Pagan races of the Malay Peninsula - Sabrizain.org

II.
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RACE-CHARACTERS OF SAKAI 55
Race-Characters of Sakai.
The Sakai appear to have their racial focus in
the mountain ranges of S.E. Perak and N.W. Pa-
hang. Their district marches on the north (in Perak)
with that of the Semang, the dividing line being
stated by some observers to be the Perak river, and
by others (De Morgan, Hale, and others) to be the
Plus river already referred to. There can be no
doubt, however, that there has been a considerable
admixture ; witness the photographs of some so-called
" Semang " tribes of Perak and elsewhere, which
frequently include types that are distinctly Sakai
certainly no really distinct geographical boundary can
be drawn between the two races, and on the whole it
would seem that the much-talked-of line of demarca-
tion between the Semang and Sakai is (as far as race
and culture go) no line at all, but a belt of mixed tribes
which run, e.g., through mid- Perak and N. Pahang.^
On the east coast the Sakai do not appear to
extend far into either Kelantan or Trengganu, though
they are found in Pahang, their admixture with Pangans
commencing somewhere near Clifford's line, e.g., in
the district of Ulu Jelai. Westward of the central
chain, on the other hand, they appear to extend
through the interior of Selangor, and thence, in
the form of a narrowing wedge (and with a rapidly
increasing admixture of Jakun blood), through the
inland districts of Negri Sembilan, at least as far south
as Malacca, and almost certainly as far south as Johor.
' For further notes on their distribu- fortunately no clear proof that the
tion, see, for instance, De la Croix's writer is always able to distinguish
article in Rev. d''Ethnogr. vol. i. No. between Semang and Sakai.
4 {1882), p. 320 ; though there is un-
;