Contemporary Islamic Studies

Dr Wai Weng Hew provides some comments on the Malaysia workshop Day 2 Panel 1. Dr Wai Weng Hew gave a commentary on the contributions from the first panel of the second day which included talks on 'Gold, Tin and Gambier: Chinese Migration and Pahang's Economic Development in the 19th Century' by Dr Rudolph Ng; 'Piecing together the early history of Pahang through Imperial Chinese scripture' by Mr Jonathan Privett-Mendoza; 'Pahang in the Maritime Spice Route: Insights from Numismatics, Shipwrecks, and Cartography' by Mr Amru Khalid Sazali; and 'The early history of the Bay of Bengal: An Austronesian Sea?' by Dr Roger Blench.

 

Mr Amru Khalid Sazali contributed to Panel One of Day Two of this 2-day workshop. Please find the slides for this lecture here: https://media.podcasts.ox.ac.uk/sant/islamic_studies/2026-01-27-sant-cis-amru_khalid_sazali-SLIDES.pdf

A presentation within Panel 1 of Day 2 which looked at Pahang, China and The Spice Route. Despite Peninsular Malaysia’s significance in regional histories and its long exposure to external influences, the early history of its constituent states— particularly Pahang—remains understudied. Previous explorations into the prehistory of Pahang are dated and brief, often based on the lacking prehistoric chronology of sites in neighbouring regions and racial ethnographic preconceptions of wider Southeast Asian ethnic groups. These cursory looks into Pahang, rather than the state itself, focus on the spread of external influences into the region such as Hindu and Buddhist art forms. The earliest mentions and characteristics of Pahang as a state are found through the foreign perspectives of contemporary late imperial Chinese dynasties. These include the Chinese Song period Song Shu, Yuan dynasty Daoyi Zhilüe, and the Ming period print Dongxiyang kao. The disparate mentions of Pahang in these texts provide no firm location for the state aside from it being established on the eastern coast of the Malay peninsula. While these texts offer ambiguous geographical data, they furnish valuable insights into Pahang’s political economy, resource networks, and sociopolitical structures through accounts of tribute missions and diplomatic exchanges. By interrogating these foreign perspectives, this essay seeks to illuminate Pahang’s formative period, bridging the gap between its nebulous prehistory and the establishment of the Pahang Sultanate in 1470.

Follow this link to view the slides from this talk: https://media.podcasts.ox.ac.uk/sant/islamic_studies/2025-12-22-sant-islamic_studies-jonathan_privett-slides.pdf

Dr Federica Gigante is a historian of the material and intellectual exchanges between the Islamic world and Europe. She is particularly interested in how things people and ideas moved across the Mediterranean and were adopted and adapted in new cultural contexts. She specialises in Islamic art and Islamic scientific instruments and worked for several years as a museum curator. Federica provides insightful commentary on second panel of this workshop.

Dr Scott Abel contributed to Panel Two of Day One of this 2-day workshop. Scott's paper explores: The inhabitants of the Malay Peninsula during the mid-nineteenth century endured a fractured geopolitical environment where both great and minor powers sought to reap the benefits of the regions' abundant natural resources and commercial chokepoint between the Bay of Bengal and the South China Sea. Such powers include both states and non-state actors who had no official recognition as legitimate authorities.  Pahang, on the east coast of the Malay Peninsula, was in a particularly precarious position.  The Bendahara needed to navigate the tensions between Siam, Johor, Riau-Lingga, and the Straits Settlements, along with domestic disturbances.  Conflict manifested itself oftentimes through naval warfare and piracy between a variety of factions.  The British government and East India Company sought local actors in Malaya to fight piracy but also undermined their abilities to do so by flooding the region with arms and depriving Pahang's authorities of rents or tax revenues from commerce. Pahang's suzerain status of Johor hamstrung their response even further because of complex court politics. The anti-slavery campaign waged by the Royal Navy further destabilized the local order.  Political power shifted more inland toward resource extraction because of the more competitive shipping environment created by free trade.  Even when the Pahang government cooperated with British naval forces to suppress piracy and fend off naval attacks from abroad, the complex geopolitical environment made establishing any meaningful peace at sea challenging.

You can download a copy of the slides for this talk here: https://media.podcasts.ox.ac.uk/sant/islamic_studies/2026-04-14-sant-cis-scott_abel-SLIDES.pdf

As one of the curators of Muzium Pahang, this presentation contributed to Day 1 Panel 2. Pahang forms part of the Malay Archipelago – a region inhabited predominantly by a maritime community with a strong maritime identity. The establishment of a maritime museum in Pahang is imperative, as a state with a rich culture and history as well as identity that is deeply influenced by riverine and maritime life which is highly intertwined with the concept of ‘tanah air’ – the term homeland that directly translates into ‘water land’. This paper will be looking into the current and ongoing effort of reconstructing Pahang’s riverine and maritime past through the establishment of a maritime museum in Pulau Beram, Pekan, Pahang. The museum will be delineating the story and narrative of a port town, which includes the historical, geographical, cultural, archaeological, technological and the local genius aspect of a port civilisation. From looking at the importance of Sungai Pahang (Pahang River) in history and prehistory to its underwater cultural heritage, this paper will also be highlighting the evidence of trade history in Pahang based on archaeological findings like ceramics and shipwrecks. Through the presentation of the historical narrative and the exhibition of artefacts including traditional boats, old maps, currency and goods traded along the Maritime Silk Road (Spice Route), it is hoped that the museum will encourage or instill a sense of appreciation towards the port civilisation history of Pahang and the Malay World as well as the principal role it once played in the global maritime history.

