Anthony Richards and the search for Lawai: myths, maps and history.

Introduction

I noticed that the bibliography appended to the end of the late Anthony Richards memorial (Borneo Research Bulletin 33:25-26) omitted his short paper "Lawai," published in the Brunei Museum Journal in 1978. (1) Written in an idiosyncratic style, the paper considered the various options for the location in what is now West Kalimantan of the important trading polity that vanished from the historical record during the sixteenth century. It helped launch me into my own first foray into the history of the region (Smith 2000), though it started where I ended: with Iban poetry that mentions Lawai. (2) Rereading Richards' account led to my search for more information and to this Research Note. As well as summarizing Richards' ideas about the location of Lawai in relation to other opinions, the present paper introduces new threads into the skein of mythical and historical evidence from local, Chinese and Dutch sources. It also illustrates the need for more research into Dayak mythology in West Kalimantan, and into the history of the Malay states (3) that were established there.

Lawai and the Kapuas

One of the chants sung by Saribas Iban bards during the festival night of Gawai Burong includes a repeated couplet: "Kati nuan aki bisi nampai igi ranyai/Baka indu Lawai ke bejalai milang lawang?" (Sandin 1977:79-91). The couplet is translated as "Have you, grandfather, seen the seed of the ranyai palm/Like a Malay woman counting the number of doors?" The context is journeys by the sons-in-law of Singalang Burong to seek human heads, for which the seed is a metaphor. The next repeated couplet refers to "indu Oya," who grates flour from a sago palm. She can be associated with River Oya and the Melanau people in Sarawak. Richards was interested in the uncertain location of Lawai, which is mentioned elsewhere in Iban poetry, associated with Malays. A more common Iban term for Malays is Laut, but according to Richards, the two terms are sometimes combined, i.e. Laut Lawai: 'Malays of Lawai.' (4) Richards suggested that Iban migrations in Borneo probably started during the sixteenth century as a result of the spread of Islam that had become established in coastal West Borneo. Relying on Iban traditional accounts, he believed that the original Iban homeland in Borneo was in the southwest, in the upper reaches of the Pawan, and that subsequent migrations were by way of the rivers Pinoh and Melawi, and across the Kapuas northwards into Sarawak. Some traditional accounts give mythical Iban origins as lying outside Borneo, (5) and then describe migrations within Borneo that mostly start in the Kapuas Basin or nearby areas (Sandin 1967:2-4; see also Sandin 1994:32, 79). At what stage myth turns into history even within Borneo is, of course, uncertain. Richards' belief about the Iban homeland in Borneo tallies with one story about a group who moved from Ketapang upriver to Kayong, (6) where they split into two, following conversion of some to Islam under the influence of visiting Arab traders. This group stayed at Kayong, while the other group started a series of migrations, first to Ulu Landak, and then to Melawi, Sintang, Sekayam, Sanggau and Semitau, before eventually moving to Sarawak (Sandin 1994:90-92). According to the same story, their relations and friends who had adopted Islam began to call themselves the Malays of Pontianak, Sampit, Kayong, Sukadana, and Sambas. There is some geographic uncertainty in this story, not least the fact that the Kayong River is far enough beyond Ketapang to not be easily accessible to foreign traders--an issue that reappears later. Nevertheless, the account gives a suggestion of likely Iban movements in this region that obviously influenced Richards in his search for Lawai.

Richards--like others before him--assessed several possible locations for Lawai in West Kalimantan, first taking into account similarities of pronunciation. He suggested that Lawai (lawe in Javanese) might refer to: a) thread, b) a curving feather or fin or a crescent shape, or c) Terminalia trees, but these possibilities seemed unhelpful. (7) Richards moved on to European maps, pointing out that "Lawai" (spelled in various ways, e.g., "Laue," "Lave" or "Lava") appears on maps from the mid-sixteenth century to the mid-eighteenth century. It was located in the sixteenth-century Portuguese maps on a broad estuary that represented the Kapuas. Lawai is also named in early Portuguese accounts of trading centers in Borneo, such as the translation by Cortesao (1944) of the account by Tome Pires in 1521. Nicholl (1990) gives some other examples. Lawai was usually named in conjunction with Tanjungpura, which also vanished from the records at about the same time (Smith 2000). Broek (1962) discussed much of the evidence from these Portuguese and Dutch sources and supported the general belief by Dutch historians that the trading port of Lawai was indeed located in or near the Kapuas delta. The favored location was on the Labai (or Labei), an eastern tributary of the Mendawak, which is a southern channel in the delta. The Labai was the boundary between administrative areas of Meliau and Simpang in early Dutch colonial times. An even smaller tributary, the Lawei (sic) is shown just south of the Labei (sic), on a map by Melvill van Carnbee and Versteeg in their atlas of the Dutch East Indies (1853-1862). The Lawei does not appear on the large-scale maps of the region that first appeared in the late nineteenth century. (8)

