Yap-Douglas letter of 1877

Water disruption at Pangkalan Lumpur

On 29 March 1877, Captain Yap Ah Loy wrote a Arkib Negara 1957/0000387letter to Captain W. B. Douglas (r. 1875 - 1882, Acting Resident of Selangor) to relay a water-related grievance at Pangkalan Lumpur tin mine. This letter is important because it contains several important data points:

1. Yap Ah Loy addressed himself with the Indic title (श्री इन्द्र प्रकाश विजय भक्ति = Sri Indra Perkasa Vijaya Bakti), and This shows that back in 150 years ago, it was perfectly reasonable for Malay courts to install their subjects with Indic titles and decorations, similar to the practices recounted in Sejarah Melayu.
   
   However, the way Yap addressed himself was not consistent, for instance, in 1881, he called himself Kaptan Cina Kuala Lumpur and not Kaptan Klang dalam Kuala Lumpur but he used his Indic title consistently. See Arkib Negara Document Number 1957/0001366W.called himself Captain Klang in Kuala Lumpur.
2. In the stamp, the Captain styled his residence/office as Tek Seng 德生 of Klang 吉隆.
3. The two place names, ‘Kuala Lumpur' and ‘Pangkalan Lumpur' are seen together in the same document. Captain Yap's usage appears to show that Pangkalan Lumpur was a Pangkalan (فڠکالن) is a derivative of pangkal (terminal point in Malay). One effect of adding the an-suffix to a Malay word m is the production of m-an, which is a noun representing an object/place closely associated with m. ‘Pangkal + an' is normally invoked in land/sea travel to mean disembarkation point, e.g. Pangkalan Batu.
   
   Another example is empang + an = empangan (the end result when a river is dammed). Empang (امفڠ barrier/blockade) was borrowed to denote tin mine. Technically, empang describes only a subfeature of tin mine, i.e. the body of still water resulted from paydirt excavation.
   
   Apparently, present-day Ampang is derived from ‘empang'. Other examples: Ampangan (the official residence of the Undang of Sungai Ujong), Ampang Tinggi in Kuala Pilah (the official residence of Tunku Besar Seri Menanti), Kampung Ampang Batu in Seri Menanti, Jalan Ampang in Tambun, Perak. These toponyms are all physically and historically tied to tin mines.point reference, and Kuala Lumpur was an Kuala (کوال) in Malay simply means a junction point in water transit networks. In the binary case (\(n = 2\)), any two elements in a network can meet to form a kuala (e.g. river-sea, river-lake, etc). For \(n = 3\), we have the typical river-river-river triple point.areal reference to the area containing Pangkalan Lumpur, centered at the Market Place confluence. In other words, Pangkalan Lumpur is a subset of Kuala Lumpur.

Surat Yap Ah Loy kpd Residen Selangor, 1877.Antara kandungannya Yap Ah Loy mengadu di Kuala Lumpur tak ada air hingga tak boleh mengepam air di lombong."Dan suatu beta di dalam Pengkalan Lumpur banyak susah karena air tiada hendak lancur".https://t.co/dYjaBFgedZ pic.twitter.com/JG4qReZaOi

— Saufy Jauhary 🇲🇾🐦 (@SaufyJauhary) October 12, 2021

The letter reads: Surat tulus dan ikhlas daripada beta Sri Indra Perkasa Vijaya Bakti (श्री इन्द्र प्रकाश विजय भक्ति = Śrī Iṇḍra Prakāśa Vijaya Bhaktī) Yab A-Loy, Kaptan Klang dalam Kuala Lumpur . . . beta di dalam Pangkalan Lumpur banyak susah kerana air tiada hendak Lancur (لنچر) refers to the separation process in which SnO₂ is isolated from mud when the tin-earth mixture is washed with water. Thus Captain Yap and his men were not able to function productively in Pangkalan Lumpur when water was disrupted.

Yap's lamentation shows that Pangkalan Lumpur must be either (a) the actual mining site or (b) very near the actual mining site.lancur. Maka inilah beta permaklumkan kepada sahabat beta adanya. Tertulis kepada 14 Rabi al-Awal 1294 (Thursday, 29 March 1877, 丁丑年2月15日). The letter was stamped and sealed with the following word in red ink: 吉隆德生書柬. 吉隆 is a reference to Klang or Klang Valley during Yap's era. 德生 (Tek Seng) is the name of Yap's office (actually his apothecary 德生號). 書柬 can mean ‘letter from/letter written by'.

