Sovereign Signs: Titles of Kingship on Malay Seals
Resource type
Journal article
Creator (person)
Gallop, Annabel Teh
Date published
June 2020
Abstract
The recent publication of a new catalogue of over 2,000 Malay seals—defined as seals from Southeast Asia, with inscriptions in Arabic script—makes available for the first time a substantial corpus of primary source material from the Malay archipelago, dating from the sixteenth to the early twentieth century. The main function of the inscription on a Malay seal was to identify the seal owner and to locate him or her within their social, political and spiritual universe. This was evoked through an iteration of his/her title and/or personal name, sometimes accompanied by a pedigree, a place name, a date, a religious expression, and an amuletic formula imbued with protective powers. In this article the titles of Malay kingship inscribed on seals will be explored through the various component elements: the prefatory honorifics, the title proper of the ruler, and the sovereign epithets used to confirm and magnify his status.
Journal title
Journal of the Malaysian Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society
Volume
93:01:00
Issue
318
Publisher
Malaysian Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society
ISSN
0128-5483
eISSN
2180-4338
Official URL
Rights statement
In Copyright