BWM Talk Series: ‘Silk, Spices and Qur’an Manuscripts: Maritime Trade Networks Across The Malay World’ by Dato’ Dr Annabel Teh Gallop
Organised by Badan Warisan Malaysia
Date: Saturday, 27 September 2025
Time: 2.30pm
Location: Badan Warisan Heritage Centre, No. 2 Jalan Stonor, Kuala Lumpur
Admission by minimum donation:
BWM members RM25
Non-Member RM50
Light refreshments will be served.
Click HERE to register.
About the Talk
The silk roads of sea, which stretched across the Indian Ocean and through the Malay archipelago transporting rich cargoes of silks and ceramics from China to the Middle East and further west, saw increased traffic from the 16th century onwards with Europeans in search of the spices of the Maluku islands. But there were also other, lesser known, maritime networks meeting the demand for other forms of luxury goods such as paper and books. In the middle of the 19th century, during the reign of Baginda Omar (r. 1831 briefly, then 1839-1876) the Malay kingdom of Terengganu rose to prominence as home to the best Islamic calligraphers and the finest illuminated Qur’an manuscripts ever produced in Southeast Asia. There is evidence that these Terengganu Qur’an manuscripts were soon in demand from royal households throughout the Malay world, from Palembang to Pontianak, and it is these previously unknown trading networks of beautiful manuscripts that will be explored in this talk.
About the Speaker
Dato’ Dr Annabel Teh Gallop is head of the Southeast Asia section at the British Library in London. Her main research interests are in Malay manuscripts, letters, documents and seals, and the art of the Qur’an across the Indian Ocean world. Recent publications include Malay seals from the Islamic world of Southeast Asia (2019), a catalogue of over 2,000 seals from Southeast Asia inscribed in Arabic script, and ‘In praise of the Prophet: illuminated Kitab Mawlid manuscripts from Southeast Asia’, in Oceans that speak: Islam and the emergence of the Malay world (Kuala Lumpur: IAMM, 2024). She was elected a Fellow of the British Academy in 2019, and in 2022 was a recipient of the Merdeka Award.
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