Bombay

Bombay (also known as Mumbai) was a major port city on the western coast of India that functioned as a pivotal printing centre in British India and is repeatedly cited in C. Snouck Hurgronje’s The Achehnese as a geographic reference for the broader cultural and religious influences of Hindustan (the Indian subcontinent) on the East Indian Archipelago. The city’s Fathul Kareem Press produced a large corpus of popular Urdu and Arabic‑Malay devotional works that helped transmit Indian‑origin Islamic traditions, literary motifs, and Shiʿite customs to the Archipelago.

Publishing Activity

The Fathul Kareem Press at Bombay published numerous popular works cited by Snouck, including versions of the story of Tamim Angari in Urdu and Afghan, as well as the romances of Shah Bahram, Abu Nawas, and the Amir Hamzah saga. In the early nineteenth century the press also issued the Madjmisa Mawlid series—comprising the Burda, Mawlid Sharaf al‑Anäm, and other texts authored by Al‑Barzandji—which facilitated the spread of Arabic poetry throughout the Indonesian archipelago.

The Mad

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Bombay in Snouck Hurgronje’s The Achehnese — Hindustan

Hindustan — the Indian subcontinent — is mentioned throughout The Achehnese as the country from which Islam was first introduced into the East Indian Archipelago, and as the source of the Shiʿite tendencies and popular stories that coloured the Islam of the Archipelago. Snouck Hurgronje uses the term more specifically than the broader “British India”: Hindustan is the country of the Deccani Moslems portrayed in the Qanoon‑e‑islam of Jaffur Shurreef, and of those peoples of southern India whence the creed of Islam made its first advances toward the Eastern Archipelago.

The first introduction of Islam

Islam as first introduced into the Archipelago from Hindustan “has always shown Shiʿite tendencies.” This provenance is treated by Snouck as a master key to the religious life of the Archipelago: the reverence paid to the descendants of the Prophet — the sayyids and sharifs — the popular stories of Amir Hamzah and Mohammad ibnuʾl‑Hanafiyyah, the Hasan‑Husain feasts, and the choice of the eighth month for the commemoration of the dead are all traced to the lasting influence of Hindustani Islam. The creed “would appear to have made its first advances towards the Eastern Archipelago” from the coastlands of the southern part of British India — that is, from the Deccan.

The mad processions of Hindustan

The mad processions of the Hasan‑Husain feast are described by Snouck as “particularly common in Hindustan, and remind one more of a fair or carnival than of a funeral pageant.” These processions, with their cries of Husain! Husain!, the exposure of the actor who takes the part of the murderer of Husain to actual violence from the crowd, and their theatrical representations of the events of Kerbela, “specially belong to Persia and the Shiʿite portions of British India.” Such observances contrast sharply with the more sober ritual of orthodox Islam, yet they are characteristic of those portions of Hindustan where Shiʿite influence has been strongest.

The chosen dish of Ashura

The cooking of special viands on the Ashura day is one of the observances which the Islam of the Archipelago shares with Hindustan. In Hindustan the chosen dish is the khichri; in Cairo it is called hubub (“seeds” or “grains”); in Java the bubur sura consists of various grains or seeds. The Achehnese likewise have their own Ashura dish. The spread of this observance, with its local variations, is treated by Snouck as evidence of the common origin of the popular Islam of the Archipelago in the Islam of Hindustan.

The predeclared taʿliq

The custom by which a husband, immediately after the marriage ceremony, declares his liability to divorce on specified grounds — the so‑called predeclared taʿliq — is treated by Snouck as one of the institutions the Archipelago shares with Hindustan. Such predeclared and morally compulsory taʿliqs are not rare in the East Indian Archipelago, and Snouck suggests they would “in all probability be met with in those parts of Hindustan whence Islam was introduced into the E. Indian Archipelago.” The taʿliq is a characteristic method by which Mohammedan law has been adapted throughout the Archipelago to mitigate the miseries of a wife abandoned by her husband.

Bombay in Snouck Hurgronje’s The Achehnese — India / Hindostan

India — or, in older European and Achehnese usage, Hindostan — is the great subcontinent whose Mohammedan and Hindu inhabitants had, from the earliest times of the Achehnese kingdom, supplied both the religion and a portion of the commercial population of Acheh. Snouck Hurgronje’s account of India in Vol. I of The Achehnese presents India as the original source of the Islamisation of Acheh and describes the contemporary Hindu and Mohammedan settlers (the Klings, the Chetties, the Mohammedan Klings from Madras and Malabar) who continued to trade in the country.

Hindostan as the Source of Achehnese Islam

Snouck argues that Hinduism had, for a considerable time, exercised a direct or indirect influence on the language and civilisation of Acheh, though little trace remains in present popular traditions. “Even in Mohammedan times,” he continues, “there are numerous indications of contact with the inhabitants of India; it is indeed more than probable that Acheh, like other countries of the Indian Archipelago, was mohammedanised from Hindostan.” The theory of an Indian, particularly Gujarati or Bengali, origin for the Islam of the Archipelago was already, in Snouck’s time, the common opinion of Orientalist scholarship.

