Recent archaeological discoveries in Malaysia 1962–1963: Malaya
B.A.V. Peacock’s 1964 report documents significant archaeological discoveries in Malaya during 1962–1963, centred on the University of Malaya’s Archaeological Research Unit and the Federation Museums Department. The overarching thesis is that Malayan prehistory is far more complex than previously assumed, with multiple technological traditions coexisting contemporaneously and surviving into recent historical times.
Summary
The principal excavation of 1962 was at Gua Kechil near Raub, Pahang, led by Dr. F. L. Dunn of the Institute for Medical Research, with a full report published in the same issue of the Journal. The 1963 fieldwork, conducted by Dr. H. A. Lamb and Peacock, focused on the Ulu Kelantan District, where three sites yielded particularly significant results.
At Gua Chawan, a working floor of Hoabinhian-type chipped stone tools was identified on a steep slope above the Sungai Jenera. Thirty-four tools were collected, including bi-facially flaked core tools and more crudely worked implements that may represent intermediate manufacturing stages. The site’s surface position, covered only by wind-blown dust and remnants of recent aborigine occupation, suggests the survival of a stone industry formally indistinguishable from the Hoabinhian into recent historical times (pp. 201–203). Peacock argues this challenges Sieveking’s earlier insistence that no contact between the Hoabinhian and the Malayan Neolithic could be accepted, proposing instead that multiple cultures at different technological levels occupied the same region contemporaneously (p. 203).
At Gua Jaya, a cave with a soot-encrusted roof and a deposit of over 1,500 pottery sherds was interpreted as a pottery kiln. Among the finds were a hollow pottery cylinder resembling bellows nozzles previously found in iron-working contexts at Jeram Kwi and Kerling, and partly-fired clay lumps likely used as kiln saggars (pp. 204–205). A flat decorated clay tablet with geometric patterns of spirals and triangles, unlike any previously recorded Malayan object, was also recovered (p. 205). At Batu Ner, a trial trench revealed a hearth level yielding fragments of a decorated globular vessel comparable to a bell-shaped beaker from Gua Cha, and a beaked quadrangular adze made by pecking from a heavy igneous rock — a technique and material combination not previously recorded in Malaya (p. 206).
Key Findings
- Gua Chawan yielded 34 Hoabinhian-type chipped stone tools on a clearly defined working floor, with a revetment of undressed limestone blocks preventing downslope accumulation, indicating a deliberate and sustained stone-working activity (pp. 202–203).
- The surface position of the Gua Chawan deposit, covered only by superficial dust and recent aborigine relics, points to the survival of a Hoabinhian-formal stone industry into recent historical times, necessitating a review of established Malayan prehistoric sequences (p. 203).
- Gua Jaya contained over 1,500 pottery sherds in a homogeneous ash deposit beneath a heavily sooted ceiling, interpreted as a pottery kiln site (p. 204).
- A hollow pottery cylinder from Gua Jaya, with a flattened bulb pierced by a narrow opening, supports the interpretation of such objects as bellows nozzles used in high-temperature processes, linking it to similar finds from iron-working sites at Jeram Kwi and Kerling (pp. 204–205).
- The Batu Ner hearth level produced a beaked quadrangular adze fashioned by pecking from coarsely crystalline igneous rock, a material and technique combination previously unrecorded from Malayan sites (p. 206).
- Pottery rim shapes from Gua Jaya, including a facetted type and one with horizontal grooves below the lip, have been found at Gua Cha, Gua Musang, and Gua Kechil, indicating shared ceramic traditions across the region (p. 205).
Conclusion
Peacock’s definitive historical takeaway is that the coexistence of a Hoabinhian-formal stone industry at surface level in Ulu Kelantan, alongside Neolithic and later ceramic traditions at nearby sites, demonstrates that Malayan prehistory cannot be reduced to a simple unilinear sequence. The ethnographic reality of groups such as the Negrito and Temiar occupying the same region at widely differing technological levels provides a plausible model for understanding the archaeological record, and the Gua Chawan evidence in particular forces a reconsideration of the relationship between the Hoabinhian and subsequent Malayan cultures.
Context
- The Malaya section was compiled by Peacock from the work of the University of Malaya’s Archaeological Research Unit and the Federation Museums Department, operating within the colonial-era institutional framework of the Federation Museums.
- The sites discussed form part of a broader regional network of cave and rock shelter sites in Kelantan and Pahang that have been the subject of investigation since the 1940s, building on earlier work by Sieveking, Tweedie, and Linehan.