Abstract

This article examines the history of Singapore over the course of about five centuries from the founding of Temasek-Singapura at the end of the thirteenth century until the establishment of a British trading post in 1819. Contrary to the dominant historiographical tradition during the period of British imperialism, Singapore not was not an obscure place devoid of history before Raffles created a British base on the island. An attack in the late 1300s destroyed the existing settlement, but Singapore subsequently passed through at least three long-term up- and down-cycles, each lasting for a century or more. In the early nineteenth century a new economic up-cycle was underway, and the link to the British Empire provided a significant stimulus.

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