TINJAUAN TAMADUN CAM: SUATU TANTANGAN BARU

Abstract

The Kingdom of Champa was one of the oldest "Malay" Kingdoms in the Malay World. Throughout its known existence from the 2nd to 19th century AD, the Kingdom has left many heritages, which are proof of a very highly civilised nation. Various influences had penetrated into the lives of its people, influences from the Indian subcontinent, Hinduism and Buddhism; later the influence from the West Asia, namely the Islamic teachings. All these three main world religions form the basis of the Champa people way of life, mainly the Cham's. This paper tries to give the overview of the Cham civilisation which remains rooted in their ways of life until the present day. Through the acceptance of the three main world religions, historical documents such as the richness of its epigraphy, monuments, statuaries and later historical records on paper, manuscripts were found and preserved, though some were lost. The latest of the Champa documentations were in the form of dictionaries. The latest two dictionaries produced in 2010 were of great challenges to the compilators, be it in the Pallava or Arabic borrowed forms known as Jawi script.