Ong Sum Ping in Chinese Sources
Ong Sum Ping lived in Brunei. He established a trading post and a Chinese settlement called Wicaya (from the Sanskrit meaning victory?) on or near the Kinabatangan River. He supported Sultan Muhammad Shah as the ruler, but he was never the ruler of Brunei. However, being an important person in Wicaya, he and his Chinese followers called him Raja or King. Having two entities in North Borneo, the Chinese of Wicaya and the Malay kingdom of Sultan Mohammed Shah, he assisted the Malays in every way he could, including marrying into the Brunei royal family. He returned to China under the title of “King of Borneo”, where he died and was buried. His son returned to Wicaya and assumed the title of King of that small entity. However, there was no established name, organisation or lineage of Wicaya. The Kingdom of Brunei and the trade settlement of Wicaya existed side by side. They worked together to defend both Wicaya and the Sultanate from the Sulu and Java threats.
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Ong Sum Ping (Huang Sen Ping 王森平 ), who was rumoured to be Han, immigrated to Borneo during the early Ming 1368-1644. There are many rumours about him in Chinese sources.
Rumour One from The Official History of the Ming Dynasty 《明史》
The Sultan of Brunei (Sultan Muhammad Shah) gave his daughter, Princess Ratnati Wei (Puteri Ratna Dewi), in marriage to Ong Sum Ping. This was a popular rumour in China at the time.
Rumour Two from Johannes Kurz, “Making History in Borneo: Ong Sum Ping and his Others during the Late Yuan and Early Ming dynasties.
Kurtz does not believe that the Brunei Royal family has any Chinese ancestry. Several books and articles are misunderstood regarding Brunei’s history and have been falsely distributed.
Rumour Three From The Official History of the Ming Dynasty 《明史》
Borneo established relations with China from the Song Dynasty Emperor Taizong period (reigned 960-976). In August of the third year of Emperor Hongwu of Ming (1371), the emperor ordered Censor Zhang Jingzhi 張敬之and the Supervisor of Fujian Province Shen Zhi沈秩 to visit the place. Sailing from Quanzhou, they arrived in Dupo 闍婆 ( Java) after half a year, and then took another month to reach the country. (Brunei?) Its King,(Sultan) Muhammad Shah, was arrogant and impolite. They reproached him, and then they began to sit down and received the Imperial Edict (bestowed gifts and formal recognition). At that time, his country was invaded by the Sulu (today’s southern regions of the Philippines), and was depleted in resources. The king resigned in poverty (which king?), so he asked to send his tributes three years hence. The Order from the emperor said: ‘Dupo(Java) has long been a vassal state to us, and the Borneo King (Ong Sum Ping) is afraid of Dupo but is not afraid of the Heavenly Dynasty (China).
Thus, the country is to send an envoy to send their tribute, including a crane, tortoise shell, peacock, Borneo camphor (commonly known as long brain in Chinese medicine), rice camphor, Western cloth, and incense. (This must be the tribute Brunei sent to China for the “Imperial Edict”.)
In August, the Borneo contingent visited the court with Zhang Jingzhi and others. The Imperial chart (a document from the Emperor which recognises Brunei as a nation) is made of gold, the letter is made of silver, and the words are close to Uyghur (a language used in north China), all of which are engraved in advance. The emperor is happy, and the banquet is very rich. In the eighth year (1375), the mountains and rivers of his country were enshrined with the mountains and rivers of Fujian.”
It can be seen that the relationship between the Ming Dynasty and Borneo in the early Ming Dynasty was still speculative: on the one hand, Borneo was relatively poor, and on the other hand, it was threatened by many enemies, and there were no extra resources to meet the requests of the Chinese Empire. It was not until the Emperor Yongle period (1402-1424) during the Ming Dynasty that the national strength of Borneo was stabilised.
Rumour Four
From Carnegie, Paul J., Is the Indonesian Transition a Model for the Arab Spring? Working Paper No. 7. Gadong: Institute of Asian Studies, Universiti Brunei Darussalam 2013
There is a misunderstanding in the translation of the visit of the Sultan of Brunei to China. In fact, Ong was not the Sultan of Borneo. When Ong Sum Ping went to China, he named himself the “king”. But the Ming government mistakenly thought that he was the Sultan and treated him with royal courtesy, and buried him with royal rites in Nanjing after his death there and bestowed Ong’s son with the title of King of Borneo, king of the small trading post.
Rumour Five
From Veritable Records of the Ming Dynasty 明實錄 (compiled by each of the emperors of the Ming Dynasty, 1368-1644) and the Official History of the Ming Dynasty 明史 (compiled in the early Qing Dynasty, 1644-1911).