Transition from Cold 冷 to Prosperous 隆

In one of Yap's earlier seal, the word Klang is transliterated as 吉冷. Since 冷 (lang¹, meaning cold) is phonetically a more correct glyph to transcribe the /laŋ/-phonem in klang, the transition from 吉冷 to 吉隆 warrants a justification. A probable reason was that Yap felt that there was a need to breathe in new energies to the mining settlement after the The Sino-Malay army was divided into many subgroups. Yap's team was divided into multiple subgroups led by Hiu Fatt, Hiu LokChung Piang, Yap Vun Lung, Yap Yeng Onn, Yap Fat Te, Tung Khoon, Ng Ki, Yap Tong Li, Le Wui, Ten Luk. Mat Akil's team was similarly divided into subgroups but we are not able to locate the names of the these subgroup leaders.Akil-Yap ensemble, with the help of the Team Pahang was led by two generals. The 28-year-old Rasu Abdul Salam bin Shahrom, b. 1845, d. 1901; and his second in command, Haji Abd. Halim bin Jaaafar.

After helping Yap to win the Kuala Lumpur battle, the former was given the title Orang Kaya Imam Perang Indra Gajah and the latter was named Orang Kaya Imama Indra Mahkota.Pahang army, regained control of Klang River from Raja Mahdi and Raja Asal in 24/25 February 1873, and he needed a quasi-similar and an auspiciously-sounding glyph.

隆 (lung², meaning prosperous) seems to be a perfect candidate. This explanation can be applied to illuminate the Yap Hon Chin 葉韓進 passed away on 5 January 1933 (Thursday) but his death was reported only 4 days later. This was in stark constrast with the treatment given to his step-mum.

Yap's second son 葉隆盛 was born on 4 April 1875 and was mothered by his second wife named Kok Kang Kweon 郭庚嬌 (1849? - 12 July 1924), a Nyonya from Melaka, whom Yap married in 1865, three years after he settled in Kuala Lumpur.

The second output from Kok was 葉隆顺, died when he was only 27.8 years ago (b. 6 March 1880, d. 8 December 1907).

Another half-brother of Hon Chin was 葉隆發 (b. 10 August 1882, d. 21 September 1900). He was mothered by another concubine of Yap Ah Loy named He 何氏, and he died young like another half-brother of his, when he was only 18.1 year-old. Probably because of this, his mum adopted another son named 葉隆森middle-name difference between his first son and his second son. When his second son was born in 1875, the boy was given the name 隆盛, while his first son, 韓進 (Yap Hon Chin), who was mothered by Liao 廖氏, was not decorated with the same middle-name, when he was born in Huiyang 惠陽, China.

The seal contains Yap's name in three scripts: (a) English on the left: Yap Tek Seng; (b) Chinese in the middle: 吉冷葉德生付 (from Yap Tek Seng of Klang); (c) Jawi on the right: Not legible. This seal is very likely the old seal used by Yap between 1869 and 1873, or even before Yap was made the captain of the miners. H. W. Firmstone (1905) listed several related examples: (a) Selangor - (Sz-nga-ngok 師牙岳, Sut-lang-ngo 雪蘭鹅, Kit-lang 吉冷) and most commonly residents outside the state call Kit-lang (Klang), p. 193; (b) Kuala Lumpur - (Kat-lung-po 吉隆坡) and Firmstone added that he also often heared kai-(or ka-) lam-po, p. 192; (c) Kuala Selangor - (Sek-a-ngo kang-khau 昔仔午港口) and remarked that these are Hokkien souds, representing the mouth of the Selangor River, p. 192. (d) Klang - (Pa-sang 吧生) - and he claimed that the name was given by the Malays to the town of Klang, p. 191. H. W. Firmstone's remarks on Kit-lang supports our postulate that the place name was first known to Yap (while he was still in Lukut) as 吉冷 and when he repeated the the same transcription in his seal when he settled in Kuala Lumpur.

The seal again contains Yap's name in three scripts: (a) English on top: Captain Yap Ah Loy; (b) Chinese in the middle: 葉德来甲政 (Captain Yap Tek Loy); (c) Jawi at the bottom: کفتن يب الوي سلاڠور (Kaptan Yab A-Loy Selangor). Note the word captain is written as 甲政 and not 甲_必丹. This seal is very likely the second seal used by Yap between 1873 and 1885. On his tombstone in Kwang Tong Cemetery, Yap's title was epigraphically memorialized as 雪蘭莪甲_必丹 (Captain Selangor). See also A. T. Gallop (2019), Seal #1313, p. 446. Gallop sampled another impression of the same seal from a Malay letter dated 18 September 1888, written by Kok Kang Kweon 郭庚嬌 to H. I. Turney, Collector Magistrate of Klang.

