James Brooke and the Bidayuh: Some Ritual Dimensions of Dependency and Resistance in Nineteenth-Century Sarawak
J. H. Walker
University College, University of New South Wales
Modern Asian Studies 32, 1 (1998), pp. 91-115.
University College, University of New South Wales
Notes
1. This paper is based on archival research and fieldwork, conducted in the United Kingdom and Sarawak in 1991, 1992 and 1994. I received financial assistance from the University College, UNSW, through three Rector's Special Research Grants. The paper has benefited from comments from Bill Case, Paul Keal, Ian McFarling, Humphrey McQueen, Craig Rendell and Ulf Sundhaussen. Back
2. See Robert Pringle, Rajahs and Rebels: The Ibans of Sarawak under Brooke Rule, 1841-1941 (London: Macmillan, 1970); Ulla Wagner, Colonialism and Iban Warfare (Stockholm: OBE-Tryck, 1972); Andrew P. Vayda, 'Headhunting Near and Far: Antecedents and Effects of Coastal Raiding by Iban in the Nineteenth Century', Sarawak Museum Journal, XXIII (44), July to December 1975, pp. 113-38; Christopher Healey, 'Tribes and States in "Pre-Colonial" Borneo: Structural Contradictions and the Generation of Piracy', Social Analysis, No. 18, December 1985, pp. 3-39. Back
3. Craig A. Lockard, 'Leadership and Power within the Chinese Community of Sarawak: A Historical Survey', Journal of Southeast Asian Studies, 2 (2), September 1971, pp. 195-217; Daniel Chew, Chinese Pioneers on the Sarawak Frontier: 1841-1941 (Singapore: Oxford University Press, 1990). Back
4. Sabihah bt. Osman, Malay-Muslim Political Participation in Sarawak and Sabah, 1841-1961 (University of Hull: Ph.D., 1983). See also Sanib Said, Malay Politics in Sarawak, 1946-1966: The Search for Unity and Political Ascendancy (Singapore: Oxford University Press, 1985), pp. 1-37. Back
5. W. R. Geddes, The Land Dayaks of Sarawak (London: HMSO, 1954). Back
6. J. Brooke to H. Wise, 10.12.1845, FO 12/19/129. Back
7. See Henry Keppel, The Expedition to Borneo of HMS Dido for the Suppression of Piracy: with extracts from the journal of James Brooke, Esq. of Sarawak, (now Agent for the British Government in Borneo) (London: Chapman and Hall, 1846, second edition), vol. 2, p. 78. (Original emphasis.) [To distinguish between the two principal journals published herewith, Brooke's will be cited as Brooke, Dido, and Keppel's as Keppel, Dido.] Brooke's concern with manners was apposite. According to one modern historian, part of the reason why Raja Yusuf failed to secure the throne of Perak in the later nineteenth century was because he 'conspicuously lacked the qualities of courtesy, gentleness of manner or refinement which Malay traditional values required of a Ruler'. See J. M. Gullick, Rulers and Residents: Influence and Power in the Malay States, 1870-1920 (Singapore: Oxford University Press, 1992), p. 281. Back
8. 'Introduction', Eric B. Ross (ed.), Beyond the Myths of Culture: Essays in Cultural Materialism (New York: Academic Press, 1980), pp. xix-xxix at p. xxiii. Back
9. See A. J. N. Richards, Sarawak Land Law and Adat (Kuching, 1971), p. 4. Compare to John H. Kautsky, The Politics of Aristocratic Empires (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1982), pp. 111 and 116. Kautsky argued that elite groups managed the threat to which subordinate groups were exposed in order to present their domination as 'protection' and, therefore, to legitimize fundamentally extractive relationships. In doing so they fostered a culture which reinterpreted these relationships so that the elite group's actual dependence on the subordinate group was perceived as subordinate dependence on the elite. Datu was the highest nonroyal title among Malays, and datus headed the Sarawak Malay social and political hierarchy. Back
10. Geddes, Land Dayaks, p. 24. Back
