The pre-eminent ‘stranger’ sayyid
The sāda (plural for sayyid) of Hadhrami Arab origin exerted an influence vastly disproportionate to their size as a community in maritime Southeast Asia.Footnote 1 Whether immigrant or locally born creole (muwallad), they shared an Alawi identityFootnote 2 based on claims of descendence from the Prophet Muhammad, which set them apart as non-autochthonous and, hence, ‘foreign’. This paper sets out to understand the pre-eminence of the Hadhrami sāda using the conceptual model of Southeast Asia's ‘men of prowess’, coterminous with the more broadly observed phenomenon of ‘stranger’ adventurers and ‘stranger-kings’.Footnote 3
The status and religious authority of the sāda ideally fitted them to the role of ‘stranger-kings’ to a degree unmatched by other individuals or communities. Their sustained socio-political influence over time was in marked contrast to the sporadic rise and fall of parvenus of other origins. Consider the meteoric rise and fall of the Persian merchant and court favourite, Aqa Muhammad, or the Greek Phrakhlang (minister of trade and foreign affairs) Constantine Phaulkon during the reign of King Narai of Ayutthaya (r. 1656–88).Footnote 4 The kingdom's Chinese merchant elite did better. A Teochiu who married a Thai rose to be the illustrious ruler Phraya Taksin (r. 1767–82), but at the cost of his Chinese cultural identity.Footnote 5 Again, in the Netherlands Indies, Dutch administrators in their role as arbiters and adjudicators in conflict resolution resonated with one of the fundamental aspects of the ‘stranger-king’ phenomenon.Footnote 6 Yet, their lack of indigenous blood ties through marriage – a key feature of ‘stranger-kings’ – sets them apart as aliens. Even the Bugis under-kings (yang di-pertuan muda) of Riau,Footnote 7 who bore every mark of physical prowess and charisma that distinguished the archetypical ‘stranger-king’ and married into the Malay royal house, were excluded from the sacred role of kingship.Footnote 8 In contrast, a sayyidi ‘stranger’ who, by marriage, could gain the title of tengku (Malay prince) and a place within the sanctum of Malay power, was a potential ‘stranger-king’.
Foreignness, political genius and marriage alliances with the indigenous ruling elite were shared features of immigrant adventurers within the international trading world of Southeast Asia. Nonetheless, exclusive religious status and the inferred cultural and social standing accounted for sāda exceptionalism. It enabled a sayyid of talent and enterprise to seal politically influential marriages so as to emerge as a ‘stranger-king’ with the ambiguous identity of a ‘stranger-kinsman’, simultaneously ‘outsider’ and ‘insider’.
The preliminary section of this paper situates the sayyid ‘stranger’ within the context of Southeast Asia's ‘man of prowess’. The discussion then focuses on the high noon of sāda activity in eighteenth-century state-making in the resource nodes of Perak, Siak and Pontianak. The sayyidi status of the respective al-Faradz, al-Syihab and al-Qadiri lineages in these three polities enhanced their credibility, facilitating their access to royal blood lines and interior resources. The broad spectrum of the sayyidi personality, which varied from extemporary piety and humanity to extreme violence and despotism, was colourfully refracted through the prism of Southeast Asian state formation. Their discrete response as ‘strangers’ or ‘stranger-kings’ to particular conditions of time and place – whether in the form of resistance or accommodation – made a singular contribution to ‘the last stand’ of indigenous power and prestige preceding the region's transition to colonial rule.Footnote 9
The ‘stranger’ as ‘man of prowess’
O.W. Wolters has emphasised the pivotal role of the ‘men of prowess’ in early Southeast Asian state formation. These ‘extraordinary persons’ manifested qualities of achievement and leadership based on the cult of Shiva, borne on the wave of Indian religious and cultural influence.Footnote 10 This externally sourced genius is identifiable with the ‘stranger-king’ phenomenon, which Marshall Sahlins associates with exotic origins, spiritual superiority, physical prowess and charisma, all passports to marriage with indigenous women of rank.Footnote 11
The metaphor of the powerful cultural broker from afar, following the path of trade to lay the foundations of supra-village leadership and authority, informed the foundation myths of Southeast Asian polities. The origins of first-century Funan, progenitor of the early Southeast Asian state, are encapsulated in the legend of Kaundinya, the Brahman who married a local naga princess, illustrating the synthesis between Indian and indigenous cultures.Footnote 12 In fact, fundamental features of Southeast Asian rulership privileged the foreign aspirant in a number of ways, especially the prevalence of cognatic kinship over lineage and the function of rulers as spiritual heads and religious teachers.Footnote 13
In the early modern Islamic period, the foreigner as charismatic dynastic founder is articulated in the hybrid myth of Iskandar Zulkarnain borrowed from the Alexander romance. According to one version, his three sons became rulers respectively of China, Sumatra and Rum (Turkey).Footnote 14 In the Malay chronicle Sejarah Melayu, Demang Lebar Daun, the founder of the Malay kingdom of Palembang, abdicated in favour of a descendant of Iskandar Zulkarnain who appeared at the sacred mount of Bukit Siguntang Mahameru.Footnote 15 These myths established a powerful link between the purveyors of Islam from afar and state formation.Footnote 16
The wali sanga (council of Islamic holy men/saints), precursors of Giri's illustrious ‘priest-kings’ and progenitors of Muslim rule and political culture in Java played a variety of roles as traders, teachers, legalists and warriors.Footnote 17 According to one tradition, the origin of the wali (14 instead of the widely accepted nine), is traced to Hadhrami genealogical sources.Footnote 18 Though the validity of this claim has been questioned,Footnote 19 the sāda are imaged as pioneers in the transmission of Islam also elsewhere in the Archipelago.
