The medieval Tamil-language inscriptions in Southeast Asia and China

Journal of Southeast Asian Studies

Volumn 29, Issue 2, 1998, Pages 239-268

  Christie, Jan Wisseman ^a  

^a UNIVERSITY OF HULL   (United Kingdom)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

ARCHAEOLOGICAL EVIDENCE; ECONOMIC HISTORY; LANGUAGE;

(SOUTHEAST); ASIA; CHINA;

EID: 0032436789     PISSN: 00224634     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1017/s0022463400007438     Document Type: Article

References (191)

1. A.L. Udovitch, Partnership and Profit in Medieval Islam (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1970), pp. 171-72.
2. Yoshinobu Shiba, Commerce and Society in Sung China (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Center for Chinese Studies, 1970), pp. 2, 188;
3. Andrew Watson (trans.), Transport in Transition: the evolution of traditional shipping in China (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Center for Chinese Studies, 1972), pp. 16ff;
4. Laurence J.C. Ma, Commercial Development and Urban Change in Sung China (960-1279) (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Department of Geography, 1971), pp. 29-43.
5. Meera Abraham, Two Medieval Merchant Guilds of South India (Delhi: Manohar, 1988), pp. 5, 19-24, 29, 110;
6. E.P.N. Kunjan Pillai, Studies in Kerala History (Kottayam, Kerala: National Bookstall, 1970), pp. 370-77.
7. Abraham, Two Medieval Merchant Guilds, pp. 41-42.
8. For discussions of the various associated merchant, craft and mercenary groups, see for example: S.R. Balasubrahmanian, "The Tisai Ayirattainür + (Combining vertical line below)r + (Combining vertical line below)uvar and the Municandai Record", Tijdschrift voor Indische Taal-, Land-, en Volkenkunde 74 (1934): 613-18;
9. K.R. Venkatarama Ayyar, "Medieval Trade, Craft and Merchant Guilds in South India", Journal of Indian History 25,3 (1947): 269-80;
10. K.A. Nilakanta Sastri, The Colas, 2nd revised edition (Madras, 1955);
11. Burton Stein, "Coromandel Trade in Medieval India", in Merchants and Scholars: Essays in the History of Exploration and Trade, ed. J. Parker (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1965), pp. 49-62;
12. K. Indrapala, "Some Medieval Mercantile Communities of South India and Ceylon", Journal of Tamil Studies 2,2 (1970): 25-39;
13. Abraham, Two Medieval Merchant Guilds.
14. Abraham, Two Medieval Merchant Guilds, pp. 117, 162-66.
15. Ruth Barnes, Indian Block-Printed Cotton Fragments in the Kelsey Museum, The University of Michigan (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1993), pp. 30-31;
16. Jan Wisseman Christie, "Texts and Textiles in 'Medieval' Java", Bulletin de l'Ecole Française d'Extrême-Orient 80,1 (1993): 193-95.
17. Indrapala, "Some Medieval Mercantile Communities", pp. 30-32.
18. Abraham, Two Medieval Merchant Guilds, p. 135.
19. J. Heitzman, "State formation in South India, 850-1280", The Indian Economic and Social History Review 24,1 (1987): 38;
20. see also the rather inflated Pandyan claims of conquest in about 1254 A.D., which included not only the Chola state, but also Kedah, Java, and China (Archaeological Dept., Southern Circle, Madras, Annual Report on Epigraphy 1911-12, p. 65;
21. Archaeological Dept., Southern Circle, Madras, Annual Report on Epigraphy 1916-17, p. 111).
22. F. Hirth and W.W. Rockhill, Chau Ju-kua: His Work on the Chinese and Arab Trade in the Twelfth and Thirteenth Centuries, entitled Chu-fan-chi (New York: Paragon, 1966 reprint of 1911 edition), pp. 87-102.
23. Abraham, Two Medieval Merchant Guilds, p. 154.
24. K.A. Nilakanta Sastri, "Foreign trade under the Kakatiyas", Journal of Oriental Research 8 (1934): 319.
25. Abraham, Two Medieval Merchant Guilds, pp. 34-35, 51-60.
26. For detail, see: Jan Wisseman Christie, "The ban + (Combining dot below)igrāma in the Indian Ocean and the Java Sea during the early Asian trade boom", in Seafaring Communities in the Indian Ocean, 4th c. B.C.-15th c. A.D., ed. J.F. Salles and H.P. Ray (Brussels: Brepols, in press).