Richards doubted that Lawai was in the Kapuas delta, "or there alone." He used a statement by Tome Pires (as translated by Cortesao 1944:224) that Lawai was "four days' journey beyond" Tanjungpura to suggest a site on the River Laur (Dutch: "Laoer"). This is a south-flowing tributary of the Pawan that enters north of the Kayong. He thought that Lawai "may now be represented by Muara Kayong" (Richards 1978:8). This conclusion tallies well with his preferred Iban homeland. Richards accepted the view of Dutch historians that Tanjungpura was located on the Pawan, probably at the site of a village called Tanjung Pura downriver from Muara Kayong that first appeared (again with variations in spelling) on nineteenth-century Dutch maps; hence Lawai had to be further up the Pawan. In the nineteenth century Muara Kayong and then Tanjung Pura were homes of the peripatetic heirs of the disestablished sultanate of Sukadana, who then became established as the Sultans of Matan and Tanjung Pura (Barth 1896, see also Smith 2000). Brock (1962) suggested that the nineteenth-century Tanjung Pura could not have been the earlier trading center on the grounds that the village would have been very difficult of access to the large sea-going trading vessels of the time. The people of Tanjungpura and Lawai themselves had "junks" ("Juncos" in Portuguese), which sailed to Malacca and Java (Cortesao 1944:224-25). This issue of remoteness from the sea applies even more strongly to the Kayong and Laur Rivers, much further upstream. To get round the difficulty, Brock suggested that Sukadana was the later name for the port of Tanjungpura. However, this would place Lawai and Tanjungpura very close together as separate trading centers and does not fit well with the Portuguese maps. There is no doubt that Tanjungpura is nowadays often regarded as the forerunner of Sukadana, but my own opinion is that it was in southern Borneo in the Barito Basin, and that Banjarmasin is its successor (Smith 2000). This opinion relies heavily on the maps and the conclusions of Ras (1968) from the Hikajat Banjar (the dynastic history of Banjarmasin and Kotawaringin). The complication of Lawai being "beyond" Tanjungpura disappears if the statement is made from the point of view of trading partners from Java rather than from Malacca, but this is not really germane to the present discussion.

Richards did not pay attention to some intriguing cartographic evidence for the location of Lawai. This was the visit by "Dom Manuel de Lima," a name written on many sixteenth-century Portuguese maps and some early seventeenth-century Dutch ones alongside a river "Laue" that is clearly the Kapuas (for illustrations see Broek 1962, Nicholl 1967, Thomaz 1995, and especially Suarez 1999). Unfortunately, this expedition was nowhere mentioned in the contemporary Portuguese written accounts or in the histories that followed. Dom Manuel was a prominent Portuguese naval commander of the mid-sixteenth century and was involved in several Portuguese expeditions and conquests in India and neighboring regions (see Smith 2000, 2001). Richards (1978) also did not use Chinese sources from the thirteenth century to the late sixteenth century that refer to Lawai. The same issue of the Brunei Museum Journal included a paper that translated part of a list of countries and their dependencies in the Chinese Nanhai Zhi, written at the very beginning of the fourteenth century (Brown 1978). (9) After "Dunyang Foni" (identifiable as Brunei) appears the country of "Danzhongbuluo" (Tanjungpura), with its dependency "Luowei" or (in Cantonese) "Loh-wai"; i.e. Lawai. Most of the other 24 dependencies of Tanjungura are identifiable with varying degrees of confidence from present-day names of locations in Borneo or nearby. However, the precise location of the trading port of Lawai cannot be deduced from that source or from the mid-fourteenth century Javanese Nagarakertagama that also mentions Lawai and Tanjungpura (for discussion, see Smith 2000). Nevertheless, the location of the port of Lawai at some place on or near the Kapuas that was accessible by large vessels and by Dom Manuel is confirmed by another Chinese account. This is the Shun Feng Xiang Song, which contains material possibly dating from the fifteenth century but also including late sixteenth-century and even early seventeenth-century additions (Mills 1979, also comments in his unpublished letters deposited in the Needham Research Institute, Cambridge). (10) It gives sailing instructions for voyages from China to trading ports in Borneo, one of which is "Luowei" ("Lao-wei" according to Mills), on a river of that name. The sailing directions make clear that the Chinese vessels entered one of the mouths of the Kapuas and then went upriver on a southeasterly course (157 1/2 degrees). Mills (1979) identified the river entrance as the Kapuas Kecil, but a more southerly channel cannot be ruled out, given uncertain knowledge of river depths at the time. (11) The upriver direction tallies quite well with the location of the Labai. The original account does not give more information that would be definitive: e.g., traveling times or changes of direction, as were given for the sea-routes. (12) Yuan Bingling (2000:69) has pointed out that the Dayaks of West Borneo are traditionally called by the Chinese there "Lo-a-kia" (Mandarin: Laoazi), and that characters for lao (as in Lawei) are used in Chinese versions of many local place-names, including Landak and Monterado. (13)

The Shun Feng Xiang Song gives another route to West Borneo via the Karimata islands that ended at "Zhugedanlan" (Wade-Giles: "Chu-ko-tan-lan"), convincingly identified by Mills (1979) as Sukadana. This record, at least, must surely be from the late sixteenth century or early seventeenth century. Strong evidence of a close geographical and historical relationship between Lawai and Sukadana comes from a much later source, Enthoven's massive account of the geography of West Borneo (1903). This was not considered by Richards (1978) or Smith (2000). Enthoven gave much historical information gained mainly from the local ruling families in the major settlements along the Kapuas, obtained in large measure during topographical surveys which he led from 1889 to 1895. These rulers were at least nominally Muslim, and their genealogies combined mythological and historical elements. Common themes that illustrated (or were designed to illustrate) longstanding legitimacy included ancient links with Majapahit in Java, and intermarriages with Dayak aristocracy. Thus, Malay (or Javanese) colonists were said to have gone from "Labai Lawai" (Soekadana) to Sepauk, on the Kapuas between Sanggau and Sintang (Enthoven 1903:672-73). One of the social classes of Malays in Sanggau was the orang Sanggau Lawai, direct descendants--according to local tradition--of the ruling family that originated from Sukadana and had links with Majapahit in Java (Enthoven 1903:702-3, 718-22). Travelers from "Labai Lawai," again equated with Sukadana by the Dutch, were involved in the foundation of Selimbau and Pijasa, much further up the Kapuas (Enthoven 1903:136, 158).

