London has been the scene recently of an exhibition of antiquities from Brunei, held at the Brunei Gallery of the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), University of London, from 16 January to 22 March. The objects on display, loaned to SOAS by the Museums Department of the Sultanate of Brunei Darussalam, underline Brunei’s long relationships with its neighbours in East Asia and with the Middle East via one of the most ancient seaborne trading systems in the world, the Indian Ocean. An accompanying Catalogue of Artefacts from The Islamic Sultanate of Brunei: Past and Present Culture, by Pengiran Dr Karim bin Pengiran Haji Osman and Hanaspi bin Haji Maidin, reiinforces the point,
The origin of the Sultanate of Brunei as an Islamic state is a direct consequence of the spread of Islam across the Indian Ocean and into the China Sea. The royal family of Brunei in its own ancestry reflects this process. The family originates in southwest Arabia on the ‘Asîr/Yemen borderlands and, like so many other Muslims from southern Arabia, the ancestors of the present ruler, HM Sultan Hajji Hassanal Bolkiah Mu‘izzaddin Waddaulah, were among those who spread Islam gradually around the coasts of Southeast Asia and China as a consequence of trade. The present Sultan is the 29th of his lineage and his family has ruled Brunei since the 14th century CE.
The exhibition included items from the Royal Regalia of the Sultanate of Brunei, finds from Brunei’s most important archaeological excavation, and items reflecting Brunei’s social customs. The Royal Regalia emanate from the indigenous traditions of Southeast Asia and reflect Brunei’s complex system of hierarchy and aristocratic ranking and titles.
Other objects displayed in the exhibition included finds from the remarkable archaeological site of Sungai Limau Manis made during the dredging of the Limau Manis River. This site is the most important ever discovered in the country and it echoes the account of 1225 CE by Zhao Rukuo, Inspector General of Foreign Trade at Quangzhou in Fujian, China, who described P’o-ni (Brunei) as an important harbour which was administered by officials who were well disciplined and ran the harbour in a manner like that used in China. The site of Sungai Limau Manis appears to be that mentioned by Zhao Rukuo and it only declined when it was replaced by Kota Batu, which subsequently became the capital of Brunei and a major settlement and trade centre in its own right.
Kampong Limau Manis is located approximately 22 km from Bandar Seri Begawan on the banks of the Limau Manis River, a tributary of the Brunei River. The Sungai Limau Manis site proved to be extremely rich in finds and it is the most important archaeological discovery in the Sultanate to date and more significant than Kota Batu (identified in the 1950s), Sungai Lumut (found in 1968), Terusan Kupang (found in 1974) or the Brunei Shipwreck (discovered in 1997).
Brunei’s importance as a major place of trade in the past is confirmed by the Sungai Limau Manis excavation, for it has produced a vast amount of archaeological material. mainly dating from the 10th to 13th century CE and with some material from as late as the Ming and the Qing periods, although by that point the site seems to have been declining as it was supplanted by Kota Batu.
The Sungai Limau Manis site was discovered during the widening and deepening of the Limau Manis River in October, 2002 and archaeological investigation by Brunei Museums Archaeological Section began immediately. Rivers in Brunei have constituted a principal means of communication since ancient times and the Sungai Limau Manis site is a part of one of these old riverine systems of trade.
The excavation revealed the remains of boats and a large and diverse number of artefacts reflecting the wide range of trade items that passed through Sungai Limau Manis. These included Chinese coins, beads, bronze bangles, wooden mortars, iron slag and crucibles as well as large quantities of pottery.
The greater part of the finds were ceramics imported from Chinese kilns from the Song through to the Yuan period (10th -14th CE). A smaller number of Ming and Qing blue and white porcelains (i.e., post-14th C. CE) were also found as well as ceramics from Thai and Vietnamese kilns. In total 50,000 ceramic sherds were recovered at Sungai Limau Manis, some of which are nearly complete and of very high quality.
An important find recovered during the excavations included a gold honorific leaf. It was used as a wrap for some precious presentational gift, perhaps sent in terms of a diplomatic exchange. It bears several Chinese inscriptions: one in the centre and four at the corners. The inscriptions are written in the archaic style and are stamped on the thin gold leaf. The central inscription indicates some personal (or dynastic) names and it is dated to the 12th century CE.
The Sungai Limau Manis artefacts are important new evidence of the sea trade between China and Brunei in the early mediaeval period and also with the mainland of South-east Asia and with ports far further west, around the coasts of the Indian Ocean.
