Wednesday, May 24, 2006

of Sulu and Brunei...

Sulu sack Brunei in 1369, Brunei conquered Sulu by the 16th century, Sultan Bolkiah was said to marry the Sulu Princess, Putri Laila, grand-daughter of Shariful Hashim, the first Sultan of Sulu...

Spanish conqurered Brunei in 1578 and put Pg Seri Lela as the Sultan... Spanish left, and Pg. Seri Lela killed.

Civil wars again... In 1704, Brunei gave Sulu, eastern parts of North Borneo, for their help in crushing the rebellion in Brunei...

Now, Sulu sultans, with too many claimants, who is considered to be the actual ruler is not known..

8 comments:

Anonymous said...

Comments
Not sure how many are interested, but thought I'd just share with you that the Sultan of Brunei bestowed Brunei's highest honour of "Darjah Kerabat Laila Utama Yang Amat Di Hormati", which carries the title "Datin Laila Utama" (Datin being the feminine version of Dato/ Datuk), to the Philippine President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo.

Also, the President Datin Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo confirmed her royal link with Brunei in an interview with the media, while visiting the country.

Excerpt from report (it's in hardcopy) reads:

...President Arroyo said:

"It happened this way. During the 16th century, the first Sultan Bolkiah married a Filipina (Sulu Princess Lela Menchanai), whose grandson is Lakandula (a Manila nobleman), whose cousin went to Brunei in 1575, and whose grandchild is a Macapagal.

The first Sultan Bolkiah, known as the Singing Captain or Nakohda Ragam, ruled during the golden age of Brunei when its territory reached the Philippines.

His wife, Princess Lela Menchanai, the daughter of a Sulu ruler, has a school named after her in Kampong Ayer [Brunei], where one of the teachers is Filipina Jhonita Rivero, who has been teaching there for 16 years.

"In our Pampango dialect, macapagal means something that is 'tiring'. So my cabinet members said it is tiring to work in Malacanang," she said

http://www2.seasite.niu.edu/tagalogdiscuss/_disc2/0000032e.htm

Anonymous said...

http://www.museums.gov.bn/Bolkiah.htm

Sultan Bolkiah famous for playing a set of royal instruments – a drum and a lute – on ship, thereby earning the nickname Nakhoda Ragam (the Singing Captain).

Sultan Bolkiah was died at sea , while returning from Java Where he had just married a princess named Puteri Laila Menchanai.According to the Salasilah, the princess was not told of his death until their ship reached Brunei, whereupon she committed suicide in grief.

Anonymous said...

http://www.e-borneo.com/cgi-bin/np/viewnews.cgi?category=3&id=986704530

The historical sites include Sultan Sharif Ali's Mausoleum (The 3rd Sultan of Brunei). "The existence of a strong connection with China is reflected in accounts of the second sultan, Ahmad, who is variously described as either Chinese or married to a Chinese woman. He had no sons to succeed him, so a son-in-law ascended to the throne. This was Sharif Ali, as Islamic religious leader said to have come from Taif in Persia and been a descendent of Amir-Muminin Hassan, a grandson of Prophet Muhammad.

"Sharif Ali spread the teachings of Islam among the people of Brunei under the first two sultans, and during his own reign, when he was known as Sultan Berkat (Blessed), he built the first mosque".

Not far from Sultan Sharif Ali's Mausoleum, was Sultan Bolkiah's Mausoleum (The 5th Ruler of Brunej). "Sultan Bolkiah was famed for his sea exploits, voyaging to Malacca and Java and conquering Sulu as well as briefly seizing Manila with the help of a cannon called Si-Cantar Alam (He who makes the earth shake). According to legend, Sultan Bolkiah once demonstrated the extend of his domain by taking a gantang (eight pounds) of pepper on a voyage and dropping a single peppercorn at each spot he landed until all were gone. He was famous for playing a set of royal musical instruments - a drum and a lute - on ship, thereby earning the nickname Nakhoda Ragam (the Singing Captain). Sultan Bolkiah even died at sea, while returning from Java where he had just married a princess named Puteri Laila Menchanai.

