SOUTHEAST ASIAN HISTORY NEEDS A REWRITE?

KUALA LUMPUR, July 6 (Bernama) -- The history of Southeast Asia may need a rewrite with the new findings on the Bujang Valley civilisation in northern-Kedah state, a well-known Oxford University professor in genetic pre-history said Monday.

Prof Stephen James Oppenheimer of the university's School of Anthropology
said the recent findings by a team of researchers from Universiti Sains Malaysia
(USM) "are very important not just for Malaysia but also for the Southeast Asian
region".

"Based on the discovery, we have to rewrite history because for the last
2,000 years the history told was that Indonesia was predominant with its Sri
Vijaya and Majapahit (civilisations), and also Vietnam and Thailand. But now the
history is changing," he told reporters on the sidelines of the first day of the
International Conference on the Bujang Valley and Early Civilisations in
Southeast Asia, here.

He said the new findings by USM on the iron industry site in the Bujang
Valley, which is believed to have been built during the era of Kedah Tua
(Government of Old Kedah), "is of national importance which shows that the
Malaysian civilisation in the Bujang Valley was earlier than it looks".

Oppenheimer was asked to comment on the USM findings which showed not only
proof that Malaysia's early population was economically advanced and had
ventured into the iron industry, but was also a bigger Bujang Valley
civilisation which encompassed about 1,000 sq km -- three times the size of
Penang island -- and not 400 sq km as thought before.


Oppenheimer said the findings were also very important not only for Malaysia
but also for the region since they showed evidence of monumental structures and
a civilisation which included the systematic exploitation of iron ore from the
local mountains and the smelting and ritual structures.

He said excavation of the area would produce a lot of works and significant
findings in the future since currently only 10 per cent of the area had been
excavated.

Meanwhile, Dr Susan Jane Allen of the United States' International
Archaeological Research Institute in Honolulu, Hawaii, a non-profit cultural
research management company, was excited with the new findings at the Bujang
Valley, especially the recently unearthed prehistoric buildings in Sungai Batu.

Dr Allen, who had been involved in the excavation of sites 71, 72 and 73 in
Sungai Batu three decades ago, had speculated that there was something about the
site.

"I was working on my PhD project. I knew there was something under the mound
and very curious about it. At that time, the area was a rubber estate, and Site
71 was a mound about 75cm above the ground in a mangrove area of the estate.


She said that with the area being developed into an oil palm plantation,
which involved the removal of large amounts of soil, the prehistoric buildings
were unearthed.

USM's Centre of Global Archaeological Research director Dr Mokhtar Saidin
said a scientific article would be sent for publication in an international
journal within the next three months to get international recognition for the
new findings at the Bujang Valley.

The article would be aimed at securing confirmation from international
archeologists on the new findings so that there would be no disputes on the
findings, he said.

He said the ongoing conference was to inform Southeast Asian archeologists
of the findings.

The three-day conference, organised by USM's Centre of Global Archeological
Research and the National Heritage Department, is being attended by 100
participants from 11 countries including India, the United States, Vietnam, the
Philippines, Thailand, Laos, Cambodia, Indonesia, China, Myanmar and the United
Kingdom.

-- BERNAMA