The Journal of the Siam Society Vol. LXII, Part 1-2, 1974 - Khamkoo

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J NUARY 1974
volume 02 part 1

©
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
THE SIAM SOCIETY
JANUARY 1974

THE JOURNAL OF THE SIAM SOCIETY
contents of volume 62 part 1 January 1974
Articles
Anthony R .. Walker
E.M. Hif)ton
I
Milton Jacobs
John B. Murdoch
Donald K. Swearer
Lahu Nyi (Red Lahu) New Year Texts-!
The Dress of the Pwo Karen of North Thailand
The Alliance of Anthropological and Sociological
Concepts and Methodologies in Field Research
in Thailand
'
The 1901-1902 "Holy Man's" Rebellion
-'
Myth, Legend and His~ery in the Northern Thai
Chtiwnicles · '
I
A.B. Griswold and Prasert Epigraphic and Historical Studies, No. 12,
!'la Nagara Inscription 9
A. B. Griswold(and Prasert Epigraphic and Historical Studies No. 13, The
!Ja Nagara ·. Inscription of Wat Pra Yi.in
Notes
Michael Smithies &
Euayporn Kerdchouay
Hans Penth
The wai kru ceremony of the nang yai
~ I
A Note on Ap Nam Ap Tha (n1ll!-11!l11JY11)
Review Articles
David K. Wyatt
Michael Vickery
A Persian Mission to Siam in the Reign of King
Narai
ibn Mul;lammad Ibrahim, The Ship of Sulaiman,
Translated from the Persian by John O'Kane
Robert B. Jones, Thai Titles and Ranks Includinga
Translation of Traditions of Royal Lineage by
King Chulalongkorn
M.C. Chand Chirayu RaJani Background to the Sri Vijaya Story-Part I
~eviews
David B. johnston
Lucien M. Hanks, Rice and Man: , Agricultural
Ecology in Southeast Asia ·

Page
Kobkua Suwannathat-Pian
M.R. Prudhisan Jumbala
:).Martin Gjitzendaner
William A. McCleary
Jane Bunnag
David P. Chandler
Lorraine M. Gesick
Michael Vickery
Herbert C. Purnell &
Phalrat Waree
William j. Klausner
Derek Brereton
Hiram W. Woodward Jr.
M.C. Subhadradis Diskul
Henry D. Ginsburg
M. Rajaretnam and Lim So Jeans, Eds., Trends
in Thailand: Proceedings and Background Paper 217
Pongpen Sakuntapai, Ed., Politics for the Citizen
(a series of booklets) 222
1) Kamel Somvichian, What is Democracy?
2) Sujit Boonbongkarn, The Citizen and His
Political Role
3) Jaroon Subhab, Parliamentary Democracy
4) Prapanpong Vejjajiva, Ombudsman
Jayanta Kumar Ray, Portraits of Thai Politics
Chira ChEj.roenlert, The Evolution of Thailand's
Economy
Ernst E. Boesch, Communication Between Doctors
and Patients in Thailand. Part I: Survey of the
Problem and Analysis of the Consultations
Nguyen Van Phong, La socUte vietnamtenne de
1882 a 1902 d'apres les ecrits des auteurs
franqais
The Crawfurc/ Papers ,
Yoneo Ishii, Osarnu Akagi, Noriko Endo, A
Glossarial Index of the Sukhothai Inscriptions
Phyapbrom, The Poem in Four Songs. A Northern
Thai tetralogy translated by S~ren Egerod
Virnolphan Peetatbawatcbai, Esarn Cloth Design
Amin Sweeney, Malay Shadow Puppets
Theodore Bowie, Ed., M.C. Subhadradis Diskul,
A.B. Griswold, & Brian Brake, The Sculpture of
Thailand
Philippe Stern, Colonnes Indiennes d'Aja'!fa et
d'Ellora
Phra Khamphi Thupawong
N.A. Jayawickrama, editor and translator, The
Chronicle of the Thupa and the Thupava1J!sa
232
238
244
250
252
256
259
270
272
274
279
284

LAHU NYI (RED LAHU) NEW YEAR TEXTS-I
by
Anthony R. Walker
INTRODUCTION
In a recent article on Lahu Nyi blessing feasts and ancestor
propitiation (Walker 1972) which appeared in this journal, I presented
the original Lahu texts of a number of prayers recited on such occasions.
In giving these prayer texts in their original language as well as in
translation, it was my intention both to preserve the texts (hitherto
unrecorded) for posterity and also to allow other students of the Lahu
language to evaluate my translations. Regular readers of the JSS may
recall, however, that I omitted the original Lahu texts in an earlier
article on the new year celebrations (Walker 1970a). I intend now to
make good this omission, but because many of the new year prayers are
extremely long and somewhat complicated, I propose to record the first
two here while hoping to present the remaining seven in two later issues
of the journal.l
THE ORTHOGRAPHY
Lahu has no traditional script, and the people among whom I did
my field work were not literate in any language. These prayers were
transcribed with the help of Christian Black Lahu, using the orthography
developed over the past sixty years or so by members of the American
Baptist Mission in Burma and China. Th~s is the first and oldest of the
three romanizations which are, so far as I know, the only scripts in which
Lahu is written today. A second orthography is used among Roman
Catholic converts in the Burmese Shan State. A third is in use among
Lahu in China, a state-sponsored "reformed" romanization probably
based on the Baptist orthography. Undoubtedly the Baptist romanization
is the most widely use4 by Lahu outside the People's RepLtblic of China.
1) I wish to thank my friend and colleague in Lahu studies, Dr. James A. Matisoff
of the Department of Linguistics, University of California, Berkeley, for his
assistance in the analysis of these texts. To my wife, Pauline, go my particular
tbanh for her help in preparing this diffic.ult mllnuscript.

2 Anthony R. Walker
The linguist Matisoff (1970) has noted that while not a phonemic transcription
(since it indicates certain features of pronunciation. which are
automatic and predictable), the Baptist orthography does "accurately
reflect all the sound distinctions made in the language, and is quite
adequate for daily use." Matisoff's "Note on the Orthography of Lahu",
which appears at the beginning of my 1970 report on Lahu Nyi village
society and economy in north Thailand (Walker 1970b), is an excellent
short description of the Baptist orthography.
Lahu has seven tones: five open (long vowel) and two checked
(short vowel ending in a glottal stop). In the Baptist orthography the
mid-level open tone is unmarked (e.g. ca) while the other tones are indicated
at the end of syllables by the followine symbols :
superscript straight line (ca-) :high-rising open tone
superscript wedge (cav) : high-falling open tone
superscript circumflex (ca") : high tone, checked
subscript straight line (ca_) : very-low open tone
subscript wedge (ca) : low-falling open tone
subscript circumflex (ca") : low tone, checked.
THE TEXTS
Lahu prayers are couched in a rather complex poetic language
very different from that of everyday speech. Often, in fact, one word
of ordinary speech is transmuted, for sound effect, into a rhyming couplet.
For example, in Text One below, instead of saying'' hk'aw" suh -, : "new
year", the reciter prefers "hk'aw" suh-ha suh-": "new year, new moon".
In this case the second part of the couplet has some definite meaning, for
the day of the new year is also the day of the new moon. On other
occasions, however, the second part has no meaning at all, or if it has a
meaning in everyday speech it does not mean the same in the poetic
language. The Lahu say that such words are "na sha ve" : "good to
listen to". In translating these texts I have attempted, within the limits
of the English language, to preserve the flavour of the original Lahu.
The texts, both in the original and in translation, are broken up
into verses. I tuwe done this in order to facilitate rapid reference and

i"AiiU NYI (RED LAHU) NEW YEAR TEXTS - j
j
No such verse struc­
coniparison between original text and translation.
ture is recognized by Lahu themselves.
I propose to deal with each text in three stages. First is a formal
transcription of the prayer in Lahu. Second is a "working translation"
in which I give, as near as possible, a word by word translation of the
Lahu into English. This stage enables me to indicate areas of uncertainty
or of total failure to comprehend the Lahu meaning. In the working
translation I depart from the standard orthography by omitting tone
marks and using hyphens to join syllables into words. (One ptoblehl
with the missionary orthography is that each syllable is written separately
followed by its own tone mark, and even literate Lahu themselves
sometimes have difficulty in distinguishing word boundaries.) Finally I
give a formal translation of the prayer in English. Although a brief
explanatory note accompanies each text, I make no attempt to give the
full ethnographic context of the prayers. The interested reader can
easily refer to my original article on the new year celebrations. In
reworking these texts I have corrected some errors in my first translations.
TEXT ONE
[Prayer by the senior village priest {to bo pa_) when offering glutinous
rice cakes to G'uiv fu_ (the guardian supernatural of the village) at his
altar in the village temple (cf. Walker 1970a : 7).]
1. Ha! Chi hk'aw" na_ pu_ hk'aw" suh- ha suh- tev nyi, hk'aw" tanv
ha tanv tev nyi yov law, ha, ca li- ca ma_ la ... meuv hk'a" ma awv
ceV chi htaA> lTIQV laV ffi0y shav chi ma ve yoV law, ha, ca u- ca ma_
laA meuV htaAhaw yoV law k'o" k'o, chi hk'aw,.. hk'awA tanV ha tanV
tev nyi ve, aw _ hpfuh" k'aw" te_leh G'uiv fu_ta ti" ta shehn-hpawv
meuv k'awA ta_ g'a YOv law k'o" k'o.
2. G'uiv fu_ ta ti" ta dawv pfuhv sheh_ hpav, chi hk'aw,.. na_ pu_
hk'aw,.. meuv ha meuv te nyi, ha, na_ pu_ hk'aw,.. yav ha yav chi ma
ve yov law k'o" k'o, chi hk'aw" na_ pu_ hk'aw ... sub- ha suh- te
nyi YOv law, hk'a" ma awv ce laA sha mov la,.. chi ma ve, ba, sho meuv
kuiv meuv fui_ g'a sheh_ hpav, sho bav kuiv bav fui_ g'a sheh_ hpaV,

4 Anthony R. Wa1ket
G•uiv fu __ ta ti ... ta daw" pfuh",sheh_•,bpa", 1 G'ui)Ju_ ta ti ... ta shehnpfuh"
sheh_ hpa", nawv hk'a" ma aw" cev, hk'a" teh hk'a" g'aw" meu"
htal\ haw, ha, hk'a" teh hk'a" g'aw meu" hta,., k'aw" ceuv k'aw ... caw
leh nawv chi ceuv k'aw" ceuv u hta" k'aw" g'aw leh pon_ piv.
3. Hk'av g'a" chi g'aV, chi hk'aw" na_ pu_ hk'aw ... suh- ha suh- tev
nyi, ba, G'uiv fu_ ta ti,.. ta shehn-- pfuh" sheh_ hpa", G'uiv fu_ ta
ti,.. ta hka" pfuhv sheh_ bpaV, k'aw,.. hk'a" k'aw" ca leh nawv hawk'aw"
ta_ g'a meb_.
4. Chaw ya" chive, ha, na_ pu_ hk'aw" ya" ha ya" chi ve yo" law,
bk'aw" sheh_ ba sheh_ hpa", te" nyi sheh" yan" k'aw" ceu,, ha,
hk'aw" ya" ba ya" chi ma yo" law k'o" k'o, chi hk'aw" na __ pu_
hk'aw,. sub-- ha suh-- tav tev nyi yo" law k'o" k'o, ha, hk'aw" ceb"
ha cehv fui __ sheh_ hpa", te" nyi sheh" yan" k'awA ceuV> te" ha-­
sheh" yan" k'awA ceuV leh kaV haw,
5. Ha, hk'a" ma aw" cev meu" hta,. hk'a" teh hk'a" g'aw" meu" hta"
haw, k'aw A ceuv leh k'aw A taw" leh hk'av g•av chi g'a", g'oA taw" g'oA
g'a, ui_ka" i ka" chi rna ve yo law.
6. Ha, dawv hpu te" ca" k'aw" muiv ga" hpu te" she" k'aw,. mui" leh
G'uiv fu_ ta tt ta hka" hpaw" meu" k'aw" sha" g'a yo" law, k'aw,..
sha" k'aw,. go" leb, ha, hk'a" rna aw" cev meu" hta"' chi ceuv k'aw"
ceuv u- hta,.. kay nawv le,.. g'a sheh_ hpa", G'uiv fu_ ta tiA ta daw"
pfuh" sheh_ hpa", G'ui" fu_ ta ti,. ta shehn- ka sheh_ hpa".
VERSE 1.
TEXT ONE - WORKING TRANSLATION
1. ha, an exclamation with which prayers usually begin and which
may be used after each major pause in the recital
2. chi: this
3. hk'aw : year
4. na-pu: eternal(?). Some informants say that na-pu is the name of
the sacred moon tree. According to some, Lahu see the lunar
shadows to form the shape of a tree. There is a myth to the effect
that if humans could only touch this tree they would achieve
immortality. Tbe elder who gave me this text said that na-pu here
is used simply for sound effect (na sha-ve: "good to hear").

LAHU NY! (RED LAHU) NEW YEAR TEXTS- I
5. hk'aw suh : new year ( aw-suh: new)
6. ha suh : new moon
7. te nyi: one day
8. hk'aw tan : year begin
9. ha tan: month begin
10. te nyi: one day
11. yo law, no meaning, used for sound effect only (na sha ve: "good to
listen tofhear"); yo by itself means "yes"
12. ha (see above, 1)
13. ca-li: blacksmith
14. ca-ma, no meaning by itself; rhymes with ca-li to form couplet
15. !a meu: own hands (!a: hand). 13-15 literally translated means
no more than "the blacksmith's own hands". In Lahu prayer
language, however, this is a poetic manner of referring to the farming
implements, which are made by the village blacksmith.
16. hk'a-ma: village
17. aw: four
18. ce: corner. 16-18 means "in the village"; literally, "within the
four corners of the village".
19. chi hta : in this
20. mo-ta mo-sha, rhyming couplet meaning "community"
21. chi ma ve : all these
22. yo law (see above, 11)
23. ha (see above, 1)
24. ca-li ca-ma fa meu: blacksmith's own hands (see above, 13-15)
25. hta-haw : under
26. yo law k'o k'o, no meaning, sound effect only; used alone, yo means
"yes" and k'o~ means "if".
27. chi hk'aw hk'aw tan ha tan te nyi ve: this year, year begin, month
begin, one day
28. aw-hp/uh : glutinous rice cakes
29. k'aw :· one again
30. te: make
31. leh: and
32. G'ui-/u (proper name) : the supernatural intermediary between the
villagers and their supreme supernatural, G'ui-sha; G'ui-fu is also
the protector of the village, the people and their livestock.

Anthony it Walker
33. ta-ti: all-true
34. ta-shelzn : all-precious (shehn from Shan "jeweP')
35. hpaw meu: side
36. k'aw ta g'a: once again put
37. yo law k'o k'o (see above, 26)
VERSE 2
38. G'ui-fu ta-ti: G'ui-fu, the all-true
39. ta-daw: all-wise (from daw-ve: to think)
40. pfuh : to carry on the back
41. sheh-hpa: master, expert. 38-41 literally means "G'ui-fu, the
master who carries on his back all truth and wisdom".
42. chi hk'aw: this year
43. na-pu: eternal(?) (see above, 4)
44. hk'aw meu ha meu: year point, month point. A couplet meaning
the point at which the old year meets the new.
45. te nyi: one day
46. ha (see above, 1)
47. na-pu: eternal(?) (see above, 4)
48. hk'aw ya, ha ya: year people, month people. A couplet referring
to the villagers who are celebrating the new year together.
49. chi ma ve: all these
50. yo law k'o k'o (see above, 26)
51. chi hk'aw na-pu hk'aw suh ha suh te nyi: this year, eternal, new year,
new month, one day; i.e. "Lhis eternal day of the new year, new
month".
52. yo law (see above, 11)
53. hk'a-ma aw ce : village four corners (see above, 16-18)
54. la-sha : right hand
55. mo-la: group. 54-55 means "group of the right hand side", a
poetic reference to the menfolk of the village. The women are
sometimes called "the left hand group'', and the full rhyming couplet
(which is not given in this text) is la-sha mo-la la-meh mo-hin (lameh:
left hand, mo-hin: group).
56, chi rna ve: all these
57. ha (see above, 1)

LAHU NY! (HED LAHU) NEW YEAH TEXTS- I 7
58. sho: iron
59. meu: point
60. kui meu : copper point. 58-60 : "iron points, copper points", a
couplet which refers to the fanning implements.
61. fui g'a: separating
62. sheh-hpa: master, expert. 58-62 means "you who can separate the
villagers from the cuts of the farming implements," i.e. G'ui-fu
(see above, 32).
63. sho ba kui ba (cf. 58-60) : iron pieces(?), copper pieces(?). I am
uncertain of the literal meaning of ba. The couplet refers, once
again, to the farming implements.
64. fui g'a sheh-hpa: separating master (see above, 61-2)
65. G'ui-fu ta-ti ta-daw pfuh sheh-hpa: G'ui-fu, the all-true, all-wise
(see above, 32, 38-41)
66. G'ui-fu ta-ti ta-shehn pfuh sheh-hpa: G'ui-fu, the all-true, all-precious
67. naw: your
68. hk'a-ma aw ce: village four corners (see above, 16-18)
69. hk'a: village
70. teh: to putfto place
71. hk'a g'aw: village, to count
72. meu-hta-haw: on
73. ha (see above, 1)
74. hk'a teh hk'a g'aw meu-hta (see above, 69-72, and below, 85)
75. k'aw: once again
76. ceu: look upon(?). In everyday speech nyi-ve means "to look upon",
but informants said ceu-ve in poetic language has this meaning.
77. k'aw caw: once again walk around
78. leh: and
79. naw: you
80. chi ceu : ten kinds
81. k'aw ceu: nine kinds
82. u-hta : from
83. k'aw g'aw: again count
84. leh: and
85. pon pi: let pass. 67-85 means "once again place [your blessings]
and count [i.e. take note of the people] in your village, once again
walk around [your village J and once again count [i.e. take note of]
~lnd let pass the ten kinds, nine kinds [i.e. all kinds of misfortune]."

8 Anthony R. Walker
VERSE 3
86. hk'a g'a chi g'a (couplet): every person (g'a: person)
87. chi hk'aw : this year
88. na-pu: eternal(?) (see above, 4)
89. hk'aw suh ha suh: new year, new month
90. te nyi: one day
91. · ha (see above, 1)
92. G'ui-fu ta-ti ta-shehn pfuh sheh-hpa: G'ui-fu, the all-true, all-precious
(see above, 32-34)
93. G'ui-fu ta-ti: G'ui-fu the all-true
94. ta-hka : all-precious (hka from Shan "gold")
95. pfuh sheh-hpa: carrying-on-the-back master (see above, 40-41)
96. k'aw: once again
97. hk'a: crying out [to you] beseechingly
98. k'aw ca: once again seeking [you]
99. leh: and
100. naw: you
101. haw: under
102. k'aw ta g'a: again putting [my prayer]
103. meh, indicates end of sentence
VERSE 4
l 04. chaw-ya : people
105. · chi ve: these
106. ha (see above, 1)
l 07. na-pu : eternal(?) (see above, 4)
108. hk'aw ya ha ya: year people, month people (see above, 48)
109. chive: these
110. yolaw(seeabove,l1)
111. hk'aw sheh ha sheh-hpa: master of the year, master of the month
(ha : moon, month; -hpa is understood in hk'aw sheh[·hpa ]).
Reference to the Guardian supernatural of the year.
112. te nyi: one day
113. sheh yan : three times
114. k'aw cell: once again look upon(?) (see above, 76)

LAHU NY! (HED LAHU) NEW YEAH TEXTS- I 9
115. ha (see above, 1)
116. hlc'aw ya ha ya: people of the year, people of the month
117. chi ma; these all
118. yo law lc'o k'o (see above, 26)
119. chi hk' aw : this year
120. na-pu: eternal(?) (see above, 4)
121. hlc'aw suh lui suh tate nyi: new year, new month, beginning one day
122. yo law lc'o k'o : (see above, 26)
123. ha (see above, 1)
124. hk'aw ceh ha ceh: year tree, moon tree. Reference to the New
Year tree erected in the centre of the village (cf. Walker 1970a:
12-13) and considered a symbolic representation of the tree of
immortality on the moon (see above, 4).
125. fui sheh-hpa: dividing master. 124-25 refers to the Guardian of
the year, who "divides" (determines) the time when the New Year
tree should be erected in the village.
126. te nyi: one day
127. sheh yan: three times
128. k'aw ceu: once again look upon(?) (see above, 76)
129. te ha: one night
130. sheh yan : three times
131. k'aw ceu: once again look upon(?)
132. /eh: and
133. lea haw: here under
VERSE 5
134. ha (see above, 1)
I 35. hk'a-ma aw ce meu-hta: within the four corners of the village
136. hk'a teh hk'a g'aw meu-hta-haw : put [blessings] on the village,
count [i.e. take note of the people in] the village (see above, 85).
137. k'aw ceu: again look upon(?) (see above, 76)
138. leh k'aw taw: and again shield
139. leh: and
140. hk'a g'a chi g'a.(couplet): every person
141. g'o taw g'o g'a (couplet): every household
142. ui ka: big

1 0 Anthony R. Walker
143. i ka: small
144. chi ma ve: these all
145. yo law (see above, 11)
VERSE 6
146. ha (see above, 1)
147. daw: thoughts
148. hpu: white, pure
149. te ca: one rope. 147-49 means ''bound together as with a rope
by the same pure thoughts/intentions"
150. k'aw mui: once again work
151. ga hpu: white/pure thoughts (daw hpu ga hpu is a couplet)
152. te she: one rope (she is N. Thai/Shan?)
153. k'aw mui leh: again work and
154. G'ui-fu ta-ti ta-hka hpaw meu: G'ui-fu, all-true, all-precious, side
155. k'aw sha g'a: once again pray
156. yo law (see above, 11)
157. k'aw sha: once again pray
158. k'aw go : once again stretch out the hands (the common Lahu
attitude of prayer, with right arm extended and hand holding
beeswax candles)
159. leh: and
160. ha (see above, 1)
161. hk'a-ma aw ce meu-hta: within the four corners of the village
162. chi ceu: ten kinds [of misfortune]
163. k'aw ceu: nine kinds [of misfortune]
164. u-hta : from
165. ka: also
166. naw : you
167. le: lift up/take off
168. g'a: able
169. sheh-hpa: master/expert. 166-9: "you master who are able to
take away misfortune".
170. G'ui-/u ta-ti ta-daw pfuh sheh-hpa: G'ui-fu, all-true, all-wise,
carrying on the back, master (see above, 41)
171. G'ui-fu ta-ti ta-shehn: G'ui-fu, all-true, all-precious
172. ka sheh-hpa: holding in tbe hand, master JCXpert; i.e. "master who
holds in his hands all truth, all preciousness".

LAtiU NY! (!lED LAHU) NEW YEA I\ TEXTS-- I
1 i
TEXT ONE - FORMAL TRANSLATION
1. Ha, this year, this day of the new year, this day of the new ·month,
this day on which the year begins, this day on which the month
begins, the whole community within the four cornets of the village
-on this day on which the year begins, the month begins-once
again make glutinous rice cakes from the rice cultivated with implements
fashioned by the village blacksmith's own hands; ha, once
again we ttlake glutinous rice cakes and put them to the side of the
all-true, all-precious G'uiv fu_.
2. G'uiv fu_ the all-true, all-wise, at this day of division between the
years and the months, you who protect all the people of the year, all
the people of the month,(al on this day of the new year, day of the
new month; you who protect all the people of the right hand(bl within
the four corners of the village from the sharp points of iron and
copper, from sharp pieces of iron and copper;(c> G'uiv fu~ the all-true,
all-wise, G'uiv fu_ the all-true, all-precious, once again put (blessings]
upon the four corners of your village, once again look on and once
again walk around [your village] and once again take note of and let
pass the ten kinds, the nine kinds (of misfortune].
3. Every person this year, on this day of the new year, day of the new
month cries out beseechingly to you, once again looks for you and
once again puts his prayers under you, G'uiv fu __ the all-true, allprecious,
G'uiv fu_ the all-true, all-precious.
4. You who are Lord of the year, Lord of the month,(el three times in
one day once again look upon these people of the year, people of the
month; oh you who decide upon the time for the year tree, the moon
tree,

Anthony R. Walker
times in one day once again look upon these people of the year,
peOJ?le of the month, three times in one night once again look upon
them.
5. Ha, within the four corners of the village put [blessings] on the
village, take note of [the people of] the village, once again look upon
them, once again shield them, every person, every household, the big
and the small, all of them.
6. Ha, joined together by the same pure intention, we once again pray
to the side of G'uiv fu_ the all-true, all-precious; we once again
stretch out our hands, you who can remove from the four corners
of the village the ten kinds, the nine kinds [of misfortune], G'uiv fu_
the all-true, all-wise, G'ui" fu_ the all-true, all-precious.
TEXT TWO
[Prayer recited by a household head at his Rice Cake Altar ( aw _hpfuh
hti_) within his house (cf. Walker 1970a: 9-11 and Pl. 4).]
1. o- o·- ngaV te" yeh te k'a yoV law k'oA k'o, chi hk'aw A na_ pu_
hk'awA meu" chi hk'o" hta,_, hk'awA ca" ha ca" ve yo" law le" k'o"
k'o, a-, te" yeh" te" k'a ve yo" law le" k'oA k'o, a-·, te" yeb" te" k'a
ve g'a" lea"' ce" kav ca" ka" chi ma ve YOv law le" k'o" k'o, rna" daw"
ha_ ga" hki-.
2. Neh-hk'aw A ti_ g'a ve yov law le" k'o" k'o, nav beuv sub_ chi
sub_ yan_ u- hta,.. po" leh sho tcuh- kui" tcuh- hk'o" hta,.. pov
leh shaw" ba" rna ba" hk'o" htaA k'awA po" leh hpe" haweh_ hk'aw,..
11Uy ta" hki-, hpe" la sha hpa ... laV hta" hk'o" htaA k'aw A p0v leh rna"
g'a daw" ha_ ga" hki- leh mo" Jaw k'ao" ma_ ha- sha-- htik'ao"
li" ve hta"' te" nyi shehA yan" hk'o" hta" k'aw" pa_ k'aw A go"
leh keu la".
3. A paSha- ca", a e Na" bona" ca-- yo" law le" k'oA k'o, ho- ti,..
ta tiA pfuh" sheh_ hpa", a-, nga" co ti ... co sbehn·- a" pfuhv leh
ngav ho- ti ... ta ti,.. a" pfuh" leh a e Nav bo nav ca- ho- ti ... ta ti,..
g) The Lahu Nyi act of prayer often involves stretching out the right arm, holding
lighted beeswax candles in the right hand.

LAHU NYI (HEn LAllU) NF.W YEAR TEXTS- I
pfuh" sheh_ ma, a paSha- ca" cao" caw" hka", a pa g'ui" ma a
daw" pa_, a daw" rna chi ma ve yo" law Ie k'o" k'o, tev nyi
sheh" yan" hk'ov hta,.., k'aw,.., ce leh te ha-· sheh" yanv hk'ov hta,..,
k'aw,., ce_ leh hk'o" haw- yo" law le k'o" k'o, cev va_ ce" shehu-
hta,.., cawv g'a leh hk'ov hta,.., YOv law le" k'o" k'o, chaw va
chaw sheh- u- hta,.., cawv g'a leh a-- yu,.., ha_ pa" ha_ hpa,.., shahpaw"
meu" ve yo" law lev k'o" k'o, u- hpu u- shi kao" ca_ lao
ca_ liv ca_, she_ le_ sha tav ho" ho" caw" caw" ve yov law le"
k'o" k'o, chi bon k'aw,.., pa" leh keu Ia" ce, chi bon k'aw,.., ji" leh
keu la" ce".
4. Te" ha- sbeh" yan", te" nyi sheh" yan" yov law le" k'o" k'o, rna"
g'a daw" ha_ ga" hki-, ya" hu g'a" yov law le" k'o" k'o, rna" g'a
dawv ha_ ga" hki- leh te" yeh.., tev k'a dawv hpu te" ca" muiv leh
ga" hpu te" ca" muiv leh a-, te" nyi mui.., g'a ve yo" law lev k'o"
k'o, hpu po k'awv po g'a ve, veu,.., hpu k'aw" lawv g'a ve, rnav g'a
daw" ha_ gav hki- leh a vi- cao_ caw,.., hk'a", mi" ma awv ce_
hk'o" htaM a--, hku- chi hku- ya" chi ma ve k'a, k'aw,.., hpa_ k'aw,..,
go" leh keu la".
5. Chaw ca_ chaw law" a" g'a, ne" ca __ ne" law" a" g'a ve yo.., law le"
k'o" k'o, mi" ma aw" ce_ hk'o" htaA> mvuhv rna awv ce_ hk'ov hta,..,
yo.., law le" k'o" k'o, kav shaw- k'aw" pa" ve, la shaw_ k'aw" pa"
ve k'a..,, k'aw" chi k'aw" a dawv ve k'av, k'aw" pa k'aw ..... g'o" leh
keu la".
6. Te" ha- sheh" yan", te nyi sbeh" yan" chaw ca_ chaw law" a" tcuh\
ne" ca_ ne" law" a" tcuh\ k'ao_ ca __ lao ca __ ve, ca" leh av peu",
veu,.., leh av yaw ve, chi bon ji" leh k'a la".
7. Ya,.., nyi tan_ o" k'ai ve yo" law le" k'o" k'o, neh chi neh yav chi
rna ve k'av, hpa,.., k'o" hpa,.., va" chi rna ve k'av, k'aw,.., ce_ k'aw,..,
tawv leh ha,.., sha- leh lo_ la".
8. Te" nyi sheh" yan", te" ha- sheh" yan" yo" law le" k'o" k'o, a-,
rnL,. rna hk'o" hta,.., yo.., law lev k'o" k'o, ta_ nu,.., ta_ han- chi rna
ve k'a..,, g'a ce_ g'a taw" leh u- hpu hpa,.., k'o" hpa,.., va" chi ma ve
k'av, g'a ce __ g'a taw" Ieh mav ha __ bon rnav g'aw" bon, chi bon
hk'o" hta,.., k'aw" pa" leh keu lav cev.