"According to the Selasilah, the princess was not told of his death until their ship reached Brunei, where upon she committed suicide in grief".

Matzin Haji Yahya also told Sunday Bulletin that, an archaeological site between Sultan Bolkiah and Sultan Sharif Ali's Mausoleum is not really officially opened to public but the site is possible to visit upon request. The site is still under further studies. Keliring is also another interesting site to visit and is supposed to be spelt and read as "Klirieng or burial poles," said Matzin Haji Yahya.

"Some of ethnic groups of Sarawak did not use caves for their burial jars but elaborate structures such as burial poles, known locally as KLIRIENG, which were constructed to house the burial jars of high-ranking individuals, especially chiefs. The burial poles are usually made from belian (ironwood). These majestic structures are carved from top to bottom motifs which often anthropomorphic. The use of Klirieng must have been in existence for several hundred years.

Other interesting sites on historical trail also included the Malay Technology Museum, Archaeology and Conservation Building, Islamic Religious School, mosque, Sharif Adam's Tomb, Imam Yakob's Tomb, Sharif Buntak's Tomb, Exhibition Office, and 15th Century Spanish Cannon. All admission is currently free and last year more than 60,000 visitors had visited the Brunei Museum.

Anonymous said...

http://www.newsflash.org/2001/08/pe/pe001989.htm

GMA TRACES BLOOD TIES TO BRUNEI SULTAN

Bandar Seri Begawan (via PLDT), Aug. 23, 2001 – President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo yesterday established her link to the Royal Family of Brunei as she revealed that during the 16th century, the first Sultan Bolkiah married a Filipina whose grandson was Lakandula and whose cousin went to Brunei in 1575.

The President, in an interview with Borneo Bulletin editor Antonio Alabastro, revealed that Lakandula’s cousin has a grandchild who was a Macapagal.

"It happened this way. During the 16th century, the first Sultan Bolkiah married a Filipina (Sulu Princess Lela Menchanai), whose grandson is Lakandula, whose cousin went to Brunei in 1575, and whose grandchild is a Macapagal," the President said.

The first Sultan Bolkiah, known as the Singing Captain or Nakodha Ragam, according to the local papers, ruled during the golden age of Brunei when its territory reached the Philippines.

His wife, Princess Lela Menchanai, the daughter of a Sulu native, has a school named after her in Kampong Ayer (water village) here.

Asked on the meaning of her family name Macapagal, the President said: "Kasi sa kapampangan, ang ‘mapagal,’ ‘pagod,’ so iyong ‘macapagal,’ baka yung nakakapagod."

The President candidly added that: "Sabi ng Cabinet member ko, totoo daw iyon, nakakapagod magtrabaho sa administrasyon ko."

Anonymous said...

Arroyo claimed to be a descendant of Rajah Lakandula, a Filipino Muslim royal who came to Brunei in 1575, to visit his cousin Sultan Saiful Rizal, grandson of Sultan Bolkiah.

Rajah Lakandula is supposed to be the grandson os Sultan Bolkiah and Laila Menchanai, and Lakandula grandchildren was a Macapagal.

---------------

Funny that Brunei records mentioned that Menchanai is a Javanese princess and that Sultan Bolkiah just married her on his trip before she accidently killed him. His death was not known until they reach Brunei and after that, she killed herself... that shows that it cant be true that she would have any descendents from the Brunei sultan as she died together with him....

Anonymous said...

Inquirer Mindanao : Muslim Mindanao’s past and present

First posted 10:20am (Mla time) June 04, 2006
By Nash Maulana
Inquirer



Editor's Note: Published on page A23 of the June 4, 2006 issue of the Philippine Daily Inquirer


LOOKING back at one’s origin could reveal things unpleasant to some and a source of social pride to others, so say modern-day genealogists.

Weeks or even months of reading the Tarsilan (genealogy), which is written in old Malay scripts, has been the latest addition to the menu in most Muslim households in Mindanao these days.

Oral historians and genealogists helping build peace in conflict-ridden Muslim Mindanao have emphasized Dr. Jose Rizal’s adage for today’s offspring of erstwhile sultanates: “He who doesn’t look back to where he comes from cannot reach his destination.”

