Imagining the original Malay wooden palace of Kampong Gelam in Singapore
Palaces speak to the imagination as places of fairy tales, romance and intrigue. Nineteenth century Singapore had several, which held fascinating stories, that like their buildings have mostly been forgotten. Traditional Malay architecture is made in wood, not as durable as stone, and has unfortunately not often been deemed worthy to preserve. Yet with their elaborate woodwork, wrapped verandas and gabled and hipped roofs, Malay palaces are a beauty to behold. It makes one curious who lived there, and what their lives were like. As in many cultures, it was the Malay royal wives and mothers that ruled at home. With their men often out at sea, women held the fort at home.
The most famous Istana of Singapore was once home to the Sultan of Singapore, Sultan Hussain. In a previous blog I described how the current building was constructed in 1890, and that Sultan Hussain built a classic wooden palace in the Malay style when he first settled in Kampong Gelam in 1819. I regularly get asked what this original palace looked like, but unfortunately, we don’t know, as there are no images and few descriptions of the building. On a recent visit to Terengganu in northern Malaysia, I was happy to find several preserved Malay wooden palaces and even got to spend a few nights in one. Although building styles differ across the region, there is a close link between Istana Kampong Gelam and Terengganu that makes the comparison interesting: Sultan Hussain’s main royal consort in Singapore was a lady called Tengku Prahbu. Her title tengku shows she was royalty, and she was the granddaughter of a Sultan of Terengganu.
Sultan Hussain had several wives, as to the Malay royal weddings forged important alliances. His first Raja Perempuan, or main royal consort, had been Engku Bulan, a relative of the Temenggong family, who secured his alliance to the Temenggong who would make his rule in Singapore possible. His second wife was a daughter of the ruler of Pahang. None of the children of these first two wives outlived their father, and by 1819 Engku Bulan must have died, as it was Tengku Prahbu who was in charge of the Singapore palace as main royal consort. With many wives, the Malay sultans had many children, and according to adat (custom), sons of royal wives were prioritised to succeed. Succession disputes were common, and the Kampong Gelam royal compound would see its share of dynastic conflicts.
Malay palaces are relatively simple buildings. As the sea straits the maritime Malay ruled were often contested, they were attacked and forced to relocate their capitals regularly. The kota raja (royal citadel) was simply the place where the ruler lived, and had a wooden palace, a balai (meeting hall), a mosque and a scattering of houses for the orang kaya (regents). It was situated on the shore of the sea or a river, and surrounding the palace lived traders and artisans. Besides fruit, herbs and vegetables for their own use, the Straits Malay did not practice much agriculture, and all was easy to dismantle and resurrect elsewhere. Kampong Gelam grew as a classic kota raja around the palace, evidence of which can be seen in the layout of the neighbourhood today.
The Terengganu State Museum displays several preserved and relocated royal palaces. As the royal families of Riau, Johor and Singapore were closely related to the one in Terengganu, looking at Terengganu palaces can give us at least an idea of what the palace of Sultan Hussain and Tengku Prahbu could have looked like.
The house pictured above was the home of a daughter of the sultan of Terengganu in the late 19th century. It is considered a rumah limas belanda. A rumah limas is a traditional house found across the region that is associated with people of high standing. It is raised on stilts and has rooms on different levels, usually a veranda in front. The roof has five pyramid ridges with triangular gable spaces at the end. The term belanda refers to the Netherlands, as this style reflects European design elements blended with traditional Malay ones. The style was popular in Johor and Riau, where the Malay rulers had a alliance with the Dutch based in Melaka since the early 1600s.
This istana might seem a simple building, but its elaborate wood carvings make clear that it was inhabited by someone wealthy and of high birth. The interior is richly decorated with geometric designs, and the different rooms are separated by ornate arches. Malay houses are raised from the ground because the coastal areas where they lived are swampy and prone to flooding. Due to its open design, high gabled roofs and raised height, a Malay house catches a breeze which makes it comfortable in the hot and humid Malay climate.
A Johor example of a rumah limas belanda can also be found in Terengganu and was brought there by heritage enthusiast Alex Lee. Alex runs a resort called Terrapuri, where he has brought together wooden palaces from across Terengganu, and guests stay in one of them – a very special experience. Though most of the Terrapuri buildings were built for wealthy commoners and nobles, a few came from the Terengganu royal compound at Bukit Puteri in Kuala Terengganu. Alex has developed a second estate, where he brings together heritage buildings from across the Malay peninsula, to show the differences and similarities in style. Besides the Johor istana pictured above, it also has buildings from Kedah, Melaka and Negeri Sembilan. It shows how local elements influenced the design, and the similarities between the rumah limas belas in the State Museum and the building from Johor illustrate how closely related the Johor-Riau royal families were to those of Terengganu.
