to the sovereignty of a Malay Raja. 74
89

Perhaps the most obvious way in which the chronicle links this coastal Malay ruler with
the Batak lands, and emphasises his claims to authority there, is by connecting Ibrahim with
the famous dynasty of Batak priest kings, the Si Singa Mangarajas. In the chronicle, Sultan
Ibrahim marries the daughter of the former chief of Bakkara. He converts her to Islam and,
through her, fathers the first of the dynasty of Si Singa Mangaraja kings.
In Batak legend Bakkara was the original home of the Si Singa Mangarajas. The date of
the dynasty's foundation is not known, nor is the actual number of priest kings who claimed
the title; but the last of the line is known to have died in upper Singkel during the Padri War.
Heine-Geldern has pointed out that the account found in the Sejarah Tuanku Batu Badan
chronicle of Sultan Ibrahim's contact with the Batak lands, his special links with the
Pasaribu marga and his fathering of the first Si Singa Mangaraja king, is only one version of
a legend which is found in various forms among the Bataks. 75
In Batak versions of the story,
Sultan Ibrahim is not mentioned, but it is noted that tribute consisting of horses was sent in
the past from Toba to Barus. Heine-Geldern explores, in his article on the subject, the
history of the Si Singa Mangarajas, the traditions surrounding them, and their historical
relations with Barus, Aceh and Minangkabau. Although his theories, built upon these
various traditions, are complicated and ingenious, a proper consideration of them is out of
place here. What is of relevance here is his suggestion that the story of Raja Ibrahim's
journey through the Batak lands, with its various incidents, is a Malay version of existing
Batak beliefs intended to legitmate the arrival of a Malay Muslim ruling dynasty at Barus. 76
Such a conclusion is consistent with the interpretation of other parts of the Hilir story
outlined above. Like Merah Silu in the Hikayat Raja-Raja Pasai, and like the Pohan clan in
the Hulu chronicle, Sultan Ibrahim appears in the Sejarah Tuanku Batu Badan to have been
recognized in the Hulu before staking his claim on the coast. In so doing he seems to have
gained legitimacy and enhanced the authority of his claim.
* * * * * * * * * * * *
In these chronicles, and the Dutch source materials which were considered earlier, the
worlds of the pesisir and the hinterland are intimately linked. They converge in lines of loyalty
between coastal rulers and upland groups. In Barus it was not riverine traffic but mountain
paths which carried a network of relationships with the interior, but the information
available concerning these routes does offer clues to the social bonds between rulers and subjects
mentioned by Wolters and Micsic.
Trade between the hinterland and coast created the most obvious bond between the two
groups. Camphor and benzoin export was the foundation of Barus's prosperity, her raison
d'etre and a vital concern for her rulers. Trade explains the preoccupation of the rulers with
the pathways, their competition for control over the upland routes and the messages they
sent into the interior urging the Bataks to bring resins to port. VOC sources, however, tend
to emphasize trade to the exclusion of all else. Other things counted in the relationship between
Barus and the interior. Mutual protection and the mobilization of manpower mattered
too, and these bonds are reflected in both local and European sources. In the Hulu chronicle,
agreements of mutual protection were made between Barus, Rambe and Tukka, and
these were invoked in the narrative. For instance when Guru Marsakot's son, Tuan Namura
Raja was summoned to Tukka, he travelled inland to assist his brother against members of
90

the Simamura clan. In the Hilir text, Raja Ibrahim also made agreements of mutual protection
with the Pasaribu people. In VOC sources these Bataks were said to be fiercely loyal to
the Hilir family. The oath of loyalty was invoked towards the end of the Hilir chronicle
when a foreign prince murdered Sutan Larangan, a Hilir prince who ruled in Sorkam. According
to the chronicle, Larangan's grandmother travelled from Barus to Sorkam where
she summoned all the Bataks from the hills behind Sorkam who had pledged loyalty to the
Hilir house. Many thousands came and avenged the death of her grandson. This incident appears
to be more than a self-glorifying legend on the part of the Hilir family. According to
William Marsden, writing in the 1770s, "Inland of a place called Sokum [Sorkam], great
respect was paid to a female chief or uti (puteri) ... whose jurisdiction comprehended many
tribes. Her grandson, who was the reigning prince, had lately been murdered by an invader,
and she had assembled an army of two or three thousand men, to take revenge". 77
Such oaths of loyalty and mutual protection appear to have been an important feature
of those links which bound the Barus Rajas and the upland people. As noticed at the beginning
of this paper, Micsic has pointed to inscribed oath stones such as those from Pasemah
and Palembang as possible evidence of the links between highland and lowland peoples and
as a ceremonial and sacred way of safeguarding their intercourse. It seems likely that the
agreements mentioned so often in the Barus chronicles are more modern manifestations of
the same impetus.
Lastly, and in addition to questions of trade and mutual protection, the Barus evidence
briefly considered here suggests that the coastal rulers of this area depended upon the inland
Bataks for recognition of, and for the very substance of, their sovereignty. Foreign traders
such as the Javanese and Malaccans, who visited the port in van Bazel's time, are unlikely to
have been impressed by these petty princelings of Barus who could not even contrive to rule
alone. As Resident Silvius notes in the 1670's the Rajas of Barus had more authority inland
than among their own people on the coast. VOC sources report that certain Rajas were unpopular
on the coast and, like Sutan Larangan, some of them did not last long. However
between the two ruling dynasties of Barus, and key groups in the interior, lasting bonds were
created which endured over time. These were bonds which are reminiscent of the fierce
loyalty offered by the orang laut to the ruling family of Malacca. They are evident not only
in the external reports of Dutch merchants and soldiers, but in local sources concerned with
the issue of legitimate sovereignty in Barus. And it is in these local sources, which can surely
convey most about the essence of royal authority in Barus, that such loyalties are most clearly
revealed.
NOTES
1. In 1761 Van Bazel prepared a three part report on west Sumatra entitled "Radicaale Beschrijving". Two
parts of this report, the second and third parts, containing a history of VOC trade with the west coast of
Sumatra and a report on the profitability of the area, were published. The first part, a description of the
land and its inhabitants, was not. It is available, however, in two places: E.B. Kielstra has summarized the
report in his "Onze Kennis van Sumatra's Westkust, Omstreeks de Helft der Achttiende Eeuw", BKI, vol 36
(1887), pp.499-559; and a copy of the original document is held in the Arsip Nasional (National Archives) in
Jakarta. The above reference comes from that copy, SWK 10, pp.8-9. It can also be found in Kielstra,
pp.508-9.
2. O.W. Wolters, "Studying Srivijaya", JMBRAS, Vol. LII, pt. 2 (1979) pp.1-33.
3. Ibid., p.30.
91

4. Md., p.21.
5. J. Micsic, "Classical Archaeology in Sumatra", Indonesia, No. 30 (1980), pp.43-4.
6. Ibid., pp.50-4.
7. K.R. Hall, "The Coming of Islam to the Archipelago: A re-assessment" in K.L. Hutter (ed.), Economie Exchange
and Social Interaction, (Michigan, 1977), pp.213-31.
8. Ibid., pp.223-6.
9. Also known as the Aek Si Raha and in earlier times as the Aek Si Buluan.
10. M. Joustra, Van Medan naar Padang dan Terug (Leiden, 1915), p.84.
11. Ibid., p.82.
12 For two different opinions on the extent of the early prominence of Barus as a trading centre see L.F.
Brakel, "Hamza Pansuri", JMBRAS, vol. Lil, pt. 1 (1979). pp.89-92, andO.W. Wolters, Early Indonesian
Commerce, (Ithaca, 1967), especially Ch.12.
