PARAMESWARA'S SWORD - CURA SI MANJA KINI

by e.s. shankar

Cura Si Manja Kini

Royal Collar

 Bezoar of Dew

Kris Taming Sari

I recently stumbled upon the fact that there is in the possession of the Sultan of Perak and the Perak Royal Family some astounding relics of antiquity that in all probability have an extremely significant bearing on the question of Malaysian identity and history.

One such astonishing artifact is the sword Cura Si Manja Kini or Chora Samanda Kian mentioned in John Leyden's 1810 Malay Annals or Sejarah Melayu (published in 1821 by Sir Stamford Raffles). The same sword is said to have been used during the installation of Parmeswara as ruler of Melaka in 1400. 

But in fact, its origins go further back, possibly 200-400 years earlier than 1400. 

The sword was part of the regalia of a Indian/Hindu prince linked to the Chola Kings (Raja Cholan) from South India, i.e. Nila Utthaman/Sri Tri Buana/Sang Nila Utama (founder of Singapore) narrated in the Sejarah as having landed on Mt. Segantang Maha Meru in Palembang, Sumatra together with two other princes, Vichitram and Karna Pandita, and a probable Brahmin Priest, Bat'h, exact date unknown!

Now, Bat'h is a pretty unusual name for an Indian and perhaps it's a truncated form of Vadhyar (Tamil for priest), Vadh, which became Bat'h, in the same way Vichitram is spelt in the Sejarah as Bichitram. This is consistent with the fact that the Malay language generally does not have old words that commence with the letter 'V' and 'B' was substituted.

The Sejarah relates that it is this self-same sword that was used by the borrower (from Nila Utthaman/Sri Tri Buana/Sang Nila Utama) and champion warrior Peramas Cumambang to slay the serpent monster Saktimuna (Sakatimuna/Ichktimani) into 3 parts in Minangkabau, Sumatra. In the process the sword became etched with 190 notches which strange "clue" of Dan Brown and da Vinci Code proportions, no Indonesia or Malaysian historian or anyone else has ever deciphered!

The list of relics, other than Cura Si Manja Kini, dating anywhere from 600-1,000 years includes:

1. Royal Collar (15th century) said to have been presented by the Emperor of China
2. Dokong or Kerongsang Besar (Neck Pendent)
3. Cap Lalulintar (Royal Silver Seal) of Sultan Muhammad Shah (Melaka) and Kayu Gampit mentioned in Sejarah Melayu. (The Royal Lance, Limbuar appears to be missing)
4. Betel Boxes
5. Mestika Embun (Bezoar of Dew)
6. Kancing Halkah (Royal Collar Ornament)
7. Kris Taming Sari (originally said to belong to Hang Tuah).

For full details (available at the official website of the Perak State Government) Click here 

So, how did all these relics from Palembang and Melaka end up in the custody of the Perak Royalty?

After the fall of Melaka on 24th April 1511 to Portugal  led by Alphonso de Alburquerque, Melaka's last ruler, Sultan Mahmud Shah eventually made his way to Kampar in Sumatra where he died in 1528. One of the sultan's two sons, Muzzafar Shah journeyed to Perak where he was installed the first Sultan  in 1528. The other son, Alauddin Riayat Shah, was installed as the 1st SuItan of Johor. Thus historically, Melaka gave rise to four sultanates in Malaya i.e. Johor, Perak, Pahang and Selangor!! It was Sultan Muzzafar Shah who brought with him the artifacts which had been handed down to his father, Sultan Mahmud.

The inscriptions on Cura Sa Manjani Kini in Sanskrit are said to come from the the words "Churiga Si Mandakini" which means "the blade from Lake Mandakini of the Ganges (River) in India!! Refer to Sembangkuala's blog for more details. click here.

And what is the link between the Chiri of Perak, nobat players and Bat'h the Brahmin Priest cum charitra or cheritra teller in the Sejarah (pg. c4/23 - 25 John Leyden's Sejarah Melayu)? Click here and refer to the document below extracted from the Sejarah and a translation of it from page 175 of 'A History of Perak' by R.O.Winstedt and R.J.Wilkinson published by The Malaysian Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society (MBRAS): :

 

In short, Bat'h had recited the lineage of the 3 Indian/Hindu princes who landed in the mountains of Palembang to Demang Lebar Daun, the aboriginal chief and his people in Sanskrit !! Astonishing, is it not? 

