Volume I 
of 
Excavations of the Prehistoric 
Iron Industry in West Borneo 
has a prefatory section 
on pages I - XXII, 
including the table of contents 
for Volumes I and II. 
That is why Volume II 
begins on page XXIII. 

EXCAVATIONS OF THE PREHISTORIC IRON 
INDUSTRY IN WEST BORNEO 
Volume Two 
Associated Artifacts and Ideas 
( 

EXCAVATIONS OF THE PREHISTORIC IRON 
INDUSTRY IN WEST BORNEO 
by 
Tom Harrisson and Stanley J. O'Connor 
Volume Two 
ASSOCIATED ARTIFACTS AND IDEAS 
Data Paper: Number 72 
Southeast Asia Program 
Department of Asian Studies 
Cornell University, Ithaca, New York 
April, 1969 
Price: $5.00 Set 
© 1969 CORNELL UNIVERSITY SOUTHEAST ASIA PROGRAM 
First Printing 1969 
Second Printing 1972 
The field work upon which this Data Paper 
is based was primarily funded by the Sarawak 
Government while one of the authors, Torn harrisson, 
was Curator, Sarawak Museum, 1947-66. Full 
acknowledgment is made to the Government and to 
the present Curator of the Sarawak Museum. 
"The reporter left. But the memory of 
McCarthy at this table persisted. And the 
memory of his presence, harder than the 
hardest alloys of steel. But not unjust.
What iron it must have taken to be annealed 
in Lyndon's volcanic breath." 
Norman Mailer, in Harper's 
Magazine, November 1968.* 
*oMr.oMailer's letter granting permission to use the above 
extract courteously wished "Good luck" to this volume. 
XXV11 

• 
TWELVE BASIC REFEREoNCES 
Ch@ng, Te-K'un. 1968. Archaeology in Sarawak, Cambridge
(I-!. 1.:; ffe rs )  . 
Coghlan, H. H. 1956. Notes on Prehisatoric and Early Iron 
in the Old World, Oxford (Occasional Papers in Technol­
ogy; Pitt Rivers Museum; no. 8). 
Forbes, R. J. 1950. Metallurgy in Antiquity, Leiden. 
Harrisson, Tom. 1949. "Gold and Indian Influences in West 
Borneo," Journal Malayan Branch, Royal Asaiatic Society,
12: 33-1o10. 
Harrisson, Tom., and O'Connor, S. J. 1967. "The 'Tantric 
Shrine' excavated at Santubong," Sarawak Museum Journal, 
15: 197-2 18 (hereafter referred to for convenience as 
"O'Connor"). 
Hose, Charles, and MacDougall, William. 19 12. The Pagan 
Tribes of Borneo, London, Vol. I only (hereafter referred 
to as "Hose"). 
Ling Roth, Henry. 1896. The Natives of Sarawak and Britis h 
North Borneo, London, Vols. I and II. 
Needham� Joseph. 1958. The Development of Iron and Steel 
Technology in China, London. 
Schwaner, C. A. L. M. 1853. Borneo: Besachruving van het 
Stroomgebied van den Barito, Amsterdam. 
Smith, Cyril Stanley. 1960. A Hisatory of Metallography, 
Chicago. 
Tylecote, R. F. 1962. Metallurgy in Archaeology, London. 
Wolters, 0. W. 1967. Early Indonesian Commerce, Ithaca 
(Cornell). 
The above twelve titles will hereafter be referred to 
by author's name and page only. Thus "Wolters: 32" is page 
32 in the last item on the list. Otherwise, the reference 
is given in brief in the main text with a number (Hartwell:
1964)o4 indicating full reference in the Chapter notes, which 
follow the main text. 
• 
XXlX 
Three periodicals basic for this area are similarly cited 
in brief in the text where desirable (and likewise in the 
notes): 
F.M.J. = Federation Museum Journal, Published after 1950 
from Kuala Lumpur; deals with West Malaysia; largely
archaeology. 
J.M.B.R.A.S. = Journal Malayan (then Malaysian) Branah, 
Royal Asiatic Society, important general source for his­
toric and prehistoric papers and monographs. 
S.M.J. = Sarawak Museum Journal, defunct 1937, revived 
1949; clearing house for papers about Sarawak and Borneo 
generally. 
All other journal publications are given a fuller reference 
description, as necessary, in the Chapter notes. 
XXX 
TABLE OF CONTENTS 
Page 
Volume One 
RAW MATERIALS AND INDUSTRIAL WASTE 
PREFACE . . . . . . . .  • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • 1X 
TWELVE BASIC REFERENCES • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • Xl 
•
and XX1X 
I . INTRODUCTION . . . .  • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • 
1. Delta Background . . .a . . . . . . . .a . . . .  3 
(a) General Orientation . . . . . . . . . . . 3 
(b) Early Reports of Early Remains . . . . .  . 3 
(c) Habitation Land . . a. . . . . . . . . . .  4 
2. Systematic Excavations, 194 7-66 . . . . . . . 5 
(a) Slow But Steady Process . . . a. . . . a. . 5 
(b) 1966 Special Studies . . . . .a . . . . .  . 6 
3. Key Sites and Mobility . . a. . . . . . . .a .  . 9 
(a) The Range of Delta Sites . . . . . . . .  9 
(b) Key Sites for Iron-Working . . . a• . a. . .a 9 
(c) Topographical Factors Summarized: Access 12 
(d) Other Delta Sites Less Relevant Here . . . 14 
4 . Time Sequence in the Delta . .  • • • • • • • • 17 
(a) Difficulties in Laboratory Dating . . . .  17 
(b) C-14 Date (A.D. 1315) . . . . . . . . . . 18 
(c) Dating by Association . . . . . . a. . .a . 18 
(d) The Time Scale for Iron-Working . . . .  . 20 
II. THE EVIDENCE OF IRON SLAG • • • • • • • • • • • • 2 1  
5. The Slaga.in Local Belief and Prehistoric Fact 23 
(a) Fossil Faeces . . . . .  • • • • • • • • • 23 
(b) Some Less Easy Answers? • • • • • • • • • 24 
(c) What Slag Is in the Delta • • • • • • • • 25 
6. Scale of Delta Iron Deposits: A Broad View . 27 
(a) An Iron Mile . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27 
(b) Sweep of the Slag Through the Delta . . . 30 
(c) The Iceberg's Tip . . . . . . . . . . . . 31  
XXX1 
Page 
7. Slag Measurement Standards . • • • • • • • • • 32 
(a) Mine Detector . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32 
(b) Excavation: Weights and Depths . . . . . 3 3  
(c) Another Slag Index: Weight per Surface
Square Foot . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34 
(d) Counting the Pieces . . . . . . . . . . . 35 
8. Some Quantitative Slag Results . . . . . . . . 36 
(a) Heaps and Scatters . . . . . . . . . . . . 36 
(b) Initial Visual Classification . . . . . . 37
(c) Some Measurements by Weight at Jaong, 1952 38 
(d) Inch by Incho. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41 
(e) Comparison with Buah . . . . . . . . . . . 4 3  
(f) Main Depth Comparisons: Jaong, Buah, 
and Bongkisam . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45 
(g) Bongkisam Tends Shallower Again . . . . . 47 
(h) Kampong Ayer: Between Jaong and Bongkisam 47 
(i) Surface Square Feet . . . . . . . . . . . 48 
(j) An Estimated Slag Deposit Total . . . . . 50 
9. A Morphological Analysis of Slag . . . . . . . 54 
(a) The Purposes of This Exercise . . . . . . 54 
(b) Premise and Categories . . . . . . . • . . . 55 
(c) Some Numerical Comparisons (Jaong) . . . . 57 
(d) Comparison with Buah: Big Slags . . . . . 64 
(e) Bongkisam Comparison: "Chunks" . . . . . 64 
10. What Do Slag Forms and Numbers Mean in Terms 
of Process? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66 
(a) Slag Shapes as Process Pointers . . . . . 66 
(b) The Slag as a General Indicator for 
Smelting Methods . . . . . . . . . . . . 68 
(c) The Bowl-Hearth or Furnace . . . . . . . . 70 
11. Slag Scatter Patterns . . . . . . . . . . . . 75 
12. The Magic Iron . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 77 
(a) Hypothesis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 77 
(b) Illustration . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78 
(c) Comparisono. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 82 
(d) Explanation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 83  
III. THE EVIDENCE IN CLAY • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • 93 
1 3. "Crucible" and Slag . . . . . . . . . . . . . 95 
(a) Slag and Clay . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 95 
(b) What Were the Cylinders For? . . . . . . . 96 
(c) Crucible and Tuyere (Nozzle) Compared . . 100 
(d) Crucible First; Plus Other Uses Secondary 103 
. . 
XXXll 
Page 
14. Crucible Quantities and Associations . . .o . . . .  106 
(a) Crucible Residues . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  106 
(b) The Amount of Crucible . . . . . . . . .o . . .  107 
(c) A Piece/�eight Factor . . . . . . o. . . . . .  108 
(d) Crucible:Slag Ratios . . . . . . . . . . . . .  109 
(e) Vertical Stratification of ,Crucible: Inch 
by Inch . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 110 
(f) Wider Vertical Patterns . . . . . . . . . . .  1 12 
(g) Crucible cf. Slag by Depth . . . o. . . . . .  . 1 1 3  
(h) Distribution of "Rings" (Only) . . . . . . . .  1 14 
(i) Overall Total for Crucible, etc. . . . . . . . 1 15 
15. Crucible Shapes and Sizes . . . . .o . . . .o . . .  1 16 
(a) Cylindrical Data . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  1 16 
(b) Bongkisam Type Sample for Size . . . . . . . .  1 17 
(c) Crucible Sizes from Buah and Jaong for 
Comparison . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 120 
(d) Jaong's Larger Crucibles . . . . . . . . . .  . 12 3 
(e) Thickness of Crucible Walls . . . . . . . . .  125 
(f) Taper . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 128 
(g) Crucible Weights . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  1 3 1  
(h) Crucible Capacity . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  1 32 
(i) Visually Memorable Secondary Influences on 
Shape and Size . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  1 34 
16. Related Pot Forms • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • 1 37 
(a) Crucible in the Pottery Tradition . . . . . .  1 37 
(b) The Totality of Prehistoric Earthenwares in 
the Del ta . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 39 
(c) "Phallic Tops" or Handles . . .o . . . . . . .  14 1 
(d) "Phallic Pottery Objects" and "Net Sinkers" . 143 
(e) Clay on Potstone or Anvil? . . . . . . . . . .  146 
(f) Spouts, Nozzles or Nipples of Earthenware . .  147 
(g) One Specialized Potting Technique . . . . . .  147 
17. Bamboo . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . • • • • • 149 
(a) Bamboo Pipes and the Nozzle Question Again • • 149 
(b) Botanical Considerations . . .o . . . . . .  • • 150 
(c) Other Relevant Usages of Bamboo . . . . .  • • 15 1 
(d) Bamboo in Relation to Crucible-Making . .  • • 152 
18. Charcoal and Other Fuel Factors . . . . . . . . .  153 
(a) Coal or Wood? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 153 
(b) Available Trees and the Charcoal Economy . . .  154 
(c) Excavated Charcoal and a Radio-carbon Test, . .  155 
(d) Scale of Charcoal Needs . . . . . . . . . . .  157 
19. How was the Crucible Used and For What? • • • • • 160 
(a) Smelting or Melting? . . . . . . . . . . . . .  160 
(b) Melting? . . . . .o . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 163 
(c) Ref1. n1. ng.? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 164 
(d) So What? . . . . .o . . . . . . . .o . . . . .  . 167 
• • • 
XXX111 
Page 
IV. MINERALOGICAL EVIDENCE . . .a . . .aa. . .  • • • • • 181 
20. Or� Supplies and the Delta Industry . • • • • 18.3 
21. Ore Analyses • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • 187 
. (a) Bau Ores. . . . . . . . . . • • • • • • •• 187 
(b) Subang Ores . . .a. . . .a . . .. . . . . . 188 
22. Slag Analyses and Some Comparisons . . a. . .a 190 
(a1  As sa  y An a 1 yse  s . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 190 
(,b.) Spectroga_ raphic Comparisons . . . . . . . 191 
(c) Subang Slag . . . . . . . . . • . . .a . .  192 
(d) What These Slag Analyses Show . . . . .a . 193 
2 3. A Philippine Slag Comparison • • • • • • • • • 195 
24. Some Island Logistic Problems . . .a . a. . . .  198 
(a) "Wasteful" Process, "Poor" Ore? . . . a. . 198 
(b) Demand and Distance . . .a. . . .a . . . .  199 
(c) A Suggested Sequence for Delta Ore-Slag-
Iron Relationships . . . a. . .a . a. .  . 201 
(d) Other Transportable Ores of the Area . .  204 
25. The Question of Flux . . . . . . . a. . a. . .  206 
CHAPTER NOTES • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • 209 
Volume Two 
ASSOCIATED ARTIFACTS AND IDEAS 
V. EVIDENCE BY AS. SOCIATIQN· • • • • • • • • • • • • • 223 
... . 
26. Whole Delta Objects of Iron • • • • • • • • • 225 
27. Slag Encrustation on Other Objects • • • • • 228 
(a) Encrusted Stoneware • • • • • • • • • • • 229 
(b) Encrusted Earthenware • • • • • • • • • • 230 
(c) Encrusted Glass • • • • • • • • • • • • • 230 
(d) Encruste·d Stones • • • • • • • • • • • • 231 
(e) Encrusted Rocks • • • • • • • • • • • • • • 232 
(f) Significance of Encrustations • • • • • •. .  233 
28. Stones apd· f�one Tools • • • • • • • • • • • 234 
(a) Geologi·cal Setting for Excavated Stones . .  234 
(b) "Pebble Beds" • • • • • • • • • • • • • • 235 
(c) Shaped Stones and Tools: The Bongkisam 
Abundance and General Purpose • • • • • 237 
(d) "Hammers tones" • • • • • • • • • • • • • 239 
(e) "Waisted Stones" • • • • • • • • • • • • 240 
XXX1V 
Page 
(f) Waisted Stones in Other Prehistoric 
Situations . . . . . . . . . . . . • • 243 
(g) "Pounders" . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 245 
(h) Shaped ("Ritual") Stones . . o. . . . .  . 245 
(i) Quartz Strikers . . . . . . . . . . . .  . 246 
(j) A Notable Absentee: Sharpening Stones .  246 
(k) Stone Use in General . . o. . .o . . . .  . 247 
(1) Historic "Waisted Stones" from Northern 
Philippines (Addendum) . . .o . . .oo . . 248 
29. Gold and Other "Precious" Materials . .  • • • 249 
(a) Whole Gold . . . . . . . . .o . .o . . . .o 249 
(b) A Heavy Ring of Lead . . . . .o . . . . .  253 
(c) Other "Metals" and Minerals . . . . . o. .  255 
(d) Diamonds and Other "Jewel Stones" . . . . 255 
30. "Indian" Associations and the Tantric Shrine 258
3 1. Chinese Ceramics and "Western" Glass • • • • 262 
(a) Glass Beads . . . . . . . . . . . . . • • 262 
(b) Chinese Stonewares: Association in 
Quantity . . . . . . . . o. . . . .  • • 266 
(c) The Scattering of Stoneware Sherds . • • 269 
(d) How Do These Stonewares Relate to the 
Iron? . . . . . . . . . . . . . • • • • 273 
(e) And a More Direct Relationship? • • • • • 275 
32. The Rock Carvings of Jaong . . . .  � . . . .  277 
(a) Petroglyphs of Three Kinds . . . . o. .  . 277 
(b) Block Cuttings. . . . . . .o . . . . o. . .  278 
VI. WIDER IDEAS • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • 305 
33. Delta Iron in a Southeast Asian Contexto. • • 307 
(a) Early Mining in Southeast Asia . . . . .  307 
(b) Archaeological Investigation of Early
Iron-Working in Southeast Asia . . o. .  309 
(c) Philippine Parallels, Especially
Ethnological . . .o . . . . . . . . .  . �15 
(d) Conclusion . . . . . . . . o. . . . o. .  . 3 18 
34. Early Indian and Chinese Iron-Working . . .o .  3 19 
(a) India with Ceylon: The Move to "Wootz" . 3 19 
(b) Ancient China: The Cast Iron Stream . .  330 
35. Some African Parallels? . . .o . . o.o . . . . .  334 
36. Elsewhere in Borneo: Ethnological Analogies 341 
(a) Source Difficulties . . . . o. . . . . . .  341  
(b) Smelter to Smith . . .o . . . o. . . . . .  341  
(c) Smelting and Related Accounts . . . o. . o. 344 
(d) To Sum Up on Native Smelting . . . .o . .  348 
XXXV 
Page 
(e) The Craft of the Dayak Smith • • • • .a •  349 
(f) The Itinerant Smith Inland • . •a . . . .  351 
37. "Damascene," Islam and Birth by the Sword • 354 
(a) Near-damascene • • • • • • • • • • • • • 354 
(b) The Keris and Islam • • • • • • • • • • 358 
Cc) Birth by the Sword • • • • • • • • • • • 360 
CHAPTER NOTESa. • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • 363 
VII. SUMMARY AND APPENDICES • • • • • • • • • • • • • 383 
Summary . • . • • • • • • . . • . . • • • • • • • 3 85  
Appendices 
A. Dr. Cheng's "Archaeology in Sarawak" • • •  391 
B. Schwaner's 1853 Report (Translated by John 
M. Echols) • • • • • • • • . • • • • • . 393 
c. Suggested Metal Trace Links Between the 
Sarawak River Delta and Merbok Estuary, 
Kedah • • • . • • • • • • • • • • • • • • 401 
D. Contents of Full Report, The Sarawak River 
Delta Prehistoric Sites • • • .aa. • . .a •  403 
E. M.I.T. Seminar on this Data Paper (and 
Other Afterthoughts) • • .a • . • . .a • • 406 
F. New Philippine Slag Data (from Cebu) • • • 412 
XXXVJ. 
LIST OF TABLES 
Volume Two 
Page 
Jaong: Stones in 1966 • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • 235 
Buah Stones, 1966 . . .  • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • 237 
Bongkisam, 157 Trenches: Stone "Types" . • • • • • • • 238 
Hammerstones from Bongkisam, II . . a. . . . . . . . . .  239 
Waisted Stones (Bongkisam) : "Symmetry" Pattern, 1955 . 24 1 
Waisted Stones (Bongkisam) by Sub-Types, 1955 . . . . .  24 1 
Jaong Waisted Stones and Slag . . a. .  • • • • • • • • • 242 
Jaong: Two Sectors of 75 Square Feet Compared for 
Gold an• d Whole Vessels . . . . . . . .a . . . . .  • • 25 1 
Delta Glass Bead: Second Analysis Series (Corning) 
(Monochrome blue or green beads only) . . .a . a. . • • 26 
Glass Beads: Color Comparisons . . . .a . .a . .  • • • • 265 
Bongkisam (1955): Numbers of Sherds or Items . • • • • 267 
Jaong 1966 Stoneware Sherds . . .a . . . . . . . . . .  . 267 
Combined Buah-Bongkisam Sherd Sample, Classified by 
Sarawak Museum Types . . . . . .a . . . . . . . . . .  268 
Bongkisam (1955) Scatter of Sherds From Single 
Yueh Bowl . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 269 
Buah (1952)a: Lateral Sherd Scatter for D and E 
Trenches • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • 270 
Buah Vessels with Lateral Scatter over Twenty Feet • • 27 1 
Buah: Vertical Scatter Maxima for D and E . . . .  • • 27a1 
Buah: Absolute Depth of "Concentration Points" for 
Reconstructed Vessels . . a. . .a . . . . . . . . .  • • 272 
Jaong: Block-Cuttings • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • 280 
Jaong: Variation in Block-Cut Sample Measurements • • 280 
• • 
XXXVll 

LIST OF PLATES 
Page 
Volume One 
1. "Batu Gambar.a" Rock Carving from Jaong 
• • 
• 11 
2 . Principal Sites 1• n Santubong Area • • • • V1 
3-4. Slag Series, Typical Pieces • • • • • • • 85-87 
5-6. Slag Series, Range of Variation • • • • • 89-91 
7-10. Clay Crucible and/or Tuyere, Typical 
Examples • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • 169-175 
11-12. Phallic-shaped Pot Knobs • • • • • • • • • 177•179 
Volume Two 
13-14. Stones Encrusted with Slaga. • • • • • • • 283-285 
15. Potter's Anvil or Ritual Object of Stone . 287 
16. Multipurpose Stone (Diorite) • • • • • • • 289 
17. Kelabit Smiths and Hammers • • • • • • • 291 
18. "Waisted Stone," Sungei Ayer • • • • • • • 293 
19. Stone with Partial Waist . .  • • • • • • • 2 95 
20. Quartz Pebble Fire s t· rikers • • • • • • • 297 
2 1. Gold and Lead Artifacts • • • • • • • • • 299 
22-23. Rock Carvings from Jaonga. • • • • • • • • 301-303 
XXX1X 

PART V 
EVIDENCE BY ASSOCIATION 
"But what the smelter, smith and alchemist have 
in common is that all three lay claim to a 
particular magicoreligious experience in their 
relations with matter." 
Mircea Eliade, The Forge 
and the Crucible, 1962. 
223 