There are views in China that Sultan Ahmed is Ong Sum Ping. Another rumour is that after Ahmad’s (Ong Sum Ping) death, his daughter succeeded to the throne as the Queen of Borneo.
After Ong Sum Ping’s death, Emperor Yongle ordered Hu Guang 胡廣（1369-1418) to write an epitaph for Ong Sum Ping. No mention of Ong Sun Ping being Sultan of Brunei or of his daughter being queen was made.
The author then divides his essay into four claims.
Claim One
Ong Sun Ping is considered a traitor of China.
Hussainmiya, B.A. and Asbol Haji Mail, “No Federation Please-We Are Bruneians”: Scuttling the Northern Borneo Closer Association Proposals. Working Paper No.11. Gadong: Institute of Asian Studies, Universiti Brunei Darussalam 2014.
The Chinese source says: “Four hundred years ago, the Chinese traitor was originally a general soldier of the Ming Dynasty, but the government established a new regime in the Ming Dynasty’s vassal state of Borneo, became one of the founders of the new Asian country, and was buried in his homeland after his death.
According to the data, at the end of the Yuan Dynasty( 1271-1368) and the beginning of the Ming Dynasty( 1368-1644), the Japanese attacked China and parts of Borneo. A warrior named Huang Yuanshou 黃元壽 cleared the areas of Japanese in the Senping Beach (reef?) area, which was located off of Brunei. The Emperor was so pleased that he gave Huang the name “Senping” 森平.
Senping then led a delegation to promote Chinese in Southeast Asia. However, when Huang Senping and his entourage were about to make landfall at the mouth of a large river in East Kalimantan, they unfortunately crashed, most of them died, and the rest of them were seriously injured. It was feared the emperor would severely punish them if they returned. Huang Senping simply stayed in the local area and worked with the surviving Chinese to expand his own independent regime.
It was said that at that time, the area where Huang Senping and his party were located was in the northern part of Borneo. The country was weakened and was often called upon to pay tribute to Indonesia in the south, and to the Sultanate of Sulu in the east, which is now in the Philippines. At the time of the change of power in Borneo, the newly succeeded king, Sultan Muhammad Shah, was ambitious and asked for assistance from Ong Sum Ping, aka Huang Senping and the Chinese led by him, in addition to rewarding Ong Sum Ping, aka Huang Senping, with the title of “Maharaja Lela.”
The Sultan even married his daughter to Ong Sum Ping, and let his younger brother Ahmad marry Ong Sum Ping’s sister Ong Yuan Li 王元麗. Two regimes of different nationalities and unrelated to each other became close allies because of the marital association between the rulers. Over the next 30 years, the Chinese forces led by Ong Sum Ping fought valiantly to contain the influence of the Sulu Sultanate, and then expanded from the river region to the northern coastal areas, establishing a series of towns with Chinese characteristics, including Kota Kinabalu.
In 1402, Sultan Muhammad Shah died and was succeeded by his son Hassan. Ong was said to have served as “regent” with the elder brother(Hassan?) of Sultan Muhammad Shah. Sultan Hassan died in 1408, and after a brief dispute, with the support of Ong, was succeeded by Sultan Ahmad.
The idea of one returning to his homeland, to the place of one’s birth, is often referred to in the Chinese idiom”落叶归根 (luò yè guī gēn), literally “fallen leaves return to their roots” and figuratively “to return to one’s native place / to die where one was born.”
Two years after Sultan Ahmad took power, Ong Sum Ping left his sister in Borneo and then led more than 150 of his followers back to China to pay tribute. At this time, it was the Emperor Yongle(reign 1402-1424) period of the Ming Dynasty. Emperor Yongle was very happy when he saw Ong Sum Ping, and especially allowed Ong Sum Ping and his entourage to enter Beijing. The emperor also set up banquets in all prefectures and counties along the way. However, after a long journey and at the advanced age of 67, Ong Sum Ping died suddenly in joy before he could fully appreciate the changes in his hometown in his later years.
Claim Two
One of the founders of the State of Brunei
It is said that Ong Sum Ping (1339-1408), whose original name was Huang Yuan Shou黃元壽, was born in the Xichunpu熙春鋪 City, Quanzhou, Fujian Province. Because of Huang’s outstanding achievements in the fight against the Japanese at Senping 森平Beach(reef?) in the South China Sea, Zhu Yuan Zhang, Emperor Hong Wu of the Ming Dynasty, gave him the name Huang Senping, and he served as the envoy to Borneo.
