Zakharov Anton

Sanfoqi 三佛斉—Srivijaya or Angkor? Notes on Liam Kelley’s Hypothesis

ЮГО-ВОСТОЧНАЯ АЗИЯ: АКТУАЛЬНЫЕ ПРОБЛЕМЫ РАЗВИТИЯ, 2023, №3(59), 236-256

 
Annotation: A Chinese place-name Sanfoqi usually identified as a name of the Old Malay kingdom Srivijaya centered in the area of Palembang, now is a point at issue. Scholars do reject the identification of Sanfoqi with Srivijaya. Liam Kelley offers to treat Sanfoqi as a Chinese term for rendition of the word Kambuja/Cambodia, and he identifies Sanfoqi with the Angkor Empire. My aim is to check Kelley’s arguments by means of their internal logic as well as by their comparison with the data available in the Chinese texts, Southeast Asian inscriptions and archeology. Kelley seems right that there were many Sanfoqi and many Jiùgǎng, i. e. ‘Old Harbor’. But there is not the case when Kelley rejects the identification of at least a Jiùgǎng with Palembang and a Sanfoqi. First, “Map of the Various Barbarian Kingdoms in the Southeastern Ocean” (Dongnan haiyang zhu yiguo tu 東南海洋諸夷國圖) shows a great distance between Sanfoqi and Zhenla, with Melaka/Mǎnlájiā-guó 滿剌加國 and Xiānluó-guó 暹羅國 between them. Second, there is a coincidence between the evidence of Ma Huan and Fei Xin which places 浡鄰邦 Bólínbāng which is a name of Jiùgǎng, in Palembang. Third, 闍婆 Shepo as a rendition of Sanskrit/Old Javanese words java/yava is the same as 爪哇 Zhǎowā because its ruler Kertanagara of Singhasari left the Mula Malurung inscription which calls him primordial teacher of Yavadvīpa/Nūṣa Java. Therefore, there is no need to reject the placing of Shepo in Java. Despite Kelley’s claims, Sanfoqi of Ma Huan and Fei Xin was in Palembang.

Keywords: Sanfoqi, Srivijaya, Angkor, historical geography, Chinese texts, Sumatra, Palembang, Java, Mekong River Basin