In Marawi City, the observance of the National Heritage Month (May 1-31), declared by President Macapagal-Arroyo under Proclamation No. 439, was colorful.

At the Mindanao State University (MSU), administrative offices showcased modern decorative items, antiquated betel nut brass cases and Maranao weapons—trying to outdo one another with authentic Maranao arts.

Rizal as Malay
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hero

Dr. Salipada Tamano, a specialist in Malay culture and tradition, traces Rizal’s roots to 17th-century Sultan Saiful Rijal of Brunei. Simply, he is unconvinced that Rizal would take his surname from a leaf or flower of a plant species when the government order then was to Hispanize Pinoy surnames.

The fact that Malaysia honors Rizal as one of the greatest heroes of the Malay race provides added hint to traces of his great, great ancestors, Tamano says.

A royal letter from Maguindanao addresses Marawi Mayor Omar “Solitario” Ali as a direct descendant of Sultan Sa Ranao a Bato Ali and of the Four Pillars or Pat a Pangampong a Ranao.

Maranao Muslims are more lenient to honorary royal appointments of non-Maranaos, owing to what one may call their “natural diplomacy” toward other faiths, nations and tribes. And this explains honorary titles accorded non-Maranaos, including that of MSU president, Dr. Ricardo de Leon, a native of Pangasinan (remember the legendary Princess Urduja), as MSU sultan.

But the more stringent Maguindanao also has its share of titles given to members of northern tribes (then considered “foreigners” or saluang), such as the Visayan finance minister, Datu Sabelmal, during the reign of 18th-century Sultan Muhammad Barahaman.

Datu Dacula VI, one of the traditional Four Pillars Maguindanao Sultanate’s appointing authority, also named a Protestant Christian, Macario Bugao as Datu Mangoda sa Palaw.

Mayor Ali was said to have declined the title of sultan. For his part, Maguindanao Gov. Datu Andal Ampatuan Sr. offered his explanation of the elaborate traditional qualifications of one who should occupy the throne of the sultanate, of which he is apparently uninterested.

Contemporary leaders

Early this month, Ampatuan, 70, led members of his clan in paying tribute to their patriarch, his grandfather Shariff Ampatuan, at the site of the old tomb in Ampatuan, Maguindanao.

Among the distinguished members of the family, conspicuously absent from the huge gathering on May 10 was Gov. Zaldy Uy Ampatuan of the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao, who accompanied the President in her state visit to Saudi Arabia.

Governor Ampatuan and his nephews, Maguindanao Rep. Simeon Datumanong and Secretary Zamzamin Ampatuan of the National Anti-Poverty Commission, presented to other clan members a plan to develop the periphery of the tomb into a memorial park.

The shariffs are descendants of the prophets from the old kingdom of Hijaz in what is now Saudi Arabia. Among them were divided the structure of governing powers: religion, trade and politics.

Lanao and the Sulu Archipelago inherited much of trade and politics, while Maguindanao reaped the seeds of religion and political powers more than trade. (During the time of Sultan Hijaban Mastura Qudratulla, Maguindanao was an international port of call until the end of the 19th century).

The sultans are direct descendants of Shariff Kabungsuan who wielded political power over Cotabato and Lanao areas. His older brother, Shariff Makdum, had his sphere of trade, religious and political influence over Sulu.

Their nephew, Shariff Saidona Mustapha, the ancestor of the Ampatuans, Buisans and Masukats in Maguindanao, had focused on religious affairs.

Rescue

Together with his cousin and brother in-law Shariff Buisan, the patriarch Shariff Ampatuan killed Spanish Maetro de Campo Esteban Villaron in 1898 in a bloody rescue of female relatives who were said to have been subjected to compelling working conditions at the Tamontaka Spanish Embassy in what is now Cotabato City.

The old book that is the Tarsilan, traces the blood lineages of the sultans, their siblings, immediate family and offspring and relatives, and former dominion that may somehow constitute the elusive “Moro ancestral domain” claim in the ongoing peace negotiations between the government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front.

Also, the Tarsilan records marriages that bridged peace among the ruling classes, as well as marital unions that led to wars.

