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The Southeast Asian Ship: An Historical Approach

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 August 2009

Pierre-Yves Manguin
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This article will concentrate on one aspect of a major question in Southeast Asian maritime history: an attempt will be made to describe and determine the origins of the type of ship that was the main form of transport for the trade of the maritime kingdoms of the western half of Southeast Asia until the arrival of the Europeans in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Surprisingly enough — if the general importance of the commercial network of maritime Southeast Asia is considered — such a study has not yet been attempted. The very few authors dealing with the economic history of the region are usually content to dismiss the problem by saying that the ships are locally called “junks”, and that their tonnage is small. (The reader is thus left with the idea that Chinese ships were being used, since the word “junk” has long been applied almost exclusively to this very specific type of ship.) The general conclusion of this study is that Southeast Asian maritime powers built, owned, and operated ocean-going ships of respectable size as early as the first few centuries of the first millennium A.D. Needless to say, this has a considerable historical significance (which will not be examined here).

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Articles
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Journal of Southeast Asian Studies , Volume 11 , Issue 2 , September 1980 , pp. 266 - 276
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Copyright © The National University of Singapore 1980

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References

This article is a slightly modified version of a paper submitted at the International Conference on Indian Ocean Studies held at Perth in August 1979. It is only the preliminary version of a more elaborate study, in which full evidence will be given. It is presented here as such, in the hope that it will provide a fruitful basis of discussion. I should like to thank Campbell Macknight for the many valuable suggestions he made and for correcting my broken English.

1 See, for instance, the two works by Van Leur, J.C., Indonesian Trade and Society (The Hague, 1967), pp. 128, 374 n.67Google Scholar, and Meilink-Roelofsz, M.A.P., Asian Trade and European Influence (The Hague, 1962), pp. 101–5, 353 n.114)Google Scholar. A characteristic example of this assertion is given in the recent study by Van Naerssen, F.H.: the author manages to use the word ship only once in his chapter on “The Maritime Powers of Sumatra”, and this unique reference is to Chinese shipping (The Economic and Administrative History of Early Indonesia, Handbuch der Orientalistik, III/7, Leiden/Köln, 1977, pp. 28–36)Google Scholar. Works like those of Schrieke, B., “De Javanen als zee-en handelsvolk”, Tijd. Bataviaasch Genootschap 58 (1919): 424–28Google Scholar and Wolters, O.W., Early Indonesian Commerce (Ithaca, 1967), esp. chap. 10Google Scholar, do more justice to local shipping, without getting into technicalities.

2 The word jong is known from earlier Javanese texts, after the 12th century. See Kern, H.'s remarks on this word in his Verspreide Geschriften 12: 237–38 and 13: 147–48Google Scholar. Up-to-date comments on the Javanese texts quoted by Kern will be found in Zoetmulder, P. J., Kalangwan (The Hague, 1974)Google Scholar.

3 Possible links between ch'uan or tsung and jong should be investigated. A good start would be provided by the few remarks on this subject by Pelliot, P., “Les grands voyages maritimes chinois au début du XVe siècle”, T'oung Pao 30 (1933):446–47CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

4 These naus had a burthen of 300 to 400 metric tons. Magalhaes-Godinho, V., Os descobrimentos e a economia mundial, vol. 2 (Lisbon, 1963–1965), pp. 78–81Google Scholar, gives higher figures (400 to 500 tons), but these refer to the naus used on the route from Lisbon to India. The average nau sailing east of India would have been smaller. The smallest had a burthen of 150 tons.

5 For a recent analysis of Portuguese enterprise in Southeast Asian waters at the beginning of the 16th century, see L.F.F.R. Thomaz, “Les Portugais dans les mers de l'Archipel au XVIe siècle”, and Bouchon, G., “Les premiers voyages portugais à Pasai et à Pegou (1512–1520)”, both in Archipel 18 (1979): 105–25 and 127–57CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

6 Correia, Gaspar, Lendas da India, vol. 1, 1 (Lisbon, 1858), pp. 216–18Google Scholar. These events are confirmed, in less detail, by other 16th-century chroniclers as well as by Giovanni da Empoli, who was aboard one of the Portuguese ships; Bausani, A. (ed.), Lettera di Giovanni da Empoli (Rome, 1970), pp. 52–53, 130–31Google Scholar.

7 In the various texts quoted in this article, italics have been used for the technical passages which form part of my evidence.

8 The “Flor de la Mar” was a nau of 400 metric tons burthen. She was at that time considered a very powerful one.

9 Description published in Wicki, J., “Lista de moedas, pesos e embarcaçoes do Oriente, composta por Nicolau Perreira S.J. por 1582”, Studia 33 (1971): 147–48Google Scholar. Only extracts from this text are given here; a few parts still set some problems that cannot be discussed at length in this article.

