THE EMPIRE OF THE MAHARAJA. 27 



for several centuries a number of " Straits Settlements/' the north- 

 ernmost of which made him for some time a near neighbour of the 

 great Indo-Chinese power of Camboja. In fact a relatively late 

 (probably 12th century) inscription referring to him and apparent- 

 ly executed by his order is in the Cambojan language, but in a 

 .script which in those days was common in Western Indonesia and 

 is almost identical with the contemporary script of Burma. 



What bearing has all this on the date when the Malays first 

 really colonized the Peninsula? Apart from the few northern 

 settlements actually mentioned, it is hard to say. But it seems 

 reasonable to assume that the Maharaja garrisoned these with his 

 -own people. Kedah, therefore, may have been the first really 

 Malay (or at any rate Sumatran) settlement in the Peninsula, and 

 there were others beyond it, in the country that is now Siamese. 

 But we hear nothing of settlements in the South of the Peninsula, 

 -except Singapore and that at no very early date. This seems to v fit 

 •in pretty well with the evidence that the North contained fairly 

 civilized Buddhist states, while there is comparatively little trace 

 of civilization in the South in pre-Muhammadan days. 



To what period then must we refer the Mon-Ivhmer influence 

 which is incontestably evidenced by the linguistic characteristics of 

 the " aborigines " of the Peninsula, for instance by the unquestion- 

 .ably Mon numerals of the Southern Sakai (Besisi, etc.) ? Are we 

 compelled to push it further back than the 7th or 8th century A.D. ? 

 Or must some other explanation be invented to account for it? Did 

 the so-called aborigines drift into the Peninsula from Indo-China 

 af ter the Malay colonization had actually begun ? That seems very 

 improbable, but it is difficult to feel positive about the matter; 

 there are still too many unknowns in the history of the Peninsula. 

 It seems certain now that some portions of it, at any rate, fell under 

 Sumatran political influence as early as the 7th or at latest the 8th 

 century. But at first they were merely trading stations, and it does 

 not follow that Malay colonization on a large scale set in immediate- 

 ly. Perhaps some day the veil which shrouds the early history of 

 the Peninsula will be still further lifted. In the meantime we havr 

 to thank M. G. C cedes for the new light he has thrown on a very ob- 

 scure matter. He has f ocussed upon it evidence derived from many 

 sources and has added to the subject a new interest. 



Postcript. 



Since the above was written, Dr. X. J. Krom, formerly head 

 of the Archaeological Survey in the Dutch East Indies and now 

 Professor of the Archaeology and Ancient History of the Dutch 

 East Indies in the University of Leyden, has contributed some 

 very important and interesting additional facts to the discussion. 

 In his inaugural address of the 3rd December, 1919, he pointed 

 out that the evidence of Javanese inscriptions shows that as early 

 as 778 A.D. the dynasty of "the king of the mountains" was 

 Tiding Central Java, and it seems to have continued to do so for 

 about a century, during which period it erected important monu- 



R. A. Soc, No. 81, 1920. 