For instance, a farewell meeting between Sultan Tambilawan Bayao of Buayan (Cotabato Upriver Valley) and Spanish Maetro de Campo Fernandez in 1899 was written in blood—quite literally in an annotation to the Tarsilan by Prof. Wardaton Fernandez Sulaiman, himself crowned Sultan of Makatoriganen, an old subdominion of Rajah Buayan in the Cotabato Upriver Valley, on May 1.

According to Sulaiman, Fernandez and Tambilawan had an unwritten covenant in a gesture of peace that if the sultan’s child was a boy, he was to be named Fernandez; if it was a girl, she was to be the namesake of Fernandez’s wife Maria.

Seventy-year-old Datu Dimasonsang Fernandez, grandson of Tambilawan by his son Tato Fernandez, was crowned Sultan Datu Dimasonsang Fernandez Tambilawan Bayao II on May 1. The sultan’s children, nephews and nieces and their children all bear the Spanish surname Fernandez.

Sultan Dimasonsang’s son, Datu Jo Fernandez, was also enthroned as his Rajah Muda or deputy. Datu Jo’s wife and first cousin, Teresita Fernandez Dilangalen-Fernandez is Labi Dalumabi sa Buayan.

The new sultan was made to wear a two-century-old, hand-sewn vest jacket in gold color worn by the grandfather of his grandfather, Sultan Maitem of Buayan, in his battles against the Spaniards.

Tambilawan’s own brother, Rajah Muda Datu Ali, died fighting American colonial forces in 1903. And so were Jakiri of Sulu and Amai Pakpak of Lanao.

In much earlier events, Rajah Balatamay, the defense minister of Maguindanao’s Sultan Muhammad Dipatuan Kudarat, married Pangian Ampay, the daughter of Sulu’s Sultan Muwalil Wasit Bungsu I, who had made a vow to get their first-born, his first grandchild, to succeed him in the throne.

Rajah Balatamay’s story is one of the finest in the glorious years of the sultanates.

Balatamay, who was from Buayan (Cotabato Upriver Valley) and Maguindanao (then comprising most of Mindanao), was exiled to Sulu after he killed Spanish Ambassador Melchor Lopez, a co-signatory of Sultan Kudarat to a Spain-Maguindanao Treaty ceding parts of Mindanao to Spanish claims on Islas Pilipinas in 1645.

His close friend Wasit gave Balatamay the highest defense post of the Sulu sultanate and subsequently sent him to Brunei to lead the combined reinforcement of Maguindanao and Sulu. He was to help Brunei’s Sultan Saiful Rijal quell a rebellion mounted in his kingdom by Visayan settlers.

It was said that the triumphant defense of the Brunei sultanate prompted Rijal to reward the sultanate of Sulu with his government’s property in North Borneo, the Sabah territory (which Malaysia, declaring independence from Britain, annexed in 1961), while the sultanate of Maguindanao was given a territory in Ternate in what is now Indonesia.

Blood evidence

Kudarat’s annexation of Ternate having been rewarded his sultanate bears blood evidence in his descendants among the Diocolano family in Maguindanao, whose matriarch was the princess of Ternate.

Returning to Sulu after almost two decades in the Brunei war, Balatamay learned that his father-in-law was determined to enthrone his child by the Sulu princess even if the child turned out to be a girl.

Balatamay declined to anoint his young daughter to reign over Sulu as Pangian Ampay Putri Kabira after her grandfather. (Pangian is the feminine title equivalent to the masculine sultan).

The son-in-law’s opposition prompted the Sulu sultan to call for bloodshed in a gladiators’ fight of sorts: should there be none to take the challenge of the sultan to fight his hardest fighting warrior, then it would become a one-on-one fight between the father-in-law and the son-in-law—a kind of only one wish, yours or mine, should prevail.

Datu M’gkap of Buayan took up the cudgel for Balatamay and won over the Sulu warrior. But still, Balatmay submitted to his father-in-law, who still had ultimate power to decide over the affairs of Sulu. Some historians say the ascension to power of Pangian Ampay Putri Kabira remains an unresolved case to this day in the Sulu sultanate’s council, the Ruma Bichara.

