RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1970 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/ww72j0241 HONG KONG BEFORE THE BRITISH 149 also wear headdresses and tails to resemble dogs and they have a legend about their descent from a dog. This legend, as reproduced in the later Han history, is as follows. An emperor who wished to subjugate a certain chieftain offered his youngest daughter in marriage to anyone who would bring him his head. After this proclamation one of his pet dogs brought a man's head and laid it in front of the throne. It proved to be the head of the enemy. The princess then insisted that she should be married to the dog and the Emperor was forced to comply. The princess was taken by the dog to a stone fortress in a mountain in Hunan. There she changed her mode of living, discarded her Chinese clothes and wore a strange head-dress. She bore six children. They made bark clothes which they dyed with various grass juices. They cut them with a tail behind. They lived in the mountains. Their descendants multiplied and are known as the Man I Man and I are Chinese terms for barbarians. Man, as we have seen, is applied locally to the Hoklo, but it can represent a barbarian of South China in general. It generally represents Tibetan or western barbarians. When Chao T'o, one of the chiefs of the Canton estuary, made himself independent in the Han dynasty, he called himself "King of the Man and I". Since the Yao have the same dog myth as the Man I, there is a likelihood that this people were partly composed of Yao and partly of Indonesian stock. It is only possible to take such broad distinctions as the Chinese historians allow. There were in ancient South China two types. One the "dragon myth" peoples, primarily in Fukien, using boats with eyes painted on the bows, and designated by many names Min Man Tan and so on with the radical for serpent or dragon. The other a mountain people with a "dog myth" stretched from the confines of Tibet to South China and included the Yao. The former may be of Indonesian and the latter of Tibetan stock. One problem must still be mentioned. The presence of a very early Negrito population in South China is suspected. Negrito dwarfs are still found in Cochin China, the Malay States, the Philippine Islands, and Formosa and in the history of the Liang dynasty occurs the following text: ================================================================================ RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1972 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/gm80qf99h ARCHAEOLOGY IN H.K. AND SOUTH CHINA 165 they have revealed a new province of culture, which from its leading characteristics as well as its geography can be seen to link the Chinese classical culture with that of the Archipelago and the Pacific Islands, generally referred to as 'Indonesian'. The reciprocal influence of these two cultures has never been adequately studied, for only in a region on their respective boundaries, such as the China Coast, can this be done. These characteristics may be summed up as: 1. use of stone adzes, chiefly rectangular and stepped; 2. working stones with circular borer to make rings, and with stone saws to cut stone implements; 3. pottery made on the turn-table, in both coarse and fine qualities built up by the ribbon technique and decorated with cord, mat and geometrical patterns; 4. lance heads of shale or slate; 5. cylindrical stone beads; 6. rings of hard stone used as ornaments; 7. cultivation, probably by growing grain in cleared patches of jungle; 8. fishing and boatbuilding; 9. cloth-making. The later form of this culture has in addition these features: 10. casting of bronze weapons and tools; 11. use of ceremonial objects of jade, especially in burials; 12. hard, high-fired pottery stamped with the f pattern; 13. leadless glaze, green and brown, applied to pottery. Second, they demonstrate the flow of Chinese culture to the south and its replacement of the native culture, in which can be seen traces of the ancient Chinese culture of the Shangs. Third, they show that this native culture formed part of a culture-province which included not only the Chinese coast provinces but Japan, Manchuria, Formosa and Annam, and whose remoter connexions extend landwards into E. India and N. Asia, and seaward as shown by the adze forms into the Archipelago, the Philippines, and the furthest Polynesian islands. For instance, a highly polished adze with a large tang, of very distinctive form, is found in Hong Kong, the Philippines, Hawaii, Tahiti, New Zealand and Hervey Islands. Fourth, light is thrown upon the ancient trade routes of S.E. Asia. Painted pottery, which was not, it seems, made on the China Coast, was imported from Tongking, probably along the West River. Bronze and jade of Chinese workmanship was imported from the Yangtse valley, by which of the three possible routes is uncertain. The Swabue people produced quantities of shale lance-heads, harpoons, arrow heads and rings, sometimes very delicately worked, ================================================================================ RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1972 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/gm80qf99h 166 W. SCHOFIELD and exported them to Hong Kong. Even a scrap of tin, perhaps smelted from ore obtained on the Kwangtung coast, was found during excavation at one site where bronze axes were cast. At the same time, the bead trade, so active in Malaya and the great islands, and even in the Philippines, appears to have passed South China by, for the only beads found are either of jade or of soft greenish local stone used as a substitute. This bead trade is in fact coextensive with Indian influence in the Archipelago. Fifth, these finds raise the vast question of the immigrations of the Polynesians and Indonesians from Asia into the Pacific, and the routes they followed. Having regard to the distribution of anthropological types today, we cannot suppose that any large number of Polynesians ever visited the China coast; but there is the strongest probability that tribes of the types of those inhabiting Hainan, Formosa, the Philippines and