The line of the left of the spirit tablet of Yap in the Sin Sze Si Ya Temple 仙四師爺廟 reads: 特授克復吉隆甲_必丹. 克復吉隆 means ‘recapture Klang from the enemies'. It was related to his title: Sri Indra Perkasa Vijaya Bakti, awarded to him by the Sultan to commemorate his bravery (فرکاس perkasa प्रकाश) and loyalty (بقتي bakti भक्ति) of winning (وجاي vijaya विजय) the land of Klang from the enemies. The line on the right: 例授誥封中憲大夫 (Zhōngxiàn Dàfū), was awarded 授 to him by the Emperor Guangxu in 1883. Zhongxian Dafu is a middle-rank (4th grade 四品) official in Qing system. The word 例 is associated with 捐例 (juānlì), and shows that the title was a outcome of donation 捐 given by Yap to the Qing government (e.g. mininum donation to get a 9th grade 九品 official is approximately 40 taels (\(40 \times \frac{37.301}{10^3} \approx 1.5\) kilos of silver), but getting a 4th grade offical is much costly. Yap probably donated 2,000 - 3,000 taels (75 to 100 kilos) of silver to the Qing government. For more statistics and examples, see the recent article by Wu Yue 伍躍 in the Review of Osaka University of Economics and Law: 伍躍 (2006) 清代捐納制度に関するデータベースの構築に向けて:1889年江浙賑捐を例に, 大阪経済法科大学論集, pp. 67 - 90.

Hsu Yun Tsiao's argument for 吉隆 as the Hakka transcription of Klang can be found in Chapter 4: 馬來亞地名掌故談 (first published in 1961 in Singapore). Hsu's position that 吉隆坡 was simplified from 吉隆埠 is problematic for pō 坡 is unlikely to be a corrupted form of 埠 (bù | fù) in this situation, although they are conceptually similar (埠 means port city or For example, 曲阜 (Qǔ Fù) in Shandong is the hometown of Confucius. Note that the earth radical ‘土' is yet to be added to 阜.city in general). In Malaya, the word 坡 was first used to transcribe the /pɔː/-sound in Singapore 新嘉坡. And ‘pore' is the anglicized version of ‘pura', which in turn, is an Indic word पुर for city or town. On the front page of Lat Pau 叻報 3 January 1927, we have examples of how the two glyphs are used symbiotically: (a) 外埠郵費另計，英屬每份加四占 . . . (b) 無論本坡外埠如有賜函定閱者請將 . . . It is obvious that in this context 坡 is specifically referring to Singapore and not a generic town, and the word 埠 is used to denote towns in generally.

Sungai Lumpur in Irving's Map (1872)

If the aforementioned treatment is correct, we posit that 隆坡 is etymologically unrelated to the Malay word ‘lumpur لمفر'. This theory is not really new because Hsu Yun Tsiao 許雲樵 surfaced the same idea back in 1961.

馬來亞的首都吉隆坡，這個地名也有問題，它並不是原名Kuala Lumpur的譯音，而是一個歷史陳迹。原來在一百年前葉德來開辟那 里的時候，那時還是一個山芭，來往的華人，大多是在附近開采錫矿的客家矿工，那時他們稱吉隆坡為Klang，客家人寫起字來，便作吉隆，后來那里熱闹起來，他們便給它加上一個坡字。 其實就是埠字訛別。但現在，吉隆坡已不再叫Klang，卻把它讓渡給予巴生了。所以巴生也不是Klang的對音，而是馬來人稱市區中 的一個地方叫做Pasang，而被華人訛作全市的名稱。

至於Kuala Lumpur也不是一個筒單的地名，因為這兩個字，並非純粹馬來語詞，前一個字我們知道是河口的意思，因為最 初的市區是在Gombak河流入巴生河的地方，但這河口為什麼不叫Kuala Gombak 而叫Kuala Lumpur呢？因為當時河口是一片濫巴 (Lampa)，Lumpur就是濫巴的譯音，所以在馬來文字典內是找不到Lumpur這個字的。

In the burial certificate (24 May 1942, cost of burial = $4) of the wife of Yap Hon Chin (Au Yong Kwee Hin 歐陽桂馨), issued by Kwang Tong Cemetery, we see that the address of the deceased was written as 巴生路 + 吉隆 (variable) + 埠（template word in the form meaning town). However, after the war, the same address was rendered as 吧生路 + 吉隆坡 (variable) + 埠 in the form issued by the same cemetary (e.g. Yap Swee Lin 葉瑞麟, b. 22 June 1928, d. < 9 February 1955, cost of burial = $25)

