Panglima Awang (2)

This is my understanding and opinions about Panglima Awang based on my reading of the links given in the first post by Ahmad Fuad on Panglima Awang.

1. Panglima Awang was a Malay warrior at the time of the Malacca Sultanate when Sultan Mahmud was the ruler (sultan). This was around 1509-1511, before the Portuguese attack on Malacca.
2. When the Portuguese attacked Malacca in 1511, they also attacked the palace of Sultan Mahmud and captured the court officials (hamba raja = hambarajas/hambarajes/ambarajes).
3. One of the captured court officials was Panglima Awang. If he was very dark, then he would be known as Panglima Awang Hitam. If he was slightly darker than the Portuguese Caucasians, then he would be just Panglima Awang. Awang is a common call name but it is uncommon to call a youth Awang in Malacca. Awang is used in Kelantan dialect to call a young boy, a youth, or a young man.
4. Even though Panglima Awang was a Malay court official of the Sultan Mahmud's palace, as with many court officials, they could come from any of the nearby regions surrounding Malacca. Most Malay warriors were Bugis if they came from the east (Borneo, Moluccas/Celebes, Papua New Guinea side). Otherwise they would be Minangkabau from Paya Kumbuh, a popular origin of the Malays of Malaysia. However, the Muslim warriors of the Minangkabau palace of Paya Kumboh, Sumatra only arrived in Malaya after the Dutch forces attacked Malacca; ie, circa 1641. So it is most likely that Panglima Awang was a local man from Malacca, and who worked for the court of the Malacca Sultanate under Sultan Mahmud at the time of the Portuguese attack on Malaccca.
5. The Portuguese forces defeated the Malacca Sultanate and captured Malacca and its people, including court officials, eg Panglima Awang. There maybe other court officials who were captured by the Portuguese but we may not have the entire history about the fall of Malacca to the Portuguese under Alfonso d'Albuquerque.
6. European captors such as the Portuguese in Malacca made their captives accept their religion. In the case with Panglima Awang, he was either forced or freely accepted into a new faith, the faith of his Christian conquerors. If he was a slave, he would have been forced and that could be for his own protection and/or safety. If he was not a slave and treated just like a friend, he probably merely followed the 'religion' of his non Muslim masters but never converted to Christianity. Even though Muslims do not convert to any religion, in those times and in times of battle or after losing battles, captives have no choice and follow the instructions of their captors with a heavy heart.
7. Did Panglima Awang accept Christianity and converted to Christianity? No. A Muslim remains a Muslim. Once a Muslim, always a Muslim. A apostate (murtad) would suffer grievous punishment.
8. What language(s) did Panglima Awang speak? He definitely spoke Malay (Bahasa Orang Melayu).
9. Why wasn't Panglima Awang able to communicate with the people in Cebu, Philippines? Cebuans speak their own language or dialect which is different from Malay. Tagalog contains common Malay words but Tagalog is a more recent language, arising from Malay.
10. If Panglima Awang was a Malay Muslim, and if he had died after arriving in the Philippines or Malacca, or anywhere in the Malay Archipelago, where were his siblings? Where is his grave today? If he was a Hindu and not a Muslim, what was his Hindu name?
11. Is it possible to have a small Filipino community in Malacca? Yes. There are Malacca Malay-Filipino marriages. One which I attended in Malacca was that of Mahani Mahabob's eldest brother who married a Filipino lady. She spoke English to us (Malacca children and teenagers).
12. Is it possible to have a small Portuguese community in Malacca? Yes. There is Portuguese Settlement in Malacca today. This is some distance from my village in Banda Hilir. People form that Settlement have assimilated into the larger Malacca mixed society today. These Portuguese descendants appear more Indian than Europeans but they have Portuguese surnames and British first names.
13. Could Panglima Awang come from any of the small communitites? Yes, indicating he was from overseas, most probably Sumatra, a large island in close proximity to Malacca. The passage from Sumatra to Malay is usually from Batu Bara to any of the ports on the Malayan western coastline. In this case Malacca, a popular seaport and famous trade centre.
14. Panglima Awang was said to be derived from a Sumatran lineage and his descendants resided in Rembau, even today. Panglima Awang himself married a Pahang lady. This is common knowledge for people who are descended from the royal household of the Minangkabau princes of Paya Kumboh. There should be approximately the 10th generation or more today in Rembau itself and proximity.
15. Panglima Awang was nicknamed Datuk Laut Dalam (Master of the Deep Seas) to avoid being found by the European captors. Much later, Mat Kilau did the same and used the nickname Mat Siam.
16. Why did his captors name him Enrique or Henry the Black? He was made their affiliate and he worked for them.
17. Was Palingma Awang a loyal servant to his Portuguese captain? Yes. Malay men, especially warriors, are loyal to their masters. They don't defect or they will die as traitors. 
18. Was Panglima Awang a traitor to his Portuguese master and his crew? No idea.
19. Was Panglima Awang murdered in Mactan? No idea. Probably not. He was not an enemy of the locals so they wouldn't kill him. He did no harm to them. Malay communities do not kill unless it was a  feud or battle or something they would stick their neck & life for. Malay men (warriors) are known to be loyal, rational and civilised.
20. Was Panglima Awang the sole survivor of the Mactan Massacre where Magellan died of wounds from (poisoned) arrows? No idea. He was probably the sole survivor of that massacre.
21. Did Panglima Awang plot Magellan's death? No idea. Usually no. It is a yes if the murder was for ransom.
22. Did Panglima Awang collude with Raja Humabon to kill or murder Magellan? No idea. A Malay warrior knows whom to side with, and usually he is loyal to his Malay fellows or countrymen.
23. Was Raja Humabon a Malay? Probably a Bugis and therefore the language was Bugis Malay. Humabon itself sounds like 2 words = Huma (tanah or land) + bon (a place or land called Bone in Sulawesi). I think this is old Malay.
24. Did Panglima Awang meet any Sulu ruler while in the Philippines? No idea. The British Queen was said to have married a Sulu ruler. This could mean that the issues and descendants are all related to the British Crown and nobility. They could pass as locals with black hair or other hair colours, and with black (iris) eyes or with colourful irises (blue, brown, dirty green or hazel).
25. Did Panglima Awang return to Malacca or his village (Rembau in Negeri Sembilan) to take revenge on his captors? No idea.
26. Is Panglima Awang a hero? No idea. He was the first to circumnavigate the globe but this is controversial from the European quarters who contend that Magellan was the first to do so. 
27. Which nation shall claim the famous Panglima Awang as its national hero? No idea. He was a Malay hero shared by 3 nations - Malaysia, Indonesia and the Philippines. He was a hero of the Malay World or the Malay Nation.

