CONTENTS

Dari Meja Pengarang

Wang Gungwu

/M alaysia's Social History

JFhe Federation of 1896: Its Origin

Khoo Kay Kim

Prelude to the British Forward

/?. Sankaran

Movement of 1909

A. J. S. Reid

A Russian in Kelantan?
Documents
Biography
Short Notes

am m ed

INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS HISTORY

Un iv e r sit y of m a la ya
til ALA LTJMPUR.

Book Reviews

PERPUSTAKAAN AWAM NEGERI

TERENGGANU

0002271320

Vol. 1 No. 2
December, 1966

UNIVERSITY

OF

MALAYA

PRESS

For a good number of years the University of Malaya

Press has been publishing books of scholastic value
written by local and expatriate authors. The well-pro
duced books so far published have gained international
repute and have often been quoted by well-known
scholars. This is the eleventh year of publishing. Many
more are to come. The role of the University Press
fills the need of a non-profit making local establishment
which sets itself the task of publishing books which are
pioneers in the field of scholarship. Above is an
illustration of the new crest of the University Press
which will appear in all future University of Malaya
Press books. When you see it on any bock, you may
be sure it is a quality book.
Write to the University of Malaya Press, P.O. Box
282, Kuala Lumpur for free catalogue.

KOLEKSI PERCBa DI

Prof. D ato Mohamad B in Abu Baka^

t r ip l e

crown

club

We are advertising Oxford

Not Oxford w ith her dreaming spires, she needs
not June for beauty's heightening, but Oxford University Press
Nor are we
advertising Oxford Bibles or Dictionaries we sell a lot of these a lre a d y or
books on bread-making, the Mon dialects or the Gond Village
We are trying
to persuade teachers of History to join a Books Club w hich offers tw o books
every month to members
We are not trying to get rid of overstocks the
books selected are new books (Made available to Book Club Members before
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We are not trying to force members
to buy more books for their coffee-tables
If they have small coffee-tables,
they need buy only four books a year
Between January and June we shall
offer new books w hich include BEGBIE The M a l a y a n Peninsular,
MILLS
British M a la y a 1 8 2 4 -6 7
ROFF S w e t t e n h a m S tories and Sketches
LIM
CHONG YAH E conom ic D e v e l o p m e n t
of M odern Malaya
R A T N A M M a l a y a n P a r l i m e n t a r y Elections
HUNTER S o u t h - E a s t Asia,
Race C u l t u r e and S o c ie t y
These books will be sent to members post
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may be used towards payment for any book published by Oxford University
Press and its agencies; a monthly newsletter and each quarter, a copy of
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Please enrol me as a member of the Triple Crown Club. I agree to buy

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PENINJAU

SEJARAH

JOURNAL OF THE HISTORY TEACHERS' ASSOCIATION OF MALAYA

Vol. 1 No 2.

DECEMBER, 1966
Contents

Dari Meja Pengarang

Malaysias Social History
Wang Gungwu
The Federation of 1896: Its Origin
Khoo Kay Kim.
Prelude to the British Forward Movement of 1909
R. Sankaran
A Russian in Kelantan?
A . J. S. Reid
D o c u m e n t s : The Naning Treaty of 1801
Biography: Raja Mahdi bin Raja Sulaiman
Mohd. Amin Hassan
The Life and Times of Hj. Othman Abdullah
William R. Roff
S hort N otes:
About 19th Century Selangor
B o o k R eviews :
The Constitution of Malaysia
Harry E. Groves
South East Asia: A Short History
Brian Harrison
The Cultural Background of the Peoples of Malaya
N. J. Ryan
Primary History for Malayans
M.A. Mallal and Seow Ban Yam
A textbook of Modern European History
George W. Southgate

1
6
24
42
48
53
62
69
76
79
80
82
85

The Editorial Board wish it to be understood that the statements and opinions expressed
by contributors do not necessarily represent those of the Editorial Board or the Association.

