I am well aware that many people are going to respond with immediate disbelief to the idea of the article that I am about to publish that there was no “Srivijaya” and that the information in Chinese sources about “Sanfoqi” that was employed to produce a history for “Srivijaya” is actually about “Kambuja,” that is, Angkor.
Beyond all of the textual evidence that I provide in my two-part article, I would argue that it is also important to consider the larger scholarly environment in which the study of “Srivijaya” has taken place, as that environment, I argue, is also responsible for the perpetuation of what I call the “Srivijaya myth.”
So, what is it about the scholarly environment of the larger field of Southeast Asian history that could enable the “Srivijaya Myth” to persist for so long? While there are many issues that have enabled this myth to persist, I have outlined some key points below.
1) Colonial-Era Scholars Were Not as Great as Many People Think They Were
Some of the first European scholars to produce work about Southeast Asia did so based on their examination of texts and inscriptions in languages like Sanskrit and classical Chinese. These are difficult languages to gain proficiency in and many historians today are not able to read those languages.
It is therefore quite easy today to feel a sense of awe at what some of those early scholars did. Further, when one is not familiar with the languages and texts which these scholars studied and wrote about, it is also easy to get lost in their writings with all of the unfamiliar names and references that get mentioned, and the fact that these guys basically made zero effort to communicate their ideas to anyone other than themselves.
As a result, I think a lot of the earlier scholarship has been given a pass, as scholars today who read it end up saying to themselves, “Well, I don’t know what they’re talking about, but they must be right because they could read those old texts and I can’t.”
In reality, however, there are enormous problems with the way that colonial-era scholars read texts. For instance, one common practice that we can find in the work of scholars who employed sources in classical Chinese was to develop intricate and improbable explanations for why a certain character should be read and understood differently from what was actually recorded in a text.
A scholar would come across a character that didn’t fit with the way that he was interpreting a text, and he would then create an extremely complex and improbable explanation for why that character should be a different one, namely, one that would fit his interpretation.
For example, this explanation might be that someone misread character A for character B and then miswrote it as character C, which was similar to a variant of character B, etc.
For another example, see this blog post:
https://leminhkhai.blog/the-yueviet-migration-theory-and-the-hidden-network-approach/
2) Baby Boomer Politics
The above approach is particularly common in colonial-era writings. However, it is also prominent in the writings of O. W. Wolters, a figure who traversed the colonial / post-colonial divide and who played a large role in promoting “Srivijaya” to a new group of scholars of the Southeast Asian past.
This new group hailed predominantly from the English-speaking world, and consisted largely of people who were born and grew up after World War II, a generation known as the “Baby Boomers.”
This generation took up a call to produce an “autonomous history” for Southeast Asia, one which would free it from Euro-centric perceptions and interpretations. This generation also generally had much weaker linguistic skills than their colonial-era predecessors.
As a result, they left it up to scholars like O. W. Wolters to get the details about “Srivijaya” correct (a tragic mistake), and focused on promoting “Srivijaya” as part of a liberal/progressive view of Southeast Asia as a place where women enjoyed more “autonomy,” where slaves were not really slaves, where warfare was not particularly deadly or violent, where the Vietnamese had possessed a unique identity since time immemorial, where the Thai had strategically chosen the most beneficial Western practices to modernize the kingdom, where everyone “localized” outside cultural practices and ideas. . .
The list goes on and on and on. . . and I have published on this topic here and here.
In this imagined vision of the past, “Srivijaya” fit perfectly, as it was an indigenous polity that had flourished in the centuries prior to any European contact and it had done so peacefully through trade, rather than conquest.
The fact that most of the scholars who promoted this idea could not actually read the sources on which the story of “Srivijaya” was built was irrelevant because their politics were right.
Right?
3) The Chinese as the Incompetent and Patriarchal Other
Something we can also see in both the colonial and post-colonial eras is an opportunistic down-playing, or at times outright dismissal, of information in Chinese sources.
As mentioned above, colonial-era scholars often developed interpretations of texts that were based on an imagined scenario of the incompetence of Chinese scribes (misreading and miswriting characters).
When I was first starting out, I read writings in Western languages before I had the ability to read classical Chinese texts, and I “absorbed” this idea. However, over the past 25 years, after learning classical Chinese well enough to be able to read primary sources, I’ve found case after case where the problem is not that there is a scribal error in the text, but that the modern scholar tried to get the text to support an idea or interpretation which it doesn’t.
Again, most people in the field of Southeast Asian history cannot see this, because they cannot read those texts. As a result, they have maintained this sense that the Chinese “got things wrong” about Southeast Asia, and under the influence of Baby Boomer politics, this idea has extended to include not simply supposed textual errors, but perceptions as well, as the “patriarchal” Chinese can’t possibly produce accurate information about the liberal/progressive Southeast Asian past that has been imagined over the past 60 or so years.
