[ { "id": 205062, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1966", "page_number": 18, "title": "RAS-1966", "content_text": "REGIONAL APPROACH TO CHINESE HISTORY\n\n13\n\nHis luck ran out, however, in 1807, when he was caught in a typhoon off Luzon. Part of his fleet was destroyed and Cheng himself drowned.\n\nLeadership of the pirate fleet fell to Cheng's wife, a kind of early nineteenth-century Dragon Lady, who may have accompanied her husband on his forays. Her chief lieutenant was a young Hsin Hui buccaneer by the name of Chang Pao-tsai. Unkind rumour had it that Chang was more than the lady's \"chief lieutenant\".\n\nUnder the leadership of Chang and the wife of Cheng I, the pirate fleet expanded its activities. It was divided into three divisions, each with a commander. Raids on coastal shipping were carried out with dispatch and precision, each division having been assigned specific areas of the coast. By 1810, Chang's fleet numbered six to seven hundred vessels, manned by as many as thirty to forty thousand men.\n\nNor were they concerned with just coastal shipping. No village or town along the coast was safe. Chang was apparently able to land elements of his navy at will at any bay or harbour from Mirs Bay to Hainan and as far up the river as Whampoa. There are differing accounts as to what his methods and motives really were. Some accounts, probably somewhat romanticized, make Chang out to be a kind of Chinese nautical Robin Hood, landing his men and appearing at village gates only to replenish their supplies of food and water, treating the people with kindness and honesty and refraining from terror. On the other hand, local histories record that more than one village was left in ashes and more than a little blood was spilled.\n\nWhatever way Chang Pao-tsai carried on his raids, the fact remains that the Ch'ing government was powerless against him. Time and again units of the Imperial fleet were sent in search of Chang's navy, only to return empty-handed and usually badly mauled. Once, in 1809, the Imperial navy did succeed in trapping a portion of Chang's fleet off Lantau, but clever seamanship and greater and more efficient firepower enabled him to break through without much damage.\n\nFinally, in 1810, the authorities resorted to the old political expedient... \"if you can't beat 'em, join 'em\". Governor-General", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1966.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/bz60k0811", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 205398, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1967", "page_number": 160, "title": "RAS-1967", "content_text": "NOTES AND QUERIES\n\n153\n\nLong before the arrival of the Europeans in south China (1514) the Chinese were manufacturing cannon. Examples of them, some bearing fourteenth century dates, may be seen in museums in north China. The earliest one known, bearing a date equivalent to 1332, is housed in the Historical Museum in Peking. For an illustration see my short article in ISIS55(no.180), June 1964, pp. 193-4. At the beginning of the sixteenth century a new type appears, apparently introduced from Java or Cochin-China. It is known in Chinese literature as fo-lang-chi (or Farangi-Franks), the name applied slightly later to the Portuguese. This type is remarked as early as 1510. (Cf. Pelliot in T'oung Pao, 1948, pp. 199-207.) In the struggles against the Japanese and other pirates who infested the coast during the Chia-ching reign (1522-66) these cannon were frequently put to use not only on land but also at sea. (See Chao Shih-chen, Shen-ch'i p'u i, published 1598. Chao knew what he was writing about, as he was a drafter in the Grand Secretariat at the court in Peking, concerned with military defense, and is said to have manufactured some firearms himself.) Ming dynasty illustrations of war vessels sometimes show cannon mounted on deck. (See Mao Yüan-i, Wu-pei chih, published 1621, chüan 117. Mao was an expert on military affairs, and saw service both in Liao-ning and Fukien.) In the effort to repel the Manchu invaders in the north the Ming court sought the aid of both the Spanish and the Portuguese. Huang K'o-tsuan, for example, reports that when he was serving in the ministry of war (up to 1619) he recruited people from Luzon who could manufacture cannon; they made twenty-eight pieces, which he sent up to the northeast frontier in Manchuria. These must have been formidable (or Huang was trying to impress his superiors) for one cannon is said to have weighed over three thousand catties, and a shot could dispose of some seven hundred barbarians! (Ming shih-lu, Hsi-tsung, 4/29b. I owe this reference to Dr. Ray Huang, visiting professor at Columbia University.)5\n\n*\n\nThe importation of cannon and cannoneers from Macao about this same time is well known. In 1621 the well-known Christian convert and high official Hsü Kuang-ch'i ordered a shipment sent up to Peking, and a year later he recommended that the Jesuit fathers, Nicolo Longobardi and Manuel Diaz, proceed to Macao to purchase ten cannon and a few soldiers to operate them. In", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1967.