The Sejarah Melayu associates the arrival of a sayyid, Abd Aziz from Jedda, with Melaka's conversion to Islam in c. 1400.Footnote 20 The sayyid foreigner is furthermore depicted as harnessing the power of Islam to the interest of ruler and state. During the reign of Sultan Muzafar Syah (d. c. 1459), a sayyid is believed to have saved the city from imminent invasion by a Siamese prince, miraculously killed by a bow shot in distant Melaka.Footnote 21 In Perak, the saint Sayyid Jamalu'llah al-Hadziri is attested to have introduced the Perak Law Code in accordance with Islamic jurisprudence. Ranked with the royalty, he was buried beside the ruler and his consort. Upholding the family's reputation, his son Sayyid Husayn al-Faradz served as Sultan Muzafar Syah's (r. 1528–49) religious teacher.Footnote 22 In Aceh, the title of ‘Syeikh al-Islam’, which Sultan Iskandar Thani (r. 1637–41) conferred on the Sufi muwallad from Gujarat, Nur al-Din al-Raniri, acknowledged his theological authority.Footnote 23
Distant origins and the association of sāda with religious teachers and holy men connected them with spiritually endowed Southeast Asian ‘big men’ who commanded access to power. The association of kingship with magic and the recruitment by rulers of outsiders gifted with shamanistic and spiritual powers to guarantee the efficacy of kingly status were distinctly Southeast Asian traditions.Footnote 24Sāda foreigners bearing mystic ‘soul stuff’ married indigenous royalty by virtue of the flexibility of the Southeast Asian concept of cognatic kinship. Such alliances between the wali sanga and local royalty formed the bedrock of the fifteenth- and sixteenth-century Muslim states of the north coast of Java.Footnote 25
By the second half of the seventeenth century, indigenous states under the threat of Dutch economic and political ascendance sought fresh sources of spiritually ordained power for revitalising leadership. Contacts with Mecca and hospitality to foreign clerics, jurists, scholars and merchant-predicants at the Malay-Indonesian harbour-capitals expressed a clear religious bias which favoured the sāda. Alawi ulama (singular alim) and awliyā' (saints), some of whom were elevated to the rank of habib, appear to have had a significant role in the political life of Southeast Asia.Footnote 26Sayyid and syarif Footnote 27 were among saints, miracle workers and clerics who developed a compelling attraction among a people seeking new sources of strength and direction in the throes of the economic crisis at the end of the ‘Age of Commerce’.Footnote 28
In the main theatre of power politics in the Straits of Melaka, the opportunity for leadership was readily seized by ‘outsiders’ of outstanding talent among the newly arrived Hadhrami and Bugis migrants.Footnote 29 In contrast to the seizure of power by the latter, sāda with their wide influence and spiritual capital were readily recruited by beleaguered local rulers to help shore up the moral and material structures of statehood. The tide of eighteenth-century opportunistic Arab migration was mythologised around the lives of four sāda scholar-adventurers from Hadhramaut. Able to use their ascribed religious status and personal talents, they infiltrated dynastic bloodlines to take centre stage in affairs of state. As J.M. Gullick has pointed out, although it was difficult for a Malay peasant to enter the ruling class, ‘[a]n immigrant adventurer could more easily win acceptance as a member of the ruling class. His claim to aristocratic status in his own country could not easily be checked. A Sumatran sayyid, in particular, could always make a place for himself among the ruling class of a Malay State’. In recognition of their special status, the sāda, in common with the aristocracy, state officials and Islamic clerics, were exempted from kerah or corvée. Moreover, they bore the special mark of distinction as the only community of non-indigenes who were ranked in status with royalty, to whom they were commonly related by marriage.Footnote 30
Perak's ‘stranger-kings’: Religion, magic and authority
Spiritual mentors
Perak, a former dependency of Melaka, shared a common ethnogenesis with the rest of the Malay world. Richly endowed with elephants and tin, the mainstay of eighteenth-century trade in the Bay of Bengal, the state reached its apogee under the reign of Sultan Iskandar Syah (r. 1752–65) who wore the proud epithet ‘Zulkarnain’ or the ‘two-horned’.Footnote 31 Previous vassalage under Aceh, followed by close commercial links with Muslim Coromandel, suggests constant renewal of religious life in Perak, replicated during the era of eighteenth-century Hadhrami migration.
During the mid-eighteenth century the religious influence of the al-Faradz represented a countervailing source of internal strength in the face of Bugis challenge and alliance with the ‘infidal’ Dutch. Sultan Iskandar Syah, who co-opted members of the family as religious teachers, ministers and shamans, himself married a daughter of Sayyid Jalaludin, purportedly a fifth-generation descendant of the saint Jamalu'llah and thirtieth from the Prophet. A brother-in-law by the same marriage, Sayyid Abubakar, a favourite of Sultan Iskandar, rose to great prominence. Another brother-in-law, Sayyid Hassan, married the ruler's sister and an issue of this alliance, Raja Syarif Bisnu alias Sultan Muda Bisnu, in turn married a daughter of Sultan Iskandar.Footnote 32 By means of these marital ties the al-Faradz bloodline irreversibly merged with that of the Perak ruling dynasty. As the only group of ‘outsiders’ acknowledged as equals by the Perak royalty, the al-Faradz soon gained ascendance over the distinguished Megat family of Minangkabau origins.Footnote 33
As men of intellect and high birth, the sāda ‘strangers’ provided an important counterweight to the power of the traditional chiefs. Thus, Sultan Iskandar appears to have used the al-Faradz for restoring stability following the civil war between Sultan Muhammad and his brother Sultan Muzafar and the consequent rift between hulu (upriver) and hilir (down river) territories.Footnote 34 When the Bendahara (prime minister and commander-in-chief) from the Megat family was killed during a trip to trap elephants, Sultan Iskandar seized the opportunity to appoint Sayyid Abubakar to fill the vacancy. As the highest ranking minister within the Orang Besar Empat or ‘council-of-four’, the Bendahara managed the personal affairs of the ruler. Viewed probably as an impartial ‘outsider’, he was secretary and administrator of the royal household and was entrusted with the office of revenue collector, receiving in return taxes from the Kinta River.Footnote 35 Sultan Iskandar also appointed Sayyid Abubakar's brother Sayyid Husayn as Menteri di-Bota (menteri at Bota, Kinta), in the tin-rich Kinta area. As the ruler's trusted servants, the sāda, like counterpart ‘stranger’ communities elsewhere in Southeast Asia, helped steer the state in the direction of economic prosperity.
