Volcanoes, Refugees, and Raiders: The 1765 Macaturin eruption and the Rise of the Iranun

This chapter is an investigation of the ways in which the unpredictable power of nature and the rise of the Iranun, as long-distance, saltwater slaves, changed the course of South-East Asian history. I discuss the effects of the eruption of Mount Macaturin on a people and a region. Too little is known about the extraordinary history of the eruption of Macaturin Volcano 1765-the most devastating explosion in centuries-and the remarkable events that occurred over the following several decades in Mindanao, the Sulu Archipelago, and north Borneo, including harvest failure, famine, social dislocations, and displacement. As far as is possible, i reconstruct what actually happened to the Iranun/Maranao people of the Rio Grande valley in the period 1765-1790, and I try to make a balanced assessment concerning the probable links between the cataclysmic eruption of the Macaturin Volcano and its social and material impacts on the Iranun/Maranao, who lived in its shadow