A kingdom of words : Minangkabau sovereignty in Sumatran history
Date
1993
Authors
Drakard, Jane
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Abstract
The thesis is concerned with the nature of royal authority in the Sumatran inland kingdom of
Minangkabau in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. It takes as its point of departure the
problem posed by early European perceptions of that authority.
European contacts were with the coasts of Sumatra. The Minangkabau heartland, behind its mountain
barrier, appeared remote and inaccessible. The Dutch, following on the heels of the Portuguese in
the seventeenth century, were contemptuous of the rulers of
Minangkabau, describing them as powerless - as kings in word only and not in deed. This view has been
repeated by many subsequent observers, some of whom have spoken of the sacral or the symbolic
nature of Minangkabau claims.
The thesis will argue that the Minangkabau kings were far from being mere figureheads or possessors
of merely symbolic authority. They provided a focus for unity extending far beyond the inland
centre of the kingdom and were a means of mobilizing a supra-nagari identity. The use of the king’s
name by his subjects in the rantau, royal intervention in local movements of resistance to the
Dutch and the creation of an extended communications network combined to indicate the presence of
genuine political substance. The Dutch had to come to terms with that force and themselves found it
useful, on occasion, to rely on the king’s name. Attention is given to the details of Dutch
contacts with coastal regions, to their initial contacts with the inland court itself and to the
development of movements of resistance to the VOC.
The cultural encounter embodied in these early contacts is approached through a study of the VOC
archives which are read for the light they throw on Dutch perceptions and expectations as well as
for the events they report.
Central to the argument of the thesis is the view that the king’s power lay, to a considerable
extent in the language of royal communication and in the substance given by his subjects to the
signs of his authority. Attention is given in detail, therefore, to a range of royal letters. Many
of these are to be found in Dutch translation in the archives of the VOC. These have been studied
in the context of a corpus of manuscript Malay letters
from the nineteenth century which were discovered in the course of research for the thesis. The
study of the words and the format of these letters enables conclusions to be drawn about
Minangkabau perceptions of authority and about its substance.
A semiotic approach to the communicative process rather than one which focusses on the
institutional structure of the Minangkabau state, it is argued, can throw significant light on the
meaning of Minangkabau kingship during this period.
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