V.26. WHOLE DELTA OBJECTS OF IRON 
It does not follow by law and order that any of the 
massive delta iron activity had to produce finished objects
in that metal at the time and retained on the same spot. The 
basic operation was to smelt the ore in the first place, sepa­
rate the slag in the bloom and get wrought iron. The later 
stages can be and often are entirely distinct: reheating new 
pieces of the wrought iron to make steel, then shaping the 
reheated red-hot steel on an anvil to produce finished tools 
(the work of the smith). 
A rather small number of iron tools have been found dur­
ing the nearly twenty years of this study. Few of them are 
in good shape; most are badly corroded and misshapen through 
weathering in the soil. This is a major trouble for iron 
tools: under normal tropical conditions in open sites of 
this sort, they deteriorate so rapidly; it is doubtful if 
any would last six centuries, unless by chance circumstances. 
The intense human population of this terrain in the past 
century has produced a litter of discarded tools, especially 
in connection with rubber tapping; and these further confuse 
the issue in sites not susceptible to normal stratigraphical 
study (I.2). 
The tool material as a whole is therefore less than 
satisfactory from two points of view--dateable horizons and 
condition of the tools themselves. 
One of the aims of the renewed 1966 excavation season 
was to check on these points and pay especial attention to 
iron tools in situ in the deposit. Alas, although we care­
fully excavated 2341 cubic feet in five sites, including 1661 
cubic feet in the three main iron ones, not a single iron 
tool was recovered in recognizable form right through the 
dig. Taken against the large quantities of slag, crucible, 
stonewar� and earthenware, this negative result is signifi­
cant in indicating the paucity of such objects in the delta 
now--i.e., that have survived the exposure conditions. 
Finished iron is rarer in aggregate than finished gold here; 
but the gold is virtually imperishable, even in the open. 
Even if finished iron tools did not readily deteriorate, 
absolute absence would not prove that they had never been 
here. For one equally might have expected to find at least 
one piece of the solid, durable, unworked iron in its ex­
smelting form. But not one piece has been recovered over 
the years. It was too precious to leave around, no doubt. 
225 
226 
We would give a lot to see a single specimen showing to the 
living eye the reward·of this tremendous dead effort.o1 
Of special interest in this context is a small, whole 
T'ang saucer excav�ted at Jaong in 1957, illustrated in 
Harrisson ( 1954: 1)o2 and now on display in the Sarawak 
Museum. The following record note describes it: 
Small Saucer with E�crusted Iron, S. Jaong, 57/A at 
11" (7.57) 
An early Yueh-type vessel in good condition. This 
conical shaped bowl measures 1½" high and is 3 3/4" in 
diameter at the rim. The lip of the rim is rolled out­
wards and slightly thickened (the "folded-over" style 
common in T'ang dishes). There is a bare ringo½" in 
diameter in the.bottom of the bowl, surrounding a slight­
ly raised area. This is often seen on pieces that were 
made quickly, but carefully, in one "pull" of the pot­
ter's fingers. This bowl was most likely thrown "on 
the hump," made with a series of other identical bowls 
from the same piece of clay. The foot and about l" of 
the outside wa 1·1 of the bowl have been turned (cut while 
spinning) in the s· ame quick but careful manner as the
potting. There have been no attempts to smooth over 
the marks of ·the turning tools, but there was no need, 
as they were not sloppily done. The foot itself is 1½" 
in diameter with a vertical outside wallo½" high and an 
inside wall that is sharply beveled towards the center. 
The center area is raised and the inside wall is only 
1/8" high. The rim of the foot ring varies in thickness 
from 1/8" to 1/16". 
The body of the bowl is vitrified, of a grey-white 
stoneware flecked with a few tiny bits of iron, which 
show up in the glaze. The bowl is glazed to withino½" 
of the foot with a grey-green glaze that has been un­
evenly applied and several marks in the glaze and near 
the foot strongly suggest that the piece was glazed
inside and out by quickly dipping the whole thing into 
the glaze. 
A highly corroded piece of iron, evidently a knife 
blade, is encrusted across and on the rim of the bowl: 
the iron is 4¼" long and from 5/8" to 3/8" wide. 
This part of Jaong also had some gold objects associated 
with similar bowls in a funerary setting. The use of the 
iron blade in this way suggests a reverence for the baser 
metal at that time'(? ninth century), which fits into all the 
other indications at Jaong, the earliest of the three sites, 
especially (cf. II.12, V.32, etc.)o. 
227 
One other point which could relate to the paucity of 
iron tools in these delta sites is a widespread Asian belief 
that to bring iron (or other finished) tools into a smelting 
area is to endanger the success of the whole operation.
There is a similar prohibition against bringing completed 
tools to blacksmith's forges when these are working in- the 
Borneo interior today. Similar taboos are found all over 
Southeast Asia. Not only iron, but all metals to be smelted, 
may be involved. At Perak in Malaya in the last century metal 
workers who had knives or spears of iron had to keep these 
wrapped in leaves (Hale, 1885: 309),o3 while Chinese tin-miners 
in the Peninsula would not--and in some places probably still 
will not--permit any tool or weapon of iron to be "taken into 
a smelting house under pain of the displeasure of the spirits
who preside over smelting operation" (Maxwell, 1882: 10) .o4 
Spiritual considerations apart, there are real diffi­
culties and deficiencies in our understanding of early metal 
tools, not only in the delta but much more widely in South­
east Asia. Available knowledge is very small. We hope to 
return to this subject ourselves at a later date. Fortun­
ately, much more is known about some of the other artifacts 
of the period found in the delta, with which the following
chapters are mainly concerned. 
V.27. S LAG ENCRUSTATION ON OTHER OBJECTS 
The general mix-up of stoneware, earthenware, glass and 
stone all in among the slag and clay has already been indi­
cated (III.o14, etc.). We will now look at the archaeological
evidence which proves that this mixture does not reflect any
chance or subsequent conjunction of objects or events, but 
does represent some sort of simultaneous activity involving
all these things together. This evidence is provided in a 
rather special way by the presence of iron slag encrusted 
onto the other artifacts in such a way that this can only
have occurred when the metal was molten, still hot liquid
from the smelting process. This in turn can only mean that 
the encrusted objects were already in the ground (or in any 
structure elevated above it) at the same time the iron was 
worked, though they could of course have arrived there ear­
lier. Discolorations and minor contacts are not discussed, 
where these could result from contact after (possibly long 
after) the slag was cold. A good example of what is here 
meant comes from the deep slag concentrations at Buah; as 
described in the 1955 fieldnotes: 
. . .  Thus at 7-9 feet down Sung ceramics reappeared.
No celadon, but T'ing (including large good pieces, 
among them a spout), combed brown-glaze stoneware and 
(mainly) whiteish crackled pieces (Cheng-pai type). 
Above--or rather under--all, one piece of clear 
white T'ing was firmly and inextricably embedded in a 
mass of slag fused with clay, below the main crucible 
levels. 
It is difficult to believe any appreciable number 
of such pieces, not pulverised or fused, could have 
penetrated through 5 or 6 feet of "metallic" strata un­
less they marked both the lowest and the highest level 
of the deposit during its time of operation or occupa­
tion.o" (T. H.,  Buah Workbook, 5/ 1 1/55) 
The above 1955 field note refers to an uncommon instance, 
where a non-metal artifact is fully fused into or with a 
large piece of slag. In most cases encrustation is less pro­
found and consists of a small droplet or splash of molten 
metal spilled on to the other object. These run up to 4" 
long and 2" wide on some rocks [ (d) below], but are usually
much smaller than that, especially on stoneware sherds. Un­
less worked and cleaned, the accretions are difficult to see. 
228 
229 
Particular care was taken to identify and record all such 
instances in 1966. There follows a sample of the results, 
to illustrate this theme: that such drops as it were foss il­
ize a relationship of propinquity between two dissimilar 
objects. 
(a) Encrusted Stoneware 
Four examples, all from the 1966/A series at Jaong, are 
typical (see also bowl at V.26). At this particular 
point slag is at a low frequency, Chinese ceramics very high,
in Jaong. 
A/2, 9-12": 2½" x 2½" sherd of heavy (dark glazed?) 
coarse stoneware jar, with irregular 1" slag piece fully
fused to inner, slightly curved face; the slag is hard 
and rough. 
A/4, 9-12": l" triangular sherd of rather thin but 
strong stoneware (glaze and style unidentifiable), with 
½" droplet of slag only slightly attached to unders ide-­
can be worked off. On separation the slag is very 
light, suggesting this was the very tip of a metal over­
run, heavily oxidized. 
A/7, 12-15": l½" triangular sherd of thick coarse 
stoneware from a medium size jar of uncertain glaze with 
combed curved patterns characteristic of Yueh-type
(T'ang) wares; a low flattened splash of slag which can 
be chipped and is similar to the previous (66/A.4, 
9-12") but softer, gradually disintegrating to rubble-­
possibly from the tip of a tool rather than the slag 
proper? On inner side of vessel. 
A/7, 15-18": l½ x 3/4" rectangular sherd of fine 
stoneware (not further identified) with l" splash simi­
lar to previous (66/A.7, 12-15") but larger and elabo­
rated to a small cone; on inner side of vessel. 
All these are hard stonewares and smallish sherds from a 
slag-poor ·area, close also to the recovery point for the 
whole bowl above (5-20 ft.). Similar results come from the 
other sites. Buah, for instance, has a rather heavy white­
ware ("Ting") ewer with several sherds, scattered over 3 0  
feet, encrusted with iron. Also at Buah, an unusual Tzu-chou 
bowl, decorated with leaves in brown, yellow and white slip 
and incised lines, has sizeable lumps on one side sherd and 
iron stains on the edges of the base sherd.n1 
230 
(b) Encrusted Earthenware 
Only one piece of 1966 earthenware was identified as 
truly encrusted, from Buah, 3.7.66: 
Buah, E. 6-9": 2" x l" section of a well-made, outflow­
ing rim sherd from a prehistoric earthenware pot of 
fairly large size (related more or less closely to that 
figured in Solheim, 1965: fig. 2 from Kubor)2: outer 
rim sherd thoroughly encrusted along half its length
(l") to a heavy cake of slag fused with some burned 
sand [II/9, type (g)]; total weight just undero½ lb. 
An earthenware piece coated with iron--a rather differ­
ent matter, unknown in the delta--is described from Klang,
Selangor, in Malaya by Linehan ( 1951). 3 Some sherds of the 
local delta pottery do occur with slight films or edging of 
a mixture of burned sand or clay and iron slag. Thus, four­
teen earthenware sherds so affected to a minor extent were 
identified at Buah in 1966: 
X/ 1: 12- 18" (3)
X/1: 30-36" (3)
X/2: 30-36" (4 - 1 all along the edge of a rimsherd)
X/2: 36-42" (3)
X/2: 42-48" ( 1  - quite strongly granular with rusty
brown contact) 
In most cases, including the two strangest (as noted in 
the brackets), this effect was on both sides of the sherd, 
and had clearly not affected or broken a whole pot before 
fragmentation; that is, the effect was on the sherd of a pot
already broken. The implications of these sherds rather con­
firm the view that Linehan's example from Malaya may indicate 
iron-working there--no slag/smelting site has been excavated 
on the peninsula and the whole iron question lies wide open
there (cf. VI.33). 
(c) Encrusted Glass 
A single small blob of glass from Jaong is unlike any­
thing previously found in the delta and may belong to this 
category: 
66/A.2 at 1 1": ½" (10 mm.) blob of greenish very light
glass with pitted, browned surface--as if it were a 
bead or some other object which had been in contact with 
or close to smelting operations and slag heat, meta­
morphosing shape and texture. 
2 3 1  
Another tiny fragment of glass is encrusted in some 
brittle, "bloom"-type material, from 66/A.2, 6-9" at Jaong;
the nature and shape of the glass is no longer recognizable
and it has probably been melted by the heat. 
(d) Encrusted Stones ( Pls. 13 and 14) 
The two common types of extraneous stone found in slag 
deposits are rounded pebbles and "waisted stones" (V.28).
Two waisted stones and a conspicuous pebble were found en­
crusted in 1966: 
Buah W/3, 24- 30": low waisted stone, 8" x 4½", charac­
teristic form, one side worked with waist deeply
grooved, ends beveled. A½" splash of slag is 
thoroughly encrusted and ingrained into the groove 
at one outer side. (This trench has one of the 
biggest slag-concentrations known in Borneo to date.) 
Ayer W/2, 8": waisted stone, large, broken, waist on 
one face, weighs 10½ lbs., encrustation on main 
face, to one side, running unevenly for 2" inside 
the groove, which is 3/4" wide and nearly¼" deep. 
At one point, 1½" from the edge, the encrustation 
almost fills the groove. 
Jaong M/2, 3 3-34": 2½" long, weighs 40 oz., slightly
curved, round-sided river pebble with largish ir­
regular piece of very hard finger-type slag (l" 
across at top; see Pl. 1 3), firmly fixed to upper 
curve of pebble skin. The adjacent pebble surface 
is also thinly crusted with slag overrun or browned 
and burned from the consequent heat, and this effect 
continues round the curve on to the underside. 
The above pebble and the earlier earthenware rimsherd 
are the most fully slag involved; they were imbedded in the 
smelting process! The others may be more casual points of 
contact, but not to be ignored for that. 
While working on the stone material in previ• ous years, 
many additional examples were identified. One from 1957 is 
of special interest: 
Jaong 57/ B, 6-12": (among a series of ca. 100 small 
pebbles connected with the underlying "pebble bed"), 
a small natural oval pebble 2" long, flat on one 
side and rounded elsewhere. On the flat side is a 
rim of an iron or slag adhesion, 3/4" across, as if 
232 
something like the tip of a crucible had (acci­
dentally?) rested on the pebble top. (On "pebble 
beds" see V.28.b.) 
A large number of other stones, including "hammerstones" 
were not truly encrusted, but many have sherd "bloom" or 
stain traces (cf. V.28)o. 
(e) Encrusted Rocks 
Different in quality are the slag encrustations on rocks 
and boulders which form a natural part of the geological
formation at Jaong, either exposed by these excavations or 
already above the surface before 1950. Two described below 
were left exposed from 1957 and 1959 trenches, the third 
(Rock 3 below) newly identified on one of the largest boul­
ders of the place, 4½ ft. above the old ground surface level, 
but previously hidden in dense vegetation: 
Rock 1: this boulder is located in trench 59/0. It is 
7'3" northeast of the exposed face of trench X/2. Be­
fore excavation in 1959, the top surface of the rock 
was 2 1" below the surface of the soil. The rock is 56" 
long by 46" wide and the slag is fused to the upper 
surface in eleven separate patches. The largest concen­
tration of slag is a rough rectangle, 6" x 2". 
Rock 2: located 6' east of cement marker for trench 
57/A. The upper surface of the rock was 14" below the 
surface of the soil before excavation in 1957. The top
surface is presently 10" above the level of the ground,
roughly square in s.hape with sides 21" by 20". The 
slag forms an irregular circle with a diameter of 1½". 
Rock 3: from the corner of trench Y/3, the boulder is 
62'8" in a northwest direction. It is roughly rhomboid 
in shape, its surface completely covered with repeated
rectangular carvings. The rock is 10' long at its 
greatest length, and 7' in width. The top surface is 
4' above the ground. Slag is encrusted in an area that 
is 18" from the top surface and 30" from the northern 
end of the boulder. At this point there are two irregu­
lar patches of slag fused to the rock, one about 3/4" 
long ando½" wide and the other about 2". 
The last of these three rocks is indeed noteworthy. The 
slag is 36" above the present ground surface level, at a 
point where there is nothing to indicate secondary erosion 
or other surface changes reducing the deposit level in the 
2 3 3  
past two tho�sand years, but on the contrary considerable 
reason to think the level of deposit has grown since these 
early human contacts thereabouts. This rock is also covered 
with cut-out blocks of patterning in the strange archaic 
Jaong tradition (V. 32; also see II. 12 ) .  
It could be that the boulder surfaces, since submerged 
by scrub and humans (until cleared in the fifties)a, were 
used in the early iron-working at Jaong as natural nanvils" 
upon which to hammer the bloom from smelting clean of slag. 
(f) Significance of Encrustations 
Over th� years, thousands of cases of slag encrustation 
have been identified in the delta excavations. Some of these 
are on natural boulders, albeit carved, or on smaller stones 
likely to have been so affected either by the position of 
the "crucible" operations or by use in connection therewith 
(especially the waisted stones)a. But many stoneware and 
fewer earthenware sherds can hardly have had so direct a 
relationship to the iron work, and must be regarded as casually 
involved. 
Although encrusted sherds amount to less than 1% of all 
those excavated, the frequency of metallic combination is 
sufficiently high and so widespread as to make it clear that 
both the imported Chinese stoneware and the softer earthen­
wares (almost certainly made in Borneo) represent the debris 
of human activities conducted side by side with the smelting 
of iron ore. The exact style and scale of this cohabitation 
deserves careful thought as well as further study--which we 
hope to offer when describing the delta sherd material in a 
later paper of this series; but we will touch on this further 
in other connections during a following chapter (V.31)a. 
V.28. STONES AND STONE TOOLS 
As well as iron-encrusted stones, a variety of pebbles 
and rocks are frequently associated with slag and other iron­
working evidences in the deposit and not infrequently asso­
ciated again in a functional way. Such stones are considered 
here when they could not have got into deposit position 
naturally, anymore than sherds of Chinese stoneware. To put
this in perspective, the geological setting must be briefly
outlined here. 
(a) Geological Setting for Excavated Stones 
The delta is a system of geologically modern swamps of 
mangrove and nipah palm on alluvial saline mud and sand 
building out from older land which, for archaeological pur­
poses, can be roughly divided into abundant sandstone, meta­
morphosed sandstone and restricted igneous rock. Santubong
Mountain, nearly 3,000 ft., is of the "plateau sandstone 
formation" in geological terms; this weathers away to the 
fine white sand, which underlies much of the human deposit 
at Bongkisam and Jaong especially--at Jaong whole pots, bead 
clusters and other specialties are often reached right down 
in this otherwise "sterile" white sand. The upper levels of 
the mountain, which form quite impressive cliffs, shine white 
and the rock can be crumbled by the climbers' fingers. 
Several sills or dykes of harder stone are found at the 
foot of the cliffs behind Bukit Maras and Tanjong Tegok (see
I.3), and there are large intrusions of hard igneous dolerites 
and gabbros, of Tertiary date, up the west coastline of the 
main Santubong headland 4-5 miles north of Bongkisam. More 
accessible are two considerable outcrops of igneous biotite 
grandiorite, quartz diorite and porphyry, one 2½ miles north 
of Tanjong Tegok near Telok Penyok ("Turtle Bay") the oppo­
site side of the headland. These are well known to the 
present inhabitants and stone from the former especially has 
been extensively used for sharpening iron, local government
works, and other purposes in this decade. The stone used by
the iron-workers and ceramic traders of the delta a thousand 
years ago came largely from these sources, too--but its dis­
tribution is quite complicated, and this is a simplified 
summary (based on the Geological Survey's Progress Report 
for 1965, augmented by Museum exploration). So it is far 
from easy, even with the geological help given over the years
by Dr. G. E. Wilford, and Dr. A. R. Pimm, to separate each 
234 
235 
excavated s tone as placed there by man or  long before mankind. 
Where s tones are demons trably placed and worked, there is 
little difficulty. Where whole pebbles or  naturally frac­
tured pieces of  s tone occur intermixed with slag, it is o ften 
hard to draw the line. 
(b) "Pebble Bedsn" 
The geological considerations apply particularly to de­
ciding o n  the meaning o f  the large numbers of  s mall, more or  
les s rounded, river pebbles which appear as a r ather puzzling 
feature, s ometimes in layers several inches thick, not ably 
at Jaongn. Sometimes these occur in the bottom of  the archae­
ological deposit , o n  top o f  sterile (in the human sense) 
s and; s andstone, in such a way as t o  sugges t natural pos i­
tioning by s ome s or t  o f  water wash- out. But in other places,
this explanation is patently insufficient. More attention 
was devoted to clarifying this subject in 19 66, with help 
again from the Geological Survey Staff in Kuching. 
In 1966 all recovered s tones - - nearly always small water ­
worn pebbles 3 - 7" long - - were first  clas sified together , and 
counted in every trench and layer, before subdivision and 
other more elaborate t reatment of  previous years .  Those  
be low human levels in total sterility are not included : 
Jaong : Stones in 1966 
Depth to Stones per
Trench Sterility Number ofStones surface Comment(inches ) s q. foot 
(a) Slag Concentration 
X/1 48 23 9 All below 36" 
X/2 48 5 2 All below 36" 
X/3 48 19 8 All but 1 below 36" 
Y/1 48 165 7 150 below 3 6" 
Y/2 36  125 5 115 in 24- 3 6" 
Y/3 3 6  5 7  2 42 in 24- 36" 
M/2 48 12 5 9 below 42" 
(b) Out s ide Slag Concentration 
(below 10 lbsn. s lag per s q. ft.) 
A/1 24 3 1  1+ 28 in 12- 18", none below 
A/2 21 19 1 - 18 in 6- 12" 1 in 12- 18" 
A/3 21 2 0 .1 Both 6- 18" 
A/4 21 9 0.3 All 6- 18" 
2 36 
All tabulated stones--90 %  of which are less than 6" 
long - -o ccur in layers which also produced definite human 
artifacts. It is clear that in the slag-poor but ceramicn­
rich Jaong A/sector ,  stones , though less numerous , are more 
spread upward in the deposit, whereas in the slag concentra­
tions of X well over 95% are in the botntom 12" of the archae­
o l ogical deposit. 
A correlation between Jaong stone frequency and slag 
frequency was checked by submitting 115 stones in two random 
samples,  from Y/2 and Y/3, 24-36" . These were compared with 
similar-looking samples of pebbles from the Jaong stream bed , 
10 0 yards beyond the archaeonlogical area. Here is the geolo­
gistn' s  report : 
These two groups of (excavated) stone .nprobably 
selectnively placed at siten, because they consist almost 
entirely of one sort of stone namely hornfels (meta­
morphosed shale) ; the stream (adjacent) contains a 
greater variety of rocks but the two samples dug only 
contained three and one non-hornfels spec imen respec­
tivel y. Also probabl y  collected because of exceptional 
roundness ; therefore , not a random stream sample , but 
highl y  selective.1 
I t  looks as if these select ,  rounded hornfels pebbles 
were laid down or fell from some sort of a wall support or 
underpinning for some part of the iron operation. Perhaps 
they were used to strengthen mud and clay in kiln walls? So 
far we can find no explanation verified by any known living 
procedures in working iron. This may be partly because the 
pebbles belong to an ear ly form of operations at Jaong , not 
continued into later times. That this may be so is suggested 
by the comparable data for the later site at Buah. 
In Buah, there is no comparable "pebble bed , "  and few 
extraneous stones in the deposit at all. In no 1966 trench 
is there over 1 stone per surface square foot,  compared with 
an average of 5 up to 9 in slag- rich parts of Jaong earlnier. 
In Buah there are many less stones--less than 1/l 0 0 0 th 
of the Jaong number for equivalent areas--in the "human" 
archaeological deposit. In slag concentrations and less 
slaggy sectors at both places there is a tendency for more 
stones where there is most slag , and fewer (very few indeed 
at Buah) where slag is poor. There is a positive correla­
tion between slag and stone. A number of  stones are also 
directly slag encrusted , notably at Jaong (see V.27. d-f)n. 
2 37 
Buah Stones, 1966 
Depth to Stones per
Trench Sterility Number ofStones suorface Comment(inches) sq. foot 
( a) Slag-Rich Sectors 
W/ 1 84  2 1 1 at 0 -6"; 1 at 30-36" 
W/2 84  0 0 Very dense slag, plus
42 sheords of stone-
ware 
W/3 7 2  6 0 . 2  5 in upper 18"; 1 
below 30" 
(b) Outside Main Slag 
E/ 1 39 1 0.o1 At 3-6" (below that 
dense with sherds, 
no more stone)
E/2 30 0 0 Over 1,000 sherds in 
this trench 
(c) Shaped Stones and Tools: The Bongkisam
Abundance and General Purpose 
At Jaong there is plenty of extraneous stone, usually
in the form of "pebble beds" which are not in evidence at 
either Buah or Bongkisam. Other and mo re obviously shaped 
or placed stone is present but sparse at Jaong, yet fairly 
common at Buah and locally abundant at Bongkisam. There is 
no maorked major typological diffeorence between what are evio­
dently stone tools  at either end of the Jaong-Bongkisam time 
scale, and since a detailed consideration of this subject
would be out of place here, the essential picture can best 
be given by summaorizing the largest sample of stone mateorial 
excavated at Bongkisam in 1955o. 
15 7 numbered Bongkisam trenches in 1955 produced 244 
extoraneous stones. These were classified as shown in the 
table on the following page. 
The pebbles, meager here, have been sufficiently dis­
cussedo. The "other" category need not detain us here. 
The five remaining types will be discussed in the 
following sections, in so far as they relate to the present 
theme (further treatment elsewhere). First, though it will 
help to restate the processes in which stone is likely to 
have been required in the iron working processes in so far 
as these have been detected here in the delta. 
2 3 8  
Bongkisam, 157 Trenches : Stone "Types" 
Type Number 09.: of D iscussed Plateof These Whole .ln Section No. 
Pebbnles 122 . S O b 
Hammer -stones 46 19 d 17 
Waisted-stones 3 5  14 e , f  18 
Pounders and Rubbers 16 7 g 16 
Shaped ("r itual") Stones 1 6  7 h 
Quartz Strikers 4 1 .l 20 
Other (including "anvil") 5 2 f 19 
Total 244 
Stone tools were of value in five known phases of delta 
work (and perhaps others unknown)n: 
(i) When necessary b reaki ng up the iron ore from rock 
into pieces of a size suitable for treatment over 
the fire i n  the initial smelt ing. 
(ii) Hammer i ng repeatedly the soft ish ,  pasty "bloom" 
which resulted from this smelting to separate the 
slag and other detritus from the usable raw metal, 
a j ob for heavy tools like the "waisted stones" 
(see below)n. 
(i ii) Breaking up the ra� me tal  obtai ned at (ii) into 
small lumps for insertion into the "crucible,n" i f  
used, and generally. 
(iv) Smashi ng the "cruc ib le" to release the refined "steel" 
- -or otherwise complet i ng the work. A j ob for light 
hammerstones [ (d) below] ? 
(v) Hammeri ng or otherwise shaping the metal from (iv) 
in any subsequent treatmentn- -for instance i n  trying 
to make iron b ars or tools (cfn. V . 26 above)n. 
The following simple classificat ion is not b ased on any
assumpt ions about specialized stone use for any ore or 
general use for all of the above purposes. Probably much de­
pended on weight and durab ility of the ston� as much as the 
shape which alone can provide a visual typology today. 
2 39 
(d) "Hammerstones" (Pl. 17) 
These are usually, but not always, naturally elongated 
oval pebbles of medium size in hardstone, nine out of ten 
from the local igneous sills [ (a) above ] .  Always one rounded 
end shows pitted percussion marks, usually both, often heavily
(see Pl. 17). Sometimes there are other pressure marks on 
the sides, too. But there is no deliberate shaping or waist­
ing. The largest weigh under 2 lbs., and they are seldom so 
heavy, and never so shaped, as the waisted stones. Fourteen 
hammerstones from Bongkisam trench I I  gave these measurements: 
Hammerstones from Bongkisam, II 
General Shape Length Width Weight(in.) (in.) (oz.) Comment 
" Elongate" 4½ 1½ 1 3  These three are 
4 1 8 "typical," the 
6 1½ 1 3  basic "type"
3 1½ 8 Tw. isted by batter-ing 
"Oval" 3½ 2 1 1  
4½ 2½ 19 
"Round" 3½ 3½ 32 Very thick ( 3" )  
3 3½ 2 1  These three show
2½ 2 10 second commonest 
2 2 7 form. 
"Roughly rectangular" 3½ 3 25 
5 2 2 3  
"Roughly triangular" 3 2½ 17 Cherto; exceptional
3½ 2½ 16 Base flat and 
used too 
Closely similar hammerstones occur in Stone Age sites 
recently excavated round Hong Kong, and even back into a 
paleolithic context in mainland China.o2 One shown to Dr. P. 
Boriskowsky at a Tokyo Conference ( 3 1/8/66) was regarded by 
him as very close to some ·from the early neolithic or "mesoo­
lit hic" in the Hoabinh caves, Nort:h Vie.tnam, recently re­
excavated under Russia:n auspices.· Al though such tool forms 
have several origins and functions, it seems probable that 
the delta ones pre-date the advent of iron, at least in part 
(as is more clearly the case with the waisted stoneso; below). 
240  
These light hammers would be suitable for use i n  steps 
(i i i )  and (iv) outli ned above--preparing the metal for the 
crucible and later bre aki ng it  out of theren. Also , and espe­
ci ally for finer work i n  forgi ng and tool-making (cf. V.n26 
above ) .  Other usages cannot be discounted. They would be 
slung i n  a sling of bamboo and/or rattan, as is  still done 
by Ke labit smi ths (Pl. 17).n3 
(e) "Wa iste d Stones" (Pln. 18) 
Waisted stones are generally of the same local material 
as hammenrstones ,  but average much larger and heavier ,  and 
have been pecked to give a waist for securi ng with some sort 
of lashing or haft. This  waist effect is  unmistakable. It 
may have been  enlarged by wear in use , and is  frequently 
i rregular i n  form. 
The waist runs round the approximate cente rli ne of the 
stone , which is  a large natural pebble , often broken  into a 
suitable sized piece rather than carefully shape d. This 
waist may go to l" depth , but very seldom runs ri ght round 
the circumfenrencen, which may be as high as 20". One side of 
the stone is  usually flatter ,  the other more rounded; but 
again ,  this is  not invarinable--the tools have been made i n  a 
rough, ready way, to serve purposen, not taste. About one i n  
thre e is  a whole , huge pebble , unbroken. The common mate­
ri als are biotite granite and quartzite , but a good many are 
of chert and other seemingly non-local materinals. 
The waist is  the di agnostic feature. But the essential 
face of the tool comes from one good , wide , hammering end.  
This is often worked down almost flat, e i ther on purpose or 
by use. A minority have use marks at both ends. E ight out 
of te n are waisted close to the mi ddle point , the rest very 
asymmetr ically. Eight selected from the Bongkisam sample as 
looki ng nearly "perfect" are shown i n  the first table on the 
following page. 
This frequent asymmetry can hardly be accidental , and 
has to do with the we ighti ng of the tool , which was suitable 
for heavy workn, such as phases ( i )  and (i i)  bre aking the ore 
i n  the first place and hammering the bloom there after. 
These wai ste d stones certainly carry a punch whe n swung
hafted to a wooden handle. They normally we i gh over 4 lbs. 
against average 1 lb. for the hammerstones. The second table 
on the followi ng page gives some representative measureme nts 
for the Bongknisam group. 
\ 
24 1 
Vifaisted Stones (Bongkisam)o: "Symmetry" Pattoern, 1955 
Distance from one end of stone to 
Material nearest margin of its waist (in inches)
"Top" end " Bottom" end 
Igneous (diorite, 3 4 
quart zite) 2½ 3 
3½ 2½ 
1 2 
1 1½ 
Other (chert, meta­ 1 3 
morphosed dacite) 2 2½ 
3 6 
Waisted Stones (Bongkisam) by Sub-Types, 1955 
Material Length Breadth \\Te ight(in.) (in.) (oz.) Comment
A .  Igneous 
a. whole stones 8 6 162 Huge round p ebble 
8 7 193 Huge p ebble 
b. half-stones 6 4 so 
or less 6 5 73 
7 3½ 43 Much broken 
5 3 47 Very big waist 
B. Other 
c. whole stones 8 4 99 Delicately made 
d .  half-stones 12 7 167 Only 1/8 waisted 
or less 10½ S½ 163 Broken 
7 5 68 Ve ry faint waist 
10½ 6 105 
9 6 109 Very deep (4½") 
The non-igneous waisted stones tend to run a bit larger,
partly because natural "pebbles" o f  igneous stone rarely ex­
ceed 8' x 7' and it is more difficult to e·xtract t.hem from
larger blocks without bad shattering. Evidently there was a 
technique for separating out the lumps of workable softer stone 
from their original deposits. This could be done with metal 
tools. Similarly, a good igneous from Buah in 1966, a half-
24 2 
stone, was 8" x 4½" at 56 ozs.; and two from Sungei Ayer, 
6½" x 4½" at 73 ozs. and 6" x 4½" at 74 ozs., compared with 
two nono-igneous (shale) of 9" x 4" at 168 ozs. and 5½" x 6" 
(but very thick, to 4") at 143 ozs. 
One of the few significant differences between the, Bong­
kisam tools and those at Jaong earlier, is in the size 
(rather than shape) of waisted stones: 
- -Over 50% of Bongkisam waisted stones are 8" or over 
in length, as compared with only 33 % Jaong waisted 
stones. 
--33 % of Bongkisam waisted stones are less than 5 %  in 
breadth, as compared with 47 % Jaong. 
But these differences reflect a trend to larger size 
later, not anything absolute. Some Jaong tools are just as 
bigo- -and asymmetrical--as any at Bongkisam, the Jaong record 
length being 13½", breadth 7½" , a monster. 
There is a distinct tendency for waisted stones to occur 
in loose pairs. Nearly half of them from Jaong were withoin 
12" of each other, for instance; and there were at least 9 
cases iri 1952 where three were found within a few inches. 
The association of waisted stones with slag is positive 
in Bongkisam, though odd ones occur away from it - -and in re­
cent times any Malay fisherman, finding one, adopted it .to 
serve as an anchorstone for the sampan. A Jaong 1952 sample
of 70 waisted stones studied in situ gave comparatively few 
in the slag-poor sectors, which comprised the larger part of 
the excavations in that year. 
Jaong Waisted Stones and Slag 
Position in relation to main Numbers in this 
slag concentration by depth category 
Above it 1 3  
Amongst it 3 0  
Below it 19 
243 
(f) Waisted Stones in Other Prehistoric Situations 
The use of waisted stones for, among other things, delta 
iron-working, is hardly open to doubt. Yet, as with the 
hammerstones, there are deeper complicating echoes into_  the 
past and outside of the island. These must be heard in detail 
elsewhere, but merit a whisper here in so far as they strongly 
suggest the carry-over of an earlier, pre-iron technology 
transferred to the working of the key metal in a local con ­
text. There is, for instance, a direct visual parallel be­
tween the Santubong series and several stones excavated on 
Lamma Island, Hong Kong, in a neolithic association there 
with bronze relationships. The two lots are not identical, 
but strikingly alike, notably in the way the waist is pecked 
out and in its asymmetry with reference to the stones' center 
line. Some examples are illustrated by Walter Weinberger
(1948),o4 along with two stones where there is a depression 
on the broad sidea, but no waist--an effect noted on several 
delta hammerstones, and in some so accentuated as to give
the impression of a small mortar, for pounding some semi-soft 
substance. A similar delta mortar is included in the cate­
gory "other" from the Bongkisam stone sample [Table in (c)
above and illustrated as Plate 19 here). 
Dro. Weinberger pointed out the similarity of the Hong
Kong waisted stones to others described by Dr. - F. Maccarthy 
from prehistoric Australia, and he illustrates two from 
Eastern Australia which are almost interchangeable with 
"better" finished delta examples. Attention may also be 
drawn to a much earlier interest shown by the great American 
orientalist Bertho ld Laufer, who became positively excited 
at discovering what he termed "a grooved axe or hammer" 
( 19 12: S O);  he wrote:o5 
The greatest surprise among the stone implements
of Shantung is afforded by the find of a grooved axe or 
hammer of diorite (Plate XIII, Fig. 1),  9 cm. long and 
6 cm. wide, with a deeply furrowed groove running all 
around, about 2 cm. wide. It is the first and only 
known type of this kind from China, and of particular 
interest to us, because it is a type very widely spread 
in North America. The Chinese specimen is better worked 
than any from America known to me and exhibits a remark­
able regularity and proportion of form, that same sense 
for dimension which elicits our admiration in their most 
ancient productions of pottery, metal or stone. 
As this type stanods alone in the Chinese field, 
according to our present state of knowleodge, and is 
generally of greatest rarity in Asia, it will be appro­
priate to determine its position by calling attention 
2 4 4  
to finds o f  a related character in other regions. Only 
one of  this type, as far as I know, has become known 
from India. It was found at Alwara , two mi les north of  
the Jumma, and thirty seven miles wouth- west of  Allahabad 
by Mr. J .  Cockburn , placed together with a number of  
other stones under a sacred treen. It was figured andn· 
described by J. H. Rivett- Carnac ("On Stone Implements 
from the No rth Western Provinces of  Indi a,n" p. 6, Cal­
cutta, 1883)n, after whom it  is  here reproduced on plate 
XIII, f i g �  2 ,  a and b (upper and lower faces)n. The 
original is  now preserved in the British Museum. It is  
13 cm. long and 6.5 cm. wi de. Rivett- Carnac describes 
it  as made o f  a tough , grayish quartzite, somewhat re­
sembling a modern hammer in form, being flat at the ends 
and slightly curved on the upper surf�ce. A gronove has 
been carefully carried round the centre. The base has 
been hollowed out with equal care in a gouge- like form. 
The whole arrangement suggests that the hammer was at­
tached by a ligature to a wooden o r  withy handle, the 
legature being kept in its place by the upper groove, 
while the lower groove held the hammer in position on 
the rounded haft. Mr. Cockburn has pointed out certain 
minute marks,  especi ally on the lower groove, which s ug­
gest the possibility of metal implements having been 
used in the fashioning of the hammer, and it may be that 
this implement belongs to the trans ition s tage from 
stone to metal, when metal, though available, was s carce. 
Laufer goes on to detai l  other parallels from Saghalin 
I sland (north o f  Japan) and among the Ainu. We have italin­
cized his last sentence cited above, because in our view 
this may really be the answer to the function o f  at least 
· some of these tools outside Sarawak as well as in. 
• 
The various parallels indicated above are far from per­
fect, but too strong to be all merely conincindental. It is 
not suggested that every "waisted" or "grooved" stone has 
one common origin in place o r  one common function in  time, 
though i t  is  tantalizing to note that Laufer's Shantung one 
is  of  diorite and the Indian one of  quartz (his  Plate XIII ) ,  
both favored materials in the Sarawak River delta. On the 
other hand ,  i t  must be clearly stated that no similar artin­
facts in these or other materials have been found in any of 
the extensive Stone Age cave excavations carried out by one 
of us in the past decade for the Sarawak Museum in Sarawak 
and for the Sabah Museum in Sabah (North Borneo)n. To this  
extent the delta tools are not of  local origin time-wise. 
If any finger po ints here, it  is to both Indi a and China. 
Fuller re- study of the whole assemblage may further i llumi ­
nate.n6 
245 
Finally, we have from the delta several quite small 
stones p e eked with more or less incomplete pecked out waists. 
These seem too light to be effective iron-working tools, exo­
cept perhaps for crucible working. They may also have had 
r itual usage, as we suspect (see below)o. 
(g) "Pounders" 
Pounders and rubbers are pebbles and rounded stones 
large enough to batter betel nut or rub tuba root, evidently
in their present position through human agency, but not showo­
ing the distinct results of shaping or working as with waisted 
and hammerstones. Their uses remain anomalous at present.
Some of them assuredly were used at one or another point in 
the iron processes. 
A good example of a multi-purpose stone which does not 
make either of the more definite categories of hammerstone 
or waisted stone yet remains emphatic in style, is a 5" 
pebble, length 12.5 mmo, width 89 mm, maximum height 37 mm, 
weighing 495 gms. (17.5 obs. ) of dark diorite, turtle-shaped
--that is, gently domed above, flat below--from Jaong, 57/K, 
6-12", 1957 (Plate 16). This could be used as a rubber, a 
polisher, a pounder, a hammer or even a small "anvil"; and 
there are signs it may have, over the years, been used as 
all fiveo! The delta has produced no large anvil stones, 
suitable to support hot iron being hammered at the tool­
making stage; but these tend to be .valued and are not likely 
to be left about. At Jaong natural boulders may well have 
served as casual anvils, also (cf. V.27.e)o. 
(h) Shaped ("Ritual") Stones 
These strange objects are quite common at Bongkisam, but 
even more so at Jaong, where they also tend to run large.
Usually of local igneous rock, they always appear to be broken 
parts of longish, shaped objects, broader at the base, taper­
ing up, crudely faceted, sometimes with eight faces running
all up the stone, but much more commonly with six. They are 
believed to be connected with ritual associated iron-working, 
related to the "phallic tops" of the earthenware lidded 
boxes, the golden Z inga of the silver box in the Bongkisam
shrine and so on. 
246 
(i) Quartz Strikers (Pl. 20) 
These occur in a wide variety of forms, all due to use 
or breakage; and in iron-slag sites just as much as the 
Tanjong Kubor headland cem etery. Identical strikers occur in 
paleolithic levels at the Niah Caves in Sarawak and indeed 
almost any Borneo Stone Age site. They continued in use for 
fire-making in the Kelabit uplands of north Sarawak and Kali­
mantan until after the Japanoese Occupation ( 1945). This was 
certainly their main function in the delta. The crystals 
are always hexagonal faceted [cf. (h) above]. The average
size is about l½", but one from Bongkisam ( 1952) is 4 "  x 2 ", 
slightly abraded on one side. Whole or broken quartz pebbles 
come in all manageable sizes, usually with some "skin" r e­
tained on the pebble surface. 
(j) A Notable Absenteeo: Sharpening Stones 
There is thus much linkage of delta stone direct to iron, 
though this is not at all exclusive. One unexpected feature 
is the scarcity of knife-sharpening stones (whetstones) 
easily identified by flat wear. These are a frequent feature 
of any Borneo (and area) excavations with metal age aspoects, 
and often go with protohistorical (and recent) Dayak burials 
too. They are essoential apparatus for the native use of 
iron tools, and no man moves far on this island without one 
--often tied to his belt or in his "wallet." In the Bong­
kisam assemblage of stones none have been detected. One or 
two from other sites are more than tinged with the suspicion
of recent intrusions from the past century ; one of these is 
in s itu on top of a surfac e boulder in the Raso brook, site 
of the Museum's 1952 base camp at Jaong. An exception of 
merit comes from Jaong X/3 at 40-4 1 "  in the major slag con­
centration there. This is a broken piece of metamorphosed 
shale, of the kind that occurs geologically beyond Tambak (3
miles from Jaong) and is widely used for knife sharpening by 
modern Malays. 4 "  x 2 ", it is worn flat top and bottom with 
wear of metal blades. The breakage is such as to make it 
difficult to use, and it was therefore discarded. This 
singl e specimen is conspicuous (in the delta context). If 
anything, it implies that the people in the vicinity of the 
iron-workings were doing very little else, and had not much 
traffic with outdoor work for agriculture and forestryo. That 
would fit the tool-making pattern already indicated (V.26).
Had they been making or using finished blades on a large
scale, such stones "should" have been more frequent in the 
excavations ? 
2 47 
(k ) Stone Use in General 
The evidence is very strong for extensive use of stone 
tools in the delta iron industry. There is quite stiong 
evidence, tooo, for these having survived out of earlier techo­
niques, possibly even the Stone Age and its transition into 
pre-iron metallurgy. But it has to be recognized that the 
evidence remains meager in depth. No hafted example of a 
waisted stone has survived, for instance; nor is it likely 
that one would ever be found, under open sites conditions of 
decay in this terrain. The general reassessment for native 
iron industries and more intensive archaeology in iron-working 
sites, which is one of this papero' s  themes, might strengthen 
the pictureo, especially in sites where a very peaty soil en­
ables wood to survive over very long periods--as at Kota 
Batu, Bruneio, which however so far lacks any iron industry.o7 
Meanwhile, we can only deduce from the actual and seldom 
"obvious" evidence in the delta ground, augmented by ethno­
graphic experience of related activity in historic times. 
Three relevant aspects should be indicated here, before main 
treatment of historic parallels (in V I.33-37 ) .  The traveler 
Posewitz, earlier noted, described hammers of rock lashed to 
bamboo with rattan used to crush goZd ore in southeast 
Borneo.o8 No gold trace can be detected on any delta stone 
tool examined. 
The Kelabits were still using stone hammers lashed into 
frames in 1945 [see Plate 17 (b ) ] .o9 But the most elaborate 
of all accounts of contemporary iron-working in Borneo, that 
of Schwaner for the upper Barito in the northeast refers 
only- -and surprisingly--to wooden hammers.o1 0  
There has been an overlap between gold and •iron tech­
niques in southwest Sarawak, where the former also has an 
ancient, active place in prehistory, certainly pre-dating 
Jaong. Moreover, this went on at and around Jaongo, at least 
as far as search for the mineral went (V.29 following) .  
It would certainly be unwise to be in the least dogmatic 
or arbitrary about tool use at this stage. With two main 
processes (initial smelting to wrought iron, cruci�le treat­
ment for steel) variously widespread in the deltao, and a third 
(forging for tools; cf. 26 above ) likely on a smaller scale, 
there was a great scope for tool use, whether of perishable 
wood (and iron) or of abiding stone. The greater abundance 
of such stone tools--especially the lighter hammerstones 
which appear to distinguish earlier Jaong from Bongkisamo- ­
indicates an increase in finer work in the later delta phases, 
oro, more probably, a concentration of heavier work at upriver
Buah and of more finished processes down the river mouth at 
Bongkisam. 
2 4 8  
It is striking that there are no obvious major differ­
ences in stone types over the whole period--nothing compara­
ble to the changes in imported stoneware pottery, for example. 
This again suggests a strong, persistent local, indigenous
know-how, continuing into iron technology with artifacts 
dating back before it, and touching also almost as precious 
delta gold. 
(1) Historic "Waisted Stones" from 
Northern Philippines (Addendum) 
Since completing the main text of this chapter-- and 
specifically subsection (e) on waisted stones--one of us has 
been able to visit the Field Museum of Natural History at 
Chicago for a critical examination of some important shown- case 
exhibits of Philippine metallurgy there. 
Immediately relevant is the use of very large waisted 
rounded stones (which visually look j ust like the Santubong
granites) as hammers to beat out red-hot iron in an early 
twentieth century smithy collected from northern Luzon. 
These stones weigh twenty pounds and more, nearly double the 
largest from the Sarawak River delta. The waist also extends 
all the way around in a symmetrical style--as can be seen 
in the sealed displaysn. Either end was used to batter the 
metal, and both show heavy pitting, but no encrustation or 
other visible metal remains. There can.nbe no doubt, however, 
that these are first cousins to the waisted stones found at 
all our delta sites. The hafting and handling, described on 
the case and in an associated Field Museum booklet ,n1 1  as 
employed among inland pagans in the northern Philippines 
after 1900 A.D., are clearly applicable to Bongkisam before 
140 0  A.D. too. What now seems extraordinary is that nothing 
of the sort has (so far as we know) been reported to this 
purpose in the intervening 1, 30 0 or so miles, either archae­
ologically or ethnologi cally. 
V.n2 9 .  GOLD AND OTHER "PRECIOUS" MATER I ALS 
( a) Whole Gold 
Over 2 0 0  whole gold objects, mostly small, thin, flat 
leaf- shaped pieces, have been excavated over the delta years, 
and many others found by local people, back into Everett's 
(19 0 9 )  time. Beyond that, there is unmistakable evidence 
that gold was mined, in deep shafts, notably around Jaong 
and up thence from Buntal into Bako Bay. And gold has been 
panned at several places along the Sarawak River into his­
toric times, while Bau in the headwaters has been a gold 
field of international importnance into this century (Harris­
son)n. 
A note in the Sarawak Gaz e t te on 1 July 1874 describes 
a reef of rocks located about two miles from Buntal ( that is, 
one mile from Jaong creek - head) which runs out from the main­
land into the sea : 
The people of a small village which is situated close 
by, procure a living by collecting sand from the crev­
ice of this reef, which sand is said to be rich in gold. 
Malays and others panned gold from sand collected between 
boulders near the mouth of Sungai Binyokn,nabout two miles 
northwest of Buntal,  as late as 1895. According to geologist 
Dr. G. E. Wilford, the gold in the sand there was : 
Almost certainly derived from micrograndiorite intru­
sions in the headwater of streams draining the eastern 
slopes of Gunong Santubong of which the Binyok is the 
most important.n1 
This is the micrograndiorite whi-ch we j ust now met as a 
common source for the waisted stone tools, which are in their 
time- turn to some extent related to pre-iron activities 
( 2 8. e-f)n. 
All this was part of a very wide gold pattern for West 
Borneo in Southeast Asia, in some respects comparable to the 
pattern of iron at another level. This situation is reflected 
i·n the term "Golden Khersonese" which has been placed at 
different points by different authors, but in our view really 
reflects a whole "atmosphere" of precious metals- - t heir values 
varying with time. 
2 49 
250  
Here, as elsewhere very widely, gold pre-dates iron in 
the native mining tradition. This is generally the case. 
As R. F. Tylecote (2) has put it: 
Gold mostly occurs in the native state, and since it 
has such an obvious lustre one can be fairly sure that 
it was the first metal known to man. 
Gold melts at 1063o° and only needs to be melted at most 
(cf. iron 1540o°) .  In various places this was done by the 
crucible method, direct, without previous "smelting." As 
gold is very ductile, it can normally be hammered without 
prior softening- -nearly all the delta pieces have been thus 
simply treated--into beaten foil. With gold, the struggle
is largely in the search; and the knowledge thus gained be­
came of great help for other metals like iron, wheie discovery 
was only the beginning of the hard work. The eventual side 
effects of the golden quest are with us still--the continuing
Chinese extraction of gold at Bau in the Saro�ak River head­
waters, long after local iron has been forgotten,·o and, as 
R. J. Forbes (141) has it: 
Its (gold 's) supposed mystical and philosophical quali­
ties were the driving force of early chemistry and 
alchemy from which after nineteen centuries of strenu­
ous research our modern chemistry arose. 
It was equally the search for gold that stimulated so 
much outside probing into the Indo �Malaysian islands, espe­
cially from India, as Sylvain Levi has emphasized.o2 Profes­
sor Coedes has demonstrated that Indian exploitation of 
Southeast Asia was directly stimulated by developments in 
the last centuries B.C., when they lost access to their 
Siberian source of gold supplyo.o3 Whatever the sources, the 
whole area seems to have been combed for gold, with an inten­
sity hardly conceived of by later European "prospectors." 
As Anker Rentse well put it for the northern Malaya Peninsula 
in 1947, there are "traces of ancient mining evaerywhere in 
the jungle.o"o4 Theodor Posewitzo's  map in his Borneo shqws 
two major concentrations of then-known gold and diamonds 
[closely associated, cf. (c) below ] ,  one in the southeast 
corner behind Pulu Laut, the other and larger reaching from 
around Kuching through Bau over into the southwest corner of 
Kalimantan.o5 
It is more than likely that Santubong first attracted 
outside interest and exploitation metal-wise for its microo­
grandiorite gold. The gold objects recovered by excavation 
are nearly all unmistakably of local gold--the Chinese jewel­
ers in Kuching, expert in judging (and working) area golds,
have confirmed this on several occasions. These golden things 
251 
are not directly or co ns tantly as sociated archaeologically 
with s lag or other iron-working evidence . But they cons i s t­
ently appear i n  all types o f  delta depos i t, i ncluding all the 
main i ron s i tes and t he specialized "cemeter ies "  like the 
Kubor and Tegok headlands . Within Jaong, Buah, and Bong­
kisam, too, gold f i nds tend to  be concentrated i n  s lag-poor 
sectors, in close  as sociation with rare unbroken Chi nes e 
s to neware ves s elsn. 
Fifty gold objnects were excavated i n  the 1952 and 1957 
seasons at Jaong, readily divisnible i nto four categories--the 
first  two closely related, forming 75% of the whole: 
--30 are plain gold fo i l  
--1 5  are decorated fo i l  (usually dimpled) 
3 are small r i ngs 
-- 2 are gold beads 
Of these fi fty small gold objnects, 3 1  were closely as s ociated 
with whole small s to neware ves s els. Several were either in­
s ide t he ves s el, or covered by it i n  an i nverted pos it ion. 
There was also a pos i t i ve as s ociat ion  with glas s beads (V.3 1). 
In 1966 at Jaong, relat ively little attent ion was pai d  to  
this "burial sector" but a piece of  leaf-s haped gold foil 
was excavated i n  66/AZ , and the overall result is  representa­
t i ve i n  res pect to this and to  the as sociat i o n  with whole 
ves s els, of  which 6 were recovered i n  1966. Thus, nei ther 
gold nor whole ves s els were found i n  the slag-rich trench 
series of  M, X, and Y (cf. II.8). Tak i ng three trenches with 
sur face area 75 s quare feet i n  s lag - r ich Y and compari ng thes e 
with 3 trenches of  the same surface area i n  s lag-poor 66/A, 
we see t he previous  regular pattern repeated i n  1966: 
Jaong : Two Sectors of  75 Square Feet Compared
fo r Gold and Whole Ves s els 
Objectns Y/1-3 66/A 1-3( slag-ri ch) ( s i ag-poor) 
Gold 0 1 
Whole s toneware vesns els 0 5 
Glasns beads 1 8 
The commones t gold form at Jaong i s  t he roughly oval or 
double- triangle, "mo re or les s leaf-s haped,n" beaten out of 
fo i l  with a median cut breach-slit  running down the i nner 
third o f . the long axi s  [ as i n  Plate 2l (a)]n. Closely s imilar 
2 5 2  
gold objects have been reported and illustrated from an early 
iron-ore burial site with megalithic associations in I ndia 
(see V I .3 4.a, with related notes 14-15 there)n. 
Such clearly symbolic and non- functional objects are 
rare elsewhere in the delta and absent at Bongkisam. On the 
other hand, at Jaong there are no figures , human or animal , 
cut from the gold foil, whereas at Bongkisam there are ten. 
There is no Jaong gold comparable to six finely made golden 
needles from Bongkisam , which also had more and better­
finished gold  beads. These and other differences must be 
detailed elsewhere. The point is relevant here in confirm­
ing slight , significant , but not major,  shifts in style and 
emphasis , which we have already seen notably in crucible 
sizes and some stone tools ,  and which fit with the imported 
stoneware type changes. I n  particular, the Jaong gold forms 
are closely associated with the " native" symbolism of  the 
rock-carvings there; so very much a part o f  the iron-working 
site as a whonl e ,  yet distinct in feeling within it. The 
Bongkisam gold belongs to a wider tradition ,  later in the 
delta, and more readily interpreted in outside terms.6 But 
the heart of  the matter remains : that gold and iron co-exist 
throughout the delta .  This co - existence is , as it were, at 
the limit of  each activity ,  touching , overlapping a little ,  
if not conjoining. 
Remarkable confirmation of  this comes from other excava­
tions 300  miles northeast up the Sarawak coast , at Niah Caves. 
Here the roles are reversed. I ron slag now appears as the 
o ddity,  the precious thing , placed deliberately in remote 
cliff grottos and l edges where no one can possibly have 
smelnted the ore, but again associated with gold. I n  the 
Lobang Tulang mouth of  Niah Great Cave , high up , difficult 
and dangerous of  access and shrouded in darkness, is a ceme­
