VII.] THE OCEANIC MONGOLS. 231 



sense, to most of the insular peoples from Madagascar to Easter 

 Island, and from Hawaii to New Zealand. It is now of course 

 too late to hope to remedy this misuse of terms by proposing 

 a fresh nomenclature. But much of the consequent confusion 

 will be avoided by restricting Malayo-Polynesian* altogether to 

 linguistic matters, and carefully distinguishing between Indonesian, 

 the pre-Malay Caucasic element in Oceania, Malayan or Proto- 

 Malayan, collective name of all the Oceanic Mongols, and Malay, 

 a particular branch of the Malayan family, as fully explained in 

 Ethnology, pp. 326-30. 



The essential point to remember is that the true Malays who 

 call themselves Orang-Maldyu, speak the standard 

 but quite modern Malay language, and are all ca i Malays" 

 Muhammadans are a historical people who appear 

 on the scene in relatively recent times, ages after the insular 

 world had been occupied by the Mongol peoples to whom their 

 name has been extended, but who never call themselves Malays. 

 The Orang-Malayu, who have acquired such an astonishing pre- 

 dominance in the Eastern Archipelago, were originally an obscure 

 tribe who rose to power in the Menangkabau district, Sumatra, 

 not before the i2th century, and whose migrations date only from 

 about the year 1160 A.D. At this time, according to the native 

 records 2 , was founded the first foreign settlement, Singapore, a 

 pure Sanskrit name meaning the " Lion City," from which it 

 might be inferred that these first settlers were not Muhammadans, 

 as is commonly assumed, but Brahmans or Buddhists, both these 

 forms of Hinduism having been propagated throughout Sumatra 

 and the other Sunda Islands centuries before this time. It is 



also noteworthy that the early settlers on the main- 

 Migrations 



land are stated to have been pagans, or to have and present 



professed some corrupt form of Hindu idolatry, 



till their conversion to Islam by the renowned Sultan Mahmud 



1 Ethnically Malayo-Polynesian is an impossible expression, because it 

 links together the Malays, who belong to the Mongol, and the Polynesians, 

 who belong to the Caucasic division. But as both undoubtedly speak lan- 

 guages of the same linguistic stock the expression is justified in philology, 

 although even here Indo-Pacific or Inter-Oceanic might be preferable terms. 



2 Dr J. Leyden, Malay Annals, 1821, p. 44. 



