What little is known of Singapore's ancient history relies heavily upon legend and supposition. In the late thirteenth century, Marco Polo reported seeing a place called Chiamassie, which could also have been Singapore: by then the island was known locally as Temasek - "sea town" - and was a minor trading outpost of the Sumatran Srivijaya empire. The island's present name - from the Sanskrit Singapura , meaning "Lion City" - was first recorded in the sixteenth century.

Throughout the fourteenth century, Singapura felt the squeeze as the Ayutthaya and Majapahit empires of Thailand and Java struggled for control of the Malay Peninsula. Around 1390, a Sumatran prince called Paramesvara threw off his allegiance to the Javanese Majapahit Empire and fled from Palembang to present-day Singapore. There, he murdered his host and ruled the island until a Javanese offensive forced him to flee north, up the Peninsula, where he and his son, Iskandar Shah, subsequently founded the Melaka Sultanate.

With the rise of the Melaka Sultanate , Singapore evolved into an inconsequential fishing settlement; a century or so later, the arrival of the Portuguese in Melaka forced Malay leaders to flee southwards to modern-day Johor Bahru for sanctuary. A Portuguese account of 1613 described the razing of an unnamed Malay outpost at the mouth of Sungei Johor to the ground, an event which marked the beginning of two centuries of historical limbo for Singapore.

Raffles and the British
By the late eighteenth century, with China opening up for trade with the West, the British East India Company felt the need to establish outposts along the Straits of Melaka to protect its interests. Penang was secured in 1786, but with the Dutch...
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Nineteenth-century boom
In 1824, Sultan Hussein and the temenggong were brought out, and Singapore ceded outright to the British. Three years later, the fledgling state united with Penang and Melaka (now under British rule) to form the Straits Settlements ...
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World War II
The bubble burst in 1942. In December 1941, the Japanese had bombed Pearl Harbour and invaded the Malay Peninsula. Less than two months later they were at the top of the causeway, safe from the guns of "Fortress Singapore", which pointed south...
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Towards independence
Following the atomic destruction of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945, Singapore was passed back into British hands, but things were never to be the same. Singaporeans now wanted a say in the government of the island, and in 1957 the British government...
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Contemporary Singapore
Instead, Lee's personal vision and drive transformed Singapore into an Asian economic heavyweight, a position achieved at a price. Heavy-handed censorship of the media was introduced, and even more disturbing was the government's attitude...
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