27. M. Boechari, "Prasasti Kalirungan" (unpublished ms.).
28. H.B. Sarkar, Corpus of the Inscriptions of Java (Up to 928 A.D.), two volumes (Calcutta: K.L. Mukhopadhyay, 1971), inscription xciii.
29. S.D. Goitein, Letters of Medieval Jewish Traders (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1973), pp. 175-229;
30. S.D. Goitein, "From Aden to India", Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient 23,1&2 (1980): 46;
31. R. Chakravarti, "Merchants of Konkan", The Indian Economic and Social History Review 23,2 (1986): 215.
32. Christie, "Texts and Textiles", pp. 193-95.
33. J.L.A. Brandes, Oud-Javaansche Oorkonden, nagelaten transscripties van wijlen Dr. J.L.A. Brandes, uitgegeven door Dr. N.J. Krom (The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, 1913), inscription lviii.
34. Brandes Oud-Javaansche Oorkonden, inscription lix.
35. The Kaladi inscription - for which, see A.M. Barrett Jones, Early Tenth Century Java from the Inscriptions (Dordrecht: Foris, 1984), pp. 178-94 - from the same region, which is dated 909 A.D., but which survives only as a later reissue, preserves an anachronous list identical to those of the Cane and Pātakan inscriptions.
36. Paul Wheatley, "Geographical Notes on some Commodities involved in Sung Maritime Trade", Journal of the Malaysian Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society 32,2 (1959): 59-61;
37. Hirth and Rockhill, Chau Ju-kua, pp. 88, 92-93, 96-98.
38. Christie, "Texts and Textiles", p. 194.
39. Brandes, Oud-Javaansche Oorkonden, inscription lxiv. From Truneng, in the Brantas delta region. Undated, but commissioned late in Airlangga's reign, probably in the 1040s.
40. M. Boechari, "Prasasti Garamān, 1053 A.D." (unpublished ms.).
41. Jan Wisseman Christie, "Javanese markets and the Asian sea trade boom of the tenth to thirteenth centuries A.D.", Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient 41,3 (1998).
42. R.Ng. Poerbatjaraka, "Vier oorkonden in koper", Tijdschrift voor Taal-, Land-, en Volkenkunde 76 (1936): 378.
43. A. van Aelst, "Majapahit picis: the currency of a 'moneyless' society", Bijdragen tot de Taal-, Land-, en Volkenkunde 151,3 (1995): 357-93;
44. Jan Wisseman Christie, "Money and its uses in the Javanese states of the ninth to fifteenth centuries A.D.", Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient 39,3 (1996): 243-86.
45. Th.G.Th. Pigeaud, Java in the 14th Century: A Study in Cultural History, five volumes (The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, 1960-63), canto 83.4.
46. Christie, "Texts and Textiles", p. 194;
47. Ruth Barnes, "From India to Egypt: The Newberry Collection and the Indian Ocean textile trade", in Seafaring Communities in the Indian Ocean, 4th c. B.C.-15th c. A.D., ed. J.F. Salles and H.P. Ray (Brussels: Brepols, in press).
48. There is, in fact; another, much earlier Tamil-language inscription, not considered here, that has been found in Southeast Asia. It comprises two words written on a small stone that was apparently used as a goldsmith's touchstone, now held in the museum at Wat Khlong Thom, Krabi, on the west coast of peninsular Thailand, about 120 km. south of Takuapa. Khlong Thom was the site of a very early port and manufacturing centre specializing in the production of beads and other jewelry. The short inscription, written in Brahmi script of the third or fourth century A.D., reads perumpatan kal, meaning, "the [touch]stone of the master goldsmith". This was the personal property of an individual artisan, rather than an inscription set up for public attention. See Norobu Karashima, "Indian Commercial Activities in Ancient and Medieval Southeast Asia" (Paper delivered at the Conference of the International Association of Tamil Research, 1995), pp. 3-4.
49. Wang Gungwu, "The Nanhai Trade", Journal of the Malayan Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society 31,2 (1958): 123.