A sea travel advertisement 新船回唐 in Lat Pau 叻報 (3 January 1927, p. 32). Here 吉隆 appears twice in two sea routes: (a) Penang > Klang > Singapore 叻 to Haikou > Xiamen > Shantou; (b) Yangon > Penang > Klang > Singapore 叻 to Hong Kong > Shantou > Xiamen. It is obvious that 吉隆 is used here to mean the port of ‘Klang' and not the town 坡 of Kuala Lumpur (吉隆 + 坡).

When 吉隆 was hijacked to mean ‘Kuala Lumpur', another name had to be chosen to represent the actual area of Klang. The name chosen creatively and semi-humorously by the Hokkien community was 巴生, which is a direct transcription of the Malay word ‘pasang' (i.e. high tide = air pasang, low tide = air surut).

However, the analysis given by Hsu in the Actually Hsu's opinion in the second part of the first paragraph (the relationship between 坡 and 埠) is also problematic.second paragraph are inappropriate and completely off-tangent, because lumpur is a legit Malay word and it is not a Chinese loanword. In R. J. Wilkinson's Malay-English dictionary (p. 610), we have:

لمفر  lumpor. Mud, slime. Sa-ekor kĕrbau membawa lumpor, sĕmuwa kĕrbau terpalit: if one buffalo is covered with mud all the rest of the herd will be smeared with it; one scoundrel will corrupt the whole gathering; Proverbial expression, Hikayat Abdullah 24. Laut lumpor: a sea of mud; Hikayat Abdullah 357. Lumpor kĕtam: hard mud perforated with crab-holes, such as is often met with near high water-mark.

Note that in 1901 Wilkinson omitted both vowels in ‘lumpur' and rendered the word as ‘lmpr'.

. . . Kuala Lumpur sebenarnya memiliki Sungai Lumpur sebelum ia ditukar nama kepada Sungai Gombak pada 1875 atas sebab yang tidak dapat dipastikan . . .

Now the question asked by Hsu in 1961 on why the triple point was not named ‘Kuala Gombak' could be partially solved if we take Khoo Kay Kim 邱繼金 (1937 - 2019) and his interpretation on Irving's map (1872) as the final word, that Sungai Gombak was simply known earlier as Naming substreams of river is tricky, e.g. we can also call left-branch with Simpang Kiri and the right-branch with Simpang Kanan (in Batu Pahat river for instance).Sungai Lumpur and the name was changed to Sungai Gombak around 1875.

How not to propagate misinformation and problematic interpretations, a textbook example. Here, in the history textbook published by the government (Sejarah, Tingkatan 3), a postulate championed by Khoo is included by the textbook editors in p. 61. Khoo's conclusion was deduced based on Irving's map (1872), which we know cannot be made consistent with Anderson's observations in 1823. Furthermore, Irving's Sungai Lumpur can be arbitrarily mapped to both Sungai Batu and Sungai Gombak (both mappings are topologically correct), and his Lumpur-Gombak transition in 1875 is not supported by any data or known records. The name ‘Gombak' is likely a corruption of ‘Tambak', since Sultan Abd al-Samad made two references to Sungai Tambak in 1876 (See Arkib Negara, 1957/0000113W)

But Khoo's remark is hardly authoritative in this matter.

Apakah Kuala Lumpur dibuka oleh Yap Ah Loy? (9:30 - 12:00, 18 July 2017, Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia). From clip position 36:36, the 80-year-old (again) recounted his verdict that Sungai Gombak was earlier known as Sungai Lumpur. Khoo Kay Kim (1937 - 2019) probably formulated this theory when he was 29/30-year-old, while he was doing his M.A. at the University of Malaya, Kuala Lumpur, under the supervision of Wang Gungwu (1930 – ). It was postulated based a 1872 war map sketched by C. J. Irving in the Straits Settlement Records. It is clear from Khoo's tone that he did not treat his deduction as a theory and he wanted all tourist guides to take his words as the most authorative statement to explain the origin of the name of Kuala Lumpur. It was very likely that the 30-year-old Khoo was unaware of Anderson's Lumpoor (1823), which predates Irving's Sungai Lumpur by approximately 50 years. However, it was very unlikely that the 80-year-old Khoo was unaware of the existence of Anderson's remarks on Colong (Klang) and Lumpoor (see for example Abdur-Razzaq claimed that Anderson was in Selangor in 1818 (since Sultan Ibrahim sold 100 bahar of tin to Mr. Anderson in October 1818). However, Abdur-Razzaq's hint that the present-day Kuala Lumpur region was also visited by Anderson in 1818 is unlikely to be correct, since John Anderson explicitly mentioned 1822 in his chapter/section on ‘Colong'.