11. W. R. Geddes, Nine Dayak Nights (Melbourne: Oxford University Press, 1957), p. 15. Back
12. These rituals are detailed by William Nais, The Study of Dayak Bidayuh Occult Arts of Divination (Kuching: Sarawak Literary Society, 1993). Back
13. Geddes, Nine Dayak Nights, p. 21. Back
14. O. W. Wolters, History, Culture, and Religion in Southeast Asian Perspectives (Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, 1982), p. 6. Back
15. K. M. Endicott, An Analysis of Malay Magic (Singapore: Oxford University Press, 1985 [1970]), p. 41. Back
16. Shelley Errington, Meaning and Power in a Southeast Asian Realm (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1989), p. 61. Back
17. Ibid., p. 130. Back
18. Wolters, History, Culture, p. 6. Compare this to Weber's concept of charisma. See Reinhard Bendix, Max Weber.An Intellectual Portrait (New York: Anchor Brooks, 1962 [1960]), Chapter X. Back
19. Wolters, History, Culture, p. 6. Back
20. Errington, Meaning and Power, p. 10. Back
21. Ibid., p. 166. Back
22. Hugh Low, Sarawak: Its Inhabitants and Productions, Being Notes during a Residence in that Country with H. H. Rajah Brooke (London: R. Bentley, 1848), pp. 259-60. Back
23. Endicott, Analysis of Malay Magic, pp. 134-6. Back
24. See Brooke, Dido, 20.6.1842, vol. 1, p. 308. Back
25. See Brooke's journal for 29.9.1845, in Rodney Mundy, Narrative of Events in Borneo and Celebes, down to the Occupation of Labuan: From the Journals ofJames Brooke, Esq., Rajah of Sarawak, and Governor of Labuan. Together with a Narrative of the Operations of HMS Iris (London: John Murray, 1848), Vol. 2, pp. 42-3. [To distinguish between the two journals published herewith, Brooke's will be cited as Brooke, Iris, and Mundy's as Mundy, Iris.] Back
26. Low, Sarawak, pp. 255-7. Back
27. Ibid., p. 405. Back
28. A. R. Wallace to Mrs Wallace, 25.12.1855. James Marchant (ed.), Alfred Russel Wallace: Letters and Reminiscences (New York: Arno, 1975 [1916]), p. 48. Back
29. Mrs (Harriet) McDougall, Letters from Sarawak Addressed to a Child (Worwich: Thomas Priest, 1854), p. 57. Back
30. See 'Dyak Village, Borneo', in James St John, Views in the Eastern Archipelago Borneo, Sarawak, Labuan etc. (London: Thomas McLean, n.d.). Back
31. Spenser St John, Life in the Forests of the Far East (London: Smith, Elder and Co., 1862), vol. 1, p. 149. Back
32. Captain Bethune, quoted in 'Dyak Village, Borneo', in James St John, op. cit. Back
33. Low, Sarawak, pp. 259-60. Back
34. Spenser St John, The Life of Sir James Brooke, Rajah of Sarawak (Edinburgh and London: William Blackwood & Sons, 1879), p. 228. Back
35. Ibid., p. 254. Back
36. Brooke's diary for 30.10.1850. See Henry Keppel, A Visit to the Indian Archipelago in HMS Meander, with portions of the private journal of Sir James Brooke, KCB (London: Richard Bentley, 1853), Vol. 2, pp. 59-60. [To distinguish between the two journals published herewith, Brooke's will be cited as Brooke, Meander, and Keppel's as Keppel, Meander.] Back
37. Brooke, Meander, vol. 2, p. 66. Back
38. Spenser St John, Life in the Forests, vol. 1, p. 142. Back
39. See ibid., pp. 142, 225 and 158. Back
40. See, for one example, C. T. C. Grant, A Tour Among the Dyaks of Sarawak (Borneo) in 1858 (Printed for Private Circulation: 1864), p. 52. (Copy in Basil Brooke Papers, MSS Pac. s. 90.) Back
41. J. Brooke to B. Brooke, 8.3.1856. Basil Brooke Papers, MSS Pac. s. 90, Vol. 2A, f. 56. Back
42. Brooke, Dido, 20.6.1842, vol. 1, p. 308. Back
43. Grant, A Tour, p. 6. Back
44. J. Brooke to Mrs Thomas Brooke, 16.3.1842. J. C. Templer (ed.), The Private Letters of Sir James Brooke, K. C. B. Rajah of Sarawak (London: Richard Bentley, 1853), vol. 1, p. 183, (Emphasis added.) [Henceforth cited as Letters.] Back
45. J. Brooke to Mrs Thomas Brooke, 19.8.1842, Letters, vol. 1, p. 207. Back
