The Straits Settlements were the British colonial possession comprising Penang, Malacca and Singapore, and the principal British base in the Malay world at the time of the writing of The Achehnese. The translator of Vol. I, A. W. S. O’Sullivan, was Assistant Colonial Secretary of the Straits Settlements, and it was he who, in the early months of 1899, informed Snouck Hurgronje of his project of translating the book. The translator and the author were at that time separated — “one in the Straits Settlements, the other in Netherlands India” — and both, wrapped up in official duties, found it as much as they could do to get through their self-appointed task.
”Kompäni” and the British Government
The Straits Settlements is one of the countries in which the name Kompäni (“Company”) has survived the decease of the East India Company and is still universally used to denote the British Government. The appellation is taken from the English East India Company, just as the Achehnese Kumpāni is taken from the Dutch East India Company; in both cases the name has “taken such root in the native mind that it is still used to designate the Government even after the ‘Company’ proper has ceased to exist.” The parallel is noted by the translator in one of his footnotes, where he observes that “similarly in the Straits Settlements ‘Kompāni’ (= the East India Company) has survived the decease of that trading association and is still universally used to denote the British Government.”
Chinese female slaves
Some few persons of position in Acheh, Snouck Hurgronje observes, had permitted themselves the luxury of importing Chinese female slaves from the Straits Settlements as concubines. This traffic is mentioned as one of the rarer forms of slave-acquisition in Acheh, alongside the more common practice of bringing slaves home from the East Coast dependencies. The comparative wealth of the Straits Settlements — and especially of Singapore — as a commercial centre made such importations possible, though they were always exceptional.
Ruya, calendars and measures
The ruya doctrine — the principle that the beginning of each Mohammedan month should be fixed by observation of the new moon — was, at the date of Snouck’s writing, “universally adopted among the Malays of the Straits Settlements,” whereas in Acheh the method of calculation had been followed from the earliest times. The eight-year cycle of the Achehnese calendar, Snouck notes, corresponds in some respects with the Javanese calendar described by Dr. A. B. Cohen Stuart in the Government Almanac for 1868; the year-letters used by the Achehnese correspond with those found in some Arabic handbooks, which Newbold cursorily refers to as in use among the Malays of the British Settlements in the Straits of Malacca. The common Malay measures used in the Straits Settlements are the chupak (4 of which = 1 gantang, about 1¼ gallons); 16 gantang = 1 naleh; 10 nalehs = 1 kuncha; 5 kunchas = 1 koyan. The same system of measures is employed, with local variations, throughout the Peninsula and the Archipelago.
Penang and Province Wellesley
The English Government in Penang and Province Wellesley has adopted the word mukim — the Achehnese and Malay word for a minor subdivision of a district, corresponding almost exactly to the English “parish” — to designate the minor subdivisions of a district for administrative purposes. Among the Malays of Penang and Province Wellesley, the Mandi Safar or “bathing of Safar” is one of the most popular of festivals, and its method of observance is “almost identical” with that of the Achehnese. Penang Mohammedans have a superstition that articles of value vowed to the saint of Nagore, if thrown into the sea at Penang, will be washed up in a few months’ time close to the shrine at Nagore.
See Also
- Penang
- Malacca
- Singapore
- Malay Peninsula
- A. S. O’Sullivan
- C. Snouck Hurgronje
- Dr. A. B. Cohen Stuart
- T. J. Newbold
- British India
Account from Land en Volk van Atjeh Vroeger en Nu
British colonies (incl. Penang, SingaporeBritish colony; its Governor repeatedly warned of the danger to persons and goods in Acehnese waters.
Source: J. Jongejans, Land en Volk van Atjeh Vroeger en Nu (Baarn: Hollandia Drukkerij N.V., c. 1938), pp. 393.
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.
Land en Volk van Atjeh Vroeger en Nu, by J. Jongejans, Oud-Resident van het Gewest Atjeh en Onderhoorigheden, with a foreword by Dr. H. Colijn (Baarn: Hollandia Drukkerij N.V., c. 1938), pp. 393.