A more plausible statement is that Anderson visited Klang/upper reach of Klang river in 1822 or 1823 or 1824, and most likely 1823 if you want me to bet, since his book was published in 1824.Abdur-Razzaq Lubis (2013) Sutan Puasa: the founder of Kuala Lumpur, Journal of Southeast Asian Architecture 12, pp. 24 - 37).

Mr. Anderson's Lumpoor (1824)

Now we digress to a paragraph written by See also J. Anderson (1824) Political and commercial considerations relative to the Malayan Peninsula, British settlements in the Straits of Malaya, William Cox.

See also Anderson's Malayan Peninsula (Description of the tin countries on the Western coast of the Peninsula of Malacca from the Island of Junk Ceylon to the River Lingi near Malacca and the Rivers on the Coast etc) in Singapore Chronicle and Commercial Register, 4 June 1836.John Anderson in 1824 about Klang (Colong):

. . . is about 200 yards wide at the mouth, but narrows to 100, and in some places 70 after a few reaches. The channel is safe and deep in most places, and th current very rapid. The first town is about 20 miles from the entrance, called Colong. It is situated on the right bank, and defended by several batteries. Here the King of Salengore resides at times. The inhabitants, before the war with the Siamese at Perak in 1822, were reckonded at about 1500, and the following are the names of the villages upon the river, as far as within one day's journey of Pahang, on the opposite side of the Peninsula, viz . . .

Teluk Gading
Sungei Dua
Teluk Puleh
Sungei Binjek
Pankalan Batu
Kampong Lima Pulu
Bukit Kechil
Puatan
Bukit Kruing
Bukit Kuda
Sungei Bassow
Naga Mangulu
Kampong Lalang
Bukit Bankong
Sungei Ayer Etam
Penaga
Petaling
Sirdang
Junjong
Pantei Rusa
Kuala Bulu
Gua Batu
Sungei Lumpoor

For the toponyms marked with red ink, an additional remark was appended by Anderson:

At all these places, tin is obtained, but most at Lumpoor, beyond which there are no houses. Pahang is one day's journey from Lumpoor.

If we take a step back and a deep breath to consider the fact that Irving's map and Anderson's remarks were gapped by approximately 50 years = Plenty of time for interpolations and corruptions50 years, and probably we should reset our analysis by giving more weights to Anderson's writing. Note that contemporaries of C. J. Irving such as F. Swettenham tried to resolve the same etymological puzzle but was unable to locate a convincing solution.

Irving's Map (1872). Appendix A. Map of part of Selangor - Appendices to memorandum of affairs of Salangore and Perak, C. J. Irving, 15 February 1872, Straits Settlements Records G7. This map was first mentioned by the then 30-year-old Khoo Kay Kim in 1967 (The western Malay states, 1861 - 1873: the political effects of the growth of economic activities, M.A. Thesis, University of Malaya, Kuala Lumpur). The M. A. dissertation was later revised and published in 1972. See Khoo Kay Kim (1972) The Western Malay States 1850 - 1873: The Effects of Commercial Development on Malay Politics, Oxford University Press, Kuala Lumpur (however, Khoo made several adjustments to the map, he converted all the archaic spellings on the map to their modern cousins, e.g. Salangore v. Selangor; he deleted some of the place marker, e.g. Fort Q. Lumpor; he added some annotation of his own, e.g. he marked Pancallan Battu as Pengkalan Batu (Klang). See also Map 4 in p. 5 in Abdur-Razzaq Lubis (2018) Sutan Puasa: Founder of Kuala Lumpur, Areca Books.

Placenames in maps may be easily revised and altered by cartographers and we have no easy way to extract the etymologically correct toponyms by just merely looking at them. For instances, we have the following revisions:

1. Sungei Ulu Klang in Irving's map (1872) was left unmarked in de Souza's map (1879).
2. Sungei Lumpoor in Irving's map was grown and bifurcated into Sungei Gombah and Sungei Batu in de Souza's map.

de Souza's choice of leaving the Sungai Ulu Klang branch unmarked was accompanied by two new markers: Kwala Lumpor (کوال لمفر) and a police station (P.S.). If we couple the modern fact that the the toponym Ampang is yet to be invented/marked in the de Souza's mapAmpang region is alluvially richer than the east bank of Klang River, and Anderson's comments that most tins can be obtained in Lumpoor and Pahang is Jalan Pahang is on the west bank of the Klang river, situated just next to Titiwangsa.one day from Lumpoor. One cannot help but to conclude that Anderson's Lumpoor is in fact the west bank of the Klang river or the Titiwangsa | Ampang | Kampung Dato Keramat is previously known as Kampung Tangga China.

