How Boni Became Borneo Became Brunei

Abstract

In the discussions about the location of Boni reported in Chinese sources, Brunei, on the northwest coast of Borneo, has been a favourite of writers for a long time. Even though there are alternative views about the correct identification of Boni, Brunei as Boni has been the focus of scholarly attention since the 1970s. This Brunei-Boni identification is possibly a consequence of the influence of English-language studies that possessed a more ready and larger readership than publications in Chinese or French. In this connection, I shall demonstrate how writers have interpreted translations of pre-modern Chinese sources as well as secondary literature to establish a history of Brunei via Boni that extends back to the tenth century ce. Brunei was only given a specific Chinese designation in the sixteenth century, namely Wenlai. The existence of a Malay Muslim sultanate there that was implied by contemporary European sources cannot be verified with the relevant contemporary Chinese sources. In the tenth century until at least the fourteenth century, by contrast, Boni denoted a location in western Borneo, opposite the island of Java. The basis for this suggestion is a careful reading of the original sources as well as the sinological scholarship and a critique of previous works.