10 Information on tonnages will be found in the following sources. de Lima Felner, R.J., Subsidios para a historia da India portuguesa, vol. 3 (Lisbon, 1868), p. 9Google Scholar. de Sa, A.B., Documentaçao para a historia das missoes … Insulindia, vol. 4 (Lisbon, 1954–1958), p. 15Google Scholar. de Couto, Diogo, Da Asia, dec. IX, chap. 27 (Real Officina edition, Lisbon 1786, XIX: 227)Google Scholar. Documentaçao ultramarine portuguesa, vol. 1 (Lisbon, 1960), p. 332Google Scholar. de Varthema, Ludovico, Itineraio, (Giudici, P., ed.) (Milano, 1928), p. 257Google Scholar. Cartas de Affonso de Albuquerque, vol. 3 (Lisbon, 1884–1935), p. 59Google Scholar. de Lemos, Jorge, Historia dos cercos que os Achens e Jaos puserao a fortaleza de Malaca (Lisbon, 1585), 2nd part, 1st chapterGoogle Scholar. Thomaz, L.F.F.R., “Maluco e Malaca”, in A viagem de Fernao de Magalhaes e a questao das Molucas (Lisbon, 1975), p. 41Google Scholar. V. Magalhaes-Godinho, op. cit., vol. 2, p. 176.

11 Observations gathered during fieldwork in 1979 and from Dick, H.W., “Prahu shipping in Eastern Indonesia, Part I”, Bulletin of Indonesian Economic Studies (1975): 71Google Scholar, and Pelly, Usman, Ara, dengan Perahu Bugisnya (Ujung Pandang, 1975), pp. 16, 22, 29Google Scholar.

12 This is confirmed by other texts, such as De Moluccis Insulis (dated 1523); a translation of it is given in Blair, and Robertson, (ed.), The Philippine Islands, 1493–1898, vol. 1 (Cleveland, 1903–1909), p. 305Google Scholar.

13 On the classification of boats into broad categories like shell or skeleton build, see the standard works by Greenhill, B., Archaeology of the Boat (London, 1976)Google Scholar, and Casson, L., Ships and Seamanship in the Ancient World (Princeton, N.J., 1971)Google Scholar.

14 Two shipwrecks are known to have had edge-to-edge fastening of the planks and lashing of the shell to the ribs. The older was found in Pontian, near Pahang, and dates from some time during the first millennium A.D. (Gibson-Hill, C.A., “Further Notes on the Old Boat Found at Pontian, in Southern Pahang”, Journal of the Malayan Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society (JMBRAS), 25, no. 1 (1952): 111–33Google Scholar; regarding the date of this shipwreck, J. Boisselies noted that the pottery recovered closely resemble those found in Oc-eo; see his report in Arts Asiatiques 20 (1969): 73Google Scholar. Another such shipwreck, presumably of Malay origin and dating from the 13th to 14th century A.D., was recently uncovered in Hong Kong (see the report in Journal of the Hong-kong Archaeological Society 5 (1974): 22–33Google Scholar. Around the middle of the 16th century, Portuguese authors describe this method being used in the building of the Moluccan kora-kora (G. Rebello, Informaçao sobre as Molucas, published in A.B. de Sa, op. cit., vol. 3, pp. 317–22, 381–86; Jacobs, H.Th.Th.M. (ed.), A Treatise on the Moluccas (Rome, 1971), pp. 156–59)Google Scholar. Hooridge, A. has recently found this technique being used in remote islands of Eastern Indonesia [The Design of Planked Boats of the Moluccas, National Maritime Museum, Maritime Monographs and Reports no.38, (London, 1978)]Google Scholar.

15 A further improvement in the edge-to-edge fastening of the strakes is the addition of flat rectangular tenons inserted in mortises hollowed out in the seams of the planks and then secured by two wooden pegs which prevent the planks riding apart. Though this sophisticated technique would seem to differ from that described by Fr. Perreira (the wooden pegs would be seen from the outside), it also is well attested in Southeast Asia: it was used on Vietnamese boats and the planks of a presumably 19th-century shipwreck recovered in Johor Lama were fastened in this same way (Paris, P., “Esquisse d'une ethnographie navale des pays annamites”, Bulletin des Amis du Vieux Huê, 1942, p. 21Google Scholar; Piétri, J.B., Voiliers d'Indochine (Saigon, 1949), pp. 17–19 and Fig. 65Google Scholar; Sieveking, G. de G., Wheatley, P., and Gibson-Hill, C.A., “Recent Archaeological Discoveries in Malaya”, JMBRAS 27, no. 1 (1954): 229–30Google Scholar; Gibson-Hill, C.A., “Johore Lama and Other Ancient Sites”, JMBRAS 28, no.2 (1955): 178–79Google Scholar.

