The Temenggongs of Muar
This short note by R. O. Winstedt reproduces Newbold’s 1837 account of the Temenggong lineage of Muar and appends a genealogical tree tracing the family from its Hadramaut-Acheh origins through eight successive holders of the title.
Summary
Winstedt quotes at length from Newbold’s Moor’s Notices of the Indian Archipelago (Appendix, p. 74, Singapore 1837), which records that a Mantri of high birth named Samade Raja received a grant of Muar from Sultan Abdu’l-Jalil Shah of Johore in 1707, and traces the succession through his son Paduka Tuan, grandson Burok, great-grandson Konik, and great-great-grandson Syed (Said), the latter confirmed by Sultan Hussain Shah I in Singapore and styled Temenggong Dato’ Said (p. 30). Newbold notes the Temenggong’s jurisdiction was confined to villages on the Muar and Segamat rivers, and that he acknowledged Johore as suzerain, sending an annual tribute of one dollar per house and 200 kampits of rice (p. 30).
Winstedt then presents a genealogical tree supplied by the then-incumbent Temenggong, linking the family to Sayid Idrus of the Hadramaut and Kampong Pasir, Acheh, and through Zainal-Abidin and Maharaja Sri ‘diraja to the four branches that produced the successive Temenggongs, ending with Wan Abdu’r-Rahman as the eighth holder (p. 31). He closes with a brief critical remark questioning Newbold’s date of 1707 for the Muar grant, noting that Netscher assigns that year to the taking of the child-pretender Raja Kechil to Kota Tinggi, and that no child is historically ascribed to Sultan Mahmud (p. 31).