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/0c488p70g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 205862, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1969", "page_number": 168, "title": "RAS-1969", "content_text": "162 \n\nNOTES AND QUERIES \n\nand symbolises pledge of Salvation or Nirvana. (Other Buddhist emblems and symbols often used in a similar way on bowls of this type are the sea-shell, the wheel and, above all, the vajra). Both the potting and decoration of these bowls point to the last years of the 15th century or very early 16th century.\n\nThe discovery of these blue and white bowls removes an apparent anomaly in the Ming archaeology of Hong Kong that is, if it can be said to exist at all. Previously, the only type of Ming pottery found in Hong Kong was a high-fired stoneware with an olive green glaze and a greyish body2, whereas the much more common blue and white porcelain had not been found at all.\n\nThe blue and white bowls provide the clue to the dating of the earthenware jars which are of a type not uncommonly found in the New Territories especially in the areas of Yuen Long and Sek Kong. These jars are generally of globular shape with wide shoulders, thin walls and a porous buff-coloured body with a brown slip coating on the outside. There are usually three or more lug-handles on the shoulder. Similar jars, dating from Sung to Ming, have been found near Canton, especially near Fat Shan where these pots were probably made3. Most of them have been found in cremation burial pits as containers for ashes or grave goods. These jars usually have covers of the same material and the covered jar, when used as ash containers, is often in turn placed inside a bigger covered jar or two large basins (one covering the other). It is thus most likely that the present jars and covers were used for similar purposes.\n\nIt is interesting to note that in recent excavations of a burial site in Pila, Laguna (Southern Luzon) in the Philippines, secondary cremation burials, with stoneware jars and covers, were found in the cultural layer which has been dated by C14 to the late 14th century or early 15th century, i.e. late Yuan or early Ming. Another point to observe is the question of whether the Shek Pik pots were broken deliberately at the time of the burial or by accident at a later date. In the excavations in the Philippines, large stoneware jars containing charcoal and charred fragments of human skeleton were often found smashed. The same phenomenon was also recently found in Thailand. According to the report on the Thai excavations, the practice of smashing pots in", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1969.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/9g553n20d", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 207990, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1977", "page_number": 29, "title": "RAS-1977", "content_text": "BRUNEI A HISTORICAL RELIC\n\n13\n\nSultan Dewa Emas Kayangan, mated successively with fourteen aboriginal maidens. After much to-ing and fro-ing the fourteen chose one of their number as leader. When they were all converted to Islam the leader became sultan.\n\nThe chronicles of Brunei which date from perhaps the early 1700s, relate that the first Muslim sultan was installed by the Sultan of Johore. This agrees in general with the theory among historians that Islam spread from centers in Malaya and Sumatra to the eastern archipelago, as far as Mindanao in the Philippines during the 15th century.\n\nIt is interesting to note that among the ruling elite in Brunei there existed an admixture of ethnic origins. For the period of the 14th through the 17th centuries we know that there was much immigration to Borneo from Java, Sumatra, Malaya, China and Arabia. The second sultan was either Chinese or married to a Chinese woman, the daughter of a wealthy Chinese trader who had settled on the northwest coast. Accounts of the injection of Chinese blood into the royal line of Brunei vary. The third sultan was an Arab sharif who married the daughter of the second sultan according to Brunei chronicles. The addition of the blood line of the Prophet to the ruling clan would lend legitimacy to the ruler in Islamic terms. Whether fact or an invention of the royal chronicler it is impossible to verify. Up to contemporary times there have been numerous Arab adventurers living around the coastal regions of the Malay world who denominated themselves sharif - blood descendent of Muhammad.\n\nThe kingdom of Brunei reached its greatest extent of power and prosperity under the fifth and great sultan, Bulkiah, after whom the present, the 29th, sultan is named. Brunei extended its power southward and northeastward around the coasts of Borneo. Bulkiah's forces raided into the Philippines as far as Luzon and left colonies of Brunei Malays on the shores of Manila Bay where they encountered the Spaniards in the middle of the 16th century. The Catholic Spaniards suspected Brunei, probably quite rightly, of being the center of Islamization of the Philippines and so attacked Brunei Town in 1578. Thereafter sporadic warfare continued for over 300 years between Malay Muslim communities of northern Borneo and southern Philippines and the Spanish conquistadores of Manila. This warfare is referred to in Spanish records as the Moro wars.3", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1977.