Country or people · Self-governing peoples of Island Southeast Asia · as at first light, 1 January 1200

Clove islands

The five islands where the clove tree grows and nowhere else on earth: Ternate, Tidore, Moti, Makian and Bacan (board).

Every clove in Cairo, Venice, Baghdad and Hangzhou began under these five mountains, carried west by other people's ships (board). The islands grow little food and live by exchanging cloves for sago and rice brought across from Halmahera and from farther west. There is no king on 1 January 1200 that any source can name, no writing, no coinage and nothing built for defence; the Ternate king list begins by tradition about 1257 and the sultanate is of the late fifteenth century.

The later tradition of the four kingdoms (Ternate, Tidore, Bacan and Jailolo) is not read back.

Who holds it

Title
No overall chief shown for 1200: the village heads of each island (momole in the later tradition)
Since
not pinned
Born
not known
Family
not known
Confidence
low

Nothing is written about the rulers or headmen of this country for 1200. The structure is read from geography and from ethnography of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.

What it holds

  • The clove groves on the five cones
  • The village shelves
  • The sago and rice trade with Halmahera

Allies and rivals

The Ternate, Tidore, Makian and Bacan village heads (Ternate village heads, Tidore village heads, Makian heads, Bacan heads).

How things stand that morning

Not described for 1200; the villages are presumed to be farming, fishing and selling what the rivers and forests give.

Wealth

Cloves; no figures.

Military

Not known; boats, spears, shields and blowpipes in the later record. No numbers.

Threats

  • Feuds and raiding between villages
  • Flood, drought or fire
  • A change in the trade that comes by sea

Places of note

  • Ternate: The cone and its villages.
  • Tidore: The taller cone.
  • Moti: Small clove island (missing from the land mask).
  • Makian: The most dangerous cone.
  • Labuha (Bacan): Largest and southernmost island.

Where the sources disagree

  • The campaign board entry id ternate-and-tidore says no king can be named for 1 January 1200: we agree. Every date on the Ternate king list before about 1500 is traditional.

Evidence: The campaign board's statement of the spice's range and the Ternate tradition; nothing written for 1200.

"The campaign board" is OMNIA's working map. These notes record where its earlier claims were checked against the sources.

On the map: A rough outline of the people's country; the real extent of any village group in 1200 is not known, and nothing here is a border.

Sources and studies

  1. Wikipedia, 'Sultanate of Ternate' (read in this pass): the momole of the four villages, the 1257 start of the king list, all dates up to 1500 traditional
  2. The OMNIA board (September 2026) note for this place: a lead only, not a source
  3. Background knowledge of Southeast Asian history (Wolters; Hall; Bellwood; Scott; Junker; Reid), recalled and not re-read in this pass

Last revised 4 November 2026. Published 4 November 2026. Suggest a correction on the OMNIA Discord.