Page 40 - Hikayat-Patani-The-Story-Of-Patani 1

THE HIKAYAT PATANI AND RELATED TEXTS 31

How Mr. North’s copy of the Hik. Patani came to be in the possession
of the Library of Congress has not been investigated in detail. Most of
the manuscripts rediscovered in 1967 bear the indication “Smithsonian
Deposit” on their label; according to information kindly provided by
Mr. P. W. Bishop, Chairman of the Department of Arts and Manu­
factures, Smithsonian Institution, the Institution transferred its library
to the Library of Congress in 1866/67. The simplest conjecture is that
after Mr. North’s return to the U.S.A, in 1847 (and apparently before
his death in 1869) his collection of Malaysiana, including both printed
works and a number of manuscripts, was donated or sold to the
Smithsonian Institution; apparently no-one ever studied these interest­
ing materials either in the Smithsonian Institution or in the Library of
Congress.
The other Malay MS. of the Hikayat Patani was also rediscovered
largely by accident. In July 1969 A. Teeuw went through the materials
and notes collected by the late H. W. Emanuels in connection with his
plan to edit and publish the Malay Laws of Malacca, the Undang-
undang Malaka. After the untimely death of Emanuels these materials
had been put at Teeuw’s disposal, but the latter had never found an
opportunity to cast more than a superficial glance at them. When
looking through some of the notes on Malay texts in English collections,
Teeuw was struck by a short note regarding an item in the Skeat col­
lection which is kept in the Institute of Social Anthropology, University
of Oxford. Emanuel’s note identified no. 15 of this collection as “His­
torical Notes on the State of Patani”.18 A letter was then written to
Dr. Rodney Needham of the said Institute, who kindly made available
the item in question, which turned out to be another MS. of the Hikayat
Patani. This MS. bears the following title:
“Sk. Ms. 15 [16 crossed out and replaced by 15!]: Selasilah Negri
Patani (Historical Notes About Patani)”.

The title page bears a short note saying:
“Note: This copy was made for me by the owner, who could not
contemplate parting with the ms.” Signed: W. W. S.
C.U. Expn. 1899.

18 It is probable that Emanuels took this note from Voorhoeve’s unpublished in­
ventory of the Skeat collection, where it is mentioned as “15. Pencil copy of a
Salasilah negeri Patani”. However, neither Voorhoeve nor anyone else using his
list apparently ever studied this text in sufficient detail to identify it as a copy
of the Hikayat Patani.