Article

The capture of Malacca, A.D. 1511

From Munshipedia, the MBRAS digital historical encyclopedia

The capture of Malacca, A.D. 1511

R.J. Wilkinson’s 1912 narrative recounts the Portuguese conquest of Malacca in 1511, tracing the sequence from the first European contact under Diego Lopez de Sequeira in August 1509 through the decisive assault by the Viceroy d’Albuquerque in July 1511. The article frames the capture as the product of a collision between Malay political caution and Portuguese imperial ambition, with the internal machinations of the Malaccan court—particularly the Sultan’s execution of the Bendahara—proving as consequential as any act of arms.

Summary

Wilkinson opens with the arrival of Sequeira’s squadron at Malacca on 1 August 1509, a moment of profound uncertainty for a port whose Indian merchants were instinctively hostile to the newcomers and whose Bendahara, Mutahir, counseled inaction. The Sultan, overruling his minister, permitted a Portuguese envoy named Teixeira to deliver King Emmanuel’s letter and gifts, but Teixeira’s culturally clumsy behaviour—fastening a bead necklace around the Bendahara’s neck—deepened Malay suspicion. When an alarm-gun was fired on a Portuguese ship, hostilities erupted over what Wilkinson calls a “petty mistake”; the fighting was half-hearted but irreversible, and Sequeira was forced to withdraw with his men captured (pp. 71–73).

The political aftermath proved fatal to Malaccan cohesion. The Sultan, resenting the Bendahara’s growing prestige as the nominal leader of the resistance, had Mutahir executed; the minister’s daughter was taken into the harem and his wealth dissipated at a royal wedding (p. 73). When d’Albuquerque appeared in the roads on 1 July 1511 with the full naval force of Portuguese India, the Sultan attempted to temporize, offering the execution of the Bendahara as a gesture of goodwill while refusing to release the Portuguese prisoners or pay an indemnity. D’Albuquerque, advised by the captive Ruy d’Aranjo who had spent two years in the town, methodically seized shipping, forced a landing at the mouth of the Malacca River, and after a costly repulse of a Malay counter-charge, advanced up St. Paul’s Hill (pp. 73–75).

The decisive assault fell on 24 July 1511, when d’Albuquerque’s troops, though heavily outnumbered and suffering from poisoned arrows, heat, and smoke, broke through the Malay defences by burning the buildings as they advanced. Prince Alaedin led repeated charges in person and the Laksamana Hang Nadim sent fireships down the river, but the combination of Portuguese armour, discipline, and superior weaponry proved decisive. By the following day the town was empty; the Sultan, the Prince of Pahang, and the new Bendahara had all fled, and the foreign merchant communities submitted to Portuguese authority (pp. 75–76).

Key Findings

  • Sequeira’s squadron anchored at Malacca on 1 August 1509; d’Albuquerque’s fleet arrived on 1 July 1511 with 19 ships, 800 European soldiers, and 600 native sepoys (pp. 72–73).
  • The Portuguese floating-battery, intended to cover the landing at the river mouth, grounded in the wrong position and was nearly captured; its commander Antonio d’Abreu held his post while grievously wounded (p. 75).
  • The Portuguese lost 60 men in the first major Malay counter-charge, led in person by Prince Alaedin mounted on an elephant (p. 75).
  • The crowning assault occurred on St. James’ Day, 24 July 1511, when a mob of 700 Malays and mercenaries charged the landing force (p. 75).
  • The Bendahara Mutahir was executed on the Sultan’s order after the Sequeira incident; his daughter was taken into the royal harem and his wealth spent at the Sultan’s daughter’s wedding to the son of the Ruler of Pahang (p. 73).
  • The Laksamana Hang Nadim attempted to harass Portuguese communications by sending war-canoes and fireships down the river from the upper reaches, but to no avail (p. 76).

Conclusion

Wilkinson presents the fall of Malacca as the inevitable outcome of a structural mismatch: the Malay court’s reliance on diplomatic ambiguity and internal factionalism could not withstand the methodical, single-minded application of force by a commander who had already consolidated Portuguese power in India. The article closes with the image of the aged, bedridden Bendahara being borne away in a litter, cursing “the cowardice of a generation that was not as the warriors of his youth”—a final note of civilizational elegy that underscores the author’s view of the event as the definitive end of Malay maritime supremacy.

Context

  • Wilkinson writes in the idiom of early-twentieth-century colonial historiography, portraying the Portuguese as rational agents of order and the Malay court as a study in passive indecision; the narrative carries the assumption that European military technology and discipline were inherently superior, a framing typical of the period.
  • The article draws on the Malay Annals and Portuguese sources but does not identify specific archival collections; it reads as a popular historical sketch rather than a document-based monograph, consistent with the JSBRAS’s role as a society journal of the era.

References