14 Anthohy R.. Walkei·
9. o- o- ya ... nyi tan_ 0" k'ai ve k'o" k'o-ehv, ma" g'a daw" ha ___ ga"
hki- leh chi bon k'aw ... pa" leh keula" meh_.
10. A paSha- ca" yov law le" k'o" k'o, a e Nav bo na" ca- k'av tev
ha- sheh~< yanv hk'ov hta" k'awA pa_leh keu lav, a pa Sba- ca"
k'av te" nyi sheh" yanv k'aw,. hpa_ leh keu lav, mav g'a dawv ba __
ga" hki- ve, o-, o-, ya ... nyi tan_ o" k'ai ve yo ... law le" k'o" k'o,
cheh" sha caw ... sha bon ti- k'aw" pa_leh keu lav.
TEXT TWO - WORKING TRANSLATION
[Roman numeral I refers reader back to Text One, Working Translation.]
VERSE 1.
1. o, o, an exclamation beginning prayer
2. nga: my
3. te yeh : one house
4. te k'a, no meaning by itself; forms couplet with te yeh to mean "one
household"
5. yo law k'o k'o (see I/26)
6. chi hk'aw: this year
7. na-pu: eternal(?) (see I/4)
8. hk'aw meu: year point (see I/44)
9. chi: this
10. hk'o-hta: on. In the poetic language of prayer, hk'o-hta seems to
be a morpheme of quite general locative meaning; Noun+ hk'o-hta:
injatjaroundjup tojonjaway from the noun (personal communication,
J.A. Matisoff).
11. hk'aw: year
12. ca: celebrate
13. ha ca-ve : month, celebrate
14. yo law le k'o k'o (see I/26)
15. a, exclamation at beginning of new clause
16. te yeh te k'a ve (couplet): one household
17. yo law le k'o k'o (see I/26)
18. a (see above, 15)
19. te yeh te k'a ve: one household

20. g'a: chicken
21. ka: also
LAHU NY! (HED LAHU) NEW YEAH TI•;XTS- I 15
22. ce ka ca ka (couplet) : animals
23. chi ma ve: all these
24. yo law le k'o k'o (see l/26)
25. ma dmt• ha ga hki (couplet): no troubled/distressing thoughts.
Literally, "no difficult thoughts" (daw-ve : to think; ma, negative;
ha : difficult); ga hlci is the second part of the couplet and has no
meaning by itself.
VERSE 2.
26. neh hk'aw: next year
27. ti: only
28. g'a-ve: to reach. 26-28 means "until next year".
29. yo law le k'o k'o (see 1/26)
30. na-beu: sickness
31. suh-chi suh : seventy-seven
32. yan, literally "times", here means "kinds"
33. u-hta : from
34. po: let pass; i.e. "protect us from"
35. leh: and
36. sho : iron
37. tcuh, literally "joint", as in vav tcuh-: joint 'of a bamboo.
38. kui tcuh: copper joints. 36-38 is a poetic couplet meaning the
knives and axes used in farming.
39. lzk'o-hta: from
40. po leh (see above, 34-35)
41. shaw ba ma ba (couplet): pieces of wood (shaw, na: wood; cf. 1/63)
42. hk'o-hta : from
43. k'aw po: once again let pass, protect
44. leh: ana
45. hpe: to tie
46. haweh (?)
47. hk' aw na : year sickness
48. ta; all kinds of (from Shan)

16 Anthony R. Walker
49. hki (?). 45-49 means "tied up by all kinds of sicknesses throughout
the year"
50. hpe-la sha-hpa (couplet) : sickness(?) (cf. hpev /ai_ve: to decay)
51. la-hta {?) (probably only sound effect)
52. hk'o-hta : from
53. k'aw po: again protect
54. leh: and
55. ma g'a daw ha ga hki : no troubled or depressing thoughts (see
above, 25)
56. leh: and
57. mo-law: down there, i.e. "in the lowlands"
58. kao, from aw-hkao: the first
59. ma-ha: great (from Burmese

LAIIU NY! (Hl'D LA!IU) NEW YEAH TEXTS- I 17
75. ho-ti: all-knowing (ho from Shan "to know")
76. ta-ti: all-true
77. pfuh sheh-hpa: carry-on-the-back master (see I/41)
78. a, exclamation
79. nga: my
80. co ti co shehn (couplet): precious life (shehn from Shan "jewel")
81. a pfuh: do not carry on the back. 80-81 means "my life, unlike
yours, is not precious".
82. leh: and
83. nga: 1
84. ho-ti: all wisdom, all-knowing
85. ta-ti: all-true
86. a pfuh: do not carry on the back. 83-6 means "l, unlike you, am
not all-wise, all-true".
87. leh: and
88. a-e Na-bo na-ca : Mother Na-bo-ma
89. ho-ti ta-ti pfuh sheh-ma: all-wise, all-true person (female)
90. a-pa Sha-ca : Father Sha-ca
91. cao, Shan title for prince
92. caw-hfca, Shan for "goldsmith", here a poetic reference to the
divine prototype blacksmith. The usual word in Lahu for blacksmith
is ca-li.
93. a-pa : father
94. g'ui-ma: divine, partaker in the divinity of G'ui-sha, the supreme
Lahu supernatural
95. a-daw-pa : headman; literally "he who thinks" (daw-v.e: to think).
94-5 means "the divine prototype headman."
96. a-daw-ma: headman's wife; i.e. divine headman's wife
97. chi ma ve: all these
98. yo law le k'o k'o (see I/26)
99. te nyi sheh yan : one day three times
100. hk'o-hta: onjin
101. k'aw ce: once again help
102. /eh : and
103. te ha sheh yan : one night three times
104. hk'o-hta k'aw ce leh: onfin, once .~gain help and

18 Anthony R. Walker
105. hk'o haw: underneath; i.e. underneath the bouse
106. yo law le k'o k'o (see I/26)
107. ce va ce sheh (couplet): many animals (sheh from Shan" 100,000")
108. u-hta, accusative particle, indicates preceding noun is object of
sentence
109. caw g'a: may have
110. leh: and
111. hk'o-hta: in; i.e. in the house
112. yo law le k'o k'o (see I/26)
113. chaw va chaw sheh (couplet): many people (cf. 107 above)
114. u-hta (see above, 108)
115. caw g'a: may have
116. leh: and
117. a-yu: life
118. ha : five
1!9. pa, traditional unit of money (one pa = 80 rupees)
120. ha: five
121. hpa-sha (?). 117-121 means ''very long life".
122. hpaw meu ve: side
123. yo law le k'o k'o (see 1/26)
124. u hpu: white heads (u : head)
125. u shi: yellow heads. 120-121 means "the white-headed elders
and the yellow-headed youngsters"
126. kao ca lao ca li ca (meaning of individual words uncertain); a
poetic way of saying "to talk aboutjdiscussfcomment upon".
127. she-le: dignity, style, respect (opposite of "shame")
128. sha-ta: money (corruption of Thai satang)
129. ho-ho caw caw ve: Oh ho, have have! 124-9 means "let the elders
and young people of the village talk, of our fine style and say of us,
'Oh ho, they have plenty of money !.' ''
130. yo law /e k'o k'o (see I/26)
131. chi bon: this blessing (aw-bon: blessing)
132. k'aw pa: once again order
133. leh : and
134. keu Ia: put/bestow
135. ce, indicates speaker is making request on behalf of others

LAHU NYI (RED LAHU) NEW YEAR TEXTS- 'i
i9
i36. chi bon k'aw ji: with this blessing once again enwrap (ji-ve) us
137. keu Ia: bestow
138. ce (see above, 135)
VERSE 4.
139. te ha sheh yan, te nyi sheh yan yo law le k'o k'o: three titnes in one
night, three times in one day
140. ma g'a daw ha ga hki: no troubled/depressing thoughts (see above~
25)
141. ya-hu: pregnant
142. g'a: get, reach
143. yo law le k'o k'o (see 1/26)
144. ma g'a daw ha ga hki: no troubled/depressing thoughts (see above,
25)
145. leh: and
146. te yeh te k'a {couplet): one household (see above, 3-4)
147. daw hpu te ca : bound together as with a rope by the same pure
intentions (see I/ 149)
148. mui: work in the fields
149. leh: and
150. ga hpu te ca mui leh, same meaning as 147-9; daw-ve ga~ve (couplet):
to think
151. a, exclamation
152. te nyi mui g'a ve: one day working in the fields
153. yo law le k'o k'o (see I/26)
154. hpu: money; literally, "silver"
155. po: box
156. k'aw po: nine boxes. 154-56: "much money"
157. g'a-ve: getfobtain
158. veu : clothes
159. hpu: white (hpu: whitejsilverjmoney)
160. k'aw law: nine barns. 158-60: "many white clothes"
161. g'a-ve: getfobtain
162. ma g'a daw ha ga hid: no troubled/depressing thoughts (see above, 25)
163. leh : and
164. a-vi: elder brother

2o
Anthony R. Waikei;
165. cao caw-hk'a: prince goldsmith (see above, 91-92)
166. mi-ma: earth
167. aw ce: four corners
168. hk'o-hta: within
169. a, exclamation
170. hku: "sir", from Shan and Thai title khun
171. chi: this
172. hku ya : people of the khun
173. chi ma ve : all these. 170-73 : "this headman and all his people"
174. k'a : also
175. k'aw : once again
176. hpa : create
177. k'aw go : once again stretch out the hand
178. leh keu Ia: and bestow [this blessing]
VERSE 5.
179. chaw : people
180. ca (?)
181. chaw : people
182. law (?)
183. a g'a : not reach, not able: 179-83 is a poetic manner of saying
"let us/them not be killed by men".
184. ne ca ne law a g'a ve: let us not be killed by spirits (ne: spirit)
185. yo law le k'o k'o (see l/26)
186. mi-ma aw ce hk'o-hta : within the four corners of the earth (see
above, 166-68)
187. mvuh-ma: heaven (short form of mvuhcnaw-ma)
188. aw ce hk'o-hta : four corners within
189. yo law le k'o k'o (see 1/26)
190. lea-shaw : a Lahu villager possessing oracular powers
191. k'aw pave: nine pa (one pa=80 rupees); poetic manner of saying
"all ka-shaw everywhere"
192. lrt~shaw: a ritual official associated with the cult of G'ui·sha, the
supreme Lahu supernatural
193. k'aw pave (see above, 191)

LAHlJ NY! (RED LAHUl NEW YEAR TEXTS- 1
:ii
194. k'a: also
195. k'aw-chi k'aw: ninety-nine
196. a-daw : headman. .195-96 : "all headmen"
197. ve k'a: also
198. k'aw pa: once again order
199. k'aw go: once again stretch out the hands
200. leh keu Ia : and bestow
VERSE 6.
201. te ha sheh yan, te nyi sheh yan: one night three times, one day
three times
202. chaw ca chaw law a tcuh: may we not be killed by people (cf. above,
179-83 ); tcuh-ve: to pluck out (?), therefore a tcuh : not to pluck
out (?) ,
203. ne ca ne law a tcuh : may we not be killed by spirits (ne)
204. k'ao ca lao ca ve: may everyone talk of our good fottune (see
above, 126)
205. ca: eat
206. leh: and
207. a peu : not finish
208. veu : dress
209. teh : and
210. a yaw-ve: not be depleted
211. chi bon : this blessing
212. ji: cover, i.e. cover us with
213. leh k'a !a: and give to us(?)
VERSE 7.
214. ya nyi tan o k'ai-ve: today and hereafter
215. yo law /e k'o k'o (see I/26)
216. neh chi: women these
217. neh ya: women's children
218. chi ma ve k'a: all these also
219. hpa k'o hpa va (couplet): Buddhist monk (hpa from Shan)

Anthony It Waiket
220. chi ma ve k'a: all these also
221. k' aw ce : once again help
222. k'aw taw: once again count, i.e. take note of
223. leh : and
224. ha-sha : take care of [us]
225. leh lo Ia: and look after [us] (lo-ve: to look after, cover)
VERSE 8.
226. te nyi sheh yan, te ha sheh yan : three times in one day, three times
in one night
227. yo law le k'o k'o (see I/26)
228. a, exclamation
229. mi-ma: earth
230. hk'o-hta : on
231. yo law le k'o k'o (see I/26)
232. ta-nu: policeman (from Thai)
233. ta-han : soldier (from Thai)
234. chi ma ve k'a : these all also
235. g'a ce: help
236. g'a taw: count (see above, 222)
237. leh: and
238. u hpu: white headed [elders]
239. hpa k'o hpa va : Buddhist monks (see above, 219)
240. chi ma ve k'a : these all also
241. g'a ce g'a taw leh: help count and
242. ma ha : no hardship
243. bon : blessing (from aw-bon)
244. ma g'aw bon, second part of couplet ma ha bon, ma g'aw bon
245. chi bon : this blessing
246. hk'o-hta : on (?) (see above, 10)
247. k'aw pa: once again order
248. leh keu Ia : once again bestow
249. ce, indicates that request is being made on somebody else's behalf

LAHU NYJ (RED LAI-IU) NEW YEAR TEXTS -I 23
VERSE 9.
250. 0,0, exclamations (end of prayer drawing near!)
251. ya nyi tan o k'ai-ve: today and hereafter
252. k'o k'o-eh, used only for sound effect, variation on yo law le k'o k'o
253. ma g'a daw ha ga hlci: no troubled/distressing thoughts (see above,
25)
254. leh : and
255. chi bon: this blessing
256. k'aw pa: once again order
257. leh keu Ia: and bestow
258. meh, indicates end of sentence
VERSE 10.
259. a-pa Sha-ca: Father Sha-ca (see above, 70-71)
260. yo law le k'o k'o (see 1/26)
261. a-e Na-bo na-ca : Mother Na-bo-ma (see above, 72-3)
262. k'a: also
263. te ha sheh yan hk'o-hta : one day three times on
264. k'aw pa: once again order
265. leh keu Ia: and put upon [us this blessililg]
266. a-pa Sha ca: Father Sha-ca (see above, 70-71)
267. k'a: also
268. te nyi sheh yan: one day three times
269. k'aw hpa: once again create
270. teh keu Ia: and put upon [us this blessing]
271. ma g'a daw ha ga hki ve : no troubled/distressing thoughts (see
above, 25)
272. o, 0, exclamations {prayer is almost :finished!)
273. ya nyi tan o k'ai-ve : today and hereafter
274. yo law /e k'o k'o (see I/26)
275. cheh sha caw sha: health and prosperity
276. bon : blessing
277. ti: only
278. k'aw pa /eh keu Ia: once again order and bestow

24 Anthony R. Walker
TEXT TWO
FORMAL TRANSLATION
l. Ob, at this completion of another year my whole household, yes,
my whole household celebrates the new year, celebrates the new
month; may the chickens, may all the animals of the household
suffer from no distressing thoughts.
2. Throughout the whole year protect us all from the seventy-seven
different. kinds of sickness, protect us from the cuts of the knives
and axes, once again protect us from sharp-pointed pieces of wood,
once again protect us from being tied up with all kinds of sickness
throughout the year, and let us not be troubled by depressing
thoughts, rather let us enjoy great wealth like the people down
there, three times in one day once again order, once again stretch
out your hand and once again bestow this blessing upon us.
3. Oh Father Sha-ca and Mother Na-bo-ma, you who are allknowing,
all-true, my life is not precious, I cannot know all, I
cannot speak the truth; oh Mother Na-bo-ma, the all-knowing,
all-true, Father Sha-c~, Lord Blacksmith, Father Heavenly Headman,
Headman's 1 Nife, all of these, three times in one day, three
times in one night

LA!IU NY! (HED LAHU) NEW YEAR TEXTS- I 25
us all enjoy long lives; may the white-beaded elders and the yellowheaded
youngsters talk of our fine style and say of us, "Oh ho,
those people have plenty of money;" this blessing my household
asks that you once again order upon us, with this blessing they
ask that you once again enwrap us.
4. Three times in one night, three times in one day let us not be
troubled by depressing thoughts, let the pregnant women deliver
safely, let the whole household united by the same pure thoughts
work together in the fields, and from one day's labour in the
fields may we obtain nine boxes of money and white clothes 0 > to
fill nine rice barns, may we not be troubled by depressing thoughts;
may all elder brother blacksmiths within the four corners of this
earth, may this headman [of our village] and all his people once
again create for us [this blessing], once again stretch out their hands
and once again bestow [this blessing] upon us.
5. May we not be killed by men nor by malicious spirits, may every
ka-shaw, every la-shaw also within the four corners of the
earth, within the four corners of the heaven, may. the ninety-nine
headmen also, once again order upon us, once again stretch out
their hands and once again bestow upon us this blessing.
6. Three times in one night, three times in one day grant tbat we may
not be killed by men nor by malicious spirits, let everybody talk
of our good fortune, may the food never finish, may the clothing
never become depleted, with this blessing enwrap us.
i) "Yellow-headed youngsters" is simply a euphonious couplet to "white-headed
eiders". Lahu youth generally have jet-black hair.
j) i.e. "may there be no disputes within the household" (which would endanger
the smooth functioning of this basic economic unit).
kl i.e. •·a great deal of money".
1) The adjective "white" is used poeticall-y and aoes not indicate the colour of
Lahu clothing.
ml "Elder brother" here indicates respect for the blacksmith, who is the most important
artisan in the village because he makes the farming implements.
n) Ka-shaw, a Lahu villager possessing oracular powers.
o) La-.~haw. a ritual official associated with the cult of the supreme Lahu supernatural.
G'ui-sha (cf. Walker 19 70 b: 191 ).
p) i.e. "all headmen".

26 Anthony R. Walker
7. From today and hereafter, may all the women, all the children of
women, and all Buddhist monks also, once again help us, once
again take note of us, take care of us and look after us.
8. Three times in one day, three times in one night on this earth,
may all policemen and all soldiers help us, take note of us, may
all white-haired elders, and all Buddhist monks also, once again
help us, once again take note of us; the blessing of no hardship,
this blessing my household ask that you once again order and once
again bestow upon them.
9. Oh from today and hereafter may we be troubled by no distressing
thoughts, this blessing once again order and bestow upon us.
10. Father Sha-ca and Mother Na-bo-ma also, three times in one night
once again order and once again bestow upon us this blessing that
we may not be troubled by distressing thoughts, oh, from today
and hereafter let us enjoy health and prosperity, this blessing alone
order and bestow upon us.
REFERENCES CITED
MATISOI'F, James A.
1970 "Note on the Orthography of Lahu", in WALKER (1970b: xxxiii-v).
WALKER, Anthony R.
1970a "The La" Hu- Nyi- (Red La" Hu_) New Year Celebrations",
Journal of the Siam Society LVIII Part I, 1-44.
1970b Lahu Nyi (Red Lahul Village Society and Economy in North Thailand.
Chiang Mai (Tribal Research Centre). 2 vols mimeographed.
1972 "Blessing Feasts and Ancestor Propitiation among the Lahu Nyi
(Red Lahul", Joumul of the Siam Society LX Part I, 345-3 7 3.
ql A couplet meaning "all people".
rl While Lahu prayers retain certain traditional themes, the precise wording of a
prayer is not rigidly ordained. Each recitation may be different as the individual
embroiders a theme to his liking. It is quite acceptable, therefore. that
this household head calls also upon the powers that be outside his own community:
Buddhist monks. the spiritual leaders of the Labu's lowland neighbours,
and soldiers and policemen, agents of lowland secular authority.

THE DRESS OF THE PWO KAREN
OF NORTH THAILAND
by
E.M. Hinton
The Karen are the most numerous of the minority peoples who live
in the hills of North Thailand. Originally from Burma, they have been
moving through the hills for centuries in search of new sites for their
villages. Many are still in Burma, but those in Thailand number about
300,000.
There are several closely related groups comprising the Karen, the
largest of which is the Skaw Karen. The next most numerous are the
Pwo Karen, of whom there are about 100,000 in Thailand. It is the
dress of these people that I wish to descnbe. My observations were
made in 1968-69 in Dong Luang, a Pwo village close to the Burmese border
and little influenced by contact with the Thai lowlanders.l Dong
Luang was typical of the many other mountain Pwo villages in the area,
but not, however, of lowland Pwo who wore different clothes again, the
women retaining traditional garb while the men were indistinguishable
from the Thai.
By tradition the Karen are subsistence farmers, so there is little
cash for indulging expensive whims in clothing. Nevertheless, the Pwo
have devised a most dignified and colourful mode of dress which compares
with any in the hills. Single girls wear a long white dress, richly
decorated with red (Pl. 1 ); men and boys wear black trousers and a red
shirt (Pl. 2), while married women wear a red skirt and blouse (Pl. 3).
Colours are bright-red, green or black for preference-and accessories
are as elaborate as the Pwo can make them.
Most clothing is handwoven. The cotton is grown in the fields and
spun into thread, or purchased from the Thai. If black or red cloth are
required, the homespun thread must be dyed accordingly-with forest
dyes if black, or with purchased red dyes. When these skeins have been
Il Data for this paper was gathered during anthropological Fieldwork with my
husband in Dong Luang village, Mae Sariang District, North Thailand. Fieldwork
was conducted under the auspices of the Tribal Research Centre, Chiang
Mai.

28 E.M. Hinton
combed and rolled into balls, they are woven into cloth by the women
and girls. They sit on the floor with legs extended under the loom, and
with their backs supported by a wide leather strap. (Pl. 4) A girl learns
to weave at about the age of ten or twelve years.
Pattern and decoration are introduced into the cloth in various
ways. The red, geometric decoration on the girl's dress is created by
inserting a number of tufts of red thread into the cloth as it is being
woven, and then cutting them off close. The more tufts that are inserted,
the rnore fluffy is the design. Then, intricate patterns arc woven in coloured
wools. Another form of decoration is simply a narrow cotton
stripe of one form or another; or yet another, just a series of ratsed ridges
in the cloth. Unlike other hilltribes, such as the Yao and the Mco,
the Pwo do not decorate with embroidery, but with pat tern woven into
the fabric.
I should now like to look more closely at these clothes, and first at
those of the single girl. Her dress consists of two long strips of white
cloth folded in half and seamed down the sides and centre front and back,
leaving holes for head and arms-a simple basic pattern which also characterises
the boy's sl1irt and the married woman's blouse.
The appeal of this dress lies in its decoration, especially the fluffy
pattern from knee to hemline and across the shoulders, (cliUj khe phaw,
lit. "the dress's fluff). This pattern varies from dress to dress, but it
does always seem to consist of squares or perpendicular lines. A line or
two of this pattern is also to be found above the bustline, but it differs
from the pattern elsewhere in that it is almost invariably a l'orm.of zig
zag. Plates 5-12 illustrate a sample variety of patterns found in this
decoration and their combinations.
Below the fluffy pattern at the bustline is the yoke pattern (chbj kh6
aj, lit. "the dress's pattern")--strips of plain red weaving in wool, alternating
with patterned strips of diamond shaped squares woven in
coloured wools. (Pl. 13}
Interesting variations occur in this dress and especially in the yoke
pattern, according to the age of the wearer. In a baby girl's dress only
a minimum of decoration is present: the yoke pattern will consist of just
one patterned strip and two coloured stripes instead of the three patterned
strips. (Pl. 14) As the child grows she will perhaps have three very

THE DHESS OF THE PWO KAREN OF NORTH THAILAND 29
narrow strips of pattern and they will grow wider as she grows older.
At the age of courtship-usually early twenties-decoration is at its most
elaborate (Pl. 13) but after that, as the single woman grows old, the decoration
again becomes rudimentary.
The single girl wears her hair long, tied in a knot on top of her head
and covered by a manufactured hand towel held by a colourful headband.
Her arms are laden with metal bracelets from wrist to upper arm and
her ears are pierced for earrings. At her neck is a string of tiny black
beads wound tightly round and round; sometimes she adds layers of white
beads as well. 2 With her little red bag for pipe and tobacco slung over
her shoulder she will go barefoot to the fields in wet season or dry.3
2) The jewellery of both men and women is sometimes bought and sometimes
made in the village. Earrings, whether of glass or beaten out of silver into
round, button like shapes, are bought from Thong Su traders who cross periodically
from Burma; so also are the black choker necklaces worn at the throats
of both men and women, and the l~yers of white beads.
But bracelets. hairpins and tight fitting neck bands are made in the village,
hammered into shape after scrap ~luminium has been melted down into ingots.
Boys often make these in their leisure time for their girlfnends, other girls buy
them for themselves.
Most bracelets are just plain curves of metal, but some are more special,
consisting of two curves twisted round each other. Both kinds grow shiny and
smooth with wear. Girls collect their bracelets from childhood until eventually
both forearm and upper arm are covered by their metallic ;hine, and they continue
to wear them after marriage.
3) A prized possession of any Pwo is his pipe. Pwo of both sexes smoke pipes
from childhood, but do not usually own one until the age of ten or twelve.
There are various kinds or pipes-usually carved out of wood. either made
locally or purchased from traders. Expensive "pipes are decorated with silver,
and even more expensive ones (Lua pipes) are made entirely of silver. A few
Pwo do not smoke and prefer to chew betel instead.
Bags for pipes and tobacco are small red shoulder bags. (See Plate 23)
They are adorned by a large section of coloured woollen decoration similar to
the decoration over the shoulders of the married woman's blouse and by flowing
tassels; there are also vertical stripes as in the boy's shirt and small bands
of woollen pattern as in the yoke pattern of boy's and girl's garments.
Larger bags are woven for carrying goods food or clothing for overnight
trips, or commodities for s&le in the market. These are usually white with some
form of red or black stripe. Medium sized bags are often decorated with
woollen weaving, but the large ones are plain.
Blankets arc also woven of cotton and decorated with stripes. Some are
red with white stripes, others white with red stripes, but they seem always to
be some combination of these colours.

30 E.M. Hinton
When a Pwo girl marries she discards the girl's white dress for the
red skirt and blouse of the married woman. If she never marries then
she wears her virginal white for the rest of her life; it is a custom which
emphatically demonstrates the low status of the unmarried woman in
Pwo society.
The married woman's blouse is as elaborate as the white dress. Its
decoration consists of a design woven in coloured wools over the shoulders,
(chdj khuu thaj, lit. "the top of the blouse") and beneath it, front
and baCk, another design ( chtzj Cz daAaj, lit, ''the blOUSe'S wingS"),
Beneath the heavily decorated yoke is "the red", (thee daang), three or
four bands of purchased red cloth appliqueed onto the hand woven blouse
and separated from each other by white weaving.
The shoulder pattern is always a series of diamond shapes, but the
size of the diamonds and the intricacy of the colours and pattern vary.
According to the informants, the younger the woman the smaller and
more intricate the designs. The older she was the larger and "more
ugly" were the designs. (Pl. 15). The second design is a vertical one and
reminiscent of wings, as the name suggests. Again the complexity and
intricacy vary, but usually according to the complexity and intricacy of
the shoulder pattern. The most common patterns found at Dong Luang
are illustrated in Plates 16-18.
The skirt is much less elaborate and has no colourful woollen weav­
It consists of two long strips of cloth sewn together horizontally
ing.
and then down the side, into a tubular garment.
It is gathered at the
waist by a belt or tie of some kind which also holds it in position.
relies for its decoration on horizontal cotton stripes.
The mast
nottceable stripe is a wide black one about midway in both halves of the
skirt; it is called simply "tbe skirt's black" (niing a saa). Other narrower
combinations of stripes are called "the skirt's eyes" (niing a mea) and
ar~ concentrated in the middle of the garment between the black stripes.
Less obtrusive single stripes ("dividers of the red", chii a chaw), serve to
break up the solid blocks of red. The colours of these stripes are left
to the choice of each woman, but yellow and green are common. If they
bold further meaning I was unable to elicit it. (See Plate 3)
It

THU: DHU:SS OF THE PWO KAHEN OF NOUTH THAILAND 31
Accessories for the married woman include headscarf and jewellery,
(earrings, necklaces and bracelets), and hair is long and tied in a
knot on top of the head.
When meeting a Pwo boy for the first time, one notices only his
hair. It is also worn long, but knotted over one ear and anchored with
a shining metal hairpin. Much attention is paid to the grooming of its
sleek blackness with a finely toothed wooden comb (or perhaps a plastic
one), and when colourful headbands, necklaces and earrings are added,
the exotic picture is complete. (Pl. 19)
The other special feature of the boy's dress is his tattooing, extending
from navel to knee in a striking replicated design of dark blue tiger
cats. (Pl. 20) The actual tattooing is a most painful process, but boys
regard it as a demonstration of their manhood and say that no girl would
marry them if they remained untattooed. · Other decorative tattoos
appear on their arms - perhaps lines of Karen script which wind round
and up, or the coils of a long snake. (Pl. 20) (Girls, by contrast, have
only a minimum of tattooing on their hands, arms and ankles.)
The boy's shirt is bright and colourful. Woven in red cotton it is
· similar in style to the married woman's skirt, being striped (but perpendicularly)
with thin lines of black, yellow, green, turquoise or whatever
else might contrast with red, in various combinations. The yoke pattern
is like the girl's and woven in at chest level in coloured wools; but unlike
the girl's, it consists of only a single band of decoration. Beneath it,
tiny raised ridges of red change the texture of the cloth until they reach
a pair of horizontal stripes near the bottom of the shirt, matching stripes
in the yoke. Then the cloth is plain again for the last few inches. (See
Plate 2)
As with the girl's dress, decoration of the boy's shirt changes according
to age. A small boy will have but a rudimentary yoke pattern
-a thin line or black diagonals-and the simplest of stripe combinations,
but as he grows older they will grow more complex. By his twenties
the band will be wide enough to fit several lines of pattern in it. When
he is an old man only an insignificant stripe will remain.
This traditional red shirt is as often as not either discarded by boys
in favour of a bright green manufactured shirt, or worn over the green
..

32 E.M. Hinton
shirt. The black trousers and towelling headbands are purchased, too.
In fact, the only handwoven article used by the boys is frequently the
little red bag for pipe, tobacco or betel nut.
At marriage the clothing of a young man does not change, but as
the years pass by there is a gradual discarding of the glamour of the
younger man. (Pl. 21) The bright scarves, the necklaces and jewellery
are the first things to go; but the most noticeable change is the cutting of
the long hair, eventually into a crew cut, which no man does before he
marries. The age at which it is done varies. Some continue to wear
their hair long under a scarf into middle age or even old age, while
others cut it off just a few years after marriage. Some say that it is cut
in order to appear less conspicuous on visits to the lowlands, but whatever
tile reason, there is no mistake about the fact that glamour and a
preoccupation with it are the preserve of youth. 4
Festive occasions, such as weddings and New Year ceremonies, are
celebrated in best clothes by everybody. But the gala occasions of Pwo
Karen life when the young people appear in all their finery are the
funerals. They gather from far and wide to sing round a bier night
after night, sending the soul of the deceased to the afterworld. It is a
time for courting and making new friends and all married people look
back on the fun, excitement and glamour of such times with great nostalgia.
Initially clothes for funerals are the same as for everyday, but they
are the newest and best in each person's possession. The girls wear
their newest dresses, in which the cloth is still clean and white and the
decoration bright red. And the boys wear their newest, blackest trousers
and their newest shirts, usually a bright green one under the traditional
red one. However there are additions.
The first addition to the girl's dress is a layer of long, bright red
tassels, both front and back. (Pl. 22) Then, instead of the usual old
towelling beadclotb a scarf of bright green silk is substituted (if possible),
4) While Pi bun Songkhram was Prime Minister ( 194 7-1957), the wearing of distinctive
ethnic costumes was banned. Although the decree did not affect people
living in isolated areas, those visiting lowland towns were compelled to conform.

THE DRESS OF THE PWO KAREN OF NORTH THAILAND 33
held in position by a band of bright ribbon.
The newest red bag is
carried, the same bracelets and choker necklaces are worn and layers of
white ones are added. Boys also wear a green silk scarf or some other
colourful one, and add additional hairpins, perhaps a big comb, and the
layers of white beads to their normal jewellery. They also tie a bright
red length of cloth round their waists. {Pl. 23)
The girl's hairdo on these occasions is strikingly different. Instead of
the usual knot on top of the head the hair is padded out into a mushroom
shape by a number of hair pieces, and then held in position by an armoury
of shining hairpins. (This is not evident to the onlooker as it is hidden
beneath scarves and headbands.) There is also a further elaboration of
headgear in a series of floor length silk scarves of various colours which
flow from the back of the head like wide ribbons. (Pl. 24)
Most glamorous of all, however, is the singing cape, worn over the
girl's shoulder as a stole and heavily decorated with hundreds of little
buttons interlaced with strings of pearly beads; a glistening fringe of
irridescent green beetle wings completes the cape and sways and swings
with the girl's movement.
With the addition of lipstick and powder for both sexes and a towel
to muffle the stench of the dead, the young Pwo go off to sing and to
court, looking very grand indeed. (Pl. 24)
No discussion of Pwo dress \.vould be complete without mention of
the Pwo genius for improvisation, necessitated by subsistence economy.
The bracelets demonstrate it clearly. Most hill peoples are laden with
valuable silver neckpieces and bracelets which the Pwo could never
afford. But they are not to be outdone and hammer theirs out of aluminium,
bedecking themselves with as many as their arms will hold.
One also suspects that the original inspiration of the singing cape was
the jewel and sequin encrusted richness of the Burmese and Mon courts.
But the Pwo manage a similar effect with old buttons, cheap pearly beads
and beetle wings.
This love of the colourful, rich and dramatic in clothes contrasts
markedly with the style of the Skaw Karen, a group with which the Pwo
are often very closely associated. Skaw clothes are basically similar, consisting
of the same white dress, married woman's skirt and blouse, and

Unlik~
mytlu:,
nu::rdy
dec"r~nh:e. arc
UOttne ilk ~>in~~ltd olU
~(1!rit p«:tiph: h'l u~furd mH,u~
~uion i11 fit
i:~
But !.lam: h ~~
at illl hCiiJ!.bL
~':n!fie,ctimt of
Such then ure the
and worr1, or briain ~wd w~w. the>· ~ne worn '"'llh
At time~ t:me even !iUllpcct'll. thern hith:len
of the few unique n:~pect i tJf l 1 wo Karen hf~.
S):f Jacqueline Butler, r

!'late 2. l'wo l\i~ren !my.

