ABSTRACT
This chapter presents the poem Sjair Perang Mengkasar by Macassar Malay, which describes the successful war of the Dutch against Macassar. The manuscript of the original poem is no longer available, but it is deduced that it must have been written between July 1669 and June 1670 and people learn from a comment in the poem itself that it was recorded on Chinese paper. The chapter explains the second manuscript, in SOAS Library, gives the bulk of the poem. Dr. Skinner notes that it was probably copied in Sumatra, but leaves the dating of the copy within very wide limits, the latter part of the 18th century. The manuscript belongs to the Marsden collection and it is written on European watermarked paper. This does not automatically bring the terminus ad quern forward from 1811.
