Southeast Asia is the geographical south-eastern region of Asia, consisting of the regions that are situated south of China, east of the Indian subcontinent, and north-west of mainland Australia which is part of Oceania. Southeast Asia is bordered to the north by East Asia, to the west by South Asia and the Bay of Bengal, to the east by Oceania and the Pacific Ocean, and to the south by Australia and the Indian Ocean. Apart from the British Indian Ocean Territory and two out of 26 atolls of Maldives in South Asia, Maritime Southeast Asia is the only other subregion of Asia that lies partly within the Southern Hemisphere. Mainland Southeast Asia is entirely in the Northern Hemisphere. East Timor and the southern portion of Indonesia are the parts of Southeast Asia that lie south of the Equator.
The history of Southeast Asia covers the people of Southeast Asia from prehistory to the present in two distinct sub-regions: Mainland Southeast Asia and Maritime Southeast Asia. Mainland Southeast Asia comprises Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar, Peninsular Malaysia, Thailand and Vietnam whereas Maritime Southeast Asia comprises Brunei, Cocos (Keeling) Islands, Christmas Island, East Malaysia, East Timor, Indonesia, Philippines and Singapore.
The East Indies is a term used in historical narratives of the Age of Discovery. The Indies refers to various lands in the East or the Eastern Hemisphere, particularly the islands and mainlands found in and around the Indian Ocean by Portuguese explorers, soon after the Cape Route was discovered. Nowadays, this term is broadly used to refer to the Malay Archipelago, which today comprises the Philippine Archipelago, Indonesian Archipelago, Borneo, and New Guinea. Historically, the term was used in the Age of Discovery to refer to the coasts of the landmasses comprising the Indian subcontinent and the Indochinese Peninsula along with the Malay Archipelago.
The Lombok Strait, is a strait of the Bali Sea connecting to the Indian Ocean, and is located between the islands of Bali and Lombok in Indonesia. The Gili Islands are on the Lombok side.
The Malay Archipelago also called Insulindia or the Indo-Australian Archipelago is the archipelago between Mainland Southeast Asia and Australia. It has also been called the "Malay world," "Nusantara", "East Indies", and other names over time. The name was taken from the 19th-century European concept of a Malay race, later based on the distribution of Austronesian languages.
Nusantara is the Indonesian name of Maritime Southeast Asia. It is an Old Javanese term that literally means "outer islands". In Indonesia, it is generally taken to mean the Indonesian Archipelago. Outside of Indonesia, the term has been adopted to refer the Malay Archipelago.
The spice trade involved historical civilizations in Asia, Northeast Africa and Europe. Spices such as cinnamon, cassia, cardamom, ginger, pepper, nutmeg, star anise, clove, and turmeric were known and used in antiquity and traded in the Eastern World. These spices found their way into the Near East before the beginning of the Christian era, with fantastic tales hiding their true sources.
Sundaland is a biogeographical region of South-eastern Asia corresponding to a larger landmass that was exposed throughout the last 2.6 million years during periods when sea levels were lower. It includes Bali, Borneo, Java, and Sumatra in Indonesia, and their surrounding small islands, as well as the Malay Peninsula on the Asian mainland.
The earliest anatomically modern human skeleton in Peninsular Malaysia, Perak Man, dates back 11,000 years and Perak Woman dating back 8,000 years, were both discovered in Lenggong. The site has an undisturbed stone tool production area, created using equipment such as anvils and hammer stones. The Tambun rock art is also situated in Perak. From East Malaysia, Sarawak's Niah Caves, there is evidence of the oldest human remains in Malaysia, dating back 40,000 years.
By around 788 BCE, a large settlement had been established on the northern bank of the Merbok River. The settlement was one of several in the Bujang Valley, covering the Merbok and Muda Rivers, about 1000 square miles. The Merbok settlement was built near the estuary of the tributary river, the Sungai Batu. Around 170 CE groups of Hindu faith arrived at Kedah, joining them soon were peoples from nearby islands and from the northern Mon-Khmer region. At the same time traders from India, Persia and Arab, arrived the brink of the Malacca Strait, using Gunung Jerai the Kedah Peak as marking point. Ancient Kedah covered the areas of Kuala Kedah, Kuala Bara, Kuala Pila and Merpah.