Plate 3. Pwo Karen married woman.
Plate 4.
Pwo Karen loom.

.~;~--'
Plate 5. Fluffy red patterns on girl's dress-"Tiny Little Squares" on the shoulder, "Zig Zags"
at the yoke, and "Tiny Little Squares" at the hem.

Plate 6. Fluffy red patterns on girl's dress-"Squares with Diagonals" at the shoulder, "Zig
Zags" at the yoke, and "Double Squares" at the hem.

Plate 7. Fluffy red patterns~ on the girl's dress-"Perpendiculars" _at the shoulder, "Zig Zags" at
the yoke, and "Horizontal Lines of Squares" at the hem.

Plate 8. Fluffy red patterns on the girl's dress-" Zig Zags" on the shoulder, and at the yoke, and
''Horizontal Lines of Squares" at the hem.

Plate 9. Fluffy red patterns on the girl's dress-"Tiny Little Squares" at the shoulder, "Zig Zags"
at the yoke, and "Horizontal Lines of Squares" at the hem.

Plate I 0. Fluffy red patterns on girl's dress-"Squares" at the shoulder, "Zig Zags" at the yoke,
and ''Perpendiculars" at the hem.

Plate 11. l'lurfy red patterns on girl's drchs--"Doublc Squares" at the shoulder, "Zig Zugs" ut
the yoke, und "Line~ of Square!i" at the hem.

Plate 12. Fluffy red patterns on girl's dress-"Zig Zags" on the shoulder, and at the yoke, and
"Perpendiculars" at the hem.

Plate 13.
Pattern on the yoke of single
girl's dress.
Plate 14. Simple decoration on the dresses
of small girls.
Plate 15. Old married Pwo woman- the design on
~ her blouse is a lar~e one.

Plate 16. The coloured woven patterns of the married woman's blouse. The shoulder pattern is called·
"Squares with small Sides". Like the pattern found at the hem of the girl's dress, this pattern is invariably
based on "squares" (or diamond shaped rectangles), which vary in size and trimmings-some are simple
squares, while others have squares within squares, or coloured diagonals.

Plate 17. Coloured patterns found in a married woman's blouse.
with big Sides".
The shoulder pattern is called "Squares

Plate 1 &. Coloured patterns found in a married woman's blouse. The shoulder pattern is called "Squares
with big Sides".

Plate 19. Pwo Karen boy. Plate 20. Decorative tattoos of Pwo Karen boy.
Plate 21.
Old Pwo Karen man.

Plate 22. Ceremonial dresses of Pwo Karen girls.
Plate 23.
Ceremonial dress of Pwo Karen boys.
Plate 24.
Young Pwo Karen at a funeral.

THE ALLIANCE OF ANTHROPOLOGICAL AND
SOCIOLOGICAL CONCEPTS AND METHODOLOGIES
IN FIELD RESEARCH IN THAILAND
by
Milton Jacobs*
This paper is an answer, albeit a partial one, to the question that
deals with the compatibilities between the two disciplines, anthropology
and sociology. My view is that the two fields are so closely related that
the future growth of both depends upon their cooperation and willingness
to understand one another.
Let me put forth my position plainly. It seems to me that the orthodox
anthropological field techniques are well suited to the study of
small societies. Where the problem of research lies imbedded in large
urban areas, sizable rural areas, or even in nations, then I doubt that our
type of intimate research ... participation-observation, interviewing
informants, obtaining life histories, giving psychological tests to small
numbers, are adequate to the task. The opportunities for field research
these days take the researcher into developing countries in Africa, Asia,
and Latin America as well as into new concerns in our own society. We
must be quite aware that we are dealing with countries of some millions
of inhabitants and with the problems of such countries. Under these
circumstances, a new perspective is required; this new perspective calls
for the alliance of our two fields and militates against isolationism.
Calling for the collaboration of these two disciplines shows my
bias. The major problems of city decay, poverty, and a polluted environment
in the industrial world as well as the multitude of problems in
the Third World require the concerted efforts of the entire family of
physical scientists, engineers, humanists, and social scientists.
I would suggest, as a beginning, that the anthropologist and the
sociologist must work hand in hand in order to begin to achieve the
significant research required by these times of ferment and explosions.
To demonstrate this band in hand approach, I would like to discuss field
*Professor of Anthropology, State University College, New Paltz, New York, U.S.A.

36 Milton Jacobs
work that I conducted in Thailand in 1961-62.1 Simply stated, I utilized
as the major framework of the study design the folk-urban continuum of
Redfield (1960). As is known, Redfield arrived at his concept through
classical anthropological research in Central America. In a sense then,
I viewed the Redfield concept as a hypothesis which I attempted to test
and amplify by using the more sociologically accepted techniques of
systematic sampling of urban and rural areas, interviewing with structured
questionnaires, quantifying the responses to questions, setting up
specific moss tabulations, and applying statistical 'tests of significance to
the tables. ·In this fashion, we do not generalize on the basis of a handful
of village studies but rather make the generalizations after we have
tested the hypotheses derived from village level research. I am suggesting
that anthropologists will undertake the hypothesizing role and the socialgists
will undertake the verifying role. Both roles arc after all components
of the scientific method. This paper is a demonstration of such
a cooperative enterprise.
1) A short note on the research design:
(a) The study represented an attempt to gather empirical information concerning
communications behavior. A large number of persons were asked to
describe their own reee'nt behavior. In order that findings might apply to
many parts of Thailand, seven locations were selected to include Bangkok,
. three provincial capitals, and three villages. In these selected locations,
area probability sampling was employed to select the respondents for
interviews.
(b) The questionnaire was designed generally to obtain descriptions of a number
of different social and geographical conditions. The data allowed the
partial completion of the well-known formnla of communication :- source
(who says?), content (what?), audience (to whom?) media (how?), and
effect (with what effect?). It should be noted that the "with what effect"
component of the formula was not studied. Specifically, the questionnaire
contained questions dealing with (i) exposure to the mass media; (ii) wordof-mouth
behavior with respect to passing political and personal information
and to receiving or giving advice; (iii) word-of-mouth behavior in
different social contexts and in spatial contexts (travel, migration); and (iv)
the respondents' background.
(c) The interviewers asked the questions as written in the Thai-language versions
of the questionnaire and either recorded the spontaneous responses
verbatim or fitted the responses into precoded categories for certain items.
If the respondent failed to understand a question, the interviewer was instructed
to rephrase it slightly to obtain a response. The sequential arrangement
of the questions was such that in some cases all questions were not
asked of all respondents. Whether or not certain questions were asked
depended upon the response or lack of response to the preceding ones.

~IETIIODOLOCIES IN FIELD HESEARCH IN THAILAND 37
The above sequence can be reversed. There are examples where
sociological research, theory, and hypotheses operate within a particular
cultural context. It is then good practice to replicate the study or to
attempt to test the hypothesis in other cultural contexts thus moving
toward greater generality. Of course, this is what sociologists are now
calling comparative sociology.
Admittedly then, this complementing of anthropology and sociology
should be a two-way street, but I would argue that in the developing
countries the small scale anthropological studies based on a number of
villages, for example, should occur first and should provide for the
initial hypothesizing. The sociological concern for quantification and
sampling should follow to test out the anthropological hypotheses.
There are a number of reasons why this seems preferable: (1) it allows
for more flexibility; (2) it allows for more depth research although admittedly
on a small scale; (3) lastly, it is more practical, easily managed,
and less costly.
The example of testing anthropological hypotheses or concepts by
sociological methods which I want to present in brief form is as follows:
Following Redfield's folk-urban (traditional-modern) continuum, how
can we define or better delineate the traditional, transitional, and modern
Thai on the basis of sociological characteristics like spatial mobility,
social isolation, exposure to the mass media, and communication behavior?
I am aware of the controversy (Foster: 1967: 2-4) over thefolk-urban
continuum and admit the confusion that Redfield (1953: 7, 22, 31, 33)
created by using "folk" and "peasant" interchangeably. However, I am
convinced that it is a useful typology and can serve with some adjustment
in the analysis of Thai society. For example, I find more similarity than
diJference in Miner's ( 1967: 3) descriptions of Redfield's folk-urban typology
and the rural-urban continuum. In a sense, the rural-urban continuum
fits within the larger continuum called the folk-urban.
The adjustment that 1 referred to above is the creation of the
continuum- (1) village, (2) town, and (3) city. Since we are dealing
with a nation having political, cultural, and economic extensions, I
include the peasant village within the continuum but exclude the "primitive''
village of the hills tribesmen (Service: 1971 : 390). But 1 must
first admit the resemblances between the folk and the peasant village.
Perhaps, a tabular presentation of data can best point out these similarities
as well as the diiTerences and can indicate the characteristics of the
village-town-city continuum:

38 Milton Jacobs
FOLK___
--------,-------- ---URBAN
"PRIMITIVES" I ;PEASANTS( 2 )
\ I
VILLAGEk-- --------- --> TOWN+------------~CITY
"Prectvt . 'l' tzc d " Ch aractenst1cs: . .
Smallness
Isolated< 4 >
Homogeneous
Self-sufficient
Personal relationships
emphasized
Simple division of labor
Nonliterate
Somewhat literate
" C tvt . '1' tze d ''Cl laractenstiCs: . .
Not small
Not isolated
Heterogeneous
Not self-sufficient
Impersonal relationships
emphasized
Complex division of labor
Literate
Sacred or moral order Secular order
Connected to city
through markets< 6 >
Market-focused
econom/ 9 >
Politically controlled
by city< 7 >
Political complexity and
control
1) The concepts "folk" and "little community" are used synonomously by Redfield
(1955:3,4, 144).
2) Peasants are referred to as rural natives whose life style take account of the city
(Redfield : 19 53 : 3 1 ).
3) Redfield: 1953: 7-13, 22.
4) "Isolated" refers to the infrequent contacts between urban peoples and village
people (Halpern: 1967: 38), and to the lack of literacy of the folk culture
(Redfield: 1941:16, 17).
5) Peasants are said to possess the "traditional moral solidarity found in any isolated
folk society." (Redfied: 1953: 39).
6) Service: 1971: 441; Redfield: 1953: 33.
7) Service: 1971: 457; Redfield: t'953: 53.
8) Redfield: 195 3 : 22.
9) Halpern: 1967: 3 8.

METHODOLOGIES IN ·FJELD HESEARCH IN THAlLANil 39
Most of the "precivilized characteristics" of the folk culture or
"little community" are opposites of the "civilized characteristics" of the
urban culture. The peasant village and the primitive village share many
of these precivilized characteristics except that they may appear to a
somewhat lesser degree in the peasant village. The main difference
between the two types of villages is that there is some presence of literacy
in the peasant village and none in the primitive village. At the same
time the important connections between the city and the peasant village
must be stated: (1) the peasant village is linked to the city through the
market economy and (2) the peasant village is controlled politically by
the city.
Rather than putting forth a typology or a continuum as has been
illustrated above, Hauser (1965:8, 9) prefers to use the term urbanization
as a social process which has brought about changes in life style. As if
influenced by Hauser's viewpoint, I choose to examine social interactions
as examples or segments of life style: everyday (personal topics) wordof-mouth
behavior, political discussions 2 , advice-giving and adviceseeking
in the study in Thailand. In all cases, I was interested in determining
the sociological characteristics of both parties in these interactions.
In addition, it was possible to look for differences among these social
interactions as we compared them in (I) the city (Bangkok), (2) the towns
(the provincial capitals), and (3) the villages. Thus, I combined the
continuum concept with Hauser's emphasis on social process.
My examination of the practices of passing personal information
showed that there is a greater similarity of male and female behavior in
Bangkok (city) than in the provincial capitals (town) and villages where
males are generally more active than females (Table IA-1).
2) If a respondent reported to the interviewer that he had recently discussed a
political topic, the interviewer would ask him to describe the nature of the
topic. In this way we were able to verify that the topic was truly political.
The interviewers were native Thai speakers. ThQse w)lo cQded tl1e question­
P!Iires were also nat~ve T)lai spe~ker~,

40 Milton Jacobs
Table I. The Passing of Information by Word-of-Mouth
------ ------------- --------~~1 - - -- ------- A-2- ---· -~- --------;----------
The% passing per- The% passing poli- The% who gave
sonal information tical information personal advice
Bangkok:
(city)
Sex
-M
F
50(113)*
39 (92)
61 (166)
44 (98)
26 (451)
17 (395)
Occupational
Levels**
I
II
III
64 (28)
54 (34)
62 (26)
59 (90)
30 (33)
57 (34)
36 (184)
26 (109)
18 (125)
3 Provincial Sex
Capitals M
(Town) F
75 (76)
44 (54)
58 (84)
48 (63)
18 (278)
18 (272)
Occupational
Levels
I
II
III
50 (24)
78 (22)
48 (31)
65 (42)
42 (19)
54 (15)
18 (89)
10 (86)
16 (77)
3 Villages Sex
(Village) -M
F
70 (32)
54 (13)
46 (19)
33 ( 9)
* The number without parentheses is the percentage; the one within the parentheses
refers to the number of cases involved.
** The Occupational Levels· subsume specific occupations and are generally
correlated with power, prestige, and education. Some students of Thailand
argue that attempting to construct a class system for Thailand is meaningless
but insist that occupation is a highly significant social differentiating variable.
Level I includes the f,ollowing occupations which are government or large-or.
ganization oriented and require certain kinds of formal training or education :
government officials, military-police, teachers, professionals, white collar
workers, and students. Level II is made up mainly of persons in the commercial
field who own business: merchants. Level III includes occupations requiring
few complicated skills and therefore little in the way of formal training or
education: transport workers, waiters, gas station attendants, store clerks,
jabon;:rs (skilled (tnd unskilled), farmers, and fishermen,

MgTHODOLOt:IES IN FIELD HESEARCII IN TIIATLAN!J 41
If the information being passed is political, then males are even
more involved generally than females but are again somewhat more
active in Bangkok than elsewhere (Table IA-2).
There are more advice-giving interactions in Bangkok than in the
provincial capitals. Provincial females are just as likely to give advice
as their male counterparts. In Bangkok, more males than females give
advice. Similar behavior seems exemplified by the women while the
urban-rural dichotomy is more striking among males (Table I B).
The less urban (or more rural) Thai males are more socially restricted
than the urban males in that the former (39%; N = 130) are less
likely to cross occupational lines in their social interactions than the
latter (48%; N=243).
What about social interactions that involve connecting distant
points ... or carrying information from one point to another? Which
Thai are involved in such interactions?
Urban Thai (27%; N =546) are more likely to become involved in
long distance interactions than rural Thai (9%; N=102); the urban Thai
(36%; N=126) are also more spatially mobile than the urban Chinese
( 14%; N =40). Similarly, travel beyond the limits of their home city is
practiced by the urban Thai (32%) to a greater extent than the rural
Thai ( 15%).
Further, those urban Thai who are involved in long distance
social interactions and in travel are characterized as more modern than
traditional by virtue of their occupations (Level 1=46%) and education
of western orientation.
In another study limited to urban Thai males,
we discovered that monks, professionals and the military were vitally
involved in word-of-mouth communication as sources and discussants
of political information and as adv.ice-givers (Jacobs et al: Social Forces,
1966). This is corroboration to some extent of the previous statement
about prestigeful western-oriented occupations being more involved in
significant social interactions than non-prestigeful professions.
Political conversations or discussions 2 in the work and friendship
contexts occur more frequently in urban areas than in rural areas (See
Table II),

42 Milton Jacobs
Table II.
Percentage of Conversations Reported by Mule Respondents as
Having Political Content
------~------------
Type of Network Bangkok 3 Provincal Capital 3 Villages
At Work
,.,, 1------- '
% % %
31 23 12
(281) (163) (50)
-- ~--~-------·-- --
26 18 9
Friends
(266) (162) (50)
-·----------···--
In a number of different contexts we find that the more modern
segment of the social structure-the professionals of western orientation-­
exhibits greater involvement in political discussions than the more tra~
ditional segments (peasants, farmers, fishermen, laborers).
An examination of the status relationships in the work context,
between male respondents and their reliable sources of news indicates
that respondents in the villages (42%; N=35) and provincial cities (29~;;
N= 121) tend to seek out tbe[r superiors for this function to a greater
extent than Bangkok respondents (ll%; N=177). In other words, the
provincials and villagers behave more traditionally in following the
usual Thai superordinate-subordinate pattern of behavior. Examining
word-of-mouth networks along the village-town-city continuum (my
modification of Redfield's folk-urban continuum) casts additional light on
the Thai society. The data presented so far also helps us define more
precisely the homogeneity of the village culture and the heterogeneity of
the urban culture :3
3) My statement is reminiscent of Redfield's stated objective of his Yucatan study,
that is to investigate the differences between "isolated homogeneous society"
and "mobile hetero~eneous society" (Redfield: 1941: 17),

METHODOLOGII

44 Milton Jacobs
Most of the conclusions reached in this study have been reached
on the basis of dyads in the word-of-mouth process such as A passes
everyday information to B, A gives advice to B, or A discusses politics
with B: (I) Level I respondents interact with only Level I persons on all
three kinds of word-of-mouth networks. (2) Level II respondents are
apparently most frequently in word-of-mouth contact with Levell persons
and secondly with their own kind except in political discussions
where they prefer Level I and III persons. (3) Level III respondents
discuss personal infonna tion mostly with Level I persons, somewhat
with Level II persons, and least with Level III persons like themselves;
in the other two networks they interact with Level I and their own kind.
Thus, we see that although the respondents' own occupational group is
always present, as would be expected, the high prestige occupations
definitely and significantly belong to most of the triads. Thus, all occupational
levels seem to gravitate toward more prestigeful occupations as
reliable sources of news and as political discussants. (See Table IV).
Table IV.
Word-of-Mouth Dyads: Thai nespondents and (a) Their Reliable
Sources of News, (b) Discussants of Personal and
(c) Political Information; by Occupational Levels
0 ccupational
L evels
R espondents
------
I
--~---·--- ~-
II
--------
Occupational Levels of:
(a) Their Reliable (b) Their Discus-
Sources of News sants of Personal
Information
'
I
II
I* I
I
II
----
(c) Their Discussants
of Political
Information
I
I
III
-·---
III
I
III
I
II
Ill
I
Ill

~IETHODOLOr;ms IN [IIgL!J HESEAHCH IN THAILAND 45
*The roman numerals in the cells (a) through {c) refer to the individuals,
identified by occupational levels, with whom the Thai respondents
interact for different communication purposes. The roman numerals
are arranged according to magnitude.
It would seem that such empirical findings need explanation or
refinement. Such explanation or refinement is found in Lucien Hanks'
anthropological work in Thailand (AA: 1962). Hanks' article, "Merit
and Power in the Thai Social Order" is not concerned with communications
in Thailand but is an attempt to explain the Thai social order.
Hanks {p. 1247) makes the point that the Thai hierarchy depends on a
composite quality called "merit" and explains (p. 1248) that a man's merit
may be lost or it may be gained. The man with merit-based effectiveness
becomes the nucleus of a group to which he distributes resources and
benefits (p. 1249). Such groups, he describes, as tiny hierarchies with
the superior. .. or the man with merit. .. showering benefits on his nearest
inferior, who then relays some portion to someone beneath him. The
ideal example-where persons interact with others immediately adjacent
to their station (status)-is found in the large Thai government bureaus,
but Hanks feels that this hierarchical structure is also significantly
present throughout Thai society.
Hanks' work helps us to interpret word-of-mouth flow of information
through the Thai social structure. His use of the concept "merit"
explains to some extent why and how certain Thai, particularly government
officials, teachers, military officers, and monks, function effectively
as key word-of-mouth communicators and advice-givers (influentials).
The relationship between word-of-mouth communications and the
hierarchical structure of the Thai social order is reflected again and again.
When asked to describe that person who is most reliable as a source of
political news, the Thai respondents used such words as "respectability,"
"being learned," and "being informed" which are applicable to those
who occupy the upper end of the social hierarchy or who possess "merit".
As part of the fieldwork, I used a projective picture displaying two
Thai men (attired simply and similarly) sitting on a porch. The respondents
were told that the man on the left (the advice-seeker) in the picture
had come to ask advice from the man on the right and then were asked
to describe the man on the right (the advice-giver). In this indirect way
the Thai respondents were given an opportunity to describe the kind of
person they sought out for important personal advice. The descriptive

46 Milton Jacobs
terms consisted of (1) personal characteristics such as experienced, old,
religious, rich, and powerful, which are clearly meri t-relatcd and (2) direct
references to high status indicating that merit is automatically present.
The data from the projective picture corroborated the hierarchical
character of word-of-mouth networks and, therefore, its relationship to
the Thai social structure.
In summary, the study utilized two kinds of information : ( l) the
skeletal word-of-mouth networks based on survey data and (2) the nHtterial
obtained mainly from an analysis of Thai Buddhism. By correlating
the two kinds of data, I believe that we have demonstrated how
anthropology and sociology are complementing disciplines. I lmve given
two examples of this position as initially stated in this paper : ( 1) how
an anthropological concept is amplified by sociological methodology and
data and (2) how sociological findings-the arrangements or word-ofmouth
dyads-are explained by the anthropological analysis of merit. I
believe that such complementary works add richness and sharper definition
to the principles and concepts in both fields. Finally, the study of
word-of-mouth behavior along the village-town-city continuum bas shed
some additional light on the folk-urban controversy.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Foster, George M. "What Is a Peasant?" in Peasant Society: .1 Reada edited by
J.M. Potter, Mary N. Diaz, and George M. Foster, Boston:
Little, Brown & Co., 1967.
Halpern, Joel M. The C!wnginfi Village Community. Englewood Cliffs, N.J.:
Prentice-Hall, Inc., 1967.
Hanks, Lucien M. "Merit and Power in the Thai Social Order." American Anthropologist,
Vol. 64, No.6, December 1962.
Hauser, Philip M. "Urbanization : An Overview" in The Study of Urbanization
edited by Philip M. Hauser and Leo F. Schnore, New York:
John Wiley, 1965.
Jacobs, Milton, Farhad Farza?egan, ~nd Alexande~ R. Askenasy. "A Study of Key
Commumcators m Urban Thailand." Social Forces, Vol. 45,
No.2, December 1966.
Miner, Horace.
The City in Modem Africa. N~w York : Frederick A Praeger
1967. • '
Redfield, Robert. The Folk Culture of Yucatan. Chicago: The University of
Chicago Press, 1941.
The P1·imitive World and Its Transformations,
Seal Books, !953.
Ithaca: Great
The Lit~le C~mmunity .and Peasant Society and Culture. Chicago:
The Untversity of Chtcago Press, 1960.
Service, Elman R. Profiles in Ethnology. New York: Harper and Row 1971
(revised edition) ' ·

THE 1901-1902 "HOLY MAN'S" REBELLION
by
John B. Murdoch
The "Holy Man's" I uprising of 1901-1902 was a large scale popular
rebellion involving Northeast Thailand, Southern Laos, and the adjacent
portion of the Vietnamese Central Highlands. Scholarship to date has
not adequately considered the rebellion's character as transcending
present national boundaries, having common leadership, and growing out
of common regional causes.
The principal commentators on the "Thai" rebellion have been
Toem Wiphakphotchanakit, Tej Bunnag, and Charles Keyes. Tocm
includes a chapter on the rebellion in his history of Northeast Thailand.2
Tej Bunnag's article gives a history of the events of the "Thai" rebellion,
and an interpretation explaining the uprising in largely economic terms.3
Charles Keyes' paper discusses the rebellion as an example of the potential
affinity of Thai Buddhist culture to millenarianism given changes
in elite-group structures and politicalleadership.4
The principal writers on the "Lao-tribal" rebellion in French Laos
and Viet-nam have been J.J. Dauplay, Paul de Boulanger, and Bernard
Bourotte. J.J. Dauplay, French Commissioner of Saravane (1905-1921),
portrays the rebellion as a Lao-tribal uprising against French political and
admi nist ra tive reforms that were applied too stringently and were imposed
too quickly. 5 Paul de Boulanger emphasizes the role of the "mystical and
superstitious" nature of the tribal people of Southern Laos in their
1) This uprising has come to be known in the literature as the '•Holy Man's"
rebellion. The Thai term is Phu L'vli Bun, which literally translated is "be who
bas merit".
2) Toem Wiphakpbotchanakit, Prawatsat [san (History of Northeast Thailand}
(Bangkok, 1970}, pp. 559-587.
3} Tej Bunnag, "Khabot Phu Mi Bun Pak Isan R.S 121" (The 1901-02 Holy Man's
Rebellion in Northeast Thailand) in Sangkhomsat Parithat (Journal of the Social
Sciences}, 5: 1 (June 1967), pp. 78-86.
4) Charles Keyes, "Millenialism, Theravada Buddhism, and Thai Society" (Unpublished
paper, March 1972).
5) J.J. Dauplar, Les Tm·es Rouges du Platemt des Botovens (Sai~on, 1929).

48 John B. Murdoch
reaction to French reforms. 6 Bernard Bourotte portrays the political
instability of the period, and the effects of both French and Thai maneuverings
and political reforms on the various tribal groups of Southern
Laos and the Central Highlands of Viet-nam. 7
The greatest problem of the studies to date is that they tend to see
the rebellion in discrete national terms .. ending at either bank of the
Mekong River. The impression given is that there are two separate
rebellions-the "Holy Man's" rebellion in Northeast Thailand and the
"Kba-Lao'' 8 rebellion in Southern Laos. In both cases, there are vague
references to trouble on the other side of the Mekong and allusions to
nefarious machinations of the party on the "other bank" being responsible.
This paper will consider the rebellion as a general uprising in the
Lower Mekong Region that transcended national borders. The attempt
will be made to prove that, to the extent the rebellion was an organized
movement, it was under common leadership, and grew out of the reaction
of a common Lower Mekong socio-economic polity to a wide range of
challenges to it by both the Siamese and the French.
Background
The background to the rebellion must be sought in the factors that
led up to the situation in the Lower Mekong at the turn of the century.
Prior to the late nineteenth century reforms of King Chulalongkorn,
the territory of the Siamese Kingdom was divided into three administrative
categories. First were the inner provinces which were in four
classes depending on their distance from Bangkok or the importance of
their local ruling houses. Second were the outer provinces, which were
situated between the inner provinces and further distant tributary states.
Finally there were the tributary states which were on the periphery of
6) Paul de Boulanger, Histoire du Laos Franqais (Paris, 1931).
7) Bernard Bourotte, History of the Mountain People of Southern Indochina up to 1945,
lJSAID translation of "Essai d'histoire des populations montagnards du Sud­
Indochinois jusqu'a 1945", Bulletin de la Societe des etudes indochinoises, n.s., v.
30 (1955), pp. 1-116.
8) "Kha" is the common, though somewhat pejorative, term used for the Austroasiatic
tribal people of Northeast Thailand, Laos, and Viet-nam. I use it here
\)ecausv it is cow. won parlan9e in the literature apd for ll!cl

TilE 1901-1902 "HOI.\' MAN'S" HEfiELLION 49
Siamese control. The inner provinces were administered from Bangkok;
whereas both the outer provinces and the tributary states were relatively
independent in internal affairs. Their obligations were such that the
outer provinces sent annual tribute money to Bangkok; whereas the
tributary states sent gold and silver trees every three years. Both were
expected to give Bangkok military assistance in times of war.9
In the Northeast, the Siamese inner provinces reached to Nakh9n
Ratchasima, which had been founded by King Narai in the seventeenth
century. to Beyond this were the outer provinces, including the Suwannaphum-Roi-et
region of Northeast Thailand, which came under Siamese
control in the latter half of the eighteenth century.tt Furthest afield
were Vientiane and Bassac, which became tributary states following the
1778 advance of Siamese armies,l 2 and came under increasing Siamese
control after the destruction of Vientiane in 1827.13 Until the encroachment
of the French in the late 1880's and early 1890's, Siamese power
expanded throughout the Lower Mekong Region. By the 1880's, "Siamese
dignataries were stationed in Attopeu, Bassac, Stung Treng, and
Ubon", 14 Sara vane was administered by a Chao Muang under Siamese
control, and King Chulalongkorn claimed the entire Lower Mekong
Region as far as the mountain scarp on the eastern edge of the Kontum
Plateau in Viet-nam.ts
The political, social, and economic relationships among the Siamese,
the Lao, and the Kha peoples were very complex. In the region of the
outer provinces, i.e. most of the Khorat Plateau, the Siamese ruled through
the Lao noble houses and their hereditary political hierarcbies.I6 These
hierarchies were ranged under the local lords, the Chao Muang. The top
four positions, the Chao Muang, Uppahat, Ratchawong, and Ratchabut,
9) Tej Bunoag, The Provincial Administration of Siam/rom .1892 to 1915 (Unpublished
PhD thesis, University of Oxford, 1968).
1 0) Charles Keyes, "Domain, Kinship, and Political Control on the Khorat Plateau"
(Unpublished paper, February 1972), p. 14.
11) Ibid., p. 11.
12) Tej Bun nag, op. cit., p. 57.
13) Bernard Bourotte, oj1. cit., p. 57.
14) Ibid., p. 57.
-15) Ibid., p. 86-87.
J6) Charles Keyes, op. cit., pp. 7-8,

50 John B. Murdoch
which were in descending order of status, authority, and right to :;ucccssion,
were confirmed in office by the Siamese King. In most cases this
meant that the King did not in any sense appoint "his" men, but rather
conferred ruling status on the existing Lao nobility. Below the four
major officials were the kromma!can muang or functionaries, who were
appointed by the chao muang without the need· for approval by the Kin g.
Thus in the political administration of the outer Lao provinces, local
hierarchies, constituted along kinship lines, were predominant. A similar
Lao hierarchy was present in the tributary state of Bassac, though only
the vassal King was confirmed by the Siamese King in Bangkok. As we
have seen, there were Siamese "dignataries" stationed in Ubon, Bassac,
Attopeu, and Stung Treng, but their positions were more that of resident
representatives of the Siamese King than as formal members of the local
ruling hierarchies.
The place of the Kba tribespeople in these socio-political structures
was both important and complex. The region of the Bassac tributary
state east of the Mekong River, i.e. the Bolovens Plateau, Saravane,
Attopeu, and the Kontum Plateau, was largely populated by K ha tribes,
the most important ofwhich were the Alak and Loven of the Bolovens
Plateau, and the Sedang of the Kontum Plateau. I? These tribal people
were reported to have been "sparsely colonized" by a few Lao families,
presumably the ruling nobility.I 8 With Bassac under the suzerainty of
Bangkok, the tribal people were required to pay a tax in gold as well as
providing gifts to the minor mandarins-all of which were collected by
Lao militiamen.I9
Bassac was an important economic center, for it was the outlet for
the trade from the east bank of the Mekong, including the Bolovens
Plateau, Sara vane, Attopeu, and Kontum Plateau regions. From Bassac,
trade in cardamon, rubber, wax, resin, skins, horns, and slaves, wns
conducted with Ubon, Khorat, and Bangkok.2o One of the most significant
economic roles of the tribal peoples was in the slave trade of the
17) On the tribal groups, their characteristics, and distribution, see Bernard
Bourotte, op. cit., pp. 17-23.
18) PauldeBoulanger,op.cit.,p. 343.
19) Bernard Bourotte, op. cit., p. 57.
20) Cb. Lemire, La France et le Siam (Paris, 1903), V· 34,

:imc. h~rl!.! ih~· trih:d p~~·•pk. :\:;a re~.ult, S•'llll! uf thl~ strungcr anwng the
trihe:,, riot ably til~.: Sl'd:tn~~. la I fl,i, and Jarai, began to prey upon the
Wt\lkcr trih.::• fnr their own prufit in ~.eJiing sla\cs tu the Siamc~e, !.an,
and Khmer. Thi'l :,ystt'lll uf :dave tr:ak kept the markets ol' Phnom-Penh,
!l.wgkPI\, Ba :;~ac, and Stun:~ Tr~.·ng ~.u ppl ied with slan;s --with prufi ts to
tho.: s!t~lllJ:cr triho.:s and the I a•l, Siame~c. and Khmer middk .. men. Tbc
S

52 John B. Murdoch
In 1896 the British and French signed a treaty in which they agreed
that neither country, without the consent of the other, would advance
armed forces into the region of the greater Menam watershed. This did
not include Northeast Siam, which is a part of the Mekong watershed. 25
Thus the Lower Mekong Region was divided by the Mekong River into
Siamese and French areas of control, and the status of Northeast Siam,
while not directly in question, was residually uncertain.
Relations between the Siamese and the French at the turn of the
century were acrimonious. The twenty-five kilometer zone on the west
bank of the Mekong was impossible for the Siamese to control, given the
terms of the 1893 treaty. It became a haven for lawless characters from
both sides of the river.· The French then made the impossible demand
that the Siamese restore order in the zone-without allowing them to
station armed forces there.26 In addition, the French tried to claim the
Sayaboury and Champassak regions on the west bank of the Mekong,
on the grounds that they were integral parts of the French-protected
Luang Prabang and Bassac KingdomsP The problems of keeping order
in the twenty-five kilometer zone and the control of Sayaboury and
Champassak remained in a constant state of turmoil until the treaty of
1904 which ceded the disputed territorities to France.
Substantial political and administrative reforms were made in the
Lower Mekong Region in the closing years of the nineteenth century.
One of the most significant was King Chulalongkorn's 1874 decree on
the progressive elimination of slavery. By this decree, anyone born into
slavery aft.er 1868/69 would become free on attaining the age of twentyone.28
As the results of this decree were coming to be felt in the declining
value of slaves, the Ministry of Interior in 1884 issued a decree to
tbe easternmost areas under Siamese control that the capture and selling
ofKha slaves was forbidden. This decree severely interrupted the Thai­
Lao-Kha slave trade patterns on the east bank of the Mekong before it
came under French control in 1893.29
25) Copy of 1896 Franco-British Treaty in U.S. Despatches j1·om Siam (August 7,
1902).
26) Minister to Hay/no. 127, U.S. Despatches/rom Siam (August 7, 1902).
2 7) Tej Bunnag, op. cit., p. 141.
28) David K. Wyatt, The Politics of Reform in Thailand (Yale University Press,
1969), p. 51.
29) "Khamhaikan R1,1ang Mvang Attopeu" (Testimony Concerning Muang Attopeu)
in Prachum Phongsawadan (Collected Chronicles), pt. 70 (Khurusapha ed., v.
44: Bangkok, 1969), pp. 188-190.