Sayyid Abubakar eventually lost the position of Bendahara only to become Orang Kaya Menteri (minister of standing).Footnote 36 He was responsible for resolving disputes between princes and chiefs and matters concerning law and custom, tasks the sāda customarily fulfilled. Rights of revenue collection were withheld from the incumbent, possibly as a safeguard against conflict of interest; instead, he received a personal appanage in the form of Cegar Galah. Later inherited by Sayyid Syamsuddin, Sayyid Abubakar's son and successor, Cegar Galah remained with the al-Faradz family.Footnote 37
Situated north of the capital of Kuala Kangsar, Cegar Galah placed the Arab family within easy reach of Ulu Pelus, a valuable source of elephants, which figured next in importance to tin in Perak's international trade. The association of the al-Faradz with the extraction of hinterland resources was in character with the reputation of the Hadhramis as traders in forest produce since pre-Islamic times.Footnote 38 The Arab quest for Southeast Asia's natural resources, which originated in the seventh century and peaked around the tenth was given a fresh boost by eighteenth-century Hadhrami trade and immigration.Footnote 39 Botanical, pharmaceutical and magico-religious knowledge associated with the trade in forest produce – a feature of Arab expertise – gave the sayyidi adventurer a distinct advantage.Footnote 40
As elsewhere in the region, Perak's ‘stranger’ entrepreneur relied on the quest for upriver forest resources for capital accumulation. The sāda, who unlike the court-bound Malay princes were as much at home exploring the resources of the forest interior as they were conducting state affairs, successfully harnessed indigenous herbal traditions, supernatural beliefs and shamanistic skills to their spiritual status. Deeply rooted in the Malay psyche was the belief in the ability of sāda to drive out pestilence and disease, evoke good fortune and cast spells.Footnote 41 These qualities ideally fitted a sayyid for the prestigious post of Sultan Muda or state shaman. Wilkinson, who has traced the origin of this office to Melaka, describes the Sultan Muda as a ‘king-coadjutor’ whose duties were entirely in accordance with the magico-religious powers ascribed to ‘strangers’.Footnote 42 As Wilkinson has put it, ‘Any stranger is credited with greater magic than life-long acquaintances’.Footnote 43
The office of Sultan Muda, associated with spiritual, herbal and shamanistic powers (ilmu pawang) was conferred by Sultan Iskandar on his nephew and son-in-law, Raja Bisnu, son of Sayyid Hassan.Footnote 44 As state medicine-man and shaman, Raja Bisnu assumed the title of Sultan Muda Ala'ud-din, who in the image of a spiritually potent ‘stranger’ alleviated sickness within the royal family and annually evoked the guardian genii of the country and blessed the regalia and holy musical instruments. The ‘sorcerer-sultan’ also officiated triennially at a feast conducted in the upriver wilderness, at the al-Faradz base of Cegar Galah. Here the bad spirits were coaxed to board a raft, which was then escorted downstream before it was cut adrift into the sea.Footnote 45 The title of ‘Sultan Muda’ superseded that of Raja Muda (‘young ruler’, heir to the throne) when the heir apparent was a sayyid, the spiritual and shamanistic attributes of the former potentially augmenting his claims to political succession. A case in point was the nephew and heir presumptive of the childless eleventh ruler, a man of Hadhrami origin from Siak who as Sultan Muda subsequently became Sultan Alauddin Mugayat Syah (r. 1720–28).Footnote 46
Indelible bloodlines
The interpenetration of the royal and the sayyidi lineages through marriage remained a central motif of the ‘stranger’ phenomenon in Perak. Among the sāda, those who married into royalty assumed the princely titles of Raja and Tengku while still retaining their sayyidi status. In contrast to marriage on the distaff side restricting the union of syarifah to sayyid, the sāda of the al-Faradz clan employed the freedom of exogamous marriage to penetrate the rival Mandeling Megat clan. Sayyid Mahmud, a grandson of Sayyid Syamsuddin, acquired by marriage to a Megat the prestigious office of Orang Kaya Besar. The post, which combined the duties of royal treasurer, secretary and chamberlain and had originally been held by the Megat, was transferred to the al-Faradz with the endorsement of Sultan Ismail (r. 1871–74), himself of Hadhrami extraction. Sayyid Ja'afar, who subsequently inherited the post, enjoyed the revenue rights in Pecat – again an important elephant area in the hulu – as well as exemption from tolls at the mouth of the Perak River.Footnote 47
The mid-nineteenth-century civil war in Perak, associated with the rivalry over tin, offered the ideal opportunity for a sayyid to emerge as a full-fledged ‘stranger-king’ in the form of Sultan Ismail, the son of Sayyid Hitam of Siak and Raja Mandak, a daughter of Sultan Ahmaddin (r. 1786–1806). His entry into Perak politics demonstrated the trans-regional receptivity of sāda ‘strangers’ and their socio-political mobility. Raja Ismail gained ‘insider’ status through marriage with a daughter of Sultan Ja'afar (r. 1857–65), qualifying him for the office of Bendahara. Footnote 48 On the death of Sultan Ali, he usurped the rulership (r. 1871–74) in the tradition of ‘stranger-kings’, superseding the superior claims of the Raja Muda, Raja Abdullah.Footnote 49
So powerful an influence did Raja Ismail exert that the new British administration's efforts to demote him to the position of Sultan Muda were frustrated by his refusal to surrender the royal regalia for the formal installation of Sultan Abdullah (r. 1874–76). Abdullah's subsequent banishment for his alleged implication in the murder of Resident J.W.W. Birch in November 1875 only returned to centre stage another member of the al-Faradz clan in the form of the British protégé, Raja Yusuf.Footnote 50 His mother was Raja Perempuan Ngah Aminah, a great-granddaughter of Sayyid Hassan and Sultan Abdullah Mohammed Syah (r. 1851–57).Footnote 51 Appointed regent in 1877, Raja Yusuf became Sultan Yusuf Syafuddin Muzzafar Syah (r. 1886–87), bearing testimony to the unquestioned credibility the sayyid ‘stranger’ enjoyed among indigenes.
The ‘stranger-kings’ of Siak: Kinship and violence
The centrality of marriage
The ‘Alawi way’, transmitted through diasporic genealogical networks, linked the al-Faradz with the al-Syihab in Siak through the marriage of Siti Hitam, a sister of Sayyid Jalalu'd-din, to Sayyid Ibrahim ‘panjang hidung’ (‘long nose’),Footnote 52 whose son Sayyid Uthman became a prominent figure in Siak politics. In contrast to the al-Faradz who were engaged wholly in civil and spiritual affairs, the Syihab, in common with other Hadhrami ‘strangers’, exploited the prevailing conditions of civil war to harness violence to prowess and kinship — so important in Southeast Asian state making.Footnote 53 It meant setting aside, like other Hadhrami adventurers in the Indian Ocean, the original sayyidi principle of not bearing arms.Footnote 54
Within the rapidly changing eighteenth-century political landscape of the Melaka Straits, Johor as the scion of a far-flung Malay empire was the object of conflicting claims and challenges. Following the murder of Sultan Mahmud in 1699, Raja Kecik from the Minangkabau court in Pagaruyung, who claimed to be his posthumous son, made an unsuccessful bid for the throne. This created a rift between Raja Kecik's dataran (riverine and coastal territorial) base in Siak and the kepulauan (the island and maritime) component of the Johor empire. When Raja Kecik died in 1746, the conflict deepened with the long-drawn-out rivalry for succession between his two sons, Raja Mahmud and Raja Alam, who respectively headed rival Malay and Minangkabau factions. Into this epic struggle moved Hadhrami ‘strangers’, representing the undercurrents of a new and powerful force.