50. Chinese ceramics of ninth and early tenth century date have been recovered from one of the early sites at Palembang - see Ho Chui Mei, "Ceramics from the Palembang Excavations", ACRO Update 2 (1995): 1; the Jambi site connected with that period has yet to be located.
51. O.W. Wolters, Early Indonesian Commerce: A Study of the Origins of Śrīvijaya (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1967), pp. 187-88.
52. Wang, "The Nanhai Trade", pp. 101, 104-105, 123.
53. The Sanskrit inscription on the front of a stone found in a collection in Nakhom Si Thammarat - dated 775 A.D. and lauding the king of Śrīvijaya - appears to have been superseded by an undated, but palaeographically similar Sanskrit inscription on the back of the stone, lauding a king of the Śailendra family that was in power in central Java at the time. See G. Coedès, Recueil des Inscriptions du Siam, Deuxième Partie: Inscriptions de Dvāravatī, de Çrīvijaya et de Lāvo (Bangkok: The Siam Society, 1962), pp. 20-24.
54. The Nālandā inscription, commissioned in about 860 A.D., concerning a Buddhist foundation funded by a Sumatran ruler, mentions a king of Suvarn + (Combining dot below)advīpa (Sumatra), but not the state of Śrīvijava; this ruler's main claim to fame appears to have been the fact that he was the grandson of the Śailendra ruler of Java - H. Shastri, "The Nalanda Copper-plate of Devapaladeva", Epigraphia Indica 17,7 (1924): 310-27.
55. K. A. Nilakanta Sastri, "The Takua-pa (Siam) Tamil Inscription", Journal of Oriental Research 16 (1942): 326-27; see also the archaeological evidence discussed below.
56. Wang, "The Nanhai Trade", p. 123.
57. This impression of the relative importance of Java in maritime Southeast Asia during the late eighth and ninth centuries is reinforced by Cham, Vietnamese and Cambodian sources. See Jan Wisseman Christie, Patterns of Trade in Western Indonesia: Ninth through Thirteenth Centuries A.D. (Ph.D. diss., School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London, 1982), pp. 30-31;
58. G. Coedès, Les Inscriptions du Cambodge, eight volumes (Paris: Ecole Française d'Extrême-Orient, 1942-66), volume I, p. 42
59. ; G. Coedès, The Indianized States of Southeast Asia (trans. S.B. Cowing) (Honolulu: East-West Center Press, 1968), pp. 123, 315 n. 104.
60. G. Ferrand, L'Empire Sumatranais de Çrīvijaya (Paris: Paul Geuthner, 1922), pp. 50-52;
61. G.R. Tibbetts, A Study of the Arabic Texts Containing Material on South-East Asia (Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1979), pp. 25-32.
62. Given the shifting political situation in maritime Southeast Asia during the centuries between the ninth century, when these Arab reports were first written, and the time of their reuse in later compilations, there remains some doubt concerning the exact identity of Zābaj. Tibbetts (A Study of the Arabic Texts Containing Material on South-East Asia ( ibid., p. 112) is almost certainly correct, however, in his conclusion that the term Zābaj was first, in the ninth century, attached to Java and its economic and political sphere in the eastern islands, and that only later, after the port hierarchy of Śrīvijaya had reassembled itself, did confusion set in.
63. Christie, "Money and its uses", pp. 245-47.
64. Coedès, Recueil des Inscriptions du Siam, inscription xxvi.
65. S.J. O'Connor, Hindu Gods of Peninsular Siam. supplementum to Artibus Asiae 28 (1972), figs. 28-31.
66. E. Hultzsch, "Note on a Tamil Inscription in Siam", Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society (1913): 337-39;
67. and "Supplementary Note on a Tamil Inscription in Siam", Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society (1914): 397-98.
68. "Takuapa and its Tamil Inscription", Journal of the Malayan Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society 22,2 (1949): 29.
