How Amalaka the Fruit was cancelled in Malay history

To fully appreciate the events leading to the cancellation of Malaka the Fruit, we must first roll our clock back to medieval Melaka.

Enter the first paragraph of Eredia's Description of Malacca (1613):

Malaca significa Mirabolanos, fructa de hua arvore plantada ao longo de hum ribeiro chamdo Aerlele, que dece das fontes do outeyro de Buquet China pera o mar, daquella costa de terra firma de Viontana . . .

This long-forgotten literary gem was written by a Bugis-Portuguese muggle when he was 50-year-old. It is jammed with data so valuable it is practically the vip area of Melaka's history.

First things first

Before we attempt to e.g. ChatGPT: “Malaca means Mirabelle plums, fruit from a tree planted along a stream called Aerlele, which descends from the sources of the Buquet China hill to the sea, along that coast of mainland Viontana . . ."crack open Eredia's time-travel safe with large language models, we should perhaps, run some old school literature review.

And our first stop? J. V. G. Mills (1887 - 1987), a former High Court Judge in the Straits Settlements.

J. V. G. Mills' translation (1930) of this passage

Malaca means Myrobalans, the fruit of a tree growing along the banks of a river called the Aerlele, which flows down from its source on the hill of Buquet China to the sea, on the coast of the mainland of Ujontana.

is classy but a tad challenging for the modern brain because Eredia's toponyms (see Figure 1) are kept in their archaic forms. For the benefits of modern readers, let me renovate Mill's text with relatable place names and the good old Linnaean binomial name (which we will talk about later).

Malaca signifies Myrobolano emblica, fruits of a tree growing along the bank of a small stream called Ayer Leleh, which flows from Bukit Cina to the sea (Strait of Melaka), on the coast of Thai-Malay peninsula (Ujong Tanah).

Since Eredia spent his childhood in Melaka, it is not unreasonably to suppose that the young Eredia must have seen the Mirabolanos trees and probably also tasted the fruit. Note that the fruit of Malaka was mentioned instead of the tree of Malaka, which is probably an indication that the local population appreciated the medicinal properties of the fruit (more to come).

Furthermore, Eredia was not merely repeating the phoneme /malaka/ but instead he matched it with a Latin word from Greek = μύρον + βάλανος = Scented + acorn./mirabolanos/, a sister species. In the book, he depicted Ribeiro de Airlele as a small stream flowing from Bukit Cina to the Strait of Melaka. The now extinct Air Leleh stream, used to broad enough to justify the construction of bridges. Eredia's reference to Air Leleh gives us a clue that the Malaka trees were grown or cultivated only in specific locales (and not everywhere). It was probably an imported plant and not naturally occuring species.

Tome Pires, who wrote Suma Orientalis, nearly 100 years before Eredia, mentioned that the orang selat visited Parameswara with a fruit basket and the king was reported to have said:

you already know that in our language a man who runs away is called a Malayo, and since you bring such fruit to me who have fled, let this place be called Malaqa, which means ‘hidden fugitive' . . .

One can readily understand why Pires's account (as told to him by the Javanese, who was probably not Malay-friendly at the time when Pires interviewed them) was not fully adopted in Sejarah Melayu. The Javanese were obviously joking derogatorily when they associate malayo with fleeing, but Pires entered the half-joke in his book anyway.

Figure 1. Eredia's map of the city of Melaka.

Figure 2. The pelanduk story in Sejarah Melayu. Raffles MS18, p. 49 . . . berjalan berbalik dari sana terus ke pantai, pada satu sungai, Bertam namanya. Maka Sultan Iskandar berdiri di bawah sepohon kayu, maka baginda pun berburu, maka anjing diterjangkan oleh pelanduk putih. Maka titah Sultan Iskandar Shah: Baik tempat ini, sedang pelanduknya lagi gagah, baik kita perbuatkan negeri. Maka sembah orang besar-besar: Benarlah, tuanku, seperti titah Duli Yang Dipertuan itu. Maka disuruh baginda perbuatlah negeri pada tempat itu. Maka titah Sultan Iskandar Shah: Apa nama kayu tempat kita berdiri ini? Maka sembah orang sekalian: / M-LA-K ملاک / namanya kayu ini. Maka titah Sultan Iskandar Shah: Jika demikian, Mlaklah nama negeri ini. Maka Sultan Iskandar Shah pun diamlah di Mlak. Maka Sultan Iskandar Shah pun memerintah kan istiadat kerajaan . . .

Apparently Malaka (ملاک) made many appearances in Sejarah Melayu (see Figure 2, Raffles MS18, now in the library of Royal Asiatic Society). But the plot takes a twist – forget the fruit focus, now we are zooming in on the tree where the king stood, witnessing a royal dog getting the boot from an albino mousedeer.

Why the shift, you ask? Well, apparently the original emphasis on fruit was causing a storytelling traffic jam. So, they decided to flip the script, maybe borrowed a page from some folktales from Acheh or Sri Lanka (which we will also discuss later), and landed on this quirky tree-kicking scenario.