tery dating--on the basis of  imported ceramics--from the 
T ' nang into the Sung as in the delta. Two paper-thin, gold 
foil pieces of  Jaong type were found there among the scattered 
bones. I n  her published report of  the Lobang Tulang excava­
tion, Barbara Harrisson (19 5 9 )  observes: 
This kind o f  ornament caused some excitement to 
our trained Santubong diggers; they knew it from the 
Jaong burial ground near Santubongn, where similar 
� ieces have been dug out by them along with the same 
sort o f  ceramics. 7 
Later, a small gold ring was found in this Lobang Tulang 
Cave , along with three big lumps o f  iron slag, which can only 
have been placed deliberately among the remains of  what is 
certainly a burial site,  with an underlie of  late neolithic 
stone- tools, through into iron. 
253 
The importance of gold in the present part of this delta 
study is that it provides a background for the finding and 
working of later metals, specifically iron. A people in a 
place with active gold traditions would have a readiness to 
understand and ability to assimilate the more difficult--in 
the delta setting much more difficult--skills involved in 
extracting and smelting from iron ores. I t  is notable, alsoa, 
that across the Kalimantan border in the headwaters of the 
Kapuasa, the Maloh people have specialized in gold work and 
continue as itinerant goldsmiths roaming all over interior 
Borneo even in the present disturbed politics, carrying on 
part of an ancient metal craft in the same persistent way as 
the hill folk have continued some of the prehistoric iron 
processes (see further at VI.36. f)a. 
(b) A Heavy Ring of Lead 
Tin was long traded from parts of Southeast Asiaa, and 
is a major export of West Malaysia today, though unrecorded 
as a Borneo industrya. There is no sign of it in the delta 
excavations. 
Lead is much less well-known on the area's record, 
though Posewitz maps source sites near Bau in the Sarawak 
River headwaters as well as across the Kalimantan border.a8 
It is of interesta, therefore, to find as the o n ly fully (if 
crudely) finished and well preserved base metal artifact from 
the delta an ear-ring of lead [ Plate Z l (b) ] and of a type 
well known to Asian archaeologists. 
During the 1955 season at Buaha, this heavy ring was dis­
covered in D 3/4 trench at a depth of 6-7". In design it is 
an interrupted circle with a thickening curve of metal which 
swells to heavy ends at the cut-breach. At its greatest 
diameter , the object isal" (25 mm.) acrossa. The narrowest 
width of the ring is 8 mm. and its greatest breadth is 10 mm. 
The slit between its thick ends varied in width from 1 - 2  mm. 
It  weighs 24.075 grams , its specific gravity is 10. 5 and lead 
is the metal from which it was manufactured.a9 
This objaect is a characteristic j ewelry form recovered 
in several early sites elsewhere in Southeast Asia. Professor 
Malleret found 13 similar rings intact at Oc-Eo on the Mekong 
Delta and another 34 that were broken in half.a1 0  His rings 
were made of tin and cast in schist molds. He also recovered 
a number of the molds. Similar tin rings were found at Kuala 
Selinsing in Malaya.a1 1  I. H. N. Evans describes them as ear 
pendants and Professor Malleret seems also to feel this is 
the most likely function for these objects despite the fact 
254  
that it is not immediately apparent what exactly might be 
the actual mode of attnachment to the ear lobe. 
Profes sor Malleretn1 2  notes that jewelry made in this 
desnign has been found also in Burma and in Java and Bali. 
The Buah earring tes tifies to the circulation of objects 
and/or the common fund of metal practnices throughout the 
great area wasnhed by the South C hina Sea. It s hould also be 
noted that the ring was found s ubs urface, and pos sibly repre­
sents the end of the Buah occupation period ( on which also 
see I . 3. b . ii, las t paragraph)n. 
Such leaden rings  go far back in Borneo folklore. Mr. 
Benedict Sandin, now C urator of the Sarawak Mus eum , a Sea 
Dayak by birth, recognizes the Buah example as the s ame as 
that handsomely recognized in  his own Sea Dayak people's 
s aga of the Whetstone ( F arm) Festival : 
Reaching the mouth of Ulak Jawa, 
Which flows into the wide bay, 
Where there are thous ands of river mouths, 
But seven currents are meeting together. 
The bank is occupied by Keling, 
Whose lobes are lengthened by earrings of lead. 
The mouth is occupied by Laja, 
Who has big  eyes bright like full moonlight.n1 3  
Ulak Jawa ( "the eddy facing Java")  is believed to be 
the Barito in southeast Borneo. Keling is a close as s ociate 
of T utong, mighty blacksmith of the other world, whom we have 
earlier met ( at III. 19. c) .  
This is mildly but interesntingly s upported by two other 
unusnual metal pieces from similar high levels in  nearby Buah 
trenchesn--a piece of silver foil to be noted below [ at (c) ] 
and a second lead artifact from slightly higher up i n  the 
s ame trench as the one jusnt desncribed, D 3/4, 6-7". This 
second lead [ Plate 2l ( c) ] i s  a much more ordinary, lighter, 
rougher ring made by bending over a thin cylinder of this 
metal into a circle. The lead here i s  a little softer than 
in the more mas s ive piece, but clearly of the s ame general 
origin, as well as being found within a few inches of the 
other. The cylinder is 4 mm. in diameter, diameter of the 
circle 23. S mm, s ize of the breach- s lit (to fit ear-lobe? )  
3 mmn. when found--it is eas y  to close the gap to zero by 
finger presns uren. 
This ring can eas ily be vis uali z ed on the ear of a Kayan 
or Kenyah woman in the interior today. This therefore s ug­
gests  that its  more elaborate cousin which so interes ted 
Malleret belongs to both wider s ophisnticated and s impler local 
255 
traditions-- or rather, that these met at this point. Notice 
must also be taken of the special role of lead in the form 
of net-sinkers (as mentioned in the Chu-fan-ahih of 1225 
A.aD. )a1 4  apparently originating from China. It  woulda, for 
that mattera, not be very difficult to put these two lead 
rings from Buah down as net-sinkers; they are no less so than 
some of the clay objects that have been so classified. 
(c) Other "Metals" and Minerals 
A very few pieces of silver include a tiny piece of 
silver foil also from Buah , H/2, 0 - 12 " ,  1955 and the fine 
silver box in the Bongkisam shrine (see V. 30) certainly 
brought from afara. The shrine also had small pieces of lus­
trous black stibnite, an antimony ore which occurs in quan­
tity in the Sarawak River headwaters and was commercially 
mined round Bau in the last century ; cinnabar (mercury sul­
phide) and copper pyrites, both also occurring naturally in 
the area. Several pieces of copper foil were also excavated 
in slag-rich trenches at Bongkisam. There was a piece of 
another black mineral, columbite, in the shrine, too. Colum­
bite is known in association with tin in alluvial soils in 
Malaya. The several minerals mentioned were mixed up with 
with the unusual and semi-precious "stones" to be described 
[ (d) below]a. None of them have any other special relationship 
to iron prehistory as at present knowna, but it will be noticed 
that both antimony and copper occur ·in the upriver iron ores 
( IV. 2 1) .  The presence of these little bits of sundry miner­
als in the shrine is to be linked with prescriptive practices 
widely encountered in both Hindu and Buddhist ritual deposits 
and in itself reflects a deep concern for such materials. 
[ The distinction here made between minerals and "stones" is 
rather arbitrary and partly based on a contemporary j udgment 
of values. It is likely that a l l  these colorful or shapely 
or curious things were thought of more nearly at one level 
of interested status-taste in Borneo a thousand or so years 
ago; see also Appendix C.a] 
(d) Diamonds and Other "Jewel Stones" 
Southwest Borneo has a venerable diamond tradition inland 
and mainly centered over the Kalimantan border, but extending 
into the headwaters of the Sarawak River and adjacent systems, 
notably the upper Sadong. The antiquity of this activity 
has not received sufficient attention, and cannot be properly 
placed in any time sequence so far.a1 5  
256 
The Land Dayaks in the headwaters of the Sarawak and 
adjacent Sadong and Samarahan rivers, as well as over in 
Kalimantan, became adept at diamond seeking, and there are 
several accounts of their methods. These represent a basic 
approach to ground exploration, and indeed could be easily 
conducted in parallel with gold search (and probably iron 
too) under suitable conditions and with this economic labor 
force highly skilled in the local terrain. Here is part of 
an early account written by Denison about the Sarawak Land 
Dayaks: 
A shaft is sunk about 4 feet, for a Karangan or 
bed of pebbles, which, when struck, is generally about 
3 feet in thickness. This is called Imbo, and is what 
is seen exposed in the banks of streams; it is useless, 
and is therefore thrown aside. Below the Imbo is an­
other Karangan called Pejal, from 9 feet to 12 feet in 
thickness, and in this the diamonds are found. The 
Pejal is very hard, being made up of a conglomerate of 
small pebbles, and is worked with a crowbar, it is care­
fully placed aside, washed in circular wooden trays,
and the diamonds separated from the pebbles. Under the 
Pejal a stratum of boulders or large stones is met with, 
to which is given the name of Ampan. With this the 
shaft is abandoned, as no diamonds are found in or below 
it, but only mud or sand with perhaps a little gold.
The size of the shaft varies according to the number of 
persons working: one man will sink a shaft one fathom 
square, while a party of four will not be satisfied 
under anything less than 4 or 5 fathoms. The shaft is 
driven down the perpendicular, and should water be met 
with, the diggers work in the water and drive for the 
Pe jal. One way of working, adopted both in the river 
and on "terra firma", is to sink a shaft till the Pejal
is met with, and then drive another at right angles, 
following the course of the Pejalo. This is dug out and 
brought to the perpendicular shaft, where it is handed 
up to the surface in baskets.o1 6  
Not surprisingly, no whole diamonds have been excavated 
in delta sites. Semi-precious (now) and other "jewel stones" 
occur in small numbers, in this order of frequency: 
(i) Carnelian- agate : common, mainly as hexagonal
faceted beads, but sometimes more elaborately (cf.
other shaped stones at V . 2o8.h) . Occasional in slag­
rich areas, where some show signs of heat distor­
tion--3 occasions at Jaongo; and 1 at Bongkisam which 
was excavated with a clay ball ( III.16; Plate 15).
India is a known source of these materials, but they 
occur widely in Asia (Burmao, Japan, etc.).  No local 
source is known, however. 
2 5 7  
(ii ) Roak- arystaZ : several pieces, some as beads, some 
as lumps, including one is Bongkisam shrine with 
nos. iii to v. 
(iii) Sapphire (corundum ) :  one, large glossy pink. 
(iv ) Aquamarine (beryl ) :  a nice violet one. 
(v) Gem hyacinth (zircon): one small, red, transparent.
(N.B.: zircon contains the element zirconium, used 
in some modern steel metallurgy.) 
The first two are w idely found in mainland excavations, 
and there are particularly close parallels with carnelian 
and rock crystal pieces found at Kuala Selinsing on the west 
coast of Malaya, a site which shows many affinities with 
Santubong though the iron aspect has not been examined.o1 7  
The last three are not known to occur naturally in the 
area. All threeo1 8  were excavated with the golden Z inga 
silver box and other "Tantric" things in the Bongkisam
shrine, to be discussed next. 
V. 30.  " INDI AN" ASSOCIATIONS AND THE TANTRIC SHRINE 
Material objects--in the iron-working sites and obvious­
ly "part of them"n--which can be allocated definitely to 
" Indian" products or contacts (using "Indian" in the loosest 
sense) are few in number but significant in terms of cultural 
impact. Those found before excavations began have been de­
scribed in detail (Harrisson)n; those recently excavated are 
fully discussed in another paper as indicated in our preface 
(O'Connor) . 1n This cluster of objects, a meager number in 
the face of the hundreds of thousands of pieces of Chinese 
stonewares, all evidence that the Buddhist ideas and ritual 
associations found some favor with an element, perhaps a 
tiny elite, of the ancient delta inhabitants. All of the 
generally "Indian" objects relate to the sphere of the sacred, 
operating to shape and define reality. They are counters 
for, and indicators of, the passage of ideas. They seem to 
stand i n  another sphere of meaning from the much more exten­
sive contact in Chinese things- - as amply demonstrated by the 
Chinese stonewares strewn wide and settled deep along the 
fingers of the delta creeks. These waresn, dense and marvel­
ously hard and smooth to touch, were used by the Borneans as 
value objects and grave furniture in a system of ideas, prac­
tices and meanings shaped here by local hands, no longer 
recognizable in one distinct theology. We see in the delta 
a massi ve import of trade goods, things from China (and per­
haps technologies)n, but they appear to exercise a more dif­
fuse grip on the local imagination; whereas those lesser im­
pacts from "India" opened up, at least indicated, more capa­
cious intellectual horizons , from outside. The distinctions 
should not be overemphasized, but are implicit, especially 
in the later phases at Bongkisam. 
It s hould be emphasized that when we speak of either 
"Indian" or "Chinese'' impacts on this southwestern Borneo 
coast, we do not necessarily imply the physical presence in 
significant number or function of natives of either of those 
distant countries. It is abundantly clear that the delta 
played a p art in the great web of international trade linking 
Western Asia, India, Southeast Asia, and China. It does not, 
however, appear to have been a major entrepot facilitating 
the direct, through international trade, such as already 
proven for several ancient sites bordering the Straits of 
Malacca--Pengkalan Bujang in Kedah and Takuapa i n  southern 
Thailand (Alastair Lamb, 1961) .n2 Both of these mainland 
sites, unlike Santubong, are rich in the debris of Middle 
Eastern glass, and other objects of clear Western Asian prov­
enance. With a major exception, no glass vessel has been 
2 5 8  
259 
excavated whole at Santubong; and no coins or blue or other 
characteristic ceramics of the Middle East have been recovered. 
Rather than a multiple entrepot for actual outside trade goods,
Santubong would appear to have been a substantial center for 
the collection of products including metals, supplying these 
products to other Southeast Asian entrepots, including per­
haps at Brunei, in Indonesia or on the Malay Peninsula. 
Some evidence to support these speculations that Santu­
bong may have received its Indian and Chinese trade goods
and cultural impacts indirectly, by contact with other major 
centers on mainland or maritime Southeast Asia, may be de­
rived from the writings of the Chinese K ' ang T ' ai and Ch 'ang 
Chun who visited mainland Southeast Asia in the third and 
seventh centuries respectively. As 0. W. Wolters has demon­
strated ( 173o-8), both envoys described the southwestern coast 
of Borneo in terms of a kingdom that lay east of the Malay
Peninsula. Their accounts are not based on first hand knowl­
edge, but on hearsay apparently picked up from marinerso' 
tales circulating in the ports of mainland Southeast Asia. 
There is no firm literary evidence for the direct exchange
of missions between China and Borneo before 977 A.D. when 
Po-ni or Brunei sent its first trading mission to China 
(Wolters, 175) ; but, of course, trade as such could have pre-
dated this formal contact. 
There is a body of archaeological evidence pointing to 
the existence of scattered "Indianized" occupation in the 
river valleys of southwestern and western Borneo. In addi­
tion to the Santubong material, a hoard of metal sculpture
of generally "Javanese" style has been found in the vicinity
of the ancient gold mining fields at Sambas (Harrisson) . 
Sanskrit inscriptions have been identified at the headwaters 
of the Tekarek River. Professor B. C. Chhabra assigns them 
to a date "somewhat later" than the famous yupa inscriptions
of King Mulavarman found in eastern Borneo, which are thou�ht 
to date from about the beginning of the fifth century A.D. 
Batu Pahat, the find-site of these inscriptions is described 
as being in the basin of the Kapuas River. However, Profes­
sor Alfred Hudson has drawn the authors' attention to the 
fact that Batu Pahat, as located on Map 10b in the Atlas van 
Trop is ah Nederland, is not in the Kapuas drainage at all, but 
in the drainage of either the Lida or Semandang River, and 
other features of the original report require confirmation. 
! 
There is a fairly substantial body of generally :"Indian­
ized" remains along the reaches of the navigable Kapuas River. 
A large inscription, apparently in Sanskrit, was identified 
by two American missionaries in 1840 on the right bank of 
the Skiam River at its juncture with the Kapuas.o4 The mis­
sionaries also reported that "rude images of the sacredo- cow" 
2 60 
had been unconvered on the Spau, another tributary of the 
Kapuas, and that slabs with inscriptions and an image o f  a 
"female sculptnured in stone" had been located at Sanggau
Town on the Kapuasn. These last objects had reportedly been 
removed for shipment to Batavia (present Djakarta) but the 
vessel on which they were shipped was lost at sea in passage.
Lending strength to the reliability of  this intelligence is 
the fact that sandstnone figures have been recovered from 
earth terraces at Sanggau ( F n. D. K .  Bosch, 19 2 0 ).n5 F urther 
testimony to early Hindu-Buddhist occupation has been noted 
some twenty miles above Sanggau at the confluence of  the 
Sepaoek and Kapuas Riversn. A mukh a linga, a phallic emblem 
with a small face on its top part, found there can be dated 
to sometime before the ninth cent ury (On'nConnor, 19 62 ) .n6 This 
emblem bears the most marked similarities to mukhanlinga found 
in Cambodia and dating from the pre- Angkorian period--that 
is, before the ninth cent ury A. D .  The parallels are suffi­
ciently striking to raise the possibility that in the pro t o ­
historic period, the soutnhwestern coast of  Borneo responded 
to cultural initiatives from F unan and its successor kingdoms 
Chen-la. These cultnural exchanges could have been relayed
via the chain of early city- states and trading stations 
strung o ut along the shonres of the isthmian tract o f  the 
Malay Peninsula which were under the hegemony of  Funan. 
When added altogether, the number of  Hindu-Buddhist ob­
jects found in westnern and southwestern Borneo wonuld indicate 
that this section of Borneo was in minor contact with India 
or with " Indianized" peoples in So utheast Asia. It may be 
useful here to sum up this aspect of association by quoting 
a small part of o ur 1967 Bongkisam shrine report, slightly 
edited for this purpose: 
The Bongkisam deposit operates along with an ele­
phant tile, a stupa finial and a Buddha image disconvered 
at adjacent Bukit Maras--uphill from Bongkisam- - to add 
a cluster of " Indianized" objects to  the delta pict ure . 
Other objects in this tradition surely remain in the 
gronund, since it has been impossible to excavate some 
potentially rich areas of  Bongkisam, because of the 
value of  fruit and rubber plantations on the site. It 
is apparent, however, from the matnerial now available 
that the delta trading stations were subject to intel­
lectnual and material impacts that affected the spiritnual 
life of the other and (in this sense only) more "devel­
oped" areas of Soutnheast Asian. 
The Bongkisam deposit wonuld appear to represent a 
rather late and mixed form of Buddhist tho ught: the 
Tantric . This conclusion is put forward tentatively . 
But the constnellation of  factors-- a  reliquary box, a 
261 
stone platform unsuitable for a "sanctuaryo," the exist­
ence of a small stone image in the deposit which is 
seated in meditation and is �ossibly feminineo, together
with a thirteenth century date (at latest) all make a 
Tantric interpretation plausibleo. It is also consistent 
with other Borneo indicationso. 
We would emphasize that the extraneous, ·non-endemic 
"character" of this f ind at Bongkisam is underlined by
the p resence of two elephants  among the gold objects 
(plus one on the tile found separately) as well aso- of 
semi-precoious stones of non-local origin, and the ritual 
deposit box itself made of a metal (silver) not known 
in Borneo (and evidently brought in ready made from 
elsewhere)o. The elephant is not indigenous to Borneoo. 
On the other hand, the golden sand and the actual 
gold from which the objects were made both came from 
the Sarawak Rivero. It is also easy to believe that the 
elephant and other figures were cut on the spoto, if 
under "outside" orientationo. But it is equally too 
difficult to assume that the rather intricate conven­
tions of the silver box were executed in the unfamiliar 
metal locally--anywhere in the immediate vicoinity of 
Santubong, anyway ? 
Indeed, the s ilver deposit box holding its gold
linga is at the furthest edge of known distribution for 
this sort of ritual objecto. None have been found east 
or north of Santubong; and nothing of the kind in the 
Philippines (for a recent wide review there see L .  
Rausa-Gomez in Philippine Studies , 15o, 1967, 1: 6 3-89)o. 
In this sense Bongkisam is near the "fag-endo," a far 
outpost of such esoteric impact  upon a highly organized 
local society of which theroe is, all through, strong
evidence here in the Sarawak River--speaking so elo­
quently, if obscurely, in the earlier c arved petroglyphs
of Jaong (cf. V.o32). 
V.n31.  CHINESE CERAMICS AND "WESTERN" GLASS 
Of all the artifacts assonciated with the deltan' s  slag 
and crucible, the stoneware and glass are the most evidently 
extraneous, as well as helpful to the investigator: provid­
ing, as they do, known classifiable materials in quantity 
sufficient for informed analysis . Moreover, this association 
with iron residues cannot be regarded as fortuitous or repre­
senting a situation peculiar to the Sarawak River delta. 
The same sort of pattern is duplicated sometimes in close 
typological detail, in known (though as yet generalized) 
association with prehistoric iron activity, for at least one 
other Borneo site, remote from Santubong; to the north in 
the Philippines; to the west in West Malaysia (notably at 
Kuala Selinsing on the west coast) ; and right across the 
I ndian Ocean at a number of  excavation sites along the coast 
of East Africa, such as Kilwa and Gedi. These parallels 
will be further indicated i n  the next part of this paper 
(VI . n3 3 -35)n. Meanwhile, these materials (the stonewares par­
ticularly) are so helpful in identifying sites positively-­
and to a considerable extent in "dating" them on sight--that 
this part of the delta data will be summarized rather more 
fully than might otherwise seem necessary in view of the 
lack of its apparently direct reference to the actual working 
of iron. The indirect reference is, in our view, so large 
as to countermand this consideration. ( A  much more detailed 
analysis of the delta ' s  related stoneware-glass patterns is 
proposed for separate publication . ) Since the glass is more 
difficult to correlate than the stoneware, we will summarize 
the quite extensive delta evidence on this first, briefly. 
(a) Glass Beads 
Over 99% of all delta glass excavated is in the form of 
small, monochrome beads ;  these may be taken as the main 
sample for present purponses. From an extensive field and 
museum study of 2,n472 delta beads after 1956, it can firstly
be stated that although they occur singly all over the place, 
including in slag concentrations, most of them are found in 
burial -type situations not immediately involved with the ac­
tual iron process. The association between glass and slag 
is not so close and consistent as is the case with slag and 
stoneware [ (b) below]n. 
Secondly, although glass and stoneware intermix, very 
few (if any) of the delta glasses were made in .nChina, whereas
262 
26 3 
virtually all the stonoewares were. Not nearly enough is 
known about early Chinese glass, but a regular characteristic 
is the presence of much plumbum ("lead h eavy"), uncommon in 
bulk in most other glass; some Chinese glass is also rich in 
barium, which is rare--except as a trace element--in other 
glasses. Therefore, these two elements are excell ent- -though 
not unfailing or exoclusive--indiocations for Chinese g lasses. 
Their absence in delta glass can be of importanoce as pointing
toward two different sources of imperishabl e trade goods con­
verging on the iron -working sites from different directions. 
A detailed set of analyses for selected Borneo glass 
was kindly made by Dro. Paul Perrot, Dr. R. Brill, and colo­
leagues at Corning Glass Museum, Corning, N.oY., in 1963. 
These showed l ead-heavy beads in the Brunei Bay area, far to 
the north of the delta sites, but none in the delta (Harris­
son, 1964) .o1 These results indicated that in all pre-Ming 
situations, the main glass had not come from China. To check 
and elaborate on this, another sample series was sele cted in 
1965, from Jaong (the biggest glass site) and Kubor in the 
delta, and compared with similar excavated glasso--from the 
Niah Caves, Katu Batu in Brunei, and elsewhere. These new 
r esults, again most caroefully analyzed at Corning, are not 
yet published. Once more, no lead-heavy glass was found in 
these pre-Ming delta sites, Jaong and Kubor, though two had 
lead (and two barium) traces up to 0. 1 %--compared with between 
15 % and 40 % lead for some newly tested from Brunei Bay samples. 
The main characteristics are v ery consistent, within the range
of normal sampling variation. These characteristics conform 
to the general criteria for "western" glass, as outlined in 
the papers cited. They point towards "the Middl e East," via 
India; it is not yet possible to pinpoint. 
The following table gives representative analysis re­
sults for three monoochrome blue or green beads (only) from 
Jaong, which can be taken as deposited before 1000 A.Do. there, 
compared with three  from the non-iron h eadland cemetery at 
Tanjong Kubor, which is as early as Jaong (possibly earlier) . 
There are no important differences b etween the six beads, 
from widely different archaeological contexts in the sites; 
and the three from Jaong are notably close to each other--by
bead variable standards. 
Silica is a common base in bulk for glass beads. The 
second position of sodium is the best charaocter indiocation 
for this s eries. There are also appreciable amounts of mag­
nesium and calcium in all. The Kubor series shows, as pos­
sibly significant if minor differences, the higher quantity
of potassium (2-5 %  cf. 0.5 to 0.7 % for Jaong) ; the traces of 
barium are from Kubor only. 
2 64 
Delta Glass Bead: Second Analysis Series ( Corning) 
(Monochrome blue or green beads only) 
Delta Excavat ions 
Compound Oxide of Jaong ( 3 )  Kubor (3) 
A .  3 A.4 A. 5 A. 6 A.7  A. 8 
SiO2 ( Silica) 81.4- 77n.7- 72 .1- 72.4 60.5- 67.8-
Na2 O (Sodium) 8-11 8-11 9-12 12n-15 15-18 12n-15 
Cao (Calcium) 3 . 0  5 . 0  8 . 0  5.0 7.0 6.0 
K2O ( Potassium) 0.5 0.7 0 . 6  2 .0 5 . 0 3 .0 
MgO (Magnesium) 2 .0 3 .0 4 .0 4 . 0  5.0 4 .0 
Al2 O3  (Aluminum) 0.8 1.0 0 . 8  0 .9 2 .0 1. 5 
Fe2 O 3  ( Iron) 0 . 7  0.5 1.1 0.6 1. 8 1.5 
TiO2 (Titanium) 0 . 0 8  0 .07 0 .1 0 .0 3  0 .07 0.08 
MnO (Manganese) 0 .16 0.5 1.2 0.02 0.3 0 . 82 
CuO ( Copper) 0 .07 0 . 5  0 . 0 1  0 .1 0 . 0 2  
CoO ( Cobalt) 0 .0 8  
SnO2 (Tin) 0 .12 
Pb (Lead) 0.1 0 . 0 4  
BaO (Barium) 0 .0 2  0.02 
SrO (Sulphur) 0 . 0 5  0 .06  0 .06  0.0 8 0.15 0.10 
Li2 O (Lithium) 0 . 0n1  0.0 1  0 .0 1  
B2 O3 (Boron) 0 .0 5  0.07 
C r2 O3  ( Chromium) 0 .0 2  
NiO (Nickel) 0 .0 1  
The glass beads of the delta may differ in various ways 
as between Jaong (or Kubor) and the later sites in Buah and 
Bongkisam. Butn, as usual, all fall within one broad pattern 
of similari ty. All may properly be treated negatively as un­
related to the more numerous stonewares, positively as a 
minor residue of movement from a westerly direction ( which, 
of course, could also have included many other, perishable
things). 
The glass beads were brought to the delta contemporane­
ously with (and some poss-ibly also a little before? ) the 
stonewares. The largest numbers occur in the burial sector 
at Jaong and the non-iron cemeterines--for instance 880 in 
one small plot of the Jaong whole vessel and gold sector. 
But as beads are seldom easily breakable , they were pretty 
well all put into full use, to decorate persons or as per­
sonal belongings. Those found in the deposit are thus likely 
26 5 
to represent funerary offeroings, corpse decoratoion (as w ith 
the cluster) or casual droppage. In any case, early beads 
can more read ily surv ive into later s ites than breakable, 
larger stoneware vesselso. Many of these same beads thrive 
today on the necks of Kelaboits, Kayans and Kenyahs, who have 
an elaboorate code of bead values to th is day. The d i stroibu­
t ion of non-cluster s ingle beads in the depos it is notably
upward at h igher levels, compared w ith other artoifacts: at 
Jaong 98% and at Buah 97 % are in the top 24" of the deposoit. 
It would not be r ight to leave the impressoion that there 
are no trends in bead shape, style, color, etc., through the 
d ifferent delta s ites--just as there are w ith other artifacts. 
Color may be taken as an exampleo: 
Glass Beadso: Color Compar isonso2 
(samples only stud ied) 
S ite 
Jaong Buah Bongkoisam 
S ize of sample studoied 
(number of beads) 1,442 8·4 460
Percent of color 
Red 32 52 49 
Yellow 1 5  20 2 3  
Blue 27 4 7 
Green 7 11 1 3  
Black 17 10 2 
White 1 1 2 
Other 1 2 4 
1·he increased Bongkisam and Buah proportoion of reds, 
yellows and greens, at the expense of blues (mostly dull 
blue) and blacks more common in Jaong represents a possoible 
change e ither in local taste (demand) or avaoilable supply.
But three colors, red, yellow and blue, form a majoroity under 
all cond itions--74 %, 7 6%, and 79% respect ively. So, a better 
way to put it m ight be that "plaoin" black or whoite beads de­
cl ine in t ime, in favor of br ighter colors. This raoises com­
plex other questoions, not to do immediately w ith iron, how­
evero! 
2 6 6  
( b) Chinese Stonewares : Association in Quantity 
The stoneware ( including porcelain) found in great quan­
tities--sometimes more numerous than crucible ! --gives the 
striking, internationally intelligible characnteristic to the 
delta sites, iron-working or other. A few pieces may comen· 
from Indo-China. But 99.9% is without doubt from Chinese 
kilns, made before 1350 A.nD. And 99.9% of it, alas, is in 
the form (or unform) of broken sherdsn- -a handful of whole 
small vessels have come from the burial sector at Jaong and 
half a dozen pieces, none perfect, from Bongkisam. Other 
whole pieces , some large, have been found in the creeks and 
rivers, but not, unfortunately, in an archaeological context. 
Its first value in relation to the iron work is as an 
aid to dating, on broad lines (cf. I.n4). Then-- apart from 
its intrinsic interest-- stoneware raises a set of puzzles 
both in connection with the slag and in relation to the whole 
set-up. Put simply : what do all these sherds represent? 
Breakage on the spot? Discard of ballast from ships or de­
bris from shophouses? Deliberate vandalism or ritual usage?
Some function in aid of smelting, kilns, " crucible" or what? 
To answer these and other questions involves precise 
statistical analysis from the field-work level and the deposit 
base up : much effort has been deployed to this purpose both 
in the delta and back in the Sarawak Museum in Kuching, over 
the yearsn. In the space available here, only short answers 
can be attempted, sufficient to clarify the strong yet ambiv­
alent linkage between imported fine ceramincs, flowers of 
high culture, and .locally processed metal, a full expression
of often allegedly "primitive" Dayak abilities. 
First , the broad relationship between the local iron 
industry and the wares imported from the mainland. A fairly 
easy way_. to see the scale of this association is by taking 
two of the big trenches excavated at Bongkisam in 1955, and 
comparing counted sherds of Chinese stoneware with sherd 
pieces of the crucnible used in iron- working, which are abun­
dant here along with a great deal of iron slag. In the 
following table comparable figures are given for "local" 
earthenware ( definitely not Chinese; cf. IInI.n16) and for the 
"western" glass beads previously discussed; and the l ast 
line gives the total for all 1955 Bongkisam trencnhes, includ­
ing II, JJ, the big ones. 
This proved to be a pretty representative sample of 
relative numbers of the different objnects most commonly 
found. The comparison is , of course , arbitrary. Crucible 
fragments are far more friable than most other artifacts ; 
the stoneware is highly durable in sherd form. 
2 67 
Bongkisam (1955) : Numbers of Sherds or Items 
Trench Crucibl e Chinese 
"Local" Glass 
(pieces) Stoneware Earthenware(cf. III.n16) Beads 
II 1,n476 26, 640 3 4,n3 0 5  388 
JJ 884 14, 3 10 14,n189 167 
All Trenches 
1955 3 , 10 7  49, 3 93 67,n668 659
At Bongkisam, as at Buah and Jaong, the ceramic trade 
and the iron industry have their residues literally side by
side. There tends to be less stonenware where there is most 
slag and crucible. There are places where slag and crucible 
are overwhe lmingly dominant. Even so, in maximum conce ntra­
tions of iron manufacture the stonewares are ne·ver wholly 
absent. For e xample, iri Jaong tre nch Y/1 of 1966, 5' x 5' 
produced 1,669 lbs. of slag and 95 lbs. of crucible ; in terms 
of fragments (sherds) counted this Y/1 gave: 
- - ca.  2 80 0  pieces of crucible 
10 6 stonenware sherds 
Two trenches of the same season and size, Jaong Y/2 and 
Y/3, further out from the main iron concentration by the 
Jaong creek, and therefore less rich in crucible, gave: 
- - ca.  420 pieces of crucible 
73 stoneware sherds 
Put another way for Jaong : 
Jaong 1966 Stonenware Sherds 
(a) In Slag Concen trations 
Depth Numbers of sherds 1
• n
(inches) TotalX/1 X/2 X/3 Y/1 Y/2 Y/3 66/M2 
0 - 12 1 0 2 2 4  2 5  8 5 65 
12 - 2 4  3 2 0 3 2  3 3 0 43 
2 4  - 36  4 3 2 48 2 0  14 2 93 
3 6  - 48 12 6 11 2 Ste rile 2 3 3  
Totala 2 0  11 15 10 6 48 2 5  9 2 34 
(a) = 2 . 8  per surface square foot. 
2 68 
Jaong 1966 Stoneware Sherds (cont ' d) 
(b) Out s i de Slag Concen trations 
Depth Numbers of sherds in
(inches )  Total66/A.1 A/2 A/3 A/4 
0 - 12 9 1  71 57 85 3 0 4  
12 - 2 4  12 8 2 7  44 57 2 56 
Totalb 2 19 9 8  10 1 142 560 
(b) = 5.6 per surface s quare foot. 
Every sherd of any kind excavated in the delta has, 
since the work began, been individually labeled with site, 
trench, depth and date as it was recovered on the spot. Thi s  
facilitate s  laboratory s tudy and exact reconsntruct ion of the 
pieces, and has als o furni shed the bas is for a general typol-
ogy of all the wares involve d in this traffic.n3 
To indicate the s cale and range of the s tonewares now 
being br iefly discus s e d, the followi ng crude table summarizes 
a large s ample of s toneware she rds from the Buah and Bong­
kisam iron s ites combine d ,  according to the main types put
forward in the paper jus t cited.  Weights are here used to 
indicate;  the s ample weighed nearly half a ton : 
Combined Buah-Bongkisam Sherd Sample, 
Clas s ified by Sarawak Museum Types 
Type Code Type Name Total we ight ofshe rds (ounces )  
A White wares  2, 585 
B Yueh types 3,n12 0 
C Celadons 1, 3 11 
D "Temmoku "  51 
E Green glazens 2 18 
F Tzu-chou 168 
G Coars e  stonewares 
(mosntly jars)  16,n464 
Total 2 3, 9 17 
2 69 
(c) The Scattering of Stoneware Sherds 
Certain initial conclusions may be  stated as relevant 
heren: 
(i) With the exception of Sung celadons at Buah, riowhere 
can we detect any trace of a specialized distribu­
tion of stoneware within any one site. 
(ii) On  the contrary, the effect is of a tremendous mi. x-
up of the different wares that are present, in every
imaginable sherd combnination within the limits of 
the type and time categories in any one site. 
(iii) Moreover, individual sherds from the same pot are 
frequently scattered over a very wide area laterally.
Instances of the same vessel may occur as much as 
50  feet apart, and 10 feet is commonplace. For 
example, a Yueh-type shallow bowl with rolled rim , 
light olive green in color and with incised decora­
tion, wh·ich was reconstructed to ·three- quarters com­
plete from Bongkisam, was found in 15 sherds scat­
tered about the two largest trenches and three 
separate smaller trenches, coveri ng a total area of 
approximately 3 , 0 0n0  square feet, as follows: 
Bongkisam (1955) Scatter of Sherds 
From Single Yueh Bowl 
Trench Depth Number of(inches) Sherds 
II 0 - 6 1 
JJ 6 12 1 
12 - 18 7 
18 - 24 1 
I/J/4 12 - 18 1 
I/J/5 0 - 6 2 
I/J/12 6 - 12 2 
(iv) Conversely, it is commonplace to find single sherds 
of one vessel in one trench, and no other sherds of 
it in association in that trench. 
The scatter of sherds from a singl e vessel was followed 
up many times. This and related work was concentrated largely 
at Buah, because there the archaeological deposit is deep as 
well as wide, whereas it is mainly shallow (48" or less) at 
270 
Bongkisam and Jaongn. Thus Buah gave an optn�mal scatnter po­
tential, vert ically as well as laterally . To calculate this 
properly, i t  had to be possible to assemble enough sherds to 
reconstruct the vessel more or less completely, an immensely 
laborious business. In the conti nuous D and E trenches at 
Buah, over an area 1, 221 square feet surface, t he maximum 
lateral scatter for any one reconstructed vessel was 24 feet. 
Nearly a quarter had a scatnter of over 20 feet, more than 
half over 10 feetn. If they had simply been broken i n  use, 
in situ , and remained undisturbed, one would clearly expect 
all of one vessel's sherds to be withi n  a few i nches. The 
following table summarizes part of this Buah pattern : 
Buah (19 52): Lateral Sherd Scatter for D and E Trenches 
Scatter D i stance Number of Vessels 
( i n  surface feet) Involved Percent of Whole 
0 - 3 19 24 
4 - 9 14 18 
10 - 19 28 3 6 . S  
20 - 29 13 16 . S  
3 0 + s 6 
Total 79 100  
It is further demonstrable that this sort of wide scatn­
ter is  general to all types of stonewares , and is not con­
fi ned to special sorts. See, for i nstance, the wide range 
of wares represented i n  t he 18 vessels with a 20n-foot or more 
scatter i n  the table on p .  268. The code letter and t ype de­
script ion i n  the first table on the followi ng page are as 
in the typology described earlier (table on p. 271)n. 
Looking at t he sample of 79 vessels another way, they 
can be examined vert ically i n  the deposi t  rat her t han later­
ally over t he site, by taking the sherds for each vessel as 
recovered by strat ified layers. So far as t he reconstructed 
vessels for Buah sectors D and E are concerned, the vertnical 
pattern is happily--for the reader--a good deal simpler than 
the lateral scatter (see the second table on the following 
page). 
The table on vert ical scatnter does not, of course, show 
the overall depth of the reconstructed vessels beneath the 
surface--only t he distnance between the shallowest and deepest 
271 
Buah Ves sels with Lateral Scatter over Twenty Feet 
Lateral 
Scatter Type Type name Number of
(in feet) Code Sherdos 
20 B.l Yueh (undecorated) 5 
20 E Green-glazed ware 52 
2 1  A.l.c Incised white ring bowl 12 
2 1  A.l.f "Ting" plate 8 
2 1  B.l Yueh (undecorated) 15 
2 1  C.l.c Celadon 10 
22 A . 1 . b  Spur-marked white plate 19 
22.5 A.l.f "Ting" 9 
23 A. 2.a  White ewer 16 
23 F.l Tz ' u-chou (plain) 2 
23.5 E Green-glazed ware 89
2 4  G.l Coarose stoneware 17
28 A . 2 . c Covered white box 1 1  
30 C.l.c Celadon 14 
30. S A.2.a White ewer 32 
32  B. 2 Yueh-type (decorated) 4 
33 G.2.g "Brittle" jar in coarse stoneware 8
34 A.2.a White ewer 9 
Buah: Vertical Scatter Maxima for D and E 
Scatter Distance 
(in layer inches) Number of Ves sels .oPercent
0 - 12 6 5  8 1  
13 - 2 4  8 10 
25 - 36 4 5 
37 - 4 8  3 4 
49 - 7 2  0 0 
Total 80  100 
sherds o f  a ves sel, regardles s  of trench. The following
table summarizes the information on this point: 
272 
Buah: Absolute Depth of "Concentration Points" 
For Reconstructed Vessels 
Depth "Type" of Vessels 
( % ) Total 
(inches) 
A B C E F G ( % )
0 - 12 15 8 5 . 0 3 3 34 
12 - 24 1 3 2 0 0 4 10 
24 - 36 3 0 0 0 0 0 3 
36 - 48 8 4 0 0 0 s 17 
48 - 60 23 s 1 3 1 3 36 
Total s o  20 8 3 4 15 10 0 
Summariz ing the stoneware scatter situation in depth 
for Buah, Bongkisam, and Jaong: 
(i) Very careful study of sherds by depth in any partic­
ular trench, or any particular site, fails to reveal 
any consistent "stratification"  in the ordinary ar­
chaeological sense, so far as individual wares are 
concerned. 
(ii) That is to say, the sherds of any "type" within the 
site may occur at any level--although, of course, 
there is a tendency for them to be scattered in ac­
cordance with other stratigraphical criteria (e .ng . ,  
there are fewer sherds in the immediately upper 
layers where there is no appreciable deposit or sub­
sequent top soil). 
(iii) Thus there are plenty of cases where pieces of a 
vessel are found from sub- surface through to the 
bottom of the same deposit. But naturally, again 
there is a tendency with any one vessel for most of 
the pieces to be in the stonewnare concentration 
layer ; for instance, at Bongkisam, a white glazed 
ewer, two- thirds reconstructed, category A.2n. a: 
Trench Depth Number of Sherds 
I I  0 - 6 4 
6 - 12 3 
12 - 18 1 
JJ 6 - 12 4 
12 - 18 4 
I/J/12 6 - 12 2 
273 
( iv) I n  general , stoneware sherds are concentrated in the 
6- 18" levels; on the sample studied this worked out 
at approximately: 
-- 65% at 6-18" 1n Bongkisam 
--45-50 % at 6- 18" i n  Buah (deeper total deposit) 
65% at 6-18" in Jaong 
(v) Often, within one 6" layer in any one trench , there 
is a massive mix-up if stoneware is numerous. For 
instance, at Jaong , in trench JQ , 0 -6" , there is 
everything except "Ting " white wares ( of which there 
is only one piece in the whole si te)n; and Tz ' u - chou 
(which is scarce anyway) .  Any rich trench at Bong­
kisam is l ikely to have all the Bongkisam types oc­
curring in its richest 6" layer. And similarly
elsewhere. 
(vi) An interesting and distinctive Tz  ' u- chou piece from 
Jaong illustrates wide latneral scatnter with minimal 
depth differentiationn. Pieces of this vessel were 
easily distinguishable because i t  is a hand-molded 
vessel with the relief uncolored and the background 
completely blackened in, and it is  also distinguished 
as being the only piece of Tz'u-chou with characters 
on the footn. This highly fragmented ewer was scat­
tered over the long JP series of trenches with a 
total lateral distance of not l ess than 10 0 ft.n, but 
all the sherds came from 0 -12" and nearly all at 
0 - 6 " .  
(vii) Below 18" in normal site patterns stoneware sherds 
b�come scarce, except under particular conditions 
at Buah with the very deep iron concentrat i.on 
trenches there. But even the deepest sherds within 
a site do not prove to be different or exceptional , 
let alone earlier pieces within the time phase at 
that site. This was well illustrated in the special
excavations at Buah in 1966, where several sherds 
from a rather distinctly shaped T'nang vessel were 
found in the top layers of the deepest trench , and 
then one unmistakable rim piece right down at 64"n, 
after a gap with no stonewares at all. 
(d) How Do These Stonewares Relate to the Iron? 
The delta stonewares comprised a wide range of Chinese 
kiln products ,  some of them beautifuln, some of poor quality ; 
some still little known from any other site in Soutnheast Asia 
2 7 4  
and not at all with regard to the manufacturing kiln-site in 
China itself. The principal comparable information for such 
ceramics outside China derives from the work now being done 
in the Philippines , notably expressed in the recent volume 
by Leandro and Cecilia Locsin.4 Santubong lacks any of the 
accepted kinds of Ming and later porcelains common furthern. 
north; otherwise the two areas have a great deal in common. 
In the delta ,  though, most of the vessels are fairly 
simple and utilitarian. " Fancy" pieces , figurines , and such 
like are rare by comparison with Luzon. It will by now be 
clear ,  too, that the mass of sherds excavated at Jaong, Buah, 
and Bongkisam came from vessels originally brought ashore 
whole. They are not wastes and breakages from the voyage: 
most would anyway have been more naturally dumped overboard 
in unloading. I t  seems likely , then, that they were in some 
sort of use ashore,  but were discardedn- - perhaps through acci­
dentnal breakage on the spot by people housed or camped about 
the workings; or perhaps deliberately broken as part of the 
ritual detail which was cert ainly associated with this as 
with any other major Bornean operation of the kind. The pos­
sibility of the sherds being actually used , for instance to 
reinforce clay in a kiln wall, is probably discounted by the 
fact of the whole vessel association; bags of random associ­
ated sherds would surely be more suitable for any such pur­
pose. 
I t  must frankly be stated that all of us who have con­
sidered this matter with some care, on the ground , in the 
field while excavating and at the laboratory end , on review­
ing all the evidence in an objective manner have come out 
somewhat b affled by the whole picture which is presented by 
the delta stoneware, whichever way one looks .nat it. 
Barbara Harrisson's study in some of the Niah caves 
should be referred to at this stage. She there developed 
part of the technique which has since been considerably ex­
tended, to analyze the fragmentation and scatter pattern of 
vessels, particularly at Upuising cave , up the Niah river. 
To quote from a 1965 report on that cave: 
A major problem which we have encountered constnantn­
ly over the past decade and more in Borneo excavations 
and which has also been encountered but seldom faced 
elsewhere, is the significance to be attached to indi­
vidual sherds and the relation between sherds and whole 
pots. An assessment of this problem is , of course , only 
possible after exhaustive reconstruction of all ceramics , 
which is often difficult to impracticable. Owing to 
its limited size and material , Upiusing proved a partic: 
ularly useful opportunity to study this aspect , specially 
275 
the amount of weight which must be attached to looting 
or vandalistic destruction, to assess the meaning of 
what remains in a burial cave in Southeast Asia today. 
If we do not assess this critical ly, the resul t can be 
extremely misleadingn. Therefore, this material has been 
special ly  studied from this point of view. Further re­
search is stil l needed into the extent of which vandaln­
ism was practised by outsiders or by the people them­
selves. In other recent work, 5 0 0  miles away, for the 
Sabah government in a burial cave, there was much evi­
dence for vandalism by Mohammedans wishing to take over 
pagan burial caves for other purposes, during recent 
centuries. As a protection against this, destruction 
of valuable pots was evidently practised in Upiusing 
and elsewhere in coastal areas further back in time. 
All  Upiusing ceramics were damaged in one of two ways: 
(i) specified parts of a pot were delniberately 
damagedn, which may or may not have caused it 
to collapse; 
(ii) a pot was fragmented subsequent to its col­
lapse.n5 
The special significance of the above study, from the 
delta point of view, is the statistical demonstration that 
there is major interference--here as in virtual l y  all  other 
caves studiedn- -with the ceramic pattern, even where stoneware 
has demonstrably onl y been brought to the caves for funerary 
or related ritual purposes ; and even where a considerable 
portion at least have clearly been brought as vessels and 
not simply as already broken sherds (though the latter has 
also occurred). No wonder, then, that any attempt to dis­
entangle exactl y what was going on at Buah or anywhere else 
in these open iron sites- - subject to al l sorts of secondary 
disturbance absent in the caves-- tends to be a l ittl e baf­
fling. 
Space preclnudes further efforts at de-bafflnement in this 
paper. We shoul d welncome suggestions from readers, offering 
more adequate explanations or new suggestions. Meanwhile, 
the absolnute intermixing of Chinese stonewares and iron slag 
plus "crucible" remains a major fact of past delta life, every­
where and at every level. 
(e) And a More Direct Relationship? 
The demonstrable intermesh of stoneware, crucible clay 
and iron slag in the Sarawak River delta ground, is only an 
indication of the great quantities of whole Chinese ceramic 
2 7 6  
vessels which were brought in many shapes and sizes into 
Borneo through these (and other) river mouths from the T'ang 
dynasty. Over centuries these spread into the furthest hin­
terland and became major items of material culture--especially
the "coarse stonewares" of type G, which can survive a great
deal of overland travel and then the rough and tumble of 
long-house life, waro, fire, deatho. The oldest of these big
brown stoneware "dragon jars" in 1945 were valued as equaling 
one human life among the far upland Kelabits of Sarawak and 
northern Kalimantan, while the similar but pale greenish 
jars of T' ang date favored by the Dusuns of mounotainous 
Sabah further north may rate considerably more than thato! 
These are a few relics of a past, vast international sea­
traffic in trade, in itself a reflection of island wealth in 
pre-European terms.o6 
V. 3 2  THE ROCK CARVING S OF JAONG 
(a) Petroglyphs of  Three Kinds 
Seemingly at the other end of  the cultural spectrum from 
the sophisticated highly-fired stonewares of China come the 
bold but crude designs painfully pecked out of the fairly 
soft sandstone rocks along the Jaong creek, all about and 
through the iron-rich parts of the site and not infrequently 
themselves encrusted from molten iron slag (V. 2 6. e). One of 
these Jaong petroglyphs was "discovered" by a Malay working 
in the swamp at the turn of  the century, but the rest have 
all been revealed by the Museumn' s  operations since World War 
I I 
This first-known stone is called Batu Gambar, "Picture 
Rock." I t  lies on the edge of dense mangrove at the head of  
a creek now only navigable in a small sampan on full tiden. 
This big natural sandstone boulder is carved with a striking
human figure, pecked out, probably with an iro n tool, in 
bold relief, nearly life sized. To it, the beginnings of  
organized archaeology in Borneo owe obeisance. This primi­
tive, spread-eagle figure has been cast-copied outside the 
Museum in Kuching; with such good effect· that the distin­
guished French scholar, Madame Celani in a monograph (1935)
discussed the original and the copy as two separate objects 
and ideas.n1 
The first delta trench was dug at the foot of  Batu 
Gambar, after full recon naisance of the whole area. It 
proved richly positive--slag, crucible, stoneware, earthen­
ware. F rom then on, this work never really looked back fro m 
the rich earth. At that time, early in 1952 , most of the 
upper Jaong creek outside a _thin line of  mangrove was convered 
with dense j ungle. In that and follo wing seasons, nearly
10 0 figures or forms were exposed by clearing trees, scrubs 
and humus to prepare the site; or during actual excavation, 
upon rocks under the surface. At least sixteen large natural 
boulders are thus worked. In 1964, all these were drawn to 
scale; a sample of the drawings are reproduced here to show 
the style (Plates 1, 2 2 ,  and 2 3).n2 
Three main sorts of rock carvings are involved : 
(i) Human figuresa, carved out in relief; often with 
female genitalia, never male (Plates 1 and 2 3 ) .  
2 7 7  
2 7 8  
( i i )  "Femin i ne s " - -what appear to be symbolic representa­
t i ves of female genitalia, without surrounding 
fi gure representations ( Plate 22) . 
(i i i )  ''Charactersn''--un intelligible but deliberate markings, 
some ti mes inc ised , whi ch some see as wri tten charac­
ters, d isturbed by the coarse rock med ium and by 
erosion (heavy on this stone) .  
The peculiar style , the "trad i t ion" of these rock carv­
ings is  unmatched in  Southeast Asia ,  e xcep t  perhaps in the 
the Tran N inh  P lateau in Laos.n3 I t  is  certainly " primit i ve" 
in a sense , but dynamic and intense as well. These are not 
casual do odles in  stonen, they are expressions of a powerfully 
held se t of  ideas. We have sensed the magi c  of the i ron 
slag (II.12)n. We can now fairly suggest that the Borneans 
involved in this iron and its  collateral act i vi t ies ,  magical ­
ly heat-transforming what was previously useless stone , 
laterite or limonite  on the surface , made i t  into new weapons 
of strength ,  poured the dynamism of the i r  animism and spiri­
tual energy onto a deep fee l ing for rocks, for the hard stuff 
of nature, for the fert i lity borne of geology. To cut and 
carve these in anthropomorphic or sexual metaphor could be 
both  natural and appropriate. Mother earth : Mo ther iron. 
( b) Block Cuttings 
The "block cut" boulders are simpler in design , as well 
as more numerous than the more varied ones so far consindered. 
They do not occur on the same boul ders as those . They show,  
in Abdul Aziz 'ns good term ,  a de c i ded "oneness.n" They are 
more numerous than the other t ypes,  more consistent in style , 
and literally "all over the place" along a 690 - foot strip 
from the creek landing point to Batu Gambar. One very large 
rock between the Raso brook and X/3 trench ( iron-rich) is 
cut in this way a l l  over its wide domed surface of some 300  
surface square fee t. Others have been unearthed 12" down in 
excavat ion , buried by human and then jungle deposi t i on. I t  
just might be argued that the human figures and feminine 
organs "happened to be there" before the i ron-ceramics trade 
came along and settled co incidental l y  at the same place. 
This will not do at any stretch for the block forms, which 
dominate the rockscape , show the same pecking technique with 
iron po ints, and are mi xed up with the slag,  including slag­
concentrat ions,  even more fully than the others. 
The rock carvers were probably already there--or already 
rock carving , anyway- - when the iron-workersn' influence came 
in. But that in this place the who l e  petroglyphic operat ion 
2 7 9  
precedes the metallic is inconnceivable, with the two thus 
intermixed, yet with none of the equally suitable and workable 
rock faces on the other side of the brook or elsewhere in the 
Sarawak River basin touchend--and search for parallels on the 
abundant other boulders all round Santubong Mountain has over 
the years been as intense as it has been unsuccnessful. 
Many attempts have been made, by the present writers 
now and numerous expert visitors over the years , to "explain" 
these block- cuts . They show no obvious symbolism , though 
once more the sex link is occasionally, more thinly, indicat­
ed. They di d not serve any utility functinon. They were not 
left as pieces of  the soft sandstone chipped out for some 
other purpose. The shape and outline vary, but the same 
form and exactly the same "pecking" technique is repeated
again and again. They are : 
--roughly parallelograms; 
--never with curves; 
--but occasionally with 1 or 2 small holes inside the 
the line, usually near one or both ends ( ?  sex motif)n; 
--usually on top of the boulder, but also anywhere , 
especially if the top is already used--e . g. ,  on an 
overhung rounded si de. 
The most emphatic cuts are in the junction between the 
Raso brook and the Jaong creek, around and among the slag 
concentrations. Many lesser rocks and groups of rocks are 
cut and no doubt others with the cuts still buried. The 
first table on page 280 reports the sizes of the cuts for 
two main rock groups. I t  will be seen that there is--by 
delta stanndards--connsiderable consistency in dimensions. 
None are less than 18" nor more than 3 '  long, less than 5" 
or more than 12" broad. 
The measurements cited are representative for a larger 
series studied, all closely siminlar. I t  will be seen that 
in no case is the length less than twice the breadth, and in 
most cases three times. Further, the longer the block-cut, 
the most the tendency for this ratio to increase (see the 
second table on page 2 80 ) n. The larger the cut, the higher 
the length : breadth ratio is likely to be. I n  brief, by no 
manner or means can the shapes so cut be regarded as other 
than deliberately arranged, reflecting specific ideas in the 
sculpting mind. 
To those who today cannot see any sexual phall ic sym­
bolism, these blocks cut long ago in the living rock may be 
offered alternatively as king-size memorializations of the 
crucibles in the ground below and all around. 
2 80 
Jaong :  Block-Cuttings 
Sizes (from the east side of 
each rock anticlockwise) 
Rock Number of blocks 
Code on this rock Length Breadth 
(feet) (inches) (inches) 
A/1 8 2 11 9 
2 11 8 
2 8 8 
2 8 5 
2 7 6½ 
2 6 8 
2 3 6 
2 3 S½  
A/2 3 3 3 7 
2 1 6 
1 6 6 
A/3 7 2 8½ 9 
2 7 5 
2 6 9 
2 5 8 
2 3 11 
2 3 6 
2 1 9 
A/4 10 2 9 9 
1 11 7 
1 6 7 
1 4 9 
1 4 7 
1 3 7 
1 1 7 
1 1 7 
1 1 6 
1 1 6 
Jaon g :  Variation in Block-Cut Sample Measurements (in inches) 
Maximum Minimum Total Range 
Length 39  1 3  26 
Breadth 11 5 6 
2 8 1  
But whichever what way you read the Jaong stone language,
it speaks for a virile people using new techniques in metalo­
lurgy in terms of an own, older theologyo. This early Jaong 
metaphor was lost as time went on, perhaps under increasing
outside pressures (like Tantric Buddhism) down nearer the 
coast at Bongkisam. But it has a surviving continuity inland, 
with the Kelabit megalithi�-as also with the Kelab it black ­
smithso. 5  