The Dayak element in the story of Sanggau is that the Muslim polity started with the marriage of Babai Cinga (Enthoven: "Babai Tjinga"), chief of a Dayak tribe on the Sekayam River, to Dara Nanti, granddaughter of Brawidjaja of Sukadana (Enthoven 1903:702-3). According to a Dayak version of the legend published recently on the Internet (Kusasi 2004), Babai Cinga suffered from a serious skin disease from which he had to be cured before he became leader of the village of Tampun Juah, close to the Entabai River. He urinated on a cucumber and threw it into the river, and it floated down to the mouth of the Sekayam. There it was retrieved by Dara Nanti, who showed it to her father, King of Labai Lawai, which lay down the Sekayam River on the coast of West Borneo (Kerajaan Labai Lawai terletak di hilir sungai Sekayam di pantal barat Borneo; Kusasi 2004:6). According to this account, Labai Lawai was part of the kingdom of Srivijaya in Sumatra. Dara Nanti's father told her that before she ate the cucumber it had to be clean. Having assured him that it was, she ate it, whereupon she became pregnant and gave birth to a son. After five years Dara Nanti and her son went on a search for the father. She found her way to Tampun Juah and Babai Cinga was identified as the father. Dara Nanti asked Babai Cinga to marry her. He agreed but, embarrassed by his skin disease, swam behind the boat to Labai Lawai, whereupon the "seluang" fish ate the scabs and pus, and his skin was healed. The moral of the story as published has a modern ring: even though the Dayak lived in the middle of a forest, they communicated with others who lived downriver or on the coast: they were not isolated from global civilization (Mereka tidak terisolasi dengan kebudayaan global: Kusasi 2004:12).

This legend resembles other origin myths of states on the Kapuas. One is that of Silat, upriver from Sintang, as recorded by the Dutch in the late nineteenth century (Anonymous 1952:70). (14) In this version "Babai Bentjingah" was descended from a Majapahit princess and the Dayak Demung Nutup. Again, he was afflicted by a terrible skin disease. He met and bathed with Princess Puteri Djungdjung Buih and again a fish cleaned him and he was cured. Their descendants established Silat and Sintang. This princess appears in several other Malay origin myths (see Ras 1968, passim). The versions summarized above bear similarities to the traditional story of Sukadana itself, in which the Majapahit prince Brawidjadja, himself suffering from a skin disease, was cured in the Pawan River by small fish and then met and married Puteri Lindung Buih, who had emerged from a large aquatic flower. He settled near Kayong and then Sukadana, and his descendants established states up the Kapuas (Veth 1854-1856, Vol. 1:186-89).

There is another story related to Labai Lawai in the Dayak oral traditions concerning Sanggau, Sintang and Kapuas Hulu (John Bamba, personal communication). According to this story, when ancestral Dayaks were living in Tampun Juah they used to fight with a ghost that finally won the battle and turned the Dayak food into excrement. The Dayaks therefore moved from Tampun Juah, but went in different directions, which explains why they now have different languages. This closely resembles part of an Iban myth recounted by Sandin (1994:79). According to John Bamba's version, one group moved down the Sekayam River and reached the Kapuas. They then moved further down the Kapuas to a place they called Labai Land, downstream from Tayan. As the name of the group's leader was Lawai, they called their new village Labai Lawai. After they had been settled there for some time, the Tanjungpura kingdom that then ruled Sukadana expanded its territory to Tayan, so Labai Lawai came under the rule of Tayan. Later, the Dayaks heard that the Dutch East Indies Company (VOC) planned to attack Tayan because it refused to pay tribute. They fled upriver and eventually split into Sekadau, Ketungau, Kerabat, Benawas River Dayaks, etc. (15) The introduction of the Dutch into this story complicates the historical element, because Lawai was clearly established much earlier than the arrival of the VOC in Borneo.

A possible complication in the naming ofLabai Lawai is that "Labai" (or very similar words) has Muslim associations (Richards 1978). One example in a Dutch report from southern Borneo refers to conversion of disgruntled Dayaks to labei (Anonymous 1926:468). (16) Likewise in West Kalimantan lebai for the Malay means someone of religious qualification ("penghulu": John Bamba, personal communication). There is a Dayak story of Lebai Malang ('The Unfortunate Lebai') which is quite well-known, as it is taught in school, etc. (John Bamba, personal communication, again almost verbatim). However, this usage does not seem to be associated with Labai Lawai.

Whether the origin of the name Labai Lawai is a riverine association or otherwise does not affect the conclusion that Richards' preference for a location on the Laur as the center of Lawai must surely be wrong. The myths of origin, though varying in detail, demonstrate continuity with known history, i.e. identification of Lawai Labai as a polity in the lower Kapuas that can be linked with the later sultanate of Sukadana. Nevertheless, he had picked on an interesting area, as the Laur forms part of a network of ancient river routes and tracks that connect Sukadana and Simpang with Tayan, Meliau, Sanggau and Sekadau to the north, and Ketapang to the south (Wadley and Smith 2001).

