East Timorese rebellion of 1910–12

The East Timorese rebellion of 1911–12, sometimes called the Great Rebellion or Rebellion of Manufahi, was a response to the efforts of Portuguese colonial authorities to collect a head tax and enforce the corvée, part of their larger effort to encourage cash crop agriculture and construct modern infrastructure. The countrywide conflict of 1911–12 was the culmination of a series of revolts led by Dom Boaventura, the liurai (chief) of the native kingdom of Manufahi. The first lasted from 1894 to 1901, the second from 1907 to 1908. In 1911 Boaventura led an alliance of local kingdoms in the last and most serious revolt against the Portuguese.

In February 1912 rebels from one kingdom entered the colonial capital of Dili, killing and burning as they went. They looted Government House and decapitated several Portuguese soldiers and officers. In August, the Portuguese brought in troops from Mozambique and a gunboat from Macau to suppress the revolt.

The revolt cost 3,424 Timorese killed and 12,567 wounded, and 289 Portuguese killed and 600 wounded. After 1912 the Portuguese pacification of East Timor was complete. They also ceased to appoint hereditary liurais and the native states went extinct. The rebellion of 1912 was seminal in creating an East Timorese identity distinct from "Portuguese subject" or just "Timorese".

The reino or native kingdom of Manufahi (also Manufai) lay on the southern coast of Timor, within the military district of Alas, based on the rationalised re-districting of 1860. It had an estimated population of 42,000 living in 6,500 houses in 1903. It owed a finta (customary tribute) to the Portuguese treasury of 96,000 Mexican dollars, although this was difficult to collect. It was governed by a king or liurai (hereditary native chief) who was confirmed in his position by the Portuguese governor. Manufahi's agriculturalists produced horses, sheep, cereals, fruit, coffee and tobacco. Its craftsmen were the finest silver and goldsmiths in Portuguese Timor, manufacturing bracelets and anklets. There were also skilled pyrographers working bamboo pipes. More ominously, Manufahi produced leather cartridge belts and musket shot, materials that could be put to use in a revolt.

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