283 
,, 
(_ 
( 
·�". . 
• V 
.. 
Plate 13 . River Pebb le Encrusted with Iron Slag. Excavated 
at Jaong, Trench M/2, Depth 3 3 - 34"  . Natural s i ze 
(Chapter V . 27 . d) .  

2 8 5  
.,,.
.
,. _..
=-! 
, 
� .
·•
. •
, . i
  ·• 
.,-,: -.: 
,.. 
Plate 14n. Stones Encrusted with Iron Slag. Bongkisam, 
Trench Z/4, Depth 0 -6"a. Natural Size. Shading 
Indicates Area of Slag (Chapter V . 27 . d)  . 

287 
t!> 
0
" 
() 0 
" 
• 00 
. 
/J 1/�  0 
0 I 
. � . i 
0 
0 
0 
, 
' 
' 
, 
Plate 15. Stone Coated with Clay and Bearing Traces of 
Ferrous Material. Pottera' s  Anvil or Ritual Obj ect. 
Bukit Maras, Trench A/2, Depth 6-12". Natural 
Size (Chapter III.16.3)a. 

. . - � . • .
•1 _ ..: . . - -... .. 1 ' ...,  . '.. · :.. • : . '"':•r•r.·..•  •··\....  
... �' <',; ...•   ·...•.•.  Jlo!>...�-   ' •  •J• I.,.J:,. . " '·.. . , . •. ...... .... � · ... ... I .  -�.. , .......__.  '\ · .-...,.. , \. . .. .! .. .•.c I. � ....- .--- ,·,/�  , ,. \.-:4 
...........-..
Plate 1 6 • Multi- Purpose Stone of Diorite. Jaong, Trench 57/K, Depth 6 - 1 2 " .  
Natural Size (Chapter N V . 2 8 . g) . 00 
I.O 

291 
(a) Ston� Hammer in a Sling of Bamboo and/or Rattan (After 
Hose and McDougall ,  Plate 107)a. Reduced Scale (Chapter 
V . 2 8 . d) . 
(b) Kelabit Smiths Using Stone 
Hammers (After Hose and 
McDougall, Plate 107)a. 
Reduced Scale (Chapter 
V . 2 8 . d) . 
.L I '  
'I � """ '•  •. 
(. 
Plate 17 

2 9 3  
Plate 1 8 . Wa isted Stone . Sunge i Ayer ,  Trench W/C ,  Depth 
6 - 1 2 " .  Natural Scale (Chapter V . 2 8 . e ) . 

2 9 5  
I 
I 
I 
I 
I - --- - - - - - -
I 
I 
I 
I 
I •
I - . .I • • • � II• ; 
I • •  i • . 
• • 
,,. - 1. ,:c.,
J
" '· 
·�� 
· a  
«:.•, '
 ' ; .�•. . 
• • • .. 
• . . •, . 
� . . .  -
I 
I 
I 
I 
I 
I 
I 
I 
I 
I 
:.t1 ....'). - ...� ...  
 
., - : 
•  .,.
. � .... .
� t.. ••  
Plate 19. Stone with Partial Waist. Possibly a Mortar. 
Bongkisam, Trench Z / 1  (A), Depth 12o- 18". Natural 
Size (Chapter V.2 8 .f) .  

2 9 7  
----
I..... 
. .l•.  ,
Plate 20a. Quartz Pebble Fire-strikers. Excavated from 
6-12" (top two) down to 42-48" (bottom one) ; 
top right from Bongkisam, rest from Jaong. 
Natural Size (Chapter V.a2 8 . i). 

299 
(a) ( b )  
(c ) 
.· t 
Plate 2 1 .  (a) Typical Gold Foil Piece from Jaong. Center 
of Long Axis is Slit. Natural. Size (Chapter 
V.29.a)a. 
(b) Heavy Ring. Lead. Weight : 24.075 grams.
Buah, Trench D 3/4, Depth 6-7". Natural Size 
(Chapter V. 29.b)a. 
(c) Ring. Lead. Buaha, Trench D 3/4a, Depth 6-7". 
Natural Size (Chapter V.29. b ) .  

': • 
-�
 •. 
.,·.  �'  
: 4=•s'·'. ,••Tz· ·:i�;i;J 
; 
•' � tl!lY .. 
� ½
• '6.:./1 .:'• ., ,•
n- ' ��s,  
Plate 2 2 . Rock Carvings from Jaong . Drawn 1/4 S i ze (Chapter V . 32 . a) . 

' .. •·, "". s • • ,. .. 
.·•" ''.  .,, . . . . • • : .. \ • .- . .. .. • • . 303
·, .  ,. , . ·,.  , •'·   . � .. 
..•  
. . • •• , . . . .� . ,.  J \ '•  .,. , • • • I.,. . ; . . 
, 
. , 
•• • 
,,.. , .. . . - ...• , .. .. : � . . ., • •  ·"' •
. " ':,, . • 
•
•• 
. . • . -·•·  -· , 
.•,...•
 
  
:, 
� -
... 
.. . 
.•. ...  
.,.. 
•·•. .-.·... 
 
