The Indonesian region of Makassar has long been a crossroads for trade and a contact zone in which speakers of diverse languages interacted. Since at least the early modern era, Makassarese were extraordinarily interested in foreign languages and written manuscripts. Yet despite this cosmopolitan background, with few exceptions Makassarese translated but a handful of foreign works. The explanation lies in the assumptions behind the process that is termed translation. This essay uses the example of Makassar to rethink the motivations and meanings that can be attached to translation. Translation must be viewed as part of a spectrum of possible relationships to foreign languages and foreign texts, all of which are means of gaining access to another culture through language. Translation may have surrogates of its own because of how it is enmeshed in the establishment, negotiation, and perpetuation of social relationships. The initially puzzling dearth of translations into Makassarese offers a window into the complexity of the linguistic and cultural dynamics that characterize contact zones throughout the Indonesian archipelago and beyond.