13. A. Cortesao (trans.), The Suma Oriental of Tomé Pires (London, 1944), vol. II, p.161.
14 For a description of Acehnese expansion down the west coast of Sumatra in that century see J. Kathirithamby
Wells, "Acehnese Control over West Sumatra up to the Treaty of Painan, 1663", JSEAH, vol. 10(1969).
pp.453-70.
15. H. Kroeskamp, De Westkust en Minangkabau, 1665 — 1668, (Leiden, Ph.D. thesis, 1919), pp.137-8.
16. Ibid., Ch. 8 passim.
17. Ibid., pp. 142-7.
18. VOC, 1272 f. 1067 v.
19. Wolters, op.cit., p. 114.
20 For instance, L. van Vuuren, "De Handel van Baroes Als Oudste Haven op Sumatra's Westkust Verklaard
en voor de Toekomst Beschouwd", TAG, vol. 25, no. 6 (1908), pp.1389-1402; P. van Zon, "Korte
Mededeelingen omtrent den Kamferboom", Tectona, vol. III (1915), pp.220-4; and J. Kreemer, "De Winning
van Kamferhout, Kamferolie en Kamfer in het Singkelsche", TAG, vol. 33 (1916), pp.880-7.
21. Van Vuuren, loc. cit., pp.1397-9.
22. Ibid., p.1395.
23. W.H.K. Ypes, "Nota omtrent Singkel en de Pak-Pak Landen", TBG, vol. XLIX (1907), p.235.
24. Van Vuuren, loc. cit., p.1395.
25. VOC, 1272 f. 1067 r.
26 Van Vuuren, loc. cit., p.1396 and "Verslag van een Reis van den Controleur van Baros naar de Beoosten
Baros Gelegen Onafhankelijke Landschappen in het Jaar 1883", TBB vol. 52 (1917), pp. 195-205 and
252-265.
27. W.H.K. Ypes, Bijdrage tot de Kennis van de Stamverwantschap, de inheemsche rechtsgemeenschappen en
het grondenrecht der Toba- en Dairibataks (Leiden, 1932), p.503.
28. VOC, 1272 f. 1087r.
29. Ibid.
30. Ibid.
31. VOC, 1272 f. 1084 v.
32. VOC, 1322 f. 1328 v.
33. VOC, 1322 f. 1327 r.
92

34. VOC, 1272 f. 1082 v.
35. VOC, 1322 f. 1328 r.
36. Ibid.
37. VOC, 1272 f. 1077 r.
38. VOC, 1272 f. 1082 v and 1083 r.
39. See for instance VOC, 1272 f. 1065 r.
40. VOC, 1272 f. 1067 r.
41. VOC, 1290 f. 599 v.
42. VOC, 1272 f. 1180 v.
43. VOC, 1290 f. 599 v.
44. VOC, 1290 f. 595-605.
45. Ibid.,
46. See, for instance, VOC, 1290 f. 1060 r. and VOC, 1396 f. 1075 v.
47. N. MacLeod, "De Oost-Indische Compagnie op Sumatra in de 17e eeuw", Indische Gids, (1905), p.136.
48. Ibid., (1906), pp. 1434-8.
49. Corpus Diplomaticum, 1602-1800, vol. IV, pp. 142-4.
50. VOC, 1760 f. 125-9.
51. VOC, 1777 f. 39.
52. VOC, 1777 f. 43.
53. VOC, 1777 f. 29.
54. Ibid.
55. VOC, 1777 f. 29.
56. Macleod, op. cit., (1906), p.1423.
57. W. Ph. Coolhaas. Generale Missiven van Gouverneurs-Generaal en Raden aan Heeren XVII der Verenigde
Oostindische Compagnie, Deel VII ('s-Gravenhage, 1979), p.101.
58. VOC, 1926 f. 88-92.
59. Kielstra, loc. cit., p.514.
60. In P.H. van der Kemp, "Eene Bijdrage tot E.B. Kielstra's Opstellen over Sumatra's westkust", BKI, vol. 44
(1894), pp.551-8.
61. Bat. Gen., 162.
62. There is insufficiënt space, in an essay of this type, to explore the complicated question of the origins of the
manuscripts. I have dealt with this in some detail in my M.A. thesis, currently in preparation, on the history
of Barus.
63. The language in this printed copy has been modernised in some degree and it is necessary to resort to the
original manuscript for a full appreciation of the chronicle. The printed version has nevertheless been used
for the references which follow since it is more readily available to readers.
64. The information in the previous two paragraphs comes from the Asal Turunan Raja-Raja Barus, pp.58-7.
65. Ibid., p.49
93

66. Ibid., p.46.
67. Ypes, loc. cit., p.549.
68. Sejarah Tuanku Batu Badan, p.8.
69. Ibid., p.11.
70. Ibid., p.12.
71. Ibid., p.8.
72. ƒ&/£?., p.9.
73. For a discussion of the significance of Kerajaan in Malay life see A.C. Milner, Kerajaan: Malay Political
Culture on the Eve of Colonial Rule (Tucsan, 1982), passim.
74. Milner, op. cit., discusses the ideal relationship between ruler and subject in a Kerajaan and the qualities
expected of a Malay ruler.
75. R. Heine-Geldern, "Le Pays de P'i-k'ien, le Roi au Grand Cou et le Singa Mangaradja", BEFEO, vol. xlix
(1959), p.390.
76. Ibid.
77. W. Marsden, The History of Sumatra (London 1811, reprinted in facsimile, 1965), p.375.
ABBREVIATIONS:
BEFEO Bulletin de 1'Ecole Francaise d'Extreme Oriënt.
BKI Bijdragen tot de Taal-, Land- en Volkenkunde van Nederlandsch -Indie.
JMBRAS Journal of the Malayan Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society.
JSEAH Journal of Southeast Asian History.
TAG Tijdschrift van het Koninklijk Aardrijkskundig Genootschap.
TBB Tijdschrift voot het Binnenlandsch Bestuur.
TBG Tijdschrift voor Indische Taal-, Land-, en Volkenkunde, published by the Bataviaasch
Genootschong voor Kunsten en Wetenschoppen.
94

REFLECTIONS ON GROWING UP IN COASTAL SUMATRA:
AN INTERVIEW AND DISCUSSION
Amy Davidson, Nuim Khaiyath, Sadaruddin Munir, Etty Rice and
John Maxwell (Chairperson)
John Maxwell: We are going to discuss a number of issues related to our panelists's early
years in Sumatra. I should point out at the outset that none of our panel would claim to
have had a direct, personal hand in the major events of modern Indonesian history. But as
you shall hear, each of their lives was deeply affected by many of these events.
I should also emphasize that I have not been able to assemble an ideal cross section of
coastal Sumatrans. It would have been best to have had one representative each from
Aceh, Medan, Padang and Palembang but that was not possible. Nevertheless all our participants
are from urban coastal areas of Sumatra, though none of them comes from a
peasant or farming background, and none of them would claim to come from the poorest
sections of the societies in which they grew up. All of them have had the benefit of higher
education to tertiary level and they all eventually left Sumatra to live abroad, three of
them marrying foreigners in the process. Three of our panel now work as staff members
of the Indonesian section of Radio Australia.
Our panel members are Mr Sadaruddin Munir, a Deli-Malay who grew up in Riau on
Sumatra's east coast; Ms Amy Davidson, formerly from Padang, part of the rantau area
of Minangkabau and Sumatra's west coast capital; Ms Etty Rice, also a Minangkabau
who grew up in Medan but whose family came from Maningau in the highlands of West
Sumatra; and finally, Mr Nuim Khaiyath, born and raised in the Kesawan area of Medan.
