To: MCOBA-MALAYSIA
Sent: Saturday, February 05, 2005 6:36 AM
Subject: Tie-in with tsunamic history RE: Lost City Believed Found in Malay Peninsula
Terima kasih for mentioning me, Sdr Rosli. [Rosli's message underneath]
It's okay, Raimy is also a friend of mine whom I knew thru my Heritage Asia mag, and he had given me a personal briefing on this exciting find.
Raimy is a wonderful guy, very proactive and I'm proud to know him and to know that there is a Malay like him, even though I myself am not ethnically Malay :-) (In fact, Raimy is also mixed blood...)
I was also interviewed by The Star, and I gave my opinion as outlined below:
There are of course skeptics who say among other arguments against this find, that "How and why should any ancient city in the Malay Peninsula be found far inland? They should be along the coasts like all other traditional settlements including Melaka."
I think I can help give a better historic background on this.
The Malay Archipelago has always been geologically active - the recent end-2004 tsunami being a painful case in point. We know that in 1883, Krakatau in the Sunda strait exploded and sent worse tsunamis then.
But what's less known is that in the 6th century AD an even more powerful volcanic explosion in the same Sunda strait was so terrible that it is believed to be the mother of all disasters, which sank and severed the land connection between Java and Sumatra, creating separate islands.
At that time there were several maritime cultures around Southeast Asia, the nearest being the Pasemah culture in southern Sumatra and Tarumanagara in western Java. The resulting volcanic quakes and tsunamis pretty much wiped out many of these cultures. In their place, new kingdoms such as Srivijaya emerged and encompassed the Malay Peninsular by the 7th-8th centuries and others beyond. [There are also old Chinese records regarding these events.]
The memory of catastrophic destruction by those 6th century tsunamis and worse the sinking of land into the sea was so great that for many centuries the trauma persisted and, with port exceptions, people felt safer to build major cities much further inland. Thus it was so with 8th century Borobudur and Prambanan in central Java and later, Angkor Wat, all of which are in hinterland jungle areas.
In contrast, the great Melaka port was founded later in the 14th century when the memory of the seaborne disasters were dimmed.
Thus it would be no surprise to find a city like Kota Gelanggi which long predates Melaka being built far inland, safer from the tsunamic ravages of the sea.
Another factor for Kota Gelanggi’s inland site is that it would be on the legendary Jalan Penarik where travelers and their perahu would go up the Muar River to Kota Gelanggi and then pull their boats a short distance to reach the Pahang River and reach the other side of the Malay Peninsula.
There is even a legend that Sungai Pahang once emptied into the Straits of Malacca, not as it currently does into the Bunguran Sea (now known as South China Sea).
All the above would explain why an important inland city like Kota Gelanggi could exist in the Muar River's hinterlands of Johor.
-nadge-
At 03:50 AM 2/5/05 +0800, Rosli Mohd. Ali wrote:
Faisal,
I had met this Raimy Che-Ross, a Johor born. In fact he came to present us this paper, after doing so with the Museum and Antiquities Department, seeking opinion and support, assistance, even funding for expanding the matter pursued.
Too bad our friend, A. Najib Ariffin (Nadge), could not attend the presentation when it was held together with the Past Presidents of Pertubuhan Arkitek Malaysia (PAM) and the current Heritage Sub-Committee Members, last year in2004.
Raimy has been doing Ph.D at the Australian National University (ANU) in Canberra, Australia, where the current Department of Museum and Antiquities director-general Datuk Adi Taha did his. Raimy's research is wholly based on old manuscripts that he had collected and/or read.
All I can disclose for now is that the location he pinpointed is aligned towards two main waterways connecting east and west of the Malay Peninsula, that was believed to be the inland routel - and is currently also, a place of high surveillance for some other reasons that he could not disclose, until such finding is certain.
Real or not, only time will tell.
Rosli Ali
Class of 69
(The class that St Bul rejects.)
----Original Message Follows----
From: faizal.aziz
To: mckk-comnet@yahoogroups.com ; mcoba7680@yahoogroups.com ; MCOB_UK-Eire@yahoogroups.com ; sejarah-melayu@yahoogroups.com ; Hulaimi
Sent: Thursday, February 03, 2005 11:43 PM
Subject: [MCOB_UK-Eire] Lost City Believed Found in Malay Peninsula
Guys
Is this for real?
http://islamonline.net/English/News/2005-02/03/article04.shtml
Lost City Believed Found in Malay Peninsula
CAIRO, February 3 (IslamOnline.net) - A 1,000-year-old lost city, possibly older than Angkor Wat in Cambodia and Borobudur in Indonesia, is believed to have been located in the dense jungles of Johor, Malaysia, a discovery that may set to transform the historical landscape of the Asian region, according to a leading daily Thursday, February 3.