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/np198x23n", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 208943, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1980", "page_number": 105, "title": "RAS-1980", "content_text": "SILK & SILVER: MACAU, MANILA TRADE\n\n73\n\nPhilippines was a colony within a colony, being financed and administered not from Madrid but by the government of Nueva España in Mexico. The islands produced little except small quantities of wax, ginger, cinnamon and gold, and the entire Spanish military and administrative establishment had therefore to be subsidised from Mexico. Apart from the missionaries, who were scattered fairly widely over the archipelago and later became the principal landowners in the Philippines, there were no Spanish settlements of any consequence outside Manila and the colony's sole economic—as opposed to spiritual—justification was the existence of Manila, which therefore grew rapidly and soon became the metropolis of the whole archipelago. Its excellent harbour facilities and its proximity to the rich rice-producing hinterland of central Luzon had made it a natural centre for government and commerce in the first place. By 1650 the population of the Spanish walled city of Intramuros and the suburbs where the Chinese and Filipinos lived was about 42,000.\n\nFor about 200 years the Manila galleon sailing between Manila and Acapulco in Mexico was the economic mainstay of the Spanish colony in the Philippines. The galleon trade was based on the exchange of Chinese silks, for which there was an almost limitless demand in Mexico, and Mexican silver, for which, as we have seen, there was an equally insatiable demand in China.\n\nTo the galleon trade the substantial Chinese immigration into the Philippines, which has significantly altered the ethnic composition of the Filipinos, must also be attributed. Already by the 1580s the Sangleys, as the Chinese settlers were called, had been assigned a separate quarter of the city—the Parian or market place—which soon became the commercial centre of Manila. The Chinese rapidly gained a virtual monopoly of retail business in the city and dominated the craft trades. The galleons also brought to the Philippines the clergy needed for the propagation of Christianity in the islands and many new crops and animals from the New World, including maize, cattle, goats and horses.18\n\nThe voyage across the Pacific was made almost annually from the foundation of Manila and in 1593 was regulated at two ships a year from Acapulco to Manila. This pattern was maintained more or less continuously right up till the end of Spanish rule in Mexico. Very large ships were used for the voyage; vessels of up to 1000 tons are recorded from 1614,19\n\nPage 105\n\nPage 106", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1980.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/kh04md207", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 209703, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1982", "page_number": 360, "title": "RAS-1982", "content_text": "338\n\nBOOK REVIEWS\n\nThe diffusion, he feels, through the bureaucratic network ended by the middle of the Ch'ing dynasty, thereafter the other two types have been the dominant methods by which theatrical styles have diffused into the Hong Kong area.\n\nIn short, the author has an appropriate conceptual framework for presenting the field research data. The book will be welcomed by many scholars, particularly by anthropologists and sinologists. The book is written in Japanese, but includes a short guide to contents in English. It is profusely illustrated with photographs.\n\nWANG SUNG-HSING\n\nJohn M. Chin, The Sarawak Chinese, Kuala Lumpur: Oxford University Press, 1981. xvi, 158 pp. maps, plates, appendices, bibliography, index.\n\nR.H.W. Reece, The Name of Brooke: the end of White Rajah rule in Sarawak, Kuala Lumpur: Oxford University Press, 1982. xxxi, 331 pp. maps, plates, tables, appendices, glossary, bibliography, index.\n\nThese two books published recently by Oxford University Press in Kuala Lumpur are so disparate that a combined review seems to this reviewer very unfair. Hence my observations are given below separately.\n\nFirst, The Sarawak Chinese: This small readable work is a thumbnail sketch of the role of the Chinese in Sarawak from their earliest arrival to the present. It gives a background to Chinese contact with Borneo from ancient times (Ch. 1); sketches the migration of Chinese (mostly coolie laborers) to Sarawak (Chs. 2-6) and the policies of, first, distrust and then gradual toleration, and direct encouragement of Chinese immigration and enterprise in the late nineteenth century, and early twentieth century development of agriculture and trade (Chs. 6-7).\n\nThe historical section, covering the period up to World War II (Chs. 1-7) lacks sufficient detail to be more convincing than a cursory sketch can be. It contains a few myths: that “Majapahit succeeded Shivijaya\" and \"extended its rule over Ternate, Luzon and the northern coasts of Borneo\" (p. 3) (A better term would be \"influence\" or \"suzerainty\"); the \"intolerant\"\n\nPage 360\n\nPage 361", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1982.