Rudi, your parents were both Deli-Malays from the Binjai-Langkat area of North
Sumatra, yet you yourself were born in 1934 in Riau on Sumatra's east coast. Can you explain
how that came about and can you teil us something of the two places in Riau where
you spent your childhood years?
Sadaruddin Munir: My mother originally came from the Langkat area, Tanjung Pura. We
come from a little village there called Sejagat. It's still there now and the entire populatior
of about 1500 are still related to one another. My father was not entirely from that areE
because some of his family came from Riau and in fact there is a little bit of Minangkabat
on his side. But they were known as Melayu-Deli — Malays from the Deli area of North
Sumatra.
I was born on Bengkalis, one of the main islands in the Riau archipelago. Bengkalis ii
very famous for its ikan terubuk and telor terubuk — it's just like the Russian sturgeor
which produces caviar — and this was a sought after delicacy throughout Malaya, particularly
by the Chinese of the region.
Before I was born my father worked for a Dutch plantation in North Sumatra. Bui
later on he got a job with the Harbour Authority, Haven Bedrijf as a clerk and worked hi;
way up until eventually he became a harbour master. He was sent to a number of places ir
Raiu. He started off in Karimun, before my time. Then he was moved to Selat Panjang or
the island of Tebing Tinggi and later on to Bengkalis where I was born. I grew up there foi
about six years until we moved to Bagansiapiapi. That is another port and a very famou:
95

one too. A fishing port. In fact at one stage it produced more fish than any other port in
Indonesia. Some people compare Bagansiapiapi with Grimsby in England.
John Maxwell: What was the ethnic composition of a place like Bagansiapiapi? Were these
Malay people?
Sadaruddin Munir: No, there was a large Chinese population. Bagansiapiapi was rather
unique really because 75°7o of the inhabitants were Chinese. Many of them were wealthy
Chinese, not small fishermen but the owners of large fleets of boats. The waters around
Bagansiapiapi are rich in fish resources and they traded their fish to Malaya — Kelang,
Port Swettenham, Penang, Singapore.
John Maxwell: Was this area of Riau then foreign territory for a Malay family from Deli?
Sadaruddin Munir: Oh, not at all because we are basically Malay and the population of the
Riau islands is mostly Malay. But they were more oriented to the Malay peninsula in those
days than was the Deli area of North Sumatra in the sense that they spoke like the people
in Malaya. And there were quite a lot of people in Bengkalis who when they went home
for a holiday they went back to Malacca. They had their aristocracy too. People with titles
such as Datu, Wan, Tun and so on. They were well respected people in the community
there.
John Maxwell: Your memory goes back to colonial times. What sort of a Dutch presence
was there in these places?
Sadaruddin Munir: There were about a hundred of them in Bagansiapiapi, mainly the top
echelon of the civil service. There was a Controleur there — the Assistant-Resident was in
Bengkalis. Then all the top jobs — the judge, the head of the police, the doctors in charge
of the hospital.
John Maxwell: Amy, you were born in Padang in the late 1930s into a Minangkabau family.
Can you teil us something about your family's background and what they were doing in
Padang during your childhood?
Amy Davidson: My father came from what we called the ambtenaar (Dutch term for civil
servant, Ed.). They were not trading people. Most of them worked for the Dutch government
at that time. My mother came from what we called the saudagar, the trading
families. My mother was the only girl. He had five brothers and none of them worked for
the Dutch government. One uncle was a chemist and another an optometrist.
From my father's side all the children went to a Catholic school so consequently they
spoke Dutch at home. On my mother's side we went to a school established by the prominent
trading families in Padang, although the school did receive a government subsidy.
All of their children went to this school — not just from one family. As you know the
Minangkabau are a matrilineal society, so my uncles' children and the children of our
immediate family all went to this school.
John Maxwell: I want to ask you about the implications of being born into a matrilineal
society. Can you explain what this meant for you as a child? You have spoken about the
two sides of your family, your father's side and your mother's side. Which side of the
family did you have more to do with when you were a young child growing up?
Amy Davidson: You always live with your mother's side of the family, so my maternal
grandmother lived with us — and we were closer to our mother's side of the family than to
our father's side. We even call our uncles by different names — on the mother's side mak
and on the father's side pak.
97

John Maxwell: What did your father do? Who in your family took care of the material
necessities of life?
Amy Davidson: Well normally the father would, but also to a large extent the uncles on the
mother's side. But in my case for some reason my father didn't work very much. He was
twenty-three when they got married and my mother was eighteen. My five uncles all contributed
to our upbringing. However, even if my father had worked my uncles would still
have done the same thing.
John Maxwell: It is sometimes said that in Minangkabau the women hold the purse strings.
Do you think it is true?
Amy Davidson: That is the general impression that people have — but as a Minangkabau I
don't think it is accurate. There is more of a division of roles because some things have to
be done by men and some by women. But there are times when they all come together on
an equal basis, such as in the event of a wedding for example. This is an important occasion
in our society, especially for the girl's side of the family. Now in this case women
have as much say as the men. There are certain tasks which the women control such as
how the wedding is going to be conducted and how many people are going to be invited.
The men look after the financial side of it. No, I wouldn't think that in our society women
hold the purse strings. It's not quite as simple as that.
John Maxwell: Etty, your family is also originally from the Minangkabau area of Sumatra
but you were born in Medan in 1940. Can you teil us something of your family and how
they came to live in Medan?
Etty Rice: My grandparents on both sides of the family had settled in Aceh, merantau from
Maninjau in West Sumatra. My mother was born and raised in Aceh near Kuala Simpang
and my father was born in Bireuen. But my parents both returned to Padang Panjang in
West Sumatra for their education, my mother to a teacher's college for girls and my
father to an Islamic college for boys.
It was customany in my parents' generation for intermarriage between people from
the same village. People always knew where there were other families from their village
even in Jakarta or Medan. And so after they finished their schooling my mother who was
nineteen married my father who was then twenty-five. They went to Medan where I was
born. My father was a businessman and part-time teacher there. He ran a printing and
publishing company and he opened a bookshop in Tebing Tinggi, a large town near
Medan.
John Maxwell: You are one of a large family. We have heard from Amy about the influence
of Minangkabau adat on family life. Was the influence of adat still strong in your experience,
even though you were not living in Minangkabau? Was your upbringing a strict
one?
Etty Rice: I didn't feel it so much when I was young but when I began high school it seemed
as though I was not as free as I had been before. I have five brothers and one sister and my
mother had said when we were growing up that we were all the same. But when I became a
teenager my mother began to say that according to our adat it should be like this ... I was
not allowed to go here, I was not allowed to go there. I was not free any more and I always
had to have one of my brothers accompany me.
John Maxwell: Nuim, your family is a mixture of both Arab and Malay. I want to ask you
about thjs particular kampung of your childhood in Medan, but first can you teil us a lit-
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tle about your parents?
Nuim Khaiyath: My father came from Mecca, then known as Hijaz and now of course part
of Saudi Arabia. He had to leave that country. It was not a voluntary exit because he was
very active in those days in the field of education but at the same time agitating for particular
freedom. So he had to leave Mecca for his own safety.
He went to join his father, my paternal grandfather who had already left Saudi
Arabia and had started teaching in Kedah in Malaya. But when my father arrived there
was no opening for him there so he crossed over to Medan where there was a school in
need of a religious teacher. This was just before the turn of the century. He took up a
position as a sort of headmaster.
However he had already given a pledge to his father that he would never sell his
knowledge — his religious knowledge. And that of course put him in a very difficult
dilemma. On the one hand he had to live, on the other he could not earn a living by
teaching because that would be breaking the promise that he had made to my grandfather.
