The Journal of the Siam Society Vol. LXIV, Part 1-2, 1976 - Khamkoo

REVJEW ARTICLES 305
1. Perhaps there was "another Palembang" south of th~e Musi
river. It bears repeating that, according to Soekmono's geomorphological
paper, Palembang in the 7th century was on the tip of a promontory
and the land below that was stilL under water. In any case, from what
I have seen, if there had been another Palembang it could be found more
easily from air photographs than conjecturing about it.
2. In case another Palembang cannot be found, Wolters seems to
veer from straight history to a research on the changing coastline of
Southeast Sumatra. Four Chinese itinararies are mentioned of which two
are discussed, namely,
(a)
(b)
(c)
(d)
7th century 1-Ching,
8th century Embassy from Pyu in upland Burma,
11th century Embassy from South India, and
15th century Ma Huan.
The 7th and 15th century itineraries give no trouble. The evidence
is first hand by writers who visited the locations. But the 8th and lltb
century itineraries are something else. The information was supplied to
the Chinese by foreign embassies, probably through interpreters. It is
difficult to understand why embassies goJng to China from Burma and
South India should use the Sunda and not the Malacca Straits. Indeed
if Pyu was really in upper Burma one would have expected the journey
to have been made by land and not by sea at all. But this is immaterial.
The main point is that if the two embassies went through the Malacca
Straits, then the Chinese toponyms that Wolters located in South Sumatra
could all be wrong. On the other hand, if the trips were really through
the Sunda Straits, landmarks in the Peninsula and North Sumatra would
-have been sighted and probably mentioned. So only some of the
toponyms might have been mislocated. The whole exercise smacks of
playing the Chinese word-game to me~ And iri any case, the muddy
coasts of South Sumatra is hardly a worthwhile research subject for a
historian of Wolters' calibre.
3. Again, if another Palembang cannot be found, Wolters switches
fr9rn history to "the nature of early Malay civilization," If the people