THE 1901-1902 "HOLY MAN'S" HEBELLJON 53
The increasing problem of the encroachments of the British and
the French on the Southern and North-eastern borders of Siam led the
Siamese government to appoint permanent Commissioners responsible
for defense and revenues to all "frontier" areas. In the 1880's Commissioners
were appointed to Nongkhai, Bassac, Nakhon Ratchasima, and
Ubon.3o These Commissioners were to coordinat~ the efforts of the
local, provincial, and central governments, and to make administrative
changes affecting manpower and revenue at their discretion. While
under Siamese suzerainty, there was a bead tax of one tical ($. 60) on
Lao and tribal people in the Bassac K.ingdom,3 I although about twenty
percent of the people were exempted from paying taxes by offering their
service to the nobility. In 1891, the Siamese Commissioner of Bassac
took the ruling Lao nobility into Siamese government administrative
service to compensate them for loss of power and prestige under the new
tax system.32 In the west bank region of Northeast Siam, the Commissioners
also sought to undermine the strength of the local Lao nobility
and bring their areas under increasing central control through further
"nationalization" of taxes in the Bassac, Ubon, and Nongkhai regions.33
Following the cession of the east bank territories to France in 1893,
the Siamese government further tightened its administrative control in
its west bank regions. From 1893-1896, the central government, through
its Commissioners, formalized and redefined the duties of local provincial
administrators, and took over the judicial and financial administration
of the provinces.34 In 1899, the Ministry of Interior established the
Thesaphiban system of provincial administration that formalized administrative
practices under the bureaucratic control of the central government,35
As a result, the payment of tribute was abolished in 1899,36
and the Commissioner of the Northeast established a four baht tax to be
collected from all able-bodied men, of which thirty-eight percent went
to the National Treasury, fifty-nine percent to the local Siamese administration,
and three percent to the lower ranking Lao officials.3 7
---· ··--··---·---
30) Tej Bunnag, op. cit., pp. 100-104.
31) J.J. Dauplay, op. cit., p. 59.
32) Tej Bunnag, ojJ, cit., p. 109.
33) Ibid.,pp. 116-117.
34) Ibid., pp. 178-179.
35) Ibid., p. 191.
36) Ibid., pp. 261-262.
37) Tej Bunnag, "Khabot Phu Mi Bun ...", p. 81.

54 John B. Murdoch
The results of the Siamese reforms were that the Lao o!licials'
bases of support were undermined by the central government. 38 The
head taxes were unpopular among the people, and their burdens were
further increased by corrupt practices of extracting money from them
by local officials facing declining power, prestige, and fortune. 39
On the French side of the river, increasingly stringent reforms were
also felt. The French created a transportation system centering on
Saigon. The products of the east bank Bassac region were sent down
the Mekong River, transported around the falls near Khong bland, and
shipped on to Saigon by steamer. Thus the profits from the trade were
transferred from the Lao of the Lower Mekong to Saigon. 40 In addition,
head taxes were tripled from what they had been under the Siamese, and
the number of people exempted was reduced. 41 From the mid 1890's
to 1900, there was a resurgence in the traditional Lao-tribal pattern of
slave trade. Jn reaction to this, the French sent militiamen to the
interior region to interdict the slave trade, suppress banditry, and build
fortified military posts.42
The result of the French reforms was a general discontent on tbc
part of the Lao and Kha populace. The economic positions of both Lao
and Kha leaders were undermined, and both were dismayed and unprepared
for the increase in taxes. In addition, Lao officials resented the
Vietnamese who accompanied French officials and treated the Lao us
though they were in Vietnamese conquered territory. 43
In short, at the turn of the century, the people on both sides of the
Mekong faced similar situations, and bad similar dissatisfactions. Th~
old Thai-Lao-Kba social hierarchy and political-economic relationships
had been broken. The Lao of Northeast Siam had come under the
domination of what was to them "foreign" Siamese rule, and the Lao
38) Tej Bunnag, Provincial Administration ... p. 89.
39) Tej Bunnag, "K.habot Phu Mi Bun ...", p. 81.
40) Ch. Lemire, op. cit., p. 34.
41) J.J. Dauplay, op. cit., p. 59. Dauplay gives the French rate as $2. The
Bangkok Times Weeldy Mail (~ug. 3, 1901) quoting L'Opinion of Saigon (July
19, 1901) says that Doumer Imposed a $4 poll tax on all males over twentY
years old.
42) Bernard Bourotte, ojJ. cit., p, 100.
43) J.J. Dauplay, op. cit., p. 59.
--~---~---- ·----·---"- ··---------

THE 1901-19 02 "HOLY MAN'S" REBELLION 55
and Kha of the east bank of the Mekong had come under the domination
of the French and Vietnamese. The kingdom of Bassac was divided by
the river. The populace was upset by new and higher taxes. The bases
of power and prestige of the Lao nobility and Kha tribal leaders had
been undermined. The seeds of rebellion were firmly rooted, and needed
only a few precipitating incidents to germinate into full flower.
The Rebellion
Writers from the Thai side have asserted that the rebellion began
in French Laos, and writers from the French-Lao side have claimed that
it began in Siam. A careful sifting of the evidence on both sides leads
to the conclusion that the major incidents of the rebellion began in 1901
among the Kha in French Laos. The main Kha groups involved were
the Alak, Nha-heun, and Loven of the Bolovens Plateau-Saravane-Attopeu
Region, and the Sedang of the Kontum Plateau.
In March, 1901, Remy, the French Commissioner at Saravane,
became increasingly concerned with the growing attraction of a selfproclaimed
"sorceror", known both as Bac My and Ong Keo,4 4 who was
reputed to have supernatural powers. l-Ie was an Alak tribesman who
was performing rituals on Phou Kat Mountain, south of Saravane, and
was attracting an increasing following among the Kha groups of the
Bolovens Plateau. By the end of March, 1901, Phu Mi Bun (Holy Man)
Ong Keo and his following grew more threatening, and Commissioner
Remy with fifteen militiamen, went to the plateau to investigate. On
April 12, Remy and his fifteen militiamen were surrounded in the pagoda
Thateng by fifteen-hundred Kha tribesmen armed with flintlocks. Remy
was able to talk himself out of the situation and return to Saravane,
though by this time the entire plateau was aroused.4 5 News of the Phu
Mi Bun and his followers reached Prince Sanphasitthiprasong, High Commissioner
of Monthon Isan in Thailand via the ruler of Champassak,
along with the rumor that they would cross the Mekong and attack Ubon.
The High Commissioner had heard similar stories of mystics and sorcerers
and was not inclined to take it seriously.46
44) Bangkok Times Wee1dy !11ail (hereafter referred to as BT), (Oct. 19, 1901)
quoting the Courier d' Haiphong.
45) J.J. Dauplay, op. cit., p. 60. Dauplay gives the figure of 1,500 attackers.
The BT quoting L'Opinion of Saigon (July 19, 1901) gives the figure 300,
46) Toem Wipbakphotchanakit, op. cit., p. 563, ·

56 John B. Murdoch
The situation in French Laos became more serious when Ia tcr in
April, 1901, a Frenchman named Menard was killed by Kha tribesmen
while travelling from Saravane to Bassac.47 Later, trouble broke out
in the Kontum Plateau, inspired by Sedang followers of the Phu Mi Bun.
In that region, northwest of Kontum, the French bad set up a military
post with a French military officer named Robert in charge of stopping
the transport of Annamite slaves sold along the Mekong by the Sedang
and Loven. On May 29, 1901, the post was attacked and Robert was
speared twenty times by Sedang tribesmen.48 Thus through May, 1901,
the incitement to violence among the followers of the Phu Mi Bun was
confined to Kha tribesmen in Southern Laos and the Kontum Plateau of
Viet-nam.
The leadership of the Phu Mi Bun uprising is particularly interesting.
The French sources and Thai contemporary newspapers all agree that
the main instigator was the Alak tribesman, Bac My or Ong Keo. Dauplay,
in describing his tenure in Saravane, reported that in several of the
wats of the Sara vane region, there appeared white cotton panels depicting
Ong Keo as a Thevada (god) enjoying the blessings of a Buddhist
Paradise. In 1906-07, he destroyed more than fifty of these in Saravane
alone. 49 Ong Keo was joined by the Loven chiefs Komadam and Kommaseng,so
and was also reported to have a first lieutenant named Ong
Wan, who appeared in the Savannakhet region, and was the most important
leader in the rebellion on the Thai side of the river.Sl Another
report claimed that Ong Keo stayed on the religious side of things, and
left the direction of the movement to a man named Ong Luang, who
claimed to be descended from the Kings of Vientiane, and bad been
imprisoned at Khong in 1895 for trying to have himself proclaimed "Phu
Mi Bun, Luang Sakda, Nailam of the Khas."s2
47) Accounts here differ somewhat. The BT (Aug. 2, 1902) quoting Saigon's
L'Oj>inion says his head, hands, and feet were cut off and displayed in a bird
cage. TheBT (Oct. 19, 1901) quoting the Courier d' Haiphong says his body
was never found.
48) Bernard Bourotte, op. cit., pp. I 03-1 04; and J.J. Dauplay, op, cit., p. 60.
49) J.J. Dauplay, ojJ. cit., p. 61. .
50) M. Colonna, "Monographic de Ia Province de Saravane", Bulletin des Amis dtt
Laos, no. 2 (1938), p. 86.
51) BT (May 29, 1902); and.Toem ~iphakphotchanakit, op. cit., p. 564,
~2) BT (Oct 19, 190 1) quotm~ Col{rz~r d' Haiphons-. .

THE 1901-1902 "HOLY MAN'S" REBELLION 57
By June, 1901, Lao began to become involved in the rebellion. A
band of Phu Mi Bun followers began burning sa/as in the villages along
the Sedone River in Laos. Soon Lao chiefs began to join in the uprisingincluding
the Chao Muang and Uppahat of Ban Khamthong-nyai, the
Ratchawong of Saravane, and the Uppahat of Attopeu.S3
By this time the P!w Mi Bun movement was also growing in Northeast
Thailand, but had not- yet entered its violent phase as in Laos.
In Northeast Thailand, a prophecy was being circulated that in the
sixth month (i.e. May) of the year 1901
.. a major catastrophe will occur. Gravel will become gold and
silver and gold and silver will become gravel. Gourds and pumpkins
will become elephants and horses, albino buffalo and pigs
will become man-eating yaksa. Thao Tbammikarat (Phu Mi Bun)
will come to rule the world. Whoever wishes to remain free from
these evil happenings should copy or retell this story and make it
generally known. If one is pure and has not performed any evil or
bad karmic deeds (or if one wishes to become rich), one should
collect gravel so that Thao Tbammikarat can transform them into
gold and silver. If one has performed v'arious evil deeds, then in
order to become a pure person one should perform the ritual of
tat kam wang wen whereby one arranges to invite monks to come
sprinkle 'holy' water. If one is afraid of death, one should kill
albino buffalo and pigs before the middle of the sixth month to
prevent them being transformed into yaksas. If one is still a
maiden or a married woman who has not yet consumated her
marriage, one should quickly take a husband. Otherwise the yaksas
will catch you and eat you.s4
The prophecy was said to have come from the east, and the rumor was
that the Phu Mi Bun, Thao Thammikarat (Ruler of Law or Ruler of
Justice), would also come from the east. 55 Through the rest of 1901
and the beginning of 1902, ·would-he prophets arose, people collected
pebbles and gravel, animals were slaughtered, and monks were attracted
to perform the appropriate rituals.
53) Ibid.
54) Cllarles Keyes, "Millenialism ... ", pp. 19-20~a translation combining
elements of the accounts of Tej Bunnag, op. cit., p. 78; and Toe!llWiphakphotchanakit,
op, cit., p. 559.
~5) Tej Bunna$, op. cit., p. 80,

58 John B. Murdoch
In March, 1902, Northeast Thailand began to experience the violent
phase of the rebellion. Ong Man, the· lieutei1ant of Ong Keo from
Savannakbet, appeared with the claim that he was Thao Thammikarat
and began to recruit and arm a band of followers from the Khemmarat­
Sapheu region. 56 On March 28, 1902, Ong Man and his followers robbed
and burned Kbemmarat, executed two Khemmarat krommakan officials,
and captured Phra Khemmaratdetpracharak, the governor of Khemmarat,
whom they used to attract the townspeople to join the movement,S7
When Commissioner Sanphasitthiprasong heard. about the Khemmarat
incident, he telegraphed the commander of the army at Nakhc;m
Ratchasima to send reinforcements quickly. Four hundred soldiers were
sent. Two hundred were sent by way of Surin-one hundred to Srisaket and
one hundred to Ubon. Two hundred were sent by way of Suwannaphum
-one hundred to Roi-et and one hundred to Yasothon. They were given
orders to put down any trouble they met along the way, and to report to
Commissioner Sanphasitthi prasong.s a
Meanwhile, Ong Man and )ljs.followers had set up their headquarters
in·.Ban Sapbeu. Ong Man by this time bad about a thousand followers
I
whom he had organized into armed fighting units. 59 After a few minor
incidents, Commissioner Sanphasittbiprasong ordered the commander of
the Ubon army to examine the situation and report the facts. He sent a
dozen soldiers in the direction of Ban Sapheu. On the third day, one
private came back and reported ~o the Commissioner that the group had
fallen into an ambush laid by the Phu Mi Bun, and that all the others
had been killed. This victory over the soldiers enhanced the prestige
of the Phu Mi Bun and attracted fifteen hundred more followers. . The
rebels then resolved to attack Ubon. 60
56)
57)
58)
59)'
60)
Toern Wiphakphotchanakit, op. cit., p. 565.
Tej Bunnag, op. cit., p. 8 3; and Toern Wiphakphotchanakit, ap. cit., p. 564.
Phraratchahatlekha· Ratc_hakan ti Ha thi Ideo kap Pharakit khong Krasuang Mahat
Thai (Royal Letters of the Fifth Reign Concerning the Affairs of the Ministry
of Interior),v. 2,

l.irld above 200m. ----Siam northeast border 1893/1902 _ .... _ Present borders Km. 0 20 40 60 00 100
Courtesy of Prof. DaPid K. Wyatt,
Department of History,
Cornell University.

THE 1901-1902 "HOLY MAN'S" HEBELLJON 59
At this point, Commissioner Sanphasitthiprasong reacted with
strength. He sent an artillery unit of one hundted soldiers armed with
rifles and two cannon to suppress the Phu Mi Bun. They, along with a
group of local militia, left Ubon on Apri12, 1902, and reached Ban Sapheu
on April 3. They set up an ambush along the trail leading to Ubon to
wait for the Phu Mi Bun and his followers to make their move. The next
morning the rebel group set out for Ubon and walked into the ambush.
The result was that considerably more than three hundred were killed,
many fled, and four hundred were captured. Ong Man was said to have
passed himself off as a farmer and to have escaped with ten of his followers.6I
Of prime concern to King Chulalongkorn was the problem of relations
with the French in the deployment of Thai soldiers in the twentyfive
kilometer zone along the Mekong River.
The French Ambassador
agreed to work with the Thai in suppressing the rebels,· but the Viceconsul
in Ubon insisted that if Thai soldiers were sent into the twentyfive
kilometer zone, they must be accompanied by a French official.
The
· King's concern for the sensitivity of relations with the French is shown
by his instructing his Ministry of Foreign Affairs to send a telegram
·thanking the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs for working out procedures
by which Thai troops could enter the twenty-five kilometer zone.
He insisted, however, that Thai strength was sufficient, and that French
troops should not cross to the Thai side of the Mekong.62
With the deployment of Thai troops, rebellious incidents quickly
subsided in the Northeast. Following legal actions against captured
local leaders of the Phu Mi Bun movement, the Thai government considered
the case of the rebellion closed; however, on the Lao side of the
river it was far from ended.
61) Ibid., pp. 570-572; and Prince Damrong Rajanubhab, op. cit., pp. 341-3.42.
There were undoubtedly far more than ten followers who escaped with Ong
Man. If we follow Toem's figures, he would have had about 2,500 followers
before the Sapheu incident; following Damrong's figures around I ,000. In
any case, Ong Man and followers appeared in an attack on Savannakhet three
weeks later so he presumably escaped the Ban Sapheu incident with more than
ten followers.
62) Phraratchahatlekha ••. , o}'· cit., pp. 392, 394, 404.

66 john 13. Murdoch
Late in April, 1902, Ong Man and Ong Keo, with "hordes" of
Laotians; chanting and playing the khene, surrounded the French Commissariat
in Savannakhet. They were convinced that the French militia's
ammunition would turn into frangipani flowers, and they would be in
no danger. The French opened fire on them leaving one hundred fifty
dead in the square and at least as many wounded.
Keo escaped.63
Ong Man and Ong
Following the Savannakhet incident, the rebels withdrew to the
Phou Luong mountains on the northeast edge of the Bolovens Plateau,
and the situation was relatively calm until 1905, when on November 30,
a group of rebels surrounded Ban Nong Bok Kao and massacred fortyone
Loven tribesmen.64 Under greater French pressure, most of the
remaining rebel leaders, including Ong Keo, surrendered. Khomadam,
however, successfully escaped.
Following Ong Keo's surrender, he confessed and swore loyalty to
the French, after which he escaped to Thailand. After gaining further
a·rms and supporters, be returned to Laos, where he held out against the
French on the Bolovens Plateau. 65 In 1910, Chao Nhouy (Rasadanai),
Prince of the Na Charnpassak ruling family and Governor of Champassak,
arranged for negotiations between Ong Keo and Fendler, a French
government representative. After a weapons sea,rch, in which Fendler
knew that by Lao custom the head would not be touched, he pulled his
pistol from under his hat and killed Ong Keo.66
After Ong Keo's death, Khomadam continued to resist the French
until he was shot in attempting to escape a French suppression attempt
in January, 1936. 67 I~terestingly enough, the legacy of this rebellion is
63) J.J. Dauplay, op. cit., p. 62; BT (May 29, 1902); and Phraratchahatlckha ... ,
op, cit., p. 420.
64) J.J. Dauplay, op. cit., p, 64.
65) Ibid., p. 6 5.
66) Wilfred G. Burchett, Mekong Uj>Stream (Berlin, 1959), pp. 207-212. Burchett's
account of the shooting of Ong Keo comes from an interview he had with
Khamphan, Khomadam's son and Si Thou's younger brother. This interview
also outlines Khomadam's career of resistance.
67) M. Colonna, rJp. cit., p. 87.

'filE 1901-1902 "HOLY MAN'S'' REBELLION 61
still part of the struggle in Laos. The son of Chao Nhouy, who arranged
the negotiation in which Ong Keo was shot, is Prince Boun Oum, the
present Lao rightist leader; and the son of Khomadam, heir to Ong Keo's
rebellion, is Si Thon, the present Vice-chairman of the Pathet Lao for
the Southern Hill People.6s
Inteq>retation
Phra Yanrakkhit, chief monk of Monthon Isan, attributed the Thai
side of the rebellion to the people's "hardship and need". He emphasized
the poverty of the Northeast, where there was very little opportunity for
wage labor, and very little profit to be derived from agriculture. This
situation, coupled with corruption in tax receipts and registration of
animals on the part of local officials, made life increasingly difficult for
the populace, and rendered them susceptible to rebellion.69
Phra Yanrakkhit's analysis contains an interesting distinction. He
implies that conditions with regard to corruption were satisfactory in
area~ ruled directly by Siamese government commissioners. However,
the problem of corruption was greatest in areas far from government
commissioners where local leaders bullied the people. (He was writing
to Commissioner Sanphasittbiprasong.)
Following the Ministry of Interior's reforms of the 1890's, both the
local leaders and the populace were left in an uncertain position. The
local leaders lost their direct control over revenue and manpower to the
central government bureaucracy. Thus, they faced economic hardship
and loss of status. The Ministry of Interior, however, suffered from its
own shortage of manpower, and hence selectively brought some of the
local leaders into the government administration as salaried civil servants.
These leaders would presumably have vested interests in the
success of the new administrative reforms, and would be expected to
oppose the rebellion. However, those who were not hired by the bureaucracy
would presumably be. the local leaders falling back on their
traditional, though eroding, sense of control of revenue and manpower,
and extracting money from the populace through corruption. It would
68) Alfred w. McCoy, "French Colonialism in Laos, I 893-1945" in Nina S. Adams
and Alfred W. McCoy, Laos: War and Revolution (New York, 1970), p. 89.
69) Tej Bunnag, op. cit., p. 81.

62 John B. Murdoch
also be expected that these people with their dissatisfactions would be
likely candidates for leadership in the rebellion-for they had no future
in the new order, but could gain by a return to the old order.
The common people would similarly have been in an uncertain
position. To the extent that they saw the governmental reforms, particularly
the newly imposed taxes, as oppressive, they could be expected
to react to these influences from "outsidersjj by rallying to their traditional
leaders, at least the ones who were not "colloborating" with the central
government as civil servants. On the other hand, to the extent that dispossessed
local leaders were "squeezing" their people above and beyond
the government taxes, the people could be expected to react against
them. The ambiguity of the positions of both local leadership and the
populace is reflected in their being on both sides of the issue-as rebels
and as local militia putting down the rebels.
J.J. Dauplay, French Commissioner of Sara vane ( 1905-21), emphasized
the Kha misunderstanding of French policy, and the corruption of
Lao officials as important in the uprising. He claimed that the Kha bad
traditionally submitted to the Lao or Thai; therefore the French should
not be seen as taking away their independence. Rather, the French
should be seen as liberators, removing the Kba from bondage to the Thai
and Lao, and ma~ing them equal under French law. Dauplay complained
that the Kha were dislocated by their new freedom, that they did
not know how to make decisions. In fact they hardly seemed to notice
the gift of independence-and finally took counsel with their "natural"
chiefs, the Lao, against the French. In addition, both Lao and Kha
officials under the French became corrupt in tax collection and price
fixing .. They were further angered when the French eliminated vassalage
and slave-trading. Dauplay thought the French were in error in challenging
the system of debt-slavery, for it cut off servants from the Lao
and the merchants and only angered them. Also, the Bolovens Plateau
drew its revenues from trade in slaves-and its leaders reacted with fury
when the French cut off Vietnamese slave trade by occupying Kontum.70
Both Phra Yanrakkhit and Dauplay reflect the common political
and. economic conditions faced by local rulers and the populace on either
70) J.J. Dauplay, op, cit., pp. 55-58.

THE 1901-1902 "HOLY MAN'S" RIWELL!ON 63
side of the river. The local ruling elites had been deprived of power,
and then split-some being co-opted bp the Siamese and the French, and
others retaining their traditional hold over the people which led them
to leadership in the rebellion.
Both Siamese and French complained of
corruption on the part of these dispossessed rulers-yet "corruption"
from the point of view of the new order may well have been "rulers'
prerogative" or ''acceptable sources of revenue" in terms of the old order.
In addition to this uncertainty of "legitimacy" of rule, we must also
bear in mind the uncertainty of the relationship between the Siamese
and the French.
In 1893 the French had taken control of the east bank
of the Mekong that had formerly been under the control of the Siamese.
This split the Bassac Kingdom in two, leaving the capital and ruling
family on the Siamese side, and most of the territory on the French side.
The ruler of Bassac, a Siamese sympathizer, was reported to have sided
with the rebels in the hope he could get back the territories of Sara vane
and Attopeu when the "just ruler" came to reign. 71
The French, however,
were claiming the we&t bank portion of the Bmsac Kingdom which
they saw as being within their legal rights.
Both the Siamese and
the French were deeply suspicious of the motives of the other, the twentyfive
kilometer zone on the Siamese side was essentially ungoverned,
and relations over responsibilities for its control were strained.
Another point strongly emphasized by Dauplay was the millenia!
element. This contains the sense that the Phu Mi Bun have special powers
from the spirits which makes them able to rule and dispense justice, to
do miracles, and to have the quality of invulnerability.n He further
records the impression that this tradition of millenialism, spiritual power,
and invulnerability was stronger among the non-Buddhist Kha than
among the Buddhist Lao. The Lao around the Plateau, who had had
long contact with the Kha, were seen to have adopted these elements of
Kha tradition, but the more "pure" Lao of the Mekong and the Khong
regions took this less seriously. 73
------------· -·····--·---·-·
71) Bernard Bourotte, op. cit., p. 102.
72) J.J. Dauplay, op. cit .. p. 59,
73) Ibid., p. 65,

64 John B. Murdoch
The issue of millenialism is a dimcult one. Obviously, Dauplay
cannot be entirely correct in interpreting this solely as a Kha phenomena,
for the appeal of the millenia! elements is heavily stressed in the Thai side
of the rebeUion, where the Kha were an almost inconsequential minority.
Keyes argues that the potential for millenialism is inherent in the Theravada
Buddhist traditions of Southeast Asia; that there is a recognition
of people with extraordinary powers, and a proto-Bodhisattva ideal of the
coming of the Maitreya Buddha.74 Given this conceptual frame, Keyes
argues that "millenialism appears to be most associated with crises in
human relationships and the most central of these relationships is the
distribution of power within society including both power over men and
power over resources and wealtb.7S"
It has been shown that during the period of the rebellion, there was
a serious crisis in the distribution of power within the society of the
Lower Mekong Region. The panels found in the Sara vane area portraying
Ong Keo as a Thevada suggest the invocation of the proto-Bodhisattva
Maitreya tradition. In addition there were repeated references to "Phu
Mi Bun" (he who has merit) and "Thammikatat" (Ruler of Law or Ruler
of Justice). On the Lao side of the river, and specifically among the
non-Buddhist Kha, the more common reference was to invulnerabilityas
though invulnerability to bullets or personal harm was a kind of "proof"
of the "legitimacy" of the Phu Mi Bu11 and his cause. The tradition of
sorcery, spirit-mediums, and invulnerability is particularly strong in the
Kha tradition, as has long been acknowledged by the Lao,76 The point
is that sorcery and millenialism are intertwined parts of both Thai-Lao
and Kha traditions, and that while they may well have been 'vehicles'
, for the rebellion, they are less likely to have been its causes.
The main cause of the rebellion appears to lie in the far reaching
political changes instituted by both the Siamese and the French. The
74) Charles Keyes, op. cit., p. 14.
75) Ibz'd., p. 4.
76) Kha sorcerers have been believed to have the knowledge of ceremonies that
will render a person invulnerable, and by tradition one of the sons of the
family of the ''Kings of the Front" of Luang Prabang have been sent to Attopeu
to have.this ceremony performed, See Jean Larteguy, The Bron:~;e Prums
{London, 1967), pp. 2~-~o.

fl'HE i 901-1902 ''HOLY MAN;S,; REBELLION 65
results of these changes severely dislocated the economic patterns and
traditional leadership structures of the Lower Mekong Region.
In the political sphere, power traditionally held by various Lao
elites had been taken over by "outsiders" and "foreigners'j-the Siamese
and the French. They had initiated the new order of reforms that
imposed central government control, increased taxation, changed tradi·
tional trade patterns, and radically altered power relationships among
central governments, local nobilities, and the local populace. The local
rulers lost their control over taxation and manpower, and without this
control, their traditional positions were no longer viable. The French
diversion of the trade of Southern Laos from Ubon and Bangkok to Saigon
further undermined the economic position of the area. Siamese and
French suppression of the traditional Thai-Lao-I

John B. Murdoch
Siamese and the French represented the new bureaucratic order; the
leaders of the rebellion a return to the old "feudal" order-with the Phu
Mi Bun reinstituting the "rule of law" the people understood. The
rhythm of events was temporarily suspended-people in the region were
not sure which way control would go, and many were attracted to the
rebellion.
King Chulalongkorn showed a deep insight into the causes of the
rebellion when he discussed with Prince Damrong the case of a would-be
Phu Mi Bun who tried to set up an independent muang. The King felt
that this man was not crazy, but knew the old Lao administrative methods
practiced "in the reign of Rama lil when he set up towns for people from
Vientiane."77 King Chulalongkorn saw that the rebellion was an attempt
to turn back to older governing traditions in the face of dislocations
caused by the new reforms.
The rebellion was a widespread but short-lived cause in Siam. It
was suppressed within a few months, marking the successful administrative
incorporation of the Lao Northeast by the Siamese central government.
In Laos, however, the success of the French was less than
complete. The Southern Lao were brought under the French administrative
structure, but the French were unsuccessful in suppressing some
of the most important tribal leaders. Though the French have been
replaced by the Royal Lao Government, the legacy of the rebellion is
still a part of the present struggle over which elites shall govern the
peoples of Laos.
77) Ph1'aTatclwhatlekha • .. , op, cit., p. 434.