So he became a pedlar, selling cloth from plantation to plantation. In east and
north coast Sumatra in those days the rubber and palm oil plantations were worked by
contract labour from Java. Many of these people were religious-wise neither here nor
there — and my father thought that at the same time as doing business he could also teach
them about Islam.
You see he used to teil us that what he very much wanted to do was not so much to
sell them cloth but to liberate them from a habit which he claimed the Dutch had instilled
in them — gambling. Chinese came from Medana to the plantations and started organized
gambling. The Javanese were then trapped by their debts and were unable to return home
to Java. The Javanese — at least we in Medan think — the Javanese have a philosophy.
Mangan ora mangan asal ngumpul — "it doesn't matter whether you eat or not as long as
you're together". So as soon as they had saved some money by working very hard on the
plantations they would start going back home to Java. The Dutch didn't like this so they
introduced gambling — according to my father.
John Maxwell: And what about your mother and your kampung in Medan?
Nuim Khaiyath: You see there is this place called Kesawan in Medan which really is the top,
elite street in the heart of the city. Next to it, or parallel to it, is Jalan Mesjid — Mosque
Street. Just off Jalan Mesjid is an alley called Gang Bengkok — Crooked Alley. Its very
famous in Medan. Now here was this village bounded on one side by Jalan Mesjid (which
is only a stone's throw from Kesawan) and with the river Deli flowing through it.
All sorts of people living in this kampung. There were Chinese, mainly Hokkien.
And Indians, the Sikkhs or Punjabis and the Bengalis. The Bengalis were tailors and the
Punjabis were milkmen. And of course Indonesians from many areas. There were a lot of
Mandailing but also some Javanese and some Minangkabau. We were the only Arab
family at that time.
But in fact my mother was a Deli woman. The Deli people were actually the original
residents of that part of Sumatra.
John Maxwell: I understand that your father Sheik Mahmud was a well known Islamic
teacher in North Sumatra. His religious teaching must have been a powerful influence on
your family life. Can you teil us something about his particular approach to Islam?
Nuim Khaiyath: I suppose it was what you would now call very fashionable fundamen-
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talism. He was a fundamentalist in the sense that there were no frills, no nonsense. It was
Islam as a way of life. And as a religion it should be understood and the only way to make
people understand it was to explain it to them in a language that was comprehensible to
them.
Apparently in those days in the mosque on Fridays the sermons were delivered in
Arabic and it was considered sinful to utter any other words or language except Arabic.
My father took the view that if you couldn't understand Arabic how were you going to
understand the religion? And so he started preaching in Indonesian in the mosque. It
caused some consternation. There were many people who did not hesitate to call him a
kafir, murtad [heathen, unfaithful, Ed.). If he had been a Catholic he would have been
excommunicated.
John Maxwell: This issue was not the only religious controversy he was involved in. Wasn't
there also a conflict about the mosque itself in your kampung?
Nuim Khaiyath: Yes. You see in Medan there was a very wealthy Chinese called Tiong Ah
Fee. He was apparently the sort of person who preferred not to have all his eggs in the one
basket. If you wanted to build a church he would contribute to it. If you wanted to build a
mosque, he built a mosque. And now there is the mosque in Gang Bengkok built by Tiong
Ah Fee, a very wealthy Chinese who was a confessed Confucian.
But then again some people said that they were not going to pray there because it was
built by a Chinese. So they had a debate. They called all the Islamic leaders in Medan
together and my father was apparently a lone figure in advocating that you could pray in a
mosque built by a Chinese even though he wasn't a Muslim. They all presented their
arguments and then my father's turn to speak came. He asked those present who had performed
the pilgrimage to Mecca to step to one side. There were quite a few of them
because in those days people would sell their coconut plantations just to be able to go to
Mecca. In the past it used to take about six months and they stayed up to two years before
returning because there were no steamships until the Dutch time. The Dutch of course
provided steamships. All those people who had performed the pilgrimage went to one side
and my father said, 'Tm very sorry. By the logic of all these other Islamic leaders your
pilgrimage was not a valid one because you went by ships belonging to the Christian
Dutch". There was consternation. It was just like the camel which goes to Mecca every
day but doesn't became a haji. So finally they decided by that logic it would be proper in
the eyes of Allah to pray in a mosque built by a Confucian Chinese.
John Maxwell: Of all the panel you Rudi have the clearest memory of the Japanese Occupation.
When the Japanese arrived in Bagansiapiapi in early 1942 you were already at
school. How did your people view the coming of the Japanese and what changes occurred
in your life as a consequence?
Sadaruddin Munir: The people were petrified. You see, they landed in Singapore first and
they didn't come to the Riau islands until after Singapore feil. I think it was March 1942.
And long before they arrived we heard so much about their cruelty and how vicious they
were. So people were very concerned. Of course months before they arrived their aircraft
flew over the islands from Singapore.
I went to the Dutch Catholic school in Bagansiapiapi. We had our air raid shelter
there and nearly every day for weeks on end we would rush into the air raid shelter. But on
one particular morning they came. They arrived by boat in the harbour, a platoon of them
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with their sten guns and took over the town.
They rounded up all the Dutch officials and put them in a temporary internment
camp. Of course my teachers were mostly Dutch too — nuns, sisters and priests and they
were also rounded up by the Japanese. The ordered us about in the classroom. They forced
us to bow. There were guards everywhere at every door.
John Maxwell: But did life return to normal?
Sadaruddin Munir: Not quite, not for some time. For about a week people just stayed in
doors. All the offices and shops were closed. It was only after the Japanese announced
that things were back to normal again that everything opened again.
John Maxwell: And you returned to school?
Sadaruddin Munir: Yes. But there were a great number of changes. We had new teachers
brought by the Japanese from Pekanbaru. They were Indonesians but they had been indoctrinated.
They were tough. They ordered you about and all boys had to shave their
heads. Every morning we had to do taiso and bow to Tenohaika in Tokyo before we
started our lessons. That was a good hour spent in doing these physical education
activities.
John Maxwell: Presumably you learnt Japanese as well.
Sadaruddin Munir: That was the main subject during the Japanese Occupation. You learnt
nothing but Japanese language, Japanese history, Japanese literature.
John Maxwell: In your area was there a local militia with military training organized for
young boys?
Sadaruddin Munir: By the Japanese, yes. But not straight away. After about six months
they started to call for young able-bodied people to train to be gyogun and heiho. I was
too small but my brother was involved.
John Maxwell: Amy, I think your memories begin with the years of the Revolution. What
memories do you have of Padang in those years and what happened to your family?
Amy Davidson: I don't have much recollection of the Japanese Occupation. However, I do
remember when we left Padang because of the danger. It must have been some time early
in the 1940s. Our family decided to move to Payakumbuh which is about 125km. north.
The whole family went and this is where the matrilineal system came to play an important
role. All of us went with my uncle's family. He hired a luggage van with a sliding
door on the train which winds up into the mountains from Padang. It was a beautiful view
going up into the mountains though the steam train was not a very powerful one and stopped
at every little station.
All of us were packed into that van. While it was worrying for the adults it was fun
for all the children because all the cousins were together and we had brought food to eat
during the journey.
Eventually the family split up. My mother and father stopped in Padang Panjang,
60km away. My uncle rented a large house in Payakumbuh. Two other uncles and their
families, my grandparents and myself lived together in this complex.
John Maxwell: What memories do you have of those years in Payakumbuh?