Lawai and the Pinoh Lands

The objection of remoteness from the sea apparently also applies to Richards' second preference for the location of a town of Lawai near Nanga Pinoh on the River Melawi, or where that river joins the Kapuas at Sintang. However, as he suggested, there has certainly been more than one place in West Borneo called "Lawai." Richards paid particular attention to a map by J. van Braam and G. onder de Linden that was included in one of the volumes written by F. Valentijn (1724-1726) that describe the East Indies. It shows a large inland state ("t'Ryk van Lava") with the town "Lava" located north of the equator, on a river "Lava" that flows into the "Lauwe." The whole river system represents a misshapen Kapuas system. The map was also reproduced, along with a translation of the chapters by Valentijn that describe Borneo by Dovey (1978), in the same issue of the Brunei Museum Journal that includes Richards' paper. The map closely reflects Valentijn's text. He mentioned "Lava" as one of the inland states near Sukadana (see Dovey 1978). Valentijn obtained much of this information from a book of travels by J. Jansz de Roy (1706), who was shipwrecked off southern Borneo, spent time in Banjarmasin followed by brief visits to Kotawaringin and Sukadana, and left on an English ship. The book by de Roy also has a map by Pieter van der Aa that shows the "Lavaem Reg," this time south of the equator but without the river or town. Instead, it places the town "Lave" quite near the coast of southwest Borneo, on a short river of that name, with "varsche rivier" written alongside. The map by van Braam and onder den Linden merely calls it "Versche Riv," (17) and the most likely candidate is the Jelai ("Djelai" to the Dutch). Richards argued that these maps were consistent with a location for his inland Lawai on the Laur, given the uncertainties about inland locations at the time. They are equally consistent with a state centered in the Melawi area.

Richards bolstered his argument with a reference to the cession in 1816 to the Dutch by the Sultan of Banjarmasin of "all the Dyak provinces, the district of Mendawei, Sampit, and Kotawaringin with all their dependencies together with Sintang, Lawai, and Djelai," etc. (Irwin 1955:44). (18) Banjarmasin's historic claims to Lawai and other areas in southern Kalimantan are set out in the Hikajat Banjar, which can be dated to the beginning of the nineteenth century at the latest (Ras 1968). This work records times when--according to the author(s)--the rulers of states that include Sukadana, Sambas, Lawai (or "Batang Lawai"), Kotawaringin and elsewhere paid allegiance to "Nagara-Dipa," forerunner of Banjarmasin (Ras 1968:326-27) and later to Banjarmasin itself (Ras 1968:430-31, 440-41). If this history is at all reliable, the later of these episodes can be dated to the sixteenth century by the mention of conversion of the Banjar court to Islam, usually placed in the middle of that century. However, they are complicated by mention of Sukadana, which is not recorded as a powerful state until the end of the sixteenth century (see Smith 2000). Neither the Hikajat Banjar nor the list in the treaty cited by Irwin (1955) aid in pinpointing Lawai. Richards suggested that the order in the list could place Lawai between Sintang and the Jelai River. This too would "put Lawai where the Laner, Muara Kayong and the Pawan are; that is, in the district now called Matan." The same reasoning would, of course, apply to the Melawi area.

Nineteenth-century writings by officials of the Dutch colonial government in Batavia make clear the location of this inland Lawai. It was the name for what became called the "Pinoh lands," south of the Melawi, later to become a distinct administrative area under the Dutch. (19) A summary of unpublished reports in the 1850s by von Gaffron, who traveled extensively in southern Borneo, mentions campaigns between Kotawaringin and Matan (the residue of the sultanate of Sukadana) and "Lawai or Pinoh" (Pijnappel 1860:280, for translation, see Ras 1968:620). (20) These campaigns were part of wider disputes between Kotawaringin and Banjarmasin over frontier areas, including Jelai. Barth (1896:45) quotes an extract from the treaty that defined the border between the southern part of Matan and "Laway." Enthoven (1903) again gives much relevant information. He said that all the inhabitants of the Pinoh territory were called "Orang Lawai" after a stream (beekje) of that name in the upper reaches of the Pinoh River, south of Nanga Pinoh. According to tradition, old "Madoeng" (Madung) was established at the mouth of the Lawai in the seventeenth century (Enthoven 1903:381). Enthoven's account summarizes much information provided by Barth, who travelled into the far reaches of the Pinoh lands in 1894 to settle border issues, and Barth mentions the earlier reports by von Gaffron. Barth said that Madung was in decline, and that one of its two Malay princes spent much time hunting rhinoceroses, and gaining income from his trophies, presumably rhinoceros horn (Barth 1897:603). Among the royal regalia of Madung was a small bronze measure "Gantang Lawai," used when Madung had levied taxes from Dayaks; otherwise Barth (1897) did not mention Lawai. Madung is quite close to the Schwaner watershed and tributaries of rivers that flow into the sea west of Banjarmasin, and hence is accessible from Kotawaringin and Banjarmasin. According to Barth (1897:626-28) the Malay inhabitants of the Pinoh lands originated as settlers from Sintang and Kotawaringin who married Dayak women. The Pinoh Dayak communities fell into two groups, the free (Mardaheka) Dayaks who had links with Sintang, and those Serah Dayaks who owed allegiance to Kotawaringin. As the influence of the latter polity in the Pinoh lands declined, that of Sintang grew, but the local rulers, at least nominally Muslim, enjoyed a good deal of independence before the Dutch took control at the end of the nineteenth century.

