Chams

The Cham decorated their temples with stone reliefs depicting the gods such as garuda fighting the nāga (12th-13th century CE)

Like countless other political entities of Southeast Asia, the Champa principalities underwent the process of Indianization since the early common era as a result of centuries of socio-economic interaction adopted and introduced cultural and institutional elements of India. From the 8th century onward Muslims from such regions as Gujarat began to increasingly appear in trade and shipping of India. Islamic ideas became a part of the vast tide of exchange, treading the same path as Hinduism and Buddhism centuries before. Cham people picked up these ideas by the 11th century. This can be seen in the architecture of Cham temples, which shares similarities with the one of the Angkor Temples. Ad-Dimashqi writes in 1325, "the country of Champa... is inhabited by Muslims and idolaters. The Muslim religion came there during the time of Caliph Uthman... and Ali, many Muslims who were expelled by the Umayyads and by Hajjaj, fled there".

The Daoyi Zhilüe records that at Cham ports, Cham women were often married to Chinese merchants, who frequently came back to them after trading voyages.[18][19][20] A Chinese merchant from Quanzhou, Wang Yuanmao, traded extensively with Champa and married a Cham princess.[21]

In the 12th century, the Cham fought a series of wars with the Khmer Empire to the west. In 1177, the Cham and their allies launched an attack from the lake Tonlé Sap and managed to sack the Khmer capital of Angkor. In 1181, however, they were defeated by the Khmer King Jayavarman VII.

Depiction of Cham people in the Boxer Codex from 1590

Islam first arrived in Champa around the ninth century, however, it did not become significant among the Cham people until after the eleventh century.[22]

Cham who migrated to Sulu were Orang Dampuan.[23] Champa and Sulu engaged in commerce with each other which resulted in merchant Chams settling in Sulu where they were known as Orang Dampuan from the 10th-13th centuries. The Orang Dampuan were slaughtered by envious native Sulu Buranuns due to the wealth of the Orang Dampuan.[24] The Buranun were then subjected to retaliatory slaughter by the Orang Dampuan. Harmonious commerce between Sulu and the Orang Dampuan was later restored.[25] The Yakans were descendants of the Taguima-based Orang Dampuan who came to Sulu from Champa.[23] Sulu received civilization in its Indic form from the Orang Dampuan.[26]

A number of Cham also fled across the sea to the Malay Peninsula and as early as the 15th century, a Cham colony was established in Malacca. The Chams encountered Sunni Islam there as the Malacca Sultanate was officially Muslim since 1414. The King of Champa then became an ally of the Johor Sultanate; in 1594, Champa sent its military forces to fight alongside Johor against the Portuguese occupation of Malacca.[27] Between 1607 and 1676, one of the Champa kings converted to Islam and it became a dominant feature of Cham society. The Chams also adopted the Jawi alphabet.[28]

A Cham Muslim woman in Chau Doc, Vietnam

Historical records in Indonesia showed the influence of Queen Dwarawati, a Muslim princess from the kingdom of Champa, toward her husband, Kertawijaya, the Seventh King of Majapahit Empire, so that the royal family of the Majapahit Empire eventually converted to Islam, which finally led to the conversion to Islam of the entire region.[29][30][31] Chams Princess tomb can be found in Trowulan, the site of the capital of the Majapahit Empire.[32] In Babad Tanah Jawi, it is said that the king of Brawijaya V has a wife named Dewi Anarawati (or Dewi Dwarawati), a Muslim daughter of the King of Champa (Chams).[29][30][31] Chams had trade and close cultural ties with the maritime kingdom of Srivijaya, and Majapahit then in the Malay Archipelago.

Another significant figure from Champa in the history of Islam in Indonesia is Raden Rakhmat (Prince Rahmat) who's also known as Sunan Ampel, one of Wali Sanga (Nine Saints), who spread Islam in Java. He is considered as a focal point of the Wali Sanga, because several of them were actually his descendants and/or his students. His father is Maulana Malik Ibrahim also known as Ibrahim as-Samarkandy ("Ibrahim Asmarakandi" to Javanese ears), and his mother is Dewi Candrawulan, a princess of Champa (Chams) who's also the sister of Queen Dwarawati. Sunan Ampel was born in Champa in 1401 CE. He came to Java in 1443 CE, in order to visit his aunt Queen Dwarawati, a princess of Champa who married to Kertawijaya (Brawijaya V), the King of Majapahit Empire.[29][30][31] Local legend says that he built the Great Mosque of Demak (Masjid Agung Demak) in 1479 CE, but other legends attribute that work to Sunan Kalijaga. Sunan Ampel died in Demak in 1481 CE, but is buried in Ampel Mosque at Surabaya, East Java.[33]

Between the rise of the Khmer Empire around 800 and the Vietnamese's territorial push south from Jiaozhi and, later, Đại Việt, Champa began to shrink. At a disadvantage against Dai Viet's army of 300,000 troops, the Cham army of 100,000 were overwhelmed.[34] In the Cham–Vietnamese War (1471), Champa suffered serious defeats at the hands of the Vietnamese, in which 120,000 people were either captured or killed, and the kingdom was reduced to a small enclave near Nha Trang with many Chams fleeing to Cambodia.[35][27] Champa was no longer a threat to Vietnam, and some were even enslaved by their victors.[36]

