Thread by @uglyluhan

Now that it's Chinese New Year season, some are wondering what's the equivalent in Malay culture. The answer might be disappointing because there's a lot that was lost to time, but here's what we do know

Ancient Southeast Asians borrowed their astronomy from India. The Indian Saka calendar was used in many of the regional kingdoms like Java, Bali, and possibly the Philippines. But to know about Malay civilisation, we need to look at Srivijaya

Remember the Kedukan Bukit inscription, the oldest surviving specimen of the Malay language? Take a look at the first few lines

https://twitter.com/uglyluhan/status/1083675629986304002?ref_src=twcamp%5Ecopy%7Ctwsrc%5Eandroid%7Ctwgr%5Ecopy%7Ctwcon%5E7090%7Ctwterm%5E3

"All hail and prosperity, in the Saka year 605, the eleventh day
In the month of Waisyaka, His Majesty boarded a boat
For an expedition (siddhayatra), on the seventh day
In the month of Jyestha, His Majesty set off from the estuary..."

Let me just say the Malay language at that time sounds a lot nicer than our modern version, in my opinion. But anyway, the text not only mentions the Saka calendar but also the months of Vaisakha and Jyestha

You might notice other Sanskrit astrological terms in the inscription like suklapaksa (waxing moon phase), saptami, and ekadasi. These are the numbered lunar days, which may coincide with particular festivals

For example, ekadashi is the eleventh lunar day. For many communities in India this is a day of fasting. Adherents consume only fruit, vegetables and milk from sunrise to sunset, abstaining from water, beans, grains, and obviously meat

The first lunar day is called prathama in Sanskrit, literally meaning "first" and the origin of our word pertama. I hardly need to mention the astrological origin of the word purnama

Along with Islam, Malays adopted the Islamic calendar. This wasn't a case of Arabisation; the calendar is necessary for Muslims to calculate particular occasions, like when to fast for Ramadan

But this doesn't mean all Muslims used the Islamic calendar strictly. The Javanese developed their own calendar which was influenced by its Islamic counterpart but incorporating the native 5 day week

As for Malaysia, the British noted that the Islamic calendar was used especially along the west coast. But the majority of Malays only estimated the year based on the fruit seasons and crops of rice

And here we have a clue to the native Malay calendrical system, because this was done by the farmers and lower classes who were less exposed to foreign traders

As noted by the colonists, Malays observed the lunar year of about 354 days. At first glance this might seem to be the Islamic calendar, but this isn't necessarily so

Any calendar based on the lunar phases will have this number of days, like the Balinese Saka calendar. The Chinese and Thai calendars are lunisolar, with years alternating in length from 353-355 days to 383-385 days

The calendrical systems of India have two aspects, the lunar and solar. Chaitra is the beginning of the lunar year, and Vaisakha the beginning of the solar year

This is of course the same Vaishakha as in the Panjabi new year Vaisakhi, and the Bengali new year Pohela Boishakh. The Buddhist holiday Wesak was also named after this month

The Thai new year is on the same day, Songkran deriving from the Sanskrit term Sankranti. This was traditionally celebrated by pouring water over Buddha statues and elders as a form of ritual purification, before it became the modern water fight

On the other hand the Balinese year begins in Chaitra, the day after Nyepi aka the Day of Silence. Indian communities who observe the lunar year celebrate it on the same day, such as the Marathis, Sindhis, and Manipuris

We can only guess what day Malays would have observed, but do remember that the 12 year cycle with each year represented by an animal is common to other parts of Southeast Asia, which suggests they were using a similar calendar

https://twitter.com/uglyluhan/status/1090874937198268416?ref_src=twcamp%5Ecopy%7Ctwsrc%5Eandroid%7Ctwgr%5Ecopy%7Ctwcon%5E7090%7Ctwterm%5E3

With the Islamic calendar on one hand, and the Gregorian calendar introduced by the Europeans, Malays haven't retained any native calendar into the present day. We don't know how they celebrated their new year, so looking at neighbouring countries is the closest we can get