The head-stone is worth deciphering, because it is so far as is known the only extant stone of the tombs of the Sultans of Malacca and secondly because Mansur Shah played a great part in Malay and Chinese records.
By the help of the casts I was able to decipher the inscriptions and by reconstructing a pair of damaged words to get an absolutely certain reading of the names and of the date. Only the first line presented difficulties but by the help of my friend R. A. Dr. Husein Jaya-diningrat a reading in my opinion satisfactory was secured,. so that all the words on that line with the first word of the second line duly accounted for are meant to glorify not the Sultan as in Hervey's version but the grave. Major J. C. Moulton kindly sent me at my request photos of all four sides of the stone which is now placed on a cement pedestal for its better preservation. I give my reconstruction for each side on the accompanying plates so that any one more competent than I may express his views on it.
The reading is as follows: (Plate I. obverse):
هذه الروضة المقدسة المطهرة الزاوية الصافية المنورة السطان العادل الملك الباذل السلطا (ن) منوصو (ر) شاه بن مظفر شاه المرحوم
Plate II (Reverse) reads:-
قد انتقل من دار المحال الي دار امال يوم الاربعا من رجب سنة ثنتين وثمانين وثمانماية من ال (هجرة) النبو (ية) ال (مصطفوية)
Compared with the Hervey version it thus reads: Hadzihi al-raudzat al-mukaddasat al-mutahharat al-zawiyat ol-safiyat al-munawwarat lil Sultan al-adil al-badzil al-Sultan Mansur Shah bin Muzaffar Shah al-marhum kad intakala min dar al-mahal ila dar amal yaum al-arbaa min Rajab sanat thanatein wa thamanin wa thaman mi'ah min al-IIijrah al-Nubawyah al-mustafawyah
Or translated
"This is the consecrated the holy grave the brilliant illumin- ated tomb of the just Sultan, the magnanimous ruler Sultan Man- sur Shah son of the deceased Muzaffar Shah. He removed from this mortal abode to the abode of hope on Wednesday of Rajab in the year 882 after the Hijrah of the Prophet, the Chosen One."
As my reading of the gravestone differs in many places from
that of Hervey, I must add an explanation of some details. The
difference in my conception of the words of the first line is great
and I take it that mim has been broken off in the middle words, and
read (
Arabic characters) ((Arabic characters) stands in the lower corner), but the reading is
of little or no consequence since, once we know who the person en-
tombed is, it matters relatively little if one takes a word to be in
praise of the grave or of the dead. However the correct reading
of the bottom line on Plate I is of very great importance for the
