WHILE many believe some ruined forts in Kedah belonged to Raja Bersiong, and that an altar at Sungai Batu Pahat in Merbok was where his victims were killed, there is no archaeological evidence for any of it.
The Bujang Valley, a sprawling 224sq km area stretching from Merbok to Sungai Muda, is filled with hundreds of Hindu and Buddhist candi (temples), signifying a vibrant entrepot spanning more than a millennium between the third and 14th centuries before the Malaccan Sultanate emerged.
Merchants from China, India and Arabia traded ceramics, glass beads, spices, and aromatic woods for the locals’ repair services and forest products.
These temples are built using imported materials and technology -- terracotta, laterite and granite bricks cemented together using a mixture of eggs and honey (though the merchants soon found more cost-effective material in sugarcane molasses instead).
The area forms a historical complex at the Lembah Bujang Archeological Museum. These candis were unearthed from various areas in the Merbok area and reconstructed at the museum.
One archaeologist, who wishes to remain anonymous, suggests that Hikayat Merong Mahawangsa was contemporaneous with that period in Lembah Bujang, but archaeology has not so far corroborated the stories in that document.
He says the locals were experts in timber structures, which would not stand the test of time as long as the terracotta, granite, and laterite temples of Lembah Bujang.
"It is difficult to prove the existence of the kings mentioned in Hikayat Merong Mahawangsa based on Lembah Bujang archeological find," he said.
The lack of written evidence also suggests that Lembah Bujang was not so much a city as an international trading hub.
Kedah and Perlis National Archive director Shafie Awang says there was no known correspondence between the ancient Kedah kingdom with others before the 17th century.
“Papers, unless kept in a controlled humidity and temperature, naturally decay,” he said.
At present, the oldest documents archived in Malaysia are letters by Sultan Abdul Hamid from 1882 to 1943, recognised by Unesco on its Memory of World Register.
“We are continuously looking for ancient documents on ancient Kedah history,” Shafie said.
The historians have made a firm stand that Raja Besiong is but a character from an epic and a story adored by romantics, but many Kedahans believed the king’s blood runs in its people.
At her food stall tucked away in a village between Bukit Selambau and Jeniang, Mak Chu (not her real name) wipes her hands on her apron and bends down behind her counter to extract out a tightly rolled piece of paper.
It is a genealogy chart filling the breadth of ten sheets of A4 paper taped together.
“I am the seventh generation of Raja Bersiong,” said Mak Chu proudly.
Raja Besiong had at least two wives, she explains: a Malay and a Pattani. Mak Chu’s father was descended from the Malay lineage, and had travelled to Pattani as a trader.
There he had married another descendant of Raja Bersiong, of the Pattani lineage. Years later, they moved back to Kedah and raised the Fanged King’s seventh generation.
When war broke out between Kedah and Siam in 1821, the princes of various lineages fought over the throne. Those not favoured were hunted down, and their families retreated deep into the hinterlnd of Kedah, discarding their titles to live as commoners.
Mak Chu said they still feared repercussions if the truth be told. “It is not true that Raja Bersiong is a myth,” she said. “He was once the ruler of Kedah.”
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This is the final of a four-part series.
NST pictures by Syaharim Abidin and Shahrizal Md Noor
Showing posts with label Siti Hawa Salleh. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Siti Hawa Salleh. Show all posts
Friday, June 25, 2010
Thursday, June 24, 2010
The Fanged King: Part 3
HIKAYAT Merong Mahawangsa, a historical epic of the Kedah rulers commissioned during the reign of Sultan Rijaluddin Muhammad Shah (1625-1651), has a chapter on Raja Besiong.
According to the epic, Merong Mahawangsa, the first ruler of Kedah, sent his four children to open new kingdoms. The eldest was crowned Raja Siam; the second prince shot a silver arrow and became Raja Perak; the third, a princess, became Raja Pattani; the youngest, Raja Seri Inderawangsa, lived with Merong Mahawangsa in Kedah.
When Raja Seri Inderawangsa ascended the throne he married a “gergasi” or “ogre” princess, against his father’s wishes. The Kedah History Association’s Datuk Dr Wan Shamsuddin Yusof speculates that she might have been an aboriginal woman.
They bore a son, Raja Ong Maha Perita Deria, who is named in the epic as “Raja Besiong” (translated from Jawi script without the “r”). “The book described him from young as ‘kahar’ (a rogue) and he never outgrew that even when he became the ruler and took a Malay wife,” Wan Shamsuddin said.
“When he was asked to quit killing people for their blood, he shrugged them off saying that the spinach broth was simply too delicious to quit.”
The Al-Tarikh Salasilah Negeri Kedah by Muhammad Hassan bin Dato' Kerani Muhammad Arshad, published in 1927, is more “historical” than the magical realism of Hikayat Merong Mahawangsa (which, in Chapter Two, describes Raja Kampar transforming himself into a tusked wild boar, a venomous black cobra, and a ferocious tiger).
The Salasilah names the first ruler of Kedah as Maharaja Durbar Raja I, but concerns itself with nothing earlier than the ninth ruler, Maharaja Durbar Raja II, who embraced Islam and called himself Sultan Muzaffar Shah I (1136-1179).
