Empire of Luca

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The empires of Timor around 1700

The empire of Luca (outdated: Louka ) was a dominion on the coast in the southeast of what is now East Timor . According to some 19th century European sources, Luca was one of the empires that ruled east Timor . Today Luca is a Suco East Timor.

background

Freycinet's map of Hawaii and Timor with "Louka" (1820)

Today's knowledge about Luca is based on European records from the colonial times and oral traditions of the Timorese, although information from West and East Timor can be very different. Between 1994 and 1996, the anthropologist Peter Spillett interviewed the then 80-year-old Liurai von Luca and other members of the ruling Amaral family . Interviews in 2014 by Clementino dos Reis Amaral , the representative of the Liurai family, confirmed the records of Spillett. Most of the historical heirlooms and the Uma Lulik ( German  Holy House , the place where the relics are kept) in Kampung Badari , seven kilometers from Luca, were destroyed in the 1975 civil war. Portuguese records and documents fell victim to the Indonesian occupation (1975-1999).

Luca was centered on the coast in southeast Timor. The region forms the east of the settlement area of ​​the Tetum . Their language is now the official language of East Timor and was already the lingua franca in the center and most areas in East Timor. A circumstance that may explain Lucas' far-reaching historical claims to supremacy.

Manuel Godinho de Erédia drew one of the first detailed maps of Timor in 1613 . Among the various place names listed, Luca was particularly prominent in the east. In the accompanying text, Erédia reports on two rulers who were converted to Christianity by the Dominicans: the Emperor of Mena and the King of Luca. But since the Dominicans neglected the empires, they would soon have become "Moors" and "idolaters" again. In a publication by Salomon Müller , who visited Timor from 1828 to 1829, there is a map of the Dutch- dominated West Timor with numerous details. The Portuguese eastern part on the edge of the map is simply referred to as the “Land of the Belunese ”. On its south coast, however, the name "Loeka" can be found in large. Müller explains in the text that Luca dominates East Timor, but does not have absolute control over the region. The Dutch commissioner Emanuel Francis reported that Luca was not a legitimate ruler of the East, but had usurped power. Louis de Freycinet, however, calls "Louka" the oldest ruling house, which is recognized by many "kings" of East Timor. On the other hand, there are Portuguese documents that report on numerous independent "Reinos" ( German  empires ) in East Timor, but which Luca does not give a predominant role. For example, the former governor of Portuguese Timor Afonso de Castro listed 47 empires in the eastern part of the island in 1868, including Luca.

However , it is not clear from these sources that Luca was in charge of other great powers such as Motael , Maubara , Suai - Camenaça or Manufahi or had influence over them. Even François Étienne de Rosily-Mesros calls in his report of 1772 as the most important kingdoms of the island Oecussi Vemasse Subdistrict , Laleia and Samoro . One must take into account that the European reports are based on information provided by the Timorese themselves, including those from Luca. While Europeans assumed rigid structures with clear borders and their own administration for domains, the state in Southeast Asia was often more of a center, whose power and influence, like the light of a lamp, became weaker with increasing distance. The areas on the edge of the spheres of influence copied the institutions and rituals of the power center and thus formed their own power centers. In addition, in Timor, according to the Lulik system, a distinction is made between two powers: the inactive, symbolic, “female” ruler and the active, “male” ruler with political power. The ritual rulers included, for example, the rulers of Wewiku - Wehale in the west of the settlement area of ​​the Tetum. The empire was of great importance as a ritual and cultural center throughout Timor, but politically it was relatively insignificant after 1641/42.

According to the traditions collected by Spillett, Luca presided over four other kingdoms: Loro Ossu-Hosoroa ( Ossorua ), Loro Besuru ( Vessoru ), Loro Wemassin ( Vemassin ) and Loro Waibobo ( Uaibobo ). In addition, Viqueque and Takanar were under the control of Luca. Luca was in turn subordinate to the double kingdom of Wewiku-Wehale, as it derived its origin from the Maromak Oan (the child of God) Wehales. So the empire in the west stood in its ritual power over Luca. A queen of Luca is said to have given land in Uatumuni (between Ossu and Viqueque ) to Wewiku. Viqueque, who had a close relationship with Wehale, gave her a valuable, old bracelet (keke) .

