Chapter 5 focuses on the southern Cham nagaras. They were the earliest Chams in contact with Indic culture and Arabian merchants. Arabian merchants soon made the entry to the Cham courts from the southern coast to the northern coast. Most of the Cham embassy to China were led by the Li (Ali) and Pu (Abū) surnames between mid-nineth and twelfth centuries. The Arabian maritime network offers an important aspect through which to observe Cham polities and economy between the eighth and the twelfth centuries, a global background of which has been overlooked and marginalised in Cham historiography. Without this angle however, much of the histories of the southern nagaras and the sources of their wealth, the sudden boom of their monuments and inscriptions of the eighth century cannot be understood. The Viet southern advance pushed Muslim migration to Hainan and Guangzhou. Cham capital moved to Vijaya (Quy Nhon).

“Capital Heroes and a Hokkien Nation” highlights efforts by Chinese in the Philippines to reinvigorate and protect their hometowns in southern Fujian during an era of militarism and turmoil. The narrative follows the community leaders and China Banking Corporation founders Dee C. Chuan, Oei Tjoe, and Tan Guin Lai, as well as an outside ally, Cai Tingkai. It explores how their hometown investments and remittances transformed into political maneuvering as the leaders leaned on Hokkien affinity to effect change. Dee C. Chuan, Oei Tjoe, and Tan Guin Lai all devoted considerable sums to building hometown infrastructure, funding schools, constructing personal villas, and supporting family members. However, after encountering numerous obstacles, especially when it came to constructing a railway that would connect the resource-rich interior of the province with the seaports, the Founders began to turn toward political solutions. They founded the Southeast Asian Hokkien Overseas Save the Hometown Association to aid in their efforts, and they threw their support behind the famous general Cai Tingkai, who helped them achieve some of their objectives as head of the Fujian People’s Revolutionary Government. All these efforts eventually fell apart, but they point toward a vibrant if unfulfilled Hokkien nationalism.