In addition to the possible Dayak-Malay associations with the origins of Sintang that were recorded in the nineteenth century (e.g., by Enthoven 1903, passim), Sellato (1986:55) noted that the Melahui Dayaks, located in Nanga Serawai District southeast of Sintang, have a claim to the origins of the sultanate. The identification of "Lawai" as a name for the Pinoh lands accounts satisfactorily for the inland state shown on the eighteenth-century maps. Also, there is a possible explanation for the location of "Lave" on the "Versche Rivier" south of the Schwaner ranges if it is a misunderstood reference to the beginning of a route that led via the Schwaner ranges to the Pinoh lands. This information may have originated from Banjarmasin or Kotawaringin, possibly from de Roy. The Pinoh lands clearly had good trading connections along the Kapuas with southern Borneo and also the north. Joseph Burn, who lived in Pontianak for a few years until 1811 or 1812, described the Malay states along the Kapuas in a letter to Stamford Raffles. He said that Sintang took little notice of Pontianak and traded with Banjarmasin and Brunei (Burn 1811:130-34, for summary see Smith 2004). Two American missionaries who visited the area in 1840 (Anonymous 1856) (21) commented that the most common route from Sintang to Banjarmasin was via the rivers Melawi, Pinoh and (near by over the watershed) Kotawaringin. This was the route taken in reverse by von Gaffron in December 1846-January 1847, a year earlier than the much better-known crossing across Borneo from south to west by Schwaner (Posewitz 1892:32-34). Von Gaffron's reports of this expedition have never been published, though they were used by Barth and Enthoven, and may still exist in the Dutch colonial archives.

Recent studies of the Pinoh lands are notably lacking, compared with the Melawi downstream. The latter area has had distinctive agricultural practices at least since direct Dutch administration began in the 1890s, with extensive cattle-raising both by Malay settlers and Dayaks, as in areas of southern Borneo, though at the time the Dayaks retained their traditional agricultural practices, including padi cultivation and collection of forest products, as recorded by Enthoven (1903:434-38, see also Brookfield et al. 1995:187-90, 200-4). The ethnic groups in the Melawi area are very diverse, as shown by language studies (Sellato 1986, Collins 2001), and the same must apply to the Pinoh lands. As elsewhere in Borneo, the prevalent nomenclature of "Dayak" and "Malay" introduced in colonial times does not reflect reality in respect to distinct ethnicity and social identities, especially taking into account recent conversions (i.e. a few generations ago) of Dayaks to Islam and, more recently, to Christianity. The many migrations of Dayak groups across the Schwaner ranges that continued well into the nineteenth century greatly complicate any attempt to chronicle individual Dayak areas in the region. However, the Ot Danum and associated groups still live both west and east of the Schwaner ranges (see Sellato 1986); presumably also a factor in past claims of suzerainty made by the rulers of Banjarmasin and Kotawaringin that were in large measure based on taxing the Dayak communities. Again according to Collins (2001), Nanga Pinoh, the present district capital located where the Pinoh joins the Melawi, has been Muslim "for centuries"; it would be interesting to know how many. Clearly there is no reason to doubt that there was a substantial inland polity of Lawai from the eighteenth century, if not earlier, even though the location of a town of that name is not resolved by the historical sources reviewed here. Sintang is an obvious candidate for the historical center on the Kapuas that is shown as "Lava" on the eighteenth-century Dutch maps.

The Missing Dimension: Archaeology

Richards (1978) commented that archaeological investigations for Lawai and Tanjungpura would be unwise without local research, because of changes in river courses and sites of present villages or towns. Scarcity of archaeological evidence is a major problem in linking "myth, history and cultural identity" in Borneo (Sellato 1993). However, even a few archaeological findings can help, as shown by Sellato (1993) for a site at Nanga Balang (Putussibau District), on the upper reaches of the Kapuas. There seems to be no archaeological evidence for a port of Lawai along the Labai. However, Hindu and Buddhist artifacts have been found scattered throughout the inland areas of Kalimantan, as have Chinese artifacts--some old and some less so (for summaries see Sellato 1993, Mckinnon 1994). Strong evidence for a pre-Islamic "Hinduized" center at or close to Sanggau comes from the Sanskrit inscriptions nearby on the Sekayam, as well as Hindu statues (a Nandi bull and Ganesha) and other artifacts. These were well-known to the Dutch from the 1820s onwards (Enthoven 1903:703, Rouffaer 1909). A brief English-language account is given by Nevius and Youngblood (Anonymous 1856). They also mentioned "slabs with inscriptions and the image of a female sculptured in stone," taken from the vicinity of Sanggau a few years prior to their visit (i.e. in the 1830s) and lost in a shipwreck en route to Batavia. Joseph Burn, who almost certainly visited Sanggau, said that there were "remains of a small square-built fort of brick, which the Malay say was built by the Portuguese 140 or 150 years ago" and that the Portuguese had a settlement for many years (Burn 1811:14-15). The Portuguese did not have a settlement there in the 1650s, and a much earlier origin seems very likely (Smith 2000, 2004). However, this may be an echo of the visit to the Kapuas by Dom Manuel in the sixteenth century. I have not found other references to the brick structure at Sanggau, and enquiries among local people might be very helpful, especially given the distinction accorded to the orang Sanggau Lawai in the nineteenth century.

