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Melaka
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When Penang was known only for its oysters and Singapore was just a fishing village,
MELAKA
had already achieved worldwide fame. Under the auspices of the Melaka Sultanate, founded in the early fifteenth century, political and cultural life flourished, helping to define what it means to be Malay. The town grew rich by
trading spices
from the Moluccas in the Indonesian archipelago and textiles from Gujarat in northwest India. A levy on all imported goods made it one of the wealthiest kingdoms in the world and it gradually expanded its territory to include Singapore and most of east-coast Sumatra. Yet, beginning in 1511, a series of takeovers and botched administrations by the Portuguese, Dutch and British, caused the subjugation of the Malay people; Melaka's modern-day authorities are still working towards reversing the city's decline.
Legacies of all phases of Melaka's past remain in the city, constituting the main tourist sights. Of these, the most interesting are the ancestral homes of the
Baba-Nonya community
, a new racial mix also known as Peranakan that evolved from the sixteenth-century Chinese merchants who settled here and married Malay women. For a one-stop introduction to the city's history, watch the English-language
Sound and Light Show
on Padang Pahlawan (daily 9.30pm, 8.30pm during Ramadan; 1hr; RM5 - closed for renovations at the time of writing). Other useful information
for tourists (each section contains more specific sub-sections): |
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Malaysia,
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