All of these are relatively modest residences, made for members of the extended royal families, nobility or wealthy merchants. In the Terengganu State Museum we can also see a more expansive istana: The Istana Tengku Long, built in built in 1904 for the son of the sultan, who ruled independently Besut, an area in northern Terengganu. This is a rumah limas bungkus, where the term bungkus refers to the way the pyramid limas roof wraps the large house. It was made by a builder from Pahang, and both interior and exterior are elaborately carved. It has several interconnecting halls, and smaller rooms shielded from main areas by interior carved walls, which allow for ventilation. The building is wrapped by long verandas that can be used for communal events.
Coincidentally Singapore’s Sultan Hussain was also called Tengku Long before he became sultan, a nickname derived from sulong, that tells us he was the eldest son. Of course, we have no way of knowing whether Sultan Hussain’s palace was as large, or as intricate as that of his namesake in Terengganu. The descriptions we have suggest a less impressive building, but they date from over a decade after the Istana Kampong Gelam was built, when its owner had fallen on hard times after the British took away his island, and they are written by a European with little knowledge of the subtleties of Malay architecture.
Another interesting house at the Terengganu State Museum is the rumah tele. The term tele refers to a house that is adjacent to the main palace, and these were often used to house the royal women. Rather than having one large building, a Malay royal compound would consist of a scattering of buildings. As Muslims the sultans were allowed multiple wives, and each wive should have her own residence, or at least her own portion of the house. We know that besides Tengku Prahbu several concubines lived in the compound in Singapore.
The main royal consort was in charge of running the palace, and Tengku Prahbu hired a secretary to manage palace accounts as well as the affairs of her husband. This resulted in a scandal when this man was said to get too much influence in court, and Tengku Prahbu was even accused of having an affair with him. The scandal drove the royal family to flee to Melaka, where Sultan Hussain died in 1835. Malay legends and history regularly blame political events on adulterous wives, and whether she was guilty remains unproven. Around 1840 Tengku Prahbu came back to Singapore with her teenage son Tengku Ali to reclaim the estate. She took control of the palace again, which by then according to some sources was extended with several stone buildings, and in 1842 asked the British to raise her pension to ‘adequately support her household and maintain her royal status.’ Tengku Prahbu would dedicate the rest of her life to fight for her son and grandsons to get back their birthright.
Both Tengku Prahbu’s son Tengku Ali and grandson Tengku Alam went up against the Temenggongs to regain control of Johor, without success, as I have described before. Grandson Tengku Mahmud fared better, he married two Terengganu princesses, one of them the full sister of the Sultan, whose other grandfather had been Sultan of Riau. Around 1890 Tengku Mahmud built his own house in Kampong Gelam next to the new Istana of his elder half-brother, which is now known as Gedung Kuning. Mahmud had been named heir by his father, bypassing the higher born and older Tengku Alam, whose mother had been a noblewoman, where Tengku Mahmud's was a mere commoner. Perhaps it was the support of his grandmother and the Terengganu relatives that made Tengku Mahmud flourish? Tengku Alam married a daughter of his paternal uncle Tengku Abdul Jalil, who as son of a commoner had been passed over for the title in favour of younger half-brother Tengku Ali.
In 1890 Tengku Mahmud built a balai, or communal meeting hall, near to his property, which shows his role and standing in the community. After Tengku Alam died in 1891 Tengku Mahmud became the official administrator of the Kampong Gelam estate until his death in 1907. His meeting room would be used for official events and shows the role the royal family continued to have in Kampong Gelam. By the later nineeenth century the family might have lost political power, but the royal compound and many of its inhabitants continued to play important roles in the local community, as did their wives. It is a shame we have no remnants of traditional Malay buildings left in Singapore, and sometimes we need to travel overseas to get a better picture of what Singapore of old would have looked like.
If you plan to visit Terengganu and also want to stay in an old Malay restored house too, do check out https://terrapuri.com for details.
And if you do visit, make sure to check out the Terengganu State Museum, which besides the outdoor museum has many other interesting collections:
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