The British had a terrible time spelling Peninsular Malaysian states, map from 1862 reveals

In 1862, the British had super weird pronunciations for Malaysian states.

Sept. 21, 2022

The British had a terrible time spelling Peninsular Malaysian states, map from 1862 reveals

160 years ago, the British had already overtaken large swaths of land in Peninsular Malaya. But they had faced one big problem: They had a tough time pronouncing names of locations.

A map of the Malayan Peninsula from 1862 compiled by T. Moniot, Britain's then Surveyor General of the Straits Settlements, reveals the sort of predicament the former colonialists faced.

In the survey map, created to illustrate the political relations of the British with the locals, names of states were literally.. butchered.

Map of Peninsular Malaya from 1862. Image sourced from National Archives of Singapore.

While many Malaysians know that Melaka and Johor were spelled Malacca and Johore respectively, the way the British spelled the names of the remaining states reveals a fascinating insight to a time long forgotten.

For context, here's how the current map of Peninsular Malaysia looks like (note the name of states and their borders).

We combed through the old map (which you can view at the National Archives of Singapore) to show you just how differently the names of these states were spelled.

Here's what Peninsular Malaysian states were called in 1862.

Queda = Kedah.

Tringanu = Terengganu.

Salangore = Selangor.

Rambow = Rembau.

Naning = Melaka.

Johore = Johor.

Only Perak and Pahang retained their original spellings.

That said, the map also reveals some interesting historical nuggets. For instance, the state of Perlis was nonexistent as it was part of Queda. Patany (or Pattani) is currently in Thailand. Perak's boundaries are much larger compared to 160 years ago.

On the other hand, Melaka was part of Naning, while Negeri Sembilan was called Rambow, by far the weirdest spelling for a location.