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/mk61z420p", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 211066, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1987", "page_number": 127, "title": "RAS-1987", "content_text": "102\n\nof this has yet been found although contemporary maps indicated at La Loma a \"Burial place of infidels.” Infidels comprised non-Catholics and included European Protestants, Chinese, and Indians. Incidentally, still living in Cainta, only a few miles away are the descendants of the Indian troops of the expedition who decided to stay after deserting or being left behind after their boat capsized, but their distinctive looks are, however, slowly disappearing. Sadly, after being governed by the East India Company for eighteen months, Manila had to be returned to the Spanish by the Treaty of Paris in 1763. Speculation still exists amongst Filipino scholars about what the Philippines might have been if the British had remained in control — a British colony in the Far East, rich in natural resources, fifty years before the acquisition of Singapore and Malaya and eighty years before Hong Kong.\n\nTrade continued to prosper after the resumption of Spanish Authority, and, until 1821 the Philippines continued to be run from Mexico. Treaty ports and trading posts were established in several places including Sual in Pangasinan, on Luzon Island, in Iloilo on Panay and on Cebu and Protestant cemeteries were established in each town, where beforehand the burial of Protestants in consecrated ground was prohibited, (as was the importation of Protestant Bibles).\n\nWith the expansion of trade, a burial place for the four hundred to five hundred aliens from Europe and North America living in Manila, was becoming an urgent necessity.\n\nIn 1827 the first British Consul General was appointed and it was his successor, John William Perry Farren (sometimes referred to as Fearon) who in 1860 attempted to establish a Protestant Cemetery for the mostly but not exclusively British residents. Sadly, Farren became one of the cemetery's first residents within weeks of its establishment.\n\nOn May 27th, 1862, the Spanish Government by a \"Superior Decreto\" granted permission to construct the Cemetery, and on March 11th, 1864 a lease was signed between Farren and Don Jose Bonifacio Roxas, the Owner of Hacienda de San Pedro, of a parcel of land of 31,656 \"varas cuadradas\" (22,467.85 sq metres or", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1987.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/rx919b522", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 215816, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-2002", "page_number": 115, "title": "RAS-2002", "content_text": "48\n\nfor Tolo Harbour), its entrance faced the northeast, which was like an open door for a typhoon. The 1937 typhoon took advantage of such a tailor-made entrance to surge through it with a tidal wave.3\n\n30\n\nIf a typhoon during peacetime could cause so much damage, then one of similar magnitude during wartime, when the stakes are higher, could really set back the Allied timetable. The Tai Po Road would likely have served as a conduit to funnel supplies north to China, and a disruption to its service (even temporarily) would do much to hurt the supply situation. Moreover, if LoC by land into China were that vulnerable, then LoC by sea to Hong Kong would be even more precarious. Such a supply line would likely come from the southeast and pass through the strait between Luzon and Formosa. This region also happened to be a major alleyway for typhoons, not to mention an area of strong Japanese concentrations if either Luzon or Formosa (or both) continued to be in enemy hands.3\n\n31\n\nDue to their extensive commitment in the Atlantic, Allied merchant shipping and its escorts were more precious commodities in the much larger Pacific. The Japanese had not made it a policy to attack supply vessels thus far in the war, but that did not mean they would not alter this policy as the Allies pushed closer to the home islands. A typhoon, however, would not wait nor discriminate. While ships at harbour enjoy a little bit of protection from a typhoon, ships at sea don't have this benefit. The only option was evasion, and that depended on knowing the whereabouts of the typhoon. As noted earlier, this was an extremely difficult task during World War II.\n\n32\n\nAnother category of shipping in which the Allies weren't as well endowed as they would have liked was landing craft. These vessels were mandatory for Allied operations in the Pacific. But Europe received first priority for landing craft for much of the war, leaving just enough for the Allies to take to the offensive in the Pacific. Hong Kong's ability to serve as a lifeline into China depended entirely on a secure LoC that could be established to it by sea, and this in turn depended on the ability of the Allies to secure Hong Kong from the sea by an amphibious assault. The more landings the Allies carried out, the greater the toll on their landing craft, as the same craft would be used over and over. But landing craft were rather lightly-protected ships, which also made them prone to attrition through enemy action, breakdowns, and the weather.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2002.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/mp4901278", "rank": 0 } ]