Old Singapore
R.J. Wilkinson, a senior colonial administrator (C.M.G.), published “Old Singapore” in 1935 as a compact survey of the island’s pre-colonial history, drawing on the Malay Annals, Chinese diplomatic records, and early British-era accounts to trace the settlement from its legendary founding through its destruction by Majapahit and its subsequent decline into a haunt of sea-gypsies. The article’s overarching concern is to recover what physical and textual evidence survives of the old Malay polity of Tumasik and to assess the reliability of the traditions surrounding it.
Summary
Wilkinson opens by situating Singapore within the broader Malay world, noting that the heads of a Proto-Malayan family had held hereditary lordship over the island for four or five centuries under the title Dato’ Raja Negara, with documented appearances in 1526, 1606, 1717, and 1722. He then narrates the legendary founding: a descendant of the Chola king Rajendra-cola I, after a storm off Telok Blanga, sighted a lion-like animal at the mouth of the Singapore River and named the settlement the City of the Lion, proclaiming himself Sri Tribuana. Wilkinson is candid that these are “a series of myths,” and he identifies the Raja Suran episode as a borrowing from the Alexander legend, functioning as a satire on human ambition.
The article’s most substantive historical argument concerns the fall of Tumasik to Majapahit. Wilkinson reconciles two conflicting dates—the Majapahit poem gives 1361, while Chinese records place the final tribute from Tumasik’s son in 1377 and the interception of Chinese envoys by the Javanese in the same year. He draws on Wang Ta-yuan’s Chinese account of a Siamese raid on Tan-ma-hsi (Tumasik) to corroborate that the city was still a fortified, defensible settlement in the fourteenth century. The physical remains of the old settlement, as reported by Raffles and Crawfurd, included a broad parapet and trench running from the mouth of the Stamford Canal to Fort Canning Hill, with the sea-front left unfortified presumably because the harbour mud made landing impossible.
The final section turns to the post-Majapahit period, when the island became waste land inhabited by Orang Laut sea-gypsies. Wilkinson traces the Dato’ Raja Negara’s diminishing political role from the fifteenth century through the eighteenth, noting that by the nineteenth century the title-holder had disappeared from local politics entirely, while his vassals maintained a quasi-autonomous existence under British rule. The article closes with Abdullah’s vivid description of the river mouth—its haunted rocks, the hundreds of human skulls on the sand, and the pirates’ use of Singapore as a place of slaughter.
Key Findings
- The Majapahit poem dates the fall of Singapore to 1361 A.D.; Chinese records place the last tribute from Tumasik’s successor in 1377, with Chinese envoys killed by Javanese that same year (pp. 18–19).
- A rock inscription, probably erected by the Majapahit conquerors, was discovered at the mouth of the Singapore River and broken to pieces by Chief Engineer Coleman during Governor Bonham’s administration; one fragment survives in Raffles Museum (pp. 19–20).
- Krom concluded the inscription was in Majapahit Kawi and dated it to before 1361 A.D.; it ran to approximately fifty lines (p. 20).
- The old settlement’s defences comprised the Singapore River, the sea to the mouth of the Stamford Canal, and a broad parapet and trench from that point to Fort Canning Hill; the sea-front was unfortified (p. 20).
- Fourteen sandstone blocks, probably temple pillar bases, and a terrace known as the “tomb of Iskander Shah” were found on Fort Canning Hill; pieces of gold jewellery of Javanese type have also been recovered there (pp. 20–21).
- The Dato’ Raja Negara family is documented in 1526 (fighting Mascarenhas), 1606 (piloting Admiral Matelief), 1717 (siding with Raja Kechil), and 1722 (guests at Bugis prince weddings) (p. 17).
Conclusion
Wilkinson’s definitive takeaway is that the old Malay settlement of Tumasik, while not a place of great material importance, was a real fortified polity whose destruction by Majapahit left a deep cultural scar on the island—one visible in the blood-red soil, the taboo on Fort Canning Hill, and the persistent belief that Singapore could never grow rice. The loss of the rock inscription represents, in his view, an irreparable blow to the historical record, and the article implicitly argues for greater care in preserving such relics.
Context
- Wilkinson was a senior colonial administrator (C.M.G.) writing within the MBRAS’s tradition of accessible historical essays for a general readership; the piece is framed as a popular survey rather than a research article.
- The article relies heavily on secondary sources (Abdullah, Raffles, Crawfurd, Rouffaer, Krom) and does not report new archival research; its contribution lies in synthesizing the legendary, Chinese, and physical evidence into a coherent narrative of the pre-colonial settlement.