Page 19 - Hikayat-Patani-The-Story-Of-Patani 1

10 HIKAYAT PATANI

that Patik Siam should succeed him, thus bypassing both Raja Bambang
and his own children, of whom he had six.43 The three eldest all were
daughters, named as colours of the rainbow: Ijau (Green), Biru (Blue),
and Ungu (Violet). After them came a son by a secondary wife, Raja
Bima, and then a son by his consort, Bahdur Syah. A sixth child died in
her infancy.44 Thus when Sultan Patik Siam at the age of nine years
came to the throne in Patani in 1572, with his aunt Raja cA’ishah (the
last surviving child of Ismacil Syah) as his regent, he was surrounded
by numerous rivals whose claims to the throne were as good or nearly
as good as his own. The political struggles which ensued, as reported in
the chronicle, may simply reflect this dynastic situation, but they may
in addition reflect both internal factions and the external pressures which
so complicated the politics of Patani in the last quarter of the sixteenth
century.
The period of greatest instability lasted from 1572 to 1584, at the end
of which a queen was put on the throne of the state. The HP 45 treats
this period in a somewhat suspicious fashion, detailing two palace revo­
lutions in which the two sons of Mudhaffar and Manzur by secondary
wives, Raja Bambang and Raja Bima, killed the two sons of the same
sultans by their consorts, Sultan Patik Siam and Sultan Bahdur Syah.
Of the full-blooded descendants of the royal line, this left only the three
daughters of Sultan Manzur Syah, who succeeded to the throne in order.
In both cases, regicide was attributed at least in part to the urgings and
machinations of court officials, both of whom met violent ends.46 One
need accept neither story to recognize the deep conflict which underlay
political power in the small capital and, indeed, survived beyond this
period.
Many European visitors commented upon Patani’s century-long rule
by women — some more favourably than others. A misogynist somewhat
fancifully commented that Patani’s government was good, even though
the state was ruled by women.47 A highly interesting explanation of the
origins of queenly rule in Patani was offered by Nicholas Gervaise,
writing in the 1680s.

43 HP text, p. 29.
44 See below, Chapter VI, section 8, concerning the problem of Raja Kuning.
Names of colours as names for noble persons are quite common in Malay tra­
dition; see e.g., the names Tun Hitam and Tun Putih for many of the ladies
occurring in the later version of the SM (De Josselin de Jong, 1961, pp. 78, 85).
45 HP text, pp. 36—42.
40 T, pp. 28—29, does not involve these officials.
41RR, I,137.