I’ve written a blog post on this topic here:
https://leminhkhai.blog/dismissing-china-the-chinese-in-the-field-of-southeast-asian-history-in-the-english-speaking-world/
Meanwhile, for people who do know Chinese and who have written about “Srivijaya” more recently, they have at times continued to attribute information that does not fit their interpretations to “Chinese mistakes,” but have also perpetuated existing interpretations that are based on that form of explanation.
To be fair, one can find errors in Chinese historical sources. From all of the years that I have worked with sources in classical Chinese, I’ve found, for instance, that there are certain types of information that are more unstable than others. Numbers are probably the most unstable, followed by transliterated foreign names. However, basic textual information is generally pretty stable.
As a result, when the History of the Song says that Sanfoqi, the place which scholars have interpreted to mean “Srivijaya,” was “neighboring Champa,” and all of the extant versions contain that same information, then we shouldn’t dismiss that information as a scribal error because it doesn’t fit our interpretation. Instead, we should investigate it.
However, that is not what historians have done. Why not?
4) Academia as an Identity or an Exclusive Club
When I first began studying in graduate school, I think I naively believed that universities were filled with really intelligent people who pursue knowledge wherever it takes them.
Over time, however, I came to realize that while there are definitely some people like that, for many others academia is a kind of exclusive club that they have entered and which forms part of their identity.
I think I first realized this through my study of the history of Sino-Vietnamese relations. Essentially, in researching my Ph.D. dissertation, I repeatedly found evidence that contradicted what had been written about the historical Sino-Vietnamese relationship. I then went back and looked at the extant scholarship and found flaws and biases.
So, I became aware that there were all kinds of ideas that were not true, but then I also observed how scholar after scholar would proudly recite these “truths” at conferences, seminars, and even in casual conversations (“Well, you know, the Vietnamese have been fighting off the Chinese for 2,000 years, so. . .”).
What this made me realize is that academia is like a kind of exclusive club. To enter the club, you first have to learn certain “sacred truths,” things like the ideas that in the past Southeast Asia was a place where women enjoyed more “autonomy,” where slaves were not really slaves, where warfare was not particularly deadly or violent. . . and where there was this amazing and peaceful maritime kingdom called “Srivijaya.”
You also have to learn that the Chinese didn’t really know what they were talking about when they wrote about Southeast Asia, and that “there are so few indigenous sources” for premodern Southeast Asian history, so there is no other option but to rely heavily on sources in European languages. . .
If you learn these “sacred truths,” you can enter the exclusive Southeast Asian history club. However, it is then extremely unlikely that, as a club member, you’ll ever discover the problems with the scholarship on “Srivijaya,” because by that point you will have too many forces and influences militating against that (both consciously and subconsciously).
Therefore, while I have written a two-part article that clearly documents that there was no “Srivijaya” and that the information in Chinese sources about “Sanfoqi” that was employed to produce a history for “Srivijaya” is actually about “Kambuja,” you have to turn to the logistics and politics of knowledge production in the broader field of Southeast Asian history to understand why the “Srivijaya Myth” has persisted for over a century and why the evidence in the paper will be so difficult for many people to accept, both in practical and personal terms.
That said, I think that the revelations in this paper provide us with a good opportunity to reflect on the larger issues affecting knowledge production about Southeast Asian history, as it should lead people to ask: “How is it possible that the ‘Srivijaya Myth’ could last so long?”
This Post Has 18 Comments
A lot of history books are going to have to be re-written after this. your findings will send shock waves throughout the region. I wonder what the indonesians and malays think of this? i assume not too happy
Actually, I don’t think much will change. . . The # of people who research and write about SEAsian history who have the linguistic skills to read the sources I use and evaluate my points is tiny, and it takes a LONG TIME for academics to research, write and publish something. Meanwhile, for the majority of people who do not have the linguistic skills, they will just see this as a “perspective” and will note it in a footnote and then keep writing about “Srivijaya” as they always have.
Yes, there will be Indonesians who do not like this (one already left a comment on my YouTube video), but in reality, I don’t think anything will change there either.
That said, the new view that I am presenting offers a lot of “exciting” history to multiple places. It makes Angkor look more dynamic. It offers a powerful polity to the Songkhla area, and Majapahit comes out looking fierce!! So Srivijaya Airlines could easily change its name to Majapahit Airlines and everything would still be ok. 🙂
haha majapahit airlines, that has a nice ring to it. malay nationalists will not like this because sri vijaya was always claimed as a malay empire. the javanese will like it because majapahit was a javanese empire. you should send you findings to the cambodian government and cambodian historians as they may have an interest in pushing this side of history
One question Liam. It is said that the cholas attacked sri vijaya, if sri vijaya did not exist, who did they attack?
was it Angkor? were the cholas the “khaek” people that were mentioned in the nong chronicles?