46. See Otto Steinmayer, 'The Loincloth of Borneo', Sarawak Museum Journal, XLII (63), December 1991, pp. 43-59 at pp. 46-7. Back
47. Endicott, Analysis of Malay Magic, p. 137. Back
48. J. Brooke to Mrs Thomas Brooke, 16.10.1842, Letters, vol. 1, p. 226. For additional references to fancy work which he wanted to give to his followers, see Brooke's letters to J. C. Templer, 14.4.1843, Letters, vol. 1, p. 253; and to Mrs Thomas Brooke, 24.9.1843, Letters, vol. 1, p. 295. Back
49. Cash Book, 1842-1853. Sarawak Muzium, J 1. f. 12. Back
50. See Endicott, Analysis of Malay Magic, p. 139. Back
51. Low, Sarawak, p. 255. For additional examples, see p. 385 and p. 404. Back
52. James C. Scott, 'Patron-Client Politics and Political Change', reproduced in Norman T. Uphoff and Warren F. Ilchman (eds), The Political Economy of Development: Theoretical and Empirical Contributions (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1972), pp. 178-9. Back
53. 'Memorandum sent to the Pangeran Budrudeen', Letters, vol. 2, p. 69. Back
54. Low, Sarawak, p. 244. Back
55. J. Brooke to J. C. Templer, 1.12.1841, Letters, vol. 1, pp. 137-38. Back
56. Spenser St John, The Life of Sir James Brooke, pp. 77-8. Back
57. J. Brooke to E. Johnson, 3.5.1844, Letters, vol. 2, p. 16. Back
58. C. Bethune to Lord Haddington, 20.7.1843. Borneo Dispatch Box, Haddington MSS. Back
59. J. Brooke to Mrs Thomas Brooke, 19.8.1842, Letters, vol. 1, p. 207. Although I have treated these gifts here as instrumental, they were also ritually significant. In southeast Asian cosmology, iron was regarded as an important 'boundary strengthener' and a source of resilience and strength. According to Endicott, the 'power of iron seems to act as much to keep a person's soul in his body as to keep spirits out'. Endicott quoted Skeat's observation that a Malay who felt spiritually vulnerable would sit over the blade of his knife to protect his semangat. [Analysis of Malay Magic, p. 133.] Similar beliefs were shared by pagan people in Sarawak. According to Stephanie Morgan, for example, 'iron is deeply involved in the figurative and esoteric aspects of Iban culture'. Morgan claimed that an Iban shaman would sit on a piece of iron 'to make his soul strong and keep it in his body'. [Stephanie Morgan, 'Iban Aggressive Expansion: Some Background Factors', Sarawak Museum Journal, XVI (32-33),July-December 1968, pp. 141-85 at p. 160.] Shelley Errington documented similar ritual beliefs and practices on Sulawesi. Meaning and Power, p. 59. Back
60. Testimony of Sir James Brooke, FO 12/21/74. Back
61. Quoted by Edward Belcher, Narrative of the Voyage of HMS Samarang, during the Years 1843-46; employed surveying the islands of the Eastern Archipelago (London: Reeve, Benham and Reeve, 1848), p. 29. Back
62. Brooke, Dido, 25.3.1842, vol. 1, p. 281. Back
63. Brooke, Dido, 20.6. 1842, vol. 1, p. 297. Brooke told Templer in October 1842 that between 8,000 and 10,000 Land Dayaks had immigrated since he had taken power. These figures are absurdly inflated. J. Brooke to J. C. Templer, 12.10.1842, Letters, vol. 1, p. 221. Back
64. W. F. Wertheim, Evolution and Revolution: The Rising Waves of Emancipation (Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1974), p. 238; Lucien M. Hanks, 'The Thai Social Order as Entourage and Circle', in William Skinner and A. Thomas Kirsch (eds), Change and Persistence in Thai Society (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1975), pp. 197-218 at p. 200. Back
65. Ulla Wagner (Colonialism, pp. 18-19) is a welcome exception to this. Back
66. James C. Scott, 'Everyday Forms of Peasant Resistance', in James C. Scott and Benedict J. Kerkvliet (eds), Everyday Forms of Peasant Resistance in Southeast Asia (London: Frank Cass, 1986), pp. 5-35 at p. 5. Back