Chinese junks could not enter the Limau Manis River and it appears that the large junks would drop anchor at the river mouth and off-load their cargoes onto smaller boats to carry goods to shore. This interpretation is supported by the discovery of the remains of small local boats during the excavation. These were made with wooden dowels which are typical of the boat-building technology of the region.
The quantification of the dated ceramics excavated at Sungai Limau Manis is of great significance for establishing the rise of the place as a trading centre. Pengiran Dr Karim bin Pengiran Haji Osman and Hanaspi bin Haji Maidin of Brunei Museums in the Catalogue that they prepared for the exhibition point out that there are very small amounts of pre-10th ceramics, a fact which they attribute to the great distance away from Brunei of the kilns where these northern wares were made. They also suggest that the sea-trade that involved Brunei did not start until the Southern Song period (12th-13th century CE).
The large numbers of Longquan celadon sherds and the still greater numbers of sherds from the kilns at Fujian and Guangdong found at Sungai Limau Manis is impressive. Such wares were specifically made for foreign markets as kitchen wares which accounts for the very large quantities which were found at the excavations. Thereafter, smaller quantities of Ming wares were imported. Cumulatively this archaeological evidence demonstrates the active participation of Brunei in international trade through the port of Sungai Limau Manis in the 12th-13th centuries CE, confirming the account of P’o-ni (Brunei) by the Chinese port official, Zhao Rukuo.
Chinese cash currency from the excavations displayed at SOAS was especially interesting as it demonstrated the circulation of Northern Song money despite the paucity of Northern Song ceramics found at the site. This might indicate the continued use of the Northern Song cash into later times or the survival of a horde.
The port of Sungai Limau Manis is an important addition to the list of major Indian Ocean archaeological sites that participated in trade and the range of wares and their dating must be put into context of surveys and excavations as far afield as India, Sri Lanka, the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, Somaliland, the Swahili coast of east Africa and even Zimbabwe, all recipients of goods that travelled from China to Brunei and so many other places on the routes to the Middle East and Africa, to form a vast network of international trade in the pre-colonial period.
Other objects loaned to SOAS by Brunei Museums for exhibition provide evidence of a sophisticated local metal-smelting tradition in Brunei which appears to date back to at least the 13th century CE, when drums and musical instruments made of bronze are recorded as being used there. In subsequent centuries, locally manufactured bronze vessels for cooking and storage were exported from Brunei across the whole island of Borneo and into the interior where they were highly valued for their rarity and the prestige that ownership conferred. The raw materials of copper and tin were apparently imported from China.
This metal smelting tradition of Brunei in later times provided the basis of a sophisticated capacity to manufacture cannons which was already well established by 1521 CE when a European visitor to Brunei recorded a large number of brass and iron cannons that stood in front of the Sultan’s palace. The cannons of Brunei were reckoned to have been better made than any others produced in the region.
This capacity to manufacture artillery was reflected in the SOAS exhibition in an interesting collection of miniature cannons, known as bedils with barrels shaped as crocodiles, dragons and buffaloes. These miniature artillery pieces were used as gifts and constituted a form of regalia, reflecting both Brunei’s history of full-scale cannon manufacture and its highly developed system of aristocratic ritual expressed in the tradition of displaying the regalia of princes.
The exhibition of these objects and archaological material from Brunei Museums has been very apt in its timing as a reminder of the long-standing international trade between the Far East and the Middle East via Brunei and other ports. It also coincides with the growing realisation of the importance of these ancient links that are re-emerging in the globalisation of the present.
Alongside all of these interlinking trade networks that passed through Brunei was the binding issue of Islam and the annual flow of pilgrims from Southeast Asia who made the hajj to Makka al-Mukarrima along the same sea-routes as merchant shipping used. Both the recent archaeological discoveries shown in the Brunei Museums exhibition at SOAS and the hajj connection with Brunei and Southeast Asia more broadly underline the importance in Brunei’s Islamic history of its relationship with the Indian Ocean sea routes and the Holy Haramayn Cities of the Hijâz.
With the ending of the exhibition, items representing the cultural and traditional crafts of Brunei were kindly donated as gifts by the Sultanate of Brunei Darussalam to be added to SOAS’s permanent collection which is on display in the Brunei Gallery, SOAS, University of London.
Authors/Contributors to this article:
- Geoffrey King, PhD, is Reader in Islamic Art and Archaeology. SOAS, University of London
- Wang Tao, PhD, is Senior Lecturer in Chinese Archaeology, SOAS, University of London
- John Hollingworth is Exhibitions Officer, Brunei Gallery, University of London
- P G Dr Karim bin Pengiran Haji Osman is Curator of the exhibition
- Elizabeth Moore, PhD, is Head, Department of Art and Archaeology, SOAS, University of London