Myths and historical events

Origin and wedding

French map of Timor with “Louka” from the 18th century

Oral traditions make the small kingdom of Luca appear far larger than one of the most important domains of Timor and even on a par with Wewiku-Wehale, also through the occasional mention of Likusan as part of Luca. Lucas' role during the historical events seems to confirm that the role of Luca's rulers was more significant than their small territory suggests. Oral tradition reports that Tetum speakers immigrated to Viqueque 13 generations ago from the heartland of the Tetum in Wehale and linked themselves to the local clans through marriage. The local realm of Ai Sahe , today's Viqueque, became one of Lucas' vassals. Spillett was told that three Datos came from Wewiku-Wehale and planted the first fig tree (Ai Hali) . This grew and expanded like the power of Luca's empire.

The oral traditions from Luca also contain legends and mythical elements, so that real events can hardly be clearly separated from them. So one reported Spillett of the meeting of Lu′u Leki , the Na′i Luka Likusan ( German  ruler of Luca Likusan ) and Bei Taek Aman , the ruler of Wewiku in Kmodo Mahut Welaku . According to tradition, both had magical powers. Lu′u Leki was able to let the water recede from the reefs and drain the sea himself, while Bei Taek Aman could decide on the time of sunset and moonset. Possibly the two rulers were brothers who, united, had great strength and authority. They divided the land among themselves. According to Clementino Amaral, the Mota Masin , today's border river between Indonesia and East Timor, was established as the border between the rulers . Clementino Amaral also reported about the first rulers of Lucas. His list begins with Afoan Sila and his successor Na'i Lou Baria Sak.

The double name "Luka Likusan" refers to Liquiçá on the north-west coast of East Timor, but occasionally also includes Motael , the old empire in the area around East Timor's current capital, Dili . Sometimes even Suai-Camenaça is added on the western south coast of East Timor. Ultimately, the tradition describes a tripartite division of Timor into Sonba'i , the empire of the Atoin Meto in the west, Wewiku-Wehale in the center and Luka Likusan in the east. This tripartite division can also be found in a Portuguese report from the year 1734. Although the three rich people are granted a high position in the hierarchy, political power did not automatically result from this. But it could very well have an impact on the formation of alliances.

With the arrival of the Portuguese in the 16th century and the expansion of their influence on Timor, there were major changes in the power structure in Timor. In the 1660s there was a three-way battle for power on the island between Portuguese, Macassarians and Dutch. Regarding the conflict between the Dutch East India Company (VOC) and the Portugal allied Topasse , a VOC employee wrote to the headquarters in Batavia that the Portuguese claims to “Ade” (Vemasse) and Manatuto were not justified. Both regions originally belonged to the rich dependent on Luca, but had renounced a few years earlier, granted traders from Makassar great influence and later placed themselves under the Dutch flag . In 1668, however, a Topasse fleet attacked the two empires and occupied them, officially returning them to Portuguese sovereignty.

According to Spillett's informants, new empires gradually emerged and broke away from Luca. Clementino Amaral told about the Christianization of Lucas, that the ruler Na'i Lou Baria Sak in the West Timorese Mena was converted to the Catholic faith and baptized. It is associated with the proselytizing of the kingdom of Luca, also because the Dominican chronicles tell of a Queen Lucas who, together with her underage son, nobleman and "innumerable" subjects, was baptized by the missionary António de São Domingos, who was named after now again Portuguese dominated Manatuto came after Luca. According to the Dominican reports, this must have happened around 1670, which, according to Erédias, would have been the second Catholicization of the ruling family. On the one hand, the brutal action of the Topasse could have made an impression on Luca, on the other hand, the Portuguese expanded from 1670 and for the first time sent units around the eastern end of Timor to the south coast of the island. While individual places are reported to have been devastated by the Portuguese, such a report by Luca is missing. It seems to have submitted voluntarily. Oral tradition at least confirms that Lucas's power declined with the arrival of the Portuguese in the region.

Spillett was told that the Catholic bishop of Malacca and seven priests tried to convert Luca to Christianity, but failed. He and his entourage were murdered and his remains were buried in a secret location. Other oral sources deny that the bishop was murdered. According to Portuguese documents, the Dominican Manuel de Santo António actually settled in Luca around 1700 and successfully Christianized Luca as well as the kingdoms of Viqueque, Samoro, Fatuletiluli , Alas and Manatuto. In 1701 Manuel was appointed Bishop of Malacca . He kept his seat in Timor and was thus the first bishop on the island. He was neither murdered nor died in Timor.

Luca's importance in the chronicles waned for much of the 18th century. His vassal Viqueque, on the other hand, was a key location for Bishop Manuel's goal to Christianize Timor. In 1722 the Portuguese governor Francisco de Melo e Castro expelled him from the island. In 1759/60 Bishop Geraldo de São José died under mysterious circumstances in Timor, but in Lifau .

