The country is located at the northern tip of Borneo, the world's third largest island, sharing it with Malaysia and Indonesia. Its territory is split into a larger "mainland" in the west, which contains the capital, Bandar Seri Begawan, and 97.5% of the population, and a smaller exclave called Temburong in the east. Until the Sultan Haji Omar Ali Saifuddien Bridge was completed in 2020, Bruneians had to cross through Malaysia to reach Temburong from the mainland and vice versa, because of a lack of land connection between the two. The population is about 460,000, meaning it is the least populous country in Southeast Asia and second least populous in Asia. Malays form a majority of the population, with Chinese making up the rest. Malay, both written in Latin and Jawi (Arabic) scripts, is the sole official language.
The Sultanate once ruled over most of Borneo (the island's name of Borneo may have come from Brunei) during the 14th to 16th century, and for a while, also held Southern Philippines. The coming of the Europeans (Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch) ended its regional hegemony, although the Sultanate survived. A war was fought between Brunei and the Spanish forces in 1578 known as the Castille War. There was also a brief civil war in Brunei from 1660 to 1673, due to a disagreement between the Crown Prince and one noble over a cockfight. It also lost territory to the White Rajahs of Sarawak, had to also surrender to Britain Sabah (a fact disputed by the Philippine government as it claimed that Brunei leased Sabah to the Sultanate of Sulu, now a part of the Philippines) and had to accept British protection in 1884.
Brunei was occupied by Imperial Japan during World War II and like other Southeast Asian countries, suffered under Japanese rule. It was liberated in 1945 and put back under British rule. During the '60s upheavals in the Malay archipelago (Indonesia and Malaysia were at war, because the former couldn't accept the latter's independence), Brunei, which was at the time a part of British Malaya, experienced a rebellion in the country's jungle, abetted allegedly by Indonesia. Despite its status as a British-protected Malay monarchy making it at home with Malaysia, the Sultan of Brunei at the time, Omar Ali Saifuddien III, decided not to join the federation, partly because of the Brunei Revolt, and also partly motivated by the desire that the natural gas and oil revenues should be the sultan's and his country's, not Malaysia's. As a result, Brunei remained under British control until 1984, making it the last British colony to achieve independence.note Since the revolt, the country has been under martial law indefinitely.
The current sultan is Omar Ali Saifuddien III's eldest son, Hassanal Bolkiah, who has been ruling the country since his father's abdication in 1967. The country is an absolute monarchy, meaning Sultan Hassanal has authority over the legislative, executive, and judicial branches. It is described as an oil sheikhdom which is not Arab. It has an ample amount of oil and natural gas reserves, which the government funds to its health and education services. The Bruneian economy is very strong due to said massive oil reserves, and they make currency matters simple by pegging it 1:1 to the Singaporean dollar. Measured by GDP per capita, Brunei is the fifth richest country in Asia, and the second richest in Southeast Asia, after Singapore.
Brunei shares the same Malay culture as neighboring Malaysia and Indonesia, but is more conservative; sharia (Islamic laws) is enforced liberally in both public and private matters (unless you're non-Muslim), whereas Malaysia only takes them in private matters, while Indonesia goes even further and allows you to take secular laws if you want. A common joke among business travelers there is that there is only one hotel in the entire country that serves alcohol. Due to this, sometimes Malaysian culture mock the Bruneians in their media, with the Indonesians occasionally doing the same. The Bruneians in turn mock the Malaysians and Indonesians for their lack of supposed piety and being supposedly poorer than them.
Media in Brunei is state-controlled to maintain the traditional Islamic principles. In spite of this, most of them still have to be imported from the outside; one thing that might confound foreigners is the fact that the country has produced exactly three domestic films, one of which was released back in the 1960s. Yes, it's that small.
There is a Brunei Sultan's tomb, Tomb of the King of Boni, located at Nanjing, China.
Famous Bruneians:
- Wu Chun
, member of Taiwanese boy band Fahrenheit.
Brunei in fiction:
- According to the opening news report scenes of the intro video of Homefront, Brunei is part of the Greater Korean Republic. It is unknown if the country was annexed by force or willingly joined the Reunified Korean nation.
- In 1983: Doomsday, the country became independent earlier following the UK's collapse during the nuclear war. The country took advantage of the instability across Malaysia and quickly invaded the rest of Borneo for themselves. Years later, Brunei encounter Philippine forces in Sabah which it called an "violation of sovereignty." Both countries then signed a treaty that Sabah would be an autonomous Philippine territory, though dispute continues to this day.
- The protagonists of Jin Yong's Sword Stained with Royal Blood would end up retiring to one of the nearby island.
- The Sultan of Brunei is offhandedly mentioned as one of the examples of people who got successful without working hard by Sheldon in The Big Bang Theory.
- Hardison was preoccupied with extracting two people from Brunei in Leverage: Redemption Halloween episode.
- Elka compared her threeway relationship with Roy and Mamie Sue to the Sultan's scandalous supermodels relations in Hot in Cleveland season five.
- The Hood's gang targeted Sultan's cousin (unusually dressed in Arabic style) to get to the Sultan's secret stash in Dark Reign: The Hood.
- The twin exorcists in The Exorcist's 2nd Meter are Brunei royalties (realistically though they would be Malays).
- Robot president greeted the Sultan in a UN conference in Inside Job.
- Edge of the World chronicles the life of Rajah James Brooke, who was granted governorship of Brunei's Sarawak territory by the Sultan for helping pacified the unrest over there.
The Bruneian Flag
Emblem of Brunei
Bruneian national anthem
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Government
- Unitary Islamic absolute monarchy
- Sultan, Yang di-Pertuan and Prime Minister: Hassanal Bolkiah
- Crown Prince and Senior Minister: Al-Muhtadee Billah
Miscellaneous
- Capital and largest city: Bandar Seri Begawan (Jawi: بندر سري بڬاوان)
- Population: 460,345
- Area: 5,765 km² (2,226 sq mi) (164th)
- Currency: Brunei dollar (S$) (BND)
- ISO-3166-1 Code: BN
- Country calling code: 673
- Highest point: Bukit Pagon (1850 m/6,070 ft) (136th)
- Lowest point: South China Sea (5,559 m/8,946 ft) (-)