69. Kunjan Pillai, Studies in Kerala History, p. 371.
70. Balasubrahmaniam, "The Tisai Ayirattainür + (Combining vertical line below)r + (Combining vertical line below)uvar", p. 618;
71. Abraham, Two Medieval Merchant Guilds, pp. 45, 183, 248.
72. Bennet Bronson, "Chinese and Middle Eastern Trade in Southern Thailand during the 9th Century A.D.", in Ancient Trades and Cultural Contacts in Southeast Asia, ed. Amara Srisuchat (Bangkok: Office of the National Cultural Commission, 1996), pp. 181-200;
73. H.A. Lamb, "Takuapa, the probable site of a pre-Malaccan entrepôt in the Malay peninsula", in Malayan and Indonesian Studies, ed. J. Bastin and R. Roolvink (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1964);
74. Ho Chui Mei, Pisit Charoenwongsa, Bennet Bronson, Amara Srisuchat and Tharapong Srisuchat, "Newly Identified Chinese Ceramic Wares from Ninth Century Trading Ports in Southern Thailand", SPAFA Digest 11,3 (1990): 12-17.
75. Wheatley, "Geographical Notes", p. 25.
76. See, for example, the reports on the upper levels at Arikamedu, near Pondicherry: R.E.M. Wheeler, A. Ghosh and Krishna Deva, "Arikamedu: An Indo-Roman Trading Station on the East Coast of India", Ancient India 2 (1946): 91;
77. on the site of Kanchipuram in Tamil Nadu, see Government of India, Indian Archaeology (Delhi: Government of India, 1969-70), p. 37;
78. on the tenth-eleventh century site of Madilakam, near Cranganore on the Malabar coast, see Government of India, Indian Archaeology ( ibid., p. 15.
79. In 1005 A.D. the king of Śrīvijaya, who was also "lord of Kat + (Combining vertical line below)aha (Kedah)" built in south India a Buddhist vihära, for which the Chola ruler later granted revenues. See S.K. Aiyangar and R. Sewell, Historical Inscriptions of Southern India (Madras, 1932), pp. 57-58;
80. and Epigraphia Indica 22, no. 34.
81. A decade later, in 1014-15 A.D., the ruler of Śrīvijaya presented gifts to a Hindu temple in the Chola state (Annual Report on Indian Epigraphy 1956-57: 15, nos. 161 and 164).
82. In 1018-1019 A.D., the ruler of Śrīvijaya and Kedah presented gifts of "Chinese gold" and other objects to the same Hindu temple (Annual Report of Indian Epigraphy 1956-57: 15, no. 166).
83. These inscriptions have also been discussed by R.C. Majumdar, Ancient Indian Colonies in the Far East, volume 2: Suvarnadvīpa (Calcutta, 1937),
84. and more recently by J.N. Miksic, "Hubungan sejarah antara Seriwijaya, Palembang densan Lembah Bujang", Tamadun Melayu 3 (1995): 894-917.
85. Grace Wong, A comment on the tributary trade between China and Southeast Asia, and the place of porcelain in the trade during the Song dynasty in China (Singapore: The Southeast Asian Ceramic Society, 1979), no. 15.
86. O.W. Wolters, "Tambralinga", Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies 21,3 (1958): 605.
87. Wong, A comment on the tributary trade, no. 16.
88. Aiyangar and Sewell, Historical Inscriptions, pp. 65-66;
89. Coedès, The Indianized States, pp. 142-43;
90. Nilakanta Sastri, The Colas, pp. 211-20.
91. Rājendra's list of conquests includes: Śrīvijaya, Pan + (Combining dot below)n + (Combining dot below)ai (north Sumatra), Malaiyūr (Jambi), Māyirudingam (?), Ilangāśogam (Langkasuka), Māppappālam (Lower Burma?), Mevilimbangam (Palembang?), Valaippandūru (?), Talaittakkolam (Takuapa), Mādamālingam (Tāmbralinga), Ilāmurideśam (Lamri, Aceh), Mānakkavāram (Nicobar Islands), Kadāram (Kedah). It is interesting to note that Rājendra's son later claimed on his father's behalf only the conquest of Kidāram (Kedah) (Annual Report of South Indian Epigraphy 1912-13: 961, 26).