18th and 19th centuries

Spanish map of Timor with “Louka” from 1888

1722 warriors from Luca attacked a group of Moradores on the way from Lifau to Cailaco , who collected the Fintas, the tribute payments of the Liurais (Timorese petty kings) for Portugal . The rebels destroyed churches and murdered missionaries and converted Timorese.

In 1777 (according to other sources 1776, 1779 or 1781) the empire of Luca rose up, due to repression against the animistic religion , in a revolt against the Portuguese colonial rulers that lasted until 1785, the " war of the mad " ( Portuguese guerra de loucas , also called guerra dos doidas ). A "prophetess" had announced to the warriors that the ancestors would support them to shake off the yoke of the strangers. The warriors believed they were invulnerable. The rebellion was put down by Governor João Baptista Vieira Godinho (1785 to 1788) with the support of Viqueque.

Clementino Amaral is also the source for the story of the break between Luca and Timor's spiritual center Wewiku-Wehale. The trigger was the marriage of a ruler of Luca with a noblewoman of Wewiku-Wehale. After returning to Luca, it turned out that the bride was not of royal blood. In retaliation, Luca sent warriors to Wehale to kill the Liurai there. In return, Wehale sent a punitive expedition to Luca that killed many residents, including members of the ruling family. Some people from Luca fled to the north coast of Timor, including Liurai's brother. When the thirsty nobleman was drinking from a spring there, he noticed that the water was salty. So the place was named " Vemasse ", in German "salty water". Other sources report that Lucas Queen Maria Amaral attacked Suri, the Liurai of Wehale, in 1832/1833. The triggers were border disputes and the attempt to proselytize. Suri was killed during the fighting in Suai and his head was taken in triumphal procession to Badari , the then Lucas center. Hardly anything was left of Lucas' only Christianization 150 years earlier in 1856. Just 15 Christians were counted there this year.

In 1868 Luca supported the Portuguese colonial rulers with troops in suppressing the rebellion in Cowa . In April 1896, Luca signed a written contract with Portugal on his vassal status.

20th century

1914 Luca is not mentioned on this Portuguese map

Luca did not take part in the great Manufahi rebellion of 1911/12 , even if there was a tendency towards anti-colonialism. In the ruling family of the Amarals, it is explained that, at the invitation of the ringleader Boaventura von Manufahi, an envoy to Lucas initially announced his support. As a signal of the beginning of the uprising against the Portuguese, it was supposed to carry a certain tais as a symbol. Out of forgetfulness, however, the messenger returned with the wrong symbol, so Luca still waited. Later the failed rebels were offered shelter.

Oral traditions from Ossorua and Babulo tell of the inhabitants of Lucas who once emigrated to the coastal plains of Uato-Laris and settled there after Tomas dos Reis Amaral, a descendant of the Luca empire, from the Portuguese to ruler of Uaitame and in the mid-1910s Vessoru and administrator of Uato-Lari was made. Here they form part of today's Makasae- speaking population.

Luca became less and less important. Shortly before the Japanese invasion in 1942, a certain Carlos Cal Brandão reports on his impressions of Luca. It is a conservative area and backward even by colonial standards. Luca is the poorest kingdom on the otherwise rich and prosperous south coast. Only on the banks of a river and in some places where the forest has been cleared would there be small rice fields and simple plantings of maize. The small population is made worse by the indolence of the population. One lives in the traditions of a glorious past and the claims of the descending, once highest aristocracy in Timor. After the Japanese invasion, Lucas ruler Dom Jeremias dos Reis Amaral protected the local Portuguese and helped evacuate them to Australia . He was arrested and tortured by the Japanese, but still did not reveal anything about the whereabouts of the Portuguese who were still hiding in the country. In 1943 he was stabbed to death. Governor Óscar Freire de Vasconcelos Ruas dedicated a memorial to Jeremias in 1948.