Amy Davidson: We were there for about five years until after the Allied Forces arrived in
Indonesia. When they came we had nowhere else to go so we decided to stay put trying to
gather food wherever we could. Financially and materially this was not an easy time but
the children were well protected and sheltered by the family so I remember it in fact as one
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of the happiest times of my life. We were all together and I was with my grandmother with
whom I was very close. My uncles always looked after us almost as though they were my
own father.
John Maxwell: When you eventually returned to Padang, what did you find?
Amy Davidson: Our house was burnt down, apparently either by the Allies or the Dutch.
Everything in Padang was tumbledown and many houses had been destroyed. Some people
got compensation for the damage although our family never did. Luckily, as I explained
earlier, my uncles on my mother's side of the family were traders. So my uncle who was
a chemist reopened his shop and was able to provide for us again.
John Maxwell: Etty, your family shared some unpleasant experiences during the struggle by
the Dutch to reassert control over North Sumatra after the end of World War II, What do
you recall of those years?
Etty Rice: I think I was in second grade at elementary school in Tebing Tinggi at the time
when my family decided to flee to Pematang Siantar. At that time my father ran a
bookstore in Tebing Tinggi and the Dutch had come there looking for illegal books. Fortunately
my father managed to hide those ones so he escaped any trouble.
Then I remember there was a lot of fighting, and one day I remember coming home
from school and an old lady walking in front of me was shot. There were several bodies at
the side of the road in the ditch. So my family decided it would be safer for us to move
back to the village my parent's family came from in West Sumatra.
We moved first to Pematang Siantar. We walked there from Tebing Tinggi. We
started at night and we were guided by the Indonesian army. We didn't follow the road
but we kept to the walking paths through the fields. In the day time we hid in the bushes
and I remember seeing Dutch trucks passing by.
We stayed in Siantar for a few months and then we had to flee again. I remember it
was a very long walk and I was the youngest in the family walking at that time. I don't
remember how we got to my parent's village at Maninjau in West Sumatra but we stayed
there for about two years. I soon forgot that there was a war going on because it was so
peaceful there. After the war was over we flew back to Medan again.
John Maxwell: I suppose there was nowhere for your family to flee at such times. Were you
as a small boy aware of foreign troops on Indonesian soil?
Nuim Khaiyath: My father's attitude was that everything was written so there was no use
running away. My earliest recollection of foreign troops at that time was on one particular
day when there was great excitement within the Gang Bengkok area. Everyone crossed
Jalan Mesjid to Kesawan and there near the Bata shoe shop the place was full, the pavement
lined with people, mothers carrying their children.
We could see fatigue green open trucks, obviously army trucks. They were British
army trucks carrying Indian soldiers — very strange looking people with long hair. We
had Indians there in Medan and they started explaining that these people were Hindus,
not Moslem Indians. The soldiers were looking right and left as if they were animals in a
zoo looking out at the visitors. Some of them were chewing betel and began to play a
game to see how far they could spit. That was my earliest recollections of foreign troops in
Medan. They were Indian soldiers brought over by the British who we were later told were
trying to help the Dutch.
John Maxwell: But your family did have one narrow escape around this time because of one
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of your brothers.
Nuim Khaiyath: I am the youngest of eight children and one of my two brothers was something
of an adventurer. He had attended both Dutch school and an English school and he
spoke both languages quite well.
He wanted to play a part in the Revolution. At that time he must have been about
twenty and because he looked rather different he could pass himself off as an Indian. The
revolutionaries said, 'Alright, why don't you do your bit? Why not go in a junk across the
Straits of Malacca to Singapore taking rubber and palm oil? Try to sell them there and
then buy some weapons.' And so he did. It was an adventure apparently. And apart from
carrying weapons for the revolutionaries he was also doing some business of his own. He
would buy a few pistols and try to sell them privately in Medan.
On one occasion he returned from Singapore with a pistol for which there was a willing
buyer. But when the pistol was tested it didn't fire. It was jammed. My brother was
embarrassed and very annoyed. When he returned to Gang Bengkok he started pulling the
trigger. Suddenly the gun went off and in no time at all you could see Indian soldiers coming
led by one British officer. We were all terribly worried because of course in the house
there were boxes and boxes of ammunition.
Somebody pointed out where the sound had come from and they arrived at the
house. They were just about to ransack the whole place when suddenly the British officer
noticed the small room where my father kept his books and he could see my father standing
there his lips quivering as he prayed. He just decided for some reason not to search
any further and they went away. It was certainly a narrow escape.
John Maxwell: Rudi, what happened after the defeat of the Japanese in you part of Sumatra.
The other members of our panel came from large towns where Communications were
more effective. But in Bagansiapiapi were people immediately aware of the formation of
the Republic and merdeka!.
Sadaruddin Munir: We were quite aware of what was going on outside because we had radio
Communications. We knew that President Sukarno had proclaimed independance and we
were exhuberant that we were also merdeka. But Bagansiapiapi was isolated and Communications
were difficult. And as I mentioned earlier the population was 75°/o Chinese
and they didn't give a hoot one way or the other. The Japanese had just left.
So authority in that transition period feil into the hands of a group of people who
proclaimed themselves the TKR — the Tentara Keamanan Rakyat (The Peoples' Army).
They were the ex-gyogun and heiho trained by the Japanese, including my own brother.
But there were only about forty of them and they were supposed to be in control of
Bagansiapiapi.
However, the Chinese there were very powerful. They had been there a long time and
had never traded much with other parts of Sumatra or Java. Instead they had been closely
involved with Malaya, Singapore and Hong Kong, places where they exported produce
from the hinterland and their dried fish.
The Japanese had left behind a lot of equipment including weapons. After merdeka
these different groups began to flex their muscles. "Now you are under us. We are independent."
But the Kuomintang were also strong in Bagansiapiapi. They had their own
leader, the Chinese Kapitan and he had a palace there. The authorities took over the
office of the former Controleur.
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John Maxwell: This sounds like a formula for violence.
Sadaruddin Munir: It was. First of all the forty or so young men in the TKR tried to order
the Chinese about. But they wouldn't have it. They resisted. One day a group of these
young Indonesians went to the Kapitan and ordered him to lower the Kuomintang flag.
But the Chinese refused. "We will raise the Indonesian flag but there is no way you can
make us pull that flag down." Then one of the Indonesians tried to stab one of the
Kapitan's aides with a samurai sword — at that time all the TKR officers were wearing
those Japanese swords.
That started it. Violence erupted. Because of that the authorities in Pekanbaru and
Medan sent two platoons of troops. As soon as they arrived they started ordering people
about. At first the Chinese accepted it but the next day they also armed themselves. They
came out of their hiding places and wiped out the troops from Medan and Pekanbaru.
There were only about sixty of them and they didn't have a chance because they were
completely outnumbered by the Chinese.
At that time we all stayed in doors. Nobody went out. Some of my relatives who
worked in the harbour and who ran shops were trapped there and were unable to go
home. But the local Chinese who knew our people told us not to worry. As long as we
stayed indoors we would be alright.
But the situation became even more tense and violence increased. Chinese came from
the outer islands, Pulau Kelang and another small town nearby, Sinebui. And also from
Panipahan. When they arrived to help the local Chinese they were indiscriminate because
they didn't know the local Malays. They started shooting everybody. I lost two uncles and
a cousin.
Finally we had to flee Bagansiapiapi. We left behind all our possessions, everything.
We ran with.only what we were wearing at the time. My mother carried a bit of jewellery,
that was about all.
We had to walk through the jungle to Labaun Tangga because Bagansiapiapi is at the
estuary of the Rokan River. We just followed the river the Labuan Tangga and went
across to Batu Putih. Then we walked for about a week until we got to Labuan Bilek.