MYTH, LEGEND AND HISTORY IN THE NORTHERN
THAI CHRONICLES *
by
Donald K. Swearer**
The title of this article is somewhat misleading. It sounds quite
broad when in fact it is directed toward a rather circumscribed topic,
namely, the founding of the city of Haripui'ijaya or Lamphun. This is
primarily an attempt to analyze the myths and legends surrounding that
event in order to elucidate the meaning of these traditions and their
potential historical import. While the focus of this study is a particular
one, the parameters are the broad issues of the nature of myth and
legend and their relationship to history.
Sound historical evidence for the pre-Thai period in the north is
extremely limited. This period is generally referred to as Mon, although
neither archaeology nor the northern chronicles lend much support for a
dominant Mon presence in Haripui'ijaya prior to the lith century. The
paucity of archaeological evidence for the pre-Thai period compels us to
examine seriously the mythical and legendary, as well as the historical,
traditions embedded in the northern chronicles. While myths and legends
provide a minimum of concrete historical data, an analysis of their content
may offer a modicum of historical information or at least some
degree of historical insight.
We shall begin with a brief examination of the chronicles studied.
Then following a few remarks about the nature of myth and legend, we
shall move on to relate a connected narrative compiled from the texts.
After postulating an interpretation of the narrative, we shall then conclude
with some of the historical implications to be derived from the
narrative as interpreted.
* This article was first delivered as a lecture to the Siam Society on March26, 1973.
** Associate Professor, Department of Religion, Swarthmore College, Swarthmore,
Pennsylvania, U.S.A. Research on northern Thai Buddhism under grant from
the National Endowment for the Humanities (USA), 1972-7 3.

68 Donald K. Swearer
The Texts
Northern Thailand is blessed with an abundance of historical and
quasi-historical texts written on palm leaf (pai ran) or very heavy paper:
folded in accordion fashion (samut khoi) in northern Thai (Lanna Thar
or Thai Yuan), Pali or a mixture of northern Thai and Pali. These
northern chronicles or epics are usually identified in Thai as damnan or
phongsawadan. The most widely known is the linakalamalipakaratiam
(JKM). A Pali edition has been printed by the Pali Text Society of
London, and Thai, English and French translations have also appeared. 1
Even more important for a knowledge of northern Thai Buddhism but
less well known outside the relatively small circle of students of Thai
history are the Damnan Mulasasan'ii (MS) and the Phongsawadan Yonok
(PY) both published in Thai editions.z Of more particular focus on the
history of Haripui'ijaya are the C'iimadeviwongsa (CdW), Damnan Lamphun
or Lamphun Chronicle (DL).3
The chronicle of Wat Phra Dhatu, Lamphun, Damn7m Phra Dhatu
Haripunjaya (DPDH), provides additional information as may several
others which have escaped my attention. The Mahawongsa Luang,
apparently a borrowing from the Ceylonese Mahava/nsa with considcra~
ble material appended dealing with northern Thailand, may, contain more
information than the Damn7m Mulasasan'ii. Few copies arc available and
it was not included in this study. Serious, critical investigation of these
texts is still in an infant stage. Perhaps the most critical work remains
Coedes' study of the Jinakiil'amali and Camadeviwongsa done around
1) Ratannapai'ina: Thera, Jinaki.ilamali.pakaral}atn, ed. A.P. Buddhadatta (London;
Luzac & Co., 1962), Ratannapaiiiia Thera, The Sheaf C7arlands of the Etmchs of
the Conqueror, trans. N.A.

~IYTH, LEGEND AND HISTORY IN THE. NOllTHERN THAI CHRONICLES 69
1925. As David Wyatt observes, however, in his review of the recently
published Chiengmai Chronicle. (Damnan Phuan Muang Chiengmai),
"Indeed, this reviewer cannot recall a single major Thai text which has
ever been properly edited ..." 4
Of the major damnan mentioned there is disagreement as to which
is oldest. Prince Damrong was of the opinion that the MS was older
than the Cdw.s There are, however, some internal evidences in the MS
which seem to contradict this judgment. I have discovered at least two
instances where the MS notes that the same event is interpreted differently
in another damnan, e.g. that Camadevi's husband was free to leave
Lavapuri for Haripunjaya because her husband had become a monk.
That particular interpretation is, in fact, found in the CdW. Consequently,
either the CdW is older than the MS or utilized an older tradition.
We know that the CdW was written by Phra Bodhirangsi, the
author of Sihinganidana in the first half of the 15th century. It is thought
that the MS was begun by Phra Buddhanaq.a, the 4th abbot of Wat Suan
Dok in Chiang Mai (1417-1429) and completed by Phra Buddbapukama,
the 12th abbot ( 1489-1499). It would appear that whereas the CdW and
the MS might have been begun at about the same time, the completion
of the MS was over fifty years later. Tt might also be speculated that
the narrative style of the CdW is closer to an older, oral tradition than
the MS which is more descriptive in style. Indeed, on general stylistic
grounds there appears to be an evolution from the loose, narrative
expositions of the CdW to the more descriptive style of the MS to the
comparatively terse directness of the JKM.
We know that the JKM was written by Pbra Ratanapanna of the
Sinhala Nikaya at Wat Pa Daeng in Chiang Mai between 1516 and 1528
A.D. The CdW was written before 1450 and the MS before 1500. The
DL, mentioned half of the 15th century. The DL, mentioned in the
JKM, refers to the MS, so, it in turn must have been composed in the
latter part of the 15th or early 16th centuries. Finally, the DPDH is
estimated to have been written about 1565. In sum, with the exception
4) David K. Wyatt, "The Chiengmai Chronicle", Journal of the Siam Society, LXI. i
(January, 1973), p. 348.
5) Introduction to Prasert Churat's unpublished English translation of the Mi1lasiisana.

70 Donald K. Swearer
of the PY, an acknowledged later composite of several chronicles, the
major northern damnan with which we are familiar were written over a
period of a little more than a century bet ween the early I 5th to the midl6th
centuries. Roughly speaking, this covers the period from the return
of the Buddhist mission to Ceylon in 1430 through the reigns of two of
the greatest Buddhist monarchs of the north, Tilokaraja (d. 1487) and
Pbra Muang Keo (d. 1525).
The content and style of the northern chronicles relevant to the
Haripunjaya story vary greatly. It has been mentioned that stylistically
the CdW is a loose narrative in a rather florid style, that tbe MS combines
narration and description, and that the JKM is almost entirely
descriptive. While all of the CdW and tile DL are devoted to Haripunjaya,
only about a third of tbe MS deals with Haripunjaya and just a
small section of the JKM. In terms of the range of coverage the MS is
the most important chronicle, although, as we shall see, the CdW provides
additional valuable information.
Myth, Legend and History
The terms, myth and legend, are popularly used to denote the
opposite of the truth. When we say, "It's a myth" or "He's legendary"
we imply that the story or person referred to is false, untrue or exaggerated.
Such a popular understanding of myth and legend is at odds with
the way in which these terms are understood and used by students of
religion and culture. While myths and legends about gods or superhuman
beings do not relate stories that are historically or empirically true, they
convey archetypal or paradigmatic truth. Thus, a creation myth may
include a hierogamy and also function as a model and justification for
all human activities including whole complexes of discursive, ethical
and ritual systems. 6 We might say simply that the patterns of truth
encased in myth and legend infuse the cultures which gave birth to them
with higher or transcendent meaning. Myths and legends, consequently,
have greater import than factual history for the on-going life of a people.
History records what has happened, and while myths and legends may
6) Mircea Eliade, Patterns in Compm·ative Religion (CI~veland; MQridjan Bo9ks
1
1963), p. 412, -

MYTH, LEGEND AND HISTORY lN THI'; NORTHERN THAT CHRONTGLES 7!
have a relationship to a past history, their contemporaneity lies in the
fact that they transcend history. Myths and legends may be used to
tell us something about the history of a people, but more significantly,
they give a commentary on what a people has held and holds to be of
lasting value.
The myths and legends surrounding the founding of Haripufijaya
can be divided into three layers: the Buddhist, the Risbi and the Camadevi.
These layers are inter meshed, yet a study of the chronicles reveals
them to have been three distinct traditions which came to be amalgamated
into one story. The Rishi and Camadevi elements are more closely
related to each other than to the Buddhist element. The Buddhist layer
is comprised of the Buddha's forecast that his religion would prosper in
the area, his visit to Haripufijaya and the establishment of his relic, and
the appearance of his relic during the reign of Adittaraja (fl. 1047 A.D.).
The Rishi tradition describes the founding of several towns including
Haripufijaya and the calling of Camadevi as its ruler. The Camadevi
layer brings the founding of Haripunjaya into the realm of the historical.
Whether Camadevi actually existed as an historical person is, perhaps,
debatable; however, she serves to establish historical connections between
Lamphun, Lopburi and Lampang where one of Camadevi's sons was installed
as ruler within his mother's lifetime.
The three elements from the chronicles which constitute the Haripufijaya
story proceed in rough fashion from the mythical to the legendary
to the historical.
The Buddha's visit to Haripufijnya is mythical, yet
the visit enhances the significance of the reign of Adittaraja for the history
of Buddhism in the area. The rishis are legendary cult heroes or
clan progenitors who represent not only supernatural power but the
creation of civilization (i.e. cities). And the narrative surrounding
Camadevi often has the style of legend ( e.g. the enumeration of her
retinue, the founding of cities along the way from Lopburi to Haripufijaya),
yet she appears on the scene as a historical personage. The most
(\rchaic part of the Haripufijaya story appears to be the Rishi tradition
to which the Camadevi layer is appended. The Buddhist element seems
to be a later overlay. Interestingly enough, the episode of the Buddha's
prediction and visit to Haripufijaya is not related to Camacievi but to

Donald K. Swei\ret
Adittaraja some three to four hundred years later. The narrative from
Camadevi to Adittaraja definitely has been Buddhasized but the structure
of the story does not denote this period as being predominantly Buddhist.
From a structural perspective, Buddhism comes to the fore only with
Adittaraja.
The Story of the Founding of Lamphun
Our purpose here is to tell the story of the founding of Haripunjaya
as compiled from several of the northern Thai chronicles. The chronicles
differ to some degree in their accounts. However, our intention is not
to offer a critical analysis of these differences, but, rather, to present a
unified narrative noting conflicting reports or other discrepancies only
when relevant to the main thrust of the paper. Interpretation will follow
the narrative.
A. The Buddhist Layer
The Buddha was living in the Isipatana forest in Benares with his
disciples when he looked into the future and predicted that 1008 years
after his parinibbana a great city named Haripunjaya would be established
in the country of Samadesa or Muang Ping7 where his religion would
prosper. The next day after his morning ablutions the Buddha picked
up his begging bowl and flew to Muang Takara (now known as Jaiyabhtimi)
where he went on his pin.dapata rounds. The villagers in tbe area, identified
by the CdW and PYas Meng (i.e. Mon), were amazed by his beauty
and inquired whether he was a deva, Naga king, Indra or Brahma. The
Buddha then identified himself as the samma sambuddha, the savior of
the three worlds. After being presented with gifts of food, the Buddha
preached to the Mons who then followed him to the future site of Haripunjaya
along the Raming or Mae Ping River.s
Arriving at a spot on the west bank of the river, the Buddha put
down his begging bowl and on the spot a boulder miraculously arose from
the ground to prevent the bowl from becoming soiled. The Buddha then
predicted that this spot would be the location of his relic to be revealed
7) PY reads Samadesa; MS reads Samanta or Muang Ping. Not designated in JKM.
8) The PY elaborates this episode into the conversion of the Mons as disciples of
the Buddha. W~f!1"Js;JU 11!lwn, p. 164.

MYTII, LEGEND AND HISTOHY IN TilE NOIITHEJ1N THAI CH!\ONICLES 73
in Haripufijaya during the reign of Adittaraja9 for the adoration of men
and devas. In the DPDH the Buddha is presented with fruit of a betel
nut tree by a Lava hunter. After eating the Buddha cast aside the seed,
whereupon it circled (patakasin) three times. The Buddha then interprets
this miracle to Ananda as a sign that at this place Haripufijaya would
be located and upon the place where he sat a golden chedi for several
bone relics would be built. Furthermore, he predicts that these relics
will appear when the Lava hunter who gave him the fruit of the betel nut
tree is reborn as Adittaraja. When the Buddha had spoken, those who
were with him- the arahants, King Asoka, a pink Naga king and the
king of the crows .. all requested a hair relic. He offered one which
was encased in an urn and placed in a cave to the south of where he
sat.
After his predictions about Haripufijaya, his relics and Adittaraja,
the Buddha commands his bowl to fly back to Benares. He returns in
the same manner and along the way is followed by a white crow who
had overheard the Buddha's predictions, The white crow returned to
its home in the Himalayas and ordered his nephew, a black crow, to go
to the Mae Ping to guard the holy spot until the advent of Adittaraja.
Also guarding the place were indigenous devas (MS, DL). The DPDH
has the pink Naga king and 100,000 of his followers remain to guard the
relic and specifically notes that the crow was to prevent the sacred site
from pollution by animals and people.! o It should be noted, in concluding
this description of the Buddha's visit to the future site of Haripufijaya,
that this episode is part of an extensive visitation by the Buddha to northern
Thailand. The Phra Caw Liep Lok and other Buddha Damnan have
both a cosmogonic and etiological import and account for the founding
of many towns, Wats and other holy sites in the north. To my knowledge,
the physical presence of the Buddha as represented by his reputed visit
to the north plays a more omnipresent role here than in other parts of
the country. That subject, however, is beyond the scope of this present
paper.
9) Variant spellings for Adittariija are Aditayaraja (PY) and Adicca (JKM).
10) Singkha Wannasai, Darimun Phra Dhlitu Chao HaripuFijaya (~TU11-l W1~tl1\lll'l 11 1
'1il\lfll1~tJ) (Chiang Mai, B.E. 2516), p. 9. ·. '
•

74 Donald K. Swearer
In the PY, MS and the DL the Buddhist layer of the chronicles tied
to the Buddha's visit and the Buddha relic is broken by the Rishi and
Camadevi traditions. It is resumed again with the ad vent of Adittaraja
in the year 409 of the Culasakara Era (i.e. 1047 A.D.). 11
Adittnriija
and his queen, Padumavadi, are depicted as devout supporters of the
Buddhist Sangha who ruled faithfully according to the Ten Royal Precepts:
to provide for the poor, to be established in the five precepts, to
make gifts to the Three Gems, to be truthful in word, thought and deed,
to be'humble and sympathetic toward others, to be diligent in eradicating
demerit, to have pity toward all, not to oppress anyone, to have patience
and be restrained, and to be sensitive to the feelings of others.I2
As expected, the major event in the reign of Adittaraja is his discovery
of the holy relic, related by the chronicler in a humorous manner.
After the coronation ceremony in which sixteen Brahmins poured lustral
water over the hands of the sovereigns, Adittaraja retired to his private
quarters to relieve himself. It so happened that these quarters were
built directly over the spot where the Buddha relic was being protected
by the indigenous guardian of the soil and the black crow. The crow,
being warned by the deva of the desecration due to take place, quickly
flew over the king and let its droppings fall on his head. The king was
understandably angered, and when he opened his mouth to call his courtiers,
the crow let more of its droppings fall into the king's mouth. So
great was Adittaraja's consternation now that be ordered the entire city
to set traps to capture the crow. After catching it, the king was advised
by his astrologers not to kill the crow for the bird's strange behavior must
portend some important event. That night a deva appeared to the king
in a dream and told him to have a new-born child live with the black crow
for seven years in order to learn the craw's language. This advice was
followed and after the alloted time had passed, the child was then able to
11) Epochs of the Oonquerot·, p. 106. There is disagreement on the succession of
Adittariija. In the MS his reign is 27th after Camadevi; in the DL and JKM
it is the 3 I st. There are even more problems with the chronology. ·See
Coedes, p. 25.
12) This list of virtues is also applied to Ciimadevi-DL, p. 29; MS, p. 169. One
of the purposes of the chronicles w&s to offer advice and good coun~el to the
wielders of political power.

M'i'TH, LEGEND ANfJ ll!STOHY lN. 'i'HE NORTHEHN THAI CHRONICLES 75
act as an interpreter between Adittaraja and the crow. When the king bad
ascertained the. cause of the craw's behavior, he had his private quarters
demolished and the ground reconsecrated. He then prayed, "Servants
of the Buddha of the magnificent destiny, Lord, I beg that you deliver all
of us, Servants of the Master of the Sages. Lord, make the relic appeal'
to us soon; show to us now this excellent marvel. Render us pure in the
merit of our Buddha.''l3 After this invocation, the relic miraculously
appeared. Both the DL and the CdW add considerable detail regardihg
the relic and Adittaraja's reign, while the MS and JKM end the narrative
with the relic's appearance. While Adittaraja takes us far beyond the
founding of Haripufijaya under Camadevi, his reign deserves the brief
mention allowed because it is tied directly to the myth of the Buddha's
visit. Indeed, the appearance of the relic is not unlike a second founding
of the city, an argument to be expanded in our interpretation of the
narrative.
B. The Rishi Layer
The founding of Haripunjaya is attributed to a rishi named Vasudeva.t4
He appears in the chronicles with either three (CdW) or four
(MS, JKM, PY} other rishis. All of the rishis are associated with mountains
or towns or both: Vasudeva with Doi Suthep near Chiang Mai,
Sukkadanta (or Sukkanta) with Lavo or Lavo (LopburiJ, Anusissa or
Anusisata with Sajjanalaya (near Sukhothai), Buddhajatila with Doi
Juhapabbata (or Doi Pa Yai, near Lamphun}, and Subrahma with Doi
Ngam near Lam pang. These five high-born clansmen found the teaching
of the Buddha attractive and were ordained as monks. Unable to follow
the strict rules of the vinaya, tbey reverted to lay life. However, the
householder life was ultimately unsatisfying, so they became rishis or
hermits and acquired the five higher knowledges (abhinnas} and five
perfections ( sampattis).IS Of these five rishis, Vasudeva is the most
13) DL, p. 48.
14) In the py he appears as Sudeva. While the names of the rishis and the places
with which they are associated differ somewhat between the PY and MS, there
are significant differences between the CdW and the other two chronicles. It
would appear that CdW relied on a different source from the other chronicles
at this point.
15) The JKM has Sukkanta becoming a layman again. Epochs . .. , p. 97.

16 Donald k. Swearer
important and figures as the founder of several towns including Haripufijaya.l6
It should also be kept in mind that Vasudeva plays an
important role in the Lava tradition where he is the son of the clan progenitors,
or two of the major guardian spirits of the Lava, Pu Sae, Ya Sae.
Vasudeva always bathed in the RohirJ.i River or Maenam Khan at
the base of Doi Suthep near the present site of Wat Cedi Cet Yod. One
day while bathing in the river he saw three sets of male and female
infants in the footprints of an elephant, rhinoceros and gayal or bullock.''
In the CdW rendering, Vasudeva "looks in all directions" and sees children
in four footprints (also note that in the CdW there are four rishis
instead of five): elephant, rhinoceros, bullock and cow (wua).lB Feeling
sympathetic for their plight he adopts them and miraculously nurses the
children with his fingers. To these six are added yet another couple
born of a doe who had conceived by drinking Vasudeva's urine containing
his semen. The rishi named the boy Kunara Rasi and the girl
Migapati Rasiqi. He married the two when they attained the age of
sixteen and made them sovereigns of a city he created named, Migasangara.
They also ruled over the other children Vasudeva had raised
as well as a large number of hill tribesmen.
Kunara Rasi and Migapati RasirJ.i had three sons and one daughter.
The eldest son, Kunarikanada (MS) or Kunarishiganasa (JKM), succeeded
his father as the ruler of Migasangara. The other two sons were made
rulers of two new cities, Anarapura Nagara (MS) or Rannapura (JKM)
and Kulissa Nagara (MS).l9 For reasons unstated in the chronicles,
Vasudeva became dissatisfied with the original city, Migasangara
16) Kraisri Nimmanahaeminda provides an interesting account of the conversion
of the Lava to Buddhism in, "The Lawa Guardian Spirits of Chiengmai",
Journal of the Siam Society, LV, ii (July, 1967), pp. 185-225. There would
seem to have been distinctive Lava and Mon Buddhist traditions which become
merged in the chroniclers' accounts.
17) Jayawickrama's rendering as 'elephant-footed' following the suggestion of
Sayadaw U Titthila has no meaning in terms of the probable cosmological
structure of this mythic-legendary event. See Epochs • .. , p. 98.
18) The Thai terms translated here as bullock and cow are ifl and ·r1. They are
formal and common terms for tbe same kind of animal. It would seem that
the author's purpose was to emphasize the four cardinal directions.
19} The details of this part of the narrative including the names of the cities are
quite at variance among the CdW, MS, DL and JKM. For the most part, I shall
follow the MS.

M\''tH, LEGEND AND HISTORY IN THE NORTHERN THAI CHRONICLES '11
Nakhorn, and built a new city to the south of the place where the Buddha
had made his prediction and named it, Pura Nagara, which was ruled by
Kunarikanada.
Kunarikanada apparently proved to be an unworthy ruler. In the
MS it is said that he refused to observe the ten royal Precepts and, in
particular, refused to mete out justice to a boy who bad beaten his elderly
mother. She appealed to the devas for help. They heard her plea and
said to her, "Old woman, go and tell your relatives and friends to leave
the city immediately." After these people had gathered up their belongings
and escaped, the devas deluged the city with a great flood destroying
everything within it including the wicked king.
Vasudeva, being informed of the destruction of the city by the
devas who protected the world and seeing that the city had, indeed,
been entirely annihilated, said, "When I was a Bhikkhu I realized that
people without wisdom and virtue, no matter of what rank or position or
number of followers, usually make no progress or self-improvement.
Not only are they dangerous to themselves but also cause sorrow to other
people. This is the teaching of the Buddha. Now, where can I find a
man of wisdom and virtue to rule in accordance with the ten royal
Precepts ?'l20 Deciding that his friend, Sukkadanta in Lavo, could help,
Vasudeva descended from Doi Suthep to seek him out. Coming to the
place the Buddha had predicted as the future site of Haripunjaya, he
decided to found the new city there. He sent a message to Sukkadanta
via a deva who resided in a nearby bamboo grove. Not only did the deva
bear the message to Sukkadanta but miraculously brought the hermit
upstream using the bamboo grove as a raft. Along the way Sukkadanta
founded several villages including one where he built a shrine to the deva
of the bamboo grove.
Vasudeva and Sukkadanta met at a place half way between Doi
Suthep and Muang Lavo which was given the name of Chiang Krung or
"half-way city". This spot coincided with the place where the Buddha's
begging bowl had been received by the rock. Vasudeva thrust his staff
into the ground and pulling forth a clump of earth and perceived that the
area was rich in precious gems, fuel (charcoal) and paddy rice. If ruled by
20) MS, p. 140; DL, p. 13.

Donald K. Swearer
a man of virtue and justice ( dhamma), the area would prosper, whiie ah
unjust ruler would bring only calamity and famine.
Having decided to found the city of Haripufijaya at that very location,
Vasudeva consulted with Sukkadanta regarding the city's proper
size and shape. Sukkadanta suggested that the city's plan should be
based on the sea shell model of Halitavalli Nagar a (Sajjanalaya) founded
by their friend Anusissa. The two rishis immediately set off for Sajjanalaya
where Anusissa promised to find a shell they could use as a
design for the borders of their town. Afterwards he instructed a Hassatiling2t
bird to secure a sea shell from the ocean and take it to the
two rishis. The bird returned with the shell, perched on the branch of
a tree, and let it fall at a spot to the west of where the Buddha had made
his prediction. Vasudeva then took his staff and traced a line around
the parameter of the shell. Through his supernatural power, the line
became deeper and deeper until it formed the city's moat. Houses and
shrines for :five kinds of spirits arose from the soil and, for this reason,
the city was named Lampbun. 22 Vasudeva then had the tree devas move
their abodes beyond the moat to make the city neat and orderly.
The city being properly prepared, Vasudeva next sought Sukkadanta's
advice about a virtuous and just ruler. "My friend," replied
Sukkadanta, there is a universal monarch {cakkavatti) who has succeeded
his father as ruler of Muang Lavaratha or Lava. He has a daughter
named Nang Camadevi who practices the five precepts. Let us go and
request that she rule our city."23 Sukkadanta and Gavaya24 armed with
appropriate gifts and an escort of five hundred retainers then proceeded
to Lavo to request that C.amadevi become the ruler of Haripufijaya.
21) The Hasatiling, a mythological bird with an elephant head and a blrd's body,
is often used in funeral processions to transport the coffin of an abbot from
the Wat to the cremation ground. It signifies the passage from one mode of
being to another. Here it symbolizes the creation of a new order of things,
the Muang Haripuiijaya.
22) DL, p. 16.
23) Ibid,
24) JKM has Gavaya going on this mission alone, and the translator queries in a
footnote whether Gavaya might be one of the Gavaya.pada children. See
Epochs .•• , p. 100.

~1YTil, LIWEND AND HISTORY IN THE NORTHERN THAI CHRONICLES 79
C. The Ciimadevi Layer
Camadevi is depicted in all of the northern chronicles as the daughter
of the ruler of Lavo. The DL adds an interesting footnote to that
tradition.
There she becomes an incarnation of the fifth wife of Indra
born as the daughter of the wife of a village headman.
Indra intervenes
in an argument over the girl and places her in a 500 petaled lotus.
Vasudeva discovers her one day while searching for food and looks after
her in his hermitage until she is two or three years old.
His three
friends, Sukkadanta, Anusissa and Buddhajalita, admonish him, because
adopting a girl is not acceptable behavior for a rishi.
The four then
agree to send Camadevi on a raft to Muang Lavo with a note requesting
the king to adopt her as his daughter. The devas guide the raft safely
to the city where the ruler of the city duly accedes to the request of the
rishis.
When Camadevi reaches the age of 15, the king marries her to
his son and together they rule as viceroys in his kingdom.
In the JKM,
Camadevi's husband is the provincial ruler of the city of Ramafina, a
designation for a Mon area in the central plains of Thailand perhaps
extending into Lower Burma.•s
The chronicles offer a variety of reasons for requesting Camadevi
to become the ruler of Haripunjaya. The MS and DL state that it was
impossible to find someone who was virtuous and pious, endowed with
the Ten Royal Precepts, and-above all-of royal descent. The CdW
offers another explanation: that the people (ofLamphun) were uncivilized
forest dwellers endowed with the characteristics of the animals in whose
footprints they were born; that they could not tell right from wrong,
good from bad; and that they were unable to govern themselves. 2 6
Here
Camadevi is called to rule Haripunjaya not only because of her reputation
for piety and virtue, but also for her connection with the ruling
family of the more cultured and powerful kingdom of Lavo. The exact
nature of that connection is ambiguous because of the conflicting testimony
of the chronicles.
25) See Epochs. , . , p. 100, n. 6.
26) CdW, p. 26.

80 Donald K. Swearer
Sukkadanta and Gavaya from Haripunjaya are received favorably
by the ruler of Muang Lavo. He does not, however, immediately acceed
to their request but leaves the decision up to Camadevi. She, in turn,
graciously asks for the king's advice, which is, "To be sent to govern the
land towards the sources is of considerable importance, and the request is
made by a powerful rishi."27 Camadevi consults her husband who is not
overly enthusiastic about the proposal even when his father says he can
have any other woman in the kingdom for his wife. Yet, in the end,
neither Camadevi nor her husband can obstruct the wishes of the ruler
of Lavo, so she prepares to depart. With her she takes 500 bhikkhus,
500 ascetics, 500 scribes, 500 sculptors, 500 jewellers, 500 silversmi tbs,
500 goldsmiths, 500 blacksmiths, 500 painters, 500 astrologers, 500
governors, and 500 of every other profession to execute every kind of
sacred and profane labor. "The bhikkhus, ascetics and scribes numbered
1500. On the lists there were 7,000 others, but there were certainly more
than 7,000 men, elephants and horses involved. No one made count,
and no one knows if the number was in the ten thousands or millions.••2s
The king's parting advice was, "My dear daughter, you must realize that
you are not an ordinary ·or common person. You are of royal blood, a
descendant of kings. Now you go and become a ruling queen. Take the
B.uddhist religion and five hundred monks with you which will be the
basis for your progress and prosperity. When you are queen, always
observe the ten precepts for the happiness and prosperity of your people.
You must teach your people how to behave according to the Buddha's
precepts. The five hundred monks going with you are men of piety and
virtue who will protect and pray for you every day and night. Do not
deprecate thei:n or be heedless of them."29
Camadevi departs with her large retinue and along the way builds
chedis and several important northern towns including Tak and Hot.
Much as Vasudeva used his staff to test the probity of the site on which
H~ripui'ijaya was founded, Camadevi located ber towns at the spot
on which her royal archer's arrow fell. One location, Ramayagama,
receives considerable attention in the DL where it is said that Camadevi
2·7-) -DL,-p-.·Fh-·
28) Ibid., p. 19.
29) MS, p. 153.

