Sanfotsi


Sanfotsi, also written as Sanfoqi, was a wealthy trading polity in Southeast Asia mentioned in Chinese sources dated from the Song dynasty circa 12th century. In 1918, George Cœdès concluded that Chinese forms of San-fo-ts'i, Fo-ts'i, Fo-che, Che-li-fo-che, which correspond to Arabic Sribuza and can be reconstructed as Śribhoja, are names referring to the Srivijaya empire, located in Palembang, South Sumatra, in present-day Indonesia.
According to Chinese sources, Sanfotsi was an empire that controlled many territories in the strait of Malacca, eastern Sumatra and the Malay peninsula. It was purportedly a large thalassocracy ruled by a high-king exercising sovereignty over several states that were dependencies of Sanfotsi. Although some considered Sanfotsi to refer to Palembang proper, recent scholars say its territorial extent was more vast.

Accounts

Sanfotsi as a state is recorded in many accounts, the majority of which are from Chinese sources such as the Chinese annals Chu-fan-chi written by Chau Ju-kua, and Ling-wai tai-ta by Chou K'u-fei. Excerpts here translated by Hirth and Rockhill:

''Chu-fan-chi''

''Ling-wai-tai-ta''

Interpretations

The established theory has concluded that Sanfotsi is identical to Srivijaya. Srivijaya was written in older Chinese sources as Shi-li-fo-shi which is an approximate phonetic rendering, but changed to San-fo-qi at the end of Tang Dynasty. San means "three" in Chinese, therefore the term can be read as "the three vijayas"; this has been suggested as Chinese recognition that it was not a centralized empire at some time in its history.
However, other historians tried to locate it somewhere else. Filipino historian Paul Kekai Manansala suggested that Sanfoqi refers to it was a Prehispanic Philippine state name Sambali. He argued that the accounts suggests that Sanfotsi was located to the south of China, and was, in fact, due south of the port of Ts'uan-chou. Since the Philippines is the only area exactly and directly due south of the port of Ts'uan-chou and has several place names such as Lingmayon and Poni that may fit some of the place names in the account, it therefore may fit the description.
Some Thai historians, such as Chand Chirayu Rajani, while agreeing with the designation of Sanfoqi with Srivijaya, argued that it refers to Chaiya in Thailand rather than Palembang.