Atjehsche overheersing der Noordelijke kuststaatjes

Properties2
tagsevent, concept, atjeh, malay, precolonial, colonial, sumatra, oostkust-van-sumatra, buitenbezittingen, sovereignty
aliasesAtjehsche overlordship of the Northern coastal statelets, Atjehsche suprematie over de Noordelijke Onderhoorigheden, Acehnese overlordship of the East Coast statelets, Atjehsche opperheerschappij over de Oostkust, Atjehsche onderwerping der kuststaatjes

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The Atjehsche overheersing der Noordelijke kuststaatjes — the Atjehnese overlordship of the Northern coastal statelets of Sumatra’s East Coast — was the long period of formal and informal Atjehnese political supremacy over the Malay sultanates of Langkat, Deli, Serdang, Asahan and the smaller river-mouth polities between Tamiang and Batu Bara. First established by Sultan Iskander Moeda’s Oostkust-veldtocht in the early seventeenth century, the overlordship was briefly shaken off in 1769, revived under altered circumstances in 1854, and finally extinguished by the Dutch naval intervention of 1866 and the 1878 transfer of Langkat’s Tamiang rights. In the Encyclopaedisch Bureau’s survey of the Outer Possessions, the overlordship is the central institutional fact of the pre-colonial East Coast — the framework within which the rivalry between Atjeh, Siak and Djohore over the coast was fought out.

The original seventeenth-century overlordship

The original Atjehnese overlordship was the product of Sultan Iskander Moeda’s campaign along the East Coast, by which, as the Encyclopaedisch Bureau records, “de definitieve onderwerping dier staatjes aan dat machtige rijk” — “the definite subjection of those statelets to that powerful realm” — was achieved. The statelets — Langkat, Deli, Serdang and the smaller polities — received their galar — their ceremonial titles of recognition — from the hands of the Sultan of Atjeh, and the institution of the Atjehnese vertegenwoordiger in Tamiang and northern Langkat, which had originated in the sixteenth-century destruction of Aroe, was now formalised across the entire coast.

The 1769 recovery

The original overlordship lasted, the Bureau records, until 1769. “In 1769 wisten zij zich echter weder van deze overheersching los te maken” — “In 1769, however, they knew themselves again to be free of this overlordship.” The Bureau does not give a detailed account of the circumstances of the 1769 revolt, but it presents it as a momentary release, rapidly overtaken by the rise of Siak as the new regional hegemon. Within a few years the statelets had been forced, “door het wapengeweld van Ismail en Said Ali” — “by the armed force of Ismail and Said Ali” — to acknowledge Siak rather than Atjeh as their overlord.

The Siak interlude

The Siak overlordship that succeeded the Atjehnese was, the Bureau records, itself short-lived. After Said Ali’s death in 1821 the Siak sultanate was riven by internal disputes, and after the accession of Sultan Tongkoe Ismail of Siak in 1827 Siak’s effective power on the East Coast rapidly declined. By the middle of the nineteenth century, the Bureau notes, “waren de Noordelijke Onderhoorigheden weldra inderdaad geheel onafhankelijk” — “the Northern Onderhoorigheden were soon in fact entirely independent” — and even the old ceremonial exchange of galars had been replaced by the chiefs’ recognition of each other’s titles. By the early 1850s the East Coast statelets were, in effect, sovereign.

The 1854 reimposition of Atjehnese overlordship

The Atjehnese overlordship was reimposed, in altered form, in 1854. “Serdang, Deli en Langkat, welke zich los hadden weten te maken van Siak’s invloed, waren al sinds 1854 gedwongen geworden in plaats daarvan dien van Atjeh toe te laten, welk rijk daar sedert dat jaar inderdaad opperheer was” — “Serdang, Deli and Langkat, which had managed to free themselves from Siak’s influence, had been forced since 1854 to admit, in its place, that of Atjeh, which realm was, since that year, in fact overlord there.” The reimposition, coming after a century of formal Siak suzerainty, marked the return of Atjehnese power to the East Coast — and prepared the ground for the 1862 appeal of the Radja of Langkat to Siak for Dutch protection against Atjehnese exactions.

The Dutch intervention and the end of Atjehnese overlordship

The Atjehnese overlordship of the East Coast was finally extinguished by the Dutch in the 1860s. The Bureau records that the 1862 appeal of the Radja of Langkat — made “de onderdrukking door Atjeh moede” — “weary of the oppression by Atjeh” — led, through Sultan Tongkoe Ismail of Siak’s intercession with the Netherlands-Indies Government, to the dispatch of Resident Netscher of Riouw on a tour of the East Coast statelets in 1862. The statelets of Deli, Serdang, Langkat and several smaller polities signed acts of recognition of Siak’s overlordship; Asahan refused and was reduced by armed force in 1865. “Tevens werd in het daarop volgend jaar door optreden onzer Marine een einde gemaakt aan de vexaties der Atjehers in het Langkatsche, die daardoor naar hun eigen gebied werden teruggedreven” — “At the same time, in the following year, by the action of our Navy an end was made to the vexations of the Atjehers in the Langkat territory, who were thereby driven back to their own territory.”

Significance

The Atjehsche overheersing der Noordelijke kuststaatjes is, in the Encyclopaedisch Bureau’s survey, the central institution around which the pre-colonial history of the East Coast turns. Its establishment under Iskander Moeda, its temporary eclipse in 1769, its Siak successor, its reimposition in 1854, and its final extinguishment by the Dutch in the 1860s together constitute the framework within which the Dutch colonial state later built its own East Coast administration. The 1854–1866 phase of the overlordship is, moreover, the immediate background to the Atjeh-oorlog of 1873, insofar as the East Coast statelets’ appeal for Dutch protection against Atjehnese pressure was a principal diplomatic pretext for the Dutch assertion of effective authority over the entire northern Sumatran coast.

See Also

Source

De Buitenbezittingen, Deel II, Afl. 3: Oostkust van Sumatra. Eerste Stuk, bewerkt door het Encyclopaedisch Bureau, Mededeelingen van het Bureau voor de Bestuurszaken der Buitenbezittingen (Weltevreden: Landsdrukkerij, 1918), pp. 104, 114–115. Universiteitsbibliotheek Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, shelfmark LS.08781.

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