Huang Senping and his Chinese compatriots were famous in the local area. The people of Borneo refer to Huang as “Raja”, which means king, in their custom, while the Chinese call him “Army General” or Chief of Army縂兵 according to the Chinese name. It can be seen that Huang established an independent Chinese regime and a strong military force in East Kalimantan.
At that time, the area north of the Broken Hand River (refer to Kinabatangan River, in today’s Sabah) was controlled by Indonesia in the south, to which tribute was often demanded, and to the east by the Sulu Sultanate in the southern Philippines. The newly enthroned Sultan (Muhammad Shah) appealed to the Chinese forces led by Huang Senping for help and married his daughter to Huang Senping. He also gave him the title of Maharaja Lela (roughly equivalent to the “King of the Side-by-Side” in Chinese)
The Sultan also had his younger brother Ahmad marry Huang Senping’s sister, Yuen Lai and gave her the title of Puteri Kinabatangan. The two regimes formed a close alliance due to the marriage relationship between the rulers. Under the hard work of Huang Senping and the Chinese army, the invasion was contained, and the Borneo kingdom avoided destruction.
When Ong Sum Peng, aka Huang Senping, returned to China and knowing of his impending death, he requested the Emperor to include Borneo in the Chinese territories, the mountain at Kota Kinabalu as the “town mountain”, and that he wanted to be buried in China.
Claim Three
Chinese descendant who went overseas to establish political power
This person’s name is Huang Senping, formerly known as Huang Yuanshou. He helped establish the Ming dynasty after the overthrow of the Yuan. At that time, there was a country in Southeast Asia called Borneo, which was small and weak, and was victimised by neighbouring countries such as Indonesia and the Sulu. The Borneo Kingdom was overwhelmed, so it specially prepared an official letter to the powerful Ming Empire, hoping that the latter could help them defend themselves against foreign invaders.
Huang Senping was sent to Borneo and married into the Brunei Royal family. Huang Senping led the Chinese army and united the army of Borneo. With his outstanding military ability, Huang Senping and Borneo won a great victory, and Sulu was defeated. Indonesia no longer dared to make a mistake, and Borneo was peaceful for a long time. The king of Borneo personally named Huang Senping as the “king side by side”, and enjoyed a lofty status under one person and above ten thousand people in the country of Borneo.
It is recorded that during the decades of his time in Borneo, Huang Senping built many Chinese towns in the area, and the Chinese influence grew. After the death of the Sultan, Huang Senping became the regent of the Borneo kingdom. Later, he returned to China and led his family to meet the Yongle Emperor at that time, and according to the Official History of the Ming Dynasty, Huang Senping called himself the King of Manajajana. (AI doesn’t know where Manajajana is)
Claim 4: A Chinese general who fled to Brunei
Ong Sum Ping was an army general. The provisions he guarded were lost in battle. He fled to Nan Yang with his soldiers and sister and then sailed to the mouth of a large river in the east of Kalimantan Island. There was a shipwreck, and someone broke his arm. The natives who later moved there called the river “Broken Hand River”, that is, the river where the Chinese severed their hands. Huang Senping’s soldiers stayed and built a settlement there, which developed rapidly. The Chinese spread from the Broken Hand River valley in the east to the northern coast, and successively established many Chinese settlements there. Ong’s prestige was also immense, with the natives customarily calling him “Laja” (king) and the Chinese customarily calling him “Commander-in-Chief”. At that time, Borneo to the north was harassed by the Sulu state, and the Sultan asked Ong Sum Ping for assistance. He also married his daughter to Ong, and his younger brother Ahmad also married Ong’s sister. Ong Sum Ping was given the title of Maharajah Lela. The record goes on to say that his daughters became the queens of Brunei. The author claims that it is not true.
The author’s reflection:
Ong Sum Ping is a real figure in history. In the lineage (Silsilah) of the Brunei royal family, there is indeed the name of Ong Sum Ping.
The four claims mentioned above are all from Chinese website sources. They all point to the fact that Ong Sum Ping was born in China and died in China. The claims shared many of the background as well as the speculations of Ong Sum Ping’s role in Brunei’s history.
What is not debatable is that the one who was buried in Nanjing, China, was not the Sultan of Brunei nor a Bruneian but a Chinese named Ong Sum Ping. We may say that Ong Sum Ping had contributed to defending the country from invasion, but it is wishful thinking that Ong Sum Ping had helped to build Brunei. Brunei was there before Ong Sum Ping.
From:
Lee Cheuk Yin, Ong Sum Ping and the Early History of Borneo in Chinese Sources Universiti Brunei Darussalam Working Paper No. 86
Institute of Asian Studies, Universiti Brunei Darussalam, Gadong 2025