A kingdom on the North or East Coast of Acheh. In the Hikayat Eseukanda Ali (XVI), the merchant prince Ali Juhari is established as a sugarcane planter in Keureutoe (Kerti): ‘With this in view they purchased land from Ahli, king of Keureutoe and built a sumptuous residence which was called Indra Siluka.’ The princess Ra’na Jamin is the daughter of the sovereign of Keureutoe. The Achehnese regard this as a fragment of history of ‘Timu’ (the East, the North and East Coasts). The giant Mala’oy Rimba also ‘had just returned to his forest haunt from Keureutoe, bringing with him the dead body of a girl.’
Kerti was a small statelet — een klein staatje — on the north coast of Atjeh, lying eastward of Telok Semawé, off which the steamer Raijah was run ashore by the pirates who seized her on the night of 20 July 1893.
P. H. R. Beuming records that when in the evening one of the seven concealed Pedirese came on deck and struck up a conversation with the helmsman, he asked of het schip in de nabijheid was van Kerti — whether the ship was in the neighbourhood of Kerti. This part of the coast appeared most suitable for their plan; and scarcely had the helmsman given an affirmative answer when he was overpowered and killed with a rentjong, the signal for the general massacre that followed.
The ship was afterwards run onto the beach there and the bandits went ashore with their booty and five women. The full narrative is at Raijah piracy (20 July 1893).
Account from Atjeh by H.C. Zentgraff (1938)
Zentgraff’s Atjeh gives Keureutoe its fullest treatment as a war-era landschap. Keureutoe — also Keureutoë — was one of the richest and most populous landschappen of the North coast. Its oeléëbalang bore the honorific Kedjooroeann Lalat — the ruler of the land where the people are as numerous as flies — because the country was so densely peopled.
Two oeléëbalangs
When Teukoe Tjoet Moehamat submitted to the Dutch in 1899, the bestuur appointed instead his half-brother T. Tjhi Bentara, a weakling who could not maintain himself. The Sultan, however, gave T. Tjhi Toenong an appointment sealed with the tjap sikoereuëng — so there were twee oeléëbalangs van Keureutoe: the Dutch-appointed baroh and T. Tjhi Toenong the toenong, who held the upper country with the resistance. Tjoet Meuthia — the Parel, the Pearl — was first wife of T. Tjhi Bentara, then of T. Tjhi Toenong, then of Pang Nanggroë. T. Tjhi Toenong submitted at Lho Seumawé on 5 October 1903, was tried, and executed by firing-squad on the strand of Lho Seumawe on 5 March 1905. His pregnant wife swore to bring their son up in hatred of the kaphé and marry Pang Nanggroë.
The adelaarsjong
The son of T. Tjhi Toenong and Tjoet Meuthia — T. Radja Sabi, the adelaarsjong (eaglet) — was carried through the forests for fourteen years, from 1905 to 1919, sheltered in rice-straw when the maréchaussée searched. He returned on 13 March 1919, when a former kawan seized his arm at Lho Seumawe: “Nu moet je mèl!” In 1937 he became waarnemend oeléëbalang of Keureutoe.
In Keureutoe zal de herinnering aan dit alles blijven leven, zoolang het volk hangt aan zijn oud vorstenhuis — so Zentgraff closes. The keudé of Lho Soekon lies nearby; behind it, within wooden kandangs, are the graves of Pang Nanggroë and Pang Lateh.
Atjeh, door H.C. Zentgraff. Gedrukt bij Drukkerij “De Unie”, 1938, Batavia.
The succession dispute
Administrative errors committed in 1899 excluded Teukoe Tjoet Moehamat, son of the oelèëbalang and rightful heir to the succession, from the oelèëbalangschap; his half-brother T. Tjhi’ Béntara became oelèëbalang instead. Tjoet Moehamat became a resistance leader and was recognised by the sultan as the genuine oelèëbalang of Keureutòë, with an appointment sealed with the seal of the nine circles; he took the title T. Tjhi’ Toenòng, “of the upper districts,” while the “false” chief below became “van geen beteekenis meer” for the population.
After T. Tjhi’ Toenòng’s execution under Van Daalen, his widow Tjoet Meutia married the resistance leader Pang Nanggròë, who formed a band around her and around her son T. Radja Sabi and who, in November 1907, proclaimed the six-year-old boy oelèëbalang of Keureutòë. The half-brother had temporarily to step down in view of popular indignation. Only in 1937, after the son of T. Tjhi’ Béntara had proved a failure and been suspended in 1936, did T. Radja Sabi at last become oelèëbalang of Keureutòë.
Condition in 1908
“I found hopeless conditions in Keureutòë, formerly a rich and prosperous land,” said one of Swart’s collaborators who administered the district for years. The chiefs had been cut in their incomes by withholdings for years; spies were not everywhere well led and controlled, deceived those who sent them out, stirred up trouble between others, vexed the population, and had cattle and possessions taken from the innocent if their demands were not met; “the livestock herd was thereby virtually wiped out. The population no longer cared about anything; it grew indifferent and went over to the resistance.”
