Jam. NQ 4
W.E. Maxwell, Assistant Resident in Perak, published this 1886 article in the Journal of the Straits Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society (Vol. 17), presenting a verbatim transcription of an oral Malay legendary romance called Sri Rama, collected from a professional village storyteller named Mir Hassan of Kampar. The work documents the persistence of the penglipur lara tradition—professional oral narration of romances rooted in the Hindu epics—amid the encroachment of print culture in late colonial Malaya, and demonstrates the profound and enduring influence of the Rāmāyaṇa on Malay narrative culture.
Summary
Maxwell introduces the penglipur lara as a figure who, in the balei of a Raja or on a private verandah after the evening meal, intones legendary romances in a monotonous chant, holding audiences of both men and women enthralled far into the night (pp. 87–88). He describes having witnessed the talents of Mir Hassan, a native of Kampar in south-eastern Perak, and bringing him to Singapore in 1886 to have his stock of legendary lore committed to writing, with the text taken down verbatim by native scribes (p. 88). Maxwell notes that while the great Hindu epic’s action may be difficult to trace in the “somewhat childish narrative of the Malay village-singer,” the influence of the Rāmāyaṇa and Mahābhārata across the Farther East is beyond doubt, with village-stage dramas in Siam, Malaya, and Java all directly referable to these sources (p. 88).
The narrative itself opens in the kingdom of Tanjong Bunga, where Raja Sri Rama, childless after three years of marriage to the Princess Sakutum Bunga Satangkei, consults his elder brother Raja Laksamana, who performs a divination ritual and foretells the birth of an heir, warning that a lake on a coastal hill will transform any bather into a monkey (pp. 89–92). The Princess disobeys, is transformed, and gives birth to an infant monkey named Kra Kechil Imam Tergangga, whom Sri Rama banishes to a remote forest (pp. 97–99). The monkey prince wanders to the court of Shah Numan, then falls into the sea and is found by the Princess Renek Jintan of Bandar Tahwil, who takes charge of him (pp. 100–101). Meanwhile, the sorcerer Maharaja Duwana of Kachapuri abducts the Princess Sakutum Bunga, and the monkey prince—now commanding vast monkey armies—rescues her, destroys Kachapuri, and ultimately marries Renek Jintan, after which his monkey-skin is burned and he appears permanently in human form as Mambang Bongsu, who inherits the throne of Bandar Tahwil (pp. 102–113).
Maxwell intersperses his English summary with extensive quotations from the Malay text, highlighting metrical passages of considerable beauty, elaborate descriptions of royal dress and palace architecture, and the characteristic Malay rhetorical devices of piled similes and synonymous phrases (pp. 89–96). He draws attention to the story’s anachronisms—cannon and muskets alongside mythical elements—which do not shock the Malay audience, and to the integration of Islamic elements (Koran readings, Muslim salutations exchanged with the sun, the limau ceremonial ablution at the wedding) within a fundamentally Hindu-derived narrative framework (pp. 95, 102, 111).
Key Findings
- The text was collected verbatim from Mir Hassan of Kampar, Perak, a professional penglipur lara who had inherited his romances from his father and ancestors, and who could neither read nor write (pp. 87–88).
- Maxwell proposes that the Andaman Islands owe their name to the Malay identification of their inhabitants with the monkeys of Hanuman, the Malays calling the group “Pulau Handuman” (p. 88, n.).
- The story contains a metrical passage describing tropical daybreak that Maxwell translates into English verse, noting its “beauty of expression” as a specimen of genuine Malay legendary style (pp. 89–90).
- The narrative demonstrates the complete syncretism of Hindu epic material with Islamic Malay culture: the sun greets Shah Numan with “Salam ‘aleikum,” the wedding includes the limau ablution, and religious functionaries (Lebis, Hajis, Imams, Khatibs) are assembled for all major ceremonies (pp. 97, 102, 111).
- Maxwell identifies direct parallels between the Malay tale and the Rāmāyaṇa: the monkey showing the captive princess a ring (Hanuman showing Sita Rama’s ring), the destruction of the enemy’s favourite trees (Hanuman tearing up the asoka grove in Lanka), and the setting fire to the enemy city (Hanuman’s burning tail igniting Lanka) (pp. 109–110, nn.).
- Maxwell reports that two further romances by Mir Hassan (Raja Ambong and Raja Donan) had also been reduced to writing, and that he had secured a third (Raja Budiman or Naga Mas) from a storyteller at Balik Pulau, Penang, expressing hope that others would collect more before “the present generation of story-tellers dies out” (p. 113).
Conclusion
Maxwell’s definitive historical takeaway is that the penglipur lara tradition, though threatened by the “gradual diffusion of printed and lithographed books and newspapers,” remained vital in remote areas of the Malay world, and that the oral romances it preserved constituted an irreplaceable body of cultural heritage embodying the “profound influence which the Ramayana and Mahabharata have had in the Farther East” (pp. 87–88). By publishing the full Malay text alongside a detailed English summary with analytical commentary, Maxwell sought to create a permanent archival record of a living oral tradition that he recognized was in imminent danger of extinction.
Context
- Maxwell was serving as Assistant Resident in Perak at the time of collection, and the work was facilitated by Raja Idris of Perak, who induced Mir Hassan to travel to Singapore for the transcription sessions (p. 88).
- The article appears in Volume 17 of the JSBRAS (June 1886), a period when the Society was actively documenting Malay literary and linguistic materials as part of the broader colonial project of understanding the indigenous cultures of the Straits Settlements and the Malay states.