From there we caught a bus to East Sumatra.
John Maxwell: Did your family ever return to Bagansiapiapi?
Sadaruddin Munir: Yes. My brother, my father and my grandfather went back about a
month later when everything was calm and peaceful only to find that there was nothing
left in the house, only the empty shell. Even the glass from the windows had been removed
let alone the furniture. Everything gone completely.
John Maxwell: It is interesting that despite these experiences, the social dislocation of war
and revolution, you have all managed to complete a good education. Rudi, you have
already mentioned that you went to a Dutch Catholic school. What choices were open to
you in Bagansiapiapi and why did you choose that school?
Sadaruddin Munir: Actually my parents wanted me to go to sekolah Muhammadiyah. But
my brother went to the Dutch school and I always looked up to him and tried to follow
him in everything I did. Deep inside me I decided that when my time came to go to school
I wanted to go to his school, the Dutch school.
But by then things were different and it was quite expensive to go to the Europese
Lagare School — The European elementary school. The school fees were about 10
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guilders a month, the rent of a reasonable house at that time. So my father said, 'T think
you had better go to Muhammadiyah school. It's just as good and everybody else goes
there." I refused and there was a big argument. I got a spanking but I still insisted on going
to the Dutch school and in the end I won.
John Maxwell: And after you fled Bagansiapiapi?
Sadaruddin Munir: By then I was in the sixth class at primary school when we arrived in
East Sumatra. After one year at Kisaran we moved to Pematang Siantar and not long
afterwards the Dutch arrived. That must have been about the time Etty's family fled from
Tebing Tinggi.
It was just sheer luck that when I moved there things became quite again and the
Dutch reopened the schools. At that time we were living under the RIS (Republik Indonesia
Serikat) — the Federal Republic of Indonesia. They started a sort of semi-Dutch
school again. It wasn't then called SMP (Sekolah Manengah Pertama Junior High
School) but IMS, {Indische Middelbare School). I was at this school in Pematang Siantar
for three years and then, still under the RIS, I went to Medan. There I went to the VHO
which is equivalent to SMA {Sekolah Menengah Atas, Senior High School) nowadays.
In fact when I was in the second year in 1949 they signed the Round Table Agreement
in the Netherlands. With the transfer of sovereignty everything became part of the
Republic and all these schools became Indonesian schools. So I finished my schooling in
Medan at a government SMA. From there, I went to university in Jakarta.
John Maxwell: What was the attitude of your parents towards education, Amy? Did they
consider that it was just as important for girls as for boys?
Amy Davidson: Yes. I never experienced any opposition to my going to school, except from
my grandmother who thought that it was not so important for girls to continue their
studies as it was for boys. But the rest of my family, including my uncles and my brothers
were always in favour of higher education.
In fact my schooling was not very disrupted during the Revolution even though for a
couple of years we didn't go to school continuously. But still we went to school when we
could. I suppose because of that I was not quite so aware of the political upheaval in the
country. But I knew about merdeka. We always said "Merdeka bung". We learnt our national
anthem and were proud as Indonesians we were not ruled by the Dutch anymore.
John Maxwell: What sort of school did you go to?
Amy Davidson: During the Revolution when we were living in Payakumbuh we went to the
local school whenever we could. When we returned to Padang I went to the Adabiya
school which my uncle had established with other trading families. Actually it was a more
Islamic orientated school. We all went there — I went there for nine years, six years of
primary school and three years of secondary or junior high school. That was as far as it
went at that time.
I went to a government school for a further three years and then I also went to Jakarta
to study at the University. We were all encouraged to finish our studies and to reach as
high a level as we could, girls or boys.
John Maxwell: Was your family's attitude the same, Etty?
Etty Rice: Yes. My parents never prevented me from continuing my studies as long as it was
in Medan and close to home. That only became a problem after I finished high school and
wanted to study economics. At that time the Economics Faculty of the University of
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North Sumatra (USU) was situated in Banda Aceh.
My mother's side of the family wouldn't allow me to go and live there. And as I still
wanted to study economics I had to enrol at Nommenson University. This is a private
Protestant University which began with a theology faculty at Pematang Siantar.
John Maxwell: Who were the staff teaching at this university?
Etty Rice: When I started most of the teachers were Dutch with English as the language of
instruction. However when the Nationalization policies were introduced in the late 1950s
most of the Dutch staff left and were replaced by Indonesian staff. However the university
also received assistance from the Ford Foundation, so we had Ford Foundation staff
teaching there later on.
John Maxwell: Nuim, I think of all the panel you received the most unusual education. In
fact, you didn't go to school at all until you were about eleven.
Nuim Khaiyath: I didn't go to school until about 1950 or '51. It's very hazy. It was very confusing
in those days because there were few schools. My sisters for obvious reasons didn't
go to school.
John Maxwell: But you went to religious school.
Nuim Khaiyath: Oh, I went to religious school next to the mosque to study religion. And
then one of our neighbours in the kampung was an Indian from Pondichery who had
married an Indonesian and had opened a small warung or stall selling rice and Indian
curry. One of his sons went to the Kalsa English School.
Now the Kalsa English School was run by Indians. Most of the teachers delivered
milk in the morning on their bikes and then they would rush into class still perspiring.
Going to a state school at that time was well nigh impossible because although
everything should have been above board it wasn't. The family just couldn't afford to
send me to a state school. So the next best thing was to go with my neighbour's son to this
Indian school.
And so I went off wearing my singlet and underpants to ask the headmaster, Mr Darbara
Singh, if I could study there. I was lumped into this one room with all the other boys.
John Maxwell: What sort of students were there?
Nuim Khaiyath: All sorts of students — Chinese, Indonesians, Indians. The first day I was
there our teacher didn't even bother to teach us the ABC. He was so keen and eager to
teach us English — he couldn't speak Indonesian properly. He started with a chant:
"C — A — T, cat meaning kucing'\ And then the whole class would repeat in unison
"C — A — T, cat meaning kucing".
John Maxwell: But despite all this after a relatively short time at this school you took the
English Senior Cambridge Examination.
Nuim Khaiyath: Well, that was the thing, at the end of each year some students attempted
the Senior Cambridge. There were about 140 students at Kalsa and we had to pay quite a
handsome fee for the privilege of sitting for an examination supervised by staff from the
British Consulate in Medan.
John Maxwell: But you passed.
Nuim Khaiyath: Yes I did, but it was very tricky, it was a chancy business. I remember that
during the Senior Cambridge Examination you couldn't study at home because there was
no electricity. In those days you would have to wait for your turn and it would come only
once a week. Electricity was a luxury so all those boys from the kampung in Gang
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Bengkok who went to Kalsa school would gather around the lamp-post at night studying.
Somehow I passed and then the obvious place to continue my studies was the Islamic
University of North Sumatra. I enrolled in the Literature Faculty. Our teachers were
mainly Columbo Plan lecturers from Britain. They were actually seconded to the State
University of North Sumatra but they enjoyed teaching at the Islamic university because
many of the students were graduates of Kalsa English School. They gave their services for
free because at least they could understand us.
John Maxwell: Two of our panel continued their education at tertiary level in Sumatra while
the other two decided it was time to seek experience elsewhere. Rudi, why did you decide
to go to Jakarta for your tertiary studies?
Sadaruddin Munir: Well, in my time the Standard of USU, the University of North Sumatra,
was not very high. Many of the lectureres at that time were just local doctors or lawyers.
In fact I knew some of them. My brother implored me to stay in Sumatra because he
couldn't afford to send me to Jakarta. But I wanted to go and take a chance. I had an
uncle there who was prepared to give me a place to stay. But if I wanted to go to university
I had to earn some money to cover fees, books and living expenses.