Rouffaer (1909) was intrigued by the many antiquities along the Sekadau River, which flows from the south into the Kapuas to the east of Sanggau. He brought together reports from Dutch travelers and officials from 1779 onwards that included mention of stone statues, gold and silver ornaments and pottery. In the "kingdom" of Gascaro or Cascaro, three days' travel up the Sekadau, there was an inscribed black stone or pillar three feet high and three feet broad. According to one account (edited by Radermacher 1780), it had legible European characters. Another account (edited by Radermacher 1781) mentioned that the stone was carved with seven pyramids, letters and coded numbers ("cyffergetallen"). (22) Rouffaer (1909) could not find Gascaro or Cascaro or similar names on any of the large-scale maps that he examined. Nor could he identify Negris, a village said to be four days up the Sekadau, where there were partly buried remains of one or two large boats of peculiar form, and remains of Hindu temples, as reported to Batavia by Dutch officials in the 1860s and 1870s. There was no interest in Batavia. (23) Interestingly, the headwaters of the Sekadau and its tributaries lie over the mountains to the east of the headwaters of the Labai, and the whole region is connected by trackways. As regards the archaeology of the Pinoh lands, Barth (1897:587) mentioned a bronze statue of Buddha found at Nanga Sajan on the Pinoh, and also said that Tobias had earlier mentioned statues of Vishnu and Shiva found nearby.

Further afield, remains of brick and stone structures near Negara in South Kalimantan that were being plundered by local inhabitants were described by official visitors in the 1820s and 1830s (translations by Ras 1968:625-26). They are evidence for a link with the later sultanate of Banjannasin, as recorded in the Hikajat Banjar. Carl Lumholtz, who traveled in the area in 1916, was told of similar structures at Tapinbini in the Kotawaringin District (Lumholtz 1920:289). Tapinbini is about 100 km. from the coast in the southern Schwaner foothills, and on the Lamandau, a tributary of the Kotawaringin River. The origin of the Lamandau is in West Kalimantan, close to that of the (north-flowing) Pinoh. Tapinbini is therefore associated with the trading route by water and land between Sintang and southern Borneo. (24) These examples demonstrate the existence of the long-standing trade networks but give no clues about the nature and size of pre-Islamic regional polities. Nevertheless, they show that it is unwise to focus on coastal or near-coastal areas for locations of substantial pre-Islamic centers (assuming that brick or stone structures indicate a substantial center). This is especially so when silting of rivers and seaward land formation are borne in mind. Posewitz (1892:258) gives examples of land formation in Sarawak and southern Borneo at 50 meters per annum, commenting that the spread of new land, especially in river estuaries, has been hastened by deposition of riverine mud resulting from inland gold-mining. Likewise, in relation to possible locations for Tanjungpura in the Barito region, Ras (1968:192-97) cites evidence of coastal movements up to 50 to 100 meters per annum in estuarine locations in Sumatra and Java over the last four centuries or so. It remains possible that Sanggau was the port of "downriver" Lawai at some time, especially bearing in mind the considerable width of the Kapuas even today. There must be more relevant antiquarian and archaeological information in unpublished reports in Dutch colonial times by local officials who had interest in the history of what is now Kalimantan, and in Indonesian reports since independence. A detailed review by a specialist with appropriate linguistic expertise would be very useful.

Conclusions

"Lawai" in Iban poetry clearly has a basis in an actual polity and there is no reason to doubt Malay (Muslim) associations. When I raised this latter point at the talk at the Sixth Biennial Borneo Research Council Conference, Kuching, that was published as Smith (2000), several members of the audience with Dayak connections confirmed the Malay context. (However, another said privately that he did not agree that this was certain in all cases.) Why the Ibans should link Lawai and the Malays is not at all clear, given that the history of Lawai dates back long before Islam reached Borneo. It may be that this is a memory of conversion of some Dayaks to Islam, as recounted by Sandin (1994:90-92), though he did not refer to Lawai. Despite this uncertainty, it seems likely that, by analogy with the Oya woman, Lawai in the Gawai Burong chant does not refer to Lawai in the Pinoh lands but to the earlier polity closer to the sea, i.e. to "Labai Lawai." There are probably more references to Lawai and relevant localities in Dayak poetry or legends from West Kalimantan, though relating myth to history is never easy. The double name "Labai Lawai" is certainly unusual. Whatever its origin, it may have been used in West Borneo to distinguish that polity from Lawai in the Pinoh lands. The link (if any) between Lawai near the coast, and Lawai in the Pinoh lands still remains obscure, though separation in time due to migration resulting from the spread of Islam is still a strong possibility.

