T. Béntara Titeuë was the oelèëbalang of the II Moekims Titeuë in Pidië and a landschapsrechter (territorial judge) of the Landschapsgerecht at Sigli, who on 10 October 1913 stabbed the presiding Civil Authority, overste W. B. J. A. Scheepens, during a sitting of the Moesapat, and was cut down on the spot by an Acehnese police servant.
The occasion
In October 1913 the oelèëbalang’s son, the young Teukoe, walking through the gampong with a few followers, grew thirsty and ordered one of them to climb a coconut palm on an Acehnese’s yard and pick a few coconuts. The owner, angered that no permission had been asked, refused; the young Teukoe grew angry in turn, holding that the picking was the oelèëbalang’s right; the owner threatened him with his parang; the Teukoe held to his order; and the owner brought the parang down on his skull, causing a bleeding head wound. The perpetrator was arrested and brought to Sigli for trial before the Moesapat (“customary-law court”).
The sitting of the Moesapat
On the day of the trial T. Béntara Titeuë went to Sigli. At the entrance to the civil office the armed police servant on sentry duty took from him his visibly worn, gold-ornamented rentjong.
The adjunct-djaksa demanded the maximum penalty for slight wounding known to Dutch criminal law, three months’ imprisonment. One of the judging oelèëbalangs asked the Muhammadan adviser what penalty he considered fitting; the Teungkoe answered according to Acehnese adat: “Loeka oelón sipat, darah oelón soekat, lhò’ oelón takat, diët lhëë ploh reunggèt” — the blood-price is thirty dollars.
Hearing this, T. Béntara Titeuë sprang up in fury and abused the Teungkoe as “Kaphé”: “You know very well that according to our customary law I have the right not only to kill the man himself who shed my son’s blood, but even his whole family.” He told the President that he understood Acehnese adat could no longer be applied to the perpetrator, “but that he, T. Béntara, if the perpetrator were not punished with at least banishment to Java, would be shamed in the eyes of his people.”
In vain the Civil Authority explained that his son, by improper conduct, was the principal culprit, and that Dutch law did not permit banishment for a slight wound. The oelèëbalang persisted, and when the Moesapat pronounced three months, “T. Béntara Titeuë suddenly drew a concealed knife from beneath his clothes and stabbed Colonel Scheepens in the belly.”
The adjunct-djaksa rushed forward with only a wooden ruler; then an armed police servant, an Acehnese, drew his klewang and struck the oelèëbalang over the head. “The territorial chief fell down and died almost at once. Colonel Scheepens, having got to his feet, forbade any harm to be done to the chief, but it was already too late.”
Scheepens died of his wound on 17 October 1913.
Aftermath
The monthly report closed: “Peace and order in the territory of Titeuë were not disturbed for a moment by what had occurred.”
Significance
Du Croo printed the case in full “because it clearly illuminates how even an Acehnese territorial chief is brought to such a murder” — the collision between the adat right of blood-vengeance and the Dutch penal maximum for slight wounding, mediated by the sense of maloe.
See Also
- W. B. J. A. Scheepens
- Murder of Lieutenant-Colonel Scheepens (10 October 1913)
- Moesapat
- Adat
- Maloe
- Pidië
- Sigli
- Oelèëbalang
Source
Generaal Swart, Pacificator van Atjeh (“General Swart, Pacifier of Atjeh”), by M. H. du Croo, Colonel K.N.I.L. (retired), with the collaboration of H. J. Schmidt, Titular Colonel K.N.I.L. (retired), with a foreword by His Excellency Lieutenant-General K.N.I.L. (retired) G. K. Dijkstra (Maastricht: N.V. Leiter-Nypels, 1943), Chapter XII, pp. 119–121.