GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS ON THE ISLAND OV BORNEO* 365 
superficies has been estimated at 13,342 square geographical leagues ; 
the more exact calculation which Mr, Melvili de Carnbee has pub« 
fished in'Le Moniteur des Indes* gives Borneo a surface of 12,743 
square leagues or 6,992 myriametres; which makes it 2,589 myria- 
metres greater than Sumatra, and 5,723 myriametres greater than 
Java. 
According to Rienzi, the islanders give to their country the name 
of Pulo Kalamantan ; while Hamilton pretends that Varouni should 
be the name; this is, says he, a derivative from the Sanscrit Varani 
(born of the sea,) seeing that it is incontestible that many islands, 
once isolated, form at present part of the coast, and that they have 
been united to Borneo by the deposit which the rivers bear down 
and accumulate at their mouths. 
Mr. S. Muller tells us that the Malay name of Borneo is derived * 
from the Sanscrit Bhurni, that is to say land, or country. Piga- 
fetta is the first writer who has made mention of a city on the north 
of the island, which he designates Burn3. Ramusio, a Venetian au¬ 
thor who wrote in 1554, uses the name Bornei, and later Barbosa 
wrote Burnei; we did not begin to use the name Borneo as applied 
to the whole extent of the island until towards the commencement 
of the seventeenth century, although the northern part had been 
previously known under the name of Boerni, now Bruni, Brauni or 
Borneo Proper, 
Old documents make known to us that the Portuguese Lorenzo 
de Gomez was the first of the [European] navigators who approach- 
ed the northern part of this island ; he arrived in 1518 in the ship 
St. Sebastien on his route to China. We presume that he gave to 
the country the name of Burni, but he says that the natives term it 
Braunai or Brauni. The travellers who have recently penetrated 
into different parts of the interior, the Dutch Major Muller, Colonel 
Henrici, the members of our scientific commission, Diard, S. Mul¬ 
ler and Korthals, as well as the Englishman Brooke, assure us that 
the Dayaks which form the aboriginal population of Borneo, do not 
See ante p, 176, 