MYTH, LJWEND At'lll HISTORY IN THE NORTHERN THAI CHRONICLES 81
erected palaces, pavillions and houses all in one- day.ao After some time
Haripunjaya is reached amid the great rejoicing of Vasudeva and the
populace. Camadevi is consecrated as queen seated on a heap of gold
and "in consequence of it, up to the present day, the name Haripufijaya
has been traditionally banded down for this city."31 After ruling the
city for seven days, Camadevi (who had been three months pregnant when
she left Muang Lavo) gave birth to two boys, Mahantayasa and Indavara.
Under Camadevi, Haripunjaya flourished. Monasteries are built
for the five hundred monks who came from Muang Lavo and the people
piously practice Buddhism due to the encouragement and example of
Camadevi. She settled the town according to the regions from which
the elements of the populace came: those from Muang Lavo in the northeast;
those from Migasangara in the west; those from Ramaniya Nagara
in the south; and the interior of tbe town to the descendants of those
born in the footprints of the elephant, rhinoceros and buffalo.32 She
made propitiatory offerings to the town's protective devas and requested
an elephant of supernatural power so that her sons could protect Haripufijaya
against its enemies. The devas granted her request and sent an
elephant of silvery white skin and green tusks. Camadevi had it duly
consecrated on an auspicious day in a ceremony lasting three days and
nights. The elephant had such power that everyone who stepped before
it was stricken with an illness which could only be cured by making
suitable offerings to the animal.
One incident during Camadevi's reign receives special attention in
both the chronicles as well as the oral traditions of the Lava.aa There
was a Lava (recorded as Lua in the DL) chieftain named Vilangkha (Milangkha
in the CdW) who, having heard of Camadevi's great beauty wanted
her for his wife. He sought her hand in marriage but was refused. The
DL chronicle records the conversation between Vilangkha's envoy and
Camadevi as follows: "Your majesty," said the envoy, "Vilangkha, who
lives in the heights of the Lua mountains, the chief of all the Lua, has
30) DL, p. 25:
31) Epochs • • , , p. 100, n. 8.
32)
33)
DL, p. 27; PY, p. 170; MS, p. 166. . . "
MS, p. 169; PY, p. 181; DL, p. 29. See Kraisri Nimmanahaemtnda, The
Romance of !{hun Luang Viranga", (mimeographed),

82 Donald K. Swearer
,'·
sent me with my men to tell you that be would like to have you as his
major wife." "0 messenger," she replies, "I have never seen your chief.
What does he look like?" "Like us," was the answer. "Like you" she
cried. "Don't talk of making him my husband. · It doesn't seem fit to
me that he should even touch my band!"34 Vilangkha did not take
Camadevi's refusal seriously and assembled an army of80,000 men before
the gates of Haripufijaya. Once again the queen refused the Lava chief's
hand in marriage and sent her own troops led by her two sons, Mahantayasa
and Indavara, mounted on the magic elephant. The Lava troops
were seized with fright, threw down their arms 'and headed back for the
hills.
The Lava traditions have an expanded version of the CamadevijVilangkha
episode.3s In response to Vilangkba's pursuit of her hand in
~narriage, Camadevi sets a trial which she considers impossible to accomplish
successfully. She tells the Lava chieftain she will marry him
if on three tries he can throw his spear from Doi Suthep into the Lamphun
city walls. Vilangkha accepts the challenge, and with the !irst mighty
throw almost manages to reach the city wall. Today can be seen a small
pond marking the spot of the firs~ throw. Camadcvi, now fearful that
her ardent suitor will succeed, plots Vilangkha's downfall. Taking her
sarong she fashions a hat for the Lava chief and has it presented as a
gift feigning admiration for Vilangkha's great strength. He puts it on
his bead and launches his second throw only to find that it lands quite
short of the mark. His third effort is so weak that the spear is caught
by the wind and like a boomerang reverses its direction and pierces
Vilangkha's own heart. Unwittingly by wearing the defiled hat, Vilangkha
bad broken the taboo of touching cloth profaned by menstrual blood.
This taboo still conditions spacial relationships between men and women
as well as many modes of behavior. This old taboo accounts for the
prohibition against women entering such sacred places as the precinct
of the sacred chedi at Wat Phra Dhatu Haripufijaya in Lamphun or Wat
Phra Dhatu Doi Suthep in Chiang MaL
The JKM devotes a small paragraph to Camadevi herself being
more interested in Lamphun's subsequent history, in particular, wars
34) DL.· t:>.-35.
35) Kraisri Nhnmanahaeminda, "The Romance 0 0 o "_

~IYTH, t.iWENI> ANb HISTORY IN THE NORTHERN 'fHAI CHRONibLES SJ
Involving Lamphun; LopbUl·i and Cambodia. Carnadevi's son, Mahan~
tayasa, is installed as the ruler of Haripufijaya at the age of seven in ah
elaborate Brahmanical ceremony including such regalia as a nine-tiered
umbrella, jewelled sword and scabbard and golden slippers. Indavara;
not content with the status of uparaja under his brother, asks his mother
for a kingdom of his own. With the help and advice of the rishis­
Vasudeva, Buddhajalita and Subrabrna-and a hunter, Khelanga, a grand
city was miraculously created named, Khelanga Nagara (modern day
Lampang), and "on the same day, towns were created as dependencies
of the city, a considerable population of all sorts of people was bro_ught
into being,"36 and lndavara was made the ruler. While neither the
episodic nor the regal chronology of the subsequent history ofHaripufl.jaya
will conc~rn us here, one further incident must be mentioned. During
the reign of a king named Kambala in the lOth century A.D., a cholera
epidemic broke ou~. The citizens fled to the city of Sudhammanagara
(modern Thaton) and, later, being harassed by the king of Pagan left for
Hamsavati (Pegu). When the epidemic subsided after six years, all of
them returned to Haripunjaya. Coedes uses this incident to support his
identification of Lamphun as Mon, a presumption we hope to qualify
later in this paper.
The Narrative Interpreted
The epic history describing the founding ofHaripui'ijayaor Lampbun
is a series of creation myths and legends in the genre of the Sinhalese
chronicles (e.g. Dipavamsa, Mahavamsaj, and Indian puranic and agamic
literature which manifested itself in such Pali works as the Nidana-katha
and the commentary on the Buddhavamsa. 3 1 Above all else, this history
narrates the creation of civilization (i.e. Muang, Nagara or town) in the
midst of a non-civilization (i.e. forest-dwelling hill tribes). The funda~
mental polarity of these mythic-legends is, therefore, one between town
36) DL, p. 38.
37) See E.J. Thomas, The Life of the Buddha As Legend and History, 3rd ed.
(L~ndon: Routledge & K.egan Paul, Ltd., 1949). Thailand's contribution to
this tradition is not even noted by Thomas. European scholars are generally
unaware of such works as the Phra Chao Liep Lok and other northern Thai
Buddha damnZin,

84 Donald K. Swearer
or city and village or trihe. This polarity is manifested primarily in the
calling of Camadevi to govern Haripunjaya, but secondarily in such
episodes as Vilangklla's pursuit of Camadevi's hand in marriage. Camadevi
personifies the advanced or Muang culture of Lopburi adumbrated
in the stylized lists of professionals in her retinue. She stands in stark
contrast to the rustic attributes of those whom she has come to govern
symbolized in the CdW by the children in the footprints of the forest
animals.
On a sociological level, the narrative speaks of the progressive
development of a Muang culture. The first city Vasudeva created was
Migasangara. [Miga here should probably not be translated in its particular
meaning of deer but in its generic sense of forest or untamed
animal.] Migasangara, here, is a town designating the first settlement
of different tribal peoples, yet it cannot be called a civilization or culture
at this point. Consequently, other towns emerged until the founding of
Haripunjaya which benefited from its alliance with Lopburi. Later, it
developed a unique identity distinct from other centers of high culture,
including Lopburi, Cambodia and even the cultural influences of Nakorn
Si Thammarat.
On a mythological level, Haripufijaya is what Mircea Eliade would
term an axis mundi or center of the sacred cosmos. It is in this sense
that Vasudeva descends from Doi Suthep, "looks in all directions" and
then takes people from the four cardinal points which serve to populate
the cities he creates. Also, the flood destroying Pura Nagara and the
sea shell model of Haripufijaya ate intended to convey the emergence of
a new, sacred order. A similar mythic mentality informs the narrative
of the Buddha's visit and relic. It establishes Haripunjaya as a place
guarded by the devas and the nagas, the cleverest of the birds that fly
(crow), the temporal authority of King Asoka, and the spiritual authority
· of the Buddha himself. Haripunjaya is a Buddha-desa, the center of a
sacred cosmos charged with the power of the Buddha's presence conveyed
through his personal visit and the deposit of his relic-hence, the chronicler's
concern for pollution as evidenced by the role of the crow and the
indigenous deva as guardians of the reliquary against all kinds of impurities
and Adittaraj~'s near desecration of the holy spot.

Mvra, u~GEND AND msronY IN ti-lE NORTHERN THAt cHRONICLEs ~s
From the standpoint of the narrative's structure as outlined in our
description, Lamphun has two foundings, one associated with the Rishi/
Camadevi continuum and the other with the Buddha/ Adittaraja continuum.
The creation of a Muang culture involves the federalization of
tribal or communal loyalties by subjugating them to a higher political
authority. Camadevi primarily fulfills this function. She symbolizes a
new political authority associated with a powerful ruling family of a
Muang with a high culture (i.e. Lopburi). Yet, while Camadevi brings
with her political power in vested with the authority of both Buddhism and
Brahmanism, the religious identity of tribal affiliation is not yet decisively
transformed. Buddhism as the religion of the Muang is not established
until the time of Adittaraja. The Buddha predicts that his religion will
flourish in the land of the Mae Ping River at the time of Adittaraja.
There are at least two possible explanations for the chronicler's pointeither
Buddhism was established in Haripui'ijaya by Adittarajaor it began
to flourish as a popular religion during his reign. In either case-and
the latter may be the most probable-Buddhism was established as the
religion of the Muang during the reign of Adittaraja, not of Camadevi.
Adtttaraja, then, becomes the second founder of Haripui'ijaya. No reign
matches his importance until that of Mengrai in the 13th century A.D.
The specific details of the narrative are, of course, liable to a variety
of interpretations. Some informants say that the black and white crows
are meant to symbolize south and north Indian influences; others have
attempted to identify the children of the animal footprints with specific
tribal groups in northern Thailand; and still others have pointed out
Vasudeva's connection as the son of the clan progenitors of the Lava.
Such speculations may, indeed, have merit. I have tried to offer a
framework in terms of which the mythic-legendary part of the founding
of Haripui'ijaya has meaning. I have suggested, by way of summary,
that the fundamental polarity in the myths and legends is between civilization
(town) and non-civilization {village)and that Haripui'ijaya bas two
foundings, one associated with a Rishi tradition 38 actualized by Camadevi
38) Rishis are persons who have gained supernatural pow~rs through the exe~cise
of ascetic disciplines. They often play the role of founder or progemtor.
See Hermann Kulke, Cidambaram-:ihiitmya (Wiesbaden: Otto Harras.o~i~z,
1970) for a suggestion of the role .of the rishis at Cidambaram a holy Satvtte
site in South India. Parallels are also found in the Romulus and Remus
tradition appended tO' the founding of Rome. cf. F. Hermann Strasburger,
Zur Sage von der Griindung Roms (Heidelberg: Universitats Verlag, 1968).

86 Donald k. Swearer
and &nether associated with a Buddhist tradition actualized by Adittaraja.
These distinctions, as our description of the narrative points out, are not
clear cut but, nevertheless, are implicit in the texts.
Historical Implications
The historical relevance of our study of the story of the founding
of Haripunjaya focuses on the long-held assumption that from the 7th
or 8th century39 until Mengrai's conquest in 128140 Haripunjaya can
be identified as Mon. This position has been generally held by scholars
since it was established by Coedes in refutation of M. Lefevre-Pontalis'
view that Camadevi brought Khmer influence into northern Thailand.4I
Coedes' position means that for a period of approximately 500 years,
Haripunjaya was dominated by a culturally and artistically advanced
people who had established themselves in great strength in the central
plains. There are at least three problems with this theory: (1) Haripunjaya
would have been an isolated outpost of a people representing a
highly developed culture for a half millenium, (2) it is probable that of
the eight Mon inscriptions discovered in Lamphun, none can be dated
before the reign of King Kyanzittha of Pagan (1084-1113), 4 3 (3) some of
the earliest archaeological remains in the area, in particuliar a few sculpted
Buddha heads, are identified by some Thai scholars not as Mon but
some other, as yet unidentified, Buddhist culture. 4 3
These problems are significant enough to call into question the
presumption that Haripufijaya was Mon from the time of Camadevi
until the Thai conquest. By applying our study of the chronicles' account
to the historical situation, there appears to be some grounds for asserting
that Haripunjaya was not dominated by a Mon Buddhist culture until
the lith century, if at all, and that prior to that time it was culturally a
39) Coedes places Ciimadevi in Haripuiijaya in the 8th century and the beginning
of Adittadija's reign around the middle of the 12th century. His dating
pushes the chronology of the chronicles up approximately I 00 years.
40) W.A.R. Wood, A History of Siam (Bangkok, 1924), p. 55.
41) Coedes, Op. cit., p. 16.
42) See A.B. Griswold and Prasert na Nagara, "An Inscription in Old Mon from
Wieng Mano in Chieng Mai Province", Journal of the Siam Society, 59: 1
, (January, 1971 ), p. I 54.
43) M.C. Chand Chirayu Rajani, .Thai Monumental Bronzes.

MYTH, LEGEND AND HISTORY IN THE NORTHI\HN THAI CUUONJCLES
S7
Lava-Mon area dominated by the Lava. This position is not a direct
refutation of the traditionally held view but a qualification of it. Basically,
it reduces the gap between the Lava and Mon who, after all, are
ethnically and linguistically related. It sees the Lava not as "primitive
and savage" (to use Coedes' terms) but as relatively less advanced than
the Mon. And it affirms that Haripunjaya cannot be seen as Mon in the
same terms as the Mons of central Thailand. In short, it broadens the
MonfKhom debate by suggesting that the Lava transformed the culture
of Lopburi Mons into something unique. Mom Chao Chand makes a
similar suggestion in his Thai Monumental Bronzes but it has not been
seriously followed by historical scholarship.
The identification of Camadevi as Mon (or Meng) is not, in fact,
corroborated by any direct references in the northern chronicles including
the CdW which makes pointed reference to the Mons. The section of
the CdW dealing with her qualifications to rule Haripunjaya simply
identifies her as the daughter of the King of Lavo. The only particular
support in the chronicles for such an identification comes from the mention
of Ramanffa Nagara, a Mon designation, to which Camadevi is related
through her husband who ruled there as viceroy. The DL and a version
of the CdW as yet untranslated from northern Thai even suggests that
Camadevi was only the adopted daughter of the King of Lavo and had,
in fact, been born in northern Thailand. An association of Camadevi
with the Lava is made possible by her connection with Vasudeva who,
as mentioned earlier, is the son of the guardian spirits of the Lava, Pu
Sae, Ya Sae. It might be noted that the Lava have their own independent
tradition of being converted to Buddhism during the Buddha's visit to
northern Thailand.44 It should at least be queried whether this tradition
points to an early Indian Buddhist contact with the Lava.4s
Given the following: that we know very little about the nature of
Mon influence in Lopburi in the 7th and 8th centuries; that there is an
allusion to Camadevi's origin being in the north; and that no source
directly identifies her as Mon, it is questionable at best to assume that
Camadevi initiated the Mon period of Haripuiijaya. In fact, it seems just
44) Kraisri Nimmanahaeminda, "The Lawa Guardian Spirits ..• ".
45) There are two badly weathered Buddha heads in the Wat- Pbra Dhiitu Haripuiijaya
museum which appear to be close to a pure Gupta style.

88 Donald K. Swearer
as reasonable to picture Camadevi as a pawn in alliances between cousins
in her marriage to the Mon prince of Lavo and then later in her reign in
Haripuffjaya. She brought with her not only enhanced political authority
but many of the Mon traditions and customs she had imbibed while in
Muang Lava or Ramanna Nagara. These, in turn, were transformed into
unique tradition properly designated as Lava-Mon or simply as Haripunjaya.
It is probable that Mon Buddhist influence became dominant in the
11th or 12th century. Historically, Mon strongholds in central Thailand
an.d lower Burma were being disrupted during this period by the Khmers
and the Burmese respectively. It would be natural to assume a movement
of Mons into areas which seemed to offer greater security. Haripufijaya,
an up-country station with Mon connections, offered one of those places.
For this reason, the earliest Mon inscriptions discovered in Lamphun
dating from the 11th and 12th centuries are similar to the language and
epigraphy of the Mon inscriptions in Thaton and Pegu of approximately
the same time. It might even be that the Thais further to the north
came under the influence of the Buddhist Mons during roughly the same
period. Could this influence of Mon Buddhism have brought about such
a decisive change that it should be looked upon as the second major
turning point in the cultural and religious development of Haripunjaya ?
In which case the period from Camadevi to Adittaraja might be thought
of as the Lava-Mon period and from Adittaraja to Mengrai as the Man­
Lava period. Such a distinction may seem to be nit-picking, yet it reveals
a new dimension of northern Thai cultural and religious development
that has been largely neglected.
One final note-what about the cholera epidemic at Haripunjaya
and the forced migration to Thaton and Pegu '! Frankly, I see no reason
to become literalistic in i~terpreting the chronicles on this point. Perhaps,
as the chronicles suggest, the incident is primarily an explanation
ofthe meaning of Loi Krathong. Or, as Coedes argues, it points to old
Mon traditions at Haripunjaya. Might it not, however, be a sign pointing
to the future influence of Mon Buddhism from lower Burma into
·northern Thailand? My position would support suQb an interpret~tion,

Epigraphic and Historical Studies, No. 12
Inscription 9
by
A.B. Griswold and Prasert f}a Nagara
Introduction
The surviving portions of Inscription 9 consist of three slabs of
stone, each engraved on one face only. In referring to a given line of the
inscription, we shall use the Roman numeral before the slant to designate
the number of the slab (and not the number of the face, as in our discussions
of other inscriptions), while the Arabic numeral after the slant is,
as usual, the number of the line.
The text contains a series of dates given in an unspecified era which
isobviouslytheCUlasakaraja (CS).
to [CSJ 768 = 1406 A.D.
1406 or very soon after.
They run from [CS] 705 = 1343 A.D.
The inscription was evidently composed in
The King of Sukhodaya at that time was Mahadharmaraja III (Sai
f.,idaiya), who reigned from about 1398 to 1419. Sukhodaya, 'which had
been reduced to vassalage by Ayudhya in 1378, had gradually regained
its freedom, and declared its independence in 1400.
In 1406 Mahadharmaraja
III was still an independent monarch, but a few years later he
was forced to become a vassal of Ayudhya,I
Though the language of lnscr. 9 is Siamese, it is written in Cambodian
script much like the 'Khom' which Sukhodayan epigraphy regularly
uses for Pali texts; the inscription is addressed primarily to the monkhood;
and the Khom script may have been used to emphasize its sacred
and inviolable character.
Inscr. 9 uses the mai-han-akasa often in syllables ending in ~. and
at least once in a syllable ending in 1.1; as usual in Sukhodayan epigraphy,
it is written above the final consonant rather than the initial:
1) See JSS 56/2, pp. 207-242.

90 A.B. Griswold and Prasert t}a Nagara
...
t'h!'J.J (I/2, 22, 24; III/11, 12, 28, 29, 32, 36, 37)
...
1'1\1
..,
Vl\1
(I/3, 22, 25; III/27)
(Ili/27)
"'
'YlJ
..,
(I/24, 26, 33; Illj9, 11, 16, 22, 23, 32, 36)
-..J (I/25)
v
1\lrl (III/7, 13)
"'""
"d\l rl (III/19)
...
~u (III/12, 19)
Elsewhere the mai-han-akasa is regularly replaced by the reduplication
of the final consonant:
r~nm1~ CI/4, 6, 9; 11/9; III/I, 24)
unn (I/23; III/9)
VIUnn
(III/7)
ilnn (I/23; II/4, 5)
unmHm

EPIGRAPHIC AND HISTORICAL STUDIES
91
'EJUU (l/23, 30; III/22, 23, 26, 31, 35, 36, 37)
iJUWiJ:;
9
(Ijl8)
fllJU (III/9, 13, 16, 21)
'J .:JUiJ (III /23)
In the same order of ideas we have 11nn (III/35) for 11n; ff'JHlfl111lJ
' .
(III/36) foF ff'Jl1fl1n1J; and ti1lJlJ (passim) for tilnJ, whether alone or in a
compound.
place is taken by "'or"".
by".
The vowel -'l occurs twice: t1 "' {Iljll), f'l "' (Ul/12); elsewhere its
The vowel -t is lacking, being generally replaced
The word vvn is twice written i!ln (Ij5, 6), and once vvn (JII/7);
M~ is written il1'11 (IIf/23); 'llflU is written i'llu (III/29-30).
The mai-ek accent occurs in the following words: ~ (=~. I/13), u
(III/2, 3, 7, 10); the accent+
(lll/29), ti1 (I/14, 21, Ilf6, 12), I.J (Ilj3), 1~
(for the mai-do) occurs in 1;1. (l/18, II/7, III/30), Lfi1 (III/I), u; (III/6),
ul'!1 (III/6) and u H (III/38); but elsewhere in the inscription the same
words are written without accents.
There is no recorded provenance or date of discovery for any of the
three slabs.
Around the 1880's Slabs I and Ill were at Vat Pavaranivesa
in Bangkok, let into a wall at the entrance of the Lord Abbot's residence,
but we do not know how long they had been there.
in the Van Hna Museum at Bangkok at an unknown date.
Slab II was deposited
In 1924 all
three slabs were removed to the Vajiraiiai}a Library, and they are now
in the Vajiranal}a Hall of the old National Library building.
All three are 55 em. in width (Figs. 1-5). I and III are rectangular
with rounded tops; II must have b~en similar, but is now only a fragment
in the form of an irregular triangle.
The best preserved is III, which is
1 m. in height, with 38 lines of writing; except for a few lacunae, the
text appears to be complete. The bottom of I is broken off, leaving it
90 em. in height, with 34 lines of writing. As for II, which is 80 em.
in height, an unknown number of lines are lost at the top, as well as a
considerable portion of the 15 lines that survive.

92 A.B. Griswold and Prasert ~a Nagara
Slab III was first published by Pere Schmitt in 1886. 2 He published
it again, together with Slab I, in Fournereau's Le Siam Ancien. 3 He was
able to decipher only a small part of I. but his transcription of III in Le
Siam Ancien, though faulty, is complete. As he failed to grasp the
sequence of ideas, his translations make very little sense.
The late Professor George Coedes, recognizing that the three slabs
are parts of a single text, published them with a transcription in Romanization
and a French translation in 1924.4 This was the first publication
of If, and the first satisfactory edition and translation of the others.
The Siamese section of the same volume contains a transcription of the
text in modern Siamese letters.s
As Coedes observes, Slabs I and III give the beginning and the end
of the text respectively. Slab II, in which the first date is [CSJ 724, must
be a direct continuation of I, in which the last date is 723. But between
II, whose last date is 731, and liJ whose first date is 750, there must have
been one or more slabs that are now lost.
In the inscription there are several references to 'this Red Forest
'I ~
Monastery' {1M11J1!!~H'U, I/17, 1/21, 11/6, Ilj9, H/10) between the years
721 and 725; there is a reference, sub anna 768, to 'this Kalyana Forest
Monastery'
"" .
(nl1U1!li~U1)1ft'U, III/37); and nowhere is there a mention of any
other monastery with the demonstrative 'this' (although there is a
reference at I/33 to 'all these monasteries,' apparently meaning all the
forest monasteries in the province of Sajjanalaya). The evidence of the
demonstratives suggests that the Kalyaqa Forest Monastery was the
same place as the Red Forest Monastery, and that the inscription was
composed and erected there. The name was apparently changed some
time between 725 (1363 A.D.) and 768 (1406 A.D.). Slab 1 gives us
some information about the first Abbot of the Red Forest Monastery, a
person called Mahakalya11-athera (Mahatbera Kalyaqa). He died in 723
( 1361 A.D. l, and it seems likely that the monastery was re-named in his
memory not long afterward. '
2) Excursions et reconnaissances, Saigon, 1886.
3) Vol. I, Paris, 1895, pp. 273-282, and Pis. LXXIX-LXXX.
4) Coedes, Recueil des inscdptions du Siam, I, Bangkok, I 924, p. 131 f.
5) Prajam Siliicar'ik Syim, I-, Bangkok, 1924; second edition, Bangkok, 1957.

EPIGRAPHIC AND HISTORICAL STUDIES 93
Coedes suggested 6 that 'Red Forest Monastery' in this text might
be another name for the Arafifiika built by Rama Garph€n'l, 7 or else might
refer to a monastery halfway between Sukhodaya and Sajjanalaya whose
ruins are mentioned in Prince Vajiravudh's account of his tour in the
Land of Pra Ruang,s i.e. the •Southern Red Forest Monastery ("J~I'l~1LL\il~i~).9
But the one in Inscr. 9, as is clear from 1/13, was much closer to Sajjanalaya.
Very likely it was at or ncar the Maharattavanarama (Pali: 'Great
Red Forest Monastery'), which, according to Jinakalamali, was 'at the
foot of Mount Siripabbata.' Siripabbata is the Pali name for Mount
Bra~ Sri (&'ll1Wl:::i'li), less than a kilometre south of the south corner of
Sajjanalaya's ramparts.I 0 Recent explorations in this area by the Faculty
of Archaeology of the University of Fine Arts have revealed the ruins of
numerous monasteries, but the one discussed in our inscription bas not
yet been identified.
Jinakalamali's reference to the Maharattavanarama is connected with
the story of a miraculous relic discovered by the Thera Sumana, who had
introduced the order of Forest-dwelfing Sibalabhikkhus or 'Ceylon monks'
at Sukhodaya. This ord.er, which had been established at Martaban in
Lower Burma by the Mahasami Uduml:)ara, had a high reputation for
holiness and orthdoxy. The story, as Jinakalamali tells it, may be summarized
as follows. No date is given, but the story is placed at a time
when 'Dhammaraja' was King of Sukhodaya and his son 'Lideyyaraja'
was ruler of Sajjanalaya. Sumana and a friend of his had gone to Lower
Burma to be re re-ordained by the Mahasami Udumbara and to study
with him. When Sumana returned to Sukhodaya, Dhammaraja installed
him in the Ambavanarama (Mango Grove Monastery) which he had
just built. One day Sumana, when be was on his way from Sukhodaya
to Sajjanalaya, made a halt at the river Pa.tt A relic of the Buddha
appeared by night in an old monastery nearby, performing a miracle;
and a tree-spirit, disguised as a Brahmin, told Sumana where the relic
6) Recuei/, p. 131.
7) See JSS 59/2,210-212 and note 66.
~ .{ ~ r
8) IHJ~ll1fJ'lliJMW1:J;l'H 1 Bangkok, 1909, p. 132,
9) See the sketch-map, ibid., between pp. 36 and 37.
10) See No. 19 on Map· 3 in Griswold, Towards a History Sukhodaya Art, Bangkok,
1968.
11) i.e. the Ftt Grad!ln, ~11l1&'1il1'1l, a little over 20 km. southwest of Sajjanalaya;
see JSS 60/1, p: 67 note 13; cf. ibid., p. 60 note 26.

94 A.B. Griswold and Prasert !}a Nagara
was deposited. Sumana went there, caused the ground to be dug, U!H:I
discovered the relic in a casket. He then went on to Sajjanalaya, takin~
the relic with him. Upon learning of his approach, Lideyyaraja wcni.
out to receive him, took him to Sajjanalaya, and installed him in the
Maharattavanarama at the foot of Mount Siripabbata. Lideyyarfija.,
upon seeing the wonderful relic, was filled with delight and paid homage'
to it. Later on, at the request of King Dhamrnaraja, Sumana returned
to Sukhodaya and showed him the relic.' 2
Miilasasana tells substantially the same story. While the text is
corrupt in several places, the needed corrections are generally obviou!!i>
enough. Udurnbara had arrived at Ban (Martaban) in Ramannadesa in
1331, and established a community of Forest-dwelling Sihalabhikkhu~
there. Not long afterward Sumana and his friend Anomadassi, after
retiring from the Sukhodayan order in which they had already received
the grade of Mahathera, went to K1n to be re-ordained in Udu~bara'!l.
order. After studying with him for five years and receiving the grude:
of Nissayamutta, they spent the next five in the kingdom of Sukhodayn.
Then they returned to Martaban for three months, where, as they had
now belonged to Udurnbara's order for ten years, be gave them the grade
of Mahatbera [cf. Appendix, p. 115]. Suman a went to reside in the Mangt»­
Grove at Sukbodaya, Anornadassi in the Red Forest at Sajjanalaya; und
they often used to exchange visits.t3 This explains why Sumana was 011;
his way to Sajjanalaya when he discovered the relic, the story of which
is related at length in Miilasasana. And it explains why the author or
Jinakalamali, though he does not mention Anomadassi by name, tells U'!t
that Surnana, after discovering the relic, went to stay at the Maharattu ..
vanararna.
When did these events occur? Two very different answers to th~
question may be considered. See Appendix, pp. 114-120.
Inscription 9 gives a good deal of information about certain phase~
of monastic life in the Sukhodaya period. It is chiefly concerned witt\
the affairs of the Forest-dwelling monks (Arafifiav~si or Vanavasi), fatthe
rno·st part apparently the order of Forest-dwelling Sihalabhikkhus ttl
12) See JSS 60/1, pp. 67-68; and Coedes in BEFEO XXV, pp. 95-96.
13) See JSS 60/1, 55-65; cf. ibid., 48-54, 69-72. ''

EPIGRAP!JJC AND HISTORICAL STUDIES 95
which Sumana, Anomadassi, and other disciples of Udumbara belonged.
This order, because of its connection with Ceylon, and its adoption of the
dhuta1iga of Forest-dwelling as a permanent way of life, was thought of
as a kind of scholarly and ascetic elite.14 Its members were much less
numerous than the Gamavasi or Village-Dwellers, whom the inscription
mentions twice (apparently the same order as the Nagaravasi or City­
Dwellers, who are not mentioned under the latter name in the inscription).
It also refers once to a third sect or order, the Bra!'l Rupa, of
which we know nothing.
The author of the inscription is a high-ranking monk, Bral;l Paramagru
Tilokatilaka Tiratanasilagandha Vanavasi Dharrnakitti Sangharaja
Mahasvami Cau. As Inscr. 9 shows he was on very friendly terms with
Sumana between 1361 and 1369, some scholars-being reminded of the
chronicular accounts that tell how Sumana and Anomadassi exchanged
visits and cooperated in performing ceremonies-propose to identify him
with Anomadassi. (See Appendix, p. 120.)
One purpose of Inscription 9 is to record Tilokatilaka's appointment
as Sailghaparinayaka 'with full powers', including the power to take
action if any monk of the order of Forest-Dwellers contravenes the
Dharma. We do not know how the term Sar1ghaparinayaka ('complete
master of the monkhood') differed, in the Sukhodaya period, from Sangharaja
('ruler of the monkhood'). In the 19th century both terms signified
the Supreme Patriarch of the monkhood throughout the kingdom;
but loser. 9 suggests that in the Sukhodaya period the office of Sailghaparinayaka
was higher than that of Sangharaja, and that Tilokatilaka was
being promoted. Probably as Sailgbaraja be had been head of the order
of Forest-dwelling monks in the province of Sajjanalaya, and as SaiJghaparinayaka
he was being made bead of the order throughout tl1e kingdom
It seems that each of the three orders had its own Sangharaja for
a given province, and its own Sa1ighaparinayaka for the whole kingdom.
We do not know whether there was any Supreme Patriarch for the entire
monkhood throughout the kingdom.
14) For this order, see JSS 60/1, pp. 48 ff.; for Sumana's inadequacies, cf. JSS
61/1,1111-120.

96 A.B. Griswold and Prasert !)a Nagara
A second purpose of the text is to confirm an appointment previously
made by Tilokatilaka in his capacity as Sangharaja (Ifl/27-35). He had
appointed the Mahathera Mangalavilasa as Abbot of the Kalya11a Forest
Monastery; and this appointment, or perhaps Maligalavilasa's conduct
after receiving it, had been called into question by two Mabatheras,
Sariputta and Buddhavarpsa, who brought legal action, apparently with
the object of having Mailgalavilasa removed. In a solemn conclave held
in "768 (1406 A.D.) the King, Mahadharmaraja III, together with the
Queen Mother, the royal counsellors and others, as well as representatives
of the three monastjc orders (Gamavasi, Brag Rupa, and Araftiiavasi),
quashed the complaint made by the two monks, appointed
Tilokatilaka to the post of Sanghaparinayaka, and confirmed Mailgalavilasa
as Abbot ofthe Kalya11a Forest Monastery .rs
As a prelude (Slabs I and II) to the account of the conclave and its
decisions, Tilokatilaka goes back 63 years to review his own career. He
does not mention King Lodaiya (r. 1298 ?-c. 1347), who was reigning in
CS 705 ( 1343 A.D.), the first date in the inscription; nor does he mention
Nvva Nail) Tham, whose reign probably lasted only a few weeks in 1347.
He gives us several glimpses of Mahadbarmaraja I (J;..idaiya, r. 1347 -C.
1370), whom he calls 'Mahadharmaraja the grandfather.' The next king,
Mahadharmaraja II (r. c. 1370-c. 1398), is not mentioned in the surviving
portions of the text, though there is a reference to an appointment made'
in his reign (1388). Mahadharmaraja III (r. c. 1398-1419), who was
King at the time the inscription was composed, is designated as 'Mahadharmaraja
the grandson.'
We may sum up the information in the inscription as follows (we
transpose the CS dates into the Christian Era by adding 638, without
regard to the month; the results may sometimes be wrong by one year):
CS 705 = 1343 A.D. Someone, probably Tilokatilaka, is ordained
in the. order of Gamavasi. rl/3-5.)
15) The presence of the Queen Mother at this conclave might lead us to believe
the King was: still a minor and that his mother was acting as regent for him (cf.
Wof!d. History of Siam, p. 61; and Coedh, Recueil des inscriptions du Siam, I,
p. 91; but it seems pretty .certain that he was a full-grown man. See JSS 5 6/2,
p. 226 a.nd note 39.