So after finishing SMA in Medan I arrived in Jakarta in September 1953 and enrolled
in the Faculty of Economics at the University of Indonesia.
I was very fortunate. Three months later I was listening to the radio in Jakarta one
evening and heard an advertisement for a new announcer with Radio Jakarta. They were
looking for a person with a senior high school certificate, a good knowledge of English, a
bit of French and German and of course a reasonabie voice. A couple of hundred people
applied and I was lucky enough to be selected. That was how I was able to earn sufficiënt
money to live in Jakarta.
John Maxwell: Amy, you also decided to further your studies in Jakarta. Why did you make
that decision and what was your family's response?
Amy Davidson: I suppose that most Minangkabau like to leave home for a while at least. I
thought I would like to study French. I went to my uncle and told him that I wanted to go
to Jakarta. My uncle gave his consent and agreed to help support me.
I arrived in Jakarta intending to study French. At the last moment before I enrolled I
feit nationalistic I suppose and I thought that before I studied a foreign language I should
study my own first. So I decided to study Indonesian and that was what I did for the next
five years at the University of Indonesia.
QUESTIONS FROM THE AUDIENCE
Ailsa Zainuddin: Nuim, in the light of what other members of the panel have said it's not
entirely clear to me why your sisters didn't go to school. You said "for obvious reasons"
they didn't go to school.
Nuim Khaiyath: The idea was that they would one day get married and would not need to go
out and fend for themselves. That was the reasoning behind it. But in that they were not
unique because through arranged marriages it was certain that these girls would be married
off. So there was no need for them to go to school. Perhaps that would have given
priority to wordly matters. There were other things more important than that. That was
the thinking behind it and that's why I said for obvious reasons.
Ailsa Zaiuuddin: It just wasn't obvious to me.
107

Nuim Khaiyath: It just goes to show that there are different perspectives and cultural back-
grounds.
Jane Drakard: I'd like to ask you all about the literature you read when you were young,
both modern and traditional. I am particularly interested in the traditional literature of
Sumatra and the Malay peninsula which you read or were told about by your families.
Amy Davidson: In Minangkabau I don't think we had what you would call written traditional
literature but we had what we called tambo, stories which were handed down from
one generation to the next. Funnily enough it was mostly the women who knew these
stories.
I remember a relative of my father's side of the family. She came from Pagar
Ruyukong near Solok where the old Minangkabau kingdom was. One night she decided
to entertain us with one of these stories. It took until about four o'clock in the morning. It
was a beautiful story but it was never written down.
Jane Drakard: Did you or your contemporaries memorize these stories too?
Amy Davidson: Unfortunately only a certain section of the community in Minangkabau,
from Pagar Ruyukong, knew these stories in detail although we generally all knew how
the story ended.
Sadaruddin Munir: My recollection of early literature is the story of Puteri Hijau. The
famous princess of the Sultan of Deli. This was told from generation to generation. But I
also read the official literature at school.
Jane Drakard: You didn't read things like Sejarah Melayu!
Sararuddin Munir: Of yes, we learnt about Sejarah Melayu and Hang Tuah through the
family. Not at school of course because I went to a Dutch school.
Etty Rice: I read a lot because my father had a book-store, in elementary school I even read
Hans Christian Andersen because Balai Pustaka translated a lot of books into Indonesian
at that time.
At high school we studied a lot of Indonesian literature and as I had chosen the
humanities stream at school I read a lot when I was young.
Nuim Khaiyath: As far as traditional literature, as Rudi mentioned just now Puteri Hijau
was a very famous story. But it was not reading. There were these old women. They
couldn't read Latin script but they were able to read Arabic and they had these thick
books written with Arabic script. These stories were read like syair (a poem) with a
beautiful melody. We would gather listening to these old women and we would be
mesmerized. Perhaps not by the content of the story.
Apart from that we read Hang Tuah and Maling Kundang. Later Siti Nurbaya and
Layar Terkembang. Even that novel which would be considered very tame these days, you
had to find a secluded place to read it because it was about boy-meets-girl and holding
hands! But apart from that there were many English books too.
Jane Drakard: I wondered also about European literature.
Nuim Khaiyath: Well in my case because of the requirements of the syllabus we had to read
books like Sheridan's The Rivals, The Kontiki Expedition, The Merchant of Venice or
Julius Caesar, and Arms and the Man by George Bernard Shaw.
But the problem was we didn't have the books. The teacher might have a copy and so
it would be cyclostyled as we called it in those days. Somebody would do the typing and
then you couldn't read it properly because the typewriter had been bought from Harrison
108

and Crossfield in the 1920s. From time to time those British companies in North Sumatra
would auction off their old equipment and these typewriters had to make do for years and
years. That was the extent of our literature.
Mohd. Slamet: When our Medan friends first met non-Medan Javanese, what was their first
impression — culture shock?
Sadaruddin Munir: Not quite. Some people may give the wrong impression that because
there were a lot of Javanese contract labourers in North Sumatra all the Javanese were
uneducated. But there were also many well-educated Javanese in Sumatra.
For instance, my brother's father-in-law was a qualified chemist in Tebing Tinggi, in
Tanjung Balai and in Pematang Siantar. And then I remember a man who was the principal
of one of the Taman Sistra schools in Medan — Abdul Malik Munir. Actually he
was from Yogyakarta. We had met some of the priyayi before we went to Java so it was
no shock.
Etty Rice: There are so many ethnic groups in Medan from all over Indonesia. But certainly
my impression of Javanese was that they were much quieter than people in Medan.
Nuim Khaiyath: My father met as I said many people from Java. He always referred to them
as people from the other side of the sea — orang seberang. They were first known to us to
have a particular fondness for colours. The men wore green shirts and pink trousers when
they came to Medan.
John Maxwell: You should point out that you were selling cloth.
Nuim Khaiyath: But you should have seen those pedlars from Minang, particularly the ones
selling watches when the Javanese came to Medan you could teil that they had just received
their pay. The pedlars tried to sell them everything they could. The Minang watch
sellers would try to sell them what they called Sulu — outside it looked like a Rolex but inside
it was just hopeless.
Its unfortunate that in those days we referred to them — perhaps out of fear — as
Jakon (Jawa Kontrak). That was of course terrible with President Sukarno calling for
unity. So we changed it to Jadel (Jawa Deli). They had a Javanese name but they spoke
like a person from Medan.
And now of course they have a better name. They are called Pujakesum (Putera
Jawa Kelahiran Sumatera, Javanese children born in Sumatra).
Roswita Khaiyath: Etty mentioned before that apparently most people in her village intermarried
with other people from the same village. Etty grew up in Medan but with a
Minangkabau background. I was wondering if there were actually any arranged marriages
in her family as there were among other groups in Medan.
Etty Rice: Yes, there were. At least once every year or so people went home to their village.
They would be asked where they were living now and whether they had a son and
daughter and how old they were. Marriages were often arranged then and in my parents'
generation most marriages were arranged between people from the same village.
Roswita Khaiyath: Was that common in Padang, Amy?
Amy Davidson: During my mother's time it was and even though it still occurs nowadays it
is done in a more liberal sort of way even though the implications are clear.
Tuti Gunawan: Etty, you once remarked that your mother never told your father or sought
his permission if she went out visiting or to a meeting. Was that common? It seems very
liberated to me. On the other hand you say that your family was very strict.
109

Etty Rice: No, I don't recall my mother ever asking my father's permission but she would
teil him where she was going. They were quite strict on the matter of who your husband
was going to be.