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DARI MEJA PENGARANG

Keluaran pertama Peninjau Sejarah telah pun menjelang para peminat lebeh
kurang tiga bulan yang lalu. Di-dalam-nya kami telah meminta perhatian, ulasan,
tegoran, dan sumbangan dari segi makalah atau pun chatitan. Malang-nya, hingga
kini, maseh belom lagi kami menerima apa2 pandangan pun dari pembacha.
Sa-bagai yang telah di-tegaskan di-dalam majallah itu bahawa satu2-nya
tujuan mengeluarkan Peninjau Sejarah ia-lah untok memberi peluang kapada orang2
yang berminat dalam soal sejarah, terutama guru2 di-sekolah, menulis dan menyalorkan buah fikiran dan pendapat mereka berkenaan dengan sejarah, menerusi
Peninjau.
Makalah2, berita2 berkenaan dengan peristiwa2 dan tempat2 yang bersejarah,
pengkajian dan pengajaran sejarah, semua ini ada-lah sesuai menjadi bahan sum
bangan. Berita tentang ada-nya bahan2 sejarah, saperti naskhah2 lama, juga akan
menerima sambutan; kerana naskhah2 tempatan ini sangat-lah mustahak buat
membolehkan satu nilaian yang penoh terhadap sejarah Tanah Ayer kita. Dimasa2 yang lampau kita telah terlalu kuat bersandar kapada bahan2 dalam bahasa
Inggeris. Ini ada-lah satu keadaan yang tidak boleh kita biarkan berleluasan.
Oleh itu, gunakan-lah peluang2 yang di-kemukakan oleh Peninjau ini, baik
dari segi minat atau pun perasaan tanggong-jawab yang berkehendakan sejarah
Malaysia di-nilai dari segala segi dengan sa-penoh2-nya, tidak berat sa-belah dan
berasaskan kebenaran.
Kerjasama dari peminat2 sejarah sangat di-perlui, dan kami harap rayuan
ini akan mendapat sambutan yang memuaskan, untok kepentingan kita bersama.
Z a in a l A b id in b i n A b d u l W a h id

By gad sir, I heard a roar!

But never in all my tiger-bagging days did I hear one from a car. Could
be that new power-formula gasoline 1 filled up with. Supposed to put a tiger in
my tank. Rather incredible, what? But blast my buttons, sir, I distinctly heard
a roar!

New Power-Formula Esso Extra gasoline boosts power three ways . . . Cleaning
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Happy Motoring

MALAYSIAS SOCIAL HISTORY

by

W ang

G ungwu

Department of History, University of Malaya.

Great historians in the past have done their best work on w a rs a n d the adninistration of affairs. The excitement of leadership, of courage, of skill in
ruling and controlling people have been the historians most important themes.
The flow of events have intrigued them because many of the events have, in their
eyes, changed the course of history. When events are as spectacular as that, it
is no wonder that the historians main efforts have been to explain them and place
them in perspective.
This has also been true of the history so far written of our own country. A
great deal has been written about the political struggles and their diplomatic back
ground and about the administrative, constitutional and economic developments
under colonial rule. There are good reasons for this. Apart from their intrinsic
interest, such subjects are also part of the special experiences of most of the his
torians themselves, especially those who have served long years with the colonial
regime before 1957. The efforts have been commendable in many cases, but
a great deal more is now known, methods of research are now better and we can
expect many of the earlier works to be eventually superceded by better, more schol
arly and accurate works.
This, of course, is not all that we have to do. There are new approaches,
new dimensions in our history which few of the historians in the past could have
appreciated. In particular, there are the aspects of our history covering the growth
of a Malaysian society. For this, we not only have to know the political and eco
nomic framework in which the society emerged, but also the nature of the diff
erent communities who have their homes here. It is not enough, therefore, to
pursue the subject in terms of political decisions and economic determinants.
We must take into account the organisation of society, its religion and culture,
its capacity for social change and social mobility. In short, we need a social history.
There have been attempts to write some kind of social history in the past.
Certainly the ethnographers and the travellers have left us fascinating accounts
of our society. In more recent years, several well-known scholars have written
on the social and cultural history of the Malays and the Chinese. Some of their
works have been well received abroad as pioneers in the field and much of what
they have written can still be useful for new advances to be made. The fact re#Text of a talk given on Television Malaysia on 2nd June 1966.