J. C. Pasqual (1934), based on his Malay sources, tells us that: . . . Supplies for the mines were brought up by boats as far as the kuala of the Lumpur river near the new mosque and thence carried by coolies through the jungle to the mines. The Lumpur river joins the Klang River at Tangga China a mile upstream from the town of Kuala Lumpur (which consequently is a misnomer). . .Kampung Dato Keramat region.

If Anderson's Lumpoor is present-day Ampang, then Anderson's Sungei Lumpoor is likely the Ulu Klang fork of the Klang River.

de Souza's Map (1879) is probably the first map which clearly marked out the Median \(\Lambda\) (Lumpur region): the inter-river region between Sungai Puteh and Sungai Ulu Klang; Median \(\Gamma\) (Gombak/Setapak region): the inter-river region between Sungai Ulu Klang and Sungai Gombak; (c) Median \({\rm B}\) (Batu/Kepong region): the inter-river region between Sungai Gombak and Sungai Batu.

Median is pronounced chūō (チュウオウチ), which incidentally, is also how 中央地 is vocalized.inter-river regions around Gombak-Klang triple point. We can see the following features in the map: (a) The PWTC triple point, the bifurcation point of Sungai Gombak and Sungai Batu; (b) Sungai Bunus was joined to Sungai Klang, which is no longer the case today; (c) Sungai Puteh (present day Sungai Ampang) was shown but the Kampung Tangga Cina triple point was not marked (d) Ulu Klang was shown and was marked as tin-producing area. See also Map 5 in p. 6 in Abdur-Razzaq Lubis (2018). Note that Sungai Gombak is marked as ‘S. Gombah'. Unlike its counterpart with hard-k ending, we can reasonably associate this word with ‘gombal'. ‘Gombal' is usually used to denote something negative or empty, which seems fitting for relatively low alluvial output in the east bank of Klang River, as opposed to its Lumpur counterpart on the west bank. Another possibility is that ‘gombah' is actually ‘gumba' (forehead of an elephant). However, the most reliable explanation is found in a See Sutan Puasa's copy of a communication from Sultan Abd Samad regarding the roles of mata-mata in the eastern and western regions of Sungai Tambak, Arkib Negara Document Number: 1957/0000113W.1876 letter from Sultan Abd al-Samad (14 April 1876). In the letter, Sungai Gombak is known as Sungai Tambak and the name was mentioned twice. It is likely that tmbk (تمبق) is misread as gmbk (ݢمبق) and the incorrect name was propagated incorrectly and indefinitely. Interestingly, Setapak in H. W. Firmstone (1905) is rendered as ‘Setapah' (Man-lung-kong 文龍港), which also carries a soft h-ending.

Abdullah-Chee-Jumaat-Lim joint venture (1857)

When Raja Sulaiman bin Sultan Muhammad ibni Sultan Ibrahim died in 1853 is traditionally given as the year when Raja Abdullah was appointed as the Governor of Klang by Sultan Muhammad. We need to revise the number from 1853 to 1850 in light of a copy of the appointment letter which says that Raja Abdullah appointed in 1266 AH (i.e. 17 November 1849 < 1266 < 5 November 1850). 1850, he was not succeeded by his son Raja Mahdi. Instead, Raja Mahdi's grandfather brought in Raja Abdullah bin Raja Ja‘far (d. 1869) to govern Klang. Within a few years, Raja Abdullah was able to step-change the productivity of tin in Selangor. Low productivity is evidently clear from the It is clear from Sultan Ibrahim's lamentation that the early miners in Anderson's Lumpoor were not aided by any hydraulic technologies, and they have zero ability to draw water to the mining sites. So they were only able to lancur with rain water.

It was very likely that the Abdullah-Jumaat joint venture, with the capital loaned from Chee and Lim, was able import the water-ladder pumps 龍骨水車 or chin-chia 轉車 from China and used them effectively in present day Ampang.

