The city of Malacca on the southwest coast of the Malaysian Peninsula was the seat of the one of the most powerful sultanates in Southeast Asia. It was founded in a tiny fishing village in the early fifteenth century by Paramesvara, Permaisura or Parameswara, a Mahayanist Buddhist prince forced by the Javanese Majapahit kingdom to flee Palembang, or Palambang, in South Sumatra, Indonesia. After a subsequent brief rule of Singapura, he was forced to flee at the hand of the Siamese overlords of Singapura. Malacca, which sits at the mouth of the Bertam River, also known as the Malaccan River, on the Straights of Malacca, an opportune place for trade, is named for the tree under which Paramesvara was ostensibly sitting when he chose the site in 1399 or 1400. His palace was said to have been at the mouth of the river across from the shops and houses of the town, all of which were raised on stilts. In 1409 Prince Paramesvara entered into a defensive mercantile alliance with the strong and regionally influential Chinese Empire, strategically attracting Chinese trade. In 1414 the Prince converted to Islam to marry a Muslim princess from Pasai, north Sumatra, and changed his name to Iskandar Shah, or Iskandar Syah. His conversion further encouraged trade with Muslim merchants from India and Java.
By the mid fifteenth century, Malacca controlled most of the southern Malaysian Peninsula, the spice trade and was an instrumental in propagating Islam throughout Southeast Asia as far as Thailand. The city of Malacca was a cosmopolitan port where between 48 and 80 languages were said to have been spoken and which housed Tamil, Arab, Persian, Javanese and Chinese traders, each with their own quarters such as Bukit Cina for the Chinese and Kampong Kling, for the "Kling" or South Indians.
Reflecting this eclectic population base, and as a display of wealth at the zenith of the sultanate, the sixth sultan, Mansur Shah, who ruled from 1456-77, is said to have built an ornate palace for himself. It was at the foot of the Malacca Hill and comprised seven stories supported by thick round columns, with windows decorated with gold leafing and giant Chinese mirrors. The building is surmounted by sweeping copper and tin Minankabau roofs topped with a red glass orb that blazes in the sunlight.
At the time of its fall, the Malay Sultanate, which lasted for a little more than a century, housed over 100,000 people who were connected over the river by a stone bridge. The city was walled in with four entry gates each marked with watch and drum towers and throughout the night a men would patrol the streets with hand-bells.
In 1511 the Malaccan Sultanate was eclipsed by the Portuguese after its invasion by the fleet of Alfonso d'Albequerque, the Portuguese Viceroy of India, which initiated a 450-year colonial presence n Malacca that included the Dutch and then the British. Upon securing the territory, the Portuguese quickly built the massive fortress of A Famosa on the left bank. Its most prominent feature was a watchtower estimated to have been about 36 meters high. Under the Portuguese and the colonialists that followed, Malacca was laid out in clearly aligned streets punctuated by open squares. The Portuguese converted the city into a Christian fortress town characterized by the keep of A Famosa within the walls that also enclosed several chapels, a monastery, two hospitals, two palaces, and five churches, one of which was built with the stones of Muslim tombs. Instead of the traditional construction material, timber, the Portuguese built in masonry, particularly laterite, a locally found red clay, as well as incorporating the stones of Muslim tombs. Today all that remains of Portuguese Malacca is the Santiago Gate, which stood at the base of A Famosa.
When the Dutch conquered the city in 1641, Malacca became secondary as a trading port to Batavia (Jakarta), and much of the Portuguese and Indian population left. However, the Dutch were committed and particularly methodical in their urban planning of Malacca. They standardized their material of choice, brick; building lines were defined; foundation, party walls and drain construction were inspected; and industrial zoning was implemented. Though they destroyed much of the pre-extant Portuguese architecture, many of the Dutch buildings still stand, including the oldest Dutch structure in Asia, the town hall or Stadthuys, which housed the VOC, or Dutch East India Company. Built in 1660, these offices were made of brick, and marked by thick walls, double-sash windows, wrought-iron gables and hinges and plaster painted abright terracotta. The Chirst Church, built in 1753, sports the same color and has a robust rectangular plan without aisles and covered with a flat timber ceiling supported by joistless beams cut from a single tree. Furthermore, the Chinese community, which had diminished under the Portuguese, notably flourished under the Dutch, who were particularly dependant on Chinese labor.