.. 
.'. ... 
•,.  • S, 
.. ...,. , .•, \
,,  , • •,• 
I • , 
I 
-: •• 
,\  
� '•i• •  
• •, ••
 .
•  
• 
• 
• • • 
• ,
\ 
••• 
• • 
, •• 
. . . .... ,. � 
Plate 23o. Rock Carving a t  Jaong . Drawn 1n Scale 
(Chapter V .  3 2 . a) • 

PART VI 
WIDER IDEAS 
"Can I bring back the words ? 
Will thought of transcription haze my mental eye?" 
Allen Ginsberg, Howol,  1956. 
3 0 5  

V I .33. DELTA IRON IN A SOUTHEAST ASIAN CONTEXT 
The earlniest economic intel l igence report based on in­
formation gathered i n  Southeast As ia by a Chines e envoy al ­
ready gives evi dence of  a flourishing i nternational trade i n  
mineral ores around the shores of the South China Sea. 
K ' ang- T ' ai and Chu -Ying, who vis ited Funan i n  the middle of 
the third century A.D., refer to the "Tan-Ian i s l andersn" who 
brought i ron to Funan in their ships.  According to R. Stein, 
Tan - lan was probably located in the Phi l ippines .1 At the 
s ame time, Pei-lu, another early Southeast As i an population 
center, was trading tin with forei gners .2 These and other 
raw materials may have found their way to the bustl i ng work­
shops of Oc-Eo, the Funanese port city in what i s  now Vietnam; 
and it  i s  pos s ib l e  that the many pieces of  tin jewelry and 
the widely spread s l ags of i ron found at Oc-Eo may have been 
worked from ores carried over great stretches of the China 
Sea by early Southeast As ian shipping [ further at (b) below; 
cf. IV.n24.b and c] . 3 
(a) Early Mining i n  Southeas t As ia 
Whi le it i s  clear from the l iterary record that an early 
trade in mineral ores was underway in the South Chi na Sea 
during the early centuries of  the Chri stian era and quite 
pos s ibly even earl i er, there has been virtual ly  no archaeo­
logical i nvestigation of ancient mining s ites outs i de Borneo. 
Concentrations of  rich mineral treasure earl y  i nvited the 
attention of  man throughout Southeast As ia ,  as el s ewhere. 
It has been noted by an American mining and metal special i s t  
that " i n  every important mining district from Japan to Java 
ancient workings are the gui de to the finding of ore" and i n  
addition "no reas on exists to anticipate the finding of  great 
depos its not already i ndicated by the ancient workings."n4 I t  
woul d  thus seem that mining s ites deserve some more concen­
trated attention on the part of the prehistorian. There isn, 
of course, the obvious problem that the richest mineral de­
pos its - - those  which might most readi l y  i nvite occupation i n  
ancient timesn- -are qui te l i kely to be disturbed by more re­
cent working. Nevertheles s ,  a rich potential woul d  appear 
to be i ndicated by the fol lo wi ng notes, i ndicating a very 
closae app roximation betwaeen mining s ites and early occupation 
in historic times. 
On the mineral - rich Malay Peninsula there i s  an i nterest­
i ng co rrespondence between mining activity and the find s ites 
3 0 7  
3 0 8  
of  early Hindu-Buddhist sculpture. For example, if one 
checks the provenance of Hindu or Buddhist metal sculp tures 
found in Malaya, it becomes apparent that the greater part 
of them were found in tin-rich sites in the course of modern 
dredging.n5 Near Ipoh in 1931 a Gupta- type Buddha image, dat­
ing p robably from the late fifth or early sixth century A. D.n, 
was found o n  the property of  Sungei Kinta Tin Dredging Ltd.n6 
Bronze images of Avalokitesnvara were found, one each, in 
neighboring tin mines at Sungei Siputn, Perak. 7 Another 
bronze image of the Buddha, possibly Gupta period ,  was found 
60 feet below the surface in tin workings at Tanjong Rambutan 
in Perak and is now in a private collection.n8 An image of 
Aval okitesvara with eight arms, identified by Dr. Wales as a 
form of jatamukuta Lokesvara, dating somewhere from the 
eighth to the tenth centuries, was dredged up at the Anglon­
Oriental Mining Co. 's mine at Bidor, Perak in 1936.n9 
Extending northwards up the east coast to the rich tin­
mining area surronunding Takuapa in Thailand, one finds I ndian 
sculptures and an inscription of possibly the ninth century 
A.D. revealing the p resence there of  an Indian mercantile 
corporation. While the site was certainl y an international 
entrepot,  as indicated by the debris of glass, ceramics and 
glass beads (closely related to the Santubong types) on an 
island in the estuary of the Takuapa River, the abundance of 
tin may have been one of the contributing factors in the 
establishment of important occupation there.n1 0  Unfortunately 
much of the area has been dredged by modern machinery and it 
is extremely likely that many significant traces of ancient 
occupation have been destroyed in the process. 
During his service as local resident at Mergui on the 
east coast of the peninsula in Burma, M�urice Collis was 
able to recover from Mergui and the Tenasserim Vallery an al­
most staggering quantity of  Chinese ceramics--25 0 undamaged 
bowls dating from the T'ang through Ming dynastnies--and 15 0 
ancient metal images, most of them Thai but some few pre­
Thai. Many of these objects were found in gold and tin 
mines. While they quite likely were produced in workshops 
sustained by prosperity derived from the commercial activity 
alo ng the t ranspeninsular passage from west to  east coast 
via the Tenasserim River , mining nevertnheless would appear 
to have been a significant enterprise locally .n1 1  An early 
observer has cited the remains of innumerable tin-mining 
pits in the Mergui- Tenasserim area noting that the workings 
of many thousands of men are evident in several places.n1 2  
I n  the area of Tavoy, some short distance above Mergui on 
the same coastn, there are many evidences of ancient tin min­
ing and there is direc t evidence that mining was in full 
swing on the Island o f  Tavoy as far back as 15 99, when Ralph 
Fitch sailed from Pegu to  Malacca passing Tavoy Island "from 
3 0 9  
whence cometh great store of tinne, which serveth all 
India."n1 3  
There are i ntimations that these notes could wi th profit  
be expanded to other parts of Southeast Asi a. For example, 
i n  the Phi l i ppine I slands one of the very few Hi ndu or 
Buddhist objects so far discovered there came to light i n  or 
near gold workings i n  the Agusan River near Esperanza, M i n­
danao. It is  a golden image wei ghing about 1, 79 0 grams, and 
Professor Otley Beyer, who published it  i n  19 21, was of the 
opinion that i t  was of the Madjapahit period and that it  was 
made by Javanese who mined gold i n  the area as early as the 
fourteenth century.n1 4  Other material testifyi ng to the anti­
quity of gold mining i n  the Phili ppi nes are the reported 
finds of pre-Ming Chinese wares i n  the old tunnels and open 
cuts gold workings near Arory on Masabate I sland. 1 5  I n  
Borneo , i n  addition to the Santubong sites i n  Sarawak, there 
is at S ambas i n  southwestern Kalinmantan a correspondence be­
tween gold mining and the recovery of seven early Hindu­
Buddhist i mages made of gold. 1 6  · While the exact find site 
of these particular images is i n  doubt, and there is no sug­
gestion that they were ever associated with a mine, the fact 
that the i mages are made of gold and that S ambas was one of 
the earlinest and heavily worked of Borneo gold fields tends 
to i ndicate a connection between mining and these images. 
(b) Archaeolo$ical Investigation of Early 
Iron-Worki ng in Southeast Asia 
Apart from the mining consi deratinons i ndicated above, 
i deally the Santubong material should be i nterpolated i nto 
data recovered from other early iron-working sites in South­
east Asina. A preliminary survey suggests that archaeological 
study of i ron-smelti ng sites, with related problems of fur­
nace constructi on, fi ring, tools, remains to be developed in 
this area; and that, by strange i rony, the bronze materi als 
of "the Dong Son culture" are the subject of a voluminous 
literature while i ron is generally neglected. 
Very little is known about the process of early i ron­
worki ng i n  Cambodia, accordi ng to the recent manual of Cam­
bodian archaeology wrintten by Professor Jean Boinsselier. 1 8  
Although there are numerous i ndicatinons of i ron slags and 
tuyere noz zles made of molded pottery i n  the prehistoric 
metal-working site in the region of Mlu Prei (Kompong Thom) 
i n  northern Cambodia, the process of i ron-worki ng was not 
examined archaeologi cally. 1 9  M. Levy, who i nvestigated the 
site, noted that the tribal Kuy peoples of northern Cambodia, 
some of whom live i n  the Mlu Prei area, are noted as extrac­
tors and founders of iron. They appear to follow ritual 
310 
procedures which are of  Hindu origin. He also noted that 
their blast furnace and bellows are similar to those used by 
village industries in Orissa in India.n2 0  M. Levy further ob­
served that the people who worked iron at Angkor in the tenth 
century "no doubt" had received their techniques from I ndian­
ized settlers. It should, ho wever, be noted that there does 
not appear to be any special study of iron-working at Angkor. 
Professor Mal leret found iron slags widely distributed 
over his sites in the Funanese port city of Oc-Eo, testifying 
to a local iron industry. Although only five iron implements 
were recovered in the entire site, a miniscule number com­
pared to objnects in tin and other metal at Oc-Eo, the pre­
sumption is that most of the iron objects had disintegrated 
in the highly acid soil of  the Mekong Delta.n2 1  
E lsewhere in I ndochina there are such traces of an 
early iron industry as the widely scattered iron slags asso­
ciated with megalithic burial j ars on the Tran Ninh plateau 
in Xieng Khousang Province in northeastern Laos,n2 2  and in 
the iron objnects found at Sa-huynh , a jar burial site j ust 
north of Quang-ngai on the coast of Annam.n2 3  Iron working 
processes were not recovered at these sites. Both sites, 
however, would prove of  the greatest interest in connection  
with Borneo iron since, in addition to similarities in bead 
types, etc., several of  the megalithic carvings of Tran Ninh 
bear the most remarkable stylistic correspondence with the 
petroglyphs of Santubong, especially the Batu Gambar figure,n2 4  
while the pottery designs found at Sa-huynh have analogies 
with the three-color earthenware from Sarawakn' s  Niah caves. 
There is a strong family feeling about material from both 
these mainland sites and material found in protonhistoric 
sites in Sarawakn, quite likely testifying to the passage of 
people and goods along the extended network of sea traffic 
that linked the shores of the South China Sea before , and 
after, the development of the I ndianized kingdoms in the 
first centuries of the Christian era.n2 5  
Dates fo r the early iron industries of Indo-China are 
fluid. Colani has suggested that the megaliths of Tran Ninh 
do not appear to be earlier than the first century A.D. but 
could be more recent.n2 6  In regard to the develonpment of iron 
in I ndo -China, she cites a Chinese edict of  183 B.nC. forbid­
ding the sale of iron to the people of To nkin.n2 7  Somewhat 
at variance with the suggestion here that iron was scarce or 
unknown among the indigenous people of nonrthern I ndo-China 
two centuries before the Christian era is Professor B. P .  
Grosliern' s  statement that the use of metal, bronze and iron, 
"became dominant in the five or six centuries before our 
era."2 s 
3 1 1  
A privile ged insight into the early use of iron in Indo­
China, and its linkage with magic and charismatic leadership, 
is provided in the legend surrounding the acces s ion of Fan 
Wen in 336  A. D. to the throne of Lin-yi,n2 9  the. Chinese name 
for the smal l s tate es tablished near Hue on the coas t of 
Annam in 192 A. D. , later known as Champa. According to the 
Chinese author Li Tao-yu�n, who wrote at the beginning of 
the sixth century, Fan Wen was originally a s l ave who, while 
tending sheep in a pasnture in the Annamite chain, had caught 
two carp which , magical l y ,  turned into two s tonesn. Thes e he 
smelted and turned into two s wordsn. Fan Wen subsequently 
traveled to China after 330  A. D. He returned with knowledge 
about the building of fortifications , manufacture of arma­
ments and military s trategy. He was able through guile and 
manipulation to become king of Lin-yi in 3 3 6  A. D. It is 
worthy of note that his two s words  apparent l y  became the 
pal ladia of the kingdom, pas sing with the throne to his 
desncendants.n3 0  
In Malaya there is quite an extens ive archaeological 
literature concerning the iron implements found in southern 
Perak and Pahang, as wel l as the s lab-graves excavated in 
southern Perak .n3 1  The indus t rial procedures of this indus try 
have neither been recovered archaeological l y, nor discus sed-­
although s urface sites containing quantities of iron s lag, 
hematite and partly  smel ted ore (quite pos s ibly iron-age 
workshops ) have been provisional l y  charted on the Tembeling 
River in Pahang. On  the basis of analogies in tool designs 
and a theoretical dis tribution of the indus t ry, Dr. Sieveking 
s ugges ts  that it may have been "derived" from s outhern I ndo­
China . The chronology of the indus try is s till  undisclosedn.n3 2  
Of immediate interes t in Sarawak terms is the important 
s ite at Kuala Selins ing, s ituated in an extens ive mangrove 
s wamp s panning a delta area, much sil ted and in majnor res pects 
very s imilar to the Santubong ambience. Selinsing, which is 
on the wes t coas t of the Malay Peninsula in the State of 
Perak, was s tudied and sporadical l y  excavated by I .  H .  N. 
E vans before World War II, and he published a series of 
desncriptive papers and notes in Journ . Fe d .  Ma lay States Mus . � 
19 3 0 - 3 9. This information has been augmented by T. H. visiting 
the area on two occasnions since 19 45. 
Selinsing s hows many of the main characteris tics of the 
Sarawak River del ta ,  especial l y  Bongkisam, as regards im­
ported artifacts. Chines e stonewares of the Sung Dynas ty 
are present though not abundant in sherd form, and consis t­
entl y  conform to the Sarawak typology (V. 3 1 ) .  G las s beads 
of " wes tern" origin are equal l y  numerous and with onl y minor 
exceptions paralnlel thos e from Bongkisam; this has s ince 
been confirmed by spectrographic analyses from both Selinsing 
3 1 2  
and Santubong. Blue and green glass bangles appear ident ical 
from both sources. Stone beads, notably cornelian and rock 
crystal , occur similarly  in both places. Curious eartnhenware 
pot lids are found in both, though those from Selinsing have 
not been adequately studied for comparison- -as is the case 
for the eartnhenwares generally . Evans postulates the H i ndu 
religion for thes e Perak people and suggests they actually 
worked glass (which may well have been so , for re- export 
further eastward). A Pallnava inscription was found on a 
cornelian seal. But Dr. Quaritch Wales has quest ioned the 
evidence for Hinduism and suggested i t  is a native site-­
much like Jaong or Bongkisam.n3 3  Several gold objects were 
found , including an ear - ring showing a human figure riding a 
bi rd, and some gold beads ident ical to Santubong ones. 
Finally, after 2 5  pages in his main text (79- 13 3) there is a 
7-line paragraph on "Iron Objects and Iron Slag.n" Slag is 
definitely recorded by excavation as also lead and tin  (10 5 ). 
But no more information is forthcoming on this association 
at present. "Crucible" is not mentioned but could be included 
unnoticed in the pottery. 
Evans considered the Selinsing occupation started about 
60 0 A. D. and that it ended "in the 1 1th century.n" The start 
date seems early--and is not confirmed by the stonewares. 
However , in general , the overlap in time with the Sarawak 
River delta is acceptable (cf. I . 4). A re-examination of 
the whole Selinsing material--which has never been fully 
worked out - -and systematic new work at the site would provide 
a valuable link between Borneo and the way west towards 
India. Selninsing also bridges to some of t he East African 
iron and stoneware sites (VI.n3 5 ) .  
Finally, in the Malay peninsula, Dr. Linehan has an 
intriguing remark in a discussion of some iron tools found 
at Bukit Jati on the Klang River in  Selangnor. Among these 
was an object resembling "part of the thick-l ipped rim of a 
vessel "  which Linehan speculates about , offer ing three pos­
sibil it ies ,  the last being "c). part of a crucible used in  
iron smelt ing . "  This seems to us the most l ikely answer , 
especial ly in view of an analysis made of this item: 
Iron 60.n5 % Sulnphur 0 . 15 %  
Manganese m.nd. Silicon 0.n5 9% 
Phosphorous 0.n0 5 %  
(L inehan, 195n1; cf. IV.n2 1-2n2 above). 
I f  this is part of a crucnible, the find is the first of its 
kind in Malaya; it certainly merits re-examinat ion in the 
Museum , and perhaps then on the ground at Buki t  Jat i . n3 4  
3 1 3  
Iron has been extensoively worked in Burma and legend 
traoces the industry ba ck to at least the begoinnoing of the 
Pagan period ( 1044-1287 A.D. ) .o3 5  It is almost certaoin, how­
ever, that iron was being smelted in Burma in the independent
Mon k ingdom in the Thaton-Pegu-Tavoy area long before the 
Burmese had risen to power at Pagan. There are ind icatoions 
that the Burmese cult of the 37 Natso is based on a much older 
Mon prototype, a cult wh ich was a synthesis of local cults 
all belonging to centers s ignificant for the polit ical inte­
gration of the Mon state. Th is Mon cult of tree spirits
linked to Buddhist sites includes the "stream-winnoing Iron­
master of Iron Hill in Rangoon.o"o3 6  A European observer in 
1862 reported the remains of abandoned iron furnaoces in the 
Province of Pegu, thus indi cating the resoidue of a native 
industry in the general area of the Mon kingdoms.o3 7  
The remaoins of an extensive protohistor i cal Burmese iron 
industry at Mount Popa in Upper Burma were investoigated by
Dr. Chhibber in 1926. The industry had been defunct for 
forty years at the time of his v isit. From the abandoned 
furnaces, Chhibber was able to g ive a description of native 
iron smelting at least as it must have been practioced in the 
latter part of the nineteenth century. This is s ignif icant 
not only for compar ison w ith histor ical inter ior Borneo 
methods (cf. VI.o36 following), but also in view of our delta 
smelting hypotheses: 
. . . A  furnaoce s imply consoisted of a sort of cirocular 
or oval pit, three to four feet in d iameter, dug in com­
pact earth in certain raised portions of the ground, e.g .  
the bank of a stream. The p it was connected w ith a c ir­
cular hole above, a little more than a foot in diameter, 
through which the smelters subsequently added suppl ies 
of charcoal. It is remarkable that they had no opening 
to provide a blast. They pounded the ore to small 
pieces, about the size of a walnut and arranged alter­
nate layers of charcoal and iron ore in the p it. After 
igniting the charcoal they closed the mouth of the p it 
by means of earth to keep back the heat and as remarked 
above continued to melt the oreo. They then allowed the 
molten metal to flow out by tappoing the lower part of 
the furnace and the slag was separated. It is noteworthy 
that they used absolutely no flux exocept that furnished 
by the ash of the charcoal used as fuel. This was borne 
out by enquiries made of the v illagers. The author 
wonders if they knew the use of fluxes. As the ore was 
obtained free of cost they were not careful in economis­
ing iron and could afford to lose such a highly ferri­
ferrous slag as the actual slag is shown by the m i croo­
scope and chemical analys is to be. Further, th�re seem 
to be no deposoits of carbonates in the vicinity exocept 
3 14 
a few bands of  limestone in the Peguan rocks some dis­
tance away. 
The fuel, as remarked above, was charcoal, made 
from the woo d  o f  various trees especiall y mango (Mangi­
fera indica) and tamarind (Tamarindus indicus) which 
abound in the neighbourhood. This fact was further con­
firmed by the find o f  specimens of slag with associated 
pieces of  charcoal. It is believed that the iron manu­
factured was of  good quality. . . . 3  8  
Although there is no mention of  clay crucibles in asso­
ciation with the furnaces at Mount Popa, the general simplic­
ity of  furnace design would be well within the range o f  pron­
cedures adopted prehistorically at Santubong as well as his­
torically inland (VI.n36). It would seem likely, ho wevern, 
that the Burmese native industry might be  influenced by pro­
cedures from Orissa and parts o f  norntheastern India which do 
not emplo y the crucible process of  South I ndia. 
The archaeological materials pertaining to the "Bronze­
Iron age" in Indonesia have been usefully synthesized by Dr. 
H. R. van Heekeren.n3 9  He does not, however, describne a single 
excavated iron industry; nor does he describe any surface 
deposits of slags and other smelting residue;  While his 
archaeological record is silent, the record of  o l d  Javanese 
epigraphy gives evidence that the worker in iron played an 
important role in relationship to the ruler of the ancient 
k ratonsa. 4 0  The smiths also have a very special position o n  
Bali as remarked in 1 9 6 4  b y  C. Hooykaas : 
. . .  there is no genealogical group in Bali which has 
such marked places of  worship of  their deified fore­
father in the ancestor sanctuary Besakih on Gunung Agung 
as the very group of  smiths. There is also no group 
which has circulated a comparable numbner of  writings 
about itself and its ramifications as the smiths.n4 1  
It is clear that the smith in Java and Bali is b y  tradi­
tio n a special and honored person ,  if today a poor and humble 
one. He is believed to be  in intimate contact with super­
natural powers and his work is thus dangerous. The craft, 
and the myths surrounding it, extend far back into the pre­
Hi ndu period.n4 2  Excavation of  early iron-working sites 1 n  
Java, especially, would seem to be  a priority target. 
3 15 
(c) Philippine Parallels, Especially Ethnologincal 
There are several recent general works on the I ron Age 
in the Philippines. Dr. Robert Fox in 1962 placed the intro­
duction of iron in the Philippines at about the birth of 
Christn. He notes that slags of iron and glass are commonly 
encountered in iron age sites. In his view, this iron was 
worked by the "Malay forge"--made with two standing bellows 
of either bamboo or wood, which he observes is  sti ll in use 
today.n4 3  
Dr.  W. S. Solheim would place the advent of iron in the 
Philippines between 40 0 and 100 B.C. In his view it  was 
carried to separate areas by two or three groups: 
. . .n The "Kalanay" people, coming from Annam and Tonkin, 
settled in the Visayan I slands, Mindoro, Mariduque, the 
Calaminanes I slands, and Palawan. The "Novaliches" 
people, probably a trading people from some area far to 
the west, settled around Mani la Bay and in northern 
Palawan and the Calamianes. Besides iron forging, these 
people brought with them the industries of cloth weaving 
and the manufacture of blue and green grass ornaments. 
The Malays, coming from the south, moved up Mindanao 
and came into the southeastern Visayans. They were 
probably the first people to bring metal and glass to 
Mindanao, but not to the southeastern Visayas where the 
Kalanay people had arrived earlier. The Malays probably 
brought metal working into northern Luzon, but at what 
time is not known.n4 4  
Dr. A. E. E vangelista, writing in 1965, states that 
about the first century A.D. influences "from Indonesia" be­
gan to arrive in the Philippines, and that the art of smelt­
ing and forging iron were among the techn iques imported. 4 5  
None of the above writers, nor the excavation reports of iron 
age sites, give any picture of earl y  Philippine smelting and 
iron working practice recovered archaeologi callyn. There is 
available, however, a very complete account of practices em­
ployed in local industriali zed iron manufacture in the Phil­
i ppines in contemporary times. I t  is of a "crucible furnace" 
which would be consinderably more "advanced" than the kind of 
hearth furnaces excnavated at Santubong.n4 6  
On the ethnological si de, we have examined two important 
sets of Philippine metallurgy processes accurately preserved 
as life-si ze  models on exhibition in the Field Museum of 
Natural History, Chicago. Both are directly relevant in 
understanding the Borneo procedures. 
316  
Firstly, the Bagobo pagans round Mt. Apo i nland from 
the Gulf of Davao i n  southern M indanao are the subject of a 
fine set of Chicago exhibits.  Among the Bagobo : 
Some of the men are expert workers i n  brass and iron, 
and with their primi t i ve forges turn out remarkable 
cas t i ngs and very effectnive weapons .n4 7  
A forge is  on display , with bamboo cylinders and nozzles 
(cf . I I I .17) us i ng feather plungers and a small clay tuyere, 
to take the two bamboo nozzles onto an open charcoal fire. 
But the notable feature of this forge is  a s mall whi teish, 
cylindrical, clay crucible, about 3" high, 1" acros s,  appar­
ently with a cupped bottom, balanced in the hot charcoal. 
The case label says this is  the forge used by copper and 
bras s workers, who "turn out excellent bells , bracelets, 
betel - nut boxes and the like" ( and f i ne examples are s hown)n. 
These same craftsmen als o work the Bagobo i ron, us i ng forges : 
. . .  i dent ical with those employed by the bras s -work­
ers, except that they are larier and the bellows are 
usually made of tree trunks.n4 
The survival of a very closely i ntegrated brass and 
iron technology i nto this century i ns i de Mi ndanao i s  thus 
vivi dly i llustrated. As we s hall see, i ron and bras s are 
s t i ll simu l taneously use d  by the Kayan-Kenyah smiths i n  
Borneo; while the Malohs form almos t a cas te of i t i nerant 
metal smiths with roles changing even i n  recent his tory. 
Secondly, an even more s triking Chicago exhibit from 
the Philippines is  that of a completed forge uni t from 
Balbalasang on the Saltan River of North Luzon (Hall G, Case  
21)n, fortunately supported by a documented account. 4 9  Thesne 
Balbalas ang people were, even before 1912, among a vani shi ng 
breed i n  Luzon. By then, they no longer mi ned or s melted 
the abundant local ore, "but secured the metal from Chinese 
traders on the coas t"; i n  the pas t local smelt i ng was wide­
s pread. 
I n  this Luzon case there i s ,  of course, no crucible, 
s i nce this i s  only an i ron smithing, not smelt i ng, operation. 
There are two clay tuyeres , each entered by two bamboo pipes . 
These tuyeres are l" i n  external diameter at the bellows end, 
8" long, tapering to 3/4" externally at the fire. 5 0  The ex­
hibit leaflet i s  worth quot i ng here, as it  could apply on 
many i s lands from Luzon south to Borneo and wes tward i nto 
Sumatnran: 
The forge here illustrated comes from I nalagan, one 
of the small settlement s which makes up the community 
3 17 
of Balbalasa ng ( "the town of many maidens").  It s toad 
in a small structure with grass roof, but without sides 
or floor. At one end of such a structure is a bamboo 
bench, in front of which stands the bellows� -two upright 
cylinders made of logs hollowed out. In each of these 
is a piston or plunger, at the lower end of which. is a 
wooden ring packed with corn husks and chicken feathers. 
When a plunger is pushed downward in the cylinder, it 
compresses the air and forces it out of the small opening
in the base, but when it is drawn up, the packing col­
lapses and allows it to be raised without effort. These 
pistons are worked alternately so that one i s  rising 
while the other is falling. 
Two bamboo tubes, attached to the bellows, conduct 
the air into a cylinder of fire clay and this in turn 
carries it into the charcoal fire. These bamboos fit 
loosely into the clay cylinder, thus taking the place of 
valves and preventing the drawing of the fire back into 
the bellows. 
Near to the hearth is a stone anvil, while a heavy 
stone hammer, a small stone hammer, and pinchers of the 
same material complete the outfit. The fire is lighted 
and the operator sitting on the bench raises and lowers 
the plungers in the cylinders until the fire burns 
brightly; then the smith puts the metal into the coals, 
and allows it to remain until it reaches a white heat. 
It is then removed and placed on the anvil where his 
helper beats it out with the large hammer. This is a 
stone weighing twenty or more p ounds, fitted inside the 
handles, so that it can be used with both hands. As a 
rule, it is swung between the legs, and is allowed to 
strike the metal as it descends, but some of the men 
raise it above the shoulder and strike a much more 
powerful blow. If two pieces of metal are to be welded 
together, as is often the case, they are laid one over­
lapping the other, and are held together with damp fire 
clay. In this condition they are placed in the fire 
and heated, being then beaten together. It often takes 
several firings to bring about a perfect weld. 
After the initial shaping, the smith completes the 
work with the small hammer, and the blade is again in­
serted in the fire and brought to a white heat. Then 
the smith withdraws it and watches it intently, until 
the white tone begins to turn to a greennish-yellow, when 
he plunged it into water. The tempered blade is now 
smoothed down with sandstone, and is whetted to a keen 
edge. Headaxes, spear heads, adzes, a few knives and 
the metal ends for the spear-shafts are the principal 
products of the forge.5 1  
3 1 8  
Here, as at Bagobo, 50 0 miles to the south, there is 
the welding of  more than o ne metal strip (cf. VI. 37). Here, 
too, the use of a stone hammer, which in fact is grooved in 
the Santubong manner and is a first cousin to the delta 
"waisted stones.n" From northern Luz on, well over 1, 0 0 0  miles 
from and well over 50 0 years later than the Sarawak River 
iron industry, came first proof of  a usage for these big 
tools , previously postulated and written up before one o f  us 
visited Chicago to round off this final part of  our paper, 
with unexpectedly rewarding results.n5 2  
(d) Conclnusion 
This brief survey o f  iron age sites and iron working in 
Southeast Asia points up the dilemma of  attempting to inter­
polate the Santubong iron industry into the tradition of 
iron working in ancient Southeast Asia. There is insufficient 
strictly archaeolo gical or other prehistoric evidence to make 
any assessment as to the origin, spread, adaptation, or as­
similation o f  early iron working techniques . We cannot, for 
example, speak with conviction about furnace design, about 
the use or non-use of  fluxes, or about a crucible process in 
any single Southeast Asian iron working site. We do not 
know- -on  the basis of  present l o c a l  evidence--whether iron 
extraction techniques came from India or China to Southeast 
Asia or whether indeed it was an independent invention in 
Southeast Asia (we will examine the possibilities further 
from those ends in the next chapters). 
This situation is rather surprising. The advent of  iron 
technology was, perhaps, the greatest single material impact 
on the human record for these lands of  rain forest j ungle, 
as well as reliance on communications by boat. The advent 
of  iron opened up revolutionary new horizons for organized 
felling and carpentry, major new effonrts and advances which 
deserve very close attention in the reconstruction not only 
of  prehistorical process but also the opening of  histonrical 
times through Southeast Asia generally and the great islands 
like Borneo particularly. We can, therefore, in several 
majnor respects only reconstruct by ethnology, analogy and 
probability, until more ground study of  the past is under­
taken elsewhere. F rom this point of view we must now extend 
our net to take in the somewhat monre adequate data available 
for India and China direct. 
VI.34. EARLY INDIAN AND CHINESE IRON-WORKING 
(a) India with Ceylon: the Move to "Wootz" 
When Alexander the Great stood victorious on the plains
of India in 326 B.C., he accepted 30 pounds of steel as a 
token of surrender from King Porus of Taxila.o1 The industry
that produced Poruso' gift stretches back hundreds of years 
before Alexander'os rude visit to the Punjab. Herodotus pre­
viously had recorded that Indian soldiers fighting in the 
ranks of the A chaemenid Persian armies were furnished with 
arrows tipped with iron.o2 The dimming track of words may
draw down into the tangle of definitions for the word ayas 
in the Rigveda which usually means copper or bronze--but may
in some contexts mean iron.o3 Parallel testimony is provided 
by the dissolution of carbon in material recovered .from the 
trenoches at Artanjikhera, a site in Uttar Pradesh where C- 14 
dates indicate that iron was already enjoyed in India in 
1025 + 110 B.C. � This site, presently under exocavation by 
an archaeological team from Aligarh University, has revealed 
many iron tools in the earliest levels of the Painted Grey
Ware period.o5 This ware, familiar on post �Indus sites in 
northern India, may date from about 1000 B.C. to about 500 
B.C. 
Archaeological work on the Iron Age in India is greatly 
advanoced over the very spotty efforts noted to date in South­
east Asia. Nevertheless, the summary paper on the disocussion 
of iron in ancient India at the Conference on Indian Prehiso­
tory held in Pooma in 1964 noted that "there is pre cious 
l ittle evidence from archaeology as to the processes of 
smelting or forging obje cts of iron in ancient India ."o6 In 
the entire proceedings at Poona, where many of the most in­
formed scholars on Indian archaeology had gathered, there is 
only the most cursory reference to the archaeological reocovery 
and analysis of iron technology. This would seem to indiocate 
the diffioculties involved in the reocovery of these processes
in open sites where the most rudimentary furnaces and tech­
nological procedures were employed. Despite these unpromising
conditions, a serious start has been made in India and iron 
slags have now been found in Northern India in at least five 
sites in assoociation w ith Painted Grey Ware pottery. These 
sites are Hastinapura, Alamgirpur, Artanjikhera, and Kausambi 
all in Uttar Predesh, and at Ujjain in Madhya Pradesh.o7 Of 
these earliest sites, the evidence of Ujjain, a ccording to 
its exocavator N. R. Banerjee, is the most prolific and is 
evidenoced by heaps of slags, ore and what appears to be 
3 19 
3 2 0  
quantities of a flux (cf. IV.n25) .  Banerjeen' s  acconunt of the 
process is indispensable for the study of iron in I ndia 
( 1965)n. He notes that the evidence does not allow for a 
clear picture of the actual mode of smelting ; then draws the 
follo wing broad picture: 
. . n. Alternate deposits of charcoal mixed with the iron 
slag and a whitish powder, possibly lime, as stated 
above, occurring in an exposed section point to a simple 
method of smelting employed at Ujjain. The modus 
operandi consisted, inferably, in laying several alter­
nate courses of charcoal and iron ore and covering the 
entire pile thickly with clay to prevent the heat from 
escaping. The sides of this heaped and simple kiln, 
which should have been circular in plan, must also have 
been provided with passages for the intake of air and 
escape of gases, and outlets for molten iron. The 
monlten liquid, after collection, was, no doubt, first 
cooled by dipping into water and then beaten with hammer 
to drive out the charcoal, which, in the course of the 
hammering went into the (reduced) iron, giving it, to 
an extent, the properties of steel, and thus eliminating 
the slag. 
While the evidence at Ujjnain o n  the process of 
smelting is inconclusive as to the actual methods em­
ployed, it is, nevertheless, clear that charcoal was 
used as fuel, the hearths were of  the "open" type, and 
the iron smelters had reached the technical advancement 
requiring the use of a calcium flux to aid them in 
smelting. Such a stage of development wonuld itself be 
the result of prolonged experimentation involving much 
trial and error, and would indicate a still earlier be­
ginning for the iron working in the area, which quite
fits in with the evidence. The primitive form of the 
kiln in combination with the evidence of a flux would 
perhaps suggest a local development. 
I t  is clear that this simply direct or bloomery process 
at Ujjain would meet the mineral requirements for the produc­
tion of iron as summarized by Coghlan.n9 
1) The ore to be smelted must be sufficiently protected 
by the fuel-bed against rapid oxidization which would 
be caused by con tact with an excess of airn. 
2 )  Some form of smelting furnace is required. The fur­
nace may be with, or without, forced o r  induced 
draught. 
3 2 1  
3 )  The furnace temperature must be high enough to  enable 
the metal to reach a semi-fused or plastic condition 
so that a workable bloom be obtained. 
Unfortunately the design of the furnace was not recovered, 
but from the inference drawn by Banerjee it was likely to be 
a simple bowl furnace. The possibility of a domed furnace 
should not be entirely excludedo, however, especially as p ot­
tery kilns of the period featured this design. The reference 
to flux is most interesting (if confirmed) both because it 
is an advanced use of intuitive chemistry--for example the 
inefficiency of the reduction of ore and the l oss of iron in 
slags in early Roman kilns raises dot1bts as to whether there 
was any intentional use of flux- -and as will be seen below,
village industries in contemporary India, as in Borneo, do 
not normally utilize a flux in iron smelting.o1 0  
The iron industry at Ujjairt was fl ourishing by a later 
phase of Period II, which Banerjee dates from about 5 0 0  B.Co.o1 1  
From the Ganga-Jumna doab, iron working appears to have dif­
fused to other parts of the sub-continent.o1 2  The mute testio­
mony of this industry are the slag-heaps which are found in 
almost every district of India except for the alluvial fans 
of the Indus, Ganges, and Brahmaputra rivers.o1 3  This industry
flourished at the village level in India for almost 3 , 0 0 0  
years until it was driven from existence by competition with 
either imp orted metals or by iron produced in India with 
modern commercial technology. 
Archaeological excavations have to date provided little 
information about the actual working processes of this in ­
dustry despite the large number of sites already excavated. 
The association of iron objects with the urn and megalithic
burials of South India may prove of special interest to  the 
Santubong picture where iron and petroglyphs occur in associ­
ation. 1 4  It should be noted here that leaf-shaped pieces of 
gold-foil recovered from the iron-rich urn burial site of 
Adichanallur in District Tirunelveli, bear marked similarity 
to g old foil recovered at Jaong and other delta sites. 1 5  
Another site that would appear to  offer the greatest
interest is Vasravi in Gujarat,owhere Chinese porcellaneous 
wares have been collected in the residue of an iron industry
which appears to have flourished there between the tenth and 
seventeenth centuries. 1 6  With its intriguing constellation 
of Chinese wares and iron, Vasravi may have much to  add to 
our knowledge of the Santubong industry and one joins Profes­
sor Mehta in remarking thato". . . i t wou ld be interesting
if some systematic excavation of this site is carried out to 
clarify the situation, and to gather some data on the iron 
smelters' furnaces and their methods, if their remains could 
be traced out."o1 7  
322 
It is possible to supplement the meager archaeological 
literature on iron technology by t urning to acconunts of in­
digenonus iron-working as reconrded in the nineteenth century 
by travelers, administrators and geologists. Here there is 
almost an embarrassment of riches. The student is fortnunate 
to find a great deal of the relevant material collected and 
ordered in an excellent book by Dr. M. S. Krishnan.n1 8  Sum­
marizing an analysis made by John Percy in 1864, Dr. Krishnan 
observes that indigenous smelting furnaces were o f  three 
kinds.n1 9  The first type was used in the Deccan and parts of 
Madras, it wasn: 
. . .  2 to 4 feet high and yielded about 6 lbs. of iron 
from each charge, the larger furnaces, which were 4 
feet high, producing about 30  lbs. It was generally
circular in form, about 10 to 15 inches across at the 
bottom and 6 to 10 inches at the top .  It was built of  
tempered clay. There were two openings at the bottom, 
one for the blast and other for withdrawing the slag. 
The furnace was first half-filled with charcoal and the 
blast applied. Alternate charges of ore and charcoal 
were added from the top. As the smelting proceeded , the 
slag was tapped off by a small bar. It took 4 to 6 
ho urs to complete the smelting o f  one charge. The iron 
was taken o ut in the form of small cakes or blooms while 
hot and hammered at once. 
The second type of furnace, that used in Madhya Pradesh, 
was considerably larger. It was cylindrical in shape and 
the spongy mass of bloom was removed from the top ·by a pair 
of tongs. It could be employed 3 or 4 times before it had 
become unserviceable and was broken up. 
The third kind of furnace was also found in the same 
general area as the second type (o ur italics)n: 
. . .  Its height was 8 ftn. to 10 ftn. ,  the hearth being 
2 to 3 ftn. above the ground level. It was 18 inches 
square in the interior and o f  the same sectio n from top 
to bottom. The front wall was thinner than the others 
and 5 t o  6 inches thick, so that it co uld be broken up 
and rebuilt as necessary. At the bottom  was placed a 
layer of dried clay in which a number o f  small holes 
were punched making an angle of 45n° with the back of 
the furnace. Two earthen pipes or  tuyeres p roje c ted  
into  the  furnace at the bonttom almost to the back. At 
the bot tom, a bed of cow dung was placed and above it 
charcoal. After lighting, the bellows were worked and 
ore and charcoal alternately charged. The smelting was 
continued from 12  to 16 hours and the slag was removed 
from below. The iron went o n  accumulating until the 
323 
tuyeres were finally burnt down. The lump formed weighed 
from 150 to 200 lbs. It was cut into smaller pieces, 
reheated and hammered. The material consisted of a mix­
ture of natural steel and malleable iron which were 
separated, the steel being used for edged tools. 
Iron smelted in these relatively primitive furnaces un­
der low temperatures and with little absorption of carbon 
would be a wrought iron- -that is iron with a maximum carbon 
content of 0 .25% .  In order to convert wrought iron to steel, 
the material must be heated at high temperatures in the pre­
sence of carbon. In the ancient west the carburizing of 
wrought iron was achieved by repeated heating of the wrought 
iron bar in charcoal.n2 0 In India, however, and most espe­
cially in South India, the production of steel was accom­
plished by heating walnut-sized pieces of wrought iron in 
small clay crucibles in which leaves and other organic mate­
rials had been packed. This ancient process is known popu­
larly as "wootz.n" Because the employment of crucibles does 
suggest at least possible technological similarities with the 
Santubong material, or rather one possible use of the Santu­
bong crucible-tuyere, it will be necessary to consider this 
process in detail. 
One of the early accounts of "wootz" steel was published 
in the Asaiatic Journal of 1818:n2 1  
The Indian account of wootz-making is , that pieces 
of iron and some green wood are enclosed in a crucible, 
and submitted to the heat of a furnace; the fire is 
urged by several bellow? of a constrnuction peculiar to 
the country; the wood is charred, the iron fused, and 
at the same time converted into steel. The metal is 
suffered to crnystallize at the bottom of the crucible, 
the form of which it consequently takes : these rough
lumps are called cakes of wootz. . n. .  
Stodart may not have had first- hand knowledge of the 
process about which he wrote. An extract from the diary of 
Drn. Voyset printed in the first volume of the Journal of the 
Asiatic Society of Bengal in 1832 is very clearly based on 
detailed, on- the- scene observation given here at length:n2 2  
Kona s amundrum, (corner of the sea, ) situated about 
12 miles south of the Godaveri, and 25 from Nirmul, is 
celebrated for its manufacture of steel, the chief part
of which goes to Persia; the following are the chief 
details of this manufacture, collected by repeated visits 
to the place, and personal inspection of the process. 
3 2 4  
The furnace is a temporary circular structure of 
clay, from four to five feet in height, and five feet 
in diameter. It is sunk two feet below the surface of 
the ground. The fuel is charcoal, and the fire is kept 
up by a blast from four bullock skins, placed at right
angles to each other: the mu z zles resting on the upper 
edge of the furnace, so as to force the blast downwards. 
The granitic clay of the furnace is highly infusible; 
it is found in the neighbourhood, and is formed of the 
decomposition of granite rock with small pieces of 
quartz and felspar, and is so valued for its refractory
qualities, that it is exported for the manufacture of 
crucibles, &c. After some days, however, if a consider­
able heat has been maintained, the furnace becomes semio­
vitrified, and requires renewalo; the cost of a furnace 
is from two to three rupeeso. 
The bellows are plied incessantly day and night:
during the operation, the men are relieved every four 
hours, each being engaged to work 1 2  out of the 24. 
They are partly protected by a screen of mud placed be­
tween them and the furnace, but the heat and exertion 
render their task sufficiently laborious. 
The iron is converted into steel in p ine -shaped 
crucib  les, made of the  same c lay as the  furnace,  and of 
various sizes, according to the purpose for which the 
steel is to be applied, whether for the fabrication of 
swords, or knives, or other articleso. 
In making the crucibles, the granitic clay above 
described is ground to a fine powder along with the 
fragments of old furnaces and crucibles, and the whole 
kneaded together with the chaff of rice and oil. The 
vessels are defended by a luting of the same, they are 
covered with a similar top, but a perforation is made 
in the latter. No charcoal is put into the crucible, 
but small pieces of kanch , or the glass formed in the 
process, are put at the bottom of them along with the 
ore, and serve of course as a flu x .  The crucibles are 
arranged and steadied in the furnace occasionally by
the superintendent, with a long and stout rod of irono. 
The materials used in the preparation of the steel 
are two different kinds of irono; one from Mirtpa l li - -
the other from Kondapur  , in the proportion of three parts
of the former to two of the latter. The Mirtp a l l i  iron 
is derived originally from the iron sand already noticed, 
and is sent in the state of large amorphous masses of a 
reddish grey color, and of an extremely porous texture. 
The internal fracture is often iridescent. The Kondapur 
3 2 5  
i ron 1s procured from an ore found amongst the iron clay, 
at a place about 2 0  miles distant. It is said to be of 
a dirty b rown colour, and very frangible. The iron, 
however, is moderately compact and of  a b rilliant white 
· fracture. Occasionally it con tains some ingredient 
which spoils the steel, rendering it e xcenssively b rittle : 
the natives assert that the adulteration is copper, but 
it is more probably arsenic. The mixture being put into 
the crucible, the fire is excited and kept up for 24 
hours. It is then allowed to subside, and the crucible 
is taken out and placed on the ground to cool. When 
quite cold it is opened, and a cake of steel of  great 
hardness is found, weighing on an average ab out a pound 
and a half. The cake is covered with clay, and annealed 
in the furnace for 12  or 16 hours. I t  is then taken out 
and cooled , and again annealed, and this may be  repeated 
a third o r  fourth time until the metal is rendered suffi­
ciently soft to be worked. The steel is known by  the 
name of Wootz in Telinga, and a Kurs � a cake of about 
110 rupees weight, is sold o n  the spot for 8 annas. · The 
daily produce of a furnace is about S O  seers, or in value 
37 rupees. The cost of  this steel is much enhanced by
the e xactio n of  the j agh irdar� who not unfreque ntly 
appropriates the advance to himself, and leaves the pur­
chaser still to incur the whole expence. 
Voysey's 183 2  account then turns to the Persian trade :  
The e xport, however, of the metal to Persia must 
b e  profitable, as it is sufficient to b ring dealers from 
that country and to defray the cost and risk of travel­
ing. We found at the village, in 18 2 0 ,  Hajni Hosyn, from 
I spahan, engaged in the speculation;  and it must have 
answered his purpose, as he was. here again in 18 23,  hav-
•ing returned in the interval to Persia and disposed of  
the venture. He informed us that the place and the 
process are both familiar to the Persians, and that they
have attempted to imitate the latter without success. 
Besides residing at the village, whilst making his pur­
chases, he bore a personal part i n  the operation, weigh­
ing the proportions of the iron, and testing the tough­
ness of the steel himself. 
Perhaps the best qualified observer of  the indigenous 
iron industry in India was John Marshall Heath. He had served 
about 1815 or 1818 in the East India Company in South India. 
He resigned after a b rief tour and spent some years in England 
studying the iron and steel industry there. He returned to 
India and b e gan to manufacture iron and steel in South I ndia 
at Salem in 183 0 a.a2 3  I n  a paper read before the Royal Asiatic 
Society on 16 February, 183 9 ,  Heath gave a richly detailed 
3 2 6  
account of traditional Indian processes in the manufacture of 
wootz steel as witnessed by him in Salem :n2 4  
The ore from which the wootz steel is made, is the 
magnetic oxide of iron, combined with quartz, of which 
specimens accompany this letter: the ore varies muchn· 
in its appeanrance, according as the grains of quartz 
and oxide of iron are large or small, but the proportion
in which the component parts unite, is nearly uniformly 
48 of quartz and 52  of oxide of iron, in 10 0 parts by 
weight. 
It is found in many parts of the South India, but 
the district of Salem is the principal seat of the steel 
manufacture. The ore occurs generally in the form of 
low hills, and the quantity of it which is exposed above 
the surface of the surrounding country, is so consider­
able, that it is not probable that it will ever become 
necessary to have recourse to under-ground operations, 
supposing the smelting of iron ore from this district 
to be carried on to any extent that can be contemplated. 
It is prepared for being smelted by stamping and 
separating the quartz from it, either by washing it in 
a current of water, or by winnowing it in the manner in 
which rice is separated from the huskn: in most of the 
deposits of ore, parts are found in which the quartz is 
in a state of disintegrantion, and these, from the greater 
facility with which they are broken, are always selected 
by the natives for their furnaces. 
The furnace, or bloomery, in which the ore is 
smelted, is from three to five feet high from the sur­
face of the ground, and the ground is hollowed out be­
neath it to the depth of from eight inches to a foot: 
it is somewhat pear-shaped, being about two feet in 
diameter at the ground, tapering to about one foot diam­
eter at the top: it is built entirely of clay, two men 
can finish one in a few hours, and it is ready for use 
next dayn. The blast is supplied by two bellows, each 
made of a single goat's skin, with a bamb o o  nozz le : 
the two noz z le s  mee t  in a c lay pipe�  which passes about 
half-way through the furnace at the level of the ground, 
and by working the bellows alternately, a tolerably uni­
form blast is kept up; a semicircular opening, about a 
foot high and a foot in diameter at the bottom, is left 
in the furnace, and before each smelnting, it is built up
with clay. The furnace is then filled up with charcoal 
and a lighted coal being introduced before the bellows, 
the fuel in the interior is soon kindled: as soon as 
this is accomplished, a small portion of the ore previ-
, 
3 2 7  
ously moistened with water, to prevent it from running 
through the charcoal, but without any description of 
flux, is laid on the top of the fuel, and charcoal is 
thrown over it to fill up the furnace : in this manner 
ore and fuel are added, and the bellows plied for four 
hours or thereabouts, when the process is stopped; and 
the temporary wall in front of the furnace having been 
broken down, the bloom is removed by a pair of tongs 
from the bottom of the furnace : it is then beaten with 
a wooden mallet to separate as much of the vitrified 
oxide of iron as possible, and while still red hot, it 
is cut through the middle with a hatchet, in order to 
show the quality of the interior of the mass : in this 
state it is sol d  to the blacksmiths, who perform all the 
subsequent operations of forging it into bars and making
it into steel. 
Heath goes on to describe forging with an associated crucible 
processn: 
The process of forging the iron into bars is pern­
formed by sinking the blooms in a small charcoal fur­
nace, and by repeated heatings and hammerings, to free 
it as much as possible from the vitrified and unreduced 
oxide of iron: it is thus formed into small bars about 
a foot long, an inch and half broad, and about half an 
inch thick ; in this state the iron is full of cracks 
and exceedingly red short; and were an English manufac­
turer of steel to be told that cast-steel of excellent 
quality could be made from such iron, he would treat 
the assertion with great contempt. 
It is from this unpromising material, however, that 
the Indian steel is always made; the bars of iron just
described, are cut into small pieces to enable them to 
pack close in the crucible : a quantity of these pieces 
. amounting to about half a pound, and from that to two 
pounds, as the mass of steel is required to be of greater 
or less weight, is then put into a crucible alone, with 
a tenth part by weight of dried wood chopped small, and 
the iron and wood are then covered over with· one or two 
green leaves; the mouth of the crucibale is then filled 
up b y  a handful of tempered clay, which is rammed in s o  
closae as to exclude the air perfectly. 
The wood which is always selected to furnish carbon 
to the iron, is the Cas s ia auriculata, and the leaf used 
to cover the iron and wood is that of the Asaclepias 
gigantea, or, where that is not to be had, that of the 
Convolvulus laurifoliusa. As soon as the clay, used to 
stop the mouths of the crucibles, is dry, they are built 
3 2 8  
up i n  the form of an arch, with their bot toms i nwards, 
i n  a small furnace urged by two goa t - skin bellows; char­
coal is heaped up over them, and the blast kept up wi th­
out i ntermission for about two hours and a -half, when 
it  is  stopped, and the process is  considered complete : 
the furnace contains from twenty to twenty-four cruci ­
blesn. 
The crucinbles are next removed from the furnace, 
and allowed to cool; they are then broken, and the steel 
wh ich has been left to solidify is  taken out i n  a cake, 
having the form of the bottom of the crucible; each cake 
is the produce of one crucible, and the steel is never 
procured from a larger quant ity. When the fusion has 
been perfect, the top of the cake is covered with stri ae, 
radiat i ng from the centre, but wi thout any holes or 
rough project ions on it ;  when the fusion has been less 
perfect, the surface of the cake has a honey-combed ap­
pearance, caused probably by part icles of scoriae and 
unreduced oxide i n  the bar-iron, and often contains pro­
ject i ng lumps of iron st ill i n  the malleable state. 
Heath elaborates on the above, describing how the crucible 
is made: 
The crucib les are formed of a red l oam,. which is 
very refractory, mixed with a large quantity of charred 
hus k  of rice; they are made by t aking a lump of the tern-
pered clay i n  one hand, and giving i t  a rotatory mot i on, 
whi le i t  is hollowed out by the fi ngers of the other 
hand : each crucible serves only for one operation. 
The nat i ves prepare the cakes of steel for being 
drawn i nto bars by annealing them for several hours i n  
a charcoal fire, actuated by bellows, the current of 
air from whi ch is  made to play upon the cakes while 
turned over before i t  at a heat just short of that suf­
ficient to melt them .  I t  appears from this, that in 
order to i nsure the fusion of the contnents of the crucin­
ble, i t  is found necessary to employ a larger dose of 
carbon than is  requi red to form the hardest steel, and 
that this excess is afterwards got rid of by anneali ng 
the cakes before a current of air at a h i gh heat, the 
oxygen of the air  combining with and carryi ng off the 
excess of carbon i n  the gaseous form : without th is 
operation none of the cakes would stand drawi ng i nto 
bars wi thout breaking. 
The only fuel employed by the nat ives of India 
throughout the different stages of i ron and steel making 
is wood charcoal . The magnet ic oxide of iron, when 
3 2 9  
separated from the quartz with which it is naturally 
combined in t he ore from which t he wootz steel is made, 
consists of 72 per cent. of iron and 28 of oxygen. The 
native method of smelting the ore is so exceedingly im­
perfect, that the produce from their furnaces in bar­
iron does not average more t han fifteen per cent.· 
I t  is not unexpected to find t hat Ceylon also shares in 
t he range of technological procedures that characterize steel 
working in South I ndia. There is an extensive collect ion of 
specimens of iron and steel tools in t he Colombo Museum. 
These objnects have all reportedly been recovered from ancient 
sites in Ceylon. Sir Robert Hadfield in 1910 studied several 
of them, including a specimen of a steel chisel from Sigiriya 
which was described by the then D irector of the Museum as 
dat i ng from the fifth century.2 5  Hadfield concluded , after 
examining micro- sections of the chisel , that cementing and 
carburizing of wrought iron was known in Ceylon at least some 
150 0 years ago and that "the art of iron and steel manufac­
ture must at that time have been of quite a high order . "2 6  
The manufacture of steel in Ceylon by indigenous pro­
cesses had become a lost art by 19 08 when Dr. Ananda 
Coomaraswamy was writing his book on the work of t he Sinhalese 
craftsman.n2 7  At t hat time t here were a few families still 
smelting ore by native processes but the steel-makers, who 
are of a different and higher caste t han t he smelters, had 
abandoned their craft. Coomaraswamy was able to locate two 
old men at Alutnuvara who could demonst rate the process. The 
men employed a small bowl-shaped hearth sunk in the ground. 
The hearth was filled with charcoal and air was conducted 
into the charge by bellows. Lumps of iron were packed into 
clay crucibles together with some chips of ranavara (Cassia 
auricu l ata)n. The clay crucibles were each about eight inches 
long, two inches in diameter and a quarter of an inch in 
thickness-- close to the Santubong vessels before use? (cf. 
I I I.I S). The crucible was here covered with a lid which had 
been pierced so that gas could escape.n2 8  
These procedures would in general appear to be similar 
to the processes hypothetically employed at Santubong. I n  
crucible size and design, the S inhalese were roughly cylin­
drical, matching the vessels in use at Santubong for whatever 
purpose. The small size of t heir crucible would seem to be 
dictated by the low range of temperature possible in such a 
simple heart h furnace. By using a long, narrow cylinder, 
maximum surface area would be exposed to t he heat and temper­
atures would be held relatively uniform, through the i ron 
pieces inside. Crucibles of larger diameter would present 
the danger of differential rates of cementation along the 
majnor axes of the pieces of wrought iron being carburized 
(cf. III. I S ). 
330 
What becomes increasingly likely is that Santubong 
shared, however marginally , at a distant remove, in the clus­
ter of practices that characnterized the "wootzn" steel indus­
try of South India and Ceylon, however these were modified 
locally in Borneo. It is logical to assume that the iron 
smelters of Santubong also employed iron smelting practices 
that were roughly analogousn. Great caution is essential 
here, however, since we have not been able to trace out the 
essential plan of an iron furnace; but the kind of Sinhalese 
iron furnace described by Coomaraswamy would be difficult to 
recover in excavation in an open site , especially under the 
disturbed delta conditions. 
(b) Ancient China: The Cast I ron Stream 
Chinese iron-working seems to have developed along a 
singular path from earliest times. The date of its first 
use is not precisely fixed ,n2 9  but it is certain that iron 
was a significant factor in Chinese life by the beginning of 
the Period of the Warring States (481- 221 B.C.)n. The extra­
ordinary feature of the Chinese industry is that iron was 
cast as a fully liquid metal almost from its first appearnce . ., 
This practice, now assocniated with the modern blast furnace, 
is completely at variance with development in the rest of 
the world, where iron was made by a direct bloomery process.n3 0  
Analysis of four iron implements excavated from tombs of the 
Warring States period (480 -222 B . C. )  confirms that they were 
indeed of the cast iron variety .n3 1  Paral lel evidence is pro­
vided by the new technique of dating iron by the carbon-14 
method. A cast iron fragment collected in the 1930's from a 
tomb group near Loyang in Honan Province has tested at 
2380 + 80 B . P. ( =  430 + 80 B. C. ) . 3n2  
Before the period of the Northern Sung ( 960 -1126 A . nD . )  
most iron was produced in China in either charcoal or anthra­
cite fueled crucibles or in a blast furnace.n3 3  The crucible 
process may be the more ancient of the two methods,n3 4  but it 
was ultimately largely displaced by the blast furnace. This 
furnace , as described in 1637 by Sung Ying-Hsing, was made 
of salt and mud and was capable of holding 2, 0 0 0  catties of 
ore. The illustration provided in the text shows two men 
working the bellows next to the furnace and they appear 
smaller than the furnace.n3 5  Measurements given for a blast 
furnace in a text written 50 years later by Chu Ta-Chung 
give a height of 17 feet , a bottom dimension of 35 feet and 
walnls 2 feet in thickness as the top.n3 6  
For example, a report in Wen-Wu , 1959,n3 7  describes a 
large scale iron foundry and furnace site, possibly dating 
3 3 1  
from the Han Dynasty (before 220 A.D.). One of the furnoaces 
was fairly complete with walls 2 meters in height, diameter 
of 3 meters, and a wall· thickness ranging from 0.8 - 1.2
meters according to the relative state of preservoation. It 
is almost impossible that furnoaces of these proportions would 
have been in use at Santubong without leaving a trace ; and 
yet nothing excavated there would indicate their presence.
It also seems unlikely that the slag would have been spread 
so extensively in the delta sites, if furnaces capoable o f  
such intensive production were utilized. A further argument 
against the existence of bl ast furnaces in the delta is the 
dense mixture of slag and burnt s and which would indicate 
direct rather than indirect smelting processes (II.10.d) :  
Finally, we have not found any mold at Santubong into which 
cast iron would be poured, while such molds have been found 
intact at Chinese iron -wo rking sites.o3 8  
While it is difficult to imagine Chinese-type bl ast fur­
naces in operoation in the deltoa, the other Chinese process
involving crucibles does excite inteorest. Although this 
ancient p rocess had been largely displaced by the more effi­
cient blast furnaces, at least by the Sung period, the indus­
try lingered on in Shansi Province into contemporary times. 
There are a number of accounts of this process as witnessed 
by European observers in the nineteenth and twentieth cen­
turies. They are summarized by F. R. Tegengren who also had 
fi rst-hand knowledge of the industry.o3 9  At Shansi, iron ores 
were smelted in refractory clay crucibles in a simple, open,
stall furnaoce. The walls of the furnace were made of clay 
and old slag·. The rear well of the furnoace was closed by a 
small hut which sheltered the men operating the bellows. The 
furnace was filled with ore-packed crucibles and coal. Finoal­
ly the remaining wall was built up of fragments of old c ruci­
bles. 
The Chinese crucibles were large cylinders of refractory 
clay measuring 0.51 x 0.18 meters. They were packed with 
o re, anthroacite dust and a kind of decomposed coal called 
locally hei- t'ua. Each of the crucibles contained approxi­
mately 26.8 pounds of material. Clearly the size of these 
c rucibles has little relationship to the small cylinders in 
use for whatever purpose at S antubong. It is almost unthink­
able that o re was smelted directly in crucibles in the delta, 
since the meageor size of the vessels would militate against 
that. Further, although coal is relatively accessible from 
the delta sites, there were no traces of coal in the excavoated 
iron-woorking areas there ( I I Io.18). This last is not a criti­
cal factor however, since the original Chinese process may
well have utilized charcoal until deforestation made coal a 
necessity. 
332 
Tegengren quotes an account by T. T. Read , which indi­
cates that at one foundry at Shansi, small pieces of iron 
were placed in crucnibles which measured 7 by 14 inches. 
About S O  to 80 of these were fired in a simple stall furnace 
and then the molten iron was poured into molds.4 0  While the 
process is again suggestive of Santubong- -the size of the 
crucible, while still much wider, is at least much closer to 
the delta vessel size- -the follo wing factors militate against 
linking the two processes direcntly: 
(i) The Shansi operation described by Read follows only 
after the primary smelting in large crucibles di­
rectly from iron ore. I n  the delta, we have n o  cru­
cible of sufficient size for the smelting of ore . 
(ii) Delta crucibles are always imperfect. I f, as in 
the Chinese process, the smith had been cas ting 