Borneo frequented the coast, and perhaps started from it to their present seats. It may be possible eventually to prove that survivors of these peoples still live on the coast; personally, I am disposed to regard the Tan Ka or boatpeople of the Kwangtung coast as such survivors. Certain tribes of the interior, the Yui or Yao, and the Siapo of Foochow, may be similar remnants. The archaeology of the historic periods has, inevitably, been comparatively neglected in the attractions of unearthing ancient and unknown cultures. Pottery of types familiar to archaeologists in Canton, and attributed to the Han and the Six Dynasties period (100 B.C. to 600 A.D.), has been found at several Hong Kong sites: urns probably of pre-T'ang date (615 A.D. or earlier) have been unearthed at Sheung Shui near the border and elsewhere; and pottery and porcelain of Sung, Yuan and later dynasties can be found everywhere, especially near villages. Forts and watch-posts are to be seen on islands and promontories, and walled towns and villages are frequent inland; such fortifications are, however, post-mediaeval, and the oldest are late Ming, designed for coast defence against Japanese pirates. Of megalithic remains, such as are known as near as the Laos country in Indo-China, no trace exists. No ancient porcelain kilns, such as exist in North and Central China, were ever started within the Colony, though one small establishment for making rice bowls and cooking pots has been found. In one road cutting a mass of broken porcelain of early Ming date, much ================================================================================ RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1977 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/np198x23n 28 LEIGH WRIGHT The state of Brunei annual report for 1956 describes the water city, Kampong Ayer, this way, Set in a wide sweep of the river, this river town is in its way unique. At high tide under favourable conditions of light it takes on quite a remarkable beauty; viewed at close quarters it is even more remarkably ramshackle. The houses are grouped together in small villages, being connected by precarious plank walkways, and there the inhabitants carry on their multifarious activities in much the same way as if they were on land. NOTES 1 See e.g. O. W. Wolters, Early Indonesian Commerce; a study of the origins of Srivijaya, (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1967); and D. E. Brown, Brunei: the structure and history of a Bornean Malay sultanate, (Brunei: Brunei Museum, 1970). These works have drawn upon the earlier studies of such scholars as W. P. Groeneveldt (1880) and Lien Sung (1919). 2 See Brown, op. cit., Ch. XI. 3 The fullest account of the Moro wars is in E. H. Blair and J. A. Robertson, The Philippine Islands, 1493 - 1898, (Cleveland, 1903 -09). 4 Lord Stanley of Alderley (ed.), The first voyage round the world by Magellan, by Antonio Pigafetta, (London: Hakluyt Society, 1874). 5 J. Hunt, "Some particulars relative to the Sulo islands in the Archipelago of Felicia”, in Malayan Miscellany, I, (Bencoolen, 1820). 6 James Horsburgh, Directions for sailing to and from the East Indies and China, (London, 1811), the navigational handbook for generations of British sea captains. This work drew heavily upon the surveys of eighteenth century seafarers such as Alexander Dalrymple (1774) and Thomas Forest (1780). 7 S. B. St. John, Life in the forests of the Far East. (London, 1862), Vol. 2, pp. 248-49. 8 British Parliamentary Papers, 1854-55, XXIX (253), 9 Sarawak Gazette, 26 April, 1872. 10 Henry Keppel, The expedition to Borneo of H.M.S. Dido for the suppression of piracy, with extracts from the Journal of James Brooke, Esq. of Sarawak, (London, 1847), 11 S. Baring-Gould and C. A. Bampfylde, A History of Sarawak under its two white rajahs, (London, 1909), pp. 82-83. 12 Lennox Mills, British Malaya, 1824-67, (reprint: Kuala Lumpur, 1966), p. 248. 13 British interests in Borneo are treated extensively in, L. R. Wright, The Origins of British Borneo, (Hong Kong, 1970). 14 See L. R. Wright, "The Foreign Office and North Borneo", in Journal of Oriental Studies, Vol. VII, No. 1, (January 1969). ================================================================================ RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1980 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/kh04md207 SILK & SILVER: MACAU, MANILA TRADE 67 affairs clandestinely. This greatly encouraged them to develop autonomous merchant communities with what amounted to extra-territorial rights. The most important of these Chinese merchant communities at the end of the 15th century was in Malacca. Ships went to and from Malacca as far as India and China, trading in a wide variety of Indian and Chinese goods which were exchanged for the products of the Indonesian islands. Malacca, the "city made for merchandise", was essentially an entrepôt the very existence of which depended upon its carrying trade. It had an excellent and easily defensible harbour, protected on either side by the narrow straits between Sumatra and the Malay Peninsula and strategically placed, as Pires put it, at the end of one monsoon and the beginning of others. When Afonso de Albuquerque captured Goa in 1510 he was quick to see that Malacca's unrivalled position as an emporium and as a centre for the dissemination of Islam in South East Asia made it essential that he gain control of it also. He could thus fulfil Portuguese obligations to the Holy See and acquire a base for their commercial activities in the archipelago, in particular the carrying trade in spices and other precious goods from Indonesia to Goa and Lisbon in which the Portuguese sought to gain a share, if not a monopoly. At the other end of the maritime area with which we are here concerned was another important trading centre. This was the Ryukyu Islands. The inhabitants of these islands, known to the Europeans as Lequeos or Loochoos, were actively engaged in the carrying trade between the northern and southern parts of the area from the 13th to the mid 16th century. The islanders carried to the south Chinese porcelain, silks and other textiles, metal goods and