The Laguna Copper Plate Inscription

The Laguna Copper Plate

Inscription
"Long Live! Year of Siyaka 822, month of
Waisaka according to astronomy. The fourth
day of the waning moon, Monday. On this
occasion, Lady Angkatan, and her brother
whose name is Buka, the children of the
Honourable Namwaran, were awarded a
document of complete pardon from the
Commander in Chief of Tundun, represented
by the Lord Minister of Pailah, Jayadewa.
"By this order, through the scribe, the Honourable
Namwaran has been forgiven of all and is released from
his debts and arrears of 1 katî and 8 suwarna before the
Honourable Lord Minister of Puliran, Ka Sumuran by the
authority of the Lord Minister of Pailah.

"Because of his faithful service as a subject of the Chief,

the Honourable and widely renowned Lord Minister of
Binwangan recognized all the living relatives of
Namwaran who were claimed by the Chief of Dewata,
represented by the Chief of Medang.
"Yes, therefore the living descendants of the
Honourable Namwaran are forgiven, indeed,
of any and all debts of the Honourable
Namwaran to the Chief of Dewata.
"This, in any case, shall declare to whomever

henceforth that on some future day should
there be a man who claims that no release
from the debt of the Honourable …"
—1994 translation by Paul Morrow
The earliest known evidence for written
literature in the history of the Philippines, the
Laguna Copperplate Inscription is
a sheet of copper metal with ancient writing di
scovered in the province of Laguna
in 1989. It was found by a dredger working
near the mouth of the Lumbang River
emptying out into Laguna de Bay.
From there the plate made its way to the National
Museum of the Philippines, where the Dutch
anthropologist Antoon Postma recognised the writing
on the plate as being akin to Kawi, an ancient Javanese
script. This allowed him to translate the text on the
plate, the findings of which he published in 1992. One
of the findings was that—luckily—it was very
explicitly dated to the 21st of April, 900 C.E.. The text
was hammered out onto the copper sheet in Old Kawi
script, but the language appears to be in Old Malay,
with substantial elements of Sanskrit, Old Javanese
and Old Tagalog mixed in, making the entirety sound
like an early case of code-switching.
The document is essentially a royal debt
pardon, issued by the Kingdom of Tondo
("Tundun"), officially releasing the heirs of the
late Namwaran from a debt in gold amounting
to a rough equivalent of 926 grams.
To this day, the copperplate remains as part of
the permanent exhibit of the
National Museum of Anthropology , a
subdivision of the National Museum Complex
in the City of Manila.
Relevant Tropes
East Indies: The pre-Philippine cultures suggested and
mentioned in the plate paint a picture similar to the rest of
the precolonial kingdoms across maritime Southeast Asia.
Even Evil Has Standards / Everyone Has Standards: There
is no context in the plate to suggest that the ruler of Tondo
could be considered anything like "evil", but at least he
doesn't force Namwaran's children to pay their now dead
father's debts.
Evil Debt Collector: Averted with the chief of Tondo, who
magnanimously forgives the late Namwaran's debts by not
passing them on to his family, although the plate doesn't
specify how Namwaran got into debt in the first place (and
whether his creditors didn't try to pursue him in life).
The Good Kingdom: Tondo, based on the north
bank of the Pasig River delta, where it empties
into Manila Bay. Today it survives as a mere
electoral district of the city of Manilanote —and is
both a poverty-stricken Wretched Hive and a
notorious Gangster Land to boot.
How the Mighty Have Fallen, indeed.
◦ Still, Tondo was by no means the most powerful entity
mentioned by name, as its leader invokes the authority
of successively higher rulers across the region,
suspected either to be elsewhere in Luzon, the Visayas
to the south, or as far south as Java and Medang.
The Low Middle Ages: Quite fortunately, the
copperplate was inscribed with a very specific date, as
though it were time-stamped. The date reads: "Year
822 of the Shaka Era, month of Waisakha, the fourth
day of the waning moon, Monday." In the modern
Gregorian calendar this corresponds to the 21st of
April, 900 C.E., making this trope the equivalent time
period (in Europe and the Arab/Islamic world).
Mundane Made Awesome: Ancient documents like this
are often expected to contain things like epic poetry or
references to mythology or high culture, but the LCI is
basically just a government debt-relief letter.
No Ending: The plate is cut off where it decrees
some sort of warning against anyone who would
try to contest the pardon, and the implied penalty
(whether a legal penalty or threat of supernatural
judgement) is unknown. This implies that other
copperplates were used to write the whole
document, but these have never been found.
Older Than Print: Created at the start of the 10th
century, the plate is older than either Gutenberg's
printing press (1400s) or its moveable-type
antecedents in China (1100s) or Korea (1300s).
Pet the Dog: The Tondo chieftain's act of
cancelling Namwaran's unpaid debts so his
heirs need not pay them.
Posthumous Character: Namwaran. The plate
releases his children from the debt he incurred
in his lifetime.
Reasonable Authority Figure: The chief of
Tondo comes off as this with his act of debt
forgiveness, especially if Namwaran's family
would have likely found it difficult to pay off
his debts otherwise.

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The Laguna Copper Plate

"Because of his faithful service as a subject of the Chief,

"This, in any case, shall declare to whomever

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