92. Wong, A comment on the tributary trade, no. 11.
93. Wheatley, "Geographical Notes", p. 25.
94. Paul Wheatley, The Golden Khersonese (Kuala Lumpur: University of Malaya Press, 1961), p. 61.
95. Epigraphia Indica 25, part 6: no. 25.
96. Hirth and Rockhill, Chau Ju-kua, p. 59.
97. The Sung Shih states that the Cholas were subject to Śrīvijaya, a statement which may reflect the fact that the Cholas traded with China under the aegis of Śrīvijaya, and thus may have accompanied their missions to the court. For other views on this passage in the Sung Shih, see also: R.C. Majumdar, Ancient Indian Colonies in the Far East, volume 2: Suvarnadvīpa (Calcutta, 1937), pp. 182-90;
98. Tan Yeok Seong, "The Śrīvijaya inscription of Canton (A.D. 1079)", Journal of Southeast Asian History 5,2 (1964): 21.
99. Wheatley, "Geographical Notes", p. 25.
100. Middle Eastern missions, which continued to arrive into the second half of the twelfth century, carried ivory, rhinocerous horn, frankincense, rosewater, pearls, glassware, etc. (Wong, A comment on the tributary trade, no. 16).
101. Missions from Coromandel carried many of the same commodities (Wong, A comment on the tributary trade, ibid., no. 15).
102. Both also carried such Southeast Asian produce as camphor (probably from west Sumatra) and cloves (from eastern Indonesia, but bought in ports of Java or Śrīvijaya). Missions from Śrīvijaya carried an almost identical range of goods (Wong, A comment on the tributary trade, ibid., no. 11), presumably to advertise its role as entrepôt for Indian Ocean commodities.
103. The history behind the temple's reconstruction and the subsequent gifts of land is detailed in a Chinese-language inscription of 1079 A.D. (Tan, "The Śrīvijaya inscription").
104. Wong, A comment on the tributary trade, no. 11.
105. There was further Śrīvijayan activity during the 1080s in connection with Buddhist foundations in south India (Nilakanta Sastri, The Colas, pp. 271-72;
106. Epigraphia Indica 22: no. 35).
107. The Javanese state involved was by this time probably the east Javanese coastal state of Janggala, created during the period of civil strife that followed the death of Airlangga, which is referred to in an inscription of king Garasakan, dated 1053 A.D. (Boechari, "Prasasti Garamān");
108. on the favours shown to the Javanese mission by the Chinese emperor in 1129 A.D., see W.P. Groeneveldt, Historical Notes on Indonesia and Malaya compiled from Chinese Sources (Jakarta: Bhratara, 1960), p. 19.
109. Wheatley, "Geographical Notes", p. 32;
110. Aelst, "Majapahit picis", p. 361;
111. Christie, "Money and its uses", pp. 269-70.
112. T. Yamamoto, "Reexamination of historical texts concerning Śrīvijaya" (Paper presented at the 8th biennial conference of the International Association of the Historians of Asia, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, 1980), p. 5.
113. Hirth and Rockhill, Chau Ju-kua, pp. 23, 25.
114. Hirth and Rockhill, ·Chau Ju-kua, ibid., p. 24.
115. The inscription was first read by E. Hultzsch - Madras Epigraphy Report (Madras: Government of India, 1892)
116. - who summarized its main points, but did not publish a transcription or full translation; his comments formed the basis of studies by K.A. Nilakanta Sastri - "A Tamil Merchant-guild in Sumatra", Tijdschrift voor het Taal-, Land- en Volkenkunde 72 (1932): 314-27;
117. Balasubrahmanian, "The Tisai Ayirattainūr + (Combining vertical line below)r + (Combining vertical line below)uvar";
118. F.M. Schnitger, The Archaeology of Hindoo Sumatra, supplement to Internationales Archiv für Ethnographie 35 (1937): 15;
119. and Indrapala, "Some Medieval Mercantile Communities".
120. Karashima ("Indian Commercial Activities", pp. 6-7) actually provides the first transcript and translation, made by Prof. Y. Subbarayalu of Tamil University. The version of the contents above derives from this reading.
121. "The Five Hundred of the Thousand Directions in All Countries", one of the branches of the Aiññur + (Combining vertical line below)r + (Combining vertical line below)uvar (Ayyāvol + (Combining dot below)e) merchant association. A number of inscriptions of the eleventh century in south India and Sri Lanka mention the Ain̄n̄ur + (Combining vertical line below)r + (Combining vertical line below)uvar (Ayyāvol + (Combining dot below)e) merchant association, and a few mention the Tiśaiyāyirattain̄n̄ūr + (Combining vertical line below)r + (Combining vertical line below)uva Nānādeśa group (Abraham, Two Medieval Merchant Guilds, pp. 186-98).