Attracted by the resources and commercial potential of Siak, Hadhramis of talent and enterprise proved indispensable for the processes of state building. The initial victor, Sultan Mahmud (r. 1746–60), co-opted the support of a certain Sayyid Muhammad Ba Husain, a prominent merchant of the al-Saqqaf family who was ‘much loved by his people’.Footnote 55 The sayyid, an experienced trader with a shrewd appreciation of inland resources, was appointed Syahbandar at Senapelan, strategically placed to secure the Minangkabau gold and tin trade of Petapahan in defiance of the Dutch.Footnote 56 Sayyid Muhammad's commercial activities formed part of a growing network of Arab trade in the archipelago.Footnote 57
Sultan Mahmud also drew on the physical valour and moral rectitude of a charismatic ‘stranger’ in the form of Sayyid Umar, the son of Sayyid Muhammad, popularly known as ‘Tuan Besar’ (chief). When Sultan Mahmud's faction, frustrated by Dutch commercial restrictions, massacred the VOC garrison at Pulau Guntung in 1759, it was Sayyid Umar who performed the heroic act of stabbing the Dutch agent.Footnote 58 On hand also was Syeikh Salim, a distinguished theologian and a committed opponent of the Dutch who, with ‘a fitting aphorism ever on his lips’, lent spirit to the attacking forces.Footnote 59
Foremost among the Hadrami ‘strangers’, however, was the Syihab scholar turned trader and warrior, Sayyid Uthman, who helped Raja Alam wrest power from Raja Mahmud. According to Alawi genealogical folklore, he was one of the four pioneers from Tarim who headed the eighteenth-century wave of Hadhrami migration to Southeast Asia. Following a period of tutelage under Muhammad ibn Hamid in Malabar, the four sailed east from Calicut and, on reaching the archipelago, fanned out in different directions.Footnote 60 According to Winstedt's genealogy, however, Sayyid Uthman's father Sayyid Ibrahim was already settled in Siak and, unlike many sayyid who married outside the community, took for his wife Siti Hitam, a woman of equal rank and a sister of Sayyid Jalalu'd-din al Faradz of Perak.Footnote 61 Sayyid Uthman's standing as a member of a distinguished Alawi family was enhanced by his own experience and knowledge as a trader based in Batu Bahara where Raja Alam had his temporary headquarters. Calculating on the overall importance of the Minangkabau trading community in the political economy of Siak, Sayyid Uthman placed his stakes on Raja Alam's illustrious maternal connections with Pagarruyung. By marrying a daughter of Raja Alam, Tengku Embong Badaria, whose maternal grandfather was the Bugis warrior Daeng Perani, Sayyid Uthman acquired a prominent place within the Malay-Minangkabau-Bugis ruling elite. He was conferred the princely title of ‘Tengku’ and, revered as an Alawi, was popularly known as ‘Tengku Sayyid’.Footnote 62
From Raja Alam's perspective as well, the alliance with Sayyid Uthman was potentially valuable. Apart from his skills as a warrior, Sayyid Uthman's impeccable credentials as the maternal grandson of Sayyid Jalalu'd-din added credit to Raja Alam's cause. Raja Alam could rely on Sayyid Uthman's loyalty as a son-in-law, as well as his influence as a sayyid, for courting Bugis support against Sultan Mahmud.Footnote 63
Marauding and political capital
Within the trade-oriented environment of maritime Southeast Asia, freebooting was a political affair and an accepted means of resource and power accumulation while simultaneously demonstrating prowess.Footnote 64 Consider the years preceding Parameswara's founding of Melaka in 1402 when the founder-ruler is alleged to have lived on what his people managed to plunder from enemies. Despite this, he was etched in memory as ‘a great knight and a very warlike man’.Footnote 65 Similarly, Sayyid Uthman's buccaneering activity had the ring of heroism. The charisma of the ‘stranger’ sayyid raised freebooting to a new level of intensity and violence.Footnote 66 It earned him popularity with the Anak Raja, the distribution of spoils potentially augmenting the size and strength of his following. As an ‘outsider’ with no legitimate claims to the throne, Sayyid Uthman's display of power and charisma through ruthless acts, imaged as valour, was a necessary means of gaining political validation.Footnote 67
A shared love of maritime adventure, closely allied with state building, served as a strong bond between Raja Alam and Sayyid Uthman.Footnote 68 Sayyid Uthman's marauding skills, boosted by British arms and ammunition distributed in Riau, were used to bring to heel political and commercial rivals within the wider arena of the Straits. According to a report of 1760, Sayyid Uthman was sighted off the coast of Selangor, in command of a well-manned fleet comprising six ships, equipped with heavy cannon and rentaka (swivel guns) and well supplied with guns and gunpowder purchased from the British.Footnote 69 Dutch ships and east Sumatran vessels trading with Melaka were obvious targets of violence that disrupted vital rice supplies to the port.Footnote 70 Tin-rich Perak, identified as a Dutch ally and a commercial competitor, was also terrorised.Footnote 71 These acts were inspired by the twin objectives of undermining the Dutch alliance with Raja Mahmud and acquiring goods and captives as booty. Sayyid Uthman's acts of maritime violence, committed both independently and in company with Raja Alam, formed part and parcel of a wider agenda that ultimately brought victory over Raja Mahmud.Footnote 72
As an ‘outsider’ and a sayyid, customarily acknowledged as adjudicator and diplomat, Sayyid Uthman served as Raja Alam's chief mediator. At the same time, he shared with other Arabs the reputation as ‘good friends and very dangerous enemies’.Footnote 73 A shrewd military strategist, he contributed to Raja Ismail's defeat in 1761 by feigning friendship with the enemy, only to spy on them.Footnote 74 Once Raja Alam was installed as ruler, Sayyid Uthman collaborated in the business of territorial and commercial integration, for which his early years of adventurism served him well. A man of talent and charisma, he capitalised on the interlinked activity of trade and marauding to build an extensive network of influence on the commercially prosperous east coast.Footnote 75 While based at Batu Bahara, he had forged important links with the neighbouring commercial settlements of Asahan and Deli.Footnote 76 These early connections enabled him to play a key role as Prime Minister and Panglima Besar (military commander), extending Siak's suzerainty from Tamiang in the north to Panei in the south.Footnote 77 The Panglima Besar's awesome personality and reputation easily won over the compliance of the east coast settlements with Siak's demands for regular tribute and corvée, in addition to assistance with vessels and manpower in times of war.Footnote 78 Siak's rulers appear to have gained, for the first time, reasonable control over trade along the east coast.