The course of the resistance
On the upper Djambo Ajé Pang Nanggròë set the whole of Keureutòë in movement and worked with Tgk. Sjeh di Paja Bakong, Tgk. di Mata Ië and Tgk. di Barat. In 1908 the co-operation of the population caused two of Tgk. di Barat’s best commanders and Tgk. di Paja Bakong’s best pang to fall, so that both principal leaders withdrew to the Gajòlanden. In 1909 269 opponents still fell, including seventeen band-heads and seven Teungkoes; eleven were taken prisoner, among them the learned and fanatical Tgk. di Reubèë; seventy-two submitted.
The year 1910 brought the decisive turn: Pang Nanggròë fell in the Paja Tjitjém on 26 September, and Tgk. Sjeh di Paja Bakong, his son Tgk. Mat Saleh and Tjoet Meutia on 25 October at the Kroeëng Peutòë; Pang Aron reported himself with eight followers. Seventy-one resistance men were killed, fifty-one taken prisoner and eighty submitted.
1911 brought “the great improvement,” the monthly reports habitually opening “the political situation remained favourable,” though Tgk. di Barat returned from the Gajòland to the upper Keureutòë in June and a night attack on the patrol of captain Van der Vlerk on the Keureutòë-rivier on 23–24 March was traced to his old adherents. With his death at Behrens’s hands on 22 February 1912 “the situation in the whole North Coast division became stable and ranged from favourable to very favourable; the suffering there was over.”
Significance
Keureutòë is the district in which du Croo’s book most fully documents both the human cost of Dutch administrative error — the exclusion of a rightful heir producing thirty-eight years of resistance in one family — and the constructive method by which H. N. A. Swart reversed it: repayment of withheld incomes, advances for the purchase of cattle, and the return of the oelèëbalangs to their gampongs.
Account from Atjeh als land voor handel en bedrijf (1925)
Keureutoe (Keureuto, Kroeëng Keureutö pronounced Kertō) was river and landscape in Lho Soekon splitting underafdeeling in two halves different nature.
Description
Middle Lho Soekon run rivers Peutoë, Pira and Keureutö near hoofdplaats Lho Soekon connection two arms sea. Keureuto splits underafdeeling: south-eastern half all paja swamp 15k souls smaller northern half free counts double souls. Relation will on duration otherwise comes more people now head Simpang Olim controlled floods Djamboe Aje drainage promoted.
Hill region 100-300m extent toward Rödjö Boekit planting pepper though not much that Lho Soekon pepper land like Idi or Peureula or Groot-Atjeh. 1921 Lho Soekon 1383 picol exported but hill region marked Atjeh military annals where about 15 years ago resistance flared difficult reach because withdrew from Paja Tjitjem to hills then Christoffel bivouac Panton Labeuë subdued.
Memories suffered sorrow still fresh spiritual parasites misuse doctrine holy war keep moods bitter vigilance double necessary not conspicuous presence bestuursambtenaren with Atjeh experience language highly valued.
At Blang Djeroëën lives oelèëbalang Teukoe Tjhi Bentara.
In fairly favorable region like this known as someone who much rice eats as little other food. Lush area e.g., kampong Moeliën irrigation blessing between big kampongs beautiful blangs wide view cultivable plain mountain background big birds reigers cheerful outdoor life happy place peaceful farmer spared war kampongs many good houses ornament large bamboo wealth.
See Also
- Acheh
- Indra Siluka
- Raijah piracy (20 July 1893)
- Raijah (steamer)
- Telok Semawé
- Pedir
- 20 July
- 1893
- T. Tjhi’ Toenòng
- Tjoet Meutia
- Pang Nanggròë
- T. Radja Sabi
- T. Tjhi’ Béntara
- Tgk. Sjeh di Paja Bakong
- Tgk. di Barat
- Pasè
- Lho’ Soekon
- The resistance in Atjeh 1908–1912
- Noordkust van Atjeh
- Lho Soekon
- Teukoe Tjhi Bentara
- Paja Tjitjem
- Christoffel
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. Schetsen uit den strijd op Groot-Atjeh, met speciaal vervaardigde kaart en toepasselijke photo’s, bewerkt door P. H. R. Beuming, oud-onderofficier van het Ned.-Indische Leger (Amsterdam, December 1911; uitgegeven ten bate van het te stichten Herstellingsoord voor Rijks-Ambtenaren). Koninklijk Instituut voor de Tropen, Br N 82-144 Acknowledgement of sources. The material in this article derives from Schetsen uit den strijd op Groot-Atjeh, met speciaal vervaardigde kaart en toepasselijke photo’s, bewerkt door P. H. R. Beuming, oud-onderofficier van het Ned.-Indische Leger (Amsterdam, December 1911). Dutch passages are quoted in the original with an English rendering. 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 X, pp. 94–95; Chapter XI, pp. 103–106. Atjeh als land voor handel en bedrijf, by Dr. R. Broersma, Gebrs. Cohen, Utrecht, 1925, pp. 47-51.