John N. Miksic
Singapore: NUS Press, 2013
ISBN: 9789971695583
Temasik, an early name for Singapore, is the first settlement in Southeast Asia mentioned in a historical source, an account prepared in 1349. Situated at the southern end of the Straits of Melaka, Temasik was a logical stopping-off point between east and west for sailing ships, which could not travel through from India to China in a single monsoon. Archaeological research in Singapore has confirmed that a 14th-century settlement existed near the mouth of the Singapore River, and excavations there have recovered large quantities of local and imported artefacts. Thanks to twenty-five years of archaeological research, combined with written accounts, scholars can reconstruct the 14th-century port of Singapore in greater detail than is possible for any other early Southeast Asian city.
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