When the British took over control of the city at the turn of the nineteenth century, they demolished the Portuguese fortress and incorporated Malacca into the Straits Settlements along with Singapore in 1824. Under the British, a revival in the tin and rubber trade could be seen in the wealth of the villas that lined the streets of Malacca. However, the position of Malacca dimmed again after British trade was diverted primarily to Penang or Georgetown. The British held Malacca until the Japanese invasion in 1942. After WWII the British briefly re-established control of the city until it was soon after incorporated into modern-day Malaysia.
The heart of Malacca is its river. The successive administrative centers of Malacca have always resided on the left or east bank of the river. However, though inhabited by waves of Portuguese, Dutch and British occupations, the overall character of Malacca on the west bank of the river is dictated by a Chinese influence. Two parallel streets on this bank, which retain their Dutch names of Heeren and Jonkers streets, are mostly inhabited by Chinese shop-houses, each with one door and two windows. Some of these shop-houses and the similarly Chinese terraced houses, which extend back from the narrow street frontage and incorporate numerous courtyards, still retain elements of their delicately carved craftsmanship and continue to display half-shutters on their doors.
Also still quite prevalent in the town is a particularly Malaccan type of Malay house. This house type is categorized by a rectangular living room (ibu rumah) flanked by a kitchen (rumah dapur) of comparable size, and entered enter through a narrow verandah (serambi) which protrudes to one side of the main side lines and which is accessed by a set up ornamental steps of timber or tiled brick. The main roof has a steep pitch which is mimicked to a lesser pitch by the kitchen roof and to which is affixed the lean-to roof of the verandah. The building materials usually consist of timber or split bamboo coupled with Chinese roof tiles, though more commonly today can be found to incorporate galvanized iron, aluminum and asbestos.
Malaccan mosques are similarly distinctive and can be seen particularly in the older sections of the city of Malacca. This building, based on a square plan, is surmounted by a two or three tired pyramidal roof covered with tiles. Often detailing belies Chinese influence. The accompanying minarets similarly resemble a pagoda or stupa-like form embellished with Renaissance arches and embedded columns. Two such mosques, some of Malaysia's oldest, can be found in the Chinese quarter of Malacca, Masjid Kampung Hulu (1728) and Masjid Kampung Kling (1748).
Sources:
Ed. Martin Frishman and Hasan-Uddin Khan. 1994. The Mosque: History, Architectural Development and Regional Diversity. London: Thames and Hudson, 227, 234, 238.
Chen Voon Fee, ed. 1998. The Encyclopedia of Malaysia, Volume 5: Architecture. Archipelago Press, 6-7, 43, 58-63.
Ed. Jacques Dumarcay and Michael Smithies. 1998. Cultural Sites of Malaysia, Singapore, and Indonesia. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 9-17, 19, 23, 24, 36, 91, 96, 98.
Seow, E. J. 1983. "Melakan Architecture." In Melaka: The transformation of a Malay Capital c. 1400-1980. Volume 1. Edited by Kernial Singh Sandhu and Paul Wheatley. Kuala Lumpur: Oxford University Press, 770-781.
Vlatseas, S. 1990. A History of Malaysian Architecture. Singapore: Longman Singapore Publishers, 14, 26, 27, 54, 82.
Buyong bin Adil, Haji. 1974. The History of the Malacca During the Period of the Malay Sultanate. Kuala Lumpur, Dewan Bahasa dan Pustaka, 1- 75
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