metal in a monlten state directly from the crucible, 
then we would reasonably expect to find at least 
some intact crucnibles. The broken crucibles, on 
the other hand , indicate that the metal was solid 
before being extracted and that it was necessary to 
break the crucible to get it out. 
(iii) Slag shapes at Santubong, especially the long 
"fingers" (InI.9) would indicate that slag was being 
tapped. I f  slag were to be dripped from a height, 
some of  it could be expected to form in trickles as 
it cooled. Our "multi- fingers" type also suggests 
tapping of slag. While we obviously know too little 
about these processes to speak with confidence,  it 
would seem unlikely that iron ore smelted in the 
Chinese crucible process as at Shansi would form 
slags of that type. Rather than tap-slag we would 
expect more random shapes (cf. Tylecote: 19 2, 229). 
(iv) Conversely, according to Joseph Needham (23) there 
is no evidence that China at any ancient time used 
processes similar to that used in making "wootzn" 
steel.n4 1  
On balance then, it would seem that Chinese iron-working 
procedures would not appear to be a close mondel for what we 
find at Santubong. Neither the blast furnace or the Chinese 
crucible process appear to be suitable analogues. The situa­
tion is still unclear especially since the tuyere/crucible 
question still puzzles;nbut we could see basic siminlarities 
between a delta "crucible process" and the methods used to 
manufacture "wootzn" steel in South I ndia and Ceylon. The 
delta iron-workers may have assimilated and adapted and even 
distorted these latter techniques to fit local conditions , 
3 3 3  
or for other reasonsn, but there would still appear to be a 
"family resemblance" between the carburization of wrought 
iron in clay cruc ibles in South I ndia and Ceylon and some 
part of the activity which went on round Santubong. What is 
most clear, though, is that we are only at the beginning of 
an understanding. of these prehistoric processes for this 
part of the world. Everything offered in these chapters 
must be regarded from this point of view. 
VI.n35. SOME AFRICAN PARALLELS?n1 
There are consistent affinities between East Africa and 
West Borneo of the Sarawak River delta period, although they 
are separated by the vast span of the Indian Ocean in space. 
At several points particnularly on the Kenya, Tanganyi ka (Tan­
zania) and adjacent East Africa coastal areas, large-scale 
evidence of i ron or related metal working has been demon­
strated arcnhaeologically in  ass o oiation with  imported glass
beads and with Chinese stonewares, often very close to or 
ident i cal wi th those from the delta, as well as with Kuala 
Selinsing in Malaya.n2 I ron was different though, as summar­
i zed i n  Sonia Colesn' general survey. 
A few groups of typically mesolithic communities 
are known, but a neolithic stage before the coming of 
iron seems to be generally absent. Stone age hunters 
contninued to roam parts of the country for a thousand 
years and more after iron-using peoples introduced food 
production, an event that took place in Africa south of 
the Sahara and south of the Nile only during the first 
millennium A.D.n, long after the Bronze Age had been sucn­
ceeded by the I ron Age in  the Middle East and Europe.n3 
But when iron came, i t  came--as in  Borneo--with a bang, 
not a whimper. At Mt. Meroe in the Sudan (100 B.nC. to 350 
A. D. ) " 12 immense slag heaps are still visible there to this 
day" (Cole : 30 1) .  
Much effect i ve new research is going on into the Afri­
can " Iron Age" at this time, and Mrs. Coles' text i s  already 
outn- of-date in  some respects. Radinocarbon dates put iron as 
early as 10 0 0  B.nC. in Ghana, oa . 500 B.nC. in Nigeria , in the 
early centuries of the Christian era in Tanzania , generally 
a li ttle later i n  Zambia and Rhodesia. But major iron-work­
ing site dates also cluster heavily around 750 to 1340  A . D. 
(and later) in the last three of these terrintories. These 
and other African dates-- over 10 0 of them ! --have been recent­
ly summarized by Mi uze Stuiver and Nicolaas van der Merwe, 
who point out that the pictnure nevertheless remains far from 
clear and conclude :n4 
I t  remai ns for archaeologists to docnument fully the ap­
pearance of i ron technology . . .n informat ion from the 
date lists is meager, the site reports are unpublished, 
and a lot more needs to be done. 
334 
335 
Radio-carbon dates may tell  you l i ttle or even be coun­
terproductive i f  not ful ly co-ordinated with other site fac­
tors . It would be easy to obtain a simi lar wide date range 
for Borneo and adjacent islands--if we had the means and 
materials !  The results might not at present be meani ngfuln. 
It is  striking i n  Africa, that despite i ntense iron age 
studies, the iron i tself--which l ies at the basis of the 
whole "Iron Age" i dea--has received by comparison even less 
attention than i n  most other areas . While  prepari ng the 
present paper we had the pleasure of discussing things with 
one of the most disti nguinshed archaeologists working on the 
subject i n  Africa; he did not, for instance, know what a cru­
c ible was or did i n  terms of i ron technology. Some of the 
technol ogi cal questions have barely been asked in  Afrinca.  
In a luc i d  paper on the "Iron Age Peoples of Z ambia and 
Malawin" Dr .  Brian Fagan (1967)n5 i nc i dental ly surveys the 
record of earl ier research. Credit. goes to R. R .  Inskeep 
for excavation of an i ron-smelting site near Livingstone.n6 
But from the start the i ron age as discussed by Fagan and 
many others is  based primari ly on a consideration of native 
earthenware pottery divided i nto seven mai n  types ; these are 
i l lunstrated by twelve text figures in  Pagan's paper, which 
also has three maps , one showing copper and gol d  sources, but 
nothi ng on i ron itself. In the same volnume another pioneer 
i n  this fiel d ,  Roger Summers (1967) , describes "Iron Age 
Industries of Southern Africa . "7 Agai n, the i ndustries in­
clude pottery (heavily), mining of gold (1, 10 0 prehistoric 
mines) and copper (150+ )  plus the workings of these ; but 
nothi ng comparable on iron at any leveln. In an earli er paper 
Summers (1966) pointed firmly at one of the essential l i nks 
i n  the sti l l  i ncomplete chain whi ch surely justi fies the uni­
versal usage of "Iron Age" in African terminologies .  The 
passage is also of direct relevance to Sarawak:n8 
I ron ore was largely col lected on the surface-- haematite 
is  widely distributed--but several large i ron ore quar­
ries are known. In those areas there are abundant si gns 
of iron-worki ng, usually assoc iated with Mining Culture 
potteryn. The i ron s e e ms to have been treated in  a manu­
factured form. 
This rates seven l i nes after two pages on gold. But how, 
then, was it  smelted and rendered "manufacturable"? The 
Swedish prehistorian H .  v .  Sicard commented critical ly on 
this  African approach; among other thi ngs he emphasized the 
complexity of culnture impacts which may get oversimpl ified 
on some pottery and other locally based artinfactual sequences .n9 
Sicard sensibly adds: 
336  
Nobody would today subscribe to Frobeniusn' view [ in 
1931] that iron- working spread in the opposite direc­
tion: I ndonesian+ Madagascarn+ Equatorial African+ 
Nubian+ Egypt. Stilln, I think the solution of our prob­
lem should not be dogmatically sought in one direction 
only. One cannot contest the main facts in Frobenius'· 
map of the distribution of the main forms of bellows.  
. . . This also seems to indicate a double influence.n1 0  
Frobenius drew his conclusions on ethnological and proto-
historical grounds. The answers of archaeology and prehis­
tory have yet to be offered with equal lucidity for i ron. 
It is easy for the present writers to accept double or even 
treble influences, quite apart from the deep importance that 
can evolve internally, as part of the native process continu­
ing from one of the stone age bronze or around bronze and 
gold into iron. But it has to be recognized that so far as 
incontestable factual evidence on iron techniques are con­
cerned, rather little progress has been made in recent 
decades. This is largely, of course, because in East Africa, 
as in Borneo and most other open site areas of the tropics, 
exact recovery by excavation presents majnor difficulties and 
may often be impossible. As another African scholar has 
properly observed :n1 1  
Though the distribution-patterns of present-day cul­
tural traits, such as musical instruments, agricultural 
and iron- working tools, boats, etc. indicate lines of 
movement, they are often confused or overlaid by later 
movements, as the Indonesian movement was overlaid by
the Indian Ocean Muslim influence. The very nature of 
primitive iron- working which involves the destruction 
of the furnace to extract the "bloom" of smelted ore 
and the aura of mystery in which the art is held, neces­
sitating in many cases the process to be carried out 
away from the settlement, militates against the archae­
ologist building up from his own excavations a more de­
tailed knowledge of the process of iron- working and its 
origin in the Early Iron Age. 
An important "Early Iron age" complex at Kwale in Tan­
zania was investigated in 1967; a preliminary report comes 
from the Director of the British Institute of History and 
Archaeology in East Africa :n1 2  
Two further sites were discovered , all three being with­
in one square mile; trial trenches at these produced a 
very large amount of pottery similar to that from the 
original site together with considerable quantities of 
iron slag, fragments of tuyeraes and a few iron objaects. 
3 3 7  
From the stratigraphy it would seem that all the sites 
are broadly contemporary although it is not known whether 
they were occupied simultaneously. Charcoal which occurs 
commonly over the whole area in an equivalent position 
suggests a clearance of the forest connected either with 
agriculture or with charcoal burning for iron-sme l t i n g .  
Poised expectantly for pendi ng reports of a sort unlikel y 
to be produced so thoroughly anywhere else in the world of 
iron prehistory at present , we woul d draw additional atten­
tion to what is for Sarawak a fascinating earlier African 
paper by Miss J. R. Hard�ng, "On Some C ruci bles and Associated 
Finds from the Coast of Tanganyika.' 'n1 3  Miss Harding reports 
the first crucibles known found at K i lwa and at Kisigia. 
These strikingly reflect an approach to metallurgy reminiscent 
of what we have seen from further east. Thus the Harding re­
port almost echoes part of a Sarawak hypothesisn: 
Most of the Kisiju crucibles were found buried in man­
grove swamp from one to three i nches below the surface , 
and they usually occurred in groups of six or more to­
gether. Others were found singly on the sandy surface 
fringing the swampn. 
Miss Harding continues this passage i n  the way that has be­
come somewhat familiar to any who have been good enough to 
follow this paper so farn: 
A search for the possible remains of a furnace or other 
evidence of fire in the vicinity of the finds was unsucn­
cessful, though rare fragments of. metalliferous slag 
were noted i n  one or two places.n1 4  
Al as,  that is the last we hear of that slag ! The crucibles 
are described in isolation,  as "cone - shaped,n" 4.n5 cm. to 7.n5 
cm. across the rim, 6.n5 to 9.n5 cm. in length--well within 
the Sarawak range. Cavities in these vessels  show "particles 
of incrustation'' by molten metal. A specimen was submitted 
to the government chemist at Dar es Salaam, who reported 
iron, copper, arsenic , tin, silver, lead , calcium, silicon 
and carbon- -and then surprisi ngly "was of the opinion that 
this particular crucible had been used for smelting copper.n"n1 5  
Further, Miss Harding compares the Kisijnu and similar 
K i lwa vessels with others from Z imbabwe "where copper and 
gold are known to have been worked.n" They are "entirely 
different." The associated artifacts at K isiju range from 
the fourth to fifteenth centuries A. D. ; nothi ng postdates 
fifteenth century. These i nclude Chinese celnadons, locally 
made earthenware pottery, and glass beads of the sort so 
familiar i n  Southeast Asi a  (V.n31.a). The beads are dated by 
3 3 8  
J. S. Kirkman at between 12 0 0  and 140 0 A . D. and occur also 
at Zimbabwe .n1 6  From Gedi, too, come extensive Chinese stone­
wares, as also from Zimbabwe--and widely elsewhere in East 
Africa. 
Miss Caton- Thompson, who pioneered so much good work 
and thinking in East Africa, has recently re- stated her (cer­
tainly correct) stand on the issue of Zimbabwe, the prehis­
toric "city" of renown; i.ne.n, that it was the work of an 
endemic, native Bantu culture- - a  view unsuited to some recent 
racial politics of the arean. She concludes with emphasis:n1 7  
The prevalent belief that the natives of Rhodesia knew 
nothing of mining at depth, and therefore can have had 
no part in the exploitation of the ancient (gold) mines 
is entirely and utterly fallacious. 
Out of that gold grew much of this iron know-how, no 
doubt in Africa as in Asian. The relationships between the 
two continents can hardly be ignored . The spread of gold 
technology was importantn. But the spread of iron technology 
must have been revolutionaryn. There are associations in 
East Africa (especially) which in some respects exactly paral­
lel those in the Sarawak River deltan: notably the presence 
of the stoneware and glass in both sectorsn. Can we, then, 
imagine there are no parallels with the iron- working? The 
answer remains elusiven. These fairly superficial comments 
are by no means intended to belittle the tremendous recent 
achievements of our able and numerous colleagues on another 
continent, but rather to indicate the exciting range and im­
portance of further researchn- - or more specifically analynsis 
of existing research results--that remains to be done before 
modern man can really see what resemblances there are between 
Asia and Africa in the crucial matter of prehistoric iron 
techniques- - b e s ide which some relatively simple considera­
tions involved in working gold or making local clay pots 
surely pale almost into insignificance? It could for in­
stance be of the highest interest to examine soon the method­
ological metallurgical relationships between one or several 
African and especially East African iron industries (includ­
ing ores, slags, etc. ) all the way from collecting (the
smelter) to the finished toolsn. I n  particular, from this 
point of view, what if any impacts have " I ndian" (or even 
"Bornean") methods had into East Africa and vice versa? The 
piston bellows forge, already noted, is still used through­
out interior Borneo for example, and has known close affini­
ties with that of Madagascar, as is generally agreed. 
I t  is remarkable, toon, that: 
3 3 9  
In Madagasncar the smiths occupy a pos i t ion like thos e 
of Java, from whom they seem to have adopted tools and 
bellows .1 8  
Here, again, we mus t  note the i mportant role played by 
b amb oo i n  the Borneo-Madagasncar ("Malay") bellows and related 
aspects of iron-working .  Bamboo was almost indis pensable i n  
the evolut i on of this  wind-maki ng technique ( I I I .17) through 
Southeas t As ia .  I t  is  a matter of botanical fact that Mada­
gas car has an except ionally rich bamboo flora- - more s pecies 
than i n  all of continental Africa . 
In parts of Northeas t Afr ica, unlike Madagascar, i ron­
workers are wi dely regarded as "s laves and pariahs"  (Forbesn: 
63 ) ,  although there i s  much local vari at ion. Our colleague 
Profesnsor Victor Turner tells us that i n  Wesat Afri ca, with 
the skin bellows, wi dely a blacksmith i s  either of high caste 
or outcas t;  to become a smith often requires a spiritual ex­
perience and direct  spirit communicat ion. Forges there are 
shaped as female pudenda and the bellows regarded as male 
phallus penetrat ion. Molten metal may be regarded, i n  that 
context, as the female mens trual fluid or even as an orgasmic 
disncharge; and the whole operat ion as equivalent to chi ld­
beari ng (cfn. the delta ideas postulated in I I . 12)n. Th is  is  
illustrated in color in Rene Gardi .' s book "Mandara" 1 9 for the 
remote i nland area south of Lake Chad which shows some other 
parallels relevant to Borneo--that ofn.nthe s peci alized clay ­
treatment by s ti ck inser t ion, des cribed by Homo Sas soon for 
the Sukur, of especial i nteres t, has already been ci ted . n2 0  
These wishing to pursue these matters further cannot do better 
than expect the long s tudy of the Marghi s melters and smiths 
(not far from the Sukur)  by James H. Vaughan of Indinana Unin­
ver s i ty, who wr ites:n2 1  
The def i ni t ive s tudy of metals i n  Africa by Walter 
Cline was publi shed i n  193 7 and i t  i s  surpr i s i ng and 
regrettable that no one has re-exami ned the topic i n  
the light of recent data. 
Like the Kayans and Kenyahs of central Borneo, the 
Marghi cont inue to value splendid tools and weapons from 
their own steel, regardles s of attempted encroachment from 
outs i de export. 
Als o i n  nornthern Nigeri a, we have the recent magnetic 
surveys undertaken through the Pit t  Rivers Mus eum, Oxford, 
which located buried iron-smelt i ng furnaces, dat i ng back be­
fore the Chri s t ian era.n2 2  
Let us, reluctantly perhaps, turn from the tremendous 
further field for explorat ion that here merits attent i on. 
3 4 0  
From Madagascar , anyway , it is a long but ethnically easy 
journey back into the heart of Borneo, whence some forceful 
anthropologists and linguists, led by Professor Gratanelli 
in Rome and Professor George Murdock from the Pittsburgh 
smoke, have derived a direct, powerful cultural impact with 
East Africa at least.2 3  
VI . 36. E LSEWHERE IN  BORNEO : ETHNOLOGICAL ANALOGIES 
(a) Source Difficulties 
In the present state of prehistorical research, it has 
often been necessary in this paper to come forward in time 
and see what can be seen, learn by inference what can be so 
learned, from the methods of working iron as observedo--seldom 
alas, professionally--in historical times, whether in Madao­
gascar, India, China or Sarawak. In the absence so far of 
any other full excavations of irono-working sites in Borneo 
or Southeast Asia generally, it remains now to focus back 
down on this sort of ethnological evidence for the island 
itself. Several of the more important from the surprisingly 
meager records on this theme have been briefly cited where 
essential in earlier chapterso. 
Conveniently, Ling Roth brought together most of the 
western (but not Kalimantan) sources up to the end of the 
last century in his monumental compilation to which the 
reader is further referred, since it is widely available in 
the libraries. By 1896 iron smelting and refining (our prio­
mary and secondary concerns here) survived only in the far 
and seldom visited interior with increasing administration,
pa cification of the warring tribes and opening up of ready 
trade inland--including finished iron tools from overseas 
(including Europe). 
After 1896, we have one important if somewhat unsatis­
factory account, however: that of Charles Hose with its 
direa t statement of aruaible us e ( I I I. 1 3). Although Dutch 
Dro. Schwaner's much earlier, rather detailed and dreadfully
difficult eye-witness description of smelting in Southern 
Kalimantan is mentioned by Ling Roth, no full English trans­
lation was then available, so that we have reproduced this 
important record as Appendix B hereaftero. 
(b) Smelter to Smith 
The tertiary stage of irnn-working, the craft of the 
blacksmith, has continued intb the present, inlando. Bars of 
iron (including from railway metal and jeep springs) are now 
traded into the furthest interior and there forged into 
finished tools, though this too is a dying craft in face of 
cheap imports (this time, largely from Hong Kong and China).
There are more and better descriptions of smithing activities 
34 1 
3 4 2  
than of smelting. These may seem of les s  concern in this 
study, but they can throw light on the whole field. The 
active smith today ha s little or  no visible relation to the 
iron-wo rker at kiln or crucible stageo. But it is  difficult 
to believe that the same "culture impact" which, say, took 
the "Malayan bellows" acro s s  the Indian Ocean, did not ca rry 
at the same time, then, the other and much more vital fea­
tures qf the whole iron technology which began in the earth 
and only ended on the anvil. Moreover, it i s  conspicuously 
true that the people who have been acclaimed over the past 
two centuries, literally without exception, as  the best p ro­
ducers of finished steel in Borneo (if not in Southeast Asia) 
are thoose in the interior who are known, al so, to have 
smelted their own iron into the last century--notably the 
Kayans and Kenyahs and related people of noorthern Central 
Sa rawak and widely down the hinterland of Kalimantan from 
the Batang Kayan to the Ba rito and Kapua s river systems. 
The best known of these products is  the mandau, malat, isau 
or parang ilang, an all-purpose knife- sword-axe of great 
beauty, cutting quality and advanced workmanship, often in­
cluding b rass  inlay and a kind of damascene technique. It 
would be to stretch the bounds of reason to suppoose that 
these various iron skillos--as described by Schwaner befo re 
1850, by Hose early in this century, by the evidence of our 
own eyes both from the Sarawak River delta excavations and 
f rom ga zing with pleaosure at the ethnological exhibits of 
swords, spears and the rest in the Sarawak Museum--developed 
simply in little pockets or  among single tribes, let alone 
in the isolated far interio r of Kayan -Kenyah country. Rather, 
these latter have to be regarded as  survival s of a once much 
more extensive activity of art and labor, rooted in the p re­
historic strength of ore- reducing centers such as tho se of 
which we so far know around Santubong alone. 
Nor is  there any suggestion, in any ethnological ac­
count, that at one end of the scale smelting and at the other 
smithing were separated skills or speciali zations. On the 
contrary, the smiths worked--until recently--off steel pre­
pared by themselves in their own community. Where (for vari ­
ous reasons) ore was unavailable or unused by any inland 
group, they sought either the smithing skill or  the steel of 
their neighbors. Often, too, they traded--over very long
and difficult routes--the finished tools of Kayan-Kenyah 
type through the center of Borneo. Nothing that came from 
overseas could match these steels, in the opinion of pretty 
well all hearty Borneans. 
Nearly a hundred years ago Earl accurately echoed an 
ancient mood for the inland folk of Kalimantan:o1 
3 4 3  
The iron which is obtained in the interior is said to 
be valued by many of the wilder Dyaks even more than 
gold . . .n . T he iron must either be excellent qualinty, 
or the Dyaks must have discovered a method of tempering 
it, which s ets at defiance the competition of more civil­
isaed nations.a2 
In the same vein, the second White Rajnah of Sarawak, 
Sir Charles Brooke, commenting on something he knew a lot 
about first hand, wrote a century agon: 
Iron smelted in the interior of Rejang is s econd to 
none in making arms. (Cf. Ling Roth, II :  2 3 6.) 
But as the nineteenth century faded, smelting faded too. 
Carl Bock, one of the best ethnologists to travel the inter­
ior of Kalimantan at that time, in part covered the same 
ground as Schwaner four decades before, without now being
able to locate any actual smelting point. Writing for the 
Kalimantan Kenyahs and Kayans generall y, he pays a typical 
tribute to the surviving smithery there: 
The principal weapon is the mandau, literally 
"head-hunter,n" of which each Dyak has from four to six. 
These are placed in a rack hung against the wall in his 
room, the weapon being always kept out of its sheath 
with the blade greased to prevent rust. The blade-­
concave on one side and convex on the othern- -is about 
twenty- one inches long, nearly straight, one and a half 
inches broad in the middle, and tapering towards the 
end to a sharp pointn. I t  has only one cutting edge, 
the back being a quarter of an inch thick. The blade 
is made of steel or fine iron, which is abundant in 
Borneon. Although I have often seen the blade in the 
rough, in process of being sharpened and properly shaped, 
I have never seen either mine or smelting furnace, and 
could not ascertain where the raw material really came 
from. 
The process of grinding and sharpening is very
slow, and to polish and put a proper edge on a plain 
blade occupies more than a fortnight. Many of the 
blades are beautifully inlaid with brass along the sides 
near the back, while others have open scroll patterns 
cut right through the blade.n3 
E ighty years after this Bock record, exactly this same 
craft was so successfully continuing in inner Kalimantan that 
with good contacts there it was possible to order and even­
tually to obtain- -after over a yearn' s  interval--the finest 
mandau made to specification from the descendants of these 
same Kenyah and Kayan smiths.n4 
344  
Ironically enough, it was the people of the coastal 
plain at places such as Santubong who first acquired the 
habit of relying on a maritime trade for their steel ideas. 
As far as is known the rich center of the Sultanate of Brunei 
at Kota Batu did not develop an iron industry of its own at 
all--perhaps depending, even for raw iron, on a coastal traf­
fic up from Sarawak; certainly, Brunei depended on outside 
for all iron following the advent of Islam in strength in 
the fifteenth century (by which time, of couorse, Santubong 
was gone and buried, metalo-wise). 
If we next consider smelting and smithing separately, 
it is for convenience under historical circumstances, with­
out a tuyere 's  puff of prejudice to the c oncept of a common 
natural relationship deep inside S outheast Asian p rehistory. 
(c) Smelting and Related Accounts 
Bornean smelting seems to  have been somewhat restricted 
locally in historical times; but this could be an impression 
wholly due to inadequate reportage, plus the slow explora­
tion of the difficult hinterland--large parts of the northern 
interior were not penetrated by outsiders until well into 
this century, and the Punan Busang people were not visited 
by a white man until the second half thereof. As the record 
stands, smelting is reliably recorded since 1800 from an 
area beginning close to and south of the present political 
boundary between Sabah (North Borneo) and Kalimantan, and 
c ontinuing in a long, very uneven zone down both sides of 
the Kalimantan-Sarawak border, including to the eastern side 
of the spinal wateorshed ( =  political border), the upper 
drainages of the Batang Kayan, Mahakkam, Barito and Kapuas
rivers; on the westeorn side, the Baram (including the main 
Tinjar tributary) , Rejang (especial ly Baloi) and perhaps 
further southwest. There is no good historical record of 
smelting in Land Dayak or Sea Dayak (Iban) terrain in the 
southwestern hinteorland, though the numerous hinterland slags 
suggest someone once did it at the places they now inhabit 
(cf. IV.22); both peoples highly esteem the other inland 
tools as well as seeking these steels to work fo r themselves 
in the past. 
The Rajah Brookeo's  above-quoted evaluation of weapons 
made from metal smelted in the upper Rejango--then only in­
habited by Kayans, Kenyahs and Melanaus--was confirmed some 
years later by the exp lorer-prospector-collector A.oH. 
Everett, whp reported the richest ores in Sarawak :o5 
3 4 5  · 
. . . f rom the Upper Rejang. The Kayan tribes inhabit­
ing this district smelt their own iron, using charcoal 
onl y, in their own rude furnaces, and the steel they 
manufacture is preferred to that of European make. 
The pioneer explorer of the Kayan-Kenyah hinterland on 
the Sarawak side was a grandson of the Scottish bard, Burns, 
who wrote :n6 
Commonly at every Kayan village there is a place 
for smelting iron, in all the process of which the com­
munity mutually partake. Covered by a shed, the rude 
furnace consists of a circular pit formed in the ground, 
three feet deep, and about four feet in diameter. Pre­
vious to the smelting process the ore is roasted and 
broken into small pieces. The coals (charcoal) in the 
furnace being set fire to and well kindled, the prepared 
ore is then placed on the top with alternate layers of 
coals. The ventilators used consist of wooden tubes, 
ten to twelve in number, about six feet long and placed
vertical·ly round the furnace. The bore of each is about 
s even inches in diameter, the pistons to correspond are 
framed of cloth or soft bark. Attached to the piston
rods are others of considerable length, to which weights 
are made fast and balanced on the cross beams of the 
shed. By this contrivance the pistons are moved up and 
down, and a constant blast produced, which is led by 
c lay pipes from the orifice at the bottom of each tube 
into the furnace. In the smelting operation there is 
no flux used with the ore, which yields about seventy 
per cent. of iron. To make iron either hard or soft asn· 
may be required, different s o rts of wood are made use 
of. (Our italics) 
This description shows how commonplace such smelting was up­
river a century or so ago. Note the simple circular pit fur­
nace; pre-roasting and heating up the ore; firing in alter­
nate layers of ore and charcoal ; the typical (for Southeast 
Asia) bellows system of "wooden tubes,n" and the c lay tubes 
acting as tuye res (here as elsewhere unfortunately noat de­
scribed in more detail ; cf. 1 1 1 . 13 ) n; no flux (cf. IV . Z S )  ; 
and an alleged 70 % iron yield from the ore. 
The last sentence in Burns relates to a report by another 
pioneer explorer of West Borneo and one of its best ethnolo­
gists, Hugh Low, who wrote of the Kenyah peoples:n7 
In a Kinah village the smithy is in a central situ­
ation. The K i nahs smelt their own ore and manufacture 
their own iron ware. I watched the operation and pro­
cured a few samples of the metal. There is nothing 
346  
peculiar to describe; there were an anvil, a coupole of 
hammers, and a pair of twyers as usual, a charcoal fur­
nace, a quantity of impure ore, and the usual primitive
bellows. These people temper their own ore with a frag­
ment of European ironware, when they can get it. 
From these two accounts it  will be clear tha t by no manner 
of means did the "primiotive" Kayan, Kenyah ( =  Kinah above)
and o ther smelters of inner Borne. o--then "head hunoters," 
"slave owners," "pagans," e tc., etc.o--regard the first pro­
cess of smelting ore as crude and invariable. They sought 
to improve, by using different materials to vary the raw 
product, even if they had to reach ouotside for the necessary
finesse (like the mainland Chinese, a thousand years before 
them) . 8 
For an overall idea of what all this meant, from smelt 
to smith, let us return to the comprehensive Charles Hose 
version of what went on up the Baram River--which he knew 
intimaotely--some thirty years before publication of his two 
volume 1912 study, co-authored with Prof. W. McDougall. 
Part of this account has previously been examined, but as it  
is the best there is for Sarawak, the whole is reproduced 
here:o9 
In any account of the arts and crafts of the Kayans, the 
working of iron claims the first place by reason of its 
high importance to them and of the skill and knowledge 
displayed by them in the difficul t operaotion by which 
they produce their fine swords. The origin of their 
knowledge of iron and of the processes of smelting and 
forging remains hidden in mysotery; . . .o it  is probable 
that the Kayans were the first iron -workers in Borneo, 
and that from them the other tribes have learnt the 
craft with various measures of success. However this 
may be, the Kayans remain the most skilful ironworkers 
of the counotry, rivalled only in the production of 
serviceable sword-blades by the Kenyahs. 
A t  the present day the Kayans, like all the o ther 
peoples, obtain their iron in the form of bars of iron 
and steel imported from Europe and distributed by the 
Chinese and Malay traders. But thirty years ago -nearly
all the iron worked by the tribes of the interior was 
from ore found in the river beds, and possibly fromo· 
masses of meteoric iron; and even at  the present day 
the native ore is still smelted in the far interior, 
and swords made from it  by the Kenyahs are still valued 
above all o thers. 
3 4 7  
Smelti ng and forging demand a specialised skill 
which is  attained by relatively few. But i n  each Kayan
village are to be found two or three or more ski lled 
smiths, who work up for a small fee the metal brought
them by thei r  friends, the finishing touches bei ng 
generally given by the owner of the i mplement according 
to his own fancy. 
The smelting is performed by mixing the ore with 
charcoal i n  a clay crucibale, which is  embedded i n  a pile 
of charcoal. The charcoal bei ng i gnited is  blown to a 
white heat by the aid of four piston-bellows. Each of 
the bellows consists of a wooden cyalinder ( generally 
made from the stem of a wild sago palm) about four feet 
i n  length and six i nches i n  diameter, fixed vertically 
i n  a framework carryi ng a platform on which two men sit 
to work the pistons. The lower end of each cylinder is  
embedded i n  clay, and i nto it  near its lower end is  in­
serted a tube of bamboo, whinch, lyi ng horinzontally on 
the ground, converges upon and j oi ns with a similar 
tube of a second cylinder. The common tube formed by 
this j unction i n  turn converges with the tube common to 
the other pai r  of cylinders, and with it  opens by a clay
juncti on i nto a fi nal common tube of clay, which leads 
to the base of the fire. The upper extremity of each 
of the piston rods is  attached by a cord to one end of 
a stout pliable stick, which is  fi rmly fixed at its 
other end i n  a horinzontal position, the cord being of 
such a length that the piston head is  supported by it  
near the upper end of the cylinder. Two men squat upon
the platform and each works one pair of cylinders, 
graspi ng a piston-rod i n  each hand, thrusti ng them down 
alternately, and allowi ng the elastic reaction of the 
supporti ng rods above to draw them up again. The cru­
ci ble, having been brought to white heat i n  the furnace, 
is  allowed to cool, when a mass of metallic i ron or 
steel is  found within it. 
The forging of i mplements from the metal obtai ned 
is effected by the aid of a charcoal furnace to which a 
blast is supplied by the bellows descri bed above, or 
sometimes by one consisting of two cylinders only. 
Stone anvils and hammers were formerly used, and may 
still be seen i n  use i n  the far i nterior; but the Kayans 
make iron hammers and an anvil consisting of a short 
thi ck bar of i ron, the lower end of whi ch is  fixed ver­
tically in a large block of wood. 
The peculinarly shaped and fi nely tempered sword­
blade, malat, is  the highest product of the Kayan black­
sminth. The smith begins his operations on a bar of 
3 4 8  
steel some eight inches in lengthn. One end is either 
grasped with pincers , or thrust firmly into a block of 
woo d  that serves for a handle. The other end is heated 
in the furnnace and gradually beaten out until the pecu­
liar shape of  the blade is achieved, with the character­
istic hollow on the one side and convexity on the othe-r. 
If the blade is to be a simple and unadorned weapon , 
there follow only the tempering, grinding and polishing. 
But many blades are ornamented with curled ridges pro­
jecting from the back edge. These are cut and turned 
up with an iron chisel while the metal is hot and before 
tempering. 
Two methods of  tempering are in use. One is to 
heat the blade in the fire and to plunge it at a dull 
heat into water. The other is to lay the cold blade 
upon a flat bar of red-hot iron. This has the advantage 
that the degree o f  the effect upon the blade can be 
judged from the change of its colour as it absorbs the 
heat. The Kayan smiths are expert in judging by the 
conlours of the surface the degree and kind of temper 
produced. They aim at producing a very tough steel, 
for the maZat has to serve not only in battle, but also 
for hacking a path through the jungle, and for many
other purposes. 
Many sword blades are elaborately deconrated with 
scroll designs along the posterior border and inlaid 
with brass. 
Here Hose covers the whole arc of smelter to smithy. 
Not much more need be added separately about the latter in 
the following section , bearing in mind always the intimate 
past relationship between all parts of  the iron process in 
Borneo. 
(d) To Sum Up on Native Smelting 
Smelting continued over a large part of Borneon' s  inter­
ior into the second half of the nineteenth century. Long 
before that,  finished steel tools had become increasingly 
available in quantity and at low cost from outside sources, 
since first the growth of I slamic traders (after 1 40 0  A. D . )  
and then of Dutch and other Europeans (after 1550 A. D.)n. It 
is therefore probable that what the first whites to report 
from the island ' s  far hinterland found (after 180 0 A. D. ) was 
only the relic of a once much larger active industry. 
This native industry varied considerably from one river 
system to another, because of variant ores, group isolations 
349 
and specializations, etc. Apparently a crucible system sur­
vived in the Baram up to ca. 1880 A.D. (Hose above)o. Initial 
ore treatment varied from the simplest (as described by
Everett) to the elaborate (Schwaner, Appendix B). 
All the features of the Sarawak River delta iron-work­
ings (before 1400 A.D.) postulated in earlier parts of this 
study on archaeological grounds are repeated in various ways
and different combinations in the known historical record. 
In particular, it is striking that historically or prehis­
torically there is no indication of a real, enclosaed, per­
manently walled-up furnace or of any kind of casat-iron opera­
tions in the directly Chinesae tradition. On the other hand, 
the refinements of method in some cases are striking. 
In seeking to relate the coastal (delta) prehistoric
and interior historic, it is important not to assume that 
the former necessarily preceded the latter. Kenyah-Kayan 
type interior operations are clearly based on a very ancient 
and well established set of procedures fully integrated into 
the culture. It is quite possible, if not actually probable, 
that the upriver techniques were forming long before Santu­
bongo; and that the delta operations developed, in part at 
least, out of the native techniques already initiated round 
about the island (even from pre-iron techniques in part)o. 
This readily enabled mass-methods to be developed at concen­
trations points like Jaong or Bongkisam after a new set of 
circumstances gave purpose to such intensive lowland locali­
zation. The coastal activities need not in any way have 
"out-datedo" those continuing inlando; on the contrary each 
may have cross-fertilized the other. 
The still surviving craft of the smith, though dying 
too (in 1969), is quite clearly part of one and the same 
ancient tradition, earlier on closely integrated with smelt­
ing and refining the metal, and as ever susceptible to evoluo­
tion with new inflections in time and space. 
(e) The Craft of the Dayak Smith 
There is no direct evidence for blacksmithing in the 
Santubong sites (as we have seeno; V.26, etc.)o. But the evi­
dence of silence is unemphatically negative. It is hard to 
believe no one forged or tooled up down in the delta ever. 
But it is perfectly plausible that this was not the main puro­
pose of an operation best undertaken, for Bornean agricultural
and other purposes, at the home level and even individually.
Those inland folk who still regularly make their own swords, 
knives, adzes, seldom use a permanent, fixed smithy. Much 
3 5 0  
more usually, one man or a couple of friends decide to work 
some steel when the household needs new tools. The main 
task then is the preparation of charcoal. When that is ready, 
on a suitable (not too windy or wet) day, the bamboo bellows 
--first cousins, on a smaller scale (and sometimes inter­
changeable; as indicated by Hose above) to the air system
used in all Borneo s melting - - the job is done. Normally out 
in the open, somewhere on the open space around the long­
house. One man and his son can easily work the common small 
forge unit. More elaborate structures involving team work 
are now rare, except among groups like the Malohs of the 
Kapuas headwaters over the border in Kalimantan, who have 
developed rather special smith traditions, though these are 
significantly centered on gold and brass rather than iron 
[see (f) below]. In each long-house of all other peoples, 
one or two may be especially regarded as skilled smiths and 
paid by others to do the work for them. But most men can 
and many prefer to make ordinary things in iron for them­
selves, leaving the finer mandau- type artifacts to the 
"expert" or be traded in from further afield. 
The ordinary basic tools of the individual blacksmith 
widely in interior Borneo as seen between 1947-1967: 
- -two bamboo or hollow wooden cylinders;o1 0  
--piston rods attached to washers, of bark, leather, 
etc., often with feather edges, etc.; 
--tuyere nozzle-pipes, usually small bamboos; sometimes 
daubed in clay; 
- -charcoal, usually simply piled in a small pyramid; 
--pincers or forceps, of metal (purchased) or bamboo; 
--hammers, of metal; but up to 1945 still locally stone 
( Kelabit uplands); 
--an anvil; of metal along rivers but still sometimes 
of stone in mountains; 
--a water trough, of large bambooo, wood, or sometimes 
bark, for cooling the metal.o1 1  
This pattern has hardly changed since Low wrote of the Sea 
Dayaks (Ibans) nearer the coast:o1 2  
(The) blacksmith, with the exception of the manang, or 
doctor, is the only person in the village whose time is 
solely occupied by a profession or trade. If the black-
3 5 1  
smith of a village be celebrated for the goodness of 
his woork, he is not only employed in the manufacture of 
the arms and instruments necessary for his tribe, but 
those made by him sell for higher prices than those of 
his neighbours, and he is sure of plenty of employment 
and considerable profit. The smith's shop is always a 
little apart from the houses of the village, to prevent
accidents from fire; the bellows precisely resemble 
those of the Malays, the two bamboos, or hollow treeso; 
a stone is generally the anvil, but when a heavy piece 
of iron can be obtained it is preferred. His instruo­
ments are all of his own making, and rude in their con­
struction; the vessel in which the water for cooling
his work is held is a block of wood hollowed out. 
Of the same- period is the first White Ra jah's account :o1 3  
The Dyaks, as is well known, are famous for the manufac­
ture of irono. The forge here is of the simplest con­
struction, and formed by two hollow trees, each about 
seven feet high, placed upright, side by side, in the 
ground; from the lower extremity of these, two pipes of 
bamboo are led through a clay - bank three inches thick, 
into a charcoal fire; a man is perched at the top of 
the trees, and pumps with two pistons (the suckers of 
which are made of cocks' feathers), which being raised 
and depressed alternately, blow a regular stream of air 
into the fireo. 
There is really no major divergence from the pump-bellows 
system of smithing anywhere in Borneo. This is generally 
considered to have itself evolved out of an earlier form, the 
skin-bellows, probably evolved in Western or Central Asia. 
For an excellent general discussion of the areas of agreement 
and disagreement on bellows evolution see R. J. Forbes ( 1 17), 
who concludes: 
It might seem from these lines that the evolution of 
the bellows is quite clear, but only the outline can be 
barely traced as we possess very few details on the 
bellows of Antiquity. . . .  No adequate study of the 
subject has yet been made. 
(f) The Itinerant Smith Inland 
Mention must be made, in passing, of the special role 
played by the people called Maloh who number tens of thousands 
in the Kapuas headwaters close to the Sarawak border in the 
southern part of Borneo. They are famous for their skill 
3 5 2  
with a l l  metals, though speciali zing in the last century in 
gold. The Malohs continue to roam over huge areas of Borneo 
with a freedom not enjoyed by any other group in these timeso. 
This is firmly based on their status as smiths, and may well 
be a residual situation reflecting a once much more extended 
pattern, linking hinterland and delta in spreading new skills 
and materials. A century ago, Spenser Sto. John, one of the 
earliest British explorers of western Borneo, had heard of 
them though not visited them; he wrote as follows:o1 4  
Near the very sources of the Kapuas live the Ma lau 
Dayaks, who are workers in gold and brass, and it is 
very singular that members of this tribe can wander 
safely through the villages of the head-hunting Seribas 
and Sakarang, and are never molested--on the contrary,
they are eagerly welcomed by the female portion of the 
population, and the young men are not indifferent to 
their arrival; but the specimens of their work that I 
have seen do not show much advance in civilisation. 
The Malau districts produce gold, and it is said very
fine diamondso. 
This and other early references indicate that Maloh silver 
work was a fairly recent development, perhaps owing to the 
difficulty of obtaining other maoterials--which has also af­
fected the Malay smiths in Bruneio. Sarawak historians, S. 
Baring-Gould and C. A .  Bampfylde, early in the century 
wrote:o1 5  
The Malohs of Kapuas in Dutch Borneo formerly had 
a large village at Kanowit, but nearly all have returned 
to their own country, and the tribe is now represented
by a sprinkling only among the Sea-Dayakso. They are 
wonderfully skilled workers in brass and copper, and 
manufacture the peculiar brass corsets worn by the Sea­
Dayak women, and their armlets, anklets, leg and ear­
rings, and other personal ornaments; and they have been 
known to turn their talents to making counterfeit cooin. 
They bear a great reputation for bravery, and are dan­
gerous men to cross. 
Since 1909, other Maloh sub-settlements have been and 
gone, while several have remained, notably one near Marudi 
on the Baram, Charles Hose's long-time home on the fringe of 
Kenyah-Kayan country. These people and perhaps others in 
the past like them but no longer identifiable, served and 
serve as a continuum of craft ideas, rooted before iron and 
sending shoots out in all directionso. Their folklore and 
tradition show that this was an ancient function for one 
part of Maloh society, a very long time back. They particu­
larly exercised their mobility right across southern Borneo, 
3 5 3  
up and down the Kapuas river system from the eas t side of 
Borneo to the sp inal range (the present "border" between 
Indonesia and Malaysia) and over this westward into ·othe 
rivers o f  southwest Sarawak via the parallel systems of 
Ba tang Lupar, Sadong and Samarahan, all of which flow out 
into the South China Sea in the wide bay bounded on one side 
by Muara Tebas at  the easotern edge of the Sarawak River 
delta.o1 6  
VI.37. "DAMASCENEo'" ISLAM AND BIRTH BY THE SWORD 
damascene:  to ornament (as iron or steel) with 
wavy patterns like those of watered silk or with 
inlaid works of precious metals.o1 
The art of steel inlay is that of the traditional Dayak
sword-makers of the Borneo interior as described in the pre­
vious chapter, where brass and bronze were (until recently) 
metals as precious as and harder to obtain that gold. Along
the coast, the place of the parang, mandau or isau is taken 
by the smaller, sharper keris, the dagger knife so vastly
estimated for its laminated--in another new sense groovey-­
steel blade throughout the islands by the Malay and other 
Moslem populations. 
The wider idea of blending different materials to refine 
the final steel product is taken for granted in Bornean iron­
working. Examples have also been given in the previous chap­
ter. The Reverend Leggatt writing of the sub -coastal Balaus 
(closely related to the Iban) in the last century provides
another: 
The isau of the Balaus is a pretty weapon, and I 
am told that at one time custom required that ito. should 
be manufactured only from odd scraps of steel and iron 
collected at odd times, which were first twisted to­
gether, then welded and afterwards beaten into shape.
(Ling Roth, II: 136) 
This may or may not explain the ore specimen St. John col­
lected before smelting from the Kayans on the Baram River 
earlier in the century, which "appeared l i ke a mass of rough, 
twisted ropes, and is, I think, called meteoric iron-stone." 
He adds that they use "also two other kinds " which he did 
not collect.o2 
(a) Near-damascene 
This admixture of different irons or the intrusion of 
other elements or compounds into iron-working, finds one of 
its most interesting expressions in this general tradition 
of damascene, verbally connected with Damascus, but as little 
to do w ith that place in the Middle East as the Gulf of 
Martaban has with the martabani jars--otherwise the Coarse 
Stonewares of our type G, so abundant in the delta sites 
(V.31)o. Both relationships are past and incomplete. This 
3 5 4  
355 
and much else about the damascene process is indeed, as Dr. 
Coghlan has well said (155): "a complicated matter which 
has occasioned some measure of confusion in archaeological
literature.o" 
Far be it fromo.ous to reproach the last chapter o f  this 
Data Paper by adding to that confusion. Howevero, the 
damascene-like work on some indigenous Bornean tools and 
weapons cannot be set aside as accidental and otherwise in­
significant. The quite extraordinary elaboration used by
the Kenyah and Kayan smiths in inland sword-making and by
the coastal creators of the finest kinds of keris are part
of a pattern of attitudes to metalo--and indeed to the uni­
verse--which cannot be disassociated from any reconstruction, 
however tentativeo, of what went on ato, into and out of the 
Sarawak River delta sites before 1400 A.D. Nor is it casual 
that the damascene developed its finesse to the westward with 
the swords of Islam in the Middle East and to the east in the 
precious sabers of Japano, samurain, which "certainly go back 
to the thirteenth century A.D.o, and may well be considerably 
more ancient" (Coghlan: 1 6 6)o, while Dr. Joseph Needham (42) 
traces this craft in Japan to the early seventh century A.D. 
The assertion albeit mildo, of any sort of association 
or parallelism between the ancient and honored traditions of 
"higher cultures" in Japano, India or Syria and the remote 
long-house skills of central Borneo may come as something of 
a cultural shock to those who still believe that animists 
have to be "primitive." We know that these "pagan Dayaks" 
were in fact superbly dynamic people, great artists in their 
own vivid traditions: wood, cloth, boneo, hornbill ivory,
skin were equally media for the expression of attitudes 
which found a surviving form in the loving treatment of 
steel--when a finely wrought blade was cut, fitted and formed 
into the convolute designs of nearly all Dayak metaphor, 
dulled and inset with glittering yellow pieces of other 
metals, arranged in symbolic patterns o f  dots and lines, 
among which were added incised grooves and traceries to give
their special kind of unity to the whole strong bladeo, effec­
tive as well foro· cutting down a tree as for beheading an 
enemy with a single blow (in the "Japanese tradition"o! ) .  
A typical sword, made to order on the Batang Kayan in 
19 60, is 30" long, 1 to l½" broad, 1/8" thick at back, with 
34 inset brass plugs; the base end of the blade is incised 
and cut out in scroll-pattern for 3", and the rear side at 
the tip for 1 6", in intricate curves and spirals cut clear 
through the steel. The handle is beautifully carved of deero's  
antler and the sheath decorated with bone plaques showing 
hornbill, crocodile, snake, rhinoceros, tigero-monster. A 
sword of the type regarded as much older is, as usualo, shorter, 
356 
2 1" long, steel less elaborately incised and fretted, but 
the gold-colored plugs dominatingly numerous, 115 of them 
stretching almost the whole length of the blade [ we shall 
meet these again in obstetric use at (c) below]a. 
The relationship between the delta sites and the begin_­
nings of this indigenous ornate sword-making cannot yet be 
accurately assessed in Borneo, along with the exact advent 
of iron as a whole. The earliest pieces of the metal known 
so far are a very "soft" spear blade in a bronze and late 
stone-age (neolithic) cave, Tampadong, behind the northeast 
coast of Sabah on the Segama River ; and a few fragments in 
the cemetery sector of the West Mouth in Niah Great Cave, 
Sarawak, which gives associated dates all before O A.D. The 
development of forging may, of course, have preceded that of 
smelting, though under interior conditions of the past it is 
more likely that the two grew hand in handa. But the advanced 
techniques for making the swords and other such elaborated 
artifacts, almost certainly did evolve subsequentlya. 
But if these processes are measured against the backa­
ground of the prehistoric delta operations and the massively 
enthusiastic adoption of complex iron and steel working tech­
niques in ancient times, there is little to be surprised 
about when the same vivacious complexity of iron attitudes a 
millennium ago penetrated into the furthest valleys not 
reached by non-Asians until the past century ; and/or, altera­
natively, that the previous presence of these attitudes of 
itself deeply influenced what went on at Jaong, and thence 
out of Sarawak into the stream of Asian material and mental 
contact impacts. 
Damascene is often related to the "wootz" process eara­
lier discusseda; "the ancient Indian crucible steel furnishes 
a true damascene pattern" (Coghlan: 155)a. Whether or not 
the Santubong product was of this quality remains to be 
demonstrated, but appreciable affinities between broadly 
"Indian" procedures and those of the delta have already been 
fully discussed.a3 The actual Damascus blades were certainly 
made of wootz steel of Indian origin, andawere exported thence 
even before the Christian era.a4 At a different level, Santua­
bong steel may have gone out over or around the South China 
Sea to augment similar, later, Far Eastern tastes, echoed 
too from the mountain tops inland. 
Further than that, the extinction of the delta workings 
before 1400 A . D .  would have raised problems for the supply 
of their iron or steel--and not only locally? On the one 
hand, this cut-off must have encouraged the inland folk to 
continue and even strengthen their native skills as well as 
to meet a market demand inside the island which was, in part 
3 5 7  
at least, previously supplied from the coastal plain. At 
the end of the fourteenth century the Kayans, Malohs and 
other metallurgists of the interior thus received a new im­
petuso--assuming that these events did not originate their 
crafts at this time. 
On the other o·hand, the cut-off may have affected neigh­
boring islands, let alone the mainland? Here, again, we 
enter the realm of uncertainty due to lack of comparable 
evidence from adjacent archaeologies. One basic question,
for instance, cannot yet be answered but should be rather 
loudly askedo: After Santubong, did this iron industry "moveo" 
(become replaced and redundant because of such a move ?) else-
where--and if so, where? Or was this coastal iron-working
collapse part of some much wider, even if temporary, pattern
resulting from major outside events as well, perhaps, as some 
internal pressures (in part the result·, too, of outside 
events)o? We favor answering "Yeso" to the second question;
but if further research gives a "Yeso" to the first, that 
attitude could be undermined--although the two processes are 
not necessarily incompatible. 
There is one piece of historical evidence that is of 
much interest and relevance here--and which, up to a point,
favors the "movement" explanation for the end of Santubong 
rather than (or in addition to) any overall break-down in 
procedures. Writing in the second decade of the previous 
century, Sir Stamford Raffles describes how Java then de­
pended on outside places for its various commodities, includ­
ing iron. "Not less than one thousand to fifteen hundred 
tonso" of iron were imported from England and Sweden annually, 
to be smithed locally. In addition, 200-300 tons of steel 
came in each year. Further, "by a direct communication be­
tween Java and China, entirely upon Chinese capital,o" arrived 
a wide range of items including iron pots--the cast iron 
vessels which, as we have earlier seen, were among China' s 
metal contributions through Southeast Asia back into the 
Tang. But in addition to this several-way traffic, Raffles 
specifies a fourth metal source, thus:o5 
Almost the only articles for which Java is at present
dependent on its neighbours [in the archipelago] are 
gamtir .a. .  and pamuar, the metal used for damasking
the Javan kris, of which a small quantity is imported 
from Biliton and Celebes, where alone it is found. 
Biliton is southwest of Borneo, Celebes to the east. What 
is basic from the above extract is that even in Java, the 
most populous and sophisticated of the islands, into the 
nineteenth century there was dependence on a special steel 
from further out in the archipelago--a specialism which could 
3 58 
not be substituted even on an island where the iron-worker 
was very greatly esoteemed in a venerable tradition.o6 I t  is 
even more s triking that the special art of kerios-making, the 
flower of damascene, was thus dependent. 
(b) The Kerois and Islam 
Clearly, then, keris daggers became intima tely tied into 
indigenous technology way back. This raises o ther quesotions 
which we cannot pursue in this place. But the problem is 
deeply relevant to the Sarawak River del ta and must be briefly 
s tated here. 
Is it  possible that the advent of Islam itself- -and per­
haps in the first place unwittingly--contributed to the del­
ta ' s  downfall? This important outside impact has recently
been redated as early as c a .  1404 A.D. for West Borneo, but 
was long before that in parts of Sumaotra. This could be im­
portant because there are o ther indications that Islam--in 
conjunction with Chinese and o ther ouotside interests in the 
early Ming (af ter 1368 A.D.)o- -no t only centralized all i t  
could of exoternal trade in the political power cenoters (in
West Borneo this center was Kota Ba tu, Brunei), but in addi­
tion adopted a positively hostile attitude to the conotinua­
tion of export -s tyle activities from the periphery (and
Santubong is 3 50 miles away). This atti tude certainly pre­
vailed into hisotoric times, as illustrated in Dennison's aco­
count of the Si Panjang group of Land Dayaks, from no t far 
south of the Sarawak River, of whom he wrote: 
They lef t Sarawak [i.e., Kuching area then] owing to 
the oppression of the Malays, who were jealous of their 
skill as workers of iron ( to this day the Si Panjangs
mainotain their ancient fame and their swords are much 
sought after throughout the distric t), and finally drove 
them out of the country. (Ling Roth, II: 37) 
Withdrawn inland, the Dayak peoples practiced their 
skills without  the benefit of any post- 1400 A .D. technical 
influences, surely? Cerotainly no direct Moslem influence 
penetrated their terrain--and this was still true into the 
second half of the twentieth cenotury. 
Thus we come back to the question of the keris. This, 
at its best, is in the fullest sense a resu l t  of high dama­
scene craft. Indeed, the world autho rioty, Dr. Cyril Stanley 
Smith of M.I.T. has given i t  this final accolade (3 5): 
The most striking of all types of decorative designs
made by mixed metal forging and etching is the kris of 
3 5 9  
Java and the other islands of the Malayan archipelago.
Significantly, the first textured blades in Indonesia 
oaaur under Hindu influenae, during the Majapahit Empire
(A.D. 137 8-1478)o. 
Professor Smith'os Hindu suggestion fits well with all that 
has been.said in our earlier chapters on wootz steel and In­
dian crucible methods. And Islam was much slower to convert 
the Javanese than the coastal Borneans--not effectively until 
well after the Majapahit. · But Majapahit must be extended 
back to 1293 A.D. (Bongkisam's peak time) and on until 1520 
A.D. (over a century after Santubong's collapse).o7 
There can be little doubt that in the broader view, 
Moslem pressures spreading eastward round the Indian Ocean 
helped to spread the damascene idea, along with " Indian" 
metallurgy ideas, out eastward towards the islands. The 
Javanese keris itself, and at another level the Kayan parang 
sword, crystallized out of that impact of technique which so 
often far exceeds the impacts of genetics, politics, or 
philosophy in this archipelagan complex. 
One other small but significant question (our last) then 
emerges. Can the origin date of the keris (and the parang) 
be determined with exactitude, either by archaeology or epi­
graphy? A positive answer could illuminate many of the puz­
zles which remain with us as of now. For it is inescapable 
that highly advanced forms of iron-working at the level of 
the smith (as well as the smelter) spread through the islands 
quite independently of and long before European influence. 
We have seen the steel-welded knife blades of the Bogabo on 
Mindanao and the strip-welding technique of northern Luzon 
far up in the Philippines (V I.33). We have not even mentioned 
the "serpent keris" of Sumatran Menangkabau or western (Mos­
lem) Mindanao, often inlaid with silver and incised designs
reminiscent of the Borneo hinterland. It is possible that 
fuller knowledge will require that all this has to be put 
back earlier in time than present scholarly belief, which 
seldom goes beyond "the second prince of Majapahit, A.D. 
1300."o8 
This emphasis on Islam, or anyway on "western" influ­
ences in the later, "damascene steel" phase of the Borneo 
iron story is not intended to monopolize in favor of that 
direction. Similar influences were at work in and from the 
north, Indo-China and China. We have already suggested that 
this in itself helped make a demand for Santubong steel. 
But again a good deal hinges on exact dating. The earlier 
eastern damascene began, the easier it is to interpret one 
side of the Borneo story. Therefore, it is important to 
recognize that the literature of Southeast Asia has hitherto 
3 60 
paid little attention to similar developments in the Chinese 
mainland. One of these is of particular significance in con­
nection with the Borneo sword-inlays, as described by Dra. 
Cheng Te-K'un for the pre-Christian Chou period:a9 
The skill of the Chou iron-worker. may be judged from 
the clean, strong lines of the Hui-hsien iron tools as 
well as the high quality of the iron casting moulds 
from Ising-lung. . .a . I n some cases, iron articles 
were finely decorated with inlaid, plated and gilded 
works. 
Let the patient expertise of H. H. Coghlan (161 )  have 
the last work on damascene in general and its local ramificaa­
tionsa, complex as these surely are: 
. . .  it is a matter for wonder that so elaborate a 
technique should have been evolved so far in advance of 
modern knowledge of the nature and properties of steel. 
(c) Birth by the Sword 
An observant visitor to those often-mentioned Kayan 
peoples in the upper reaches of the Baloi, far above the 
Pelagus rapids in the headwaters of Sarawaka' s  great Rejang 
river system, might until a few years ago have noticed clus­
ters of cobwebbed ,  partly corroded sword blades hung up be­
side the human heads and other exotica above the long-house. 
These were regarded as of immense and sacred power, only to 
bea.amoved if and when the long-house moved. There was a 
marked reluctance to discuss their meaning with the outsider. 
Only as missionary influences became strong in the area 
(after 1950) was T.aH. able to handle examples and eventually 
to acquire two sets for the Sarawak Museum from a "converted" 
community. Details await publication. Very briefly, here, 
these blades prove to be of local ly smelted iron and worked 
steel, but of a kind the people call "old,a" originating in 
an ore not found in the vicinity but at the place over the 
Kalimantan whence they long since moved westward into the 
Kejang. The blades are characteristically inlaid and plated 
with the gilding effect of brass, as prototypes of modern 
mandau swords, from which they do not basically differ as 
part of the one ancient tradition. 
Their particular importance to the Kayan aristocracy 
who owned them derived from their meaning in terms of orig­
inal descenta, of genealogical continuity from the most 
ancient pasta. For in those days, the Kayans saya, conception 
was barely understood. When a woman's belly began to swell, 
3 6 1  
she w as known to be in the family w ay .  When the swelling
becoame truly large, the necessary procedure was then to open
it up, extract the b aby, sew her up again- -and all's well. 
These, the "earliest" blades, were alone suitable for this 
delicate end-product of embryonic craftsmanship. It was 
only later on in the evolution of the Kayan people that they
learned from a new teoacher that the foetus would come out in 
its own good time--a concept that on the face of it had 
seemed to the ancestral people physically imploausible (and
why not? ) .  
Thus was native iron wedded to the very life-blood of 
the people; Mother E arth, Mother Iron symbolized with a 
magical, surgical vengeance. This original form of Caesarean 
operoation had· no more to do with Mediterranean cultures than 
their lovely inlaid, engraved swords had with the Middle 
East. Yet the symbolism is adequoate for Borneo, at the tip
of the trioangle with base line running from the Persian Gulf 
to Peking. 
The proverbial wisdom of Buddhism has it, in the Pali 
canon from India some two millennia ago:o1 0  
As the fiery sparks from a forge are one by one 
extinguished, 
And no one knows where they have gone . . o. .  
Or in t�e words of an ancient Chinese song about a sword of 
Silla quoted by Edwoard Schafer:o1 1  
I have a god's sword, by a strange man given--
In the d arkness, now and again, its subtle soul speaks.
Philosophers know that it came from the E astern Se as. 1 2  

