The Kingdom of Perak

Abstract

The Kingdom of Perak J. E. de la Croix1 Editor's Note. This article was originally published in the Bulletin de la Société de géographie in 1883 (Vol 4, 7th Series) under the title 'Le Royaume de Pérak' (pp. 333–52). The author, John Errington de la Croix (1848–1905), was a French mining engineer and explorer who first visited Perak in 1880–81. He made a second visit in 1882, resided in the Malay Peninsula from 1883–85, and returned a final time in 1886. Colin Dyer (School of Languages and Culture, University of Queensland) prepared the translation. The Text Historical. Geographic and political situation Since time immemorial, the stories of travellers have celebrated the metallic riches of Malaya. Historians of long-ago speak of an active commerce long before the Christian era between the peoples of the Indies and countries in the West, Arabia, Egypt, Greece, etc. Sacred history shows us King Solomon's fleets leaving Port Aziongaber,2 in the Red Sea, for the country of Ophir, from where they returned, after a voyage of three years, laden with gold, silver, ivory, scented woods and other rare products which could only be found in the islands of the southern Indies. Knowledgeable commentators have placed this Eldorado in the island of Sumatra, formerly known as the island of Gold [île d'Or], and some modern travellers have, from these very sources, gathered legends which would seem to give a certain weight to this opinion. A Portuguese navigator Fernand Mendez Pinto who, in 1537, explored the Sunda archipelago, tells us, in speaking of Sumatra:3 'The inhabitants assert that their chronicles say that in this very town of Lampong4 there was once a committee of merchants established by the Queen of Sheba. She had, some maintain, a benefactor named Nautem who sent her a large quantity of gold which she later brought to the temple of Jerusalem when she went there to see King Solomon.' [End Page 169] The peninsula of Malacca was just as well-known and no less well provisioned from the point of view of mineral wealth, because we see it in the geographies of Strabon and Ptolemy under the very significant name of Chersonèse d'Or.5 The peninsula's commercial relations with the West grew continuously with the progress of navigation and, already at the end of the 16th century, travellers describe Malacca as the most important centre of the transgangétique [sic]6 Indies. The Dutchman Jean Hugues de Linschott [Linschoten] tells us in fact in his accounts: 'Every year from Portugal a ship is sent (to Malacca) one month before the others who go to the Indies, and comes straight to Malacca to receive its load, which it brings back richer than any other ships.'7 Among all the metallic products, gold and tin were the most important commercially. Tin, which interests us most here, seems to have been particularly exploited in the kingdom of Perak. All travellers, indeed, are unanimous on this point. The one we have just quoted, J.-H. de Linschott, tells us in his chapter XVI: '…From Queda,8 continuing along the same coast to the south-south-east for about 40 leagues,9 there is the town of Péra [sic] under the 4th degree and a half. There one finds a quantity of calaëm,10 which is like tin….' A few years later, at the beginning of the 16th century, a mixed-blood Portuguese, Manuel Godinto de Eredia, who came from Goa to Malacca as an official descobridor (explorer) of Portugal's Malayan possessions, confirmed Linschott and provides us with very interesting details11 about the peninsula's minerology. 'The land of Viontona,12 he says in his notes, 'produces (besides gold) silver, mercury, calem, tin and great quantities of iron. Gold is found in grains or dust in the matte [sic] mines. By washing the matte minerals in the river, one can separate the matte and collect the gold. There is also gold in the mines of red sand, like those at Gelé, in the Kingdom of Pam.'13 [End Page 170] Godinho de Eredia adds, a little...