The Sejarah clearly states Parameswara was buried in Tanjung Tuan (Cape Rachado) near Port Dickson, Negeri Sembilan (in Malaysia). It is Demang Lebar Daun and Nila Utthaman/Sri Tri Buana/Sang Nila Utama who are reputed to have actually been buried in Fort Canning, Singapore!!

There is therefore some serious error with the claim that Parameswara was buried in Fort Canning (Bukit Larangan) in Singapore. Click here for Keramat Iskandar, Singapore details. It absolutely makes no sense that Parameswara would be buried in Singapore when he originally fled from there in fear of his life, before founding Melaka!!). 

The time has come for the Singapore Government to initiate investigations to identify through modern scientific procedures such as carbon dating, DNA testing etc., exactly who is buried in Keramat Iskandar and Fort Canning.

Some of these artifacts and regalia must be at least a thousand years old and there is not a shadow of a doubt about their links to Parameswara and the Melaka Sultanate of the 15th and early 16th century, Indonesia and INDIA!

So, why haven't our Government and Department of Antiquities engaged an archaeologist and expert in Sanskrit and Indian languages/dialects and South East Asian history (and there must literally be hundred of them in India) as well as China counterparts to piece together what must surely be THE story of the century?

In particular, the Sanskrit inscriptions on Parameswara's sword need to be investigated in depth!

So, why the leaden footedness? Too busy "interloked" in controversies?
   
donplaypuks® and fail to poke around with historic swords, man!

DOUBLE, DOUBLE, TOIL AND TROUBLE FOR DSAI ? NOT REALLY!

Or the curious 4 cameras 1 omega watch affair

by will s. peare , donplaypuks® intrepid correspondent for nefarious political plots affairs

“Double, double toil and trouble
Fire burn, and cauldron bubble.” Act IV, Scene 1, 'Macbeth' by William Shakespeare

Often misquoted as ‘bubble, bubble, toil and trouble’ these are the famous demonic  incantations uttered by the three Scottish witches as they summon Satan and hope to add more woes to Macbeth:

“Round about the cauldron go;
In the poison'd entrails throw.
Toad, that under cold stone
Days and nights has thirty-one
Swelter'd venom sleeping got,
Boil thou first i' the charmed pot......

Fillet of a fenny snake,
In the cauldron boil and bake;
Eye of newt and toe of frog,
Wool of bat and tongue of dog,
Adder's fork and blind-worm's sting,
Lizard's leg and owlet's wing,
For a charm of powerful trouble,
Like a hell-broth boil and bubble......

Scale of dragon, tooth of wolf,
Witches' mummy, maw and gulf
Of the ravin'd salt-sea shark,
Root of hemlock digg'd i' the dark,
Liver of blaspheming Jew,
Gall of goat, and slips of yew
Silver'd in the moon's eclipse,
Nose of Turk and Tartar's lips,
Finger of birth-strangled babe
Ditch-deliver'd by a drab,
Make the gruel thick and slab:
Add thereto a tiger's chaudron,
For the ingredients of our cauldron....”

As the ghost of Banquo did to Macbeth, Anwar seems to haunt the collective bad conscience of the leaders of our ruling party and their supporters like an itch that simply won’t go away, ever. And like the ‘D’ Grade movie that it surely is, the plotters of the latest ‘expose’ on Anwar toiled and troubled to produce a damp squib in 1M (not Israel) land.

What exactly were these plotters up to? I mean, even the CIA and MOSSAD will not use 2 cameras for entrapment; if they have to leave in a hurry, having to dismantle 4 cameras in a hotel room would dangerously slow them down. It would be an operational nightmare and unwarranted risk.

John Woo and HK movie directors have a penchant for mounting 6 cameras to shoot Kung Fu and 'Shoot! Shoot! Miss! Miss! Kill! Kill!' movies. But this is done to capture the action in ‘slo mo’ from a multiplicity of angles so that the audience can climax in its pursuit of vicarious thrill from blood and gore spatter and spurt on giant screens. So, 4 cameras seem like huge overkill for Anwar and mind you, a hotel room does not have that many places for even single camera concealment without being discovered easily – it’s usually in the ceiling or behind the dressing table mirror.

So, who has such connections and power to mount a covert operation even MOSSAD would take its hat off to? And convene hacks from the top MSM for a superbly organized porn screening at Carcosa Sri Negara, formerly the British High Commissioner’s Official Residence and now fully owned by 1M (not Israel) Government?