mains, however, that many of them lacked objectivity and were unable to avoid
being unconsciously patronising towards the people they described.
Similarly, many of the books written in Malay about Malay socicty and many
of those written in Chinese about Chinese society, for example, also lack objec
tivity. In many cases, thev are defensive and apologetic and some are even less
objective than the works of foreign scholars.
The time has now come for us to go further than apologia and communal
pride, however understandable they were under colonial conditions. As people
of an independent country, we should now learn of our emergence as a plural
society, a multi-racial society, the historical roots of which date back several hun
dred years. Let us be clear how it all began from aboriginal society to Malay
settlements on the river-banks and along the coast, from the increasingly cosmo
politan centres like Malacca and Kedah, from the new stocks of Malayo-Polynesian
peoples, the Javanese, the Bugis, the Minangkabau, the Achenese, the Rawa and
Mandelings to the coming of Indians, Arabs, Chinese, Europeans, Eurasians. It
was a long process of acculturation and assimilation of all those who were content
to stay and make their homes here. It is a process far from complete and one
which now faces new challenges, new tensions and subtleties, and also new poss
ibilities.
I think everyone in the country senses the challenges and the new possibilities.
But few are able to recognise the origins of these challenges and the w^ys they
have developed to our present stage of history. This is why social history has a
growing significance; because we need to know the nature of the ingredients that
have gone into the making of the Society in which we now live.
Let us try to see what we already know of our social history. We have al
ready a number of key studies of Malay society, of adat law and the structure of
power, of social stratification and mobility and, in particular, of the role of Islam
among the various Malay communities. Most of the studies have been made by
cultural and social anthropologists, by political scientists, by linguists and by stu
dents of religion and what the Europeans call orientalists. Until very recently,
no major study has been made by a historian.
A few studies about the other communities are also mainly the works of anthro
pologists and sociologists. The subjects have included the study of immigration,
labour, secret societies, communal organisations, religion and festivals, and various
aspects of education and cultural life. Again, only a few historians have been
able to contribute towards this rich field.
Two points can be made immediately. There has not developed the history
which deals with the ordinary lives of people from all ranks of society. This is
the history which highlights the family, the home, love and marriage, festivals
and celebrations, song and dance and other forms of entertainment, arts and crafts

and literature and other types of self-expression. It takes in the peoples faith,
their customary codes of behaviour, their rewards and punishments, their concepts
of philanthropy and welfare, their attitudes towards health and medicine and their
ideas about their duties and their rights. For this kind of social history, a great
deal is already known and may be found scattered in many books and journals,
monographs and pamphlets, and a great deal more remains to be investigated in
old records. But our knowledge is very fragmentary and previous writings have
been more the results of antiquarian curiosity than of sustained historical research.
There was no vision of continuity and change, no attempt to see our communities
as a whole. All the findings are still raw data for the social historian to use.
The second point is somewhat different and refers to the approach of the
historian and the methods he uses rather than to the data and the raw materials
available. Here, what the historian today is forced to admit is his growing debt
to the social sciences. Beginning with his debt to economics he is now a beneficiary of all the work that is being done by social anthropologists, sociologists and
social psychologists. He benefits in two important ways. He benefits immediately
by the new methods of research developed, the new kinds of questions asked about
social forces in history and a new approach even towards the historians traditional
concern, that is, wars and the administration of affairs. But not only that.
The historian of the future will benefit from some of the keen and imaginative
analyses of our present societies already produced by the social scientists. Their
works, their interpretations of data collected today, will serve as the raw materials
for the next generation of historians only, of course, if the new generation of
historians knows how to use them.
#

The two points that I have made are really closely related. On the one hand,
we await a social history which pulls together all the different strands of know
ledge we have and will have and, on the other, we are becoming more conscious
of social forces in history and are improving our techniques of understanding
them. Let me now come back to our countrys social history. What are some
of the things we can do? What is now being done?
There are three main fields of researcn activity among the social historians
of our country today. Firstly, in the fields of social stratification and mobility;
secondly, in the field of education; and thirdly, in the field of social cohesion,
dealing with the organisations which have enriched the cultural life of different
communities. All three kinds of research touch on one another and depend a
great deal on cooperation among the scholars concerned.
The first field, that of social stratification and mobility, owes most to the social
scientists. Here the historian is concerned with the traditional structure of
society, the rulers and the ruled, the sources of authority at all levels, the diff
erent classes and their given places in the community and so on. He is interested,
among other things, in what the traditional rajas expected from their subjects and
what the early peasantry owed to their chiefs and landlords. He notes the sig-