Sumbawa is a medium-sized island in eastern Indonesia which has a particularly interesting past. In the premodern era it lay on the trade routes that connected the north coasts of the islands of Melaka and Java with the spice-producing areas in Maluku, while Sumbawa itself exported horses, sappan wood, and rice. Its recorded history covers periods of Hindu-Javanese influence, the Southeast Asian Age of Commerce, early Islamisation, and Dutch colonialism. Dutch Indologist Gerrit Jan Held wrote this book in 1955 but died before it could be published; this volume represents its first translation into English, and includes extensive footnotes that set it in context of current research.
- Cover
- Table of Contents
- Translator’s introduction
- 1. The ancient period
- 2. Islam and Makassar
- 3. The Sumbawan kingdoms under VOC suzerainty (1)
- The Sumbawa Kingdom
- Bima
- The Tambora Kingdom
- Dompu
- 4. The Sumbawan kingdoms under VOC suzerainty (2)
- 5. In the wake of the Tambora disaster
- Bima
- The Sumbawa Kingdom
- Dompu
- The Sumbawa Kingdom
- Bima
- Dompu
- 6. From colonial rule to independence
- Appendix: Lists of Sumbawan rulers
- Bibliography
- Index
- List of Figures and Tables
- Figures
- Figure 1 – A woman pounding grain in a highland village of West Sumbawa
- Figure 2 – A traditional storehouse in the highland village Punik
- Figure 3 – The impressive gate of the old wooden palace of Sumbawa Besar, Dalam Loka
- Figure 4 – Ministerial buildings in the palace compound of Bima
- Figure 5 – A frontal view of the Dalam Loka, the old palace of Sumbawa Besar, which was built in 1885
- Figure 6 – The sultan’s palace in Bima, completed in 1930 after the old palace had burned down in 1924
- Tables
- Table 1 – Sumbawan-Makassarese aristocratic marriages
- Table 2 – Genealogy of the sultans of Bima
- Table 3 – Genealogy of the sultans of Sumbawa