Of dominion, Kudarat reigned over most of Mindanao, ceding only the Caraga and a small parcel of land in Tamontaka in what is now Cotabato City for an Iglesia y Embajada de EspaƱa under the 1645 Lopez-Kudarat Treaty. In the document, he was alternatively referred to by Spain as the King of Mindanao.

Before Kudarat was his uncle Rajah Silongan, who ruled over most of what is now Sultan Kudarat, South Cotabato and part of Maguindanao.

Anonymous said...

Wednesday, September 20, 2006


Salvaging Sabah over territorial ownership

By Peter Jaynul V. Uckung, Senior History Researcher National Historical Institute

It was 1942, the twilight of the European gods of Southeast Asia. The guns of Corregidor were still firing the last flash of fiery resistance against the Japanese. With its eventual surrender, the island was enshrined by history into the universal monument of heroism.

Who would ever forget Corregidor?

Apparently we did. We forgot that it was also the mother of mayhem in Mindanao.

It was here in March 1968 that Muslim trainees were murdered, their bodies burned and thrown into the sea. One survived to tell the tale, and the Jabidah massacre was unveiled. It seemed that the Philippine military was preparing a clandestine mission of sabotage to precipitate the annexation of Sabah by the Philippines and aborted it at the last minute. Somehow, something went awry and the Muslim trainees ended up dead. There was an investigation and a court trial but no one was jailed for it. Hoping to avert a potentially embarrassing international scandal, the Philippine government denied any accusation of masterminding an invasion of Sabah, saying that the operation was a counterinsurgency program. It was too late.

How Malaysia howled and promptly turned the tables on the Philippines. 1968 was a year of Filipino Muslim agitation and the Jabidah massacre fanned their feeling of helplessness, of being abused. It was then that Sabah became the training ground of Muslim rebels. What’s more, they were supplied arms in Malaysia, and then sent back to Mindanao to fight for secession.

So devastating was the fighting in Mindanao that in 1973, President Marcos hinted at renouncing the Philippine claim of sovereignty over Sabah if Malaysia would stop giving arms and sanctuary to the Moro secessionists.

Sabah was a disputed territory covering about 29,388 square miles. Blessed with oil, pleasant weather and lush forests, it was some kind of a promised land to hundreds of thousands of impoverished Filipinos, mostly Muslims, who were living beyond the care and protection of the Philippine government.

Sulu’s acquisition of Sabah

Historically, Sabah is definitely a territory of the Philippines. In 1662 there was uncertainty in the sultanate of Brunei. A dispute in leadership had the two leading personalities of the Sultanate fighting each other for years. By the twelfth year of the Brunei civil war, one of the protagonists sought the help of the Sultan of Sulu. Brunei by that time had declined as a political and commercial power, and Sulu, despite the war with the Spaniards, had become a power to reckon with in the territories north of Borneo.

Why Sulu? Genealogical data would demonstrate the close blood ties between the two sultanates. The Sultan of Sulu was promised lands comprising what is now Sabah as a prize. The fighting men of Sulu then ended the stalemate and tipped the fortunes of the civil war in favor of the Brunei leader who had requested their assistance. As promised, the ownership of Sabah was transferred to the Sultanate of Sulu.

Since then, no one, not the Brunei people, not the Brunei Sultanate, and not even the British, has questioned the legitimate sovereignty of the Sulu Sultan over Sabah.

The British connection

British concerns in India and the Chinese market dictated British interest in Southeast Asia. Their first successful foray into the area was the establishment of a repair station for warships in Penang in the Malay Peninsula. To do this, they rented the place from the Sultan of Kedah in 1786. The whole Malay Peninsula became British territory in 1824 and its rich deposits of tin, a metal in great demand in industrializing Europe, and later, rubber, became British possessions.

Meanwhile, Sarawak (north­west portion of Borneo) was practically handed over to the British when the Sultan of Brunei rewarded the territory to an Englishman, James Brooke, who had assisted in restoring order among the rebelling Malays and Dayaks. Brooke was installed rajah. In 1850 Sarawak was recognized as a separate state and by 1864 Britain recognized its independence.