When I was still young I was so free. But when I reached marriageable age my
parents put it to me that this was our adat. This was something new to me. I had been
brought up in Medan and I didn't know anything about adat. But I couldn't do anything
because I was the oldest grand-daughter in the family. I had to set an example for my
sisters and brother who were younger than I was.
John Maxwell: Yet from a similar background Amy, you didn't have that sort of problem.
Amy Davidson: No, because in our family there were more boys than girls and whenever we
wanted to go out we would always have older or younger brothers or cousins to accompany
us. So there was no problem. Even if I wanted to go out with a boy there was no problem
although I would make sure that he had met my mother first. In a small town like
Padang everyone knows everybody else and people would know that he was so-and-so's
son.
Zainuddin: Pm not asking a question. I just want to say that people probably get the wrong
impression about adat. As in any law there are loopholes. So if a boy would like to meet a
girl he can always do so along lines parallel with the rule of adat. The impression given to
outsiders is that it is very strict. That is not so, there are always loopholes.
Nuim Khaiyath: One of my sisters had an arranged marriage and this loophole was really
important. When we had guests the men would sit in one room and the women in the
other. My mother would entertain the women and my father would entertain the men.
On one occasion a man came over with his son. We knew why he was coming and it
was through one of the loopholes in the door that my sister had a look at him. She found
him agreeable and they have been married for nearly thirty years now. After looking
through that loophole.
110

MONASH PAPERS ON SOUTHEAST ASIA
No.
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3. India Seen from the East: Indian and Indigenous Cults in Champa by Paul Mus. Translated and edited, with introductory
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5. One Hand Clapping: Indonesian Nationalists and the Dutch 1939-1942 by Susan Abeyasekere. 1976. $5.00.
6. The Constitutionalist Party in Cochinchina: The Years of Decline, 1930-1942 by Megan Cook. 1977. $5.00 (overseas
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7. Studies in Indonesian Music. Edited by Margaret J. Kartomi. 1978. $5.00 (overseas postage please add 50 cents).
8. Bureaucrats, Petty Bourgeois and Townsmen: an Observation on Status Identification in Kota Bharu by Halim Hj.
Salleh. 1981. $5.00.
9. Fishermen in Flats. A study of involuntary urbanization affecting the Malay minority in Singapore by Chew Soo Beng.
1982. $5.00.
*** SPECIAL OFFER Complete set of Monash Papers on Southeast Asia, 1-9 including postage $35.00.
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MISCELLANEOUS PAPERS
1. Secondary Schools Guide to Resources on Indonesia by Susan Abeyasekere et al. 1973. $2.80.
2. The Image of Asia in Children's Literature: 1814-1964; by Cecile Parrish. 1977. $1.80.
ANNUAL INDONESIA LECTURE SERIES
A series of Indonesian lectures organised annually by the CSEAS and the Australian-Indonesian Association of Victoria.
1 Religion and Social Ethos. 1977. $3.00. "Professor Haji Kahar Muzakkir and the Development of the Muslim Reformist
Movement in Indonesia", by Mitsuo Nakamura; "Religion and Politics in Indonesia Since Independence", by Benedict
R. O'G. Anderson; "Priyayi Value Conflict", by Muhammad Slamet, and "Millenarianism and the Saminist Movement",
by Benedict R. O'G. Anderson.
2 People and Society in Indonesia: A Biographical Approach. 1977. $3.00. "Arung Palakka and Kahar Muzakkar: A
Study of the Hero Figure in Bugis-Makassar Society", by Leonard Andaya; "The Chinese Minority: Politics or
Culture", by Charles A. Coppel, and "Tan Malaka: Perantauan and the Power of Ideas"; by Yuji Suzuki.
3. The Life of the Poor in Indonesian Cities. 1978. $3.00. "The Pondok System and Circular Migration", by Lea Jellinek;
"Pockets of Privilege Amidst a Mass of Poverty. Wages and Working Conditions in Indonesian Industry", by Chris
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4 Contemporary Indonesia: Political Dimensions. 1979. $3.00. "Indonesia since 1945 - Problems of Interpretation", by
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5. Kartini Centenary: Indonesian Women Then and Now. 1980. $4.50. "Kartini - Her Life, Work and Influence", by
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6 Five Essays on the Indonesian Arts — Music, Theatre, Textiles, Painting and Literature. 1981. $4.50. '"Lovely When
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7. Indonesian Medical Traditions: Bringing Together the Old and the New. $4.50. "Encounters with Traditional Healers",
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The Response to Epidemie Illness", by Tuti Gunawan.
111

WORKING PAPERS
1. Life in a Javanese Village by Supomo Surjohudojo. 1974.
2. Some Queslions Regarding Timber Exploitation in East Kalimantan by Gale Dixon. 1974.
3. Population Control in Village Java: The Case of Maguwohardjo by Terence Huil. 1974.
4.& The Samlaut Rebellion and its Aftermath, 1967-1970: The Origins of Cambodia's Liberation Movement by Ben Kiernan.
5. Part 1. 1975. Part II. 1975.
6. Rice Harvesting in the Krawang Region (West Java) in Relation to High Yielding Varieties by Boedhisantoso. 1975.
7. Traditional Yogya in the Changing World by Supomo Surjohudojo. 1976.
8. The Friends Who Tried to Empty the Sea: Eleven Cambodian Folk Tales by David Chandler. 1976.
9. The Life of a Jakarta Street Trader by Lea Jellinek. 1976.
10. The Early Phases of Liberation in Northwestern Cambodia: Conversations with Peang Sophi by David Chandler, Ben
Kiernan and Muy Hong Lim. 1976.
11. * Early Thai History: A Select Bibliography Edited by Ian Mabbett. 1977.
12. Analysing Theories of Development by David Goldsworthy. 1977.
13. The Life of a Jakarta Street Trader — Two Years Later by Lea Jellinek. 1977. A fascinating sequel to No. 9.
14. The Cultivation System and "Agricultural Involution" by R.E. Elson. 1978.
15. Brahmin and Mandarin: A Comparison of the Cambodian and Vietnamese Revolutions by Robert S. Newman. 1978.
16. * Notes on the Structure of the Classical Malay Hikayat by A. Bausani; a translation from the Italian by Lode Brakel.
1979.
17. The Pedlars of Ujung Pandang by Dean Forbes. 1979.
18. * Back Alley Neighbourhood: Kampung as Urban Community in Yogyakarta by John Sullivan. 1980.
19. Ketoprak Theatre and the Wayang Tradition by Barbara Hatley. 1979.
20. Growing up in a Javanese Village: Personal Reminiscences by Supomo Surjohudojo. 1980.
21. Famine in Cirebon Residency in Java 1844-1850: A New Perspective on the Cultivation System by Radin Fernando.
1980.
22. Aid, Basic Needs and the Politics of Reform in Indonesia by Philip J. Eldridge. 1980.
23. Three Early Indonesian Short Stories by Mas Marco Kartodikromo (c. 1890-1932). Translated and introduced by Paul
Tickell. 1981.
24. The "Exploitation" of Marine Fishermen in Malaysia: are Co-operatives a Solution? by G.R. Elliston. 1981.
25. Market Traders and the Sale of Clothing in Rural Java by Glen Chandler. 1981.
26. The Poorest of the Poor: Three Case Studies from Indonesia by Abd. Chamid, edited and translated by Keith Foulcher.
1982.
27. The Hsaya San Rebellion (1930-1932) Reappraised by Patricia Herbert. 1982.
28. The Underdeveloped State: The Study of Modern Burma's Politics by Robert H. Taylor. 1983.
* Price: $1.50, with the exception of Paper Nos. 11, 16, and 18, which are $2.00.
112