The Collaborative International Dictionary
Malay Archipelago \Malay Archipelago\ prop. n. A group of islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans between Asia and Australia.
Wikipedia
The Malay Archipelago (, , ) is the archipelago between mainland Southeast Asia and Australia. It has also been called the Malay World, Indo-Australian Archipelago, East Indies, Nusantara, Spices Archipelago, and other names over time. The name was taken from the 19th-century European concept of a Malay race.
Situated between the Indian and Pacific Oceans, the group of over 25,000 islands is the largest archipelago by area, and fourth by number of islands in the world. It includes Brunei, East Malaysia, East Timor, Indonesia, Singapore and Philippines. The island of New Guinea is usually excluded from definitions of the Malay Archipelago, although the Indonesian western portion of the island may be included. The term is largely synonymous with maritime Southeast Asia.
Usage examples of "malay archipelago".
In their father's books they found references to the Antiar or Antshar of the Indo-Malay archipelago, the antiaris toxicaria whose milky juice contains a most potent poison, like the quintessence of belladonna.
I have more especially been induced to do this, as Mr Wallace, who is now studying the natural history of the Malay archipelago, has arrived at almost exactly the same general conclusions that I have on the origin of species.
As to the animal's flesh it would furnish excellent food, for in the islands of the Malay Archipelago and elsewhere, it is especially reserved for the table of the native princes.
He likewise observed the Chinese immigrants in the Malay archipelago.
He went on a collecting expedition to the Amazon in 1848, and again to the Malay Archipelago in 1854.
But does not Alfred Wallace relate in his famous book on the Malay Archipelago how, amongst the Aru Islanders, he discovered in an old and naked savage with a sooty skin a peculiar resemblance to a dear friend at home?
The couches are deep and thickly padded and the owner is British, an exile, James Mackenzie, the Scots military engineer, who committed some crime in the Malay Archipelago and dare not enter any country of the British Empire, yet runs his den with all the tact, discretion and lavish decoration of a fashionable restauranteur.