Brunei on the Morrow of Independence
Background In the 16th century, Brunei's hegemony extended from Manila on the north to some indeterminate area of south Borneo. Spain and a resurgent kingdom of Sulu reduced Brunei dominion in the north; unknown events limited Brunei control to the southern boundary of present-day Sarawak by the 19th century, when European and American adventurers carved Sarawak and Sabah, now parts of Malaysia, from Brunei's remainder. In 1888 Britain established a loose umbrella of protection and control over Brunei, Sarawak, and Sabah, but in 1890 Charles Brooke, Raja of Sarawak, seized the last remaining large district of Brunei, the Limbang. Britain ultimately approved the seizure-though it divided Brunei into two geographically separate parts. In 1906 a Britsh Resident was established in Brunei. Britain hoped to reunite Brunei's former parts, but nothing came of those plans. In 1929 oil was discovered and the state became viable.
Brunei in 1984: Business as Usual after the Gala
Brunei's celebration of full independence after 96 years of British protection came several weeks after the fact, on the occasion of the first National Day declared as February 23, 1984.1 While some attributed the delay to the selection of an auspicious date for the event, such practical considerations as the need to largely finish interior work on the new palace and for bureaucrats inexperienced in international affairs to complete arrangements for the gala celebration should not be discounted. The formalities of British protection ended at midnight on December 31, 1983, and on January 1, 1984, Brunei (officially Negara Bruenei Darussalam) assumed full responsibility for its defense and foreign relations, having gained internal self-government in 1959. A week later, on January 7, at a foreign ministers' meeting in Jakarta, Brunei's application to join the Association for Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) was approved, bringing membership in ASEAN to six nations. For the first time since the aborted 1962 revolt, Brunei caught the world's attention with its independence and particularly the National Day celebration. Media focused largely on the extravagance of one of the world's richest nations, leading to such headlines as "Immense Palace for Tiny Borneo Sultanate," "In Sad To-do Did Brunei Man a Stately Pleasure Dome Decree," and "If You've Got It, Flaunt It. "2 Center of attention was the Sultan's 1,778 room palace which covers fifty acres, built at a cost variously reported as between $300 million and
The Provincial Centre at Camulodunum: Towards an Historical Context
Present assessment of the provincial enclosure at Camulodunum, more particularly how far it can be compared to the standard picture of similar centres elsewhere, is inevitably constrained by the limited evidence at our disposal. With no numismatic sources to draw on and in the absence of a single record of the provincial priesthood — a striking void that calls for comment — documentary testimony is restricted to what can be made of two passages in the literary authorities. The first, a notorious sneer in Seneca's Apocolocyntosis (VIII.3), tells only that a temple of some sort was associated somehow with the emperor Claudius. The second text, an obscure allusion in Tacitus, is at first sight no more enlightening but, on closer analysis, the phrase templum Divo Claudio constitutum (Ann. xiv.31) yields the invaluable inference that the temple was to the deified, not the living Claudius; in which case construction must have been begun in a.d. 54 or later. Archaeological data throw no light on the origins of the temple or of the precinct in which it stood but exploration has steadily enlarged our knowledge of the site itself, and understanding of the remains has now reached the stage at which, for all its puzzling lacunae, the centre is as well known in some ways as the triple-tiered complex at Tarraco, the provincial enclave of Hispania Citerior. We have arrived at the point where the British sanctuary and its counterparts on the Continent can be mutually illuminating.