which recognizes that these localities are part of a
single whole. The only archaeological remains are a few Hindu temples,
and it is probable that the early settlement of the south-eastern
portion of the island by Hindus dates from some time during the first
six centuries of our era. There exist, however, no data, not even any
trustworthy tradition, from which to reconstruct the early history of
Borneo. Borneo began to be known to Europeans after the fall of Malacca
in 1511, when Alphonso d'Albuquerque despatched Antonio d'Abreu with
three ships in search of the Molucca or Spice Islands with instructions
to establish friendly relations with all the native states that he might
encounter on his way. D'Abreu, sailing in a south-easterly direction
from the Straits of Malacca, skirted the southern coast of Borneo and
laid up his ships at Amboyna, a small island near the south-western
extremity of Ceram. He returned to Malacca in 1514, leaving one of his
captains, Francisco Serrano, at Ternate, where Magellan's followers
found him in 1521. After Magellan's death, his comrades sailed from the
Moluccas across the Celebes into the Sulu Sea, and were the first white
men who are known to have visited Brunei on the north-west coast of
Borneo, where they arrived in 1522. Pigafetta gives an interesting
account of the place and of the reception of the adventurers by the
sultan. The Molucca Islands being, at that time, the principal objective
of European traders, and the route followed by Magellan's ships being
frequently used, Borneo was often touched at during the remainder of the
16th century, and trade relations with Brunei were successfully
established by the Portuguese. In 1573 the Spaniards tried somewhat
unsuccessfully to obtain a share of this commerce, but it was not until
1580, when a dethroned sultan appealed to them for assistance and by
their agency was restored to his own, that they attained their object.
Thereafter the Spaniards maintained a fitful intercourse with Brunei,
varied by not infrequent hostilities, and in 1645 a punitive expedition
on a larger scale than heretofore was sent to chastise Brunei for
persistent acts of piracy. No attempt at annexation followed upon this
action, commerce rather than territory being at this period the prime
object of both the Spaniards and the Portuguese, whose influence upon
the natives was accordingly proportionately small. The only effort at
proselytizing of which we have record