Lam Alieng is a gampong (village) of the XXII Mukims in the highlands of Great Acheh. It is mentioned in The Achehnese as a striking example of the deep penetration of South-Indian (Kling) settlers into the agrarian economy of the interior, and of the rapidity with which such foreign elements could be assimilated to Achehnese language and custom.
A Kling Village
Snouck Hurgronje observes that within living memory there had been a large number of Klings (Tamil-speaking South Indians, called in Achehnese ureueng dagang — “strangers” — or simply kling) in the highlands of Great Acheh, living entirely as Achehnese and engaged in agriculture. The settlement at Lam Alieng was the most remarkable case: its entire population at one time consisted of “hybrid Klings” — that is, persons of mixed Indo-Achehnese descent who had been absorbed into the rural population of the sagi of the XXII Mukims and had taken to wet-rice cultivation in the same manner as their neighbours.
The case is of ethnographic interest because it contradicts the more familiar picture of the Kling as a trader or money-changer confined to the commercial quarters of the capital. In Banda Acheh the Kling was typically a town-dweller; in Lam Alieng he was a highland agriculturist, indistinguishable in dress, speech and mode of life from the indigenous ureueng tunong (people of the interior).
The Kling Presence in Acheh
The absorption of Klings at Lam Alieng formed part of a wider pattern. Snouck Hurgronje emphasises that the Klings of Great Acheh and of the East Coast had brought more half-caste progeny into the world than “now commands recognition as such.” The use of the unqualified word ureuengdagang = “stranger” to denote a Kling in Great Acheh itself testifies to the numerical and economic weight of the community. Together with the Arabs, Egyptians and Javanese settled in the country, the Klings were regarded as having contributed a “merely” supplementary share to the racial and cultural composition of Acheh — but at Lam Alieng that contribution had been total.
See Also
Source
The Achehnese, Vol. I, by Dr. C. Snouck Hurgronje, translated by A.W.S. O’Sullivan, indexed by R.J. Wilkinson. Leyden: E.J. Brill, 1906.