Sayyid Uthman's reputation, military skills and political acumen would have proved equally important for Raja Alam's task of integrating the core regions of the Siak and Kampar river valleys and their coastal mashes. To secure trade along the Siak River, the capital was shifted from Mempura to Senapelan (Pekanbaru), closer to the prosperous Minangkabau market town of Patapahan.Footnote 79 Control established over the adjacent Kampar River centred at Pelalawan gained direct access to the Minangkabau heartland of Lima Puluh. The interior resources of gold and tin complemented the marine wealth of Bukit Batu, overlooking the coastal marshes of the Bengkalis at the heart of Siak's rich fishery and naval and maritime base. Neither the ruler-biased VOC accounts, nor the raja-centred Malay chronicles give due recognition to the crucial role of the ‘stranger’ in Raja Alam's project. However, the core areas of the Siak and Kampar Rivers, tightly administered by the royalty and nobility of which the ‘stranger’ element was an integral part, became ultimately the locus of the Syihab dynasty founded by Sayyid Uthman. Sayyid Uthman remained a key figure in Siak politics under Raja Alam's son and successor, Raja Muhammad Ali Muazzam Syah (r. ?1765–79).Footnote 80 A ‘stranger-kinsman’ to the last, his interment beside Raja Alam, in the grounds of the royal mosque in Senapelan, was an honour comparable to that accorded to the ‘stranger’ Sayyid Jamalu'llah al-Hadziri in Perak.Footnote 81
‘Stranger’ as ‘outsider-insider’
Like his father Sayyid Uthman, Sayyid Ali's political rise was prefaced by prowess displayed as maritime violence. Apart from extending Siak's maritime power in the Straits, Sayyid brought the Syihab to the forefront of political influence by gaining control over internal markets and the flow of goods between coast and interior.Footnote 82 Apart from the customary exemption of sāda from taxes and tolls, the Syihab as political ‘insiders’ would have had an advantage over other Arab traders in the upriver markets. A letter carried by Sayyid Ali's brother Sayyid Abd al-Rahman to the Dutch in Melaka stated the Siak ruler's decision to transfer the existing privileges of the Chinese gold traders at Patapahan to the Arabs, probably through Syihab leverage.Footnote 83
Where civil war had failed to resolve the factional conflict in Siak, Sayyid Ali shrewdly accommodated to the formula adopted for peace and reconciliation by his uncle, Raja Muhammad Ali, by means of reinforcing familial ties. The latter's marriage to Raja Mahmud's daughter Tengku Ambang Besar facilitated the restoration of her brother Raja Ismail as Sultan (r. 1779–81). To similarly secure his own position, Sayyid Ali married a daughter of Raja Mohamed Ali, reaffirming Syihab connections with the Minangkabau interior and coastal peripheries (rantau Minangkabau) that crucially underpinned Siak's geopolitics.Footnote 84 In a corresponding alliance with the rival faction, he also married Tengku Sadia, a daughter of Tengku Musa and grand-daughter of ex-Sultan Raja Mahmud, while his brother Abd al-Rahman married her sister.Footnote 85 Through a third marriage with Tengku Mandak, a grand-daughter of Raja Haji, Sayyid Ali affirmed connections with the powerful Bugis line at Riau.Footnote 86
Described by the Dutch Commander J.P. van Braam as a ‘quick-witted and intrepid prince’,Footnote 87 Sayyid Ali took advantage of the stability at the capital and of Muhammad Ali's political patronage to use piracy as a potent means of resource and power accumulation for enhancing the Syihab political image. More than mere acts of raiding, Sayyid Ali's acts of violence, supported by his brothers Sayyid Abd al-Rahman and Sayyid Alwi (Tengku Lung Putih), were entrenched in a political agenda for containing Dutch influence in Perak and Selangor.Footnote 88 At one and the same time, using Raja Muhammad Ali's alliance with the VOC for the procurement of arms, Sayyid Ali and the Siak princes attacked and raided vessels in the Straits with the view to undermining the trade of Riau and curbing the independence of dependencies such as Asahan.Footnote 89
Syihab charisma won the support of a new maritime force in the form of the formidable slave-raiding Iranun of the Sulu Archipelago, strategically based at Retih in east Sumatra. Filling the vacuum left by the enfeebled Orang Laut after the fall of Riau in 1784, the Iranun helped to extend the reach and ferocity of Syihab raids.Footnote 90 In 1787, Sayyid Ali personally led the raid on Banka for tin and, two years later, used Kedah's grievances against Siam to attack Singgora (present-day Songkhla), returning with a rich booty of gold and silver.Footnote 91 It was from Bukit Batu that the abortive grand Malay-Iranun alliance against Perak and Penang set sail in 1791, headed by Sayyid Ali's brother-in-law, the Yamtuan Muda (‘young ruler’, junior ruler) Raja Endut.Footnote 92 The following year, Sayyid Ali participated in Pontianak's assault on Sambas.Footnote 93 These buccaneering activities reaped rich dividends in opium, tin and arms. Sponsored largely by Tengku Muhammad Ali, they bore the stamp of official sanction but did not fall strictly within the category of ‘privateering’ which, according to the strict Western definition, related to attacks on vessels carrying the flag of a declared enemy.Footnote 94
On the home front, the ambiguous ‘insider-outsider’ identity of the sayyid, with the simultaneous advantage of closeness and distance, was skilfully used by the Syihab for executing a well-calculated strategy of political consolidation. In 1788, Sayyid Ali gained the governorship of Bukit Batu through the influence of his father-in-law, Tengku Musa.Footnote 95 The area, which became the springboard for his broader ambitions, paralleled the resource pools appropriated by the sayyidi ‘stranger-kings’ in Perak, TerengganuFootnote 96 and Pontianak. Sayyid Ali substantially increased his power by using the rich resources of Bukit Batu to build some 30 vessels, in addition to those given by his brother-in-law, Raja Endut.Footnote 97 Once secure in the core region, Sayyid Ali next set his sights on Pelalawan, the catchment for trade flowing down the adjacent Kampar River. Sensing Sayyid Ali's bid for power, Muhammad Ali proposed transferring to Sayyid Ali his own authority as Raja Tua under the incumbent ruler, Raja Yahya (r. 1781–91). The scheme, which the Yamtuan Nuda Raja Endut found unacceptable,Footnote 98 evinced the strong bond that still subsisted within the original faction of Raja Mahmud. Its tentative link with the Syihab was irretrievably broken when Raja Muhammad Ali died in 1791. No longer held in check by the Malay political ethos of ‘playing relatives’, Sayyid Ali took on the mantle of the usurper to establish Syihab supremacy as full-blown ‘stranger-kings’.Footnote 99 He assumed the title of Sultan Abd al-Jalil Syaifuddin (r. 1791–1811) at the new capital of Kota Tinggi (Siak Sri Inderapura), with Sayyid Abd al-Rahman acting as Yamtuan Muda. Pelalawan and Kota Tinggi, backed by maritime power, gave the new Syihab dynasty effective control over a flourishing trade with the interior. Sayyid Abd al-Rahman, who also ruled Pelalawan after driving out Tengku Abdullah, was installed in 1810 as Sultan al-Jalil Syaifuddin of Kampar.Footnote 100
Sayyid Ali's violation of the succession rights was fully in keeping with the tradition of ‘stranger-kings’, as was his subsequent effort to appropriate aspects of Siak's historical past for the localisation of a dynasty perceived in the Malay world as Arab.Footnote 101 With the same aim of forging links with Siak's past, the Syihab appropriated and made their own the Syair perang Siak, originally composed for Raja Ismail and cherished by his faction.Footnote 102
