[198] Defiance is intimated by a war-dance on the ramparts (pĕnglima bĕrsilat or bĕrentak di-atas kubu). Cp. Begbie, Malayan Peninsula, p. 170. [↑]
[199] This legendary war of Tan Saban with the second king of Perak owes its origin probably to mythological accounts of the wars of Salivahana and Vikramaditya, which Hindu settlers, not improbably, brought to Malay countries. Saban is a natural corruption of Salivahana.—J.R.A.S., S.B., No. 9, p. 94. [↑]
[200] When swearing fidelity, alliance, etc., water in which daggers, spears (lĕmbing), or bullets have been dipped is drunk, the drinker saying, “If I turn traitor, may I be eaten up by this dagger” or “spear,” etc., as the case may be (jika aku belut, aku di-makan k’ris ini d.s.b.) [↑]
[201] Vide supra, p. 4, note. [↑]
[202] In original, Manikou. [↑]
[203] In original, belangur. [↑]
[204] The original text proceeds to give an explanation of certain patterns of damask given in a plate, which is not reproduced here. [↑]
[205] The Code of Sultan Mahmud Shah, the last Malay Raja of Malacca, who was expelled by the Portuguese under Albuquerque in A.D. 1511.
This Code was probably founded on earlier regulations ascribed to Sultan Muhammad Shah, the first Muhammadan Raja of Malacca, and Sultan Mudhafar Shah, his son. Nothing is known about the laws of the last named, except that (according to the Sĕjarah Malayu, chap, xii.), “he ordered the Book of Institutes, or Kitab Undang-Undang, to be compiled,” but the preceding chapter of the same work has a good deal to say about the laws of Sultan Muhammad Shah, and mentions that he “prohibited the ornamenting of creeses with gold, etc.” See Leyden, op. cit., pp. 94, 118.
A similar prohibition occurs in section i. of Sultan Mahmud’s Code, of which a translation will be found in Newbold, Malacca, vol. ii. pp. 231 seq. [↑]