Philologist Datuk Dr Professor Siti Hawa Salleh, who has done a comparative study on Kedah history and Hikayat Merong Mahawangsa, said it was almost impossible to prove or disprove the existence of Raja Besiong.
“Can anyone prove Raja Besiong did not exist? On the other hand, can anyone prove he existed? I doubt it.”
Although Hikayat Merong Mahawangsa was written in an epic style and filled with romance, magic and adventure, the writing is based on ancient Kedah history as far back as the second century.
“There are many things that we do not know about the Kedah ancient history,” Siti Hawa said. “Even the al-Tarikh cannot date the first Kedah king.”
Siti Hawa said much remained unknown of ancient Kedah history, especially on the lifestyle and culture of the people. “Perhaps the killings were influenced by an ancient sect where human sacrifice was an important holy ritual.”
Such rituals, she explained, are described in an old text, Maha Sutasoma. A young person would be sacrificed on an altar. A monk would stab the heart with a dagger, and the blood was collected and drunk. The heart was cut out and eaten by the person who wished to be purified.
Hikayat Merong Mahawangsa, although an important text, is not readily available in bookstores. The copies available at Yayasan Karyawan are leather-bound collectors’ editions.
The Kedah Public Library Council has a collection of rare editions of Hikayat Merong Mahawangsa by Pustaka Antara 1965 with a preface by Arenawati. There is also the University Malaysa Press 1968 edition compiled by Siti Hawa Salleh, and a 1898 stone imprint photocopy of R.J. Wilkinson’s compilation of the handwritten Jawi by Muhammad Yusuf Nasru’l-din.
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This is the third of a four-part series. Watch out for Part Four tomorrow.
NST pictures by Syaharim Abidin and Shahrizal Md Noor
According to the epic, Merong Mahawangsa, the first ruler of Kedah, sent his four children to open new kingdoms. The eldest was crowned Raja Siam; the second prince shot a silver arrow and became Raja Perak; the third, a princess, became Raja Pattani; the youngest, Raja Seri Inderawangsa, lived with Merong Mahawangsa in Kedah.
When Raja Seri Inderawangsa ascended the throne he married a “gergasi” or “ogre” princess, against his father’s wishes. The Kedah History Association’s Datuk Dr Wan Shamsuddin Yusof speculates that she might have been an aboriginal woman.
They bore a son, Raja Ong Maha Perita Deria, who is named in the epic as “Raja Besiong” (translated from Jawi script without the “r”). “The book described him from young as ‘kahar’ (a rogue) and he never outgrew that even when he became the ruler and took a Malay wife,” Wan Shamsuddin said.
“When he was asked to quit killing people for their blood, he shrugged them off saying that the spinach broth was simply too delicious to quit.”
The Al-Tarikh Salasilah Negeri Kedah by Muhammad Hassan bin Dato' Kerani Muhammad Arshad, published in 1927, is more “historical” than the magical realism of Hikayat Merong Mahawangsa (which, in Chapter Two, describes Raja Kampar transforming himself into a tusked wild boar, a venomous black cobra, and a ferocious tiger).
The Salasilah names the first ruler of Kedah as Maharaja Durbar Raja I, but concerns itself with nothing earlier than the ninth ruler, Maharaja Durbar Raja II, who embraced Islam and called himself Sultan Muzaffar Shah I (1136-1179).
Philologist Datuk Dr Professor Siti Hawa Salleh, who has done a comparative study on Kedah history and Hikayat Merong Mahawangsa, said it was almost impossible to prove or disprove the existence of Raja Besiong.
“Can anyone prove Raja Besiong did not exist? On the other hand, can anyone prove he existed? I doubt it.”
Although Hikayat Merong Mahawangsa was written in an epic style and filled with romance, magic and adventure, the writing is based on ancient Kedah history as far back as the second century.
“There are many things that we do not know about the Kedah ancient history,” Siti Hawa said. “Even the al-Tarikh cannot date the first Kedah king.”
Siti Hawa said much remained unknown of ancient Kedah history, especially on the lifestyle and culture of the people. “Perhaps the killings were influenced by an ancient sect where human sacrifice was an important holy ritual.”
Such rituals, she explained, are described in an old text, Maha Sutasoma. A young person would be sacrificed on an altar. A monk would stab the heart with a dagger, and the blood was collected and drunk. The heart was cut out and eaten by the person who wished to be purified.
Hikayat Merong Mahawangsa, although an important text, is not readily available in bookstores. The copies available at Yayasan Karyawan are leather-bound collectors’ editions.
The Kedah Public Library Council has a collection of rare editions of Hikayat Merong Mahawangsa by Pustaka Antara 1965 with a preface by Arenawati. There is also the University Malaysa Press 1968 edition compiled by Siti Hawa Salleh, and a 1898 stone imprint photocopy of R.J. Wilkinson’s compilation of the handwritten Jawi by Muhammad Yusuf Nasru’l-din.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
This is the third of a four-part series. Watch out for Part Four tomorrow.
NST pictures by Syaharim Abidin and Shahrizal Md Noor
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