Interestingly, the same fruit has also had a notable mention in Chinese literature, thanks to a reference by the remarkable Chinese monk Tang Xuanzang (602 - 664) 唐玄奘, in his renowned work Great Tang Records on the Western Regions 大唐西域記. It is like this fruit got its own feature in the Chinese action movie!

阿摩落迦，印度药果之名也。

Teaming up with haritaka 訶梨 and bibhitaka 毗梨, this power trio goes by the name triphala (三果 or 三勒, see Figure 3) in the realms of Buddhism and Ayurveda.

Figure 3. Medieval magic drug-combo. Triphala in Indian/Buddhism tradition: Haritaka, bibhitaka and amalaka.

Alright, so the name amalaka is probably of Bollywood origin, considering how it's the rockstar of fruits in Indian culture. If we're playing fruit detectives, breaking down amalaka is like decoding a spicy masala recipe – it is a-mala (a = without + mala = impurity) and ka (fruit). And guess what? The other two Triphala gang members are in on the deconstruction party too: Harita (green) + ka, and bibhita (fearless) + ka.

Given that amalaka is a bit of an exotic word outside Indian circles, it has undergone some serious makeovers in non-Indian cultures (see Figure 4).

$$ \begin{vmatrix} \textrm{Æ}\\ \textrm{M}\\ \textrm{L}\\ \textrm{K} \end{vmatrix} \approx \begin{vmatrix} \textrm{e}\\ \textrm{mb}\\ \textrm{li}\\ \textrm{ca} \end{vmatrix} \approx \begin{vmatrix} \textrm{a}\\ \textrm{m}\\ \textrm{la}\\ \textrm{ki} \end{vmatrix} \approx \begin{vmatrix} \textrm{a}\\ \textrm{m}\\ \textrm{la}\\ \textrm{ka} \end{vmatrix} \approx \begin{vmatrix} {\scriptsize\textrm{阿}}\\ {\scriptsize\textrm{摩}}\\ {\scriptsize\textrm{落}}\\ {\scriptsize\textrm{迦}} \end{vmatrix} \approx \begin{vmatrix} \textrm{a}\\ \textrm{m}\\ \textrm{la}\\ \textrm{} \end{vmatrix} \approx \begin{vmatrix} {\scriptsize\textrm{菴}}\\ {\scriptsize\textrm{沒}}\\ {\scriptsize\textrm{羅}}\\ {\scriptsize\textrm{}} \end{vmatrix} \approx \begin{vmatrix} \textrm{}\\ \textrm{ma}\\ \textrm{la}\\ \textrm{ka} \end{vmatrix} \approx \begin{vmatrix} \textrm{}\\ \textrm{ba}\\ \textrm{la}\\ \textrm{kka} \end{vmatrix} $$

Figure 4. Phoenetic cousins: ÆMLK, emblica (Latin), nellikai (Tamil), amalak(a|i) (Sanskrit), 阿摩落迦, 菴沒羅 (Chinese) amalaki, malaka, balakka (Indonesian)

Now, here's where it gets juicy – Ng (2011) drops the bomb that Carl Linnaeus was responsible for turning amalaka into the fancier emblica in his Species Plantarum (1753). Ng is clearly vibing on a misinformation track because Linnaeus was just recycling Bauhin's “emblica" and Zanorii's “nellika" (Tamil, nelli = நெல்லி, see Figure 5).

Figure 5. References cited in Species Plantarum. Carl Linnaeus (1753) parked emblica under the Phyllanthus genus (Phyllanthus with pinnate, flowering leaves, a tree-like stem, and a berry-like fruit. Habitat in India) and listed it as the sixth species. The species was listed as Gaspard Bauhin in his Pinax Theatri Botanici (1623) as Myrobalanos emblica, which Linnaeus cited as one of his reference. The German botanist Georg Eberhard Rumphius listed the species also as Myrobalanos emblica (Herbarium Amboinense 1740). In Hendrik van Rheede's Hortus Malabaricus (1678), amalaka (nellikai) tree (maram) was corrupted to nelli-camarum, it was likely to have influenced John Ray, who published Historia Plantarum in 1686, who continued the same corruption without correction. Jacobi Zanorii (1675), however, referenced only the fruit and cited it as nellika in his Historia Botanica. Ng (2011) pointed out that Phyllanthus emblica is a actually non-native tree in the Malay archipelago and its malay cousin is actually named Phyllanthus pectinatus, first described by J. D. Hooker in 1890 (see Flora of British India 5(14), p. 290): Branchlets scurfily tomentose, leaves \(\tfrac{1}{3}\) in. distichously close-set linear-oblong obtuse coriaceous incurved when dry with recurved margins nervelesss, fruit turbinate \(\tfrac{1}{2}-\tfrac{3}{4}\) by \(\tfrac{1}{3}-\tfrac{1}{2}\) in. P. emblica, Wall. Cat. 7903 G. Perak, King's Collector; Singapore, Wallich; Malacca, Griffith (Kew Distrib. 4799), Maingay (Kew Distrib. 1352). Very similar to P. emblica, but differing in the scurfy rusty branchlets and form of the fruit. In Agricultural Bulletin of the Straits and Federated Malay States 1(13), H. N. Ridley (1902) equated malakka with P. pectinatus when he wrote: The Malakka, P. pectinatus a small or medium sized tree with feathery foliage has somewhat similar fruit, but it is inferior as the amount of flesh on the comparatively large stone, is less. It is eaten by natives, and is common is our woods. In fact, Ridley had earlier in 1897 associated both P. emblica and P. pectinatus with Malaka: From this plant Malacca is said to be named. The two species mentioned are hardly distinct, but the latter is the commoner form. The timber is of good quality and the fruits are eaten. Another commonly cited synonym is Emblica officinalis (Josphe Gaertner, 1788): Flowers distinct by sex on the same plant. Male flower has 6 sepals, 0 petals, 3 stamens. Female flower has both sepals and petals, as in the male. Ovary superior. Style three, bifid. Drupe-like capsule, three-lobed: Seeds solitary or paired.