I haven’t spent much time looking at the Chola attack as my article focuses on the 14th and early 15th centuries. However, I did look back to check, and I can’t remember what is recorded at that time about “Srivijaya,” but it was a word that didn’t sound like “Srivijaya” and people made that guess.
I think the attack was on Angkor. From what I can tell, Angkor controlled the sea route to India and my guess was that the Chola were probably trying to gain control of that.
I do write about the Khaek in my paper (in the second part that will be out later in the year). I think that is a reference to the Javanese who I think attacked Angkor around the 1370s and then stayed in parts of the Lower Mekong region until at least the 1430s (there is evidence in Ryukyuan sources of that for the 1430s).
thank you for the reply Liam. very much appreciated
Hi Liam!
As an Indonesian and a Javanese, I am happy about your findings. I just graduated from history department this year. I want to go graduate school, but maybe will take gap year as I want to sort out my thoughts, one of my questions: will I be a historian, what kind of historian I will be. For me, your reflections influence me a lot.
I’ve been devouring your writing and research throughout this blog. I’ve read your papers and thank you so much for bravely pointed out what went wrong with historians nowadays that I found benefitting for aspiring historians. In general education, people still see history as something that is sacred. Meanwhile, I think that historical science should reconstruct the past with accuracy and subject to unpredictable changes when the other historians find flaws and bias. As historian, often times we work within the limitation of best available primary resource and mostly got interpretation wrong. That’s why we need our community of scholars that unfortunately even hardly questioning the difficult truth. I agree with you that we must learn history and politics of knowledge. Deeply appreciated!
Thank you for the kind comments!!
I think people are afraid that relooking at the past will somehow make the history of one’s country less impressive, or something like that. However, I’ve never found that to be the case, as something always emerges that is amazing.
So, in this case, there was no “Srivijaya.” Some people will think that this is “bad” for Indonesia, but I’m also finding that Majapahit attacked Angkor and controlled part of the Mekong delta (or coast?) for several decades. That’s amazing!!
Finally, as for what kind of historian to be. . . I think that’s a tough question these days, but essentially I think that one place where it is necessary to be an historian is on the Internet, because that’s where the “audience” for history is.
In any case, thank you for the kind comments and good luck to you!!!
!
Hi Dr. Kelley, so who’s going to take the blame for that Sri Vijaya?
Interesting question!! Well, first of all, of course, no one will willingly accept any “blame,” so we can rule that out.
As for where things went wrong, I don’t “blame” the colonial-era scholars. They were “pioneers” who did their best to try to make sense of historical materials, and there were only a few of them. I think where things went wrong was in the universities of the world in the post-WW II period up to the present. The work of the colonial-era scholars all needed to be looked at again and again, but instead of doing that, it became acceptable (indeed, it became the norm) for people to research about premodern Southeast Asian history without knowing the “classical” languages of so many of the sources, and as a result, there are a lot of people who have spent their careers producing works based on European-language sources and translations and who have no ability to evaluate the earlier colonial-era writings. For a historical field, that is completely unacceptable, but unfortunately, that became the norm for the field of Southeast Asian history, and that is one major reason why we are where we are today.
Ok, now I know that some people will respond by saying, “But so-and-so knows Chinese/Sanskrit.” Yes, but not all historians are created equally. Some make new discoveries but many don’t. However, for a field to progress, you need multiple people who have the essential skills to all to produce solid work based on the primary sources. Some of them will discover new things, and some won’t, but collectively they will be able to move knowledge forward because they all possess the same fundamental abilities and knowledge and can verify or challenge each other’s work.
That I was able to figure things out so quickly was because 1) sources have been digitized and it is much easier now to look through materials, cross-check, etc. and 2) I don’t believe in the “sacred truths” of the field, so I don’t have those ideas in my brain influencing how I read historical materials. For scholars in the past to be able to deconstruct the “Srivijaya Myth,” it would have taken more time. But if there had been scholars starting in say the 1960s who had the linguistic skills and who were not motivated by certain politics, then the process could have begun then, and if it had been required at that time that historians who research about premodern Southeast Asia had to be proficient in at least one classical language, then I suspect that by the 1980s, or certainly the 1990s, the Srivijaya Myth would have been laid to rest.
For anyone who looks at any of the primary sources that have been used to construct the Srivijaya Myth, it is blatantly obvious that there are enormous problems. That should have been the starting point for research way back in the 1960s.
Hi:
I have been awaiting your paper on Sri Vijaya. I wonder when it will be published or appear here in some format?
Thanks for your interest in the paper. Yes, I’ve been awaiting it too. . . It was supposed to be published on 1 June, but it still hasn’t appeared yet. When it is finally published, I’ll make it known here.