Notice the discrepancies and contradictions from ‘Datuk T’?

1.    What was he doing in a fcuk shop?

2.    He was a trusted aide. Huh? Come again?

3.    He "stumbled" upon a camera while (as Anwar’s aide apparently) searching for allegedly, Anwar’s Omega watch. How did he know there were 4 cameras then? Was he snooping around for 3 more Omega watches?

4.   Video shot in black and white. In today’s world? What, they were hoping to submit it as a ‘noir’ entry at Cannes?

5.    How did he remove all the evidence and watch if he was just Anwar’s aide and  “stumbled” upon the scenario. The original plotters and hotel management caved in totally to our half-assed, half masked Caped Crusader?

6.    What happened to the pimp who procured the so-called ‘woman of leisuee’ and the lady herself?

7.    Why did he not go the police first or, er, like Saiful, the Prime Minister?

What really were Datuk T and his cabal hoping to achieve?

In 1M (not Israel):

1.   We had a lawyer deny at a Royal Commission of Inquiry (RCI) he was the person seen in a video recording attempting to fix the appointment of judges despite testimony from the cameraman himself. After some 2 years, 1M (not Israel) government has not proceeded with prosecutions despite the RCI clearly recommending it do so.

2.   A senior Minister was caught on film having extra-marital sex with a woman. The Minister confessed to his ‘inappropriate’ actions and resigned his post. The AG did not prosecute and the Minister then famously went on to become leader of his Party!

Notice too, the desperation. Datuk T and the plotters want Datin Wan Azizah, Anwar’s wife to quit PKR and politics? What is she guilty of that she cannot lead the nation if she gets elected and wants to? What are they really afraid of?

If anything, it will paint the government in a blacker picture than it already is and prove that Sodomy1, Sodomy II and now Macbeth 2 involves a continuing conspiracy of and by, if not some rogue elements from the corridors of  government, then, the government itself, wouldn't it?

Were they hoping in their desperation to force DNA out of Anwar in an ensuing police investigation and kill two birds with 1 stone. Or “Wag The Dog’ and influence voters in the Sarawak elections?

How stupid do they think our citizens are? Do they really think that a judge should break with sensible long established Constitution, law and rules and become police investigator, prosecutor, jury and executioner to make up for police and prosecutorial incompetency and bias? And how can the judge, when Anwar has not been called to the stand and testified to anything? Whatever happened to the PRINCIPLE of 'presumtpion of innocence until proven guilty'?

If anything, the latest shenanigans will enhance Anwar’s chances of claiming the ultimate prize in his march to Putrajaya!!

donplaypuks® with Omega watches and cameras, man!

PANGLIMA AWANG OR ENRIQUE (HENRY) THE BLACK OF MELAKA

or who was the first man to circumnavigate the globe?

by edward gibbons, donplaypuks® intrepid correspondent for historical affairs

                                                                           ferdinand magellan

A couple of years ago my son brought home his class history test paper and got the answer right for the question 'Who was the first Malay to sail around the world?"

I thought the correct answer was was Dato Azahar Mansor. Boy, was I wrong. My son's History textbook said the right answer was 'Panglima Awang.' This piqued my curiosity and so I Googled it and was surprised at the volume of postings in both English and Malay on the subject. 

So, read, research and make up your ow mind!

For some early information at China History Forum click here .

"Over the years, there has been considerable debate about who actually was the first man to sail around the world. We were all taught this historic honour belongs to Ferdinand Magellan (Fernao de Magalhaes, in his native Portuguese) who led the expedition of five ships and over 270 men out of Spain in 1519 and sailed westwards, reaching the Philippines, where he was killed. However, Magellan was thought to have travelled to as far as Sabah before, and one can argue that he had indeed actually completed circumnavigating the globe. There are also those who argue that the accolade should rightly belong to Sebastian del Cano, a mutineer from Magellan's crew, who led the one surviving ship, Victoria, and 17 other men, and limped back to Spain on September 8, 1522.

However, only one individual can truly claim to have been the first man to leave his home, sail around the globe and arrive at a part of the world where his mother tongue was spoken. That man was a Malay, Magellan's able servant and interpreter, called Enrique of Melaka or Henry the Black.