122. This term, which means "the settlement on the seashore", also appears in the eulogy to aiññūr + (Combining vertical line below)r + (Combining vertical line below)uvar in several inscriptions in south India. These eulogies generally state that the merchant group was involved in commerce in 18 pat + (Combining dot below)t + (Combining dot below)inam, 32 vēl + (Combining dot below)āpuram, and 64 kad + (Combining dot below)igaitāval + (Combining dot below)am (Karashima, "Indian Commercial Activities", p. 8). This vēl + (Combining dot below)āpitram enclave attached to Barus seems, thus, to have been a trading settlement of secondary rank; the main port at Barus, however, appears to have been classed as a pat + (Combining dot below)t + (Combining dot below)inam, a commercial centre of first rank. This accords with the international significance at the time of Barus, as a major camphor-exporting port.
123. The title nagara-sēnāpati also appears in the Telegu language inscription of about 1090 A.D., from Vishakhapatnam on the Andhra coast of south-eastern India, as that of the recipient, along with the padinet + (Combining dot below)t + (Combining dot below)u (18) bhūmi", of a grant from a merchant group (Abraham, Two Medieval Merchant Guilds, p. 196).
124. The term nagaram, in south India, referred to a commercial settlement dominated by merchants, but also containing artisans (Abraham, Two Medieval Merchant Guilds, ibid., p. 84).
125. The term sēnāpati was derived from Sanskrit and referred to a military commander; it also appears in numerous Southeast Asian inscriptions, mostly in local languages, including several in Sumatra and a larger number in Java. The personal name or designation of this commander of the commercial settlement is of particular interest, since it appears to connect him with the Nattukottai Chettiar merchant community, who later traced their ancestry back to the Ayyāvol + (Combining dot below)e association (Abraham, Two Medieval Merchant Guilds, ibid., p. 5).
126. The term marakkala-nāyan, used here, may be related to the term marakkāyar, which was attached to sea-faring Muslim merchants of both the Coromandel and Malabar coasts of south India in the fifteenth century (Karashima, "Indian Commercial Activities", p. 8).
127. Karashima (Indian Commercial Activities ibid., p. 8) suggests that this term might refer to the ship's owner; it may, however, have carried a meaning closer to the term tun + (Combining dot below)d + (Combining dot below)a, which appears in east Javanese inscriptions of the tenth and eleventh centuries, referring to the deck of a vessel, in connection with the classification of boats by size for tax purposes.
128. This word was adopted into Malay and Javanese vocabularies as a term either for the musk of the musk deer (Moschus moschiferus, Linn.) or of the Malay civet (Viverra tangalunga), which was somewhat different from the Indian civet (V. zibetha, Linn.), Malabar civet (Moschothera civetina, Blyth), and the true African civet (V. civetta, Schreber), all three of which were imported by the Chinese, via Southeast Asia, during this period (Wheatley, "Geographical Notes", p. 105).
129. South Indian merchant associations exported both deer musk and civet (Abraham, Two Medieval Mercantile Guilds, pp. 161, 172). It appears that, in the port of Barus, "entrance" fees were pegged to the value of the in-coming cargoes rather than that of the out-going cargoes of camphor.
130. Goitein, Letters of Medieval Jewish Traders, pp. 227-29.
131. B. Bronson, Basoeki, M. Suhadi and J. Wisseman, Laporan Penelitian Arkeologi di Sumatera (Jakarta: Pusat Penelitian Arkeologi Nasional, 1973), pp. 18-19. Samples of the glass and ceramics are held in the offices of the Pusat Penelitian Arkeologi Nasional, in Jakarta. One fragment of the kawi inscription is held by the Museum Nasional in Jakarta, while the other remains in the village of Lobo Tuwa.