Water-ladder pump (actuated by the circular motion of limb muscles) is a staple piece of hydraulic technology to move water around paddy fields in Southern China. Eventually, leg-powered water pumps were replaced by steam-powered water pumps (introduced in 1881 by Yap) and diesel-powered water pumps.following remark by the old Sultan Ibrahim ibni Sultan Salehuddin Shah in 1818 is approximately 12 years after Raja Ja‘far departed from Selangor.

Raja Ja‘far, the father of Raja Abdullah, was the governor of Klang from 1804 - 1806. In 1806, he was summoned back to Riau by Mahmud III to take the position Yang diPertuan Muda of the Johor-Pahang-Riau-Lingga Kingdom.

Five years later, when Mahmud III died in Lingga, Raja Ja‘far installed Abdul Rahman as the new Sultan, which was the opening chapter of the end of the Johor-Pahang-Riau-Lingga empire.1818:

If there is rain, the miners can work, but if there is no rain, they cannot.

What was Raja Abdullah's recipe? In 1857, he partnered with his older brother, Raja Jumaat bin Raja Ja‘far (d. 1864), and they took a loan of $30,000 from two Baba merchants in Melaka (Chee Yam Chuan 徐炎泉 b. 1819, d. 1862, and Lim Say Hoe 林西河). The Abdullah-Chee-Jumaat-Lim (ACJL) joint-venture was able to mobilize \(n\) Huizhou miners and \(m\) Mandailing miners (\(n = 87, m = ?\)) from Lukut and send them to present-day Ampang.

$$\underbrace{\textrm{pay dirt}}_{\textrm{1806 to 1857}} \xrightarrow[{\rm H_2O}\,{\rm (rain)}]{\rm lancur\,separation} \underbrace{\textrm{watery dirt}}_{\rm lumpur} + \underbrace{\rm SnO_2}_{\rm tin\,⥁}$$

In a statement given to H. C. Ridges on 11 March 1904, Sutan Puasa told his interviewer that:

. . . been in this country for 40 years, was made headmen or tantamount to headmen, in Kuala Lumpur in the time of Sultan Muhammad, father of Raja Laut. My immediate chief, Raja Abdullah of Klang, appointed the first Captain Ah Siew (Ah Siu) a Hakka. I came from Lukut, and with me came both Ah Siew and one Loh Chye . . .

If Sutan Puasa's last sentence is to be taken seriously, then the following must be true: the Huizhou-Mandailing trio: Sutan Puasa, Hiu Siew 丘秀, and Given the fact that Liu's sons are named Low Koon Swee and Low Koon Fatt, his surname should rightfully be rendered as ‘Low' instead of the ‘Liu'.

In a petition letter filed by Low Koon Fatt on 1 March 1904, his father's name was spelt Pah Loh Chye (with an additional ‘Pah' appended before Sutan Puasa's ‘Loh Chye'; In J. C. Pasqual (1934), Liu's name was spelt Pak Loh Tsi).

It was mentioned in the petition that his father was only about 33 years old when he died in 1868 (this indicates that Liu Ngim Kong was probably born in 1835 and thus was two years older than Yap). The name of Liu's wife was mentioned as Wee Kiow Neo. We also know that the cremated remains of Liu was left in Sin Sze Si Ya Temple.Liu Ngim Kong 劉壬光 reached But we know Hiu and Liu built their residences 三間莊 near the bifurcation point, to facilitate upload and download of goods.Ampang together in the 60s (most probably in 1859). Sweet-Potato-Sze or Yap Ah Sze 葉茨 was probably one of the early inhabitants but his name was not mentioned by Sutan Puasa.

In Abdur-Razzaq Lubis (2013) Sutan Puasa: the founder of Kuala Lumpur, Journal of Southeast Asian Architecture 12, pp. 24 - 37Abdur-Razzaq Lubis (2013), we were given the sequence: Sutan Puasa (1850), Hui Siew (1857), Liu Ngim Kong (1861). In Abdur-Razzaq Lubis (2018), we were given two options: (a) 1850 (Abdullah Hukum's recollection); (b) during the reign of Sultan Muhammad, d. 1857 and Raja Sulaiman, d. 1853 (Recollection of family members). This sequence is apparently not aligned with Sutan Puasa's own recollection in 1904. Sutan Puasa's told the interviewer: ‘. . . in the time of Sultan Muhammad . . . I came from Lukut, and with me came both Ah Siew and Loh Chye'. There are a couple of ways to write down the arrival order of the three men since it was not explicitly worded by Sutan Puasa. The most neutral way to decipher this statement is that Sutan Puasa, Hiu Siew, and Liu Ngim Kong were from Lukut and they settled in Kuala Lumpur together, probably between 1857 to 1859, since Sultan Abd al-Samad ascended to the throne only in 1859 (see Gallop (2019), p. 440, Seal 1293).