In the conflict between the Minangkabau and Malay factions, Sayyid Ali had placed his bets on the former, with its superior claims for crafting an autonomous state on the Sumatran mainland. At the same time, he acknowledged the reality of Siak's deep-rooted connections with the Malay royal house across the Straits and its indestructible ethos and prestige, despite its political decline. Not surprisingly, therefore, Sultan Mahmud of Riau-Johor was one person who commanded Sayyid Ali's respect and deference.Footnote 103 The political coup brought successfully to fruition the Syihab claim to the awesome legacy of Raja Alam, but Sayyid Ali saw the wisdom of having the new order legitimised by Sultan Mahmud of Riau, the powerless yet respected scion of the Malay world. The Tuhfat records that in receiving Sayyid Ali at Riau, Sultan Mahmud ‘honoured him following the customs for greeting a dependent’. It was on this occasion that Sayyid Ali married Tengku Mandak, reinforcing the old Siak–Johor kinship ties.Footnote 104 Once again, he was ‘playing relatives’ within a society that was ‘kacukan’, mixed/hybrid and not pure, through the intertwining of ‘outsider’ and ‘insider’.Footnote 105
The Syihab ‘stranger-kings’ of Siak successfully transformed what the European powers regarded as a ‘pirate state’ into a polity commanding a thriving trade, coveted by the British and Dutch alike. They had long recognised profit from commerce as the means to political power. Kota Tinggi and Pelalawan led the trade with Penang and, later, Singapore.Footnote 106 Apart from promoting the export of forest produce and terubuk (tenualosa macrura), the Syihab dynasty presided over the proto-industrial production of pearl sago, timber and some of the region's finest gold-threaded cloth (songket).Footnote 107 Although by the 1820s, Siak's trade was on the decline, the British agent John Anderson considered it still impressive. Some 400 ships based at the capital serviced the export of Minangkabau gambier and coffee to Penang and Singapore.Footnote 108 On the east coast, Batu Bahara, Bulu Cina and Langkat conducted a brisk trade in pepper and gambier exports to Penang and Singapore.Footnote 109
Siak's continued survival was contingent upon appropriate adaptation to the changing political dynamic in the region, a fact the Syihab were quick to recognise. Adaptability was for the ‘outsider’ an indispensable tool for localisation and, ultimately, the way to achieving the privileged dual identity of ‘stranger-kinsman’. As Anglo-Dutch cooperation against maritime violence got under way, the Syihab opted to take advantage of new opportunities in the Straits for trade and investment, raising their profile as ‘orang kaya’ (lit. ‘rich men’). Commanding the interdependent forces of power and wealth, the orang kaya of the maritime world, predominantly foreign and cosmopolitan, functioned as mediators of internal-external relations, a role the sayyidi ‘stranger-kinsmen’ ideally fulfilled. Sayyid Ibrahim (r. 1821–27), who succeeded his father Sayyid Ali was a patron of trade. He stirred Siak in the direction of change, exchanging conflict and violence for political stability within the new structure of commerce introduced by the rise of Singapore.Footnote 110 In 1822, following its 1818 treaty with Major William Farquhar, Siak renewed its 1761 agreement with the Dutch bringing into play the sayyidi genius for political brinkmanship.Footnote 111 The British unease, represented to the ruler by their agent, James Anderson, was encountered by the consummate diplomacy of a sayyid: ‘Mana bulih buang Janji dangan Orang Engris [!]’ (How can a treaty with the English be broken [!]).Footnote 112 By confirming the Farquhar agreement, Sultan Ibrahim successfully neutralised his position.Footnote 113
In 1858, almost a century after the Syihab staked their fortunes on establishing Siak's viability as a state, Sayyid Ismail (r. 1827–64), who succeeded his brother Sayyid Ibrahim, accepted Dutch intervention. Among reforms undertaken by the forward-looking Sultan Syerif Kassim II (r. 1915–45), last in the dynastic line of Siak's ‘stranger-kings’, was a revised version of the manual Babul Qawaid describing the structure of government.Footnote 114 It evinced the strategy of adaptability Siak's ‘stranger-kings’ had unflinchingly embraced as their passport to success.
Symptomatic of the Syihab strategy of accommodation was the reformed Panglima Besar (commander-in-chief) of Siak. The erstwhile daring pirate who had killed so many men ‘that their eyes could fill a [cupak] measure’, settled into a life of comfort and dignity, elegantly attired in gold and silk.Footnote 115 As successful merchant entrepreneurs, the sāda ‘stranger-kings’ of the new era developed a taste for good living with a weakness for opium consumption, in stark contrast to their pious and abstemious forebears. These features were as much a part of the courtly life of the Syihab in Siak as they were for the al-Qadri in Pontianak. The sumptuous and elegant lifestyle observed by John Anderson on his mission to Siak was representative of the social habits of a new generation of entrepreneurial sāda ‘strangers’ and ‘stranger-kings’ who dominated the commercial bridgeheads of the maritime region, adroitly negotiating the interconnected spaces of trade and politics. The accoutrements of good living – fine attire, furniture, books, carpets and carriages – and lavish entertainments marked the superior social standing of the politically ambitious sāda. The urbanity and material wealth, which Sayyid Hussein al-Aidid of Penang best exemplified, facilitated easy mingling with Europeans, whether for private or public business.Footnote 116
Pontianak's ‘stranger-kings’: Accommodation and collaboration
Man of virtue
Hadhrami transformations from ‘strangers’ to ‘stranger-kings’ were played out equally spectacularly in the remote quarters of western Borneo (Kalimantan), again in an area of immense natural resources in the region of the Kapuas and Landak Rivers. The way was led by Husayn al-Qadri, one of the four Alawi scholar-adventurers from Tarim, who followed the directions of his mentor in Malabar to pioneer a settlement amidst the dense forests further eastwards. On arriving in the Malay Archipelago, Husayn, descended from a long line of habib, took on the role of the archetypical peripatetic merchant-predicant. He visited Aceh, Batavia and Samarang along the main commercial route, trading, making influential contacts and enlarging his reputation before arriving in Matam.Footnote 117 Here, as well as in Mempawah where Habib Husayn finally settled in 1747, he established his pre-eminence as theologian, preacher and lawgiver.Footnote 118 Daeng Menanbun, the Pangeran Tua who reigned further upriver at Si-Bukit, considered it a rare honour to have in their midst a sayyid and a renowned jurist. The habib, who also earned the respected title of syarif, was assigned a strategic spot near the river mouth. The former pirate hideout gave way to a settlement centred on the mosque, court house and school complex established by the habib. His reputation for justice and the port's low taxes offered a haven of peace where trade and religion fed off each other.Footnote 119 Having extended the reach of Muslim trade at Mempawah, the habib duly relinquished control to Adi Wijaya when he succeeded his father, Daeng Menanbun, as penambahan (ruler/sovereign).Footnote 120
Man of muscle and ‘soul-stuff’
In the typical manner of the ‘stranger’ adventurer, Habib Husayn forged indigenous relations by marrying Nyai Tua, a former slave from Matan by whom he had a son, Abd al-Rahman.Footnote 121 Born in c. 1742, Abd al-Rahman grew up to be starkly different from his pious father. Faced with the challenge of European ascendance, he pursued an aggressive programme for the accumulation of power through the inter-related activities of trade and marauding.