16 Additional strength is provided by the driving of a wedge into the head of one out of three or four dowels (whether in the fastening of the planks together or that of the latter to the ribs), thus preventing the planks riding apart. This important technical detail, observed during recent fieldwork, had already been noticed by Collins, G.E.P., Makassar Sailing (London, 1937), p. 221Google Scholar. Recent descriptions of the building of Bugis ships are to be found in Usman Pelly, op. cit., and Hooridge, A.G., The Konjo Boat builders and the Bugis Prahus of South Sulawesi, Maritime Monographs and Reports no. 40 (London, 1979)Google Scholar. See also Macknight, C.C. and Mukhlis, , “A Bugis Manuscript about Praus”, Archipel 18 (1979): 271–82CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

17 J.B. Piétri, op. cit., p. 17. Howitz, Pensak C., Ceramics from the Sea: Evidence from the Koh Kradad Shipwreck, Excavated in 1979 (Bangkok, 1979), p. 9Google Scholar.

18 Cartas de Affonso de Albuquerque, vol. 3 (Lisbon, 1884–1935), p. 59Google Scholar.

19 G. de G. Sieveking et al., op. cit., pp. 229–30.

20 See the reports on this excavation in Wenwu (1975), no.10, pp. 1–35, and an abstract of this, in French, in C., and Lombard, D., “Un vaisseau du XIHe siecle retrouvé avec sa cargaison dans la rade de ‘Zaitun’”, Archipel, 18 (1979): 57–67Google Scholar.

21 In Fr. Perreira's description given above, three rudders are mentioned (two lateral and one central). This differs from other 16th-century sources, as well as from later observations up to the 20th century. Fr. Perreira might have seen a ship with an oar — or rather a long sweep — fitted on the stern-post to help in harbour manoeuvres when the ship had hardly any way on her. This might also provide an explanation for the three steering-oars of the ships decorating the Gulf of Bengal and the South China Sea in the Lopo Homen-Reineis' map of 1519 (Cortesao, A. and da Mota, A. Teixeira, Portugaliae Monumenta Cartographica, vol. 1 (Lisbon, 1960), p. 21Google Scholar.

22 See, among others, L. de Varthema, op. cit., p. 257. Thomaz, L.F.F.R., De Malaca a Pegu, Viagems de urn feitor português (1512–1515) (Lisbon, 1966), p. 134Google Scholar. Relaçao das Plantas & Dezcripsoes de todas as Fortalezas … (Lisbon, 1936), p. 45Google Scholar. Mills, J.V. (ed.), “Eredia's description of Malacca, Meridional India and Cathay”, JMBRAS 8, no.1 (1930): 36–37Google Scholar.

23 One of these representations of a jong (Fig. 2), the best of the three, was drawn in Malacca by Manuel Godinho de Eredia some time before 1613 and he included it in his manuscript description of Asia (published for the first time by Janssen, L., Malaca, l'Inde méridionale et le Cathay (Bruxelles, 1881–1882), 2 volsGoogle Scholar. with a facsimile of the whole manuscript. See also Mills's translation and annotations, op. cit.). The second (Fig. 3) was engraved in D'Eerste Boeck … door G.M.A.W.L. [i.e., Lodewijcksz] (Amsterdam, 1596), fol. 35 v°Google Scholar. The third one, by Van Linschoten, Jan Huygen, was engraved in his Itinerario, Voyage ofte Schipvaert… (Amsterdam, 1596), pp. 32–33Google Scholar; this is a rather freakish rendering of a ship, probably including Chinese elements into it (it is reproduced again, in a slightly modified form, on the right-hand side of the above-mentioned engraving by Lodewijcksz; see Fig. 3).

24 One could refer, for instance, to the descriptions and the beautiful and technically very accurate drawings and plans made by Paris, Adm. E. in Southeast Asian waters during the first half of the 19th century (Essai sur la construction navale des peuples extra-européens (Paris, 1841), 2 volsGoogle Scholar. He gives a good description of the steering-gear of an Achehnese boat (pp. 70–72, and plate 76). Other descriptions will be found in Nooteboom, C., “Vaartuigen van Mandar”, Tijd. Bataviaasch Genootschap 80, no.l (1940): 29Google Scholar and in Hooridge, op. cit. (1979), p. 21.

25 Information on the number of masts and sails will be found in the sources quoted in notes 10 and 22. The richest source for that purpose is a document published by L.F.F.R. Thomaz, which gives the details of the sails purchased in Pegu to be rigged on a newly bought jong (op. cit., 1966, 134ff.).

