P.J. van Leeuwen was a Dutch academic who, in his dissertation on the Maleise Alexanderroman (1937), argued that the Malay Alexander romance constituted an exception to Christiaan Snouck Hurgronje’s claim that “oudere verhalen” were purely Arab in origin. Van Leeuwen’s ninth proposition challenged the “stelling” of Snouck Hurgronje and suggested that some Malay narratives might retain indigenous elements.
Dissertation Highlights
In his 1937 Utrecht dissertation, Van Leeuwen classified the Hikayat Iskandar DzŌe KI‑Karnain as a “belangrijke uitzondering” to Snouck Hurgronje’s thesis, thereby reopening debate on the Arabic versus indigenous roots of Malay literary tradition.
See Also
Source
20260707_232246_DLP-54-Een_16de_eeuwse_Maleise_vertaling_van_de_Burda_van_al_Bu_s_i_ri_OCR.txt, pp. 18‑20.