Singapore's bicentennial: 1819-2019
700 years of history, a bicentennial and four cycles of settlement
Kwa Chong Guan For The Straits Times
Published
Jan 5, 2018, 5:00 am SGT
Far from being an abandoned fishing village in 1819, Singapore was in fact a port city which had been settled twice in its history. The arrival of British traders marked the third cycle of settlement, and independent Singapore in 1965 marked the fourth.
Nearly 200 years ago, British merchant Stamford Raffles arrived in Singapore searching for a place to establish an East India Company settlement to service the company's trade to China. He met the local chieftain ,Temenggong Abdul Rahman, and worked out an arrangement for the British to establish a port on the unpopulated island of Singapore.
http://www.straitstimes.com/opinion/700-years-of-history-a-bicentennial-and-four-cycles-of-settlement
