Dammar

(Travellers | Cities | Routes | Trade Goods | Themes)

by Sally K. Church

Dammar is a resin from various pine trees of Australia, New Zealand, and the East Indies. It is used in making varnish.

Dammar Incense is described as one of the products of Melaka by Ma Huan. Mills makes the following comment:

“Giles, nos. 10,494; 7591; 3333; ‘dammar’; Malay damar, an exudation from various coniferous and dipterocarpous trees; see Yule and Burnell, under ‘Dammer’, p. 294b. The substance is still obtained and used in the way described by Ma Huan (Groeneveldt, p. 244, n.). See Wheatley, ‘Commodities’, pp. 92-3.”

- J. V. G. Mills, trans., ed., Ma Huan, Ying-yai Sheng-lan: The Overall Survey of the Ocean's Shores [1433], Hakluyt Society Extra Series 42 (Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press. 1970), "The Country of Man-la-chia [Malacca]", p. 110, n. 7