The Kling and Chetty Settlers

Snouck describes the contemporary Indian settlers in Acheh: “Not only Mohammedan Klings and people from Madras and Malabar, but also heathen Klings, Chetties, and other Hindus, have carried on trade in Acheh down to the present time, and there has been from first to last no serious opposition to the permanent establishment in the country of such kafirs, harmless as they were from a political point of view.” The Chetties — the money‑lending caste of Southern India — were a familiar feature of the commercial life of Banda‑Acheh, and the Mohammedan Klings, known in Achehnese as Kling kaphé or simply Kling, were among the principal trading communities of the port.

The Hindu Element in the Achehnese

Snouck insists that the Hindu element in the Achehnese population, though real, has left few traces in popular traditions and institutions. The Achehnese themselves attribute the name of their country to Acheh or Arabic ʿajam, not to any Sanskrit origin. Yet the presence of Hindu blood in the Achehnese is, in Snouck’s view, “past all doubt,” and the continued immigration of Kling and Chetty settlers, down to the present time, is one of the channels by which that element has been maintained.

The Comparative Use of Indian References

India is repeatedly invoked in The Achehnese as a point of comparison — most often in connection with parallel institutions of the Deccan, the Malabar coast, and the Coromandel shore. The Klings of Banda‑Acheh appear in the chapter on the marriage ceremony as one of the stranger‑communities with whom the better class of Achehnese objected to intermarry, and the parallel is drawn between the Achehnese dislike of giving daughters to Klings and analogous restrictions elsewhere in the Archipelago. Thus India functions in Vol. I as a source, a continuous presence, and a comparative reference; its Mohammedan and Hindu inhabitants supplied Acheh with religion, traders, and a portion of its blood, and its contemporary institutions furnished the comparative material by which the singularity of Achehnese adat could be highlighted.

Bombay in Snouck Hurgronje’s The Achehnese — Southern India

Southern India, including the Deccan and the Coromandel (or Madras) coast, is, in The Achehnese, the country from which the creed of Islam first made its way to the Eastern Archipelago, and the source of many religious ideas, festivals and popular superstitions that distinguished Achehnese Mohammedanism from the more austere Arab form of the faith. Snouck treats southern India as a more powerful formative influence on Archipelagic Islam than any other agency, Arabia included.

The argument rests on three classes of evidence:

Commercial intercourse – “Mohammedan Klings and people from Madras and Malabar, but also heathen Klings, Chetties and other Hindus, have carried on trade in Acheh down to the present time, and there has been from first to last no serious opposition to the permanent establishment in the country of such kajirs, harmless as they were from a political point of view.” From this Snouck concludes that “Acheh, like other countries of the Indian Archipelago, was mohammedanized from Hindostan.”
Comparative religious texts – The Qanoon‑e‑islam of Jaʿfar Shurreef (translated by G. A. Herklots, second edition, Madras, 1863) relates “to a non‑Shiʿite people, the inhabitants of the coastlands of the Southern part of British India, whence the creed of Islam would appear to have made its first advances towards the Eastern Archipelago.” The Mohammedans of the Deccan, “are Shafiʿites just like those of the Malay Archipelago, but their national ideas and customs have arisen to a great extent under strong Shiʿite influences.” The Hasan‑Husain festival, “in different parts of Netherlands‑India and especially on the West Coast of Sumatra (Padang, Bencoolen etc.) is celebrated on a smaller scale, but in much the same manner as we find it described in the Qanoon‑e‑islam.”
Popular religious literature – Tales of Amir Hamzah, Mohammad Ibnu’l-Hanafiyyah, Samʿun, Raja Badar and many more are traced to southern India. “It is more particularly in British India that works of this sort are to be met with, nor is it possible that they should have been disseminated to such an extent in any country closer to Arabia.” The influence of the Deccan form of Mohammedanism is “superior in force to that of any other agency,” as seen in the character of the popular religious literature.

Southern India is also the source of the Achehnese cult of Tuan Meurasab (known locally as Kadir Wall Sahib), whose tomb is at Nagore on the Coromandel coast, and whose anniversary is kept in Acheh on the 9th–11th days of the month Jumadilawal. Vows of gold or silver hands made to this saint for the recovery of sick children are transmitted through Kling traders journeying to Madras. The word kanduri itself — the central term of Achehnese religious feast‑life — is imported from India and corresponds closely to the sedekah, slametan or kenduri of the Javanese and Sundanese.

Source

The Achehnese, Vol. II, by Dr. C. Snouck Hurgronje, translated by A.W.S. O’Sullivan, indexed by R.J. Wilkinson. Leyden: E.J. Brill, 1906.

Bombay (Mumbai) – entry on the printing centre in British India, source unspecified (original draft provided).

tags	place, legendary-land, foreign, region, india, comparative, islam, islamic-influence, comparative-reference, country, colonial, publishing
aliases	India, British India, the Indian subcontinent, the Indian mainland, Hindostan, Hindustan, Hindūstān, Hindu India, Southern India, the Deccan, Bombay, Mumbai, Bombay Press

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