132. Schnitger, Archaeology of Hindoe Sumatra, p. 15;
133. R.S. Wicks, Money, Markets and Trade in Early Southeast Asia: The Development of Indigenous Monetary Systems to AD 1400 (Ithaca: Cornell University Southeast Asia Program, 1992), fig. 7.3;
134. Christie, "Money and its uses", p. 246.
135. E.E. McKinnon, "Tamil Imagery in Northeast Sumatra", Oriental Art 40,3 (1994): 15-24;
136. and "Medieval Tamil Involvement in Northern Sumatra, cl1-cl4 (The Gold and Resin Trade)", Journal of the Malaysian Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society 69,1 (1996): 85.
137. This provisional transcription and translation has been made by L. Thyagarajan (P.Y. Manguin, personal communication, 29 Jan. 1996). Further work on the text may produce more information.
138. McKinnon, "Medieval Tamil Involvement".
139. E.E. McKinnon and Luckman Sinar, "A Note on Pulau Kompei in Aru Bay, Northeastern Sumatra", Indonesia 32 (1981): 49-73.
140. E.E. McKinnon, "Research at Kota Cina, a Sung-Yuan period trading site in East Sumatra", Archipel 14 (1977): 19-32;
141. and "Tamil Imagery"; John Miksic, "Classical Archaeology in Sumatra", Indonesia 30 (1980): 43-66.
142. H.F. Schurmann, Economic Structure of the Yüan Dynasty: Translation of Chapters 93 and 94 of the Yüan shih (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1967), p. 230.
143. John Guy, "The Lost Temples of Nagapattinam and Quanzhou: A Study in Sino-Indian Relations", Silk Road Art and Archaeology 3 (1993-94): 300.
144. Schurmann, Economic Structure, pp. 223-25.
145. Abraham, Two Medieval Merchant Guilds, p. 150.
146. M. Elvin, The Pattern of the Chinese Past: A Social and Economic Interpretation (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1973), p. 217.
147. Schurmann, Economic Structure, pp. 225-27.
148. R.E. Latham (trans.), The Travels of Marco Polo (Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1958), p. 237.
149. Schurmann, The Travels of Marco Polo ibid., p. 224.
150. Guy, "Lost Temples", p. 299.
151. Coedès, The Indianized States, pp. 198-201.
152. Latham, Marco Polo, p. 254.
153. Boechari, Prasasti Koleksi Museum Nasional, vol. 1 (Jakarta: Museum Nasional, 1985/86), pp. 164-68.
154. It was reported in Oudheidkundig Verslag 1912: 46, no. 39,
155. and in Notulen van het Bataviaasch Genootschap van Kunsten en Wetenschappen 1911: 128, 14e;
156. it was referred to by N.J. Krom, in Hindoe-Javaansch Geschiedenis (The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, 1931), p. 410,
157. but no transcription or translation has been published. See also J.G. de Casparis, "Peranan Adityawarman, Putera Melayu di Asia Tenggara", Tamadun Melayu 3 (1995): 933-64;
158. Satyawati Suleiman, The Archaeology and History of West Sumatra (Jakarta: Research Centre of Archaeology of Indonesia, 1977)
159. [Berita Pusat Penelitian Purbakala dan Peninggalan Nasional, no. 12, p. 5].
160. The stone is housed in the Museum Nasional in Jakarta, where it is numbered D 181, but now apparently lacks a record of its provenance. See P.V. van Stein Callenfels, "Rapport over een diensreis door een deel van Sumatra", Oudheidkundig Verslag (1920): 70, for the initial report of the find and its context;
161. see Karashima, "Indian Commercial Activities", p. 9,
162. for discussion of the content of the text in both languages, based partly upon a provisional reading by Sukarto K. Atmodjo. A provisional transcription of the Old Malay/Javanese-language portion of the text is presented by Edi Sedyawati, Ganeśa statuary of the Kad + (Combining dot below)iri and Singhasāri periods: A study of art history (Leiden: KITLV Press, 1994), p. 326, along with inscriptions on a number of Gan + (Combining dot below)eśa statues from east Java. The translation above is based on her transcription.
163. Edi Sedyawati, Gan + (Combining dot below)eśa statuary, p. 326.
164. Karashima, "Indian Commercial Activities", p. 9.
165. Callenfels ("Rapport over een dienreis", p. 70) read the date as 1167 Śaka (1245 A.D.),
166. but L.C. Damais later, in "Etudes d'Epigraphie Indonésienne III: Liste des Principales Inscriptions Datées de l'Indonésie", Bulletin de l'Ecole française d'Extrême-Orient 46,1 (1952): 100,
167. corrected it to 1135 Śaka (1213 A.D.); Karashima ("Indian Commercial Activities", p. 9), using the incomplete astronomical data given in the inscription, suggests three possible dates: 1187, 1258 or 1265 A.D., but on palaeographical grounds prefers the last two.