If there is any single Malay ever who has had the greatest impact on world history, it would probably be Enrique. It is therefore ironic that we know so little of the man. He is called Panglima Awang in Malay literature but there is no mention of him in any credible Malay historical records. There is brief mention of Enrique in the official Spanish crew lists, as well as Magellan's last will and testament. Almost all of the certain facts that we know of Enrique come from the most comprehensive chronicle of Magellan's voyage, the narrative by Antonio Pigafetta, an Italian volunteer who joined Magellan's crew. " 

Here's Wikipedia's notes on the same subject. click here :

"Enrique of Malacca was a native of the Malay Archipelago who became a slave of the Portuguese explorer Ferdinand Magellan in the 16th century. Italian historian Antonio Pigafetta, who wrote the most comprehensive account of Magellan's voyage, named him "Henrich" (which was Hispanicized Enrique in official Spanish documents). Pigafetta explicitly states Henrich was a native of Sumatra. His name appears as "Henrique", ^[1] which is Portuguese, and is what probably was written in his baptismal certificate, as he was baptized a Roman Catholic by his Portuguese captors. His name appears only in Pigafetta's account, in Magellan's Last Will, and in official documents at the Casa de Contratación de las Indias of the Magellan expedition to the Philippines....."

Local amateur historian Sabri Zain gives a more detailed account of events under the title"Enrique of Melaka: Was the first man to travel round the world a Malay?"  click here .

"If there is any single Malay who has had the greatest impact on history, it would probably be Enrique.......if he had indeed made his way home, he would have arrived home earlier than del Cano making the Malay the first man to sail around the world rather than Magellan or Del cano... Little was nown about him until 1958 when the writer Harun Aminurrashid published one of the greatest novels in modern Malay fiction..'Panglima Awang'.."

Know your history and donplaypuks® with history, man!

DOCTORED BIRTH CERTIFICATE SURELY? NO?

or tribute to Gary Moore, 58 (R.I.P.)

by rhythm and blues brothers, donplaypuks® intrepid correspondents for musical and wailing affairs

It's always a time to stop, ponder and reflect when a legend passes away, especially someone like the great Gary Moore from Belfast, N.Ireland of a suspected heart attack in a hotel room in Estepona, Spain on  6th February 2011. 

Moore came from that genre of solo guitarists like Jimi Hendrix, Carlos Santana and Jimmy Page (of Led Zep) who gutted your soul with their matchless compositions and renditions.

The world shed a huge collective tear for the prematurely departed Gary Moore who penned those immortal lyrics of nostalgia delivered in smooth and infused shattering Rock Blues style with Phil Lynott (Thin Lizzy) that tear at your heart:

PARISIENNE WALKWAYS

"I remember Paris in '49.

The Champs Elysee, Saint Michel,

And old Beaujolais wine.

And I recall that you were mine

In those Parisienne days.

Looking back at the photographs.

Those summer days spent outside corner cafes.

Ooh, I could write you paragraphs,

About my old Parisienne days."

Not long after, well into his autumn years, an 85-year old surly manipulator (as opposed to the bright and youthful looking 58-year old Gary Moore) unleashed on an unsuspecting world his sordid autobiography. As the old man reflected on the Paris of 1949, never drank Saint Michel and old Beaujolais wine, neither looked fondly at old sepia stained photographs nor wrote cheerful paragraphs about his old "Parisienne" days, he lost a grand opportunity to secure his place in the history books as a popular and respected ex-PM. 

Where Moore had dazzled us for decades with celestial strains, instead, there was an abundance of excuses, raw vindictiveness, plain self-denial and vitriolic, vengeful hate from the old man in his winter of discontent. Vinegar - sour, acrid and rancid - flowed in copious quantity rather than intoxicating wine as malevolent venom and lies spewed forth in contrast to Moore who gave us sweet honey, divine melody.

When news of Moore's demise spread, many who knew him only by his music felt a great loss as tears welled up in their eyes. They thanked God for Moore's gift, generosity and legacy.

And when eventually that old man goes to meet his maker, as we all  must one day, who shall pause to shed a tear for him? Shall anyone come to praise him and shall "the evil that men do lives after them; while the good (if it was there in the first place) is oft interred with the bones?"

What truth is there in the birth certificate below and is it not all about doctored legacy?:

gary moore/phil lynott - parisienne walkways

gary moore - still got the blues

donplaypuks® with your autobiography, man!