Panglima Awang (1)

The search for the real identity of Panglima Awang who accompanied Magellan on his first journey to circumnavigate the globe continues till today. Did Magallen circumnavigate the globe at all? No, he died in the Philippines before the last leg of circumnavigation was completed; someone else completed it. Was he the first person to circumnavigate the globe? No, he did not complete his mission. He died before his misison was completed. If no, who then was the first to do so? It is a mystery till today. There maybe a few names but only one shall concern us. He was known as Panglima Awang in the Malay World (Dunia Melayu). He was known as Enrique or Henry the Black in world history. He was probably of Sumatran origin. Black here may mean he had dark skin and hair; he was probably a dark Malay, a dark Indian or a Black African. We don't know. He was definitely Asian or African, not Caucasian.


I started writing about the Mayans and Malayans in Facebook, and the similarity of the plants they shared. The discussion then moved to Panglima Awang.
http://www.yucatanadventure.com.mx/yucatan-flora.htm

Help on this big maritime mystery was provided by Ahmad Fuad, Dr Abdul Ghani (Pak Din) and Abidin Hussin in the Medicinal Plant Interest Group in Facebook. Here is a re-post of the discussion thread:

Abidin Hussin Maybe Ulam is a Mayan word. Our language is a mixture of many languages. Or it can be by chance.

Faridah Abdul Rashid I don't think it is by chance. A lot of the Mayan fruits are the same fruits we have in Malaysia. Even the flowers are the same ones. Only the people are different. I think the Arabs came to Malaya, and then went to Spain, and then the Spaniards went to Yucatan peninsula, and the Mayan people learned from us in that way. There must be something that we did in the past that we are now in Mayan territory.

Pak Din Prof., my take on this is that the Malays are seaferers by nature and we colonised the tropical belts and build communities along the places we stop over. I study the distribution of plants and found that the Periwinkle is one important plant in our society in the past. The distribution is widespread throughout the tropics from Madagascar to Hawaii and probably across the Panama strip into the Carebbean Islands. The features of the people along this belt is very strikingly similar and the language too contains words almost similar to each other with similar meaning. We were once a great nation and our language was the language of trade through out the tropical belt.

Faridah Abdul Rashid > Pak Din, Yes, the Malays have always been the greatest seafarers and shipbuilders since time immemorial. The Malays have always had the greatest civilisation and an exhaustive materia medica. So most probably, they sailed the equatorial belt and brought along their medicinal plants. Even the Chinese respected the Malays for their skills working with wood, esp intricate carvings of flora. That is how important and great the Malays were and are even today.

Ahmad Fuad Haji Morad The distributional range of the Malayo-Polynesian race stretches from Madagascar to Easter Islands on the western coast of South America. Ain't that far to have some influence.

Pak Din But Che Mat, I think we went further than that, to cross over Panama and into the Caribbean Islands too.

Ahmad Fuad Haji Morad The Malays seafaring adventures definitely more extensive. Thot' Henry The Black atau Enrique (Panglima Awang) played a pivotal role navigating after Magellan's death to complete circumnavigating the globe.

Faridah Abdul Rashid I don't have the full biography of Panglima Awang to be able to appreciate his panglima role in our naval maritime history.

Ahmad Fuad Haji Morad Google the keywords Panglima Awang, Enrique or Henry the Black and you will find some lead about him. In fact there's a novel, Panglima Awang (1957) written by Harun Aminurrashid. "Historians and trivia buffs have often speculated that Enrique was the first to circumnavigate the world" not Sebastián Elcano after Magellan's death in the Philippines.
Here's some links to appreciate him:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enrique_of_Malacca
http://www.sabrizain.org/malaya/port3.htm
http://tulahan.blogspot.com/2011/09/sejarah-panglima-awang-atau-henry-black.html ;
http://ulasbuku.blogspot.com/2007/04/panglima-awang-1957-harun-aminurrashid.html .

Faridah Abdul Rashid Thanks. Will follow the links. He maybe a Sulu Malay.

Ahmad Fuad Haji Morad Claimed from Sumatra, and if you run thru the Malay Annals the whole Malay archipelago were interconnected w' many Sultanates and regarded all alike.

Faridah Abdul Rashid Yes, I saw the illustration where the sea level was lower than that today, and one could walk throughout the Malay lands. Sailing & boat-building came much later when the water level rose.

New Bedford, MA, USA (photo by Alan Tan, 13 Oct 2012, Facebook)