To those who know Singapore as a thriving modern city, relentlessly striving towards the futuristic, it is something of a shock to learn that “Singapore’s golden age came to an abrupt end just before 1400.”
Most visitors and even most residents think of Singapore as a place where nothing much happened until it was discovered by the British under Sir Stamford Raffles in the early 19th century. And it only really made something of itself after independence in 1965.
“Singapore and the The Silk Road of the Sea”, however, a splendid new book by John Miksic, an archaeologist at the National University of Singapore, reveals the glaring omission in this account. Singapore was also a thriving, populous city in the 14th century.
Soon after the British arrived, according to a scholarly journal published in 1820, Lieutenant Ralfe, an engineer, digging round the remains of the old city wall, found a stash of coins. It was Chinese, from the reign of an emperor of the Sung dynasty, who died in 1125.
Raffles would not have been taken aback. A big reason he chose Singapore as a base rather than other islands in the vicinity was that he was a scholar of the region’s history, and had read of Singapore in a book called the “Malay Annals”. His intention, writes Mr Miksic was “to revive an ancient seaport that already had a glorious history”.
That Singapore had an earlier incarnation as an important port and entrepot is one of three surprises that Mr Miksic has for a reader unaware of its history.
Read the rest of the article here: http://www.economist.com/blogs/banyan/2013/11/14th-century-singapore