EPIGRAPHIC AND HISTORICAL STUDIES 97
CS 719 = 1357 A.D. He is ordained in the order of Arannavasi
and comes to reside at a place whose name is lost (l/5-9; cf. below, p:
104, note 5).
CS 721 = 1359 A.D. Mahadharmaraja I builds a kuti for Mabakalyaqathera
to live in, and in the same year builds the. Red Forest
Monastery for him. Mahadharmaraja conducts a campaign to Bre
(11w1'), which lasts seven months. At the conclusion of it (probably in
CS 722 = 1360) he presents fifteen families of prisoners of war to the Red
Forest Monastery. He invites Mabakalyaqathera to come (and spend
the rainy season retreat there?). (l/9-17.)
CS 723 = 1361 A.D.t 6 Tilokatilaka goes to Sukhodaya to do
homage to someone, apparently Mahakalyaqathera. When Mabakalyaqathera
is taken ill, he and Tilokatilaka return to the Red Forest Monastery.
Knowing his death is near, Mahakalyaqathera asks the monks
and white-clad ascetics to choose his successor. The choice falls on
Tilokatilaka. Mahadharmaraja I comes to the Red Forest Monastery,
and after Mahakalyaqathera's cremation he puts Tilokatilaka in charge
of 'all these monasteries', apparently meaning all the Arafifiavasi monasteries
in the province of Sajjanalaya. (1/ 19-33.)
In the same year Mahadharmaraja I sends for Mahasamaqathera
to come to the Mongo Grove; Mahasamaqathera is the Mahathera
Sumana who discovered the relic (see above, p. 93 f.). Mabasamaqathera ·
visits the Red Forest Monastery to salute Tilokatilaka and perhaps shows
him something (the relic?), though the lacunae in the text prevent us
from being certain. Then Mahasamaqathera goes into retreat for the
rainy season at the Mango Grove Monastery, while Tilokatilaka goes
into retreat at the Red Forest Monastery.
(II/I-9.)
16) This was the year the 'Mahathera Sangharaja' (rom Bann (Martaban) arrived at
Suk.hodaya, and Mahlidharmarlija I was ordained as a monk; see JSS 61/1,
11 9-16 7. F:or the identification of the Mahathera Sangharaja, see below,
Appendix p. 121. As it seems pretty certain that he was put in charge of all
the Forest Monasteries in the kingdom of Sukhodaya, we should expect him to
be mentioned in Inscr. 9; but if so, the references to him are lost or unidentifiable.

98 A.B. Griswold and Prasert ~;~a Nagara
CS 724 = 1362 and CS 725 = 1363. Tilokatilaka spends the rainy
season retreat at the Red Forest Monastery. (ll/9-10.)
CS 731 = 1369. Mahasamaqathera goes to the north. (11/14-15.)
A lacuna of 19 years follows. The lost text may have contained
a statement that the name of the Red Forest Monastery was changed to
Kalyaq.a Forest Monastery (presumably in memory of Mahakalyaqathera);
and it certainly contained a statement that Tilokatilaka appointed
Padumuttaramahathera as Abbot of the monastery. This statement may
have been preceded by references to one or more earlier appointments
to the post. Very likely Tilokatilaka himself bad become Abbot of the
monastery in 1361 at the same time he was appointed Sangharaja, but
later on put the monastery in charge of a series of other Mahatheras,
though he seems to have continued to reside there himself as Sangharaja.
CS 750 = 1388. Upon the death of Padumuttaramahathera,
Tilokatilaka appoints Taqhal!lkaramahathera to the post. (111/1-3)
After that, upon the death of Ta:qbarpkaramahathera, be appoints
Vessabhumahathera; and upon the latter's death he appoints Mangalavilasamahathera.
(III/3-6.)
At an unstated date, probably in CS 768 = 1406 A.D., or a little
earlier, two monks make a complaint against Mangalavilasamahathera
and bring suit (to have him removed). Mabadharmaraja HI, together
with his mother and numerous advisors, as well as a large assembly of
monks representin~ the three orders (Gamavasi, Brah Rupa and Arannavasi),
meet together in the uposatha hall on Lake Chari and quash the
suit. (III/6-23.)
CS 768 = 1406 A.D. Mabadharmaraja III issues an edict in the
same uposatba ball, appointing Tilokatilaka to the post of Sanghaparinayaka,
with full power to discipline any monks of tbe Arafinavasi as
he deems best. At the same ·time Tilokatilaka and all the monks,
together with the King, etc., confirm Matigalavilasamahathera as Abbot
of the Kalyaqa Forest Monastery.

EPIGRAPHIC AND HISTORICAL STUDIES
99
Text
SLAB I
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'11
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100 A.B. Griswold and Prasert J}n Nagara
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EPIGRAPHIC AND HISTORICAL STUDIES
101
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drnl9l

102 A.B. Griswold and Prasert f!a Nagara
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EPIGRAPHIC AND HISTORICAL STUDIES
103
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104 A.B. Griswold and Prasert l}a Nagara
Translation
[1/1-5.] This message of Bral:t Paramagri.i Tilokatilaka Tiratanasilagandha
Vanavasi Dharmakitti Sangharaja Mahasvami Cau is a
statement! (of events that have occurred) since His Lordsbip 2 was
ordained as a monk in the Gamavasi in sakaraja 705, a year of the goat,
on the eleventh day of the waxing moon of the sixth month, a Monday. 3
[I/5-9.] When he was ordained as a monk in the Arannavasi, in
sakaraja 719, a year of the cock, on the sixth day of the waxing moon
of the sixth month, a Tuesday,4 he came to reside ats ...•............
[I/9-18.] In sakaraja 721, a year of the boar,6 Mahakalya11-a [thera]
......... the Bra\1 Mahfithera ...............•...... Mahadharmaraja
the grandfather? invited him to ..... (and) built ... a kuti for the
Mabathera to live in when he 8 came to do homage ....... to the
1) buddhatikli (I/3), 'Buddhist sub-commentary'. While an atthakatha is a 'com·
mentary' on a Canonical work, explaining and illustrating various points in it, a
Fkii is a 'sub-commentary', i.e. a commentary on an atthakatha. It contains a
clarification of points in an attbakatha, or gives supplementary material regarding
the discussions in it. (See Malalasekera, The Pali Litet·ature of Ceylon,
London, 1928, p. 192 ff.) Tilokatilaka's use of the term ~ika, like his use of the
'Khom' script, was probably intended to enhance the authority of his statement.
In Siamese, however, buddha ~ik;L means simply 'to say' or 'to state' when used
of a monk; and Madame S. Lewitz informs us that the sathe is true in Khmer.
We have translated 1/3 .freely, rendering~ ('has,' 'contains,' etc.) as 'is', and
omitting the expressiotl ('11"~~. 'like this' or 'as follows'),
2) It is not certain whether 'His Lordship' (\11U=~1\.i) at 1/3 refers to Tilokatilaka
or to MahakalyaQathera; we think the former is more likely, whereas Coedes
prefers the latter (Recueil, p. I 36 note 1 ). In the 14th century a good many
monks were first ordained in the Gamaviisi but later retired from the monkhood
to be re-ordained in the order of Forest-Dwelling Sihalabhikkhus.
3) Monday, April7, 1343 A.D. (Julian).
4) Tuesday, April25, 1357 A.D. (Julian).
5) The place where he took up his residence would have to be one that would
qualify as a forest monastery or a hermitage: and the expression 2J1tlrl at 117
('came to reside') implies that it was somewhere near the forest monastery where
he composed the inscription.
'
6) 1359 A.D.
7) Mahiidharmaraja I q ..idaiya).
8) 'VIlli (I/12); the lacunae prevent us from being certain whether the reference is
to Mahiidharmariijii. I or to MahiikalyaJtathera.

'
EPIGRAPHIC AND HISTORICAL STUDIES 105
Mahadhatu at Sri Sajjanalaya 9 , also in that same year ....... (He) to had
the Red Forest Monastery built for him to live in, also in that same year.
Mahadharmaraja the grandfather took his army to Moan Blell and stayed
there for seven montbs12 ... ,,. [When be returned] from Ble he bad
fifteen families of persons sent .......... to this Red Forest Monastery.ll
Then he invited Mahakalyaq.athera to come ......... si yonder because
the throng of white-clad ascetics could not cast (the statue of) our
Lord14 ...
[I/19-33.] Tn Sakaraja 723, a year of the ox,ts 1 therefore went to
Sukhodaya to do homage to His Lordshipl 6 • . • Thent7 he was taken
9) The Mahiidhiitu or Temple of the Great Relic at Sajjanalaya was either the
monument now called Vat Jail Lorn ('J.. ~;l~nviJ), which stands in the center of
the old walled city (No. 1 on Map 3 in Griswold, Towards a History of Sukhodaya
Art, Bangkok, 19 68), or else a monument at Jaliail (Chalieng), less than 2 km.
away, which occupied the present site of Bra4 ~riiil. Jalian (vm:tl·n~~'ll:af:EJ~,
ibid., No. 15). Bra~ rrail Jaliab. was built around 14 75 on the ruins of an older
temple.
10) Mahiidharmaraja I.
ll) UVHl (l/15); modern 1 Bre CPr~. uw ·h.
12) The campaign may have started after the rainy season in CS 721, and ended
before the rainy season of CS 722. For the probable purpose of the campaign,
cf.JSS61/2,p. 105.
13) Evidently the fifteen families were prisoners of war who were being sent to
the monastery as slaves.
14) The word lll

106 A.B. Griswold and Prasert ~1a Nagara
ill, so Mahakalyaqathera and I returned's ..... [to stay] in this Red
Forest Monastery. Then he became ill (beyond hope of recovery), [so
he invited] the monks and the throng of white-clad ascetics to come and
meet together, and he saidl9 : 'I ..... My heart is uneasy. Who is a
suitable person for me to leave in charge of the monasteries which are ...
. . . ?'20 All the throng of monks [answered]: 'No one is more (suitable)
than His Lordship.'21 So he said : 'Let them be left in his charge ....•.
[He] is more suitable than all others ............ to succeed me. I shall
live four or five or six days, but I cannot live long.' So he sent word to
Mahadharmaraja the grandfather at Sukbodaya. Mahadharmaraja came
to see His Lordship's remains. After the cremation Mabadbarmaraja the
17)
18)
19)
20)
21)
word in the next line (l/20) clearly refers to Mahakalya!]athera we should
probably assume it refers to him here too.
fHHHJ (1/20), which reappears at 1/21, III/ 6 and IIJ/8, seems to be used as an
adverb or conjunction of time, but its precise meaning escapes us; we conjecturally
translate it as 'then'. Coedes translates it as 'lorsque' ('when') at 1/20,
1/21 and III/6, but omits it in his translation of III/8, where the meaning
'when' would not fit the context. A footnote in Prajum Silaciirik Syiim, I
(1924), p. 140, glosses the words as tla~:rJtJLn\1; the Glossarial Index of the
Snkhothai Inscriptions by Ishii, Akagi and Endo (Discussion Paper No. 53,
Center for Southeast Asian Studies, Kyoto University, Kyoto, November,
1972), glosses mHltl as 'when' or 'while'.
We conjecturally restore ~-at the end of 1/20 as flll (~u), 'to return'.
Coedes, conjecturally restoring the word as fl~, 'to think about', translates:
"'
'nous songeames (a lui dt'!signer un successeur) dans ce Vat fa Ten' (Rccueil,
p. 135). ~
We omit from our translation the phrase~~"'~ (1 /22), modern -;,"'nt, 'like this'
or 'as follows', which often introduces a direct quotation. We omit it in
some other places also, particularly at 1/25, where it occurs in the mutilated
.,

EPIGRAPHIC AND HISTORICAL STUDIES 107
grandfather took the sanghati 22 which Mahakalyaqathera [used to wear]
1 'd23 . )
m 1t over my shoulder, and gave me his blessing as follows : 'May
Your Lordship .... live long 24 to practice the Lord's religion! In the
future let ........ all these monasteries2s be in Your Lordship's charge.'
[1/34.] •
year.26 .......... 21
0 I I I I I I I I 1 I I 10101111
in
the eleventh [month] of that
[II/1-14.] .......... 28 live at Sukbodaya ............. So [Maba]
dharmaraja the grandfather sent for Mabasa[maqathera)29 ........•. to
come to the Mango Grove 3 o. Mahasamaqatbera wished to come ..... .
22)
23)
24)
25)
26)
27)
28)
29)
30)
The sangbiiti (shawl) is a large piece of yellow cloth originally worn as a cloak
over a monk's uttariisailga (robe). In Siam, for certain ceremonies, it is folded
accordion-wise and laid over the monk's left shoulder. In this passage, the
King's action in laying Mahakalyar;tatbera's sai:tgha1i over Tilokatilaka's
shoulder symbolizes his appointment of Tilokatilaka as Mahakalya~athera's
successor.
We conjecture that .. lil (l/31) should be restored as rl11il, 'to lay (something)
on top of'.
Probably .• u (I/31-32) should be restored as v~u (~u). The expression
~Ul~~~i1~vu is a rhyming jingle meaning 'to live long'.
Apparently" the King was appointing Tilokatilaka to the post of Sangharaja in
charge of all the Forest-Dwellers in the province of Sajjanalaya.
Despite the lacunae, it seems pretty certain that 'that year' (I/34) is CS 723,
mentioned at 1/19, rather than 724 which is the first date in the surviving
portion of Slab II (II/ 19). The eleventh month of CS 723 was the month in
which Mahadharmaraja I entered the monkhood. He was ordained as a
samanera on Wednesday September 22, 1361 A.D. (Julian); and he was
ordained as a monk soon afterward, probably the next day (see JSS 61/ I, p.
122; cf. ibid., !32-167). It may be conjectured that a good deal of the lost
text dealt with these events; and something may have been said about the
Mahiisami Sai:lghariija from Martaban as well.
If Slab I originally had as many lines as Slab III (3 8), four lines are lost at the
bottom.
Only the last 15 lines of Slab II survive, in whole or in part, including part of
the last line (the stone below II/ 15 is blank). If Slab II originally had as
many lines as III, 23 lines have disappeared from the top. In addition, II/ I is
too fragmentary to offer any meaning. lt is not clear how much of the lost
text dealt with the events of CS 723, and bow much with those of CS 724; cf.
below, note 36.
The Mahathera Sumana.
cf. JSS 60/1, 69-72. Instead of translating as we have done, ' .... •.... to
come to the Mango Grove,' Coedes, conjecturally filling the lacuna, translates
'(Lorsqu'il fut) arrive dans le Jardin des Manguiers,' and places the clause
with what follows (Recueil, p. 13 7). For 111 at Il/4. cf. above, note 14.

110 A.B. Griswold and Prasert !Ja Nagara
Nay Svarapraji'ia and Pa Dharmatrailoka 5 1, as well as Khun Suga ndharasarajamantri
and Nay Beni Bamuy Rajasas on behalf52 of the royal
counsellors, (met)53 together with representatives 5 4 of the entire monkhood
: (namely) the orderss of Gamavasi headed by the Sai1gharaja
Naf!arucimahiHhera, and (including) Traipita kamahathera, Buddhavarp.sathera,
Mahaarivatpsathera, Pa Naf!agandhika, Pa Svaradeva, Pa
Rahula, and Pa Nanavilasa; the orders6 of Brah Rupa 5 7, (represented by)
. .
DhamarasimahiHhera, Subodbanandamahathera, and a numerous company
ofmonksss; and the order59 of Arafinavasi, (represented by) Sumat1-
galamahathera, Khemamangalamahathera, Dharmaghosamahathera,
Na11agambhiramahathera, SamanadevamahlHhera, Buddhavilasamahathe'ra,
Suriyamahathera, RamaransirnahiHhera, Dharmasenapatimaha-
51) Pa Dbarmatrailoka may be the same person as 'the poet and royal paqgita
named Sri Dharmmatrailoka' who composed the Pali face of the Asokiidi.ma
Inscription on behalf of the Queen Mother (see JSS 51/1,43, 93). A monk
with a somewhat similar name, who was the younger brother of the Queen
Mother, appears in loser. 49 (I/7, etc.; see JSS 56/2,231 f., 233 f., 236 f.).
Cf. Prince Chand Chirayu Rajani, JSS 61/1, p. 262 f. Though Pii Dharmatrailoka
seems to be a layman, he is given the same honorific as a lot of the
Giimaviisi monks listed at II 14 ff.; the honorific pa ('teacher', etc.) may have
been applied indifferently to monks and laymen.
52)
53)
54)
55)
56)
57)
58)
59)
The words 1Htn'lllJ1~tl (III/10), which we translate 'on behalf of the royal
counselors', come before the names of the persons who are acting on the royal
counselors' behalf; both here and below we have shifted the position of such
expressions when it would make our translation clearer. At Ill! 10-16 the
words 111-1 and IUtl-3 (t~M) occur several times; the general meaning of both
is 'side,' 'direction.' or 'on the side of'; both sometimes seem to mean 'representing,'
and sometimes 'order' or 'sect'. As well as we can make out, no
semantic distinction between l1ll and tile~ is intended; the two words seem to
be used interchangeably, each of them in more than one sense. We have
translated freely, according to the context.
We have added the verb in order to make for easier reading by breaking up
the long sentence that runs from lll/8 to III/23.
LUtl~ (HI/11).
'1114 (III/12).
l~fl~ (111/15).
Evidently a third sect or order in the Sukhodayan monkhood in addition to
the Gamaviisi and the Arani:iauasi. We know of no other references to it.
bbiksuparsatt (III/ 16), for Skt. bhik~upar~ad (bhik~upari~ad),
...
IUtJ~ (lll/ 16).

EPIGRAPHIC AND HISTORICAL STUDIES 111
thera, Pranadhikamah~ithera, Suvaqq.asyamamahathera, :Nanavilasamahathera,
Anandamahathera, Argafiaq.amahathera, Dharmakit.titbera, and
a numerous company of monks 60 • (Tbey)61 met together in the uposatha
ball6 2 located on Lake Cha(iJ.)63, and quashed the suit64 brought by
the two monks.
[III/24-32.] In sakaraja 768, a year of the dog, in the first month,
on the tenth day of the waning moon, a Sunday,6s at the beginning of
the first watch 66 , an edict of Stec Mabadharmarajadbiraja was issued in
the uposatha hall67 on Lake Chan6s, saying69: 'We are appointing Bra~
Pa_~~~~~grii
Tilokatilaka Tiratanasilagandha Vanavasi Dharmakitti
60) In these lists of names there are a good many irregularities of spelling (preserved
by Coedes in his Romanization of the text at Recueil, pp. 134-135, but
for the most part regularized in his translation, ibid., pp. 138-139). In our
translation we have regularized most of them, but without eliminating the
Sanskritic forms among the Pali names. In a few cases, where we are uncertain
what Pali or Sanskrit name is intended, we have kept the original form.
61) We have supplied the pronoun; cf. above, note 53.
62) ma1v 11JlHl (I.II/22) could be any place ( m::m) duly consecrated and surround'ed
by slmii boundary stones, used for ordination, uposatha ceremonies,
etc. Such a place is commonly, though not necessarily, a building; but a raft
is deemed particularly suitable, as its situation on the water exempts it from
the risk of certain hidden flaws in the rites with which it was originally consecrated.
In this case, as appears below, it was certainly a building, presumably
located on an island in the lake. According to the Pali Text Society's Dictionary
(s. v. uposatha) there is a special ceremony called samaggi-uposatha
('reconciliation uposatha'), which is held when a quarrel in the monkhood has
been made up. This was evidently the ceremony that was being held in the
uposatha hall on Lake Chan.
63) The name, written jale chii ('ll!'Ml1) at Ill/22-23, reappears at III/26 as dale
chiin (1-11an1~). The words 'll~!a and l'l::ln are doublets, both meaning 'a body
of water', in the present context obviously a lake; UH (written U1 by mistake
at JII/22-23) means 'granary.'
64) adhikarapa (III/23), here written in the standard fashion; cf. above, note 47.
65) Sunday, December 5, 1406 A.D. (Julian).
66) wt.lamJtlllJ (III/26-27); the first watch is from 6 p.m. to 9 p.m.
67) wl::~111HllJ111la1flilJl'Hl (III/25-26), a hall or vihiira duly consecrated and
surrounded by sl~a boundary stones, and used for uposatha ceremonies, etc.
(cf. above, note 62). Probably the uposatha ball was built on an artificial
island in the lake, which would give it the same ritual advantages as a raft.
The remains of several such uposatha halls can be seen at Sukhodaya.
68) See above, note 63.
69) 'ilu~~ (111/27), literally 'like this', i.e. 'as follows'.

112 A.B. Griswold and Prasert I}R Nagara
Sangha raja MahasvamiCau as Sanghaparinayaka 70 with exclusive authority.
11 If any monk in the order 72 of the Arani:iavasi' contravenes the
Dharma?J, then some cases74 may be settled by the Paramagrii. himself
...... 75 cases in which the Paramagri1 has made any rcgulation76
whatever, we can have no right to infringe'' it ... at all78,•
70) We gather that Tilokatilaka already had the position of Sangharaja, which in
this context must mean the head of the order of Forest-Dwellers in a single
province (Sajjanalaya), and that he was now being appointed Sanghapariniiyaka,
presumably bead of the order of Forest-Dwellers throughout the kingdom;
cf. above, p. 95.
71) ff'VIB (II!/29). The Skt. and Pali no,un siddhi, meaning 'accomplishment,'
'success,' etc., takes on the meaning of 'exclusive right' or 'exclusive authority'
in Siamese. Coedes says: 'Comme dans tous les mots derives de Ia racine
sidh actuellement usites en khmer et en t'ai (siddhi, prasiddhi, etc.), il s'y
ajoute une•idee de droit exclusif.' Clnscrij>tions du Cambadge, II, Hanoi, 1942,
p. 108 n. I; cf. Bhattacharya, BEFEO LII/ l, p. 63). Grammatically we should
OJ "" ~ ""'
probably take the whole expression 1 tl 1-lff~'IJU'l'U1flflff'VIti together, literally 'to
have the exclusive authority of a Sanghapariniiyaka' (cf. expressions like
.I "' "' t ,
lu1-li1'1'11111f1~1-l, 'to hold the exclusive authority m one's own hands').
72) 111-1 (III/29).
73) mhui'l1U11'l'lJl.J (III/29-30), 'acts not in accordance with the Dharma' (l'liu =
modern 'litlU) •
. " .
74) fl!VHJ (IH/30. III/31) is the Khmer word ambo, which Guesdon's Dictiomwi1·e
Cambodgien·Franqais (Paris, 1930, p. 84) glosses as 'action, acte, fait, resultat,
feinte, mali:fice'; and which Maba Charp. glosses as ~~~m::ah (Prajum Silii'cirik,
B'angkok, 1957, p, !52 note 2). Here, as the context shows, it refers to
an act in violation of the Dharma,
75) In translating .we have omitted the word !VI1 {!II/30) which is followed by a
lacuna. · .
76) Ull)J1U~ (Ill/31), for Skt. prajnapti, 'instruction,' 'agreement,' etc.; Pali paiiiiatti,
'idea,' 'concept/ 'regulation'.
77) t'll~!lll' (111/31), mod. n::a~~~ 'to disregard,' to go against,' etc.
78) Our translation of this sentence is conjectural. Perhaps Tilokatilaka is being
given full power over the Araniiavasi in disciplinary matters, and the King
promises that if an appeal is made direct to him be will decide the case in
accordance with any general regulations Tilokatilaka may have made that
would be pertinent. Coedes translates the last Part of the sentence : 'quelle
que soit la decision rendue par le paramagru, nous ne nous y opposerons pas'
(Recueil, p. 139). We are not sure whether this interpretation, which differs a
little from ours, is better or not.

EPIGHAPH!C AND HISTOHICAL STUDIES 113
[III/32-35.] After that, therefore, I and all the monks, together with
Mahaclharmarajadhiraja and Sri Rajamata and the King's great-uncle79,
[confirmed SO) Mai:tgalavilasamahathera (as Abbot) of the Kalyaqa Forest
Monastery with full privilegesBI and exclusive authority82 of every
sort£ 3 • 11 o 11
[III/35-38.] If Mangalavilasamabathera dies, then let all the monks
who reside on Mount Svargaramas4 and the monks who reside in this
Red Forest Monastery, in the presence 85 of .......... , [choose] any
monk whatever (whom they deem suitable, to succeed him).
79) cf. above, note 50.
80
,'l
) Conjectural restoration of th .. 1-J ______
1h::a

114 A.B. Griswold and Prasert \!a Nagara
APPENDIX: DATES AND IDENTIFICATIONS
1.
When did Sumana and Anomadassi return from Martaban and
settle in the Mango Grove and the Red Forest Monasteries? Some scholars,
relying on the testimony of Jinakalamali (J) and MUlasasana (M),
think it was around 1341 or 1342.
J's account of Sumana opens in the reign of King Kilana (G'it Nli)
of LanNa (1355-1385). At that time, says J, without giving any precise
date, Dhammaraja was reigning at Sukhodaya; and Kilana wished an
ord~r of Forest-dwellers to be established in Lan Na.
J then skips back an unstated number of years to give us the biographical
information about Sumana which we have summarized above
(p. 93 f.). Soon after returning from Lower Burma and settling in the
Mango Grove, it will be recalled, he discovered thl! relic; and though we
are given no date we are told that 'Dhammaraja' was King of Sukhodaya
at the time and his son 'Lideyyaraja' was ruler of Sajjanalaya. Sumana
took the relic to Sajjana\aya, where Lideyyaraja installed him in the Red
Forest Monastery at the foot of Mount Bra~ Sri. After showing Lideyyaraja
the relic, Sumana received a request from King Dhammaraja,
who also wished to see it; so Sumana returned to Sukhodaya and took up
his residence again in the Mango Grove Monastery.
Here the retrospective insertion comes to an end, and J reverts to
the story of King Kilana's efforts to establish the order of Forest-dwelling
Sil1alabhikkhus in his kingdom. After his first attempts ended in
failure, he sent a message to King Dhammaraja of Sukhodaya, asking
him to permit Sumana to come and settle in Lan Na. As we know from
other sources (see below, p. 133, n. 26) Sumana started out for the northern
kingdom in late 1369.
Who is 'Dbamrnaraja' in J's account ?
All the kings of Sukhodaya, from Lodaiya to Mahadharmaraja IV
(with the possible exception of Nvva Narp Tharp), bore tbe title of
Dharmaraja or, as the author of J, writing in Pali, puts it, 'Dhammaraja.'
ln .the opening and closing passages which we have summarized, Dhammaraja
is evidently Mahadharmaraja I (Vdaiya); but he is not necessarily
the same person as the Dhammaraja in the intervening passage, whose

EPIGHAPH!C AND HISTORICAL STUDIES 115
son Lideyyaraja was ruler of Sajjanalaya when Sumima discovered the
relic, for the discovery of the relic belongs to an earlier period of
Sumana's life. As 'Lideyya' is the Pali form of ~idaiya (see Inscr. 6, I/7),
it would be natural for the author of J to speak of ~idaiya as 'Lideyyaraja.'
If this identification is right, the Dhammaraja who was King
of Sukhodaya when Sumana discovered the relic has to be ~idaiya's father
Lodaiya (r. 1298?-c. 1347). From 1340 to 1347, :J;..idaiya was viceroy at
Sajjanalaya, where he completed his famous treatise, the Traibbumikatha
(T) in 1345. 1 It would therefore appear that Sumana discovered the
relic some time between 1340 and 1347.
According to the usual rule, a monk must spend ten years in the
order before he receives the grade of Thera ('Elder'); and when he has
passed a certain course of study he receives the title of Maha ('Venerable').
M tells us that Sumana and Anomadassi, before being re-ordained
in Udumbara's order at Martaban, had already become Mahatberas in
another order (doubtless the Gamavasi), and upon arriving at Martaban
they retired from the monkhood. It seems to follow that by doing
so they lost their seniority, so that after being ordained as ordinary
bhikkhus by Udumbara they would have to spend ten years in his order
before regaining the grade of Mahathera.
J does not mention Anomadassi by name, but he is obviously the
friend with whom Sumana studied at Martaban. If it took ten years in
Udumbara's order to become a Mahathera, and if Sumana discovered the
relic before 1347, he and Anomadassi must have been re-ordained by
Udumbara some time before 1337.
According toM, Udumbara had arrived at Martaban in 1331 (see
above, p. 94; and .JSS 60/1, p. 55 note 3). M implies that Sumana and
A"nomadassi were re-ordained in his order soon afterward, say in 1331
1) According to Inscriptions 4 (11/1 0 f.) and S (II/18 f.), :Pdaiya was in the
twenty-second year of his reign in 1361 (JSS 61/l, pp. 133,139, 150, 156);
and according to Inscr. 4 (!/ 1-12) the date of his accession to the throne of
Sukhodaya was 1347 (JSS 61/1, 132, 136). This means that his reign as viceroy
of Sajjanalaya began in 1340. See Coedt3s in BEFEO XYII/2, pp. 8, 9, .45
(note that two misprints need to be corrected: p. 8,, last line of text: for en
l'an 25 • read 'en l'an 23'; an\i p. 45, line 28, for 'depuis dix ans,' read 'depuis
six ans:). The Traibhumikatha, according to the exordium of that work, was
completed in a year of the cock, when the author was in the sixth year of his
reign [as viceroy at Sajjanataya ], i.e. 1345.

116 A.B. Griswold and Prasert 1,1a Nagara
or 1332. After spending five years with Udumbara at Martaban, and
another five years in the kingdom of Sukhodaya, M tells us, they returned
briefly to Martaban, where they received the grade of Mahathera from
him, which qualified them to perform all the acts of the Sar1gha in his
order. Upon their return to Sukhodaya, say in 1341 or 1342, Sumana
settled at the Mango Grove Monastery, while Anomadassi settled at the
Red Forest Monastery (JSS 60/1, p. 59 and note 2; p. 63 and note 38; p,
64 and note 42; p. 67 and note 11; p. 68 and note 15). M says they
planted sima boundary-stones and ordained people into the monkhood,
in cooperation with each other. Sometimes Sumana brought candidates
to be ordained at Sajjanalaya in cooperation with Anomadassi, and
sometimes Anomadassi brought them to be ordained at Sukhodaya in cooperation
with Sumana (JSS 60j1, p. 59). The date Sumana discovered
the relic, supposing it was fairly soon afterward, might be put in 1342
or 1343, a date that falls comfortably within .l--idaiya's term as viceroy at
Sajjanalaya.
The preface to T lists 'Bra~ Anomadassi' among the monks who
helped Lidaiya compose the treatise, and the concluding statement calls
him •Bra!) Mahathera Anomadassi' (see JSS 60fl, p. 70 and note 3). It
seems likely this is the same Anomadassi we have been discussing. Perhaps
~idaiya wrote the preface before Anomadassi received the grade of
. Mahathera in Udumbara's order,and the concluding statement in 1345, the
year when Twas completed. This would fit well enough with the estimate
that Anomadassi received the grade of Mahathera in 1341 or 1342.
If we accept the evidence of J and M, we shall have to agree that
the Mango Grove Monastery and the Red Forest Monastery were already
in existence in the 1340's, certainly before 1347. But we have no means
of knowing whether they were mere sylvan hermitages at that time, or
fully developed monasteries with a considerable number of resident
monks; nor do we know whether they stood on exactly the same spot as
the monasteries of the same name that Inscriptions 4, 5, 7 and 9 speak
of.
The chronology of Sumana and Ariomadassi given above is the same
as we gave at JSS 60/1, pp. 24, 51, 52, 69, 70. At p. 71 of the same
article we alluded briefly to some possible objections to it, We shall
now try to bring out these objections more clearly.