26 One may refer to the above-mentioned drawings by Adm. E. Paris. The Bugis ships, though they have been rigged with Western-style sails for the past century, used to have canted sails (see Matthes, B.F., Ethnographischen Atlas … opheldering van het Boegineesch Woordenboek (The Hague, 1874), pp. 16 and 17Google Scholar.

27 Cortesao, A. (ed.), The Suma Oriental of Tomé Pires (London, 1944), pp. 183, 189, 195, 226Google Scholar; see also the sources quoted in notes 10 and 22 above.

28 On the common use of iron nails and clamps in Chinese shipbuilding, from at least the 8th century onwards, see Needham, J., Science and Civilisation in China, vol. 4, no.3 (Cambridge, 1971), pp. 412, 459Google Scholar. Some clamps were recovered in the above-mentioned (n.20) 13th-century Chinese wreck.

29 Needham, op. cit., pp. 627–56.

30 Van Erp, Th., Voorstellingen van de vaartuigen op de reliefs van den Boroboedoer, Monographiëen over Kunst en Cultuur, no.1 (The Hague: 1923)Google Scholar, (also in Nederlandsch Indië Oud en Nieuw (1923): 227–55Google Scholar. Van der Heide, G.J., “De samenstelling van Hindoe-vaartuigen, uitgewerkt naar beeldwerkken van den Boroboedoer”, Nederlandsch Indië Oud en Nieuw 13 (1928): 343–57Google Scholar. The work by Van Erp is illustrated with excellent photographs of these reliefs.

31 The crew of these outrigger boats is obviously not represented to scale and cannot be of any help in ascertaining their size. But one detail at least allows us to give a rough estimate of it: this is the relative dimensions of the oars — or rather the paddles — which stick out of the portholes on some boats (Van Erp, op. cit., plates 7 and 10).

32 On the use of double outriggers, see Hornell, J., Water Transport: Origins and Early Evolution (Cambridge, 1946), pp. 253–71Google Scholar, and the discussion of this chapter by Paris, P., “Discussion et données complémentaires à propos de l'ouvrage de M. James Hornell …”, Mededelingen van net Rijksmuseum voor Volkenkunde, no. 3 (Leiden, 1948), pp. 39–40Google Scholar.

33 Mookerji, R., Indian Shipping (Bombay, 1912)Google Scholar.

34 The best colour reproduction of this frescoe is to be found in Yazdani, G. and Bynion, L., Ajanta: Colour and Monochrome Reproductions of the Ajanta Frescoes …, vol. 2 (Oxford, 1930–1955), pl. 42Google Scholar. Needham, op. cit., Fig. 967, gives a freely interpreted tracing from this painting. See also Schlingloff, D., “Kalyanakarin's Adventures. The Identification of an Ajanta Painting”, Artibus Asiae 38, no. 1 (1976), pp. 5–28CrossRefGoogle Scholar. For the dating of these caves and their frescoes, see Sterr, P., Cotonnes indiennes d'Ajanta et d'Ellora (Paris, 1972), pp. 139–41Google Scholar.

35 Wolters, O.W.' Early Indonesian Commerce (Ithaca, N.Y., 1967)Google Scholar, is the standard work on this matter. Ferrand, G., in “L'empire soumatranais de Crivijaya”, [Journal Asiatique (1922): 1–104, 161–216]Google Scholar and “Le K'ouen-louen et les anciennes navigations interocéaniques dans les Mers du Sud” [Journal Asiatique, 13 (1919): 239–333, 431–92Google Scholar; 14 (1919): 5–68, 201–42] published and commented all the textual evidence available at that time.

36 This seems to be a reference to the lashing of some components of these ships (see note 14 above). But dowelling must also have been used, for it appears impossible to sew or to lash together multiple sheaths of planks.

37 These texts were first translated by Pelliot, P., “Quelques textes chinois concernant l'Indochine hindouisée”, Etudes asiatiques, publicées à l'occasion du 25e anniversaire de l'Ecole Française d'Extrême-Orient, vol. 2 (Paris, 1925), pp. 243ff.Google Scholar; J. Needham also makes use of these texts (op. cit., pp. 495–600). My version is based on both Pelliot's and Needham's translations.

38 Christie, A., “An Obscure Passage from the Periplus”, Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies 29, no.2 (1957): 345–63CrossRefGoogle Scholar. But Stein, R. had already proposed this same reading of the Periplus in “Le Lin-yi”, Han-hiue, vol. 2 (1947), pp. 65–67Google Scholar. Other interpretations of kolandio phonta through Sanskrit or Tamil have also been propounded [Coedès, G., Textes grecs et latins relatifs à l'Extrême-Orient (Paris, 1910), p. xvii, n.1Google Scholar]; Meile, P., “Les Yavana dans 1'Inde tamoule”, Journal Asiatique (1940), pp. 90–92Google Scholar.

39 Needham, op. cit., pp. 619, 642.