Hi Liam. Is it true that the Cholas started the campaign against “Srivijaya” because of its support for piracy? I couldn’t locate any primary sources about this. I asked this because a Wikipedia article has been proven to be full of made-up claims and hoaxes, and one section emphasized this. This is the page: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chola_Navy
Hello Raja Warastra, did you (or someone) already change that Wikipedia page? I looked at it late last night and saw that passage there, but now it’s gone.
Yes, that passage was completely false. There is no historical information to support what was written there, and the one book that was cited did not cite evidence for its information.
Interesting, but how do you account for the Sanskrit inscriptions?
Dear Adrian, thank you very much for your question.
At the moment, I think that the ones on / near Sumatra are not from the same place as the Ligor inscription and the mention of Sri Vishaya in some Chola inscriptions, however, I suspect that the latter ones are referring to the same place, which is the place that is referred to as Zabeg (and other variations) in Arabic sources and Shepo in Chinese sources, and which I think, based on geographic descriptions and other information in both of the above sources, was the area around Songkhla.
At first, I thought, as some early scholars did, that the Sri Vijaya in the Sumatran inscriptions could refer to a person. A very knowledgeable scholar has recently shown me why that should not be the case for the Sumatran inscriptions (the gist is that in later, but similar, inscriptions in Javanese, a term like kadatuan was not usually followed by a person’s name). That same scholar, meanwhile, also noted, as I think is well known, that the term “kadatuan” could refer to either a domain or kingdom or a royal residence.
The term vijaya / vishaya has the meaning of an administrative district, and it appears in that context in certain Cham inscriptions. It is too detailed to explain quickly here, but that is a reading that I think makes sense in a couple of the Chola inscriptions where we have information about Srivishaya and Kedah.
My sense now is that this term was used in more than one place (Sumatra, Songkhla) to refer to the “capital” or royal area and that in the inscriptions, the name of the “kingdom” is not mentioned. My main expertise is in premodern Vietnamese history, and such a practice (mentioning the capital but not the kingdom) was very common, and indeed, I think it’s a pretty common practice everywhere in the world prior to the rise of modern nationalism.
As such, I think the “kadatuan Sri Vijaya” of the Sumatran inscriptions could be referring to the “kadatuan of the royal district” or something like that. Which kingdom was it in? Chinese sources provide strong support in this time period for the strength of “Maluoyu” (in modern Mandarin), or the place I think most scholars associate with Jambi, and I think the archaeological evidence for Jambi is strong as well. In the Chola inscriptions, what appears to be that same place is referred to as an “ancient/old” polity (if I remember correctly).
As for the overall picture that I’m starting to develop, it looks like Jambi, Kedah and Songkhla were all key early trading centers. Ships from areas to the west probably went to Kedah first, and then Songkhla tried to get the trade to move over the Malay Peninsula and then onward whereas Jambi tried to get it to come down towards the Straits of Melaka. I think there is also strong evidence to indicate that Cham(ic) mariners were responsible for moving goods from Aceh all the way to China, as well as to Brunei and places in the Philippines. Then Angkor emerged on the scene, and it struggled to find a way around this trade network. Then finally, in the late fourteenth century, I think there is strong evidence to indicate that Angkor was attacked by not only the Siamese from the west but Javanese and Cham from the east, and that Javanese occupied some places in the Mekong delta for several decades (and were also present in Brunei at that time). This would have happened after the Nagarakretagama was compiled, and thus, the extent of the Majapahit “empire” was larger than that text indicates.
Finally, I have only just now started to look at the material evidence for all of this, but so far what I have found has supported this overall view as well.
The article that I wrote deals primarily with the fourteenth and early fifteenth centuries, however, I have started to go back and look at the historical information from earlier periods (that’s what I’m writing about in the Srivijaya 3.0 series). From what I can see so far, it all fits this new model, but there are definitely details that I will get wrong along the way, so any suggestions and input are greatly appreciated!!
Thanks, I’ve got a student working on this question at the moment, so I’ll see what she comes up with first. Yes, more than one ‘capital’ is definitely a possibility. We’re also waiting to see what Arlo Griffiths’ project turns up in the way of reinterpretations of the inscriptions. Have your read the two books by Suzuki?
No, I have not read the full books by Suzuki as I do not have access to them. However, I have read something that he wrote that I found online, and I’ve seen the TOC if his book, and read what others have said about it, so I am familiar with his basic arguments. While I appreciate the fact that he also recognized that there are major problems with the extant scholarship on “Srivijaya,” he makes a lot of the same mistakes with Chinese sources that others have, and as a result, there are many problems with his ideas. At this point, unfortunately, I think his writings only make the topic more confusing, rather than clarify it. Nonetheless, people should appreciate that he recognized that there are serious problems with the extant scholarship.