John N. Miksic
About
John Norman Miksic is an American-born archaeologist and one of the fifty foreigners recognized in Epigram Books' Not Born in Singapore: Fifth Personalities who Shaped the Nation. Sometimes referred to as "the Indiana Jones of Singapore's history," he has been cited as being one of the key figures who has changed historians' impressions of Southeast Asian history. As C. M. Turnbull of the University of Hong Kong wrote, the work of Miksic and his colleagues "will challenge historians to look at Singapore afresh in an attempt to re-unite twenty-first century Singapore with its distant past." He is perhaps best known for being the archaeologist who discovered archaeological evidence for Singapore's importance as an early major regional port, for literally "identifying it as a centre of commerce and culture in the 14th century." As a result of Miksic's years of research and work, Singapore schools revised their secondary school curriculum. He was the winner of the inaugural Singapore History Prize awarded in 2018 for his book Singapore and The Silk Road of the Sea, 1300-1800.