CHAPTER NOTES 
Part V. Evidence by Associaotion 
Chap ter 26. Whole Delta Objects of Iron 
1. Compare the Stuff s till inside Bongkisam crucible already
discussed a t  Chapter III.1o3. 
2. T.· Harrisson, "Some Ceramics Excavaoted in Borneo," Trans. 
Oriental Ceramic Soc. , 28, 1954: 1-11, with Colored 
Pla te ;  also Oriental Art, 5, 1959: 1-1 2. 
3. A. Hale, "On Mines and Miners in Kinta, Perak," 
J. S. B. A. S.a, 16, 1885: 303. 
4. W. E. Maxwell, "A Journey on Foo t to the Pa tani Frontier," 
J. S. B. A. S. ,  9, 1882: 1.  
Chapter 27. Slag Encrustaotion on O ther Objects 
1. A sherd of this unusual Tzu-chou (delota type F, see Chap­
ter VI.31.b) is illusotrated in Oriental Art, 5, 1959: 
1-1o2. 
2. W. S. Solheim in S .  M.  J .  , 1 2, 1965 : 1-45. 
3. W. Linehan, "Bronze and Iron Age Culotures Associaoted in 
Ma 1 aya ," J .  M. B .  R .  A .  S .  , 2 4 , 1951 . 
Chapter 28. Stones and Stone Tools 
1. Special report prepared by Dr. G. E. Wilford and Dr. A .  
Pimm, Geological Survey; for a "Geological Map of the 
Sanotubong Area" see Borneo Reg.a, Malaysian Geol. Survey, 
Ann. Report, 1965: 1 31 ,  fig. 26. 
2 .  Dr. Cheng Te-K'un, personal communica tion a t  Santubong, 
July 31, 1966; T.H. examinaotion of excavation maoterials 
in Hong Kong, 1959, etc.; and information from Miss Mary
Tregear, previously Hong Kong and now Ashmolean Museum, 
·ooxford. 
3. Compare T. Posewitz, Borneo, Berlin, 1889: Figure on p.
265, for a Barito iron-smitho's  sling. This figure has 
3 6 3  
3 6 4  
been copied with varying accuracy by other writers, too. 
(See our Plate 17.) Also relevant is the method of 
s linging incised stones used for beating bark from neo­
lithic into recent times, as illus trated in S. Kooijnman's 
Orname nte d  Bark Cloth in Indonesia, Leidenn, 1963: Plate 
XVI and Figs. 1- 3. This method of s linging or hafting 
is related to that proved as used for waisted stones in 
Luzon early in this century- - s ee (j ) at end of the 
present chapter. The wider implications are indicated 
in S.aM. J. ,  11, 1964: 597-60 1. 
4. Walter Weinberger, Trans. Orieantal Cearamic Soc.a, 2 4, 
1948- 49: 31 at Plate 16b for waisted s tones f-rom China, 
etc. ; Plate 18b from Eastern Ausntralia (s ee following 
paragraph in our text)n. 
5. Berthold Laufer, Jade : a Study in Chine se Archaeology 
and Religion, Field Musneum of Natural Hisntory, Chicago, 
Anthropology, 10, 1912: S O .  
6. See also the addendum to this chapter, section j. 
7. T. and B. Harrisson in S.aM. J.a, 7, 1956: 2 83 - 319 (first  
excavations at Brunei)n. 
8. T. Posewitz, Borne o, Berlin, 1889: 2 65. 
9. T. H. personal observation, March 1945. 
10 . Schwanern' s  Dutch text, translated by our colleague Prof. 
John Echols, is Appendix B. 
11. Department of Anthropology (Field Museum) Leaflet no. 2,  
192 2,  with photographs; the display is in Hall G, Case  
4. See also at Chapter VI.33, Note 49. 
Chapter 2 9. Gold and Other "Precious"  Materials 
1. Geological Survey Report, Kuching, 1955: 159. 
2.  Sylvain Levi in Bijdragean (Leiden) , 88, 1931: 62n7. 
3. George Coedes, The Indian Stateas of Southeast Asia, 
Honolulu (new translation) , 1968: 2 0 .  
4. Alker Rentsne,  J. M. B. R. A. S. ,  20,  1947n: 31. 
5. T. Posnewitz, Borneo, Berlin, 1889n. 
3 6 5  
6. Fo r points related to this pa ragraph in other Chapters 
see IIIo.15 (crucible si ze) ; V.28 (stone tools)o; V.31, 
cf. I .3 (stoneware types) ; V.32 ( ro ck carving symbolism) ; 
and V.30 (wider Indian impliocations)o. 
7. Barbara Harrisson on the Lobang Tulang cave in S.M.J., 
8, 1958 : 607 ; cf. 9, 1959 ; 171 ; and J.M.B.R.A.S., 41,
1968o: 148-175. 
8. Posewitz, as Note 5. 
9 .  We are grateful to Professo r G. G. Co cks of Co rnell 
University, who tested this metal for us. 
10. Louis Malleoret, L 'Araheologie du Delta du Mekong ; 1960, 
Vol. II : 310-312 and Fig. 45 (see further at Chapter 
VI . 33, Note 3). 
11. I. H .  N. Evans , Journ. Fed. Malay States Mus.  (pre-war 
journal of F.nM. J. ) ,  15, 1932 : 105 ; and other papers
there 1930-1939o. 
12. Louis Malleret, as at Note 10 ; Vol. III : 417. 
13. Verse from T. Harrisson and B. Sandin, S.M.J. Special 
Monograph, 1966 : 205 ; cf. Chapter III .19.c. 
14. Compare Chapter III.16.d for discussion of Chu-fan-ahih 
text. 
15. Compare also Stamford Raffles' A History of Java, Lon­
don, 1817, Vol. I :  238 ; now reprinted by Oxford Univer­
sity P ress 1964 ; and Chapter VI.37, Note 5. 
16. In Ling Roth, Vol. IIo: 238. 
17. See Note 11 above; also further at Chapter VI.33. 
18. A sma ll piece of yellow amber (fossil resin of vegetable 
o rigin) was also present in this shrine assemblage ; and 
a green opaque stone resembling jade. 
Chapter 30. "Indian" Assoociations and the Tantric Shrine 
1. See twelve basic texts listed with Prefa ceo. 
2. A lastair Lamb ' s  important paper "Kedah and Takuapa: 
some tentative histoorical conoclusions,o" F.M.J., 6, 1961o: 
69o-88. We have incidentally commented on some related 
points in S.nM.J., 11,  1964: 562-566. 
3 6 6  
3. B. C .  Chhabra, "Expension of Indo-Aryan Culture during 
Pallava Rule, as evidenced by Inscrniptions,n" Journ. Royal 
Asi ati c Soc. of Bengal, 1, 1935 :  41-44 . 
4. "Journal of a Tour on the Kapuas,n" in Journ. India n 
Archiapelago, 1, 1856 : 10 1 - 10 2. 
5. F. D. K. Bosch in Oudheiadkundig Verslag, 1920: 10n2-10 4 . 
•• 
6. S .  J. O'Connor, "Note on a Mukhalinga from Western 
Borneo,n" Artiabus As i ae, 29, 1967 : 93 - 96 .  
Chapter 3 1. Chinese Ceramics and "Western" Glass 
1. On these glass beads generally see T. Harrisson in Man, 
64, 1964n: S O ,  as also Alastair Lamb, Man, 65, 1965: 30;  
and F.M.J. ,  6, 1961: 1 - 90 .  A further paper with new 
delta and other glass analyses from Corning is in press 
with Asi an Persapectiaves (Honolulu) ,  as indicated in the 
main text here. Compare S.aM.aJ.a, 5, 1950n: 1-22 for ethnic 
background (T . H.) ; and more widely Earle Caley, "Analysis
of Ancient Glasses," Corning (N. Y. ) ,  1962. 
2. These comparisons were facilitated by help from Mr. 
Stephen Ingai Gasing, of the Sarawakn·nMuseum staffn. 
3.  C. Zainie with T. Harrisson, "Early Chinese Stonewares 
excavated in Sarawak, 1947-67n: a suggested First Basic 
Classification,n" S.aM.J.a, 15, 1967 : 30 -90, with many il­
lustrations of the types. This was submitted as a paper 
at the Trade Pottery Seminar, Manila, March 1968, organ­
ized by John Pope and Robert Fox, being modified to meet 
criticisms--mainly minor--there. A further revised ver­
sion of this classification is now is preparation. Nils 
Palmgren, Sung Sherdsa, Stockholm, 1967 for part back­
ground. 
4 .  Leandro and Cecilia Locsin, Oriaental Ceramics dis covered 
i n  the Phialiappianesa, Tokyo, 1967, with excellent color 
illustrations of many types common to the delta too. 
5. Upiusing Cave report in S.M.aJ.a, 1 2, 1965: 83n- 116; cf. 
a comparative study of Magala Cave, Niah, in J. M. B.aR.A. S.a, 
41, 1968: 148-175, where the method has been further 
developed. 
6.  See C hapters I I I . 19. d and IV. 24. c.nxvi in relation to the 
last paragraph here; also Appendix C .  
3 6 7  
Chapter 32. The Rock Carvings of Jaong 
1. M. Colan i, Les Megalithes du Haut-Laos, Parois, 1935, 
Vol. II. 
2. Valued assoistance in this part of the work was rec� ived 
from Inche Abdul Az iz b in Jahaya, then Curator on the 
staff of the Muzium Negara, Kuala Lumpuro--alas, he  has 
now transferred to another department of the Malaysoian 
C iv il Serv ice. See also section (b) of text, second 
sentoence. 
3. Colani (as above), II: 35; cf. c itation in our VI.3o3.b. 
4. The related Kelab it megal ith ic is descroibed in a ser ies 
of papers, S. M. J . ,  8, 1958: 394-401 ;  19, 1959: 14-20 ; 
10, 1962: 376- 382. See also A.N.J. van der Hoop, Mega­
lithic Remains in South Sumatra, Zutphen (Holland), 1932 ; 
and Mubin Sheppard for Malayan megal iths in F.M.J., 7, 
1962: 70-85. See also Chapter VI.3 3, Note 3. 
5. There is an undertone of "human sacr ifice" impl ic it in 
some of the Jaong rock-carvoings, as perhaps in some of 
the ideas of "Mag ic Iron" (Chapter II.12) ; cf. Needham: 
14. Compare the Batu Gambar f igure, our Front isp iece in 
Volume I. 
·oPart VI. Wider Ideas 
Chapter 3 3. Delta Iron in a Southeast As ian Context 
1. R. A. Stein, "Le L in-ya,o" Han-Hieu, 2, 1947: 120-122; 
0. W. Wolters: 5 1-52o. 
2. Wolterso: 276, footnote 26. 
3 .  L .  Mal leret ,  L 'Archeologie du Delta du Mekong, Paris, 
1960, Vol. II ; La Civilisation materielle d ' Oc-Eo: 255-
260. Professor Malleret found iron slag w idely spread 
at Oc-Eo, assocoiated w ith sherds of pottery, glass and 
carnelian beads as well as fragments of t in and bronze. 
One of the str ik ing features of the Oc-Eo s ite is the 
occurrence of iron slag in monuments Koand A. Thois cono­
fus ion of the c eremonial and rel ig ious spheres of exist­
enc e w ith the industr ial seems. to bear marked analog ies 
w ith the petroglyphs and slag at the Sunge i  Jaong s ite 
and, especoially, the "Tantr ic Shroine" at Bongkoisam 
(O ' Connor). Further analyses of Oc -Eo metal materoials 
(now in Sa igon and Paris ?) would seem overdue. 
3 6 8  
4. H. F. Bain, Ores an d Industry in the Far Easat, New York, 
1927: 26; cf. also discussions in Chapters IV.24 and 
V . 29 of our text here. 
5. Evidence of extensive early mining operations has been 
. noted in Perak and Pahang: Abraham Hale, "On Mines and
Miners in Kinta, Perak," J. S. B. A. S. ,  16, 1885: 303o-3 20; 
F. T. Ingham and E. F. Bradford, Geology and Mineral 
Resources of the Kin ta Valley, Perak, Fed. of Malaya
Geological Survey District Memoir #9, 1960: 95o-96; D. 
Devahuti, India and Ancient Malaya, from the Earlies t 
Times to Circa A.aD. 1 40 0 ,  Singapore, 1965: 39. One 
writer, without citing his source, notes the early tin 
miners of Malaya were followed by Indians in the fifth 
century. The metal was transported to India where it 
was in demand for the manufacture of Hindu images. See 
Wong Lin Ken, "The Malayan Tin Industry,o" in K. G. 
Tregonning's (ed.) Papaers on Malayan Hisatory, Singapore,
1962: 10-40. Often cited in connection with the early
history of mining operations in Perak is the article by
Leonard Wray, "Some account of the tin-mines and tin­
mining industries of Perak," Perak Musaeum Notesa, 3, 1894: 
1-24; unfortunately, this publication was unavailable in 
the United States at the time of writing. See also, 
M. W. F. Tweedie, "Prehistoric Objects from the Tui 
Goldmine near Padang Tengku, Pahang," J.aM.aB. R. A. S.a, 20, 
1947: 4 1-44; W. Linehan, "Ancient Tin Ingots in the 
Perak Museum," J.M.B. R.A. S. ,  24, 195 1: 69-7 3; and A. 
Rentse, "A Historical Note on the Northeastern Malay
States," J. M. B.aR.A. S. , 20, 1947: 3 1  (cf. Chapter V.29, 
Note 4). 
6. I. H. N. Evans, "Buddhist Bronzes from Kinta, Perak," 
Journa. of the Federated Malay States Musaeum, 15, 193o2; 
and A. B. Griswold, " Imported Images and the Nature of 
Copying in the Art of Siam,o" in Griswold, et al. (ed.), 
Ess ays Offered to a·. H. Luce, Ascona, 1966: 6 1 o. 
7. H. G. Q. Wales, "Archaeological Researches on Ancient 
Indian Colonization in Malaya," J.M.aB.aR. A. S. ,  18, 1940: 
Plates 80 and 8 1. 
8. Wales: SO; and S .  Durai Raja Singam, India and Malaya 
Through the Ages , Third Edition, Kuantan, 1954: 60, 
Plate 60. 
9. Wales: 5 1, Plate 79. 
10. For summaries of the archaeological material at Takuapa 
see A. Lamb, "Some Glass Beads from Kakao Island, Takuo­
apa, South Thailand," and "Three Statues in a Tree: A 
3 6 9  
Note on the Pra Narai Group, Takuapa,o" F.M. J.a, 6, 196o1: 
48- 5 5  and 64-68 ; S. J. O 'Conno r and Tom Harrisson, 
"Western Peninsula r Thailand and West Sarawako--Ceramic 
and S tatuary Comparisons," S. M. J. ,  1 1, 1964: 562-566. 
1 1. Maurice Collis, Into Hidden Burma, London, 19 5 3: 2 18-
2 3 3. Mr. Collis has also kindly co rresponded with us 
on these and related p roblems, as of 1968 (M.C./T. H. ).  
12. Capt. G. B. Tremenheere, "Report on the Tin of the Prov­
ince of Mergui,o" Jour. of the Asiatic Soc:;. of Bengal, 
10, 184 1: 84 5. 
1 3. Ralph Fitch, "The Voyage of M. Ralph Fitch . . o. to 
Pegu, to Lamhay in the kingdome of Siam, and backe to 
Pegu, and f rom thence to Malacca, Zeilan, Co chin and 
all the coast of the East India," Hakluyta' s  Principa l 
Navaigationsa, 1 599, Vol. II: 2 50-268, cited in H. L. 
Chibbeor, The Mineral Resaources of Burma, London, 1934: 
181. 
14. O tley H. Beyer, "The Philippines before Magellan," Asia, 
21.  192 1: 86 1-866, 890-892. Bu t fo r the most recent 
study of the image see Juan R. F ran cisco, "Notes on the 
Inda-Philippine Images," in M. D. Zamoora, Studies in 
Philippaine Anthropaology, Quezon City, 1967: 1 17- 127. 
1 5. Wa rren D. Smi.th, "Histo ry of Mining in the Philippine
Islands," The Far Easatern Review, 1925: 204, and "Gold 
Mining in the Philippines,o" The Far Easatern Review,  
192 5: 691 and 695 .  See also Lawrence L. Wilson, "Primio­
tive Mining in the Philippines," The Far Eastern Review,  
19 3 3: 5 5 5 - 5 58. 
16. Tan Yeok Seang, Preliminary Report on the Disacovery of 
the Hoard of Hindu Religious Objects Near Samb as , Wes t 
Borneo, Singapoore, 1948; also J. M.aB.R.aA. S.a, 22, 1949o, 
special issue on Sambas finds. 
17. R. W. Van Bemmelan, The Geology of Indonesaia, Hague,
1949, Vol. II: 12 3. 
18. Jean Boisselier, Le Cambaodge, Pari. s, 1966: 28. 
19. Paul Levy, Recherches pre hisatoriques dan la re gion de 
Mlu Prei, Hanoi, 1943: 108. 
20. Levy : 4 3. For a brief ethnographic account of primitive 
iron-working in Cambodia see Dam Bo, "Les populations 
montagnardes du Sud-Indochinois," France-Asaie, 5, 1950: 
10 14- 101o5. 
3 7 0  
21. Malleret, ADM, II: 255; cf. Santubong disintegration, 
at our Chapter V.26. 
22. M. Celani, Megalitheas du Haut-Laos, Paris, 1935, Vol. 
II: 173- 174. 
23. The jar burials at Sa-huynh have been studied by H. 
Parmentier, O. Janse, M. Colani and others; the most 
recent summary of work there is contained in Asian Per­
spe c tives, 3, 1959, an entire issue devoted to Sa-huynh 
pottery relationships in Southeast Asia, including 
Sarawak (Niah Caves, etco.).  
24o. Celani, Megalitheas, II: 299o-30o1. See the iron and mega­
lithic associations at Jaong (V .32) and in Indian paral­
lel (VI.34) ; this figure is frontispiece of our Volume I. 
25. Malleret, ADM, III: 3 62 and the following extended dis­
cussion of the migration of techniques around the South 
China Sea. 
2 6 • Co 1ani , Mega li th es, I I : 2 5 9 • 
27o. As above: 2 87. 
2 8. B. P .  Groslier, Indochina, New York, 196 6: 1 6. 
29o. The legend is translated and analyzed at length in R. 
Stein, "Le Lin-yi," Han Hiuea, Vol. II, Peking, 1947: 
24 1 ff . 
30. It should be added that the cult of the royal linga ino­
stituted during the reign of King Bhadravarman in the 
third quarter of the fourth century would appear to 
supersede in importance the earlier symbolic signifi­
cance of the two swords. Such a switch in these symbols
of legitimation and political solidarity would suggest
fundamental shifts in the political culture, possibly
associated with the development of Indianized influences 
at the court. 
3 1. Excellent recent studies summarizing this extensive 
literature and providing full bibliographies are: 
Prince John Lowenstein, "The Origin of the �1alayan Metal 
Age," J.M. B. R. A.aS.a, 2, 1956: 5-79 ; Dr. G .  de G. Sieve­
king, "The Iron-Age collections of Malaya," J.aM. B.aR.A. S. ,  
29, 1956: 79- 138; W. Linehan, "Traces of a Bronze Age
Culture associated with Iron Age Implements . . . , " 
J.M.aB.R.A. S.a, 24, 195 1 o: 1-60, also more generally M. W .  
F .  Tweedie, Preahistoric Malaya, Singapore, 1957. 
371  
32. Sieveking, "Collections" (as above): 1 12 and footnote 
62: 124. 
33. H. G. Quaritch Wales, "The Sambas Finds in Relation to 
Problems of Indo-Malaysian Art Development," J.M.B.R. A. S. ,  
22, 1949: 23. 
34. W.oW. Skeat, Malay Magic (republished New York, 1967): 
273, summarizes information on popular Malay attitudes 
toward iron, noting it is a substance h eld in great awe. 
He  notes the use of a sacred lump of iron in the Malay 
royal regalia, and also in connect ion with the drinking
of water in which iron has been immersed in r itual con­
nected with solemn and binding oaths. See also our 
Chapter II. 12 for related Bornean attitudes. 
3 5. N. C. Bell, "Iron and Steel Work in Burma,o" Research 
Monoagrapha, Rangoon, 1907, cited in H. L. Chhibber, The 
Mineral Resoaurces of Burma, London, 1934: 9 5. E. R. 
Leach assumes that iron was being exploited in th e Kachin 
Hills area before the e ighth century A.D.; Political 
Systems of Highland Burma, London, 19 64: 249. 
3 6. This inference was drawn by the authors after reading 
H. L. Shorto, "The Dewatau Sotapan: A Mon Prototype of 
the 37 Nats,o" Bulletin of the School  of Oriental and 
African Studies, 30, 1967: 127-141. Compare Melford 
Shiro, Burmese Supernaturalism, New J ersey, 1967: 91- 152. 
37. W. Theobald, "On the Geology of Pegu," Memoirs of thae 
Geo logical Survey of India, 10, 1 873, cited in H. L. 
Chhibber, " The Extinct Iron Industry of the Neighbourhood 
of Mount Popa, Upper Burma, with Notes on the Microscopic 
Study of the Slags,o" Jour. and Proc.  of th e A siatic 
Society of Bengal, 22, 1925: 224. 
3 8. Chhibber: 2 19-223 ; on Indian charcoal woods see also 
our Chapter III.1o8.c previously. 
39. H. R. van Heekeren, The Bronz e A ge of Indoanesia, The 
Hague, 194o8. 
40. Over 1 50 years ago Stamford Raffles drew attention to 
the antiquity of the smiths as a crafto-group in Java, 
and their high status from at least the eleventh cen­
tury. He  points out that 800 famoilies of these pandi 
moved into the Majapahit realm "where they were  kindly
received" (after 1300 A.D.), but were dispersed on the 
collapse of that empire (ca. 1520)o. Raffles does not 
mention smelting in Java, but descroibes a smith's forge
with the typical cylinder bellows which, again, he traces 
back to the eleventh century at least; he illustrates 
3 7 2  
this in color, showing what is evidently a heavily
tapered clay tuyere over the end of two bamboo pipes, 
not described in the text. (Raffles, The Hisatory of 
Java, London, 1 817: 172- 173 and Plate facing p. 16 8.) 
41. C. Hooykaas, "The Balinese Sengguhu-Priest, a Shaman, 
but not a Sufi, a Saiva, and a Vaisnava," in J. Bastin 
and R. Roolvink (eds.), Malaya n and Indonesaian Studies: 
Essay s  Presaented to Sir Riahard Winsatedt on his eightya­
fifth birathday , London, 1964: 272; cf. R. Goris, "The 
Position of the Blacksmiths," in J .  L. Swellengrebel
(ed.), Bali: Studies in Life, Thought and Ritual, The 
Hague, 1960: 29 1-299. 
42. See the excellent chapter on the social and sacred 
status of the smith in Forbes (Chapter III.12, Note 5). 
43. R. B. Fox, "The Philippines in Pre-Historic Times,o" 
Saienae Review, 3, 1962: 10; but Dr. Fox has since in­
formed T.H. that he has some considerably earlier iron 
dates to be published shortly. 
44. W. G. Solheim, The Arahaeology of Central Philippinesa: 
A Study Chiefly of the Iron Age and Its Relationsahipsa, 
Manila, 1964: 2 1 1. There is no direct ethnic or other 
scientific data to confirm these "waves" of culture in 
this way and the system remains speculative. 
45. A. E. Evangelista, " Identifying Some Intrusive Archaeo­
logical Materials Found in Philippine Proto-Historic 
Sites," Asian Studiesa, 3, 1965: 87. 
46. W. D. Smith, "Iron in the Philippines,o" The Far Easatern 
Review, December, 1925: 771. 
47. Field Museum of Natural History, Chicago, Hall G, Case 
2 1. The exhibit was collected by the late Fay Cooper 
Cole in Mindanao before 1912. 
4 8. Among the excellent iron tools produced by the Bagobo 
are knives, called sangi, of rather brittle iron with a 
fine steel edge inset onto the less malleable body as a 
separate weld; something not known to us from elsewhere 
in this area but clearly related to the Kayan-Kenyah 
treatment of sword steel and part of the "near-damascene" 
approach too (cf. our Chapter VI.36-37). The collectoro, 
Fay Cooper Cole, whoo,had an exceptionally wide knowledge
of Southeast Asian ethnology (on which he published ex­
tensively) noted also that "so far as is known this 
type of knife is unique" (F.oM.N.H. Catalogue, 34526, 
129 1  15 etc.). The Field Museum has published another 
3 7 3  
accounot by Cole which is relevant hereo: 
"Among the men, as with the women, certain indus­
tries are monopoloized by a few individuals. In 
this community no men s tand higher in the esotima­
tion of their fellows than do the smiths and the 
casoters of copper . . .o .  Of even greater importance 
are the smiths who are also under the care of a 
powerful spirit for whom the Gome k-gomanan ceremony
is celebrated each year, just prior to the planting 
time. Their forges are h idden away in the hemp
fields, and I was repeatedly informed that no woman 
might see the smith at  work. Whether or no such a 
rule is rig idly enforced at  all times I cannot say,
but at  no time did I see a woman about the forge
while the fire was burning, and al though I was 
allowed to see and photograph the process, my w ife 
was at  all times prevented from doing so. The 
forge differs in no maoterial respects from that 
used by the brass casoters, excep t tha t hollowed out 
logs replace the bamboo tubes, and that a meotal 
anvil and iron hammers are used. After an iron 
knife or spear head has been roughly shaped, the 
smith splits the edge to a slight depth and inser ts 
a band of steel. The iron is pounded down on the 
harder meotal and the whole is brought to a white 
heat in the charcoal fire. Removing i t  to the an­
vil the smith gives the blade one or two light
blows and returns i t  to the fire. Th is is repeated 
many times before he begins to add the heavy s trokes 
which finally weld the iron and s teel together.
The blade having been given its f inal shape is 
again heated and is held above a tube of water un­
til the glowing me ta l begins to turn a yellowish 
green , when it  is plunged into the cold waoter. 
This process, repeaoted many timeso, gives a fair 
temper to the whole weapon. Charcoal for the fire 
is secured by burning logs and chilling them sudo­
denly with cold water." (F. C. Cole, Fie ld Mus . 
Nat . His toPy, Anthropology, 12, 1 9 1 3 o: 8 1 o-83.) 
49. This fine display is also deroived from Cole's field 
expeditions, this one in Nor thern Luzon 19 1 1 - 12. We are 
indebted to Dr. Stephan Gasser of the Field Museum for 
forwarding a copy of the now rare book le t prepared from 
Cole ' s  notes to explain the showcase ("The Phil ippine 
Forge Group,o' '  F.M.N.H., Dep t .  of Anthropology, 1 922, 
Leaflet no. 2) and for o ther valued help. 
SO. T.H. worked on this maoterial at  Chicago, 1 � 3  October 
1 968. The Balbalasang forge was more closely examoined 
3 7 4  
through the exceptional courtesy of the Museum authori­
t i es, who kindly permitted the showcase to be specially 
opened up for this purpose. This Luzon type of tuyere 
appears to parti cularly resemble the one from Java i l ­
lustrated by Stamford Raffles a century earlier, as 
c ited at Note 40  above. 
5 1. See Note 4 8. 
5 2 .  The waisted stones have been described i n  Chapter V.2 8 
previ ously; compare sections (e) and (1) i n  that Chapter. 
Chapter 3 4. Early I ndian and Chinese I ron-Work i ng 
1. Qui nt ius Curt ius quoted i n  Forbes : 4 3 8. 
2.  As above. 
3. S. D. Singh, "Iron i n  Ancient India,n" Jour . of the Eco ­
nomic and Social History of the Orient, 5, 1962n: 2 13; 
and B. R. Subrahmanyam, "Appearance and Spread of I ron 
i n  India- - An Appraisal of the Archaeological Data,n" 
Jour. of Orien tal Institute Baroda, 13, 1964 : 3 5 0 .  
4. Date given in  comments by B. K. Thapar i n  seminar on 
"The Iron Age i n  India" i n  V. N. Misra and M .  S. Mate 
(eds.), Indian Prehistorya: 19 6 4 ,  Deccan College, Poona, 
1965 : 2 10 .  
5. V. S. Begley, "The Ganga-Yamuna Basin i n  the Fi rst Mil­
lennium B.C.,n" Expedition, 9, 1966. 
6. N. R. Banerjnee, Indian Prehistory : 19 6 4 :  196; our 
i talics i n  phrase quoted. 
7. See B. B. Lal, "Excavation at Hast inapura and other Ex­
plorations i n  the Upper Ganga and Sutlej Basins,n" 
Ancien t  India, 10n- 11, 1954 -195 5; Indian Archaeo logy - -A 
Review, 195 8- 59 :  54 -5 5; G. R .  Sharma, "The Excavat ions 
at Uj j ain, "  Indoalogen Tagung (Proc. of the I ndological 
Conference at Essen, West Germany, July 1 95 9) :  78. 
8. N. R. Banerjnee, The Iron Age in India, New Delhi, 1 965n: 
178- 179 .  
9. Coghlan : 4 6. 
10. On  flux see Coghlan : 4 0 - 44; Forbes : 3 96; Tylecote : 187; 
and our Chapter IVn. Z S, plus Appendix E.6. 
3 7 5  
1 1. Banerjee, Iron Age: 178. 
12. Subrahmanyan Banerjee, "Appearance of Iron"o: 357; ibid.a: 
239. 
13. H. C. Jones, "The Ir·on-Ore Deposits of Bihar and -Oris sa," 
Memoirs of the Geological Survaey of India, 62, Calcutta, 
1934o: 225. 
14. It is  r ecognized that the megalithic cists of South 
India may have po s sible Western analogies, while the 
megalithic memorial stones  of Central and Northeastern 
India appear to spring from a different tradition with 
an Indonesian or Southeast A sian orientation; see  C. von 
Filrer-Haimendorf, "The problem of megalithic cultures  
in M iddle-India," Man in India, 25: 41-43. For the 
native megalithic of Borneo in general see  T. and B. 
Harrisoson, "The Prehistory of Sabah" (Sabah Society, 
Kola Kinabalu, in press, Chapter V; the conclu sion there 
is  for an iron age development along local lines). 
15. A. Rea, "Prehistoric Antiquities  in Tinnevelly, Annual 
Report of the Archaeological Survey of India, I, Madras, 
1902- 1903o: 1 1 o1- 140 and Catalogue of the Prehistoric 
Antiquities from Adichan allur and Perumbair, Madras, 
1915; see  also Chapter V.29.a of the pres ent text. 
1 6. R. N. Mehta, "Vasravi, an Iron Smelting Site, Taluka 
Mangrol; District Surat," Baroda, Oriental Institute 
Jour.a, 9, 1960o: 305-309. 
17. As  aboveo: 309. 
18. M. S. Krishnan, Iron Ores of India, Calcutta, 1955. 
19. As  aboveo: 33-34. 
20. Forbeso: 398. 
2 1. J. Stodart, "A Brief Account of Wootz, or Indian Steel," 
The Asiatic Journal, 1818 : 570-571. 
22. Dr. Voys ey, "De·scription of the Native Manufacture of 
Steel in Southern India,o" Joura. of the Asiatic Soc. of 
Bengal, 1, 1832: 245-24 7. 
23. Krishnan, Iron Ores: 52. 
24. J .  M. Heath, "On Indian Iron and Steel . . . ,  " Jour. 
Royal Asiatic Soc . a, 5, 1839o: 390-393. It should be 
noted that in the same di strict some steel wa s made by 
3 7 6  
the decarburization of cast iron. See Krioshnan, Iron 
Ores: 44. 
25. R. Hadfierd, "Sinhalese  Iron and Steel of Ancient 
Origin," The Joura. of the Iron and Steel Institute, 85, 
1912 : 136. 
26. A s  above : 169. 
27. A. K. Coomara swamy, Medieval Sinhalese Art (2nd ed.),  
New York, 1956o: 190. 
28. A s  abov e : 192- 193. 
29. Dr. Ch@ng Te-K'un of Cambridge Univoersity states  that 
the metal was known in the Western Chou period ( 1 1 1 o1-77 1 
B.C.) but was not widely used until the Warring States  
period; see  his Arahaeology in China, Vol. III, Chou 
Ch ina, Cambridge, 1963: 246. Kwang-chih Chang places  
the development of a highly developed iron metallurgy 
in the latter half of the Eastern Chou period (77 1-256)o; 
see  The Arahaeology of Anaient China, New Haven, 1963o: 
195. Professor Joseph Needham in his lectures  to the 
Mewcome Society in 1956, stated that iron did not seem 
to be known in China befor e  the sixth century B.C.: 46. 
30. Tylecote: 193. 
3 1. Hua Chiieh-ming, Yang Ken and Liu En-chu, K ' ao- ku- hsueh­
pao, 3, 1957: 106, cited in Chang, Arahaeology: 195. 
32. N. J. van der Merwe and M. Stuiver, "Dating Iron by the 
Carbon- 14 Method," Current Anthropology, 9, 1968o: 52. 
33. R. Hartwell, "Markets, Technology, and the Structure of 
Enterprise  in the development of Elevoenth-Century Chi­
nese  Iron and Steel Industry," Jour. of Eaonomia History, 
26, 1966: 5 1. 
34. Ch@ng Te-K ' un, Chou China : 248. 
35. E-tu Zen Sun and Shiou-Chuan Sun (transl.) Sung Ying­
Hsing, Tien-Kung Kai- Wu, Univoersity Park, Pennsylvania, 
1966 : 24 and Fig. 14-10. 
36. Kuangtung Hsin Yu, cited in Needham: 16. 
37. Wen- Wu, 1, 1959, summarized by N. Barnard, Bronze Cast­
ings and Bronz e Alloys in Anaient Ch ina, Toky o, 196 1 o: 
17. 
3 7 7  
38.  For such molds see Barnard (as at 37 above): Plate 5 and 
Fig . 4 .  
39. F .  R. Tegengren, "The Iron Ores and Iron Industry of 
China,n" Part II, Memoirs of the Geological Survey of 
China, Series A, 2 ,  1 9 2 3 :  319 -333. 
40. T .  T. Read , "The Iron Ore Resources of  the Chinese 
Empire,n" The Iron Ore Resources of the World, Stockholmn, 
19 10: 9 16-9 2 4 .  
41. It is perhaps s alutary to recall that the first well­
proven wrought iron work which has survived in Britain 
is eleventh century--notably the s creen once protecting 
St. Swithin' s  Shrine in Winchester Cathedral, of  which 
only a fragment remains, however (J  . S. Linds ay , An 
Anatomy of English Wrought Iron, London, 1964 : 13-15 
and Figsn. 2 8 - 2 9; the three perhaps earlier "Nordic" 
pieces illusntrated by this author, Figsn. 2 2 - 2 7, could 
well pas s as "Dayak" in conceptio n, incidentally-- the 
" door strap hinge" at Staplehurst Church, Kent, strikn­
ingly s o ! ) .  
Chapter 35. Some African Parallels ?  
1. T . H .  has corresponded with inves tigators in Africa s i nce 
1947 and exchanged s herds and beadsn. In particular,
thanks are due to Drn. J .  S .  Kirkman and Dr. Neville 
Chittick , who sent a collection of  Chines e wares and 
beads from these s itesn. Alm�st  every s herd could be 
matched from the Bongkisam excavations (particularly) .  
Many African beads exactly match thonse from the delta 
s ites .  Thanks als o to Dr. James H. Vaughan of Indiana 
University- -see text, Nigeria; and to Dr. Brian Fagan, 
Univers ity o f  California at Santa Barbara, for persona·1 
discus s ion and correspondence , as well as his wr itings 
referred to in the text (and Appendix E.S ) .  
2 .  See Chapter VIn. 34 and elsewhere earlier on Kuala Selin-
s i• ngn. 
3. Sonia Cole, The Prehistory of East Africa, New Yorkn, 
1963: 19n9. 
4. Miuze Stuiver and Nicolaas van der Merwe, " Radio-carbon 
Chronology of  the Iron Age in Sub-Saharan Africa , "  in 
Current Anthropology , 9, 1 968: 54-57 . The authors 
centered their work at Yale and are opening up signifi­
cant new horizons for the dating of iron slag and as s o ­
ciated materials. (Drn. van der Merwe is now at S.U.N . Y . ,  
Binghamto n, New York.) 
3 7 8  
5. Brian Fagan in W.oW. Bishop and J. D. Clark (eds.), 
Background to Evolution in Africa, Chicago, 1967. Como­
pare his separate book, Iron Age Cultures in Z ambia, 
London, 1967, Vol. I: 8 8. 
6. R.oR. Inskeep, "Some Iron Age Sites in Northern Rhode­
dia,o" s .  African Archaeological Bull.a, 17, 1967: 1 36-
1 80. 
7. Roger Summers in Bishop and Clark: 695-700, as above. 
8. R. Summers in Current Anthropology, 7, 1966: 466. 
9. H. V. Sicard in Current Anthropology, 7, 1966: 475-476. 
10. Much to this point is a re-examoination of culture spread
in North Africa by William Y. Adams of the University
of Kentucky in Antiquity, 42, 196o8: 194-2o14. 
1 1. M. Posnanskey (ed.), Prelude to Eas t African History, 
London, 1966: 94. 
12. Neville Chittick in Antiquity, 42, 1968: 166 ; our ital-
• 
l C S  . 
1 3. J. R. Harding, Man, 60, 1960: 1 36 - 1 37. 
14. Both quotations from Miss Harding, as above. 
15. This explanation, or rather opinion, is accepted by 
Miss Harding, who is then at pains to try and find a 
source from which the necessary metal (copper) could 
reach the prehistoric site. The nearest known seems to 
be 200 miles awayo! One cannot help wishing the Govern­
ment chemist could have seen and reported upon some of 
that rejected slag as well. 
16. J. S. Kirkman, The Arab City of Gedi, London, 1954 ; and 
G. Caton-Thompson, The Zimbabwe Culture, London, 193 1 o. 
17. Miss G. Caton-Thompson in Problems in African His tory, 
ed. Robert 0. Collins, New Jersey, 1968: 273. This 
view reflects our own for Borneoo, too. 
1 8. Forbes: 68; cf. our VIo. 3 3.b. See also Forbes: 1 16 for 
map o f  the Malayan "piston bellows,o" including Madagas­
caro. 
19. Rene Gardi, Mandara, Zurich, 1956: Plate 45-49. 
20. See Chapter III.15.f ; and Man, 64, 1964: 174-177. 
3 7 9  
2 1. Dr. Vaughan kindly gave T.aH .  a copy of his manuscript (cf. 
Chapter III.16 , Note 20) ; he also there stresses the 
research neglect of iron metallurgy· techniques since 
Cline's work. And see Chapter VI.36 , Note 2. 
22. Bernard Fagg, Curator , personal communication , 28 -
September 1968. 
23. The varied literature on this difficult subject reaches 
a high, wider level in Professor Murdock's "A Key to 
Oceanic Culture Historya, "  in Ethnology, 3 ,  1964: 1 1 7-
126. 
Chapter 36. Elsewhere in Borneo : Ethnological Analogies 
1. G. W. Earl , Easatern Seasa, London , 1837: 264. 
2 .  Compare the Earl quotation above: Dr. J. Vaughan has 
described j ust the same situation for the Marghi south 
of Lake Chad in West Africa (cf. Chapter VI .35 , Note 2 1 ) .  
So we are reminded that during the second millennium 
B.aC. the Hittites valued forty of silver or five of gold 
as equal to a single equal unit of iron (L. Aitchaisona, 
A Hisatory of Metalsa, London, 1960 , Vol.  I: 102 ) .  
3. Carl Bocka, Headhunters of Borneo, Amsterdama, 1883: 191a; 
cf. his Plate 18a, Fig. 3. 
4. In this way , the Curator of the Sarawak Museum was ab le 
to supply "royal gifts" representative of the State for 
presentation to H.aR . H. the Duke of Edinburgh and other 
royal visitors up to 1963. All such came from the Apo 
Kayan areaa, not "Malaysia.a" 
5. A.aH. Everett in J. S.B. A. S.a, 1 ,  1878a: 20. 
6. J. Burnsa, Journ. Indian Archipelago, 3 ,  1849a: 151-152a; 
this is reprinted (with a commentary by T. H. ) in S. M. J . a, 
3 ,  1951a: 451-486. 
7 .  Hugh Lowa, Sarawak, London , 1848 ; reprinted by  Frank 
Cass of London , 1968. 
8. The record is overwhelmingly strong on these themes. 
To mention only one more general accounta, publishaed too 
late for inclusion by Ling Roth but actually  observed 
back in 1865 ; the eminent Italian botanist ,  Odoardo 
Beccaria, observed of the Kayans of the Tatau-Tubau area 
(between the Baram and Rejang in Sarawak) just over aa· 
I 
' 
3 8 0  
century ago, a people who then had virtually no direct 
access to the west: "They do not work imported iron, 
but extract it themselves from the ore found in their 
country.o" ( Wanderings in the Great Foresats of Borneo, 
London, 1904o: 281; actual observation in 1865.) 
9. Hose, I: 193-195 ; earlier discussion of crucible queso­
tion in our III.13. 
10. H. F. Tillema illustrates an Apo Kayan ( Kalimantan) 
forge with four (and four bamboo pipes accordingly; see 
A po Kajan, Amsterdam, n.d. (? 1930): Fig. 190 at p. 224). 
1 1. "Optionalo" but usual are two, or several, more or less 
triangular, sometimes curved, stones (commonly sand­
stone) at the other side of the charcoal fire from the 
air-draught, to keep the heat in from that side--serving 
as a rear-shield which nevertheless allows some air to 
escape and not blow back too much onto the fire; based 
on T.oH. field-records here and above. 
12. Low as at Note 7: 209. 
13. Brooke in Admiral Sir Henry Keppel, The Expedition to 
Borneo of H.aM.aS. Dido, London, 1846, Vol. I: 65. 
14. Spenser St. John, L ife in the Foresats of the Far Easat, 
London, 1863, Vol. I: 44. 
15. S. Baring - Gould and C. A. Bampfylde, A Hisatory of Sara­
wak under its Two White Raj ahs ,  London, 1909o: 18. 
16. A fuller ethnological treatment of the Malohs is in 
S. M. J.a, 12, 1965: 236-350 (by T.H.). 
Chapter 37. "Damascene,o" Islam and Birth by the Sword 
1. Definition from Webstero' s  ? th New Collegiate Dictionary: 
209. 
2. Spenser St. John, Life i n  the Fores ts of th e Far Eas t, 
London, 1863, Vol. I :  1 13 cf. 122. 
3. Chapters III.o13-19 ; see further Coghlan: 156- 166 and 
Needhamo: 44; and C. S. Smitho's  detailed A Metallurgic 
Examination of s ome Japanesae s word bladesa, Assoc. Ital. 
di Metallurgi, Milan, 2, 1957: 42-68. 
4. See T. A. Rickard, "The Primitive Smelting of Iron" in 
A merican Journ. of Archaeology, 43, 1939: 85-101. 
3 8 1  
5. Stamford Raffles, The History of Java, London, 1817: 
204-216; cf. Karimata island in Chapter V.29 (see Note 
15 there ).  
6. As shown in Chapter VI.3 3. 
7. On Majapahit, etc., see D. G. E. Hal l, A History of 
South-east Asia, London (new edition), 1968. 
8 .  See for instance, G. B. Gardner, Ke ris and Other  Malay 
Wea pons, Singapore, 1936: 14. · In Malaya smiths, pandai, 
"were often made governors of provinces" in those days.
For a valuable Bornoeo-based descriptive account, G. C. 
Woolley, "The Malay Keris: its origin and development," 
J . M. B. R . A. S. ,  20, 1947: 60o- 104; some of the weapons, 
collected by Woolley, are now in the Sabah Museum, Kata 
Kinabalu, Sabah, though in general Borneo museums are 
poor in good keris, largely because Malays of status 
have taken many fine ones to the mainland? 
9. Cheng Te -K'un, Chou China, Cambroidge, 196o3: 249o; our 
italics. 
10. Dhammapada V: 92. 
1 1. Edward H. Schafer, The Golde n Peache s  of Samarkand, 
Berkeley (California), 196 3: 262, which has an excellent 
treatment of damascene in the Tang of China, at Chapter
V II. 
12. Of relevance here is George Cameron Stoneo's  A Glossary 
of the Construction, Deacoration and Use of Arms and 
Armour, London, 1934, a rare work in the original but 
reprinted in New York, 196 1. 