Abd al-Rahman's reputation for prowess, combined with his identity as the son of a respected habib and an indigenous mother, proved impeccable credentials for winning influential marriages. In 1759, he married Candera Midi, sister of the ruler of Mempawah, Pangeran Adi Wijaya. Their father, Daeng Menambun, was a brother of Daeng Marewah, the first Bugis under-king at Riau. Abd al-Rahman freely drew on his Arab and Malay-Bugis connections when roving the seas and coastal waters during the 1760s, mixing trade and marauding. His commercial links with Palembang's large Arab community, as well as with Kutei and Pasir, were backed by a large fleet of armed perahu (native sailing boat) and trading vessels, including a brig and a ketch.
Abd al-Rahman's ruthless attacks on trading vessels and his cruel treatment of captives outraged his father, but in a region where historically violence and political influence were indivisible,Footnote 122 Abd al-Rahman's atrocities enhanced his ‘stranger’ mystique. Sultan Sepu of pepper-rich Banjarmassin gave his daughter in marriage to the young adventurer, raising him to the rank of pangeran. All the same, Abd al-Rahman's ruthless ambition and Machiavellian tendencies soon raised the apprehension of the rulers of both Banjarmassin and Mempawah, whose favour he duly lost.Footnote 123
Left with no power base, Pangeran Abd al-Rahman set out to carve out a state for himself. Capitalising on his attractiveness as a fearless fighter, he successfully garnered support and, with a 200-strong fleet, sailed in 1771 to take Pontianak. Strategically located at the confluence of the Kapuas and Landak rivers, the place was uninhabited due to its perceived notoriety for sheltering a female ghost that gave the place its name. According to Malay folklore, the pontianak struck terror as she preyed on the lives of children and pregnant women. Drawing on the perceived spiritual and supernatural powers of a sayyid, Abd al-Rahman ostensibly exorcised the ghost. Through a show of extraordinary physical strength and fortitude, he cleared the forest and built a small mosque, which served as a sanctified foundation for the pioneer settlement.Footnote 124 Under the sayyid's protection, Pontianak resonated with the Hadhrami hawta or sacred enclave, protected from the perils of the surrounding forest.
Abd al-Rahman's role as a charismatic ‘stranger-king’ proved critical for state building by way of introducing overall power over the tribal chiefs.Footnote 125 This process was facilitated by the ‘stranger-king’ formula for localising exotic origins through exogamous marriage alliances. Of all his marriages, that with Utin Candera Midi, the grand-daughter of Daeng Menambun, was pivotal — bringing Pontianak into a grand alliance with the Bugis both at Mempawah and, further afield, at Riau.Footnote 126 Raja Haji, son of the Daeng Marewah and fourth under-king at Riau, was a cousin of Utin Candera Miti and a strong ally who assisted the ruler in his policy of expansionism. In 1778, the Bugis leader helped Abd al-Rahman defeat Sanggu for the purpose of gaining access to the gold resources of the upper Kapuas.Footnote 127 Following the victory, Raja Haji installed Abd al-Rahman as ‘Sultan’. The grand investiture, conducted in accordance with the customs of Johor-Riau and witnessed by representatives and princes of subject territories, was analogous to Sayyid Ali's legitimisation at Riau.Footnote 128 It evinced the common desire shared by the sāda ‘outsiders’ for accommodation within the larger Malay world with Johor-Riau at its epicentre.
However, Abd al-Rahman, who like Siak's Sayyid Ali was guided by political expediency, abandoned familial ties with as much ease as he cultivated them. Ignoring Dutch enmity with the Bugis, he sought accommodation with the VOC and its interests in Landak, Borneo's only source of diamonds.Footnote 129 In 1779, he accepted Dutch vassalage largely with the view to bringing Landal within Pontianak's economic orbit and winning Dutch financial and military support.Footnote 130
In 1786, Abd al-Rahman again broke ranks with the Bugis when he secured Dutch assistance to capture Mempawah, with his sights on the potential taxes and trade to be accrued from the prosperous Hakka gold mines in upland Mandar.Footnote 131 A successful outcome saw the installation of his son Syarif Kassim (r. 1808–19) as panembahan but also the ruthless expulsion of the Bugis under-king Raja Ali, son and successor to Raja Haji, who had taken refuge in Mempawah following Riau's fall in 1784.Footnote 132 Dislodged from Mempawah, Raja Ali fled to Sukadana, which the Dutch soon laid to waste with Pontianak's cooperation.Footnote 133
End of an era
The initiative, charisma and insight Abd al-Rahman displayed in founding Pontianak bore the hallmarks of a ‘stranger-king’ who set the al-Qadiri ruling house high above the rival dynasties of west Borneo. Pontianak's meteoric rise, superseding Sukadana as the foremost power in that part of the island, was undoubtedly the result of Abd al-Rahman's genius. Unscrupulous and irreverent in his youth, he matured into an astute politician, tempering firmness with affability and hospitality.Footnote 134 A prominent nose and ‘burning’ dark brown eyes stamped his outstanding personality and gave him the appearance of a European. He was described by P.J. Veth as ‘perhaps the most unusual man that Borneo has ever known’.Footnote 135 His politeness and forbearance in dealing with the tactless and arrogant Dutch representative, Nicolaas Kloek, while at the same time holding his own ground, were a mark of his supreme political craftsmanship.Footnote 136 Not least was his credibility as a sayyid and a Muslim ruler in his scrupulous abstinence from opium, betel and tobacco and in the protection of his women.Footnote 137
Illustrating the centrality of religious status in the emergence of the sāda as ‘stranger-kings’ was Abd al-Rahman's unquestioned authority over the coastal and maritime Muslim communities, in contrast to his weak influence over non-Muslim communities upriver. Dayak collusion with Chinese kongsis and Bugis traders in the gold and diamond trade left the ruler with ineffective control over interior resource.Footnote 138 At Mandor, the Chinese were in a sufficiently strong bargaining position to minimise the ruler's gains.Footnote 139 Pontianak's revenues could meet neither the ruler's personal needs nor the expectations of the VOC, which withdrew its post in 1791.Footnote 140
Particularly with Dutch support withdrawn and diminishing opportunities for the display of valour through maritime exploits, Pontianak's ‘stranger-king’ sought other means of winning manpower and loyalty among the politically fluid and disparate Bornean people. Converting ascribed spiritual status to political reality to counter the European challenge made heavy claims on resource-based patronage, hospitality and courtly ostentation, to which the ruler's personal vanity succumbed readily. The expensive lifestyle maintained at his sprawling dalam (palace) proved to be Sultan Abd al-Rahman's Achilles heel.Footnote 141 A large clientele and some 24 wives and their relatives strained his resources and kingly bounty (anugerah), as did his lavish entertainments for Raja Haji's entourage over a 16–17-month sojourn.Footnote 142 His partiality towards Arab merchants who ran a substantial trade with the interior on preferential terms contributed in no small measure to his financial ills. Importantly, his seeming anxiety to win their loyalty and support betrayed his indelible identity as a ‘stranger’.Footnote 143 Abd-al Rahman's creation of a deceptively prosperous ‘theatre state’ cast him into mounting debt, which his son and successor Kassim (r. 1809–19) failed to redeem despite his own more modest life style.Footnote 144 However, through their partial identity as ‘outsiders’ with greater awareness of external realities, the ‘stranger kings’ were better able to adapt to the winds of change than their autochthonous counterparts.