The Cham were matrilineal and inheritance passed through the mother.[37] Because of this, in 1499 the Vietnamese enacted a law banning marriage between Cham women and Vietnamese men, regardless of class.[38](Tạ 1988, p. 137)[39][40][41] The Vietnamese also issued instructions in the capital to kill all Chams within the vicinity.[42] More attacks by the Vietnamese continued and in 1693 the Champa Kingdom's territory was integrated as part of Vietnamese territory.[35]

The trade in Vietnamese ceramics was damaged due to the plummet in trade by Cham merchants after the Vietnamese invasion.[43] Vietnam's export of ceramics was also damaged by its internal civil war, the Portuguese and Spanish entry into the region and the Portuguese conquest of Malacca which caused an upset in the trading system, while the carracks ships in the Malacca to Macao trade run by the Portuguese docked at Brunei due to good relations between the Portuguese and Brunei after the Chinese permitted Macao to be leased to the Portuguese.[44]

When the Ming dynasty in China fell, several thousand Chinese refugees fled south and extensively settled on Cham lands and in Cambodia.[45] Most of these Chinese were young males, and they took Cham women as wives. Their children identified more with Chinese culture. This migration occurred in the 17th and 18th centuries.[46]

Chams participated in defeating the Spanish invasion of Cambodia. Cambodian king Cau Bana Cand Ramadhipati, also known als 'Sultan Ibrahim', launched the Cambodian–Dutch War to expel the Dutch. The Vietnamese Nguyen Lords toppled Ibrahim from power to restore Buddhist rule.

In the 1700s and 1800s, Cambodian-based Chams settled in Bangkok.[47]

Further expansion by the Vietnamese in 1692 resulted in the total annexation of the Champa kingdom Panduranga and dissolution by the 19th century Vietnamese Emperor, Minh Mạng. In response, the last Cham Muslim king, Pô Chien, gathered his people in the hinterland and fled south to Cambodia, while those along the coast migrated to Trengganu (Malaysia). A small group fled northward to the Chinese island of Hainan where they are known today as the Utsuls. The king and his people who took refuge in Cambodia were scattered in communities across the Mekong Basin. Those who remained in the Nha Trang, Phan Rang, Phan Rí, and Phan Thiết provinces of central Vietnam were absorbed into the Vietnamese polity. Cham provinces were seized by the Nguyen Lords.[48]

After Vietnam invaded and conquered Champa, Cambodia granted refuge to Cham Muslims escaping from Vietnamese conquest.[49]

In 1832, the Vietnamese Emperor Minh Mang annexed the last Champa Kingdom. This resulted in the Cham Muslim leader Katip Sumat, who was educated in Kelantan, declaring a Jihad against the Vietnamese.[50][51][52][53] The Vietnamese coercively fed lizard and pig meat to Cham Muslims and cow meat to Cham Hindus against their will to punish them and assimilate them to Vietnamese culture.[54] The second revolt led by Ja Thak Wa, a Bani cleric, resulting in the establishment of a Cham resistance which lasted from 1834 to 1835 until it was bloody crushed by Minh Mang's forces in July 1835. Only 40,000 Cham remained in the old Panduranga territory in 1885.[55]

The Cham language is part of the Austronesian language family. Cham is very rich with many loan words and terminology influenced by many other languages it came into contact with. Most Cham speak the language though many also speak the dominant language of the nation they reside in like Vietnamese, Khmer, Malay and others. Some Cham can also speak and write Arabic.[22]

Cham is written in Eastern Cham script in Central Vietnam while the language is predominantly written in Jawi Arabic script around the Mekong Delta.[22] Western Cham script, used in Cambodia, is different enough from Eastern Cham's to be under review by the Unicode Consortium for inclusion as its own block — as of 2022, the character set is still being revised.[72]

The Kan Imam San sect, accounting for about 10% of the Cambodian Cham minority and mainly centered around a few villages in the Tralach District of Kampong Chhnang Province and their historic mosque atop Phnom Oudong, have kept the use of the Western Cham script, akhar srak, alive — with grants from the US embassy for about a decade starting in 2007, the written form of Western Cham has moved from the preserve of a few elders to being taught in close to 20 classrooms with thousands of students exposed to some degree, albeit limited.[73][74]

Almost all of the existing texts are housed at two Kan Imam San mosques in Kampong Tralach, primarily at the Au Russey mosque.[75]

The temples at Mỹ Sơn are one of the holiest of Cham sites

The first recorded religion of the Champa was a form of Shaiva Hinduism, brought by sea from India. Hinduism was the predominant religion among the Cham people until the sixteenth century. Numerous temples dedicated to Shiva were constructed in the central part of what is now Vietnam. The jewel of such temple is Mỹ Sơn. It is often compared with other historical temple complexes in Southeast Asia, such as Borobudur of Java in Indonesia, Angkor Wat of Cambodia, Bagan of Myanmar and Ayutthaya of Thailand. As of 1999, Mỹ Sơn has been recognised by UNESCO as a world heritage site.

