Page 28 - Chinese and Asian Ceramics from an Indonesian Collection

Chapter 2. Geography & Past Settlements in the Musi River Basin

Figure 5. Sites at Palembang where ceramics and ancient artefacts have been recovered (Rianta 2014).

Parit 12 that local communities from ‘Wen Bay’ sailed out to sea
In 1979 a few shards of 12th to 14th century Chinese to intercept passing Chinese ships to trade food for metal
ceramics were recovered at Upang at the junction of the objects. However, in 2008 Wolters changed his view and
Upang River and the Musi River some half way between considered KoYing was more likely to have been in west
Palembang and the mouth of the Musi River. Edwards Java. However, Donkin (2003), Sofian (2016), Anon (2016)
McKinnon (1985) reported considerable erosion of the and other authors consider Wolters’s original placement
river bank over the past twenty-five years at that point of KoYing was correct, and that the coastal lowland area at
from passage of large vessels up and down the River. the mouth of the Musi River was the likely centre of KoYing
And that on the opposite (right bank) of the River was a trade with early Indian, Chinese, Middle East and Funan
grave-site of Demang Lebar Daun, the Kubu chief whose merchants. This centre would have been the entrepôt
daughter married Sri Tri Buana, ancestor of the founder of for luxury goods moving both east and west through the
Malacca. Villagers report the existence of old earthworks archipelago from the second to the late-4th to early-5th
in the same vicinity. century. Given the recent archaeological findings from
Other sites on the lower reaches of the Musi where we Air Sugihan and Karangagung, it is possible that these
collected a few ancient ceramics were: Buntut Burung, PT and associated settlements were part of, and perhaps were
Sharp factory, Salanamo, Sungai Gerong, Sungai Bunyut the epicentre of KoYing.
and Pulau Kemaro. Both Funan and KoYing had commercial relations
with North West India and adjacent parts of Central
Koying Polity (2nd to late-4th–early-5th century) Asia, as well as with ports along the east coast of India.
In the early years of the 1st millennium, Indonesian traders Donkin (2003) considered that KoYing was replaced, by
who dealt commercially with Indians or others from the Kantoli sometime in the late-4th or early-5th century.
Middle East never ventured much beyond Java. Sourcing of Trade goods at that time presumably included Benzoin,
aromatics and spices from the eastern Indonesian islands and alluvial gold from upstream River Musi and spices
was carried out by Malays or Indonesians with contacts and sandalwood from eastern Indonesia. It is probable
as far east as the Moluccas. According to Wolters, the that an international community also developed at the
centre of such trading was a place or region, known in mouth of the Musi which would have included Indians,
Chinese transcription as Chia-ying (KoYing), which he Chinese, Arabs and traders from Funan. It is likely that
reckoned was somewhere in southern Sumatra. KoYing Malays and Javanese were also part of the community of
was mentioned by 3rd century Chinese sources who wrote traders at the mouth of the Musi, because they dominated

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