A pragmatist
Kassim successfully subverted his father's nomination of his brother as heir apparent, only to inherit the former ruler's huge debts. However, like all sayyid ‘strangers’, Kassim lived by his wits, placing his trust in the efficacy of trade, capital and good inter-personal relations. He saw in expanding Chinese and British private trade, triggered by the founding of Penang (1786), an expanding market for west Borneo's resources from which the royal coffers might well benefit. He cultivated a close friendship with the private trader James Burn to develop commercial investment though, in adherence to Islamic principles, he declared that ‘interest [on credit] was contrary to his religion’. Again manifesting the ‘stranger’ talent for balancing practicality and orthodoxy, he abstained from the consumption of opium but traded in the article, which he received in exchange for gold from James Smith of Carnegy and Co. of Penang.Footnote 145 Through a major shift in political strategy involving an alliance with the British, Kassim turned to Pontianak's advantage the new commercial opportunities opened up for private trade by the British occupation of Java (1811–16). Responding to Raffles's agenda for commercial expansion in Borneo, he received Burn as political and commercial agent and, two years later, accepted British protection.Footnote 146 Furthermore, despite his own indirect connections with piracy, Kassim capitalised on Raffles's move against the institution as a means of defeating his arch-enemy, the ruler of Sambas.Footnote 147
Kassim bore the cosmopolitan stamp of a sayyidi ‘stranger-king’ who was knowledgeable and well travelled, unlike many of his Malay counterparts. Venturing beyond the sphere of Malay influence he had, during a three-year tour of Java, visited various rulers and the Dutch Governor-General himself.Footnote 148 Bearing the marks of shrewdness, charm and urbanity that characterised the sayyidi ‘stranger-kings’, Kassim was intimately acquainted with European etiquette and social values as they related to rank and influence. As B. Hall noted, recording Sir Samuel Hood's meeting with the Sultan in mid-1814:
The Sultan appeared to enter into his guest's character at once, and neither overloaded his attentions, nor failed to treat him as a person to whom much respect was due. I heard Sir Samuel (who had lost his right arm) say afterwards, that he was particularly struck with the Sultan's good breeding, in not offering to assist him in cutting his meat. The sultan merely remarked, that few people were so expert as his guest even with both hands.Footnote 149
The position of the al-Qadri in Pontianak was compromised by the large non-Muslim Dayak population in the interior, Chinese economic ascendance and regional Malay power at its nadir; but the sayyidi talent for engaging with counterpart ‘strangers’ from the west stood Kassim in good stead. Upon the restoration of Dutch power, Kassim, in his characteristic pragmatism, wrote to the Commissioners-General in Java that ‘he gave thanks to God and the Dutch, that his sometime brotherly friends had again taken possession of the island of Java’.Footnote 150 Renewed political negotiations that led to the treaty of 1819 were again a testament to the sayyidi genius for adaptability. According to the second article of the treaty: ‘His Highness fully aware of the wholesome benefits to himself, will ally himself strongly and closely with the Dutch government, which had built up its reputation in its Eastern Seas for more than two centuries…’Footnote 151
Conclusion: An abiding image
In a region inherently open to external influences, ascribed religious status set the sāda apart as ‘strangers’ and ‘stranger-kings’ extraordinaire. In the case of Sultan Abd al-Rahman, spiritual rehabilitation during his old age saw his vindication as a sayyidi ‘stranger-king’ with a moral public duty. He sought forgiveness from Burn, whom he had earlier defrauded over a commercial transaction and was deeply troubled by his son's violence and cruelty, equal to his own during his youth.Footnote 152 He considered Kassim – allegedly responsible for the poisoning of his Chinese creditor and the murder of a European trader – unfit to rule and advised him to undertake the pilgrimage to Mecca to atone for his sins.Footnote 153
Violence, which enhanced the mystique of the ‘outsider’, apparently did not pollute Muslim religious virtue, attained through a lifetime of adherence to prescribed ritual and followed by atonement and charitable acts in old age. In fact, Sultan Abd al-Rahman, like Sayyid Ali bin Uthman of Siak, found a place within the pantheon of Hadhrami scholars who played a significant role in shaping the religious life of the people around them.Footnote 154 Notwithstanding his acts of marauding and cruelty during his early career, Abd-al-Rahman was venerated in after-life. His tomb at Batu Layang, built by Kassim through raising public funds, became a pilgrimage site and a focal point on feast days, just like his father's, the Keramat Makam Tuan Besar at Mempawah.Footnote 155 The culture of Malay royal mausoleums and the indigenous cult of the keramat (a spiritually potent object or person) intersected with the practice of ziarah or visits to the tombs of saints and holy men popular among the Hadhramis.Footnote 156 Such pilgrimages enfolded ‘strangers’ and kinsmen within the composite temporal and spatial landscape of Malay kingship. At one and the same time, the significance of the graves for genealogical mapping of sāda within the Indian Ocean diaspora symbolised the ambiguous status of the Hadhrami ‘strangers’ and ‘stranger-kings’.Footnote 157 Taking advantage of their trans-regional religious status within the fluid and hybrid Malay world, the sāda remained irretrievably separate, yet indivisibly part of the Malay world.
The long association of sayyidi religious influence paved the way for the distinctive role of the eighteenth-century Hadhrami ‘strangers’. Pre-eminent as teachers, spiritual mentors, administrators and men of prowess, some emerged as full-fledged ‘stranger-kings’. Distinctive lineage, personal talent, charisma and an ambiguous ‘outsider-insider’ identity conducive to wide-ranging adaptation contributed to the dynamism of the sayyid ‘stranger-king’, pivotal to eighteenth-century state formation and the non-violent transition of a number of states into the modern era.