Religiously and culturally, the Chams were grouped into two major religio-cultural groups; the Balamon Chams that adhere to an indigenized form of Hinduism, and Cham Bani that adhere to an indigenized form of Shi'a Islam. The term "Balamon" derived from "Brahman" or "Brahmin", one of Hindu caste of religious elite. The term "Bani" on the other hand is derived from Arabic term "bani" (بني) which means "people". Balamon Chams adhere to the old religion of their ancestor, an indigenized form of Hinduism that thrived since the ancient era of Kingdom of Champa in 5th century AD, whereas Cham Bani are adherents of a localized version of Shi'a Islam, including a minor element of Sufism, endured with Hindu-Chamic customs as early as around the 11th–13th century. However, it was not until 17th century that Islam began to attract large numbers of Chams, when some members of the Cham royalty converted to Islam. These two groups mostly live in separate villages. Intermarriage was prohibited in former times, and remains rare even nowadays. Both groups are matrilineal and conform to matrilocal residence practice.[76]

A mosque in Da Phuoc village, An Phu district, An Giang province.

Inside Cham temple in Nha Trang

As Muslim merchants of Arab and of Persian origin stopped along the Vietnam coast en route to China, Islam began to influence Cham civilization. The exact date that Islam came to Champa is unknown; however, the religion first arrived around the ninth century.[22] It is generally assumed that Islam came to mainland Southeast Asia much later than its arrival in China during the Tang dynasty (618–907) and that Arab traders in the region came into direct contact only with the Cham and not others. Islam began making headway among the Chams beginning in the eleventh century. The version of Islam practiced by the Vietnamese Chams in Central Vietnam is often called Bani which contains many pre-Islamic beliefs and rituals such as magic, spirit worship, and propitiation of the souls of former kings, something mistaken to Hinduism. Cambodian and Southern Vietnamese Cham Muslims practice Sunni Islam though it has many indigenous, magical and Buddhist elements to it; while some practice a more centralized form of Sunni Islam and some reformist movements like Salafism can also be found.[22]

Bani Islam is the syncretic form of Shi'a Islam (including minor influences from Sunni and Sufism teaching) that blends indigenous cultural beliefs that ate practiced by the Cham Bani, who predominantly live in Vietnam's Bình Thuận and Ninh Thuận Provinces, and is considered unorthodox from mainstream Islam.[77]

The Cham Bani worship in mosques which are where the main communal setting for prayers and religious rituals take place among the Bani Cham[77] They also celebrate the month of Ramuwan (Ramadan), during which they pray to Allah for their deceased ancestors in the hereafter and pray for good fortune in the lives, and the acar (Imams) stay at the thang magik (Mosques) for one month and pray to God the practice is known as Iʿtikāf. In general, the Bani Muslims are not willing to identify themselves as Shi'a or even Muslims, but as Bani Muslims instead.[77]

However, a small band of Chams, who called themselves Kaum Jumaat, follow a localized adaptation of Islamic theology, according to which they pray only on Fridays and celebrate Ramadan for only three days. Some members of this group have joined the larger Muslim Cham community in their practices of Islam in recent years. One of the factors for this change is the influence by members of their family who have gone abroad to study Islam.

The approximately 10,000 Cham Hindus, called Balamon Cham or Balamon Hindu,[78] do not have a caste system, although previously they may have been divided between the Nagavamshi Kshatriya[79] and the Brahmin castes, the latter of which would have represented a small minority of the population.[80]

Hindu temples are known as Bimong in Cham language, but are commonly referred to as tháp "stupa", in Vietnamese. The priests are divided into three levels, where the highest rank are known as Po Adhia or Po Sá, followed by Po Tapáh and the junior priests Po Paséh. Although their religion is usually dubbed as "Hindu", they do not worship any Hindu god. By the 17th century, due to pressures from king Po Rome, the Ahier (Balamon) were forced to accept Allah as the most supreme God while retaining the worships of other Balamon deities in their faiths. In Ninh Thuận, where many of the Cham in Vietnam reside, Cham Ahier (Cham Balamon) number 7,000 while Cham Bani (Muslim Cham) number close to 64,000. Out of the 34 Cham villages in Ninh Thuận, 6 are Balamon Hindu, while 28 are Bani or Muslim.[81] In Binh Thuan province, Balamon number close to 3,000 and Bani Cham around 32,000. There are four pure Cham villages and nine mixed villages in Bình Thuận Province.[82] The Hinduism practiced by these Cham also has many elements of indigenous beliefs like the inclusion of Po Inu Nagar, a mother goddess figure.[22]

The majority of Hindu Chams in Vietnam (also known as the Eastern Chams) are syncretic Ahiér Hindu and Bani Muslims and they mostly live in Central Vietnam, while Southern Vietnam's Chams and their Cambodian counterparts are largely Sunni Muslim, as Islamic conversion happened relatively late.[83][84] A smaller number of the Eastern Cham also follow Mahayana Buddhism. A number emigrated to France in the late 1960s during the Vietnam War. In the Mekong Delta, the Sunni community (which mainly Chams) has a population of around 25,000 in 2006.[77]

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