XVI. COPYRIGHT BY KILLING. 
R. O. WINSTEDT. 
In Malay folk-tales reference is often made to a practice 
of killing an artificer so that his work may remain unique 
(e.g. a boat-builder in the Hikayat Anggun ’Che Tunggal, 
Singapore, I9I4, p. 32 and a tooth-filer in Awang Sulong 
Merah Muda, 2nd ed., Singapore, 1914, p. 59: in each of 
which cases the fate befell the craftsman in Macassar). Is 
this expensive securing of copyright by killing an Indonesian 
custom? It seems unlikely. The Himyarite poet, Dhu Jadan, 
mentions a famous castle, Ghumdan, whose architect, Sinni- 
mar, was ‘‘ on the completion of his task slain by his employer 
of his skill’? (Browne’s “ A Literary History of Persia,” vol. I, 
p. 176). Was the tradition, like so much Malay tradition, of 
imported origin ? 