Regarding issues of cultural identity in West Borneo (Sellato 1993), it seems over-simple to consider foundation of the coastal trading centers solely in relation to Malay, Javanese and Buginese immigrants, as is usual (e.g., Irwin 1955:3, King 1979:29). The emphasis in the local Malay histories on origins associated with the Majapahit or post-Majapahit period in Java, subsequent conversion to Islam and (especially upriver) intermarriage with Dayak leaders, does not help answer questions about the nature of the centers that were visited by the earlier Chinese traders. What was the nature of Bornean society that was (temporarily) "Hinduized"? Have Dayaks always lived in small longhouse settlements with little higher-level political organization beyond that later imposed by Malay or quasi-Malay rulers? Should their past coastal connections and seagoing activities be ignored? In relation to this last issue, Petersen (2000) has studied the boat-building skills and traditions in the Barito Basin, which is now heavily silted, and cites the opinion of Professor M. Lambut from Lambung Mangkurat University (Banjarmasin) that Dayaks in the region were once a sea-going people, consistent with the importance of boats in their religious life (Peterson 2000:135-38). Miksic (1995) commented that, in the context of the formation of Southeast Asian civilizations in general, there is increasing emphasis on indigenous factors, and that lack of information on local socio-political organizations is a large impediment in the discussion of what can and cannot be attributed to Indian (and Chinese) contact. This situation certainly applies in Borneo, and especially in Kalimantan, for the period before the advent of Islam. Also, far too little is known about the small Malay states along the Kapuas and its tributaries in the period before the end of the nineteenth century (Wadley and Smith 2001, Wadley 2001). Although Anthony Richards' conclusions about the actual location(s) of Lawai seem to be wrong, his emphasis on the need for additional field research in West Kalimantan is even more valid today than it was in 1978. I hope that local researchers will take up this challenge before--given the pace of change--it becomes even more difficult.

Acknowledgements

I thank John Bamba, Institut Dayakologi, Pontianak, for providing information about Labai Lawai from Dayak sources, and Clifford Sather for helpful comments, especially about Iban matters. I am also very grateful to John Moffett, Librarian at the Needham Research Institute, Cambridge, for allowing access to Mills's unpublished papers. Last, I acknowledge some financial support from the Australian Academy of Science for this study. This was provided unwittingly, for travel to Canberra for meetings that also made possible library research at the Australian National University and the National Library of Australia.

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F. Andrew Smith

School of Earth and Environmental Sciences

The University of Adelaide 

Australia

e-mail: [e-mail]

(1) The paper, however, was listed later on in the same issue (33:165) as the first item among Anthony Richards' published writings deposited in the UNIMAS library.

(2) "Lawai": I use this spelling here rather than "Lawei" (see Smith 2000, 2001), because it is the spelling mostly given in the literature of the region cited by Richards.

(3) "Malay states": in this context, polities with Muslim rulers and defined primarily not by fixed territorial boundaries but by authority over mainly Dayak subjects (see King 1979:30). "Kingdoms," often used, seems too grandiose a term.

(4) Editor's Note: In the Saribas region, of which Sandin was writing, Lawai is an old Iban term for 'Malays,' now largely obsolete. Today, in everyday usage, Malays are referred to as Laut. Like Laut, the term Lawai thus refers primarily to a people, and not to a place. However, in the Saribas, Lawai does occasionally occur in older Iban place-names, for example, Sungai Bangkai Lawai ('River of Malay Corpses'), another name for the Sungai Langit (Sandin 1994:165). While it is perfectly possible, as Andrew Smith suggests, that the term Lawai may have originally been a place-name, this is a matter of speculation. The combination Laut Lawai, which so interested Richards, does, indeed, appear in Iban oral poetry. While certainly translatable as 'Malays of Lawai,' literally, Laut Lawai means 'Malays Malays,' a pairing of essentially synonymous terms that is not at all uncommon in Iban oral poetry. Hence, caution should be exercised, I think, in describing "Lawai" as "a location associated with Malays." The term is certainly associated with Malays, but not in a strict sense as a "location." In a contrary way, it is worth noting that in Iban the term Melayu does occur as a place-name, but not, interestingly enough, in reference to Malays, but as the name of an Iban settlement area, both in the Kapuas and also across the border, near Balai Ringin, in Sarawak.

More relevant to the author's argument, I think, is Lawai Labai, mentioned later, which, unambiguously, appears in Iban oral poetry as a place-name. In Iban oral tradition, Lawai Labai is particularly associated with Keling, leader of the Iban spirit heroes (Orang Panggau), and is sometimes described as the original home of the spirit heroes before their separation from the ancestral Iban. Of later West Kalimantan place-names, one which appears in Saribas oral tradition with, to my mind, surprisingly regularity is Sukadana. Hence, I found particularly interesting the author's argument that"Lawai Labai," as an early historical polity, has a probable connection with the later sultanate of Sukadana.

(5) Linguistic evidence increasingly suggests a likely origin within Borneo (Adelaar 1995, Collins 2001). Editor's Note: This is also suggested by Iban myth. While a person reading Richards might suppose that, according to Iban mythology, the Iban trace their origins to places outside of Borneo, this is not generally the case. While there are certainly Iban myths and genealogical narratives that tell of putative ancestors who arrive from outside the island, these comprise only a tiny proportion of the total amount of such materials recorded (see, for example, the genealogical appendices in Sandin 1976 and 1994). Even in very long Saribas Iban genealogies, containing 20 to 30 generations of putative ancestors (including, in some instances, supernaturals), events, with rare exception, are set entirely within western Borneo, and for early events, more specifically, the Kapuas Basin. For the Saribas, as Sandin has documented, from 13 to 15 generations ago, local genealogical traditions deal substantially with migrations, first from the upper Kapuas region of what is now West Kalimantan, and then, from river to river, within present-day Sarawak. On the basis of these traditions, Sandin (1976) was able to reconstruct the outlines of Iban settlement of western Sarawak in some considerable detail. Given the role that these traditions play in Iban society, an emphasis on comparatively recent migrations and the opening of tracks of land that the Iban still occupy is understandable. Exceptions are unusual, and it is probably not unfair to say that the disproportionate attention given to external origins reflects the interests of those interpreting Iban ethno-historical sources, and not the sources themselves. On the other hand, Iban oral narratives are replete with events and places of enormous potential interest to historians and others, and as the author rightly stresses, there is an urgent need for more research, as the systematic recording of such material has scarcely begun in West Borneo, despite the inspired efforts of Sandin, Richards, and others.

