Poni: The Lost Kingdom of North Borneo?
This ia a presentation under the Borneo Perantis Project with the Goethe Institute.
Link: www.goethe.de/...
The Kingdom of Funan was a kingdom in the Indo-China region that arose in the 1st century CE and was incorporated into the state of Chenla in the 6th century.
Funan (perhaps a Chinese transcription of 'pnom,' or “mountain”) was the first important ‘Hinduized kingdom’ in Southeast Asia and covered an area that today, includes regions within Vietnam, Thailand, and Cambodia. Funan had trade relations with India as well as China, to whose emperor the people of Funan sent tribute between the 3rd and 6th centuries.
Archaeological evidence shows that Funan was heavily influenced by Indian cultures and religions.
So, what does Funan have in connection to Sabah and the greater North Borneo region?
The archaeological research and historical writings of G.Coedes and Robert Nicholl, formerly of the Brunei Museum tell us of an existence of such a hindu kingdom in North Borneo. The Poni claims not supported by archaeological data but from what Coedes and Nicholl have proposed, there are merits to their arguments that Poni did exist and it was along the Lawas River.
Early records from Chinese scriptures tell us of the existence of a Hindu-Buddhist kingdom known as either “Poni” or “Po-Ni” or “Srivijaya” or “Chin-Li-Phi-Shih”as the royal household of the Funan was driven out of what is today southern Cambodia and Vietnam by the Khemer.
Poni would appear to have been an important trading post in North Borneo (Sabah) and existed during the period of the Srivijaya Empire up till possibly the early 16th Century.
Coedes has suggested this mass migration from Indo-China occurred in the 7th Century (680 AD) by members of the Funan Kingdom royal household who were either forced to escape or migrated wilfully to the West Coast of North Borneo and established itself south of Mount Kinabalu along the Lawas River, which today, exists as the town of Lawas, Sarawak, and which is located next to the Sabah border.
As the kingdom was of Hindu Buddhist beliefs, it is very possible the peoples of the Funan Kingdom who migrated to North Borneo may have brought the customs and traditions and inter-married with indigenous peoples along the coastlines and in the highlands. This is a theory.
Lawas was once a part of North Borneo and ceeded to Sarawak in 1905 by the North Borneo Chartered Company under an agreement.
Whilst Coedes and Robert Nicholl have suggested that Lawas was the site of Poli whilst other historians have suggested it may have been in the vicinity of a town further south known today as Limbang whilst Brunei historians have argued that ‘Poni’ is the old Brunei kingdom and that it is unlikely any other rival or peaceful co-existing kingdoms existed at the period.
Geographic descriptions from Chinese scriptures of Poni do not support the Brunei argument in this regard and Pigafetta’s observations which I will explain during this presentation tell us of a rival ‘pagan’ kingdom that existed along with the Brunei Sultanate which can only be the Poni Kingdom in either Lawas or Limbang.
The current town of Lawas is located 19.3 kilometres up river from the mouth of the river that opens up into the Brunei Bay. Limbang, another town also located in present day Sarawak, sits 15 kilometres up river from the mouth that open’s up to the Brunei Bay. Limbang may have been another trading post, or a sister kingdom to Poni but this is pure speculation without hard evidence to support this theory.
Some Hindu Buddhist items were discovered in the 1960’s in Limbang by Tom and Barbara Harrison and these items are currently in the possession of the Brunei Museum.
Respected historians Marie-Sybille de Vienne and Graham Saunders have suggested that the "Mountain Kings" of Funan in North Borneo were the forebears of the Malacca Sultanate and Brunei Sultanate.
Antonio Pigafetta wrote about witnessing a large Brunei naval war party leaving Brunei to travel across what I have taken to be the Brunei bay to attack a 'pagan' civilization nearby within the Brunei Bay. It is believed this was the rival kingdom of Poni along the Lawas River and it is most likely Poni was probably destroyed by Brunei in the early 1500s.
No other recordings exist of Poni thereafter in any historical records after Pigafetta’s writings in his journal. This may very well have been the last known account of the existence of Poni.