YOURSAY 'We were not colonised, Hang Tuah is not a myth, and yes, Superman and Batman are from Malaysia...'

Prof Zainal Kling: Hang Tuah could well be a legend

your say Ferdtan: The gist of the whole controversy is not whether Hang Tuah is a myth. It might well be. We are looking at the motive (the hypocrisy of it) of Prof Khoo Kay Kim when he made nonsense of the history that we had studied for the past 50 years.

Any history professor worth his salt would have debunked that theory long ago, but no, he didn't because it serves the fascist Umno well with its 'ketuanan Melayu' issue.

Now we all know that it was found that Hang Tuah and his companions could actually be Chinese - they changed their stand and quietly removed them from our history books.

To get a Malay professor to come out to close the chapter of lies is bad taste, so they get a willing Chinese history professor to do the job.

Is this the kind of intelligentsia we have in our country? A history of expediency and not bothering for the truth?

Ashoka PJ: Prof Zainal Kling, the ‘Malay Annals' could be written by an Indian Muslim who must have had a flight of fancy with the five Pandava brothers in the Mahabaratha and then mixed it up with the life of Gautama Buddha.

Plagiarism may not have existed at that time.

Onyourtoes: If Hang Tuah did not exist, then what? If Hang Tuah was a Chinese, then what? What difference will these make?

I think we Malaysians are nincompoops; we are trying to solve a current problem or win an arguments by resorting to some historical events or folklore or myths or whatever.

AnonymousBersih: Another person trying to change history? Why only now say that Hang Tuah may be a legend? Why not 10 or 20 or 50 years ago? Is there some agenda we do not know?

Mangodurian: Sorry, what's the difference between a legend and a myth?

Obama: In Malaysia, if you ask 10 historians, you will get 10 different answers. If you keep learning in this country, you will become more stupid and confused. What is happening to all these so-called professors? Shame on you all.

Sap Sui: Prof Zainal: "We were not colonised, Hang Tuah is not a myth, and yes, Superman and Batman are from Malaysia..."

Mangodurian: We're getting into dangerous ground here. We know the Aztecs existed because there are the ruins that can be carbon dated. We know the Siamese empire existed because they are still here with written records.

If the Hangs are stuff of legend and they are so closely related to the Malaccan empire, wouldn't that then throw the entire narrative in doubt? Was there really an 'empire' that ruled the Malay peninsula? What was the population, range, towns, etc?

If there are no other written records aside from one 'annals', then where can we find concrete proof of a vast empire since nothing remains of that civilisation prior to the remains left by the Portugese and Dutch?

Has someone done some corroborative checking with the really organised civilisations of that time - the Siamese, Chinese, Arabs and later Portugese? Did they speak of a big unified regime as big as our history books mentioned?

Nexus: Prof, can you please explain how they came to the conclusion that the grave in Tanjong Kling is that of Hang Tuah. If Hang Tuah is a legend or a myth, then whoever is lying in that grave is not Hang Tuah.

Sabahan: Zainal, those 'descendants' (of Hang Tuah) may be living in fantasy. We are not obliged to humour them. We must always strive for the truth. That will make our nation great and strong.

Anonymous: If there is no black and white written anywhere, it's a myth. Simple as that. Can I say Hang Tuah was my brother who came from China? I can't because it's just hearsay.

ForTheNation: Whether legend or myth, there is no actual proof that Hang Tuah was real. So move along now, nothing to see here...

Up2U: Hang Tuah sounds like ‘Ang Tua' which is a title given to the head of gangsters. Any connection to the Chinese when they came to Malacca?

Manjit Bhatia: Zainal Kling said: "So, Hang Tuah can very well be a legend but not a myth."

How is this possible? Legends are the stuff of myth-making. So a legend is a myth. It can't be both. It's like folklore. All are part of oral history. It is also part of story-telling.

I suspect the stuff found in the ‘Malay Annals' is the stuff of story-telling more than of 'real' history. In fact, that's how I read the ‘Malay Annals' - mostly as fiction dressed up to look like 'real' history.

I don't mind oral history but it can't and must not replace factual history and interpretive history. Otherwise the oral history of Malaya/Malaysia of the Malacca sultanate, like the myth of Hang Tuah and company, is a big lie.

VP Biden: We have a new myth in our midst now... Ah Jib Gor, he tells nice fables.

 

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