Ruler list

  • Afoan Sila (before the Portuguese colonial period)
  • Na'i Lou Baria Sak (around 1670)
  • Na'i Lequi Sak
  • Na'i Lulequik I.
  • Sebastião Fernandes (1703)
  • António Aveiro do Amaral (in the rank of tenente-coronel 1726)
  • Sancho Manuel (1738)
  • Sebastião do Amaral (before about 1769 to about 1782)
  • Tomás do Amaral (1782 to after 1789) (nephew)
  • Ana do Amaral (1815)
  • Felix António do Amaral (1817)
  • Maria Amaral (1826-1850)
  • Na'i Lulequik II (1850-1880)
  • João de Amaral (1854)
  • Luiz dos Reis e Cunha (1869–1876) (from the ruling family of Barique )
  • José Amaral (1880-1885)
  • Rosa Amaral (around 1881 to around 1896) (widow)
  • Clementino dos Reis Amaral (around 1896–1914) (nephew of Dom José)
  • Tomás A. dos Reis Amaral (1914–1917) (son)
  • Lourenço Amaral (1917–1923) (brother of Dom Clementino)
  • Tomás A. dos Reis Amaral (1923–1926, second term)
  • Lourenço Amaral (1926–1933, second term)
  • Jeremias dos Reis Amaral (1933–1943) (nephew of Dom Tomás)
  • Zeferino Amaral (1944–1959) (son of Dom Lourenço)
  • Paulo Guterres (1959–1989) (son-in-law of Dom Tomás)
  • Domingos Torrezão dos Reis Amaral (1979–1989) (son of Zeferino)
  • Francisco ATA Guterres (from 1989) (son of Paulo Guterres)

literature

  • Peter Spillett: The pre-colonial history of the island of Timor together with some notes on the Makassan influence in the island , 1999.

supporting documents

Main evidence

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Barnes, Hägerdal, Palmer p. 329.
  2. ↑ a b c d Barnes, Hägerdal, Palmer p. 331.
  3. ↑ a b c d Barnes, Hägerdal, Palmer p. 332.
  4. ↑ a b Barnes, Hägerdal, Palmer p. 328.
  5. ↑ a b c Barnes, Hägerdal, Palmer p. 335.
  6. ↑ a b Barnes, Hägerdal, Palmer pp. 326–328.
  7. ↑ TIMOR LORO SAE, Um pouco de história ( Memento of November 13, 2001 in the Internet Archive )
  8. ↑ East Timor - PORTUGUESE DEPENDENCY OF EAST TIMOR ( Memento of February 21, 2004 in the Internet Archive )
  9. ↑ Josh Trindade: Lulik: The Core of Timorese Values , accessed November 6, 2017.
  10. ↑ a b Barnes, Hägerdal, Palmer p. 334.
  11. ↑ Barnes, Hägerdal, Palmer p. 345.
  12. ↑ a b c d Barnes, Hägerdal, Palmer p. 333.
  13. ↑ a b Hans Hägerdal: Rebellions or factionalism? Timorese forms of resistance in an early colonial context, 1650-1769
  14. ↑ Barnes, Hägerdal, Palmer pp. 335 & 336.
  15. ↑ a b Barnes, Hägerdal, Palmer p. 336.
  16. ↑ Instituto Camões ( Memento of August 5, 2011 in the Internet Archive )
  17. ↑ Gunn pp. 41-42.
  18. ↑ a b Gunn p. 50.
  19. ↑ Hans Hägerdal: Lords of the Land, Lords of the Sea; Conflict and Adaptation in Early Colonial Timor, 1600-1800, p. 407, (2012).
  20. ↑ Geoffrey Hull : The placenames of East Timor , in: Placenames Australia (ANPS): Newsletter of the Australian National Placenames Survey, June 2006, pp. 6 & 7, ( Memento of February 14, 2017 in the Internet Archive ). September 2014.
  21. ↑ Barnes, Hägerdal, Palmer p. 337.
  22. ↑ Gunn pp. 86-88.
  23. ↑ Barnes, Hägerdal, Palmer pp. 333 & 334.
  24. ↑ Susana Barnes: Origins, Precedence and Social Order in the Domain of Ina Ama Beli Darlari , In: Land and life in Timor-Leste, pp. 29 & 32.
  25. ↑ Barnes, Hägerdal, Palmer p. 339.
  26. ↑ Barnes, Hägerdal, Palmer p. 340.
  27. ↑ Barnes, Hägerdal, Palmer pp. 337 & 339.
  28. ^ António Vicente Marques Soares: Pulau Timor; Sebuah sumbangan untuk sejarah , Baucau 2003, Matebian Press.
  29. ↑ Carlos Filipe Ximenes Belo : Os antigos reinos de Timor-Leste (Reys de Lorosay e Reys de Lorotoba, Coronéis e Datos) , pp. 234–242, Baucau 2011, Tipografia Diocesana Baucau.

Coordinates: 8 ° 56 ′ 59.1 ″  S , 126 ° 11 ′ 51.4 ″  E