In 1878 an Englishman, Alfred Dent, and an Austrian, Gustavus Baron de Overbeck, both businessmen from Hong Kong (which became a British territory in 1841) became interested in the economic potential of North Borneo and decided to negotiate a lease from the Sultan of Brunei. But North Borneo was not Brunei’s business, because it belonged to the Sultan of Sulu. So off to Jolo went Overbeck.

The sultanate was no stran­ger to the British or the British to the sultanate. During the British invasion of Manila in 1762, English soldiers chanced upon an imprisoned Sultan Alimuddin and his son, the rajamuda Muhammed Israel, who were detained by the Spaniards. They were released by the English and treated well. With the history of goodwill still fresh in the minds of the Tausug, a lease contract was signed on January 22, 1878, between Sulu Sultan Mohammed Jamalul Alam and Alfred Dent/Gustavus Baron de Overbeck. As representatives of a British “company,” the two pledged to pay an annual rental fee of 5,000 Malayan dollars and to give aid and advice to the sultanate. In the early 1880s that “company” became the British North Borneo Company, incorporated by a Royal Charter. This gave the acquisition of the territory an aura of legality and the sanction of the Royal government as well as government protection. In exchange, the British Crown controlled the most important aspects of the administration of North Borneo. In 1888 the territory was made a British protectorate. This action was enlivened by a rising fear of German intervention in the area. The annexation of North Borneo to the British Empire was made without the knowledge of the Sultan of Sulu. When the news came out, protests were made, but a series of misfortunes overtook Sulu’s effort to recover its sovereignty over Sabah: the sultan died, the original copy of the lease was lost, Britain refused to hand over another true copy of the lease, and finally, the Americans came. The Americans never, not once, supported the sultanate’s claim to North Borneo. Britain got to keep North Borneo for a time as its territory, all the while giving rental fees to the heirs of the Sultan of Jolo.

British hegemony in Southeast Asia was shattered in 1941 when Japan invaded the territory. After the war, Sabah reverted to Britain. On September 16, 1963, the Federation of Malaysia was proclaimed, comprising Malaya, Singapore, Sabah and Sarawak, with Indonesia and the Philippines vehemently protesting and threatening war.

Sabah is a thousand miles away from Peninsular Malaysia, and its capital, Kota Kinabalu, is closer to Manila than the capital of Malaysia. What’s more, Sabah’s people were ethnically connected with the people of Sulu. And even if Sabah’s then Chief Minister Tun Mustapha bin Datu Harun came from Jolo, Sabah would slide steadily away from the Philippines’ grasp from then on. Several presidents would declare Malaysia’s right to Sabah in the name of peace and economic advantage (Marcos eventually did). But Philippine panel after panel would be created to lodge protests against the loss of Sabah.

Later, the protest was reduced to just how much Malaysia would pay for keeping Sabah. Then oil was discovered in Sabah. But that’s another story.


The Manila Times, 20th September 2006

Anonymous said...

The real royal family of Sulu is the JAMASALI royal family in the person of Princess Norma Piandao Jamasali descendant of Sultan Bararuddin Alam of Sulu who halped the Sultan of Brunei againts the Sumatrans logn time ago. After the war Sultan bararuddin won the war againts the sumatrans so the Sultan of brunei promised to give Sabah (North Borneo) as a gift so this only means that Sultan bararuddin's descendants are the bonafied heirs of Sabah and sulu in the person of Princess Norma Jamasali of Sulu and her children. Princess Norma has a picture at the Brunei Museum as the only royal Princess of Sulu and no body else. In the near future the real heirs of Sulu throne will be formally known and recognized by the Sultan of brunei Sultan Hji Hassanal Bolkiah.

Sultan Omar Ali Saifuddien III of Brunei recognized Princess Norma as her cousin from the Sulu-brunei Royal intermarriages long time ago.

Sultan Omar Ali Saifuddin III is the son of the last sultan of Sulu Sultan Jamalul Alam II who abdicated with no heirs and abolished Sulu sultanate after he ceded Sulu to the Philippines in 1901.