Pingtung County’s Mudan Township (牡丹) has erected a statue of Paiwan leader Aruqu Kavulungan and his son, who were killed in the Mudan Incident, with the hope of sharing the Paiwan perspective of the incident.
The Mudan Incident occurred in 1871 when Ryukuan sailors were shipwrecked off Hengchun Peninsula.
They were massacred by Paiwan when the sailors ended up in their village of Kuskus — which today is Gaoshih Village (高士) in Mudan.
Photo: Tsai Tsung-hsien, Taipei Times
The incident is usually told from the Japanese perspective. It was used by the Japanese as a pretense for the 1874 invasion of Taiwan — which at the time was governed by Qing Dynasty officials.
The Paiwan, led by Aruqu and his son, were brave heroes defending their homeland, the township said.
A plaque next to the statues — which were designed by local Paiwan artists Hua Heng-ming (華恆明) and his daughter Hua Yi-ta (華伊達) — explains that the statues were “carved out of granite to commemorate the firm determination and immortal spirit of the Paiwan to bravely defend their homeland against invading enemies.”
“The facts behind the events of 1871-1874 are not well known among Taiwanese,” Mudan Mayor Pan Chuang-chih (潘壯志) said on Saturday. “At a time when the government is focused on transitional justice, there is a responsibility to give a voice to the ancestors of Mudan.”
Preserving Paiwan history is an important but challenging process, as most indigenous history was transmitted orally, while written accounts made during the Japanese colonial era largely recorded the Japanese perspective, Pan said.
The township office earlier this year restored trails and historical sites where fighting between Paiwan and Japanese took place, allowing people to get a better sense of events at the time, he said.
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