BINTAN ISLAND a beautiful island of Riau archipelago.
Bintan Island first became politically important when Sultan Mahmud of the fallen Sultanate of Malacca fled to Bintan and created a resistance base there after Malacca was taken by the Portuguese forces in 1511. The Portuguese eventually destroyed the stronghold in 1526, and after a few years the Sultanate founded a new capital back on the Malay Peninsula and developed from there.
Bintan was also once the capital of the Sultanate of Johor that grew to considerable political and cultural power from the 17th to the 19th century. The island played a central role in Malay culture.
At the beginning of 18th century the Sultanate of Johor entered into political turmoil and the capital moved back to Bintan as the Bugis took control of the sultanate. In the hands of the Bugis, Bintan became a powerful trading port, attracting regional, Western, Indian and Chinese traders as well as migrants including Chinese much in the same way Malacca developed into a regional power three centuries earlier.
The success of the port caught the attention of the European powers. The British, who controlled Penang, were looking for a new settlement further to the south of the Straits of Malacca that would contain the Dutch expnsions and considered Bintan as a possible location.
he Dutch, however, no longer accepted the competition from Bintan and attacked and took control of the island at the end of the 18th century, bringing to an end its local trading supremacy and delaying the British arrival in the area for a few years until the internal power struggle within the sultanate of Riau-Johor offered them the opportunity to take control of the island of Singapore.
The island declined as a trading port but grew as a cultural center as a new palace on Penyengat Island developed into the stronghold of Malay and Islamic culture.
PENYENGAT ISLAND
Penyengat island is located west side Tanjung Pinang and can be reached about 10 minutes with the sampan or pongpong from Tanjung Pinang.
The old culture on the island was Penyengat leading and powerful in the Indonesian history.
Penyengat Island was the seat of the Malay Kingdom and it is famous for its viceroys of Riau during the 18th Century conflict period, Penyengat still bears the traces of their famous and mystical past. The ruins that have been abandoned almost 70 years, recently restored.
The old ruler of the royal palace and tombs, including the grave of Sultan Haji respected, may have been, creater and author of the first Malay language grammar, are among the legacies left by the Riau Sultanate. Still in use is the old vice-royal mosque, the Mesjid Raya.
Some electronic books in the Indonesian tourist guide you can
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