PART VII 
SUMMARY AND APPENDICES 
"A s one surveyos the whole story of the devel­
opment of metallography, the analogy with a phase 
tranosformation is  unavoidable. From·oan amorphouos 
body of practical knowledge, there had appeared a 
number of tranositional systems of order that dis ­
appeared a s  a result of later tranosformations (note
that it is  the arrangement that changes, not the 
components, for facts once established have the 
permanence o f  matter) . Each tranosformation was 
preceded by a kind of superosaturation of observed 
facts, and by subcritical suggeostionos of order, 
but eventually the facts precipitated upon a new 
idea which formed the nucleus of order for subse­
quent rapid growth. Eventually growth slowos or 
stopos for lack of new information; however, any
given body of knowledge may itself be usefully 
incorporated into a larger one (like an atom in 
a molecule, in a cryostal, in the whole structure) 
or it may be entirely transformed in orientation 
or in inner structure by growth from a new nucleuos 
which presents a more profound order." 
Cyril Stanley Smith, A Hisatory of 
Metallography, Chicago, 1960. 
3 8 3  

SUMMARY 
I. Introduction 
1. This is a Data Paper, concerned primarily with putting 
on record descriptive material as one stage in publishing 
a full-length study of "Iron Age" developments, tech­
niques and implications in West Borneo, part of a wide 
and vital complex in Southeast Asia and beyond (Preface ; 
cf. Appendix D). 
2. Systematic excavation started in the Santubong section 
of the Sarawak River delta (which is described at I.1) 
with Sarawak Museum teams from 1947, was rounded off by
special studies in 1966 (details given in I.2). 
3. The numerous delta sites include threeo.owith intensive 
iron-working (the theme of this Paper): Jaong (earlier
in time), Buah and Bong.kisam (later), with common charac­
teristics, integrated prehistorically with related sites, 
including two headland cemeteries ( I.o3). 
4. This iron-working activity was concentrated between about 
900 to 1350 A.D., with a peak from ca  . 1 100 A.D. --dating 
based on a study of ceramic types, coins, a "Tantric" 
shrine and radio-carbon (C - 14); the whole operation came 
to a complete stop before 1400 A.D. (I.4). 
II. The Evidence of Iron Slag 
5. Large quantities of iron slag are the outstanding--though
archaeologically difficult and aesthetically somewhat 
repellent- -feature of the delta iron-working sites. 
Locally thought to be fossil faeces, they represent the 
residue of a large-scale smelting and associated industry,
which we have here attempted to reduce from an intracta­
ble-looking mass and mess by systematic measurement 
(II.5 -7). 
6. Detailed calculations · show an irregular vertical pattern
of distribution in depth, rather than a regular, consist­
ent pattern of deposition; and a complicated lateral 
scatter, ranging from density of over 100 lbs. of slag
"per suroface square foot" (a new standard we propose)
down- -covering SO+  located acres--with an estimated gross
for Jaong, Buah and Bongkisam of nearly 70,000,000 lbs. 
of slag; and conservatively, of 40,000 tons for the delta 
as a whole (II.8). 
3 8 5  
3 8 6  
7. A first classification of slag pieces on crude visual 
criteria is exploained and illustrated: seven morpho­
logic al categories, ranging from tiny "droplets" to 
large "cakes,o" likely to help illuminoate a lost techo­
nology- -especially when comparable data  are avail able 
elsewhere (II.9o- 10). 
8. Exc avoation and then analysis of the resulting material 
indicoates that a simple type of open fire, a "bowlo­
hearth," w as the basic smelting unit, without permanent 
walled furnace or other elaborate structures, using the 
same places again and again (thus the strata-disburb­
ance) ; the technology w as basically simple but skill­
fully employed (II.o10). 
9. A modified (improved?) form of early western "bowl­
furnoace" as described by H. H. Coghlan is considered 
applicable in S ar aw ak, but some specialized features 
developed here and elsewhere in the isloands, p artly in­
dependent of outside influence and not yet fully under­
stood (III.10.c, cf. IV.24). 
10. Other fe atures of delta slag distribution are discussed; 
a strongly "religious" attitude to iron is implied 
(II.1 1- 12; cf. III.9 and VI.33). 
III. The Evidence in Cloay 
11. This picture is somewhat complicoated by the second m ain 
residue of prehistoric iron-working in the delta: 
cylindric al tubes and other artifacts of local clay, 
fully discussed. We suggest that these indicoate the 
refining of wrought iron into "steel" by some sort of 
crucible method, as well as a possible dual crucible­
tuyere use, considered in some detail (II I. 13o, 15 and 
especioally 19). 
12. Some 2,000,000 lbs. of "crucible" are estimated from the 
sites; with a slight, slow development from "clumsier" 
to r ather finer forms when earlier J aong is comp ared 
with Buah - Bongkisoarn (III.I S). 
13. The same loc al clay is used in other ways--both directly 
connected with iron-working and not so--inside one brooad 
craft-troadition d ating b ack into the stone-age, with 
interesting side effects and specializations, such as 
the curious "phallic tops" on earthenware boxes (III.16). 
14. B amboo filled an important role, p artly in associoation 
with or in place of clay, in prehistoric (and historic) 
smelting here; the wider implications of this for other 
industries are indicated (III.17). 
3 8 7  
15a. The delta mangrove swamps provided an optimum supply of 
excel lent charcoal--probably one reason why the industry 
centered here (III.18)a. 
16. Local folklore richly  supports development of a fine 
steel industry in the area far back in time (III .19.c, 
cf. IIa. 12 ) ,  we suggest the product took an ingot form, 
for use both elsewhere in Borneo and overseas, especial ly 
China (in the Sung dynasty? ;  cf. IV)a. 
IVa. Mineralogical Evidence 
17. Iron ores were freely available for delta usage by di­
rect mining and easy water transhipment, mainly downa­
river, in an area rich in metals generalaly, on the basis 
of simple yet skil led metal lurgy, already deduced--en­
ab1  ing  use of "poor" ores 1 ik  e haema t i, te , which a1 so 
has Stone Age associations? (IVa.20).  
18. Ore and slag analyses are given, though our knowledge 
at this level is in infancy (virtual ly non-existent for 
most of Southeast Asia)a; initial comparisons with the 
northern Philippines are suggestive, too ( IV.22-23 ; cf. 
VI .33 .c)a. 
19a. A reconstruction is offered of complaicated processes and 
intricate trade-exchange patterns based on Santubong 
before 1400 A.Da. ,  with emphasis on multiple (albeit 
incomplete) rather than simple, "one-way" answers to 
attempted reconstruction of a past for which--in this 
area--there is no textual information of credit (IV . 24 ).  
2 0 .  In particular, we believe that relationships, contacts, 
influences from, to, 01· with "India" and "China" at this 
time were high ly complex, often irregular and sometimes 
so indirect as to be barely discerned when compared with 
the vigorous development of indigenous, Bornean atti­
tudes and skills, linked to more or less local maritime 
shipping connecting out from West Borneo (IV.24a; cf. V)a. 
V. Evidence by Association 
21a. Finished tools in iron are poorly  represented in the 
delta, partly owing to decomposition in this type of 
open site; the indication is that smithing to complete 
tools was a subsidiary activity (V . 20)a. 
22. On the other hand, slag is attached, encrusted, onto 
all sorts of non-iron artifacts, indicating a close 
association between iron-working and other forms of 
activity on the spot at the time (V . 27 ) a. 
3 8 8  
2 3. Other  artnifacts are more briefly considered here in so 
far as they are relevant to the iron-working; firstly 
stone too l s :  a wide range of these were excavated, in­
c luding the co nsp icuous class of "waisted stones" which 
again have clear Stone Age associations over  a wide 
area- - including India and China- - as wel l  as surviving 
i n  iron use, as hammers, i n  northern Luzon in this cen­
tury (V. 2 8; cf. V I. 3 3 ) .  
2 4. Gold is quite regularly found i n  the iro n-working sites 
(over 2 0 0  objects excavate d) ; and a variety of lesser 
i tems include lead r i ngs paralle ling those from early 
mainland sites, as well as si lver, antimony, other 
mineral and "semi -precious" (by modern standards) stone s, 
part of  a broad i nte r - associated pattern (V. 2 9; cf. 
Appe ndix C)n. 
2 5. Many of these minerals and "jewe ls" (paragraph 2 4) were 
with the "Tantric Shrine "  excavated at Bongkisam; how 
far this reflects any directly " Indian" influence is  
conside red- -we conclude that this was probably somewhat 
faint material ly but apprec iable i dea-wise (V. 30;  cf. 
VI.n34.a)n. 
2 6. The rich and varied material evide nce of abundant and 
often excel lent Chinese stonewares (T'ang and Sung types 
classified in the text) points to a stronger local trade­
weal th as we ll as to material contact (not necessari ly 
direct)  with the mainland to the north (V. 3 1 ;  cf. 
V I. 34. b)n. 
2 7. Less abundant and varied glass beads, nearly all smal l 
and monochrome (including new analyses by Co rning Glass) 
point back to a western, not a "Chinese" source,  how­
eve r - - once more underlining the non- simplicity of the 
Santubong trade set-up over half a millennium ago 
(V. 3 1 )  . 
2 8. The autochtho nous character always latent in this Borneo 
background reasserts itself with those puzzling exe r ­
c ises i n  rock-carvi ng which are such a feature of the 
earliest (Jaong) site, and which contai n a distinctly 
"phallic" element, comparable to that noted for the 
earthenware phallic tops (paragraph 1 3 )  i n  some of  the 
smal ler  stone treatments, and of  course the go lden Zinga 
in the silver box o f  the Tantric Shrine (V.n32 ;  cf. 
III. 1 0 ,  V. 2 8. h, etc. , and V. 3 0 )  . 
3 8 9  
VI. Wider Ideas 
29. In the sixth and last main part of this Data Paper,
relevant published information from other sources is 
brought together in order to illuminate the considerable 
remaining uncertainties for Southeast Asia (local)o, 
India and China (as potential "influence" sources), 
Africa (various levels of parallelism and common prob­
lems everywhere), and then inla�d Borneo into today
(VI.33, 34, 35, and 36, respectively) . 
30. The data for Southeast Asia is scanty and over consider­
able areas nil. The need to extend archaeological and 
ethnological research (including folklore) into this 
"iron-age" sector is emphasized; it has been often 
"taken for granted" as compared with stone-age or epi­
graphic and protohistorical studies, especially as re­
gards actual technology and the roles of iron alongside
other metals and stone (VI.33). 
3 1. Over the area as a whole, there are many, though erratic, 
evidences of common iron method and more deeply of a 
common attitude towards iron and other metal working and 
workers, though for much of this evidence we now depend 
on scrappy European records (VI.33)o. 
32. Affinities with early metallurgic methods are quite 
strong as between West Borneo and (especially) South 
India and Ceylon, where developed the crucial "wootz" 
technique, associated with crucible use and the produc­
tion of damascene steelo; several ethnological accounts 
are cited in full to illustrate this theme- -notably re­
ports of 1818, 1832, and 1839 (V I . 34 .a)o. 
33. A different crucible process in Ancient China was linked 
to the distinctive Cast Iron tradition not thought to 
have had much directly to do with Borneo but with con­
siderable side effects (VI.34.b). 
34. Some African parallels are sketched, mainly to indicate 
major problems that remain there (as in Asia) despite
intensive other research on the Iron Age; this especially
applies on the east coast, where an important series of 
sites share the Chinese stoneware and glass bead remains 
associated with slag as at Santubong, Selinsing in 
Malaya and Southeast Asia generally (VIo.35)o. 
35. A number of nineteenth and early twentieth century ac­
counts for Borneo are regarded as important for inter­
preting delta prehistory--especially smelting as 
described by Hose (crucible use) and others (VI.36). 
3 9 0  
36. The form of "near-damascene" developed by the superb 
Kayan and Kenyah iron s miths of Borneo's interior is 
thought (by us) to be a hitherto unrecognized part (per­
haps very early) of the great damascene tradition usual­
ly associated with Indian wootz (paragraph 32 above)a; 
this is linked to the better-known damascene proces s in 
the island keris dagger (VI.37 . a-b) . 
37. The main text ends with a cautionary and fecund folka­
tale on ironic secrets (VI. 3 7 . c) .  
VII. Summary and Appendices 
38a. Six Appendices follow this summary. These briefly disa­
cus s  Dr. Cheng Te- K'un's 1968 book on Sarawak archae­
ology (A)a; Dr. C. A. L. M. Schwaner's important 1853 
account of Kalimantan smelting, specially translated 
from the Dutch by Profes sor John Echols (B)a; a. newly 
published short report on non-ferrous metal links be ­
tween the Sarawak River and the mainland (C) ; the full 
Contents Sheet of the report of which this is a first 
installment, as earlier indicated in paragraph 1 above 
(D)a; a report of the M. I. T .  seminar on this Data Paper 
(E)a; and a letter from Dr. Karl Hutterer of the Univer­
sity of San Carlos with new Philippine slag data (F)a. 
APPENDIX A 
DR. CHENG'S "ARCHAEOLOGY I N  SARAWAK" 
D r. Cheng Te-K'un, the distinguished Chinese archaeolo­
gist, author o f  standard works on mainland prehistory and 
Reader in Chinese Archaeology at the University o f  Cambridge, 
England, visited us in the delta in August, 196 6. He was 
evidently impressed by what he saw. Subsequently, he borrowed 
parts o f  manuscript drafts prepared at Santubong in that and 
earlier years reporting work progress. With our full per­
mission, he made whatever use he wished o f  his own obseorva­
tions and these earlier reports in preparing a small book 
which he has devoted to "The Archaeology o f  Sa rawak," Cam­
bridge (Heffers ),  1969; 48 pp. We welcome. this important
addition to Borneo 's  meager literature, with excellent illus­
trations provided by Barbara Harrisson and the Sarawak Mu ­
seumo's  Junaidi Bin Bolhassan. 
D r. Chengo's  text deals primarily with the delta excava­
tions begun by the Sarawak Museum two decades ago. Any cono­
clusions reached are, o f  course, the author's own. Those 
inteorested will recognize a significantly greater emphasis 
on the Chinese aspects of Sarawak findings than is given in 
the present Data Paper. Dr. Cheng graciously sent us first 
proo fs in January 1968; o f  course, only points o f  fact were 
corrected then. To some extent any di fferences in emphasis 
arise because the present paper was not started seriously 
until July 1968. 
"Archaeology in Sa rawak" is a useful book. In genera l, 
we agree with its approach and most o f  its attitudes. It 
makes a liveoty, stimulating introduction to subojects which 
are being pursued in a rather more pedestrian but intoricate 
way now at Cornell. By continuing both angles o f  view- -
Cambridge and Cornell--we may produce firmer and perhaps 
sometimes fresh findings in the futureo, as well as getting
them undeorstood by a wider public. 
In our view it is important especially to try and re­
think some o f  the basic problems o f  "early I ron Age" (and
earlie r) prehistory in the area, without feeling compelled 
to decide yes or  no, black and white, "China" or  "India,o" 
and so on, at a stage when the evidence is patently incomo­
plete. It is only too easy to fall back on accepted theory 
or  simpl i fied solutions which can then obscure the chances 
for a more fundamental re-evaluation o f  the really very com­
plex set o f  prehistoric processes developing in and out o f  
3 9 1  
3 9 2  
Southeast Asia--its islands particularly. These processes 
in these places involved not only major contributions from 
outside cultures, but also evolution from inside, integral 
to the total environment and so very strong in the context 
of great islands like Borneo--but evident, too, in different 
facets of complexity, on much smaller ones, like Timor, Nias, 
Cagayan Sulu or Pulau Condorea. 
APPENDIX B 
SCHWANER'S 1853 REPORT 
(Translated by John Echols) 
The classic account o f  iron smelting for Bo rneo remains 
that of  Dr. C. A. L. M. Schwaner, a Dutch scientist who ex­
plored the Barito river system to its headwaters between 
1843 and 1847. His book "Borneo : beschruring van het 
Stroomgebred van den Barito" was published in Amsterdam, 2 
volumes, 1853. Volume I, pages 109- 1 13 contain the relevant 
text as well as a handsome colo red lithograph plate ( facing 
p. 1 10). This now rare Dutch text has been partially trans­
lated in several later works in English, notably including a 
confused summary in John Percy, "Metallurgy: the art o f  ex­
tracting metals from their o res . . .o ," London,· 1864: 273-
275; and briefly in H. Ling Roth, "The Pagan Peoples o f  
Sarawak and British North Bo rneo," London, 1894, vol. II. 
When we came to prepare the present Data Paper, this 
description o f  smelting in the interior o f  Southeast Kalio­
mantan before 1850--when Bo rneoo's  hinterland was still un­
touched by European influences--became of  special inteorest. 
In view of  the sometimes contradictory conclusions drawn from 
the original, a full t ranslation was essential to this study, 
as well as for the record .  We are consequently most grate ful 
to our Cornell colleague, Pro fessor John Echols, the distin­
guished linguist, for the English text which follows. 
The text is not easy in English, reoflecting some pas­
sages o f  real prolixity in the originalo. Ev idently Schwaner, 
like nearly all other Bo rneo observers of  the nineteenth 
century, did not sufficiently understand the processes seen 
to make the descriptions adequately cleaor. The absence o f  
certain details renders some o f  it baffling. Some o f  the 
terms used, too, are now archaic and difficult to interpret 
--importantly unclea r passages are marked with asterisks 
below. 
The following is Dr. Echolo's  text, slightly modified 
(with his permission) on points of  detail where additional 
knowledge o f  the process or  a rea or  context enable clarifica­
tion without risk of  distoortion. 
-
The lithograph illustration wi ll be discussed a fter the 
text. 
3 9 3  
3 9 4  
English Translation of Schwaner (John Echol s, 1968) 
In the whole of Southeast Borneo only the inhabi­
tants of the Doeson Oeloe district understand the art 
of smelting iron from ore and refining it to such an 
extent that can be used for forging and manufacturing
[ swords]. 
A s  a result, iron is  shipped commercially from here 
to all neighboring areaos and it is  given preference over 
European iron because experience has taught ( so they
say) that the weapons prepared from Borneo iron are 
keener and more durable than thoose made of foreign 
metalo. 
The ore from which the iron is  extracted has its 
origin in the formation of lignite (brown coal) to be 
found in the hills hereo. The seams which contain the 
iron ore (clayey sphaeroosiderite) have been cut by the 
Barito and are expoosed in the deep river bed when the 
water level is  lowo. The natives take advantage of this 
opportunity to acquire a supply of ore, which is  more 
or les s  changed by the watero' s  action and in its com­
position closely approaches the clayey lignite. 
The apparatuos commonly used for theo·oforging of 
iron, l aboran, con sists of a cylindrical melting fur­
nace 3 '4" (Rijnland) high and 10o' in circumference. 
From the midpoint of its upper boundary surface the 
furnace pit, in the form of a parallelopiped space (long
side 8", short side 6") goeos into the shaft* of the 
furnace down to a length of 25o'4". At a distance of l" 
from the uppero-most opening it changes shape, taken on 
a pyramidal form and becomes increaosingly wider towards 
the topo, whereupon the meaosurements becomeo: long side 
9"6" ', short side 7"4"' .  The well of the furnace extends 
into the quadrangular melting place which occupies most 
of the bottom part of the furnace and has a width of 
19", a length of 2 5", and a height of 9". Maintaining
these dimensions, its mouth comes against the blower , 
the opening of which is  closed during the smelting by
various apparatus*. 
The furnace is  conostructed of yellow clay taken 
from the river banko. When mixed with water it acquires 
a certain pla sticity, and is  carefully worked with the 
hands and feet in order to remove any foreign particles 
and stones from it. The ma ss  which has been thus pre­
pared i s  then stamped into a cylindrical mold made of 
tree bark with the same dimenosions as  the furnace and 
3 9 5  
i n  which at the same t ime are fitted wooden molds of 
the furnace well and of the smelt i ng space*n, and the 
whole then is  left to dry out for a month or more. When 
the mass has attained the desi red degree of dryness , 
then the molds of the furnace well and of the smelting 
space are removed, the outnermost mold is removed and 
the furnace wrapped i n  rattan hoops in order to provide
additional firmness and to prevent cracking or splitting. 
Finally, an i nitially small but gradually i ncreasing 
fire completes the drying-out process of the mass. 
Smelting occurs only during the course of a singl e 
day and for that reason one must prepare the furnace 
for work anew each morning. To do so one covers the 
floor of the melting space with a 2" thick layer of 
charcoal dust, in the middle of which is an oblong square 
(incisi on--kakat) which serves to collect the i ron. Next 
one closes the outnermost opening of the melting space. 
Along the latter ' s  underside a 2" thick frame of clay, 
alir, is  placed in the over, the center of which is hol­
lowed out i n  the shape of a half circle , i n  order to 
let the slag run off, while on the upper rim of the aliar 
three cupolas of baked clay, langi t,  are attached* . 
These pipes of the draught-blower , with a length of 11", 
taper from 2"5" to the size of a thumb* and extend with 
the narrower end to the center of the melting space. 
Finally, the uppermost mouth of the melt i ng space ,  which 
is still open, is  completely sealed with clay and clay
sheets* so that only the openings for the draught and 
for the slag remain. 
The simple bellows (blower) consists of a 5 ' 5" high
wooden cylinder, open at the top but closed at the bot­
tom, 3 '  in circumference. This is made from the trunk 
of the Mahoei tree and is called aboedan.  Directly 
above the floor at the same height are three openings
side by side , into whi ch are to be inserted three 29" 
long bamboo pipes , through which the air is brought into 
the cupolas ( langiat )  and then by these i nto the furnace*. 
The air pressure is provided by a disk to the perimeter 
of which are attached chicken feathers , with a view to 
maki ng i t  air-tight , and this is  moved up and down by a 
piston with a 4 '  stroke. These bellows are operated 
manually and the work is rendered easier by virtue of 
the fact that the upper end of each piston is  connected 
with a long bamboo st i ck or pole which because of its  
elast i c i t y  or resilience draws it back again after it 
has been thrust down. 
The furnace is  stoked from above via the furnace 
well, through which burning charcoal is tossed onto the 
3 9 6  
kakat. The blower is then gently applied in order to 
get the scattered layer of charcoal to catch fire. 
In the meanwhile the ore, before smelting, must be 
roasted. To accomplish this, the ore is placed in lay­
ers between masses of wood, the whole is set on fire 
and this continues for one day. Next it is beaten with 
hammers to the size of nuts, mixed with charcoal and 
then thrown into the smelting appaoratus. The relation­
ship between the mixture of charcoal and ore is 10 to 1 
and the mixture occurs as a semi-ellipsoidal basket, 
tangkokh, the size of which is sufficient for three 
parts o re, each part as large as one man can carry with 
both hands, and 30 pa rts of coal (i.e., charcoal)o. 
When one proceeds to the act of smelting, after 
the furnace is filled with chaorcoal to 2/3 of its 
height, then 2 tanagkokhs of ore mixed with coals a re 
tossed into the furnace well. The first tanagkokh fills 
the latter to the upper opening, while the second forms 
a small heap over the first. When the furnace has 
reached the p roper temperature, more chaorcoal and ore 
are added. Meanwhile, in order to maintain a constant 
draught, one must provide 40 piston strokes a minute. 
The slag is removed at 20-minute intervals through the 
taphole for that purpose. In order to perform this 
task, the bamboo air pipes must be removed while the 
bellows stands idle for five minutes, i.e., just as 
long as necessary fo r draining off the slag. To be 
suore, this stoppage has a harmful effect upon the smelt­
ing process and a considerable po rtion of the iron 
thereby goes over into the slag, which flows in oblong 
drops. These, after they have become cold, exhibit a 
dark-gray metallic suorface and appear when broken to be 
finely porous and provided with a metallic luster. 
Usually two and a half hours is sufficient fo r the 
pile of chaorcoal and o re heaped up above the furnace 
well to sink down; after this, another tangkokh of the 
mixtuore is added. In the course of one day seven such 
tanagkokhs can be treated in the furnace. At the end, 
one lets the contents subside down to the melting space
(area) and increases the speed of the bellows. When, 
at last, all the coals have been consumed and the slag 
once more tapped, then the bellows is removed and the 
cavity of the smelting a rea, which had been sealed in 
the morning, is opened. The iron which has flowed to­
gether in the middle of the floor is in the form of a 
sticky (tough) redo-hot spheroid mass. 
3 9 7  
With the aid o f  wooden tongs it is remove d from the 
furnace , taken to a spot especially strewn with fine 
slag and worked with wooden mallets until it takes on 
an almost parallelepiped shape. Such a mass is called 
rangkang; it weighs 45 pounds , is the product of  four 
men for one day and fetches f. 2 in the market. 
The rangkang still contains much slag and is divid­
e d  into ten pieces,  called bila, which are repeatedly 
made red- hot and beaten with h.ammers until they lose 
onen- third o f  their original weight , and are sufficiently 
refined,  ready for forging and manufacturing (tools)n. 
The history o f  iron manufacture goes far back into 
the obscure times o f  the oldest inhabitants of  Borneo , 
without, however,  supplying any specific data. In  any 
case we are not in error when we concede to this art 
great antiquity. The name of  him who first taught this 
to the natives is gone and their first acquaintance 
with iron o re is wreathed in legendary traditions. 
* * * 
The outstanding characteristic o f  this Barito process 
is the use of  the enclosed "furnace" or kiln for smelting , 
although it is difficult to visualize this exactly from 
Schwaner ' s  description. His illustration shows a box-like 
structuren. standing about 3 '  above ground,  but with square
sides and a protuberance at the top which presumably comes 
from the laboran enclose d within. But the picture does not 
help clarify what goes on inside the clay walls strengthened 
by rattan binding (see further below)n. 
Nothing quite so elaborate has been described elsewhere 
in the area ,  and by contrast most histonrical accounts do not 
mention anything above the ground surface. But e vidently 
the use of some kind o f  "oven" for me lting was found more 
widely in Southeast Kalimantan. The German scholar Dr. T. 
Posewitz mentions that in the 1840n' s  the Saspa River area 
produced 50 , 0 0 0  p arang swords trade d out each year in this 
way ("Borneo , "  1886: 3 36) .  
We have already seen in some detail (VI.36) that the 
West Borneo processes for smelting since 180 0 have been , on 
the whole, structurally simple as describend--and as indicated, 
also , for the prehistoric de lta sites. The common form is 
that described by Schwaner ' s  contemporary on the west side 
of the isles,  the Scotsman Robert Burns,  who then wrote from 
inside northern Sarawak : 
Commonly at e very Kayan village there is a place for 
smelting iron , in all the process of which the community 
3 9 8  
naturally partake. Covered by a shed, the rude furnace 
consists of a circular pit formed in the ground, three 
feet deep, and about four feet in diameter. 
(Journ. Indona. Archipaelago, 3 ,  1849: 
151; cf. S.M. J. , 3 ,  1 951: 451-486) 
The very wide differences between the simple open hearths 
of some reliable accounts and the Barito complexity of 
Schwaner's are not surprising to the student of Bornean cul ­
ture diversity in general. In this case , additionally , a 
crucial factor must be the highly variable geology (and re­
lated botany) of the locality inhabited by the smelting 
group. And unfortunatelyn, most accounts give no exact infor­
mation on this subject : that is, on exactly what ores were 
being fired , using what fuels. Schwaner happily gives us 
exact information on the former point and it is confirmed 
geologically by Posewitz and others. The ore used in this 
part of the Barito is ( was) a spahaerosiderite. This, as we 
have already seen ( in IV. 2 0 ) n, differs from all other (known) 
Bornean ores in being a carbonate- - not  an oxiden- -of iron. 
These "spathic ores" ( F eCOn3 ) usually have a low iron content 
(48%; with practical extractable content 30-44% ) compared 
with the oxides common over West Borneo , such as limonite 
(60 % )  and haematite (70 % ) .  H .  C. Richardson had made a spe­
cial study of this aspect ( " Iron, Prehistoric and Ancient, "  
in Am. Jour. of Archaeology, XLIV, 193 9, 4) and concluded 
that spathic ores might have been the original ones discovered 
by early smelters, and that under "primitive" conditions they 
give better quality iron than most oxides. These carbonates 
have certain other advantages and difficulties which need 
not detain us at this late stage in our enquiry. But it  is 
important here that unlike normal oxides the carbonate must 
be pre- treated and roasted before smelting can begin (as de­
scribed by Schwaner above; compare Hose for the Baram Kayans 
in VI. 36 ;  cf. also R. J. Forbes , 1950: 3 81, and H. H. 
Coghlan, 1956: 15 , 49)n. 
In brief, the Barito carbonate ores had to be processed
differently from the oxides which we must presume were at 
least a major source for the prehistoric Sarawak operations. 
Over and above ore factors making technical differences,  
the patient reader will by now have become almost painfully 
aware of the variety and compalexity of differences in indig­
enous techniques in any case, even within this one island , 
let alone the whole arean, with so many separate language and 
culture communities evolved over centuries. 
Another unusual factor in the Barito system is the con­
trolling of two large tree-trunks as bellows ( each with three 
3 9 9  
bamboo air pipes) some distance apart, by pulling on pairs
of long pliable bamboos. This evidently supplied a stronger
blast than was normally employed elsewhere. But (to quote 
Burns in 1849 again) some of the Sarawak Kayans at that time 
were using up to twelve tree-trunk bellows each with pull­
rods of the long, flexible Schwaner sorto: 
The ventilators used consist of wooden tubes, ten to 
twelve in number, about six feet long and placed verti­
cally round the furnace. The bore of each is about 
seven inches in diameter, the pistons to correspond are 
framed of cloth or soft bark. ·oAttached to the piston
rods are others of considerable length, to which weights 
are made fast and balanced on the cross beams of the 
shed. By this contrivance the pistons are moved up and 
down, and a constant blast produced. 
The word cupola presents problems in -translation, too. 
Dr. Echols agrees this could mean "tuyere," or alternatively,
"snout (of a blast furnace). "  Webster defines cupola as, 
among other things, a vertical cylindrical furnace for melt­
ing iron in the foundry, having tuyeres and tapping spouts 
near the bottom ( 1965 : 202). These are, in the Barito, evi­
dently some form of apparatus to carry air from the 29" long
bamboo pipes (inserted into the bellows cylinder) down clay
pipes, langit ( =  tuyere) , each of which is 1 1" long tapering
down from over 2" to less than 1" in diameter (presumably
external diameter but not clear ; compare the much smoother 
taper in delta clay cylinders, III. 15. f) .  
Seven smaller points deserve extraction and emphasis
from the prehistoric point of viewo: 
1. Lignite, brown coal, is not known in this ore asso­
ciation elsewhere in Southeast Asia. It is tempting 
to see a link of some sort, however remote, between 
this one -time possible fuel source correlated with 
the enclosed type of furnace (kiln) here used and 
reminiscent of apparatus required by Chinese and 
other coal-fuel operations. But the Schwaner text 
clearly specifies charcoal as the fuel in use before 
1850. 
2. The 10:o1 ratio of charcoal or oreo; perhaps higher
inland than for the coastal mangrove woods? (cfo. 
III.o18). 
3. The method of tapping the slag and its appearance
"in oblong drops" (cf. our delta category of "drop­
lets" in II.9.b)o. 
4 0 0  
4. The spheroid mass of "bloom" removed by wooden tongs,
probably bamboo, which is also used in the airpipes
and the puller-arms over the bellows (cf. III .17).  
5. Hammers made of wood used on the bloom; the hammers 
used earlier to prepare the ore are not identified. 
but must be of stone (cf. delta hammers at V.28)o. 
6. Four man-days produces 4 5  lbs. of mixed iron and 
slag (the rangkang) eventually reduced to ca. 30 
lbs. of workable iron. 
7. Schwaner ' s  emphasis on the great ant iquity of iron­
working "into the obsocure times of the oldest in­
habitants of Borneo,o" a v iew we can readily accept 
on prehistorical grounds, too. 
Finally, Schwaner ' s  lithograph plate helps us to see 
what the Barito set-up looked like, but hardly illuminates 
the obscurities of his text on points of detaoil. This illus­
tration was subseoquently reproduced in color for a volume 
discussing Dutch and other European te chniques ("De Ijzers­
lakken in Nederland . . . T ijd. door Prof. S. Bleekrode," 
Amsterdam, "1857; cf. Percy: 273). A later black and white 
version is in Ling Roth (1896, II: 23 5, "after Dr. Schwaner") 
but has suffered significant minor distortions in the process 
and one major one--the exoclusion of one male figure from the 
hut area, as well as a couple with a baby in the foreground! 
At that time, 18 53, such illustrations were prepared by 
a professional artist in Europe, often w ith insuff i cient 
reference to the author's original sketches or notes. The 
frontispiece to S chwaner ' s  book prov ides a pleasant example 
of the resulto: a scene of pastoral bliss where elegant
deer are being chased and noosed by powerful men on horse­
back, against a background of mellow parkland. The smelting
picture cannot, then, be taken at anything more than its 
"face value." Even so, it gives a fine idea of a dynamic 
native iron industry in a remote area at the time when, on 
the other side of the island, the first White Rajah was begin­
ning to shape a new State stimulated by his special interest 
in antimony from the Bau limestone in the headwaters of the 
river up which he sailed past our iron sites and from which 
Sarawak was named. 
APPENDIX C 
SUGGESTED METAL TRADE LINKS BETWEEN THE 
SARAWAK RIVER DELTA AND MERBOK 
ESTUARY, KEDAH 
It is necessary to acknowledge here a most interesting 
article by F. E. Treloar which appeared too late for inclu­
sion in the main body of the text ("Chemical analysis of some 
metal objects from Chandi Bukit Batu Pahat, Kedah: Suggested
ori  gi n and date,  '  J • M. B • R • A • S • , 4 1 , 19 6 8 , 1 : 19 3 - 19 8 ; cf.  
our Chapter V.29.c)o. On the basis of an examination of the 
metal objects and minerals contained in reliquary boxes ex­
cavated at Chandi Bukit Batu Pahat in the area of the Merbok 
estuary in Kedah, Mr. Treloar postulates a system of commer­
cial exchanges in ancient times b etween the sites in the 
Sarawak River Delta and Kedah--a distance of over 1,000 miles. 
Specifically, he believes that the Bau mining district lo­
cated at the headwaters of the Sarawak River is the likely 
source of the copper, silver, mercury, arsoenic, corundum, 
diamonds, coal and tourmaline contained in the r eliquary 
boxes excavated in Kedah, preliminarily dated to the ninth 
century A.D. (ibid.n, 1968). While all of these minoerals are 
found in the Bau area, none of them occur in Malaya, accord­
ing to Mr. Treloar. 
This evidence pointing to a general system of exchanges
linking Kedah and the Sarawak River sites is congruent with 
the metal picture as we have drawn it from the evidoence in 
the ground at Jaong, Buah and Bongkisam (V.30). The evidence 
both material and literary would tend to support the view 
that the delta sites wer e  not on the great through trade to 
China direct , but rather were linked to China by a tertiary 
system of trade with Sarawak goods being shipped initially 
to an entrep6t, perhaps situated somewhere on one side or 
the other of the Straits of Malacca. 
We  thus find convincing Mr. Treloaro's  suggestion of com­
mercial exchanges between Bau and the Merbok estuary. At the 
same time, it should be observed that his supporting argu­
ments, based on conjecture about what he assumed to be a 
"limited" demand for Chinoese goods in Sarawak, are confounded 
by the evidoence in the ground; i.oe., the enormous volume of 
Chinese wares in the delta sites (and the hinterland), along
with the extensive iron industry persisting for centuries, 
shows the existence of sufficient population to maintain a 
high level of demand for Chinoese and other products (cf. our 
V.3 1 . e  above). 
4 0 1  
4 0 2  
Moreover, i t  should be noted that some of the metals and 
minerals cited by Mr. Treloar as evindence of a Kedah-Snarawak 
trade axis, are also as easi ly avainlable up the coast, i n  
Burma. S ilver, tourmali ne and corundum are found i n  Burma; 
copper and coal are found as far south as Mergui where they 
could easily be shipped to Merbok (H. L .  Chhibber, Thae Mineral 
Resources of Burma, London, 193 4 :  12 5, 140, 189, 2 3 2, 2 2 9- 3 1) .  
The mix of trading goods and the web of exchanges in an 
entropot is likely to be rich and complex, lacki ng i n  the 
clarity and tidiness that is implied by isolating several 
geologincal variables to p inpoint exchanges. 
In Treloar ' s  view, mercury is  perhaps the most compel­
ling evidence of a link between Bau and Kedah, because it  
does not seem to occur anywhere else in the whole area. 
While it  is  found i n  China, and it  is  also probable that the 
Merbok estuary was an important entrepot i n  i nternational 
trade linking Chi na with western Asia, Treloar argues that 
mercury may well have been such an important ingredient i n  
Chinese medicine that there might have been no surplus to 
expnort ( ibid.a, 196-197)n. Thus the occurrence of mercury i n  
the Kedah reliquaries would appear to p i npoint Bau as the 
most probable source of supply , with the transmission being 
handled through the coastal trading statinons clustered about 
the present village of Santubong. This  adds an i nteresting 
new dimension to the delta metals traffinc--and Mr. Treloar 
was writing without any knowledge of the conclusions reached 
by the present writers regarding iron. 
Finally it  should be observed that the minerals i n  the 
deposit  boxes from Chandi Bukit Batu Pahat may not be congru­
ent i n  time to the evi dence supplied by the entrepo t  at Peng­
kalan Bujang, Kedah. The Chandi and i ts deposits have been 
tentatively dated by A. Lamb as ca. ei ghth-ninth century 
(F.M.J.a, VI, 1961: 8, and Chandi Bukit Batu Pah at , S ingapore, 
1 960, 10 6); but with the possibility that i t  dates a century 
or so later. I t  was not until the end of the eleventh cen­
tury that entrepot trade began to develop at Pengkalan Bujang 
( Lamb, F. M. J.a, VI: 82 ) .  Prior to this time the Kedah inhabi­
tants apparently lived pri ncipally by agricnulture and fishing 
rather than by developi ng entrepot functions. Thus until the 
date of the Chandi site is  fixed with greater precision, it 
may be p remature to link materials deposited i n  its founda­
tions to developments at Pengkalan Bujang. However, all the 
Kedah activities i nvolved i n  Mr. Treloar ' s  suggesti ons are 
within the time span of the Jaong-Buah-Bongkisam metal opera­
tions, if  on the early (Jaong) side. That is  i ndeed the peri­
od when the quest for non- ferrous metals is  likely to have 
been at a peak, prior perhaps to the upsurge of iron-working, 
which made appreciable extra demands on local effort, trans­
port and manpower (and mangrove)? 
APPENDIX D 
CONTENTS OF FULL REPORT (cf. Preface) 
TI-IE SARAWAK RIVER DELTA PREHISTORIC SITES 
A. Background (only dealt with summarily in this Data Paper) 
The Sarawak River in Southwest Borneo 
Early Reports of Early Remains 
Systematic Excavationa, 1950-
Main Sites Studied in the Southwest 
Broader Implications for Southeast Asia 
Date Lines: "T'ang" to pre-- Ming · 
Date Changes with Sitesa, Air Survey and Ground 
Notes on Method and Detail 
B. Gold 
Gold Sources for West Borneo--in the Delta 
Excavated Golda, the Common Run 
Gold Foil 
Special Pieces 
Archaeological Problems 
Associationsa: Golden Implications 
"The Golden Khersonese" 
C. Other Metals 
* Iron (this Data Paper) 
Bangles 
Coppera, Copper Coinsa, etc. 
Lead and Others (briefly in V. 29 of this Data Paper) 
Mineral Implications 
D. Stone 
Natural and Worked Stone in the Delta 
The Jaong Assemblage and Petroglyphs 
The Bongkisam Assemblage and Others 
Stone Beads 
Shaped Figures and Forms , Ritual Usage 
"Waisted Stones , "  a Detailed Typology 
Hammerstones and Other Tools 
. 4 0 3  
4 0 4  
Semin-precious Stones 
Clay and Earth Materials, and Soil Samples 
Implications : Stone Age Survivals . . . P rotohistoric 
Islam Overlays in Stone, etc. 
E. Glass 
Delta Glass: Beads, Bangles, Vessels 
Frequency and Local Use Indications 
Glass Bead Clusters, a Statistical Study 
Bead Types and Analyses 
Colors, Sizes and Distribution ( Beads and Bangles) 
Glass Bangles Here and Elsewhere 
Vessel Glass: A Borneo Rarity
Delta Glass in the Borneo Context 
Borneo Glass in the Asian Context: Some New Problems 
Questions of Color and Vogue
Analyses and Origins 
F. Stoneware 
The Scale and Scope of the Delta Stonewares 
Classification of Types, Styles 
Basic Quantitative Information 
Patterns of Sherd Distribution and Original Vessels 
The Meaning of Breakage and Scatter 
The Puzzle of the Whole Vessels: (a) Excavated 
(b) Found 
Special P ieces: Blue and White 
Special Marked Pieces 
What Was It All For? And for Whom? 
The Chinese Ceramic Trade from the Pacific to Africa, 
and Borneon' s  Place Therein 
G. Earthenware 
Earthenwares in  Relation to Stonewares 
The Common Features of These Earthenwares 
Continuity and Evolution : Non Change? 
Utility and Occupation (Marasa) ?  
"Phallic Tops" and Ritual Indications 
Earthenware as Trade Goods 
4 0 5  
H .  Animal and Vegetable  
Animal : (a )  Tortoise  she l l  
(b)  Coral 
( c )  She l l  
Vegetable  : Nut s ,  Rattan ,  Ironwood (Mangrove and Bamboo 
in I I I . 1 7 - 1 8 )  
I .  Conclus ion 
Appendices 
I .  Negative Areas : Why? 
I I .  The Offshore I s lets ; and a Malay "Excavat ion" at 
Pulua Kra 
I I I .  Manpower and Charcoal 
I V .  A Bead Typology for the De lta and Wes t  Borneo · 
Generally 
V .  The Football Field  at Segu in the Headwaters 
VI  . Caves at Batu Kawa , Sarawak River 
APPENDIX E 
M.I.T. SEMINAR ON THIS DATA PAPER 
(AND OTHER AFTERTHOUGHTS) 
On completion of this paper, T.H. left Cornell for a 
tour in Europe and Southeast Asia. On the way, via Boston, 
he presented the substance of our findings to the long-estab­
lished "Materials and Archaeology" Seminar at the Massachu-
setts Institute of Technology (Department of Humanities) on 
14 November 1968, by invitation of Professor Cyril Stanley
Smith, the foremost historian of metallurgy ino.the U.S.A.* 
This presentation was supported by slides made from illustra­
tions in this Data Paper, plus color photographs of the area, 
excavations and artifacts in general. 
Among those participating actively at M.I.T. were Miss 
Heather Lechtman and Professor Arthur Steinberg of that in­
stitution, and Professor Donald Avery, Division of Engineering, 
Brown University, as well of course, as Professor Smith, who 
took the chair. The following is T.H. 's  personal summary of 
the main critoicism and comment which resultedo: 
1. Scale of operations 
The amount of slag and general evidence of industry and 
trade in the Sarawak River delta sites was considered to be 
impressive, especially in prehistoric terms. Such a scale 
of operation seems rarely to be recorded prior to modern 
times. The formula broadly favored at M.Io. T. for "primitive"
methods allows 1 ton of finished metal for 4 tons of slag, 
very roughly. So, on the basis of the calculations in I I. 8  
of the Data Paper, thousands of tons of iron were produced
in the Sarawak River delta, in prehistoric times. This 
amounts to a big industry by comparison with many known early
irono-working sites, which widely tend to be small-scale at 
any one place, though often quite extensive by virtue of many
small operations scattered over a large area. The Santubong
work can, however, be properly classified as large-scale by
any standards prior to present. 
* 
See quotations on title pages of Parts IV and V II in our 
text herewitho. His best known work is "The History of 
r,Ieta ll ography," Chicago, 19 60, a c 1 assi c. 
4 0 6  
4 0 7  
2. Steel, "Wootz,o" Wrought I ron, etc. (see text II. 19 and 
VI .33- 37) 
The ideas put forward on possibly advanced o r  unrecog­
nized m ethods of iron-working in the Sa rawak River delta b e­
fo re 1400 A.D. caused considerable M.I.T. discussion--and 
some considered doubts. There waso- reluctance to conc ede the 
likelihood of innovation o r  special development on the spot 
or  in that area, though those present readily agreed they had 
little previous insight into or  experience with Southeast 
Asia. After vigorous discussion--sometimes well above T.H.'s 
head technologically--this doubtful attitude was affirmed, if 
generously softened after the first shock received f rom the 
suggestion that anything much could come out of an "unknown" 
like Borneoo. In particular, the idea of a "wootz "  process 
seemed (to these experts in m etallurgy) improbable if not 
almost impossible. The concept of production--on a large
scale as above- -fo r export was on the whole acceptable, and 
the inclination was to consider that this may have been 
directed towa rds producing wrought iron, perhaps to supple­
ment the agreed cast iron techniques of those to the mainland 
no rth. 
3. "Crucibl e "  cf. Tuyere (see text at III. 13- 1 5  and 19) 
In part it follows from the above that the presence  of 
many clay tubes in the delta excavation materials was only
accepted by one "senior"  person present as at all likely to 
represent a genuine, known operation with crucibles (as
perhaps in the wootz m ethods of India; though also used in 
the cast iron procedures in parts of China) . The consensus 
was not in favor of these cylinders representing crucibles 
in the ordinary sense; ando·this was emphatically the view of 
Professo r Smith himself. Puz zling or  i rregula r features were 
admitted and even elaboorated by some of those present: par­
ticularly thickness of walls and lack of empahatic tapaer were 
seen as curious (though not necessarily implausible) fo r 
tuyeore functions. But the tendency to blackening and burning 
at one end, and the lack of metallic accretions in the no r­
mally (at Santubong) smooth inside surface both point towards 
tuyeore usage. 
A ratio of 1 clay (tuyere) to 20 of metal (slag) by
weight was thought to be acc eptable, though the re seems to 
be little good evidence on this--none fo r Southeast Asia and 
other outlying a reas? Crucibles should, o rdinarily, show a 
highe r  ratio? An alternative use in smelting (not m elting) 
was mentioned as possible, howevero. 
4 0 8  
We na.turally tend to accede to these views based on 
such a high expertise and wide experience. At the same time, 
there are novel factors which lie outside present western ex­
perience (and are also difficult to explain under single 
seminar conditions). Thus we do not feel able at this stage 
to concede that the complex problem discussed so fully in 
our text can be finally resolved at this stage, or probably 
at all until a new and less disturbed site has been found- ­
possibly in the Sambas area of  Kalimantan, Indonesian Borneo ? 
We invite scholars, at M.I.T. and elsewhere, to study the 
full data as now published and consider all possibilities 
within the context of  the overall evidence (such as it is), 
as well as any probabilities to be derived from information 
which still isn't available� This research continues, in 
care of the Southeast Asia Prongram, Cornell University, 
where enquiries, criticisms and other comment will be warmly 
welcomed and promptly acknowledged. 
Dr. Smith has kindly agreed to test some of the "cruci­
ble" for vitrification and other factors. M.I . T. collections 
apparently have no very good parallel for the Santubong 
tubes, though P rof. Smith produced something quite close 
used as a tuyere for lea d - smelting in the Middle East. 
4. Hearth, Furnace, etc. (see text II.10, I I I .n19, etc.) 
It was felt that our study may have under-emphasized 
the importance o f  some kind of  effective "furnace,n" however 
simple. This criticism has substance. But we have felt com­
pelled, in a Data Paper like this, to keep as close as possi­
ble to the evidence, which on this remains unclear, and only 
to go as far in hypothesis as seems essential for explana­
tion. A large factor here may be the "unconventional,n" 
mixed character of  the delta smelting operations, which we 
have sought to bring out by ethnological and historical 
analogy from Borneo and more widely (VI.n36, cf. 33-35 and 
37). The use of  broken clay and of  slag itself to make tem­
porary walls, reinforced by mud, perhaps stoneware sherds, 
etc.n, was discussed and felt to be quite likely though diffi­
cult to demonstrate under these circumstances--where "walls" 
would be improvised for each occasion. The presence of  any 
sort of permanent furnace, with fully shaped durable walls 
and top, is not at present demonstrable for any prehistorical
delta sites--andnfor only one of  many in historical Borneon. 
5. Slag (see text II. 9- 10 particularly) 
It was agreed that the delta slag patterns point, 
naturally enough, to outflow monlten onto the earth. Discus-
4 0 9  
sion on forms was inconclusoive. Our exercoise in separating 
slags by s imple, visually clas�if iab le groups, was seen as 
new. Perhaps these scholarly and helpful people were too 
polite to say that they also thought it absurd ? Th is was a 
fa intly d isappo int ing but not unexpected reaction. Whatever 
the technolog ical s ign if icance (or insoignifoicance) of mere 
shape, we believe that in terms of fieoldwork by archaeoologists 
and others not conversant w ith meta l lurg ical deta il, some way
of "looking at" the slag and thus seeing it as someth ing more 
than a horrible messy mass can only be helpful, however arbi­
trary and however much subject to desoirable further refoine­
ment. Otherwoise, the f ieldworker is l iable to turn h is back 
on the whole lot as intolerable- �as in fact has happened in 
several otherwoise f inely conducted f ield studoies in Southeast 
As ia and (even more conspoicuously) in Afroica, despoite some 
mass ive f inds of this sort there. Here we venture to quote 
a further helpful letter, recently receoived from Dr. Brian 
Fagan, to whom we have already referred ear l ier (Chapter 
Notes 1 and 5 to VI.35, etc.): 
Many thanks for your letter of November 1, wh ich arroived 
wh ile I was away from town. 
There is very l ittle archaeolog ical data on the techo­
nology of iron in Afroica. There is Cloine's famous mono­
graph wroitten for the University of W iscons in Press in 
1937, wh ich contaoins a l ittle archaeo logoical datao. But 
it is he lplessly out of date. In more recent t imes, 
there is my paper in J. R. A. I . on "Sol i ironwork ing in 
Northern Rhodes ia" ( 196 1, Part two ),  wh ich is most ly 
just a descroiption of the methods and types of toolso. 
There are also one or two accounts of smelting in the 
traditional fashion which are not very informat ive . . .o .  
A l l  in all, it is a sadly neglected suboject, and there 
are few s igns of new research be ing carr ied out. There 
are para llels in tuyere making and general levels of 
technology between our respectoive areas, but these are 
perhaps co inc idence. There is certainly no question of 
a s ingle leve l of technology through the whole Iron Age.
In the earlier per iods, the level of iron-work ing was 
s imp le, w ith only hammer ing, and probably no tempering 
or weldoing. But from about 1500 A.Do. there seems to 
have been some change.
(Fagan to TH, in Zitt , 27 Nov. 1968) 
We have earlier emphas ized the potential importance of iron 
slag in the Ph il ipp ines (IV.2 3; V I.33.c).  At Man ila in 
February 1969, T.H. was happy to meet a German archaeolog ist, 
Dr. Kar l Hutterer, currently teach ing at the Un iversity ofo· 
San Carlos in the southern Phil ipp ines. He has taken close 
4 1 0  
interest i n  slags at excavations he has been conducting on 
the island of Cebu, and had some analyses done, shortly to 
be publinshed--and to be briefly summari zed i n  a final Appendi x  
to this  paper, i f  they arrive i n  time to make the press! 
6. Flux (see text IV.nZ S )  
The M. I. T. people were not sure that flux had been suf­
ficiently consindered i n  the Sarawak context. In "playing this 
down,n" we have rather followed recent archaeological thinking. 
That would be i nconsistent with a general attempt to reexami ne 
the Borneo i ron i ndustry afresh and "winthout prejudice." It 
is also, however, i n  part a penalty of our own lack of ad­
vanced technical experience, even though we have been gui ded 
by the published works on prehistoric metallurgy. 
Anyway, Professor Avery has kindly taken some slag 
specimens for analysis  at Brown Uninversity, with special 
reference to this  poi nt. If received i n  time, these analyses 
will also be included. 
* * * * *  
7. Other New Observations 
Dr. Hutterer ' s  new work i n  the Philippines has j ust 
been cited (6 above)n. Otherwise, neglect of this  subject 
continues i n  Southeast Asia. But Dr. Alex Spoehr is now 
i nitiating new field studies i n  the Sulu Archipelago which 
could raise the issues afresh for a crucial sector, between 
the mai n  Philippine archipelago and northern Borneo. 
In January-February 1969 Dr. Robert Fox, of the Natinonal 
Museum, Manila, partly at our suggestion made a documentary 
film of metal worki ngs on M indanao (cf. VI. 33. d) , which 
should be i nvaluable i n  enlargi ng our understandi ng of the 
i n  some respects distinctly "advanced" methods there, with 
their seemi ng relevance to techniques lost elsewhere. 
T.H. was also able to confirm and elaborate the curiously 
persinstent absenae of majnor prehistoric iron- worki ng i n  the 
State of Brunei, far up the long, unfrinendly west coast of 
Borneo, from Santubong. This  is the more remarkable i n  view 
of conspicuously advanced techniques i n  other metals and in 
gun-smithing--the subjnect of two long and fully illustrated 
papers by P. M .  Shariffudin (Curator, Brunei Museum) and 
T.H. i n  the first issue of the Brunei Museum Journal (I, 
411  
1969 , due shortly). We recall, from Marryat 's  fine account 
of Brunei in 1843o: 
Iron is so valuable here that it is used as money. One 
hundred flat pieces an inch square are valued at a 
dollar. 
(Borneo and the Indian Archipetago, 
London, 1848: 1 1 3) 
APPoENDIX F 
N EW PHILIPPINE S LAG DATA 
(FROM CEBU) 
The following letter was received from Dro. Karl Hutterer 
of the University of San Carlos (see Appendix E) just in time 
for publication hereo. We quote by way of explanation his 
letter (dated 23 February 1969 from Cebu City), then two sets 
of analyses (A and B) by Philippine expertso, relevant to his 
letter; and a final note of comment (C)o. 
Dear Harrisson, 
1. This has reference to our conversation in Manila 
concerning prehistoric iron in Southeast Asia. Please find 
attached the promised information about iron slag we recovered 
during an excavation in Cebu Cityo. These data are part of a 
little monograph which I just gave to the printero. Please 
feel free to use the information in any way you see fito. 
2 .  The excavation was undertaken during the period
February through June 1967. It was under the direction of 
Mrso. Rosa C. P. Tenazas and concerned two sites in the downo­
town area of Cebu City: Lapu-lapu Stro. (site LA) and Magalo­
lanes Stro. (site MA)o. The area covered was rather limited, 
namely 38 .75 square meters in site LA and 2 1  square meters 
in site MAo. In both sites we had three horizonso: an Iron 
Age horizon, a Yuan/Ming horizon, and a late Early Ming 
horizon. All dating has been done through trade wares. The 
lower layers of the second horizon were characterized by
Chinese monochromes of probable Yuan attribution and early
Siamese wares, while Early Ming blueo-and-white p ieces were 
encountered in the higher layers of the same horizono. During
this period (early 14th century to first half of the 15th 
century), the sites were used for habitation as well as bur­
ial (io. e . ,  burial under the house)o. It was this second 
horizon which yielded the iron slago. 
3. Site LA yielded 1 1.2 kgo. of iron slag, and site MA 
26.9 kg. The pieces vary considerably in size and appear­
anceo. There are little bits weighing less than 10 grams as 
well as big lumps weighing one kilo and more, although the 
bulk is made up by pieces the size of a childo' s  fisto. Most 
of the slag is light brown to dark reddish brown in color, 
some pieces have spots or even larger pockets of whitish or 
4 1 2  
4 1 3  
yellowish material. The surfaoce is generally rough and 
pitted. The density varies greatly from pi ece to piece. 
4. There were also a good number of earthenware sherds 
with iron waste adhering to them. Two hundred and sixty-five
such sherds were found in site LA and another 173 in site MA. 
Strangely enough, the slag is always atta ched to the convex 
or outer surface of the sherds. We  are quite puzzled by 
this. For a while we  thought of crucibles, but two reasons 
stand against this explanation: first, the majority of the 
sherds is too thin for cruciobles; and second, if these sherds 
were fragments of crucibles, one would expect the iron waste 
to adhere to the concave or inner surfa ce rather than to the 
convex side as is the case here without exception. 
5. We  sub jected some of the slag to chemical and sp ec­
trographic analyses. The results are attaoched. In some 
cases, the iron content appears to be  high. I guess this 
should so_ mehow relate to the techniques employed in the 
foundries and their efficiency. As a rule, the material ado­
hering to the sherds contains less iron and more silica. 
This is even expressed in the appearance : slag sticking to 
sherds has generally more whitish or yellowish pockets and 
also looks usually quite glassy. 
6. The impurity figures are still waiting for some com­
parative material. We  hope that they might eventually be  
helpful in determining the source of the raw material for the 
Cebu foundrioes. In the chemical analysis, a speocial investi­
gation was done on sulphur for the fololowing reason: iron 
pyrite is found quite commonly in the mountains of Cebu 
Island, and it would seem logical that attempts were made to 
utilize this mineral. However, if pyrite is roasted, one 
would expect some -sulphur to be  retained, and this should 
also show up in the waste slago. Since sulphur was only 
present in minute traoces or not at all, it seems quite safe 
to say that iron pyrite was not used as raw material. 
7. I hope very much that these data will be  of some 
use to you. If there is any other information you would like 
to get from here, please let Mrs. Tenazas or me  know. We 
shall. be glad to oblige you. 
Yours sincerely, 
Karl Hutterer 
Two se ts of ana lyses a t tached (A and B )  
4 1 4  
A. C hemical Analysis  of Archaeological Samples 
of Iron Slag (From Cebu) 
P.  J. Fawcett and L. 0. Ungab 
Description  of Samp les 
The two i ron slag samples were mai nly light brown with 
some deeper red areas. The surface was rough and pitted, 
and some white or yellowish spots could be seen. 
The pieces baked to sherds were ratnher different i n  ap­
pearancen. Slag on sherd I had a dirty whi te surface and was 
firmly attached to a piece of clay pot tery. The demarcat ion 
line between slag and pottery was clearly visible. 
Slag on sherd II was almost black and the demarcatnion 
between slag and clay was not clear. 
Both pieces were removed from the clay pottery before 
analysis. 
The results of the quant i tat ive analysis are given i n  
percentages. 
Iron Slags Sherds 
Element 
I II I II 
Silicon 7 . 08 2 1.98 3 3 . 77 27a. 5 5  
Iron 2 7 . 7 5  2 2 a. 4 9  6 . 1 1 8 . 4 1 
Calcium 4 . 77 8 .8 9  5.71  4.84  
Magnesinum 1. 48 2 . 0 2  2 . 5 3  1 . 5 9  
Aluminum 4 . 47 4.89 4 . 8 6  1 2 . 5 7  
Manganese 0 . 2 2  0 . 09 0 . 2 3  0 . 5 1  
Sulphur tr. none tr. none 
The elements except sulphur are present as their oxi des. 
The oxygen analysis was not performed, so that the percentage 
analyses given do not add up to 10 0 .  The symbol "tr" stands 
for trace, meaning there is  only a trace of that element 
present. 
4 1 5  
Method of Analyses 
The powdered sample (about 0.5 g) was fused with sodium 
carbonate, and the fused mass treaoted with aqua regiao. The 
solution was evaporaoted to dryness and the residue was diso­
solved in 3N hydrochloric acido. The silica was filtered 
through ashless filter paper and ignited in a plaotinum cruo­
cible to constant weight. 
Ammonium hydroxide was added to filtraote to precipiotate 
the hydroxides of iron, aluminum, and manganese. The fil­
trate from this precipitation was reserved for the calcium 
and magnesium determinaotions. The precipitate was dissolved 
in hydrochloric acid and the iron determined by titraotion 
agains t standard potassium dichromate solution, using po tas­
sium ferricyanide as exoternal indicator. The calcium in the 
filotrate was precipitated as oxalate and after reprecipitao­
tion was dissolved in 6N sulfuric acido. The solution was 
then titrated against a standard po tassium permanganate solu­
tion. 
The magnesium was de termined by precipiotation from the 
oxalate filotrate as magnesium ammonium phosphate. The pre­
cipita te was ignited to consotant weight and weighed as mag ­
nesoium pyrophosphate. 
A second fusion was then carried out and after some reo­
moval of the silica, the aluminum was de termined gravimetri­
cally as aluminum phosphaote. The interference of iron in 
the precipitaotion was prevented by addiotion of sodium thio­
sulfaote. 
Sulphur was de termined by precipitation as barium sulfaote 
after removal of iron and silica. The filotrate from sulphur
determination was evaporated and titrated against standard 
potassium permanganate solution to de termine any manganese 
present. 
416  
B. Spectroscopic Analysis of Archaeological 
Samples of I ron Slag from Cebu 
Atlas Consolidated Mining and Development Corporation 
Lutopann, Toledo City
September 7, 1967 
Slag Sample 1 2 3 4 
Manganese 0 . 24 Trace 0 .2 8  Trace 
Silicon 2 5.0 2 4.1 34.7 33.5 
Iron 2 0.0 2 1.0 10 .0 16.0 
Aluminum 2 2 1 5 
Arsenic Trace 0 . 0 6  None 0 . 0 4  
Copper 0 .50 0 .10 0.30 0 .n06  
Note: Iron and Silicon were analyzed gravimetrically. 
0.  P. Pulmano 
Quality Control Engineer 
C. Comment 
The slag situation described from Cebu by Dr. Hutterer 
evidently differs in several respects from that described 
for the Sarawak River delta in this Data Paper, underlining 
out earlier emphasis on the theme thatn: 
I t  would not be a surprise if quite other hearth or 
furnace forms were in the use . . . a t one place or 
another inside the 70 0 -1350 A.D. framework. 
(Vo 1 . I , p . 7 3 )  
The Cebu City slag, at the end of the Buah- Bongkisam period, 
continued after the delta had died out as an ironn- working 
center in the beginning of the Ming (which started in China 
at 1368 A.D. historically). For Cebu, the larger sizes of 
slag pieces-- but low in square foot density- -are noteworthy 
(paragraph 3 in letter ) ,  as is the irregularity of surface 
and colored ("white or yellowish spots,n" his par. 3 and par. 
1 of report A) . Dr. Hutterer ' s  reference to "crucible" 
sounds here like tuyere (his par. 4) , but further informa­
tion is clearly required. 
His remark that the "iron content" of the slag seems 
high (par. 4) is difficult to interpret and perhaps incorrect ; 
4 17 
the totals (A and B) are below 100%, the figures difficult 
to compare with those in our Chapter IV.2o3, at page 197. 
Perhaps the search for sulphur (see A) has tended to confuse 
the issue here (cf. his par. 6). The idea that iron pyrites
would be a likely source of ore is unlikely, to say the 
least. No ferrous ore is less attractive and less amenable 
to "primitive" processes. By definition, as FeSo2 , it is 
charged with sulphur, which is "a very detrimental element in 
iron ore" (Tylecote : 19 1, cf. his 22, 1 82, 199, 293 ; and 
Coghlan : 107 ; also our Chapter IV. Z S  at p. 205). 
These and other uncertainties only underline the premises
of our anxious approach: that iron industries are widespread
in Southeast Asiao; that they remain barely understood and 
largely ignored; and that they must now be treated seriously
and systematically as essential features--if not the basic 
featureo--of what is so readily called, without research 
analysis, "The Iron Age" (indeed, Dr. Hutt·erer himself gets
trapped in this etymology in his letter, par. 2, fourth 
sentence). Meanwhile, Mrs. Tenazas (cf. earlier references 
in our III.16.e at pages 143- 146), her other colleagues and 
his good self are to be congratulated for giving the slag 
some consideration and treatment, which we urge them to con­
tinue and extend--for instance, repeating (and improving 
upon) some of the samples and descriptions attempted in the 
first volume of this Data Paper. We learn from their ini­
tiativeso, as well.