We are pretty sure that the west bank of the Klang River or present-day Ampang region was already sparsed populated and they told Anderson that the name of the place was Lumpur, named semi-humorically by the inhabitants to describe the physical state of the land, induced by lancur separation during rainy seasons.

$$\underbrace{\textrm{pay dirt}}_{\textrm{after 1857}} \xrightarrow[{\rm H_2O}\,\textrm{(龍骨水車)}]{\rm lancur\,separation} \underbrace{\textrm{watery dirt}}_{\rm lumpur} + \underbrace{\rm SnO_2}_{\rm tin\,⮥}$$

The contribution of the ACJL joint venture was that they re-injected hydrotechnology and reliable human labor to the west bank of Klang River. And Klang was upgraded to a tin export town as the result of the amplified output.

Digitally imagined photos of Princess Nuṭfah of Selangor (? - 1896, راج نطفه) and her husband Prince Tunku Deya' al-Din was also known as Tunku Kudin. The Tunku himself romanized his name as ‘Leya ud-Din bin Zin Ur-Rasheed of Quedah'. See the impression of Tunku Kudin's seal in 1957/0000374W (Arkib Negara).

Tunku Kudin was the paternal uncle 五叔公 of Tunku Abd al-Rahman, the first Prime Minister of Malaysia.Ḍeya' al-Din of Kedah (1835 - 1909, تنکو ضياء الدين). Raja Nuṭfah was initially betrothed to Raja Mahdi bin Raja Sulaiman was the governor of Klang. Based on a appointment letter dated 1266 AH (17 November 1849 < 1266 < 5 November 1850), we have reasons to posit that Raja Abdullah bin Raja Ja‘far ( - 1869) took over his seat after he died in 1850.Raja Sulaiman bin Sultan Muhammad Shah (? - 1882), but her father Sultan Abd al-Samad (r. 1859 - 1898) cancelled the engagement because Raja Mahdi failed to keep up to his promise of giving a fix cut ($500 per month) from his Klang revenue to his would-be father-in-law. Raja Nuṭfah was eventually married to Tunku Kudin in June 1868 (unfortunately she did not get along very well with Tunku Kudin or the royal household of Kedah, she was escorted back to Kuala Langat in 8/9 August 1879 by Tunku Yusof, Tunku Kudin's younger brother, within less than a year after her father accepted the resignation letter of her husband on 31 October 1878 | 5 Zulkaedah 1295). J. H. M. Robson (in Selangor Government Gazette 1894, p. 540), described Tunku Maharum as ‘a very beautiful Malay princess'. Robson's comment was reasonable as she probably inherited Raja Nuṭfah's youthful good-looks. 1868 is a very important marker year in Selangor, because Princess Nurfah's husband was installed as the Viceroy of Selangor on 24 June 1868 (5 Rabi al-Awal 1285, Wednesday), and it disturbed the power structure in Klang Valley, which was then dominated by Raja Mahdi (r. March 1867 - March 1870). Two months after Tunku Kudin's appointment, the second Captain Klang 吉冷甲政, Liu Ngim Kong (劉壬光), died in the 7th lunar month of the Year of Wuchen 戊辰 (ca. between 18 August and 18 September 1868, \(2024 = 1868 + 60\times\frac{13}{5}\)). In June 1869, Yap was officially installed by Raja Mahdi as the successor to Liu. Yap was in an awkward position because he was not in a good position to accept or reject Raja Mahdi's gesture, given the fact Yap was aware of the cancellation of Mahdi-Nuṭfah union and the appointment of Nuṭfah's husband as the underking of Selangor, as these are indications that Raja Mahdi would soon be ousted from the Klang power sphere..

Moniot's map (1862). Jules Moniot was the Surveyor General of the Straits Settlements and the map shows that the inner region of Selangor was completely unmarked, indicating that the inner region was not yet economically important. Moniot, however, was able to mark Pulau Klang (as Po. Colong), Pulau Lumut (as Po. Loomau), and Kuala Selangor (as Salangore Hill and town) along the Selangor coastline. In 1861/1862, Captain Hiew died and the position was passed to Captain Liu. According to Sutan Puasa himself, he and Hiew and Liu went to Kuala Lumpur together (probably in 1859, as 1859 is the year traditionally cited when Hiew was made captain by Raja Abdullah).

Tin-producing locales in Selangor marked on a 1883 map: Ulu Klang, Ampang, Pudu.