168. Since the term nagara appears here in the text written in Old Malay/Javanese, it may have been used in the Javanese manner (meaning "palace") rather than the Tamil manner (meaning "commercial centre"). Both meanings were later combined in the Malay term negri, derived from nagara, which referred to the port-capital of a Malay coastal trading state and, by extension, to the state as a whole. How early this fused meaning was adopted is unclear.
169. This title was the standard title accorded to kings of east Java from the eleventh century into the fourteenth century. The title is rendered as peritu śrī maharaja in the parallel Tamil text (Karashima, "Indian Commercial Activities", p. 9).
170. See Rumbi Mulia, The Ancient Kingdom of Panai and the Ruins of Padang Lawas. (Jakarta: Research Centre of Archaeology of Indonesia, 1980)
171. [Berita Pusat Penelitian Arkeologi Nasional, no. 14].
172. Latham, Marco Polo, pp. 255-56.
173. This inscribed base was found at Padang Rotjo, upstream from Sungai Langsat on the Batang Hari river, along with other remains of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, including the giant stone Bhairava statue that has been taken to be a portrait-statue of the mid-fourteenth century Sumatran ruler Ādityavarman. The relief statue of Amoghapāśia, to which the inscribed base was originally attached, was later moved to Rambahan, not far away, thus creating some confusion over the original provenance of the two pieces. See N.J. Krom, "Een Sumatraansche Inscriptie van Koning Kr + (Combining vertical line below)tanagara", Verslagen en Mededelingen der Koninklijk Akademie van Wetenschappen, afdeeling Letterkunde, Series 5, volume II (1916): 306-339;
174. Ferrand, L'Empire Sumatranais, pp. 179-81;
175. A.J. Bernet Kempers, Ancient Indonesian Art (Amsterdam: C.P.J. van Peet, 1959), pp. 87-88.
176. J.G. de Casparis, Indonesian Palaeography: A history of writing in Indonesia from the beginnings to c. A.D. 1500 (Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1975), p. 57.
177. Bernet Kempers, Ancient Indonesian Art, pp. 84-88;
178. Pigeaud, Java in the 14th Century, vol. III, p. 47.
179. Coedès, Recueil des Inscriptions du Siam, inscription xxix;
180. Karashima, "Indian Commercial Activities", p. 9.
181. Karashima, "Indian Commercial Activities", p. 9.
182. O'Connor, Hindu Gods, figs. 32-34.
183. E. Hultzsch, "A Vaishnava Inscription at Pagan", Epigraphia Indica 7 (1902-1903): 197-98.
184. Abraham, Two Medieval Merchant Guilds, pp. 232-33.
185. Jean Filliozat, "Research in South-East Asia and the Far East", Tamil Culture 12 (1966): 115;
186. Guy, "Lost Temples", p. 296.
187. Guy, "Lost Temples", p. 298.
188. T.N. Subramaniam, "A Tamil Colony in Medieval China", in South Indian Studies, ed. R. Nagaswamy (Madras: Society for Archaeological, Historical and Epigraphical Studies, 1978), p. 8.
189. Latham, Marco Polo, p. 237.
190. Javanese inscriptions indicate that tax farming involving mixed groups of foreign and local merchants was common in the Brantas delta by the eleventh century. None of these groups - which were labelled ban + (Combining dot below)igrāma by the Javanese courts - was exclusively south Indian in composition, and none of them acted extraterritorially. The composition of these tax-farming groups of merchants shifted over time (most significantly to include Chinese members after the twelfth century), and although Indian merchants were always included, these Javanese tax arrangements long outlasted the heyday of both the Chola empire and the south Indian merchant associations - and they outlived many individual Javanese states. See Christie, "Ban + (Combining dot below)igrāma"
191. and Jan Wisseman Christie, "Javanese markets and the Asian sea trade boom of the tenth to thirteenth centuries A.D.", Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient 41,3 (1998).