The Austronesian peoples, sometimes referred to as Austronesian-speaking peoples, are a large group of peoples in Taiwan, Maritime Southeast Asia, parts of Mainland Southeast Asia, Micronesia, coastal New Guinea, Island Melanesia, Polynesia, and Madagascar that speak Austronesian languages. They also include indigenous ethnic minorities in Vietnam, Cambodia, Myanmar, Thailand, Hainan, the Comoros, and the Torres Strait Islands. The nations and territories predominantly populated by Austronesian-speaking peoples are sometimes known collectively as Austronesia.
The Central Indo-Pacific is a biogeographic region of Earth's seas, comprising the tropical waters of the western Pacific Ocean, the eastern Indian Ocean, and the connecting seas.
Since H. Otley Beyer first proposed his wave migration theory, numerous scholars have approached the question of how, when and why humans first came to the Philippines. The current scientific consensus favors the "Out of Taiwan" model, which broadly match linguistic, genetic, archaeological, and cultural evidence.
The East Indian Archipelago is an area designated by the International Hydrographic Organization (IHO). It encompasses twelve seas, two gulfs, and one strait in the East Indies.
Prehistoric Indonesia is a prehistoric period in the Indonesian archipelago that spanned from the Pleistocene period to about the 4th century CE when the Kutai people produced the earliest known stone inscriptions in Indonesia. Unlike the clear distinction between prehistoric and historical periods in Europe and the Middle East, the division is muddled in Indonesia. This is mostly because Indonesia's geographical conditions as a vast archipelago caused some parts — especially the interiors of distant islands — to be virtually isolated from the rest of the world. West Java and coastal Eastern Borneo, for example, began their historical periods in the early 4th century, but megalithic culture still flourished and script was unknown in the rest of Indonesia, including in Nias and Toraja. The Papuans on the Indonesian part of New Guinea island lived virtually in the Stone Age until their first contacts with modern world in the early 20th century. Even today living megalithic traditions still can be found on the island of Sumba and Nias.
Indonesia is the common and official name to refer to the Republic of Indonesia or Indonesian archipelago; however, other names, such as Nusantara and East Indies are also known. Some names are considered obsolete and confined to certain periods of history, while some might be more geographically specific or general.
In 1025 CE, the Chola Emperor Rajendra I launched naval raids on Srivijaya in maritime Southeast Asia, Rajendra's overseas expedition against Srivijaya was a unique event in India's history and its otherwise peaceful relations with the states of Southeast Asia. Several places in present-day Indonesia and Malay Peninsula were invaded by Rajendra I of the Chola dynasty. The Chola invasion furthered the expansion of Tamil merchant associations such as the Manigramam, Ayyavole and Ainnurruvar into Southeast Asia. The Cholan invasion led to the fall of the Sailendra Dynasty of Srivijaya and the Chola invasion also coincides with return voyage of the great Bengali Buddhist scholar Atiśa from Sumatra to India and Tibet in 1025 CE.
The Australasian Mediterranean Sea is a mediterranean sea located in the area between Southeast Asia and Australasia. It connects the Indian and Pacific oceans. It has a maximum depth of 7,440 m and a surface area of 9.08 mil. km².
The Maritime Silk Road or Maritime Silk Route is the maritime section of the historic Silk Road that connected China, Southeast Asia, the Indian subcontinent, the Arabian peninsula, Somalia, Egypt and Europe. It began by the 2nd century BCE and flourished later on until the 15th century CE. Major players in the Maritime Silk Road include the merchants from the Tang, Song, Yuan and Ming dynasties of imperial China, Austronesian sailors in Southeast Asia, Tamil merchants in India and Southeast Asia, and Persian and Arab traders in the Arabian Sea and beyond. The network followed the footsteps of older maritime networks in Southeast Asia, as well as the maritime spice networks of Southeast Asia, Sri Lanka, India, and the Indian Ocean, coinciding with these ancient maritime trade roads by the current era.
Southeast Asia was first reached by anatomically modern humans possibly before 70,000 years ago. Anatomically modern humans are suggested to have reached Southeast Asia twice in the course of the Southern Dispersal migrations during and after the formation of a distinct East Asian clade from 70,000 to 50,000 years ago.