The fact that Ng is dancing to the wrong botanical beat can be strengthened further if a dictionary is consulted. The lowdown from the 20-volume Oxford English Dictionary (see Figure 6) spills the tea – the use of emblicos | emblick was rocking the English speaking scene even before Bauhin jumped on the bandwagon.

emblic (ˈɛmblɪk)
Forms: 6 emblico, 7 emblick.
[ad. med.L. emblica, -icus, ad. Ar. amlaj a. Pers. āmleh, cf. Skr. āmalaka of same meaning.]
The fruit of Emblica officinalis, a tree of the family Euphorbiaceæ, whose flowers are aperient, leaves and bark a remedy against dysentery. Also emblic myrobalan.

• 1555 Eden Decades W. Ind. iii. iv. (Arb.) 151 Mirobalanes‥which the phisitians caule Emblicos and Chebulos.
• 1678 Salmon Lond. Disp. 136/2 The five sorts of Myrobolans‥the Emblick purge Flegm and Water.
• 1708 Motteux Rabelais ii. xiv, A Boxfull of conserves, of round Myrabolan plums, called Emblicks.
• 1811 Hooper Med. Dict., The emblic Myrobalan is of a dark blackish grey colour.

Figure 6. OED's definition of emblic. Emblic is likely a loan word from India. The word was first mentioned in the English-speaking world by Richard Eden (1555) when he published his ‘Decades of the Newe Worlde or West India, Etc.'. In the book, Eden equated mirobalanes with emblicos and chebulos. Assocation of emblic with myrobolans/myrabolan/myrobalan is repeated by Salmon (1678), Motteux (1708), and Hooper (1811). Myrobalano, on the hand, is a composite word (Latin = myrobalanum, Greek = μύρον (unguent) + βάλανος (acorn) = µυροβάλανος). Myrobalan is the European lookalike of emblic, but they are biological different from each other.

. . . before anybody questions whether I am qualified to change history, let me explain that my comments are based on botany, and I am, after all, a qualified taxonomic botanist, one who deals with the naming and classification of plants . . .
Francis Ng (2011) What tree did Parameswara really see in Malacca? Star BizWeek 5 November 2011, p. 23.

But wait, the taxonomy maestro, shakes things up further by dropping another axiomatically correct but historically incorrect bomb: the tree seen by Parameswara was not Phyllanthus emblica, but the cool native kid Phyllanthus pectinatus.

Ng's line of reasoning?

P. pectinatus is the original gangster phyllanthus tree, and P. emblica is the imported Bollywood superstar. And he reminded us that Parameswara's Melaka was not populated by any civilized people before he cut the ribbon and opened the city.

What is the probability of native people of Melaka growing and cultivating a foreign drug-tree before Parameswara civilized the land? Probably zero, according to Ng.

But hold on. Because Ng's probability can be easily made nonzero! It can be immediately rendered weaker if we can show that the romantic pelanduk tale is just a second-hand love story, swiped right from Hikayat Raja Pasai or some wild Ceylon folktale.

	Pasai	Melaka	Kandy
Hero	Mĕurah Silo	Parameswara	An unnamed Basket-mender
Etymon	Pasai the Dog	Mlak ملاک the Tree	Tranquility the Rock
Attacker	Mouse deer		Rabbit
Attackee	Pasai the Dog	Unnamed dog

But why stop there when we can manufacture a whole new romantic saga for the origin of the placename? Imagine this: Parameswara's advisors, decked out in ancient cupid gear, decide to name the place after the swoon-worthy amalaka because, you know, it is practically something they associate with the gods they worshipped. In Malay/Indonesian language, the base of the fruit-shaped dome found on top of Indian temples is also called amalaka:

noun. Architecture. hiasan puncak di bawah mahkota berbentuk piringan batu pada menara utama bangunan candi Hindu yang menyerupai teratai (sebagai singgahsana untuk dewa) atau melambangkan matahari (sebagai pintu gerbang ke syurga)

It is clearly an auspicious name since it is a throne for the deities (singgahsana untuk dewa) or the gateway to heaven (pintu gerbang ke syurga).