SOUTHERN INDIA AND THE STRAITS. 69 



though the kings of Manjapahit claimed to be descended from 

 princes of Hindustan, the purely Javan appearance of their de- 

 scendants somewhat belies this tradition. The visible traces of 

 such a civilization in Sumatra and the Malay Peninsula are much 

 more feeble than in Java ; they are, indeed, confined to a few 

 ruins and inscriptions on stones and rocks, the former of doubt- 

 ful import and the latter practically undecipherable, though the 

 character is either Sanskrit or Pali. 



In the absence of such visible tokens, we turn again to that 

 infallible guide, the language of the people. As I have said 

 above, the influence of the Arabs on the Malay language is al- 

 most confined to religion and religious law, but does not other- 

 wise enter into the social life of the people. Far otherwise is it 

 with the influence of the Hindus. Marsden (Asiatic Researches, 

 vol. iv, pp. 223-7) writes as follows : — " The language (i.e. Malay), 

 it is true, abounds at present with Arabic words, which their 

 writers affect to introduce, because this display of literary skill 

 is at the same time a proof of their religious knowledge ; but 

 they are generally legal or metaphysical terms borrowed from 

 the Koran or its commentaries, are never expressive of simple 

 ideas, have not been incorporated into the language (a few 

 excepted), and are rarely made use of in conversation. The 

 Hindu words, on the contrary, are such as the progress of civiliza- 

 tion must soon have rendered necessary, being frequently ex- 

 pressive of the feelings of the mind, or denoting those ordinary 

 modes of thought which result from the social habits of man- 

 kind, or from the wills that tend to interrupt them.'' 



Of a truth Malay abounds in Sanskrit words, the significance 

 of which is ably traced in the preface to Maxwell's Malay 

 Manual. To go no further, the fact that the common Malay 

 words for "religion" (agama), " a plough" (tenggala), ''time" 

 (kali, masa), with many others of the same kind, are derived 

 from Sanskrit, points to Hindu influence as having first raised the 

 Malay from barbarism, taught him some of the very crudest 

 arts of civilization, and supplied him with a religion. Xow, the 

 Sanskrit element in Malay can only have come from India, and 

 it fully justifies us, taking also into consideration the existence 

 of a complete Hindu civilization proved b} r historical data to have 

 subsisted in Java, in concluding that there must have been in 