drugs, Japanese weapons and armour, lacquer and gold, all of which they exchanged for spices, aromatic woods, dyewoods and exotic beasts and birds from the Indonesian archipelago — goods that they could sell in China for several hundred times the buying price.2 Technically this trade with China remained an imperial monopoly and was carried out under the pretence of tribute. As Ming seapower dwindled and piracy in the China Seas accordingly grew, and as the Portuguese extended their trading activities in the years following their conquest of Malacca in 1511 into the Indonesian archipelago and beyond to the spice islands, to Timor and the Solor Islands, to Makassar and eventually to Macau—so the Ryukyu trade became increasingly circumscribed until it was con- ================================================================================ RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1980 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/kh04md207 68 JOHN VILLIERS fined to the limited, though evidently still profitable, carrying trade between China and Japan.3 Conditions in Japan were no more conducive to an organised system of state trade than they were in China. The period from 1467 to 1568 was the age of the warring states, in which both the Emperor and his shoguns were powerless against the might of the regional war lords, the daimyō. Even amid the anarchy to which this state of affairs gave rise, merchant communities nevertheless flourished and cities such as Hakata, Hirado and Sakai prospered. Japanese exports to China included copper, sulphur and weapons, and their imports from China were chiefly raw silk and porcelain, both of which they considered superior to their own products, cash, drugs and books. Again, from the Chinese point of view this trade was technically tribute and the ships were officially dispatched by the Emperor, the Shogun, by great daimyō or monasteries, while the fitting out of the ships and the business arrangements were in the hands of the merchants of Sakai and Hakata, and chiefly to their profit. As both Chinese policy became more restrictive and isolationist and the power of the shoguns grew weaker, so this Sino-Japanese trade collapsed and by the 1540s had been replaced by extensive piracy and smuggling. Pirates ranged up and down the coasts of China and the many offshore islands more or less unchecked. In Japan the daimyō and in China the mandarins connived at this illegal activity because it brought them considerable profits.4 Thus, when the Portuguese first arrived on the scene, they found great opportunities for acting as trading agents in goods which for various reasons could no longer be traded directly between the countries that produced them. They soon found that "there is as great a profit in taking spices to China as in taking them to Portugal". But they had to fit into existing trade patterns both in the inter-island trade of the Indonesian archipelago centred on Malacca and in the trade of the China Seas. Even in theory they were never able to attain a complete monopoly but had to trade in competition—and often in conflict—with the Asian traders already active in those waters. Within a few years of their conquest of Malacca the Portuguese had opened up direct trade relations with the spice islands and sent expeditions to the Lesser Sunda Islands in search of sandalwood. They also endeavoured to open relations with China. Their first attempt was a disaster and led to ================================================================================ RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1980 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/kh04md207 70 JOHN VILLIERS "pect our virtue". Through this gate the Chinese passed the food and other supplies needed by the inhabitants, but at other times they sealed the gate with strips of paper, allowing into China only those few Portuguese officials with authorisation and sending to Macau only customs officers. The Portuguese in Macau were first given some official recognition by the Chinese government in 1582 when the new Viceroy of Canton and Kwangsi summoned Macau's chief officials to his court. They came with 4,000 cruzados worth of presents—velvets, crystals, mirrors and so on—and were informed that foreigners could continue to inhabit Macau provided they remained subject to the laws of the Empire.10 By 1585 the settlement had acquired full city status with its own municipal council (Senado da Câmara). The Senado was dominated by the casados, Portuguese who had retired from the service of the crown, married and settled permanently in Macau. These acted not only as agents for the Chinese traders but traded on their own account in pepper, cloves, sandalwood and other goods from the Indonesian islands and financed voyages to Manila and to Japan in the so-called Great Ship from Amacon. Macau was not under royal control and was not ruled by fidalgos sent out from Portugal or Goa, so that the interests of the Portuguese government were seldom, if ever, allowed to prevail. The Crown had to be content with a share in the profits from the annual voyages that it financed and the revenues from customs, duties and license fees levied on the merchants.11 The overall command of the government of Macau was in the hands of the Captain-major of the Japan voyage, who would spend some months in Macau each year en route to Japan from Goa via Malacca—from one end of the Estado da India to the other. As the Portuguese Crown seldom got more than the commissions and port duties paid in Goa and Malacca, the Captain-major was able to amass a large fortune for himself. He was, however, only permitted to operate a single ship during his term of office so he would ensure that it was the largest ship available. This ship he would load at Goa with Gujerati cottons, chintzes and other Indian textiles, woollen and scarlet cloths, wine, glassware, crystal and Flemish clocks. He would sail with the monsoon in April or May to Malacca, where much of his cargo would be traded for Indonesian spices, camphor and sandalwood and hides from Siam. Thence he ================================================================================