(6) "Kayung" in Sandin (1994).

(7) He obtained these meanings from Wilkinson's English-Malay dictionary (1959). Ras (1968:563) gives 'yam' for lawai in Ngadju-Dayak. The context is weaving, and this meaning does not seem entirely implausible, as weaving has long been a major home industry in West Borneo. Richards (1978) gives Manja-lawei as the Malay name for myrobalans, used medicinally and for tanning. Corner (1952, Vol. 1:102) gives Jelawei and Pelawei as Malay names for two Terminalia species, and also, like Richards, Ketapang for T. calappa, a coastal tree. Locations named after plants, e.g. Ketapang, are, of course, common in Borneo.

(8) A sketch map by Broek (1962) shows a short river "Lawa," another eastern tributary of the Mendawak, to the north of the Labai, but this is a mistake. The river is the Dawak as shown on many large-scale maps of the area, along with a village of the same name. The village is shown on the map by Melvill van Carnbee and Versteeg (1859), though the river is not named.

(9) "Nanhai Zhi" is Pinyin; "Nan-hai Chih" in the Wade-Giles version given by Brown. I have converted the Chinese place-names to Pinyin except where otherwise stated. Brown also gives some names in Cantonese.

(10) In a letter to W. H. Scott (4 April 1983) Mills pointed out that mention of foreigners (presumably Dutch) at Nagasaki suggested that the account was completed by about 1610. The manuscript, in the Bodleian Library, Oxford, was edited and published in Chinese by Xiang Da (1961).

(11) The Kapuas Kecil is the present-day route to Pontianak, which, of course, had not been founded at that time. Early Dutch and British maps name all three main mouths of the Kapuas system as the "Lauwe" (spelled variously).

(12) An unpublished translation of the Shun Feng Xiang Song by Mills in the Needham Research Institute, Cambridge, on which Mills (1979) was based, shows uncertainty about some locations and terms, e.g., whether the character "geng" ("chiang", according to Mills) was used for "harbor" or "river." This does not affect his conclusion about the location of Lawai on the Kapuas.

(13) Yuan Bingling comments that the commonly used character lao does not have a pejorative meaning. Chinese dictionaries translate it as 'garrulous' or 'voluble.' The term fanzi ('barbarian') is said to be used by local Chinese exclusively for the Malays (Yuan Bingling 2000:69)!

(14) This account is taken from reports in 1876 and 1888 (footnote in text).

(15) This account is taken almost verbatim from information kindly provided by John Bamba.

(16) Wilkinson (1959) gives "Lebai" in Malay ("Labai" in Minangkabau Malay) as religious persons of south Indian descent associated with religion: 'pillars of the mosque.' Although Richards (1978) noted the association with Islam, he did not refer to Labai Lawai.

(17) Varsche and versche (Dutch) mean 'fresh,' as in fresh water.

(18) Richards (1978) gives the last three names only. The list given here is part of the full list as translated by Irwin.

(19) Veth (1854-6, Vol. 1:50) referred to the mention of Lawai ("Lewei," obviously a

misprint) in this area in early histories of Borneo, but did not give details. He noted the Lawai-(Me)lawi association.

(20) It is not clear if the words quoted are those of von Gaffron or Pijnappel.

(21) They are identifiable from missionary literature as Elbert Nevius and William Youngblood. The mission to West Bomeo was an abject failure and collapsed by 1849.

(22) All possible explanations for the stone or pillar with seven carved pyramids seem far fetched. However, the seven castles on the Portuguese coat of arms and flag since the beginning of the sixteenth century resemble stepped pyramids to some extent. Although perhaps very unlikely, the possibility that the stone is the remains of a padrao erected by Dom Manuel de Lima to commemorate his visit cannot be discounted. These monuments, examples of which still survive from other locations visited by the sixteenth-century Portuguese explorers across the world, had crosses at the top that would obviously not have survived in Borneo, nor would the five small shields in the middle of the coat of arms that were arranged in a cross-shaped pattern.

(23) Like Rouffaer, I can find no places on large-scale maps that can be reconciled with Gascaro/Cascaro or Negris. I have not checked literature over the last 100 years that might also mention the archaeological remains or investigations in the Sekadau region. Another archaeological echo comes from Yuan Bingling (2000:66), who quotes a Dutch source from 1861 that says that Chinese miners in the Monterado region sometimes found (and discarded) ancient ships and porcelain.

(24) The Nanhai Zhi gives "Tabuxindi" ("Taap-pat-san-tei" in Cantonese) as one of the dependencies of Tanjungpura (Brown 1978). Though not noted by Brown, this cumbersome name resonates with "Tapinbini." Another unidentified name in the list is "Zhili" ("Chat-lai" in Cantonese), for which "Jelai" comes to mind. Brown (1978) identified "Gumei" ("Koomooi" in Cantonese) as Kumai and "Qidingyin" ("Hat-ting-ngan" in Cantonese) as the river Katingan, near Sampit.