In the formation of ethnicity the interaction between the views of outside observers and insiders themselves is an important process. The Minangkabau, whose homeland is located in the uplands of central Sumatra, have been a popular source of study because of their matrilineal social organisation and the practice of the merantau, where young Minangkabau men leave the homeland to seek knowledge and fortune abroad. Since the 1970s as a result of the women's movement, there has been a growing number of works focusing on the matrilineal principles which underlie Minangkabau society. The merantau, too, has often been cited for the dynamism in Minangkabau society which has led to its considerable contributions to the Indonesian state in a number of fields. It is not surprising, therefore, that today the Minangkabau themselves see matriliny and the merantau as primary components in their identity. While these components were present in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, they did not play the central role in ethnic identity as they do today. As I hope to show in this paper, there were different historical circumstances in those years which required another approach to ethnic identity.