The slides from this talk can be accessed here: 

https://media.podcasts.ox.ac.uk/sant/islamic_studies/2025-12-22-sant-islamic_studies-nurul_hamizah_binti_afandi-slides.pdf

 

Pahang is one of the Malay kingdoms involved in Malay maritime activity. The history of maritime activities related to Pahang was recorded in both local and foreign sources. Although the role of Pahang was significant, no in-depth study of its maritime activity with reference to Malay historiographies—including records of Johor, Aceh, Siak, and Terengganu—has been conducted. Therefore, this study aims to fill the gap by identifying Pahang’s relations with other Malay kingdoms and examining maritime activities related to Pahang in connection with foreign powers. This study employs textual analysis with reference to Sulālah al-Salāṭīn, Ḥukum Qanun Pahang, Ḥikayat Fathani, Bustān al-Salāṭīn, Tuhfāt al-Nāfis dan Ḥikayat Pahang as well as comparative analysis with foreign traders and colonial powers (Portuguese, Dutch, English, and Belgian). The study explores Pahang’s involvement and diplomatic engagement with other Malay kingdoms, including Melaka, Johor, Fathani, Brunei, Aceh, Siak, and Terengganu, through administration, trade, war, and marriage as forms of maritime activity. The study also finds that Pahang’s maritime activities with foreign powers included administration, trade, and warfare. It further identifies the shift of Pahang’s port from Pekan to Kuantan in the twentieth century. In conclusion, Pahang played an important role in Malay maritime activities and in the broader history of the Malay world.

Follow this link to view the slides from this talk: https://media.podcasts.ox.ac.uk/sant/islamic_studies/2025-12-22-sant-islamic_studies-muhamad_bin_muhd%20Idris-slides.pdf

The Chairman of the Perbadanan Muzium Negeri Pahang contributed to Panel 2 of Day 1 ‘Constructing Pahang’s Maritime History’. This paper examines the Pahang Maritime Museum as a site of soft power and nation branding, exploring how maritime heritage is mobilised to project identity, legitimacy, and modernity in contemporary Malaysia. Situated at the confluence of history, culture, and statecraft, the museum serves not only as a custodian of coastal and riverine memory but also as a stage for articulating narratives of national belonging and regional relevance. Drawing on theories of heritage diplomacy and cultural representation, this study analyses the museum’s curatorial strategies, exhibition narratives, and institutional framing within Malaysia’s broader maritime imaginary. It argues that the Pahang Maritime Museum exemplifies how heritage initiatives can operate as instruments of soft power—linking local histories of navigation and trade to global discourses of connectivity and nationhood. In doing so, the museum becomes both a vessel of memory and a tool of projection, shaping how Malaysia situates itself in the maritime world of the twenty-first century.

Professor Dr Amal Ghazal gave a commentary on the contributions from the first panel of the first day. Day one included talks on ‘Early Interconnections in Maritime Southeast Asia’, by Dr Jennifer Gaynor; ‘World Unmaking and The Geographical Imaginery of Late Empire Between India and Arabia’, by Mr Itamar Toussia Cohen; ‘Pahang and the batu Aceh tombstone tradition’ by Dr Jessica Rahardjo; and ‘Between Tribute and Tide: Siam-Pahang relations in the Malay World’ by Ms Sonia Latha.

Sonia Latha contributed to Panel One of Day One of this 2-day workshop. This paper examines the complex and often overlooked relationship between Siam and Pahang, situating it within the broader context of Southeast Asian political negotiation and maritime exchange. While Siam's influence over Kelantan and Terengganu is well established through the tributary system administered from Nakhon Si Thammarat (Ligor), Pahang's place within this framework remains uncertain and fragmentary. Therefore, this paper argues that Siam's suzerainty over Pahang was not a structure of direct rule but a form of negotiated authority, maintained through ritualised diplomacy and maritime connectivity. The analysis proceeds along two interrelated dimensions. The first is terrestrial, centred on Ligor's role as Siam's administrative and military intermediary in the Malay Peninsula. The second is maritime, concerned with tribute missions, naval expeditions, and the economic and cultural networks that linked Pahang to the Gulf of Siam and the South China Sea. Together, these perspectives reveal that Siam-Pahang relations were episodic, symbolic and performative as it was defined by gestures of recognition rather than sustained control.

Follow this link to view the slides from this talk: https://media.podcasts.ox.ac.uk/sant/islamic_studies/2025-12-22-sant-islamic_studies-sonia_latha-slides.pdf