67. Ibid., pp. 6-7. For a related discussion, see also Kay Saunders, '"Troublesome Servants": The Strategies of Resistance employed by Melanesian Indentured Labourers on Plantations in Colonial Queensland', Journal of Pacific History, 14, 1979, pp. 168-83 at p. 169. Back
68. Brooke, Dido, 28.10.1840, vol. 1, p. 164. Back
69. Brooke, Dido, vol. 1, p. 255. Brooke recorded that the tax was for 16 gantongs of rice, about a gallon. St John later recorded that the Rajah authorized the collection of 1-5 bushels (12 gallons) of rice annually in taxes. [Spenser St John, The Life of Sir James Brooke, p. 255.] Either the Rajah increased the rate of taxation once his regime was established more securely, or 16 gantongs may have been meant to read 160 gantongs (about 10 gallons). Back
70. 'Diary of Hugh Low, 1844-1846'. John Pope-Hennessy Papers, MSS Brit. Emp. s. 409. Box 5/1, f. 100. Back
71. Spenser St John, Life in the Forests, vol. 1, p. 207. Back
72. J. Brooke to B. Brooke, 8.5.1856. Basil Brooke Papers, MSS Pac. s. 90, vol. 2A, f. 63. Back
73. J. Brooke to B. Brooke, 24.11-8.12.1855. Basil Brooke Papers, MSS Pac. s. 90, vol. 2A, f. 25. Back
74. J. Brooke to B. Brooke, 8.5.1856. Basil Brooke Papers, MSS Pac. s. 90, vol. 2A, f. 64. Back
75. B. Brooke to J. Brooke, 28.4.1858. Basil Brooke Papers, MSS Pac. s. 90, vol. 5, f. 43. Back
76. C. Grant to B. Brooke, 12.5.1859. Basil Brooke Papers, MSS Pac. s. 90, vol. 11, f. 49. Back
77. Gomes' Report, 3.1.1860, USPG, E 5, Missionary Reports, 1859, f. 1765. Back
78. A. Crookshank to B. Brooke, 2.7.1862. Basil Brooke Papers, MSS Pac. s. 90, vol. 9, f. 262. Back
79. Harriet McDougall, Sketches of our Life at Sarawak (London: Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, n.d.), p. 70. Back
80. Geddes, Land Dayaks, p. 58. Back
81. C. Grant to J. Grant, 12.4.1858. Basil Brooke Papers, MSS Pac. s. 90, vol. 10, f. 236. Back
82. Grant, A Tour, p. 4. Back
83. B. Brooke to J. Brooke, 16.5.1858. Basil Brooke Papers, MSS Pac. s. 90, vol. 5, f. 54. Back
84. B. Brooke to R. Hay, 23.4.1858. Basil Brooke Papers, MSS Pac. s. 90, vol. 7, f. 19. Back
85. M. Grant to L. Grant, 18.9 [1860?]. Basil Brooke Papers, MSS Pac. s. 90, vol. 11, f. 244. Back
86. J. Brooke to A. Burdett Coutts, 26.3.1861. Owen Rutter (ed). Rajah Brooke and Baroness Burdett Coutts: Consisting of the Letters from SirJames Brooke, first White Rajah of Sarawak, to Miss Angela (afterwards Baroness) Burdett Coutts (London: Hutchinson, 1935), p. 115. Back
87. B. Brooke to C. Grant, 5.l0.1853. Basil Brooke Papers, MSS Pac. s. 90, vol. 6, ff. 303-4. Back
88. Consul Rickett's Report, 25.9.1864, FO 12/32/68. Back
89. B. Brooke to J. Brooke, 14.4.1858. Basil Brooke Papers, MSS Pac. S. 90, vol. 5, f. 37. Back
90. J. Brooke to B. Brooke, 8.1.1858. Basil Brooke Papers MSS Pac. S. 90, vol. 2A, f. 153. Back
91. Alfred Russel Wallace, The Malay Archipelago: The Land of the Orang-Utan, and the Bird of Paradise (Singapore: Oxford University Press, 1986 [1869]), p. 80. Back
92. Ibid., p. 81. Back
93. A. R. Wallace, 'Notes of a Journey up the Sadong River, in North-West Borneo', Royal Geographic Society, Proceedings, vol. 1, 10.11.1856, p. 197. Back
94. Geddes, Land Dayaks, p. 73. Back
95. Ibid., pp. 90-1. Back
96. Brooke, Dido, vol. 1, p. 308. For the rituals associated with storing rice, see R. Nyandoh, 'The Land Dayak Padi-Store Festival', Sarawak Gazette, XCI (1286), April 1965, pp. 118-19. Back
97. Harriet McDougall, Sketches of our Life at Sarawak, p. 70. Back
98. Grant, A Tour, pp. 12-13. Back
99. O. W. Wolters, 'Khmer "Hinduism" in the Seventh Century', in R. B. Smith and W. Watson (eds), Early South East Asia: Essays in Archaeology, History and Historical Geography (New York: Oxford University Press, 1979), pp. 427-42 at pp. 429-50. Back
100. Ibid. Back
101. Peter L. Berger, The Sacred Canopy: Elements of a Sociological Theory of Religion (New York: Doubleday and Co., 1967), pp. 1-2. Back