The discovery of what is thought to be the site of Kota Gelanggi or Perbendaharaan Permata (Treasury of Jewels) by an independent Malaysian researcher has prompted museum officials to plan an expedition to confirm the finding, The Star online said.
If indeed the site is that of the lost city, it is set to transform the historical landscape of the region, the paper quoted as saying Raimy Che-Ross, who spent 12 years researching Malay manuscripts all over the world and conducting aerial searches of the area before locating the site.
The discovery of unusual formations from the air had led him to believe that the site could be the first capital of the Srivijaya Malay Empire dating back to 650AD, he said.
If the city is what we suspect it to be, then the 14th century Malacca Sultanate can no longer be considered as the start of modern Malaysian history.
Once verified, the honour will go to Johor, as one thousand years ago Malacca had not even been established, he told the paper.
Raimy had tried to enter the site in early 2003 but failed, managing to get only as far as to the formations which are believed to be trenches and embankments of the outer city, the paper said.
Expedition
Department of Museum and Antiquities Director-General Datuk Adi Taha said an archaeological expedition would be mounted this year to verify the location of the lost city, with Raimy’s assistance, said The Star. Funds for the expedition would be sought under the 9th Malaysia Plan.
Adi told the paper he and the Department were very enthusiastic about Raimy’s research findings and would work with him to verify the location of the lost city, which could be spread out over a few hundred square kilometres.
It was an old Malay manuscript once owned by Sir Stamford Raffles, the founder of Singapore, in a London library that led Raimy to the existence of the lost city in Johor, the paper revealed.
According to Raimy, the presence of a lost city in the jungles at the southern end of the Malay Peninsula had been indicated in Malayan folklore for over four centuries.
Manuscripts, Tales
His findings on the lost city have been published in the latest issue of the Journal of the Malaysian Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society 2004. In his paper, he said the place was raided by the Indian-Chola conqueror Raja Rajendra Cholavarman I, of the South Indian Chola Dynasty in 1025 AD.
The ruins could be as old as Borobodur, and definitely pre-date the later Angkor Wat, Raimy told the Star, adding that aerial photographs taken over the site and tales from the Orang Asli aboriginal jungle dwellers had indicated the existence of structures.
“From the air I could see formations which looked like a set of double-walls, protecting the inner city. I have verified all the information by reviewing and reassessing old colonial records and travellers tales.”
Information on Kota Gelanggi appears in the Sejarah Melayu (Malay Annals) a 16th century book which was edited and revised by Tun Seri Lanang, the Bendahara (equivalent to the Prime Minister of a sultanate) of the Royal Court of Johor in 1612 AD, the paper said.
The manuscript narrated an account of the devastating raids by Raja Rajendra Cholavarman I, who after destroying the city of Gangga Negara (now Beruas in lower Perak) turned his attention to Kota Gelanggi.
Raimy told the paper he did not expect to find in Kota Gelanggi structures similar to Angkor Wat, as the lost city in Johor was much older [and thus may be different from the Hindu and later Buddhist influence on Angkor Wat – Najib].
“We can expect to find simple granite and brick structures, walls, buildings and possibly undisturbed tombs. Based on the data I have collected and consultations with archaeologists over the years, it is believed that Kota Gelanggi in Johor, which some scholars believe to be what the Chinese called the kingdom of Lo-Yue [possibly short for ‘Melayu’], was also the first centre of trade for Srivijaya.”
It was possibly in Johor that the contemporary Malay civilisation was born. The Srivijaya site in nearby Palembang, Indonesia has artefacts which date back to roughly the same period.
There could be a wealth of information derived from this city. It is known that official Japanese records note that an Imperial Prince of Japan, Prince Takaoka (born 799AD), who became a monk renamed Shinnyo Hosshinno, met his death in Lo-Yue reportedly after being attacked by a tiger. Perhaps he was on his way here, en route to India.
This is understandable as Raimy said that while its main activity was a trading, Kota Gelanggi was also a centre of sacred learning. Hindu and Buddhist statues and figurines may exist but what he hopes to find are epigraphic inscriptions (writings on granite).
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