EPIGRAPHIC AND HISTORICAL STUDIES 117
2.
Some scholars are unwilling to accept the above chronology, on the
ground that it relies chiefly on documents of uncertain worth.
While we
have epigraphic evidence that 1;-idaiya was viceroy at Sajjanalaya from
1340 to 1347, 2 the date of the earliest event in Sumana's career recorded
in epigraphy is 1361; no known inscription mentions Anomadassi by
name or says anything about Sumana's discovery of the relic; and the
only certain epigraphic reference to the relic itself is in part of t~e
Inscription of Wat Pra Yiin that recounts the miracles it performed at
Haripunjaya in the early 1370's (see below, p. 140 f.).
Most of the chronology
rests on M and J.
The portion of M that concerns us was
written at Chieng Mal in the 1420's (see JSS 60/1, p. 53 and note 2); and
the text, as we now have it, is admittedly corrupt.
The account of
Sumana in J, written at Chieng Mai in 1516, seems to be based largely
on M; if the text of M was already corrupt by that time, J's account of
Sumana cannot be rated very high as independent evidence; and in any
case it is one of the 'inserted' narratives which, because the author had
no means of checking them, are not always ·up to the standard of his main
history of events at Chieng Mai from the 14th century on. The corroborative
value ofT is questionable, because the text is corrupt in many
places.
Everyone will agree that inscriptions, when they can be interpreted
with certainty, are preferable to such documents.
'
The inscriptions say nothing about the existence of a monastery in
the Red Forest before 1359, or in the Mango Grove before 1361. The
chief epigraphic references to the Red Forest and the Mango Grove are
as follows.
According to Jnscr. 9 (I/9-14) 'Mahadharmaraja the grandfather'
(i.e. Mahadharmaraja I) built the Red Forest Monastery (i»fll11'll'li'IU111~'~~)
for Mahakalyi1 11
athera in 1359. The next year he invited Mahakalyaqathera
to visit Sukhodaya (ibid.; 1/17-18). We do not know when
2) See preceding note.
'
'I

118 A.B. Griswold and Prasert 1;1a Nagara
Tilokatilaka went to live at the Red Forest Monastery; but it was
probably before 1361, because in that year he went to Sukhodaya to do
homage to Mahakalyaq.athera, and when the latter was taken ill they
both 'returned' (if we have correctly restored a missing letter) to the
Red Forest Monastery (ibid., 1/19 f.).
In the same year, upon the death
of Mahakalyanathera, Tilokatilaka was put in charge of 'all these
monasteries' {ibid., 1{29 f.), which probably means all the forest monasteries
in the province of Sajjanalaya, including the Red Forest Monastery.
The Mango Grove had been planted by King Rama Garphen as a
pleasure garden {lnscr. 5, Ij4; JSS 61/1, 148, 154).
city of Sukhodaya (Insc.r. 4, Il/15 f.; JSS 61/1, 133, 139).
It was west of the
In it there was
a Brahmin temple, built at an unknown date, in which Mahadharmaraja
I {~idaiya) erected an image of Siva and an image of Vi~q.u in 1349
(lnscr. 4, I/52 f.; JSS 61/1, 132, 137).
In 1361 Mahadharmaraja prepared
a monastery in the Mango Grove for the Mahasami Sangharaj§
from Bann {Martaban), who had accepted his invitation to settle at
Sukhodaya.
The building operations are described as follows in Inscr.
4 {II/10 ff.; see JSS 61/1, 133, 139); 'The King sent craftsmen to prepare
and erect kutis and a vihara in the Mango Grove west of this {city of)
Sukhodaya; he had it leveled, smoothed and covered with sand; and he
made it as beautiful in every part as if it were created by Yi~ryukarma.>
There is a similar statement, though mutilated, in No. 5 {Il/25 ff.; see
JS~ 61/1, 150, 157).
According to No.7 (II/I ff.), be built kutis in the
Mango Grove, and a vihara whose interior walls were painted with
scenes of the Buddha's parinibbana and the incidents that followed; and
be also founded a statue (of the Buddha) and an uposatha hall with
boundary stones (see JSS 6ljl, 150, 157).
The building operations in the Red Forest in 1359, and in the
Mango Grove in 1361, sound in each case as if Ma11actbarmaraja were
founding a new monastery rather than improving and enlarging an old

EPIGRAPHIC AND HISTORICAL STUDIES 119
one. Of course there is no proof that there bad never been any hermitages
or small sylvan monasteries in the Red Forest and the Mango
Grove before that; and even if they did not occupy exactly the same
sites as the monasteries built in 1359 and 1361, they could have been
called by the same names. If, however, we disregard this possibility,
or consider it irrelevant, we shall conclude that Anomadassi and Sumana
cannot have settled in the Red Forest Monastery and the Mango Grove
Monastery in Lodaiya's reign.
In 1361, according to lnscr. 9 (11/1-9), Mahadharmaraja sent for
Sumana to come to the Mango Grove Monastery. Soon afterward
Sumana went to the Red Forest Monastery to salute Tilokatilaka and
perhaps to show him something (the relic?); but at this point the text is
mutilated.
The implication might be that both Sumana and Anomadassi
returned from Martaban in the suite of the Mahasami Sangbaraja in
1361, or perhaps that Sumana arrived in his suite, whereas Anomadassi
had come back earlier.
If Sumana did not discover the relic until 1361, 'Dbammaraja'
throughoutJ's account of the discovery would have to be Mahadharmaraja
I (pdaiya), and 'Lideyyaraja' would have to be one of his sons who was
viceroy at Sajjanalaya, perhaps the 'Father Lodaiya' who is mentioned
in the list of ancestral spirits in Inscr. 45 (Ij11 ), which dates from
February 27, 1393 (Julian); see JSS 57/1, pp. 75, 76, 82 and note 20.
Several members of the Sukhodayan royal family were named after
their grandfathers or other forebears; this one, who was presumably
named after his grandfather Lodaiya, may have been an elder halfbrother
of Mahadharmaraja II (r.c. 1370-c. 1398), and died before
him.

120 A.B. Griswold and Prasert Qa Nagara
3.
Because of the friendly relations between Tilokatilakn and Sumana
which are recounted in Inscr. 9, it is tempting to identify Tilokntilnka
with Anomadassi.
If we understand the passage at 1/33 f. correctly, Tilokatilaka did
not become a monk until 1343 when he was ordained in the Gamavasi,
which would mean he would not become a MahiHhera until 1353.
The
concluding statement in T, giving Anomadassi the title of Mahathera in
1345, might be an obstacle to this identi'fication, though perhaps not a
very serious one because the text ofT may corrupt.
Whether or not Tilokatilaka is to be identified with Anomadassi,
there is a problem concerning Tilokatilaka which is inherent in Inscription
9. He was ordained in the Arannavasi in I 357, so in the normal course
of events he would not become a Mahathera in that order until 1367;
yet he was put in charge of a lot of Araiiliavasi monasteries around
Sajjanalaya in 1361 (1/9-33 ).
office wou~d
It seems hard to believe that so high an
be given to a monk who had not yet received the grade of
Mahathera in the AraD.navasi.
The only solution that occurs to us is
that Tilokatilaka, when he was ordained in the Arafifiavasi in 1357, was
allowed to retain the grade of Mabathera which he had previously
received in the Gamavasi.
We do not know enough about the rules of
the Sukhodayan monkbood to say whether or hot such a privilege would
be exceptional.

EPIGUAPHIC AND HISTOUICAL STUDIES 121
4.
The Mahasami Sailgharaja who came to Sukhodaya from Marta ban
in 1361 can be pretty certainly identified with the Mahathera Medhailkara,
the author of a Pali work called Lokappadipasara, which is still
extant in Ceylon (see JSS 61/2, 91-97). Some scholars propose to identify
him with Udumbara, though the sequence of events in J and M implies
that Udumbara was still living at Martaban well after 1361 (see JSS 61/2,
p. 99). If we disregard the chronicular evidence, the difficulty vanishes
(cf. ibid., p. 99 note 14); but ~he identification is still not a certainty.

Fig. 1. Inscription 9, Slab I. (After Coedes, Recuetl des inscnptions du Starn.)
:

Fig. 2. Inscription 9, Slab 11.
(After Coedes, Recueil des inscriptions du Siam.)

Fi . 3. lnscri tion 9, Slab Ill. (After Coedes, Recueil des inscriptions du Siam.)

Fig. 5. Inscription 9, Slab III.
(After Fournereau, Le Starn ancien.)

Epigraphic and Historical Studies, No. 13
The Inscription of Wat Pra Yiin
by
A.B. Griswold and Prasert tta_Nagara
Introduction
The old city of Haripufijaya, now known as Lampun, was the capital
of the Mcm kingdom of Haripufijaya from the 8th century until 1292.
In that year it was conquered by the Tai under Mang Rai, the founder
of the kingdom of Ltm Nfi. Though he established his capital at Chieng
Mai in 1296, Haripufijaya remained the cultural capital of Uln Na for
at least 75 years longer.
Wat Pra Yiin, the 'Monastery of the Standing Buddhas,' is located
about a kilometre east of Lam pun. On the basis of some scattered hints
in the Lamp~n Chronicle and Miilasiisana, Griswold has pieced together
the early history of the site. 1 Before 1250 there was a forest monastery
there, in which one of the Man kings of Haripufijaya erected a colossal
statue of the standing Buddha; but the monastery was later abandoned,
perhaps during the hard times just before or after the Tai conquest; and
by the 1360's there was little or nothing left of it except the colossal
statue.
In 1369 Mang Rai's great-great-great-grandson Kilana (Gu Na),
who reigned over Uln Na from 1355 to 1385, decided to rebuild the
monastery for the Mahathera Sumana, the celebrated monk from Sukhodaya
whom he bad persuaded to settle in the northern kingdom in
order to establish a community of Forest-dwelling Sihalabhikkhus there.z
Sumana arrived at Haripufijaya in December 1369 (see below, p.
133, n. 26).
The inscription of Wat Pra Ytin commemorates Kilana's building
operations there, particularly the erection of a huge cetiya which be began
on Friday, January 11, 1370 A.D. (Julian) at Sumana's instigation, and
1) See Griswold, W at Pra Yun Reconsidered, to appear in the Siam Society's
Monograph Series in 1974.
2) For Sumana, see above, pp. 93 f,, 97 f., 107 f.; and JSS 60/1, pp. 51-72.

124 A.B. Griswold and Prasert ~a Nagara
completed on Thursday, May 9, 1370 (Julian). The ruins of the cetiya
are now completely hidden by the temple built over them in the early
years of the 20th century A.D.; Kilana's other buildings at the monastery
disappeared long ago, and have been replaced by newer structures.
The inscription (Figs. 1, 2), which was presumably engraved soon
after the cetiya was dedicated, is set up on a low pedestal near the
present temple. It was first published in 1925, by the late Professor
George Coedes, with a Romanized transcription and a French translation
(BEFEO XXV, 195 ff.). The late Maha Cbarp Donga~warqa published
a transcription in Siamese letters, together with notes and a parallel
version in modern Siamese spelling, in Silpal

eduplicating the final consonant.
EPIGRAPHIC AND HISTORICAL STUDIES 125
Except for two very doubtful cases
(~ at I/23, which may really be ri, and ri at 1/26, which may really
~ h ~ ~ ~
be e ), t e vowels and do not occur, their place being taken by
~ + IJ +
and . The accent (for ) occurs in 1'11tl at I/36, though elsewhere
the same word is written without it. As well as we can make
out, the mai-ek ( ' ) occurs seventeen times : vi [ = wu ], If5; u, I/35,
II/23; n [ = ; ], 1/31, 32; 11/16; ~ [ 1Hl ], 11/19; ~1u, II/9; ~ [ = ~v ],
1/23; fll'l [ = fll'l ], 1/15; ~il'l [ = L~1il'l ], I/35; fl!'liqj [ VIJJI;t]J ],
t I

126 A.B. Griswold and Prasert ttn Nagara
was 18 cubits, say 8.50 m., which was the legendary height of the
Buddha Gotama. Sumana, not long after his arrival, conceived a plan
for restoring this statue and making it part of a grandiose architectural
composition. At his suggestion the King quickly put the plan into effect.
He built a huge square cetiya in the form of a maqc;!apa, with a high
arched doorway at each face, placed in such a way that the statue would
be visible from the outside through the eastern doorway. Then be made
three new standing statues of the same height, placed so that one would
be similarly visible through each of the other doorways, representing
Gotama's immediate predecessors, the Buddhas Kakusandha, Koqagamana
and Kassapa. Finally, doubtless in the middle of the maqqapa in
the space between the four statues, he built a tabernacle in the form of
a prasada for the miraculous relic which Sumana had discovered long
before.s
5) See above, p. 93 f., and JSS 60/1, p. 60 ff.

EPIGRAPHIC AND HISTOIUCAL STUDIES
127
Text
FACE I
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128 A.B. Griswold and Prasert !la Nagara
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EPICHAPH!C AND HISTOHICAL STUDIES
129
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FACE II
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EPIGRAPHIC AND HISTORICAL STUDIES 131
[Translation]
[l/1, in Pali:] Homage to the Blessed One!
[I/2,-7.] (This is) 6 the stone inscription of the ruler Stn1 SenNa
Dharmikaraja, who is the beloved son of Brafia Pha Yii, the grandson of
Brafia Qarp Fii, and great-grandson of Brafia Man Ray the Great.7 When
the years and months of his father's life came to an end, he himself
inherited the kingdom. 8 He possesses immense9 honors merit fortune
' ' '
power and bravery.l 0 He is a great and righteous king.u
[1/7-14.] Filled with zeal for the religion of the Three Gems, be
sent an invitation to an exalted Mahatherat2 named Maha Sumana
Thera, who lived at Nagara Sukhodaya. At that timei3 (the Mahathera)
did not come.l4 Tl1e_n, however,ts (the King) sent an invitation once
again,I6 praying and making offerings!? to the exalted Mabathera, with
6) fll-11-I'J1 {1/2), i.e. fl~l-11\ is an old form for the opening of a speech or communication
(see McParland, p. 984). We have omitted it in translating, and supplied
the words 'This is' instead.
7) As King Kilanfi (Gii N{l) was Mang Rai's great-great-great grandson, the word
mau, 'great-grandson', is evidently loosely used here. In the Sukhodayan
inscriptions, several relationship-terms, which now have a more precise ~eaning,
are used loosely.
8) More literally, 'this ruler, at the end of his father's life-span ('\!1-IIJ1W~ =janmiividhi)
in years and months like that, then attained to the enjoyment of royal
power' (I/4-6).
9) 11\.10n11'1-11 (1/6).
10) ffrrn (= Skt. sakti, Pali satti), 'honors'; Uty (= P. puiiiia), 'merit', i.e. a large
•
store of merits earned in previous lives; CJ"' (= Skt. fddhi), 'fortune', etc.; II)J'lft
(P. teja), 'fire,' 'energy', 'supernatural power'; I)J\Jt (P. tapa), 'austerities,'
'self-control', implying bravery. It would be a mistake to insist on the exact
meaning of each word in this list Cl/6); it is purely conventional.
11) brana mahadharmikaraja (1/6-7), 'great king who rules in accordance with the
dharma'.
12) In order to preserve the flavor of the original, we translate 'l'ntiJ111!Cl11UUI'01
as 'exaJted Mahathera.' ll
13) l'l1U1.11.11-I (I/ I 0), modern f11\J\.It.l.
o\ I iOJ
14) 1JIJ11111J1 (I/ 10), for UlJ l'llJ1.
15) Wflf.l (1/1 0), 'on the other hand', 'on the contrary', 'in turn', 'however'. Maha
Cha~ glosses the word as watJu, ll:lf.l.
'but', 'consequently' (Reinhorn).
16> I'J1U'u~iffl'l 0/12).
Compare Lao l'Hlf.l, 'l'lavv, 'if', 'though',
17) ll11J'Nt1TH ([/10-11) suggests making a sacrifice, accompanied by a prayer, tci
a god or spirit; Pallegoix glosses both u JU'N and !'il'H as 'sacrificare angelis,
geniis;' McFarland equates U'Hffl'H with lJt.llJlt.l, 'to vow, promising a thankoffering
if the request is granted.'

132 A.B. Griswold and Prasert !).a Nagara
immense reverence.ts That time his lordship set forth, accompanied by
a troop of disciples, all of them worthy and learned monks who observe
the precepts with immense strictness,19
[1/14-20.] The exalted Mahathera, moreover, is characterized by
excellent deportment. 2 0 He possesses the faculties of gentleness, restraint,
endurance, knowledge, and gratitude.21 He is endowed with
wisdom, adherence to the precepts, and a great store of merit. 22 He is
skilful in expounding all the texts. He knows bow to teach people to
seek the Three Refuges. If anyone (acts in such a way that be) would
sink into (one of) the four woeful conditions, (such as) hell,23 his Lordship
lifts him out and shows him the path to heaven by24 getting him to
18)
19)
20)
21)
22)
23)
24)
li'l11U1Hlf1f1t1W1 (1/11-12).
"'

EPICHAPHIC AND HISTORICAL STUDIES 133
observe the precepts, and to practice right effort and mental development.25
[£/20-27.] The time his exalted lordship arrived was in a year of
the cock, in the first month, on a Friday.26 On that day, when his
exalted Lordship was about to arrive, King Dharmikaraja in person
(went to receive him), escorted by a numerous throng of officers, subjects,
soldiers, princes, noblemen, and ministers, drawn up in good order.27 He
had them carry banners and fiags,28 grilled rice and flowers, torches and
candles. They struck xylophones, and sounded stringed instruments,29
gongs, drums, clarinets, cattle-horn trumpets, small double-beaded drums,
curved trumpets, and conchs, together with30 plate-gongs, hand drums,
25)
26)
27)
28)
29)
30)
~ '
VO 0/20) is for Pali viriya, 'energy'. As it is identical with 'right effort,' the
sixth item on the Eightfold Path (Nyanatiloka, Buddhist Dictionary, 171), we
have translated it so. The Eightfold Path, i.e. the path leading to the extinction
of suffering, consists of right understanding, right mindedness, right
speech, right bodily action, right livelihood, right effort, right attentiveness,
and right concentration (ibid., p. 81 ). fi1Vltl1 is the Pali word bhiivani,
which Nyana~iloka glosses as 'mental development' (lit. 'calling into existence');
he adds that in English it is generally, but incorrectly, called 'meditation';
and that it is of two kinds, samathabhiivani (development of tranquillity,
i.e. samiidhl, concentration); and vipassaniibbavani (development of clearsight
i.e. paii'iii, wisdom); Nyanatiloka, Buddhist Dictionary, p. 26.
t1lfltl'!lV~ "' (1/20), i.e. I~Hl'UL'!lV~, "~ ~ 1''· t"e t h e same expresston . m . L' ao (R em . h orn, P•
453), is equivalent to t~lluci"1u, 'the first month' of the year. In the present
context we might expect it to mean the first month according to the Chieng
Mai calendar, which corresponds to the llth month of the Sukhodayan calendar,
approximately October. But all the dates in the Inscription of Wat Pra
YUn are given in terms of the Sukhodayan calendar, in which the first month
corresponds to 1-29 December 1369. The day the Mahiithera arrived was in
December, 1369 (Julian). ~ .,
V1VOU'U (1/23); our rendering is ba~ed on Maha Ch~I!l's gloss, tlvq'l'1VO'U.
~'VI~ (l/23), 'banners and flags'; 'llfl= Tai Yuan llll 1 'banners'; 'VI~ is for 1!~
'flags'. Instead of ~lH, Maha Chii~ reads ~'VI~, sc. Olt:IH; but an examination
of the stone shows the first letter is pretty clearly 'll rather than 'lf.
~ ... ~ J.,., . . J k' .
~1'11\illilHI'IU 0/24), i.e. ~1'11VIV11~1'1ru. In colloqutal S1amese WH1tl (S t. musical
instrument') often means a xylophone; in pre-modern Siamese wru (Skt.
viiJ.ii, 'the Indian lute') meant a three-stringed fiddle. ~
We follow Maba Cham, who glosses 1111 0/ 25) as mu, equivalent to IJ 1 'to
have,' 'there are,' 'witb'; cf. Khmer min, which has the same meaning.

134 A.B. Griswold and Prasert 1.1a Nagara
and tabors [?),31 with excellent and re-echoing sound,32 (while) the people
also cheered33 loudly,34 almost shaking35 the whole town of Haripuiijaya.
[I/27-30.] Then (the King) went to receive the exalted Mahathera
and invited him to enter the vihara,36 offering it to him as a gift, and
~----------·-----
31) The identification of some of the instruments listed at I/24-25 is easy, but
not all. Our translations, several of which are conjectural, are based on the
following : Maha Chiiq:t's glosses (Prajum Siliicir'ik, III, p. 143); Dhanit
Yupho, Thai tv/usical lnstntments, Bangkok, 1960; McFarland, Thai-English
Dictionary, Stanford and London, 1944; Guesdon, Dictionnaire Cambodgien· Franqais,
Paris, I 9 30; Reinhorn, Dictionnaire Laotien-Franqais, Paris, 197 0; A. Dani~lou,
La musique du Cambodge et du Laos, Pondichery, 1957; and verbal information
kindly supplied by Professor Hans Penth of Chieng Mai.
(I) flfl~, modern cJ"tH, is a gong of the ordinary type, composed of a
circular bronze disk with a raised knob in the center of one side, and a deep
flange running around the perimeter of the other side (see Dbanit, 21 ff.; and
Danielou, 23 ff.).
(2) nM~ is a drum (see Dhanit, 31 f.).
(3) ~fflil-1, modern ~'luw, is a clarinet or oboe, a wooden flute-like
instrument of soprano pitch (McFarland; Dhanit, 78 f.).

EPICRAPHIC AND HISTORICAL STUDIES 135
also presenting him the kutis and this dwelling-place.37 Then he provided
the exalted Mahathera and the whole throng .of monks with the
four requisites,3 8 of good and suitable quality.
[1/30-34.] The throng of people living yonder at Gum Gflm39 and
Chieng Mai, as well as the people here in Haripunjaya, were filled with
faith in the exalted Mahatbera. Some of them entered the monkhood,
32)
33}
34)
35)
39)
(I 0) I'H 1~ tlff is glossed by Mahii Cbii~ either as 'reverberating loudly'
or else as 'a ~in~ of musical instrument'. We conjecture it to be the same
word as Lao~~~~~~, which Reinhorn (p. 904) glosses as 'le tambour a main,
le tambourin', i.e. a tabor; perhaps it was something like the Siamese l1lJ~'I.I1
(see Dhanit, 41 f.).
fffl~HHJffffu~nil~ "' (I/25-26), i.e. HHHLI:lf'!lfftl~nil~, "" "' "" " .'excellent sound, reverbera·
ting sound.'
1'11 (I/26), i.e. 111, ' 'to give a long undulating shout or cheer, as when marching
in a procession or on the occasion of some festival' (McFarland).
; (1/26), i.e. ~ v, 'noisy', 'boisterous,' 'loud.'
~1, 'almost'; cf. &n1Uf,"lJlh~~1~1V, 'almost die.' annu (I/26), i.e. 'ff~n1u, 'to
shake'.
36) lt is not clear whether ~1111 (vihiira) at I/28 is used in the classic sense of a
monastery or an abode for a monk, or whether it means a preaching-hall, as it
now usually does in Siam.
37) Kutis are wooden huts for monks to live in; sthiina-avasa (1/28) is a dwellingplace,
which could mean a somewhat more elaborate residence for a monk of
high rank; or else we might take.sthana-iivasa to be in apposition to ku~i. and
translate 'presenting these ku~is as· dwelling-places to the exalted Mahiitbera',
sc. as dwelling-places for himself and his monks; as a Forest-Dweller (ara'fiiiavasi)
it may have been deemed mo-re fitting for him to live in a ku~i like the
other monks.
38) 1l1!C'I'lh11ltJ (l/30), for Pali catupaccaya, tlie four requisites of a monk, i.e.
robes, almsfood, a dwelling-pl,ace, and medicine. Of course he had already
presented them with a dwelling-place.
. .
(~lJn1lJ),
vm (I/31) is for ~u, 'yonder'; vnv is for mv, 'in the direction of'. Gum Gltm
a short distance from the old city walls of Chieng Mai, was Mang
Rill's first capital in this area. The site, which is still marked by the monument
known as Cetiya S~ Liem (11l~~~Llf~tJlJ) built by Mang R&i in the I 290's
but much altered by a 20th-century 'restoration', is said to have proved unsatisfactory
because of recurrent floods, and was superseded in 1296 by Chieng
Mai. Its mention here shows that Gum Gllm retained a certain importance
even after being abandoned as the capital. Today Chieng Mai has grown so
much that it has absorbed the site of Gum Gl\m.

136 A.B. Griswold and Prasert !).a Nagara
observed the precepts, and practiced right effort40 in the community4t
of the exalted Mahathera. From that time on, therefore, an immense
amount of merit was earned. 42
(I/34-41.] Not long after the exal.ted Mahathera arrived here to
take up his residence, be debated back and forth in his mind, reflecting
that this .......... and the statue of the standing Buddha loca.ted at
the end43 of this ............ , made and erected long ago by mastercraftsmen
of old, [was falling into decay?]. 44 The exalted Mahathera,
being able to consider (the matter) with the force of his insight, (decided
that he). would ......................... ,45 all worthy men .. .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . the Buddha ........ to attain five [thousand
years]46 ......•................................. (11/1-4] as
supports underneath their feet;4 7 and he sent word to inform King Dharmikaraja,
the lord of the land, of his plan to make the statues.
[II/4-9.] The King, when4s he beard that the exalted Mahathera
wanted to make statues like that, was filled4 9 with immense faith and
40) i1 (I/33) is for Pali viriya; we translate it as 'right effort' for the reason
stated at note 25.
41) ~1'Willl (l/33), modern am"'n, The word now means 'house,' 'dwelling-place,'
'rest-house,' or 'office;' but in Miilasasanii, in which it occurs frequently, it
obviously means the abode of a religious teacher and, by extension, the whole
company of his disciples; cf. JSS 59/1, p. 202, note 14. Here it refers to the
order of Forest-dwelling Sihalabhikkhus, and more particularly to Wat Pra
Ytin, which was as yet the order's only establishment in Lan Na.
.. ., "
42) U~4ttl!l~ (I/34), modern u~tn~, 'produced.'
43)
44)
45)
46)
47)
48)
49)
Restoring thn (1/36) as tl~1!J.
Conjectural restoration of the lacuna.
We assume he was planning to ask the King to restore the old statue, make
three new ones, and erect the maQ$iapa; see above, p. 125-126.
The restored statue and the three new ones were to last until the year 5000 of
the Buddhist era when, according to an old prophecy, the Buddhist religion
will com~ to an end (see JSS 6111, p. 84 and note 10).
'HI!l~~!l~~'WW1fl'l91 {II/ I). Both UM~ (here written 'lftl!l~) and 1!l\l mean 'to
support'; the Jirst is the royal word, the second the ordinary one. f'I1!Ji91,
modern fl1!li91, means 'on the under side,' 'underneath.' The feet evidently
!~~n7 1 ~~ 4
\~e :~~~~~·~~\.the supports must be pedestals.
In our translation we omit ltltl (II/5), modern tfifl, used here as an emphatic
particle.

EPICI\APH!C AND HISTORICAL STUDIES 137
delight; so he commanded a throng of officials to come and stayso to
supervise the work in cooperation with the exalted Mahathera. After
that the exalted Mabathera sent word the throng of devout laymen and
laywomen, to all worthy people in general, and to all the throng of wise
men, 5 I for laterite to be fetched and made smooth.52
[II/9-14.] Then his Lordship caused the heavenly bodies to be
observed,53 (to determine) the day of the week, the time, the shadow,
the nii4i, the triyansa, the naviii!Sa, and the lagna that would be most
auspicious,s4 and (at the time thus fixed) be had (the people) begin
(making) the arched doorway and putting together the pedestal for this
standing statue of the Lord.ss (It was) in the year of the cock, in the
---------------------------
50) lJ1fl'tl~11h (11/5), i.e. 2J1llfltl~~~1.
51) Perh~ps the 'wise men' are· the officials who helped the Mahiithera supervise
the operation.
52)
"' • .I

138 A.B. Griswold and Prasert ~a Nagara
second month, on the third day of the waxing moon, a 'kap set' day in
Tai, sukravaras6 in Mon, just before dawn, in the year seven hundred
thirty-one 731 of the Era,57 in the seventh rk~a, Punarvasu by narne. 58
[II/14-18.] After that,s9 in turn,6o his exalted Lordship had them
begin (making) the arched doorways and putting together the pedestals 6 1
way that one of the statues could be seen through each of the doorways.
Both passages start with the words imtlnl'l~fl. Obviously iH'wm means 'had
it is equivalent to~ as in
them begin'; as \'1 bas to be a verb, we co~jecture
~ l'J, 'to put up a fence' (McFarland, p. 369); hence 'to make'. The word
flfl which now means 'prison,' is the Khmer word guk, 'shrine' or 'vault' (cf.
' , .
Pali guha, 'a cave'); and we suppose 1t refers to the sort of arched doorways
we have described. The next word, 1J'llU 1 is of uncertain meaning; the
ordinary sense ~f tln:ouu, 'to compete,' .will not do; but perhaps we can get a
clue from mg:ou\1, 'placed close together,' 'to follow in quick succession', or
else from tl~,
which now means 'to. patch', but formerly may have mean~ 'to
piece,' 'to make', plus ouu, 'to collide'. Mahii Chiirp. glosses ll'U~I as l'll!llJ
or tl1~a'11-1, 'to solder together,' 'to join together.' We conjecturally translate
lJ'UU as 'putting together,' i.e. putting blocks of laterite together. The next
word, lJUlHH~ (Pali pallatika) in the first passage, corresponds to 'J1fl in the
second; in this context, both must mean 'pedestal.'
56) a'fl'l'WU (II/12), for sukravara, 'Friday.'
'
I
57) lJ ~~~~ (ll/23), i.e. 11~111; this expression, which we have omitted from our transla·
'II 'U \ '1.1
tion, means 'to concentrate one's attention on': sc. 'if we concentrate our
attention on the Era, it was in the year seven hundred thirty-one,' etc,
58) The name of the rksa is written purnarrbasu. The date corresponds to Friday,
January 11, 1370 A.D. (Julian). Regarding this date we are indebted to the
kindness of Mr Roger Billard, of the Ecole Franqaise d'Extr8me·Orient, for the
following observation : 'Cette date est en toute certitude le vendr·edi 11jmlt•ie1'
1370 A.D. julien. Toutes les donnees, y compris les cycles thai, s'y verif1ent
sauf le quanti!~me lunaire. Le texte doit ou devrait porter 14 (OU, a Ia rigueur,
13) de la tune croissante, et non 3. Meme si le texte donne indubitablement
3, la securite de toute la verification est tel!e, qu' on est en droit de conclure
a une erreur materielle de copie ou de gravure.' Since the number is written
out !i111J 1 line 12) there is no chance of a misreading; it is obvious the engraver
has simply forgotten to put in the word fflJ before ll'1lJ. The author of M made
the same mistake, which shows that he was following the inscription.
59) tHI~Uuu (II/ 14), 'at a later time'; as we shall see in a moment, it was five weeks
later (note 66).
60) 'YI!l~ (II/14); cf. above, note 15.
61) See above, note 55.

EPIGRAPHIC AND HISTORICAL STUDIES 139
for standing statues of three (other) Buddhas, at the south side, the north
side, and the west side, 62 in the year of the cock, in the third month, on
the fourth day of the waning moon, a 'katt rau' day in Tai, varasukra63 in
Man, when the shadow (of the gnomon) cast by the morning sun measured
fifteen feet, 64 in the ~k~a of Citra, 65 in the year seven hundred thirty-one,
viz. 731, of the Era.66
[II/[8-23.] T6 make these standing images of the Lords, (begun)
in the year of the cock and finished in the year of the dog, two years
sufficed. 6 7 During these two years his exalted Lordship had dedication
ceremonies held three times. 6 s On the occasions when those dedication
ceremonies were held, King Dharmikaraja, for his part, (havi~g) caused
almsfood and all the eight requisites69 to be prepared, came and presented
them as an offering to the monkhood70 at each side.71 Through the power
of the immense merits of the Mahathera and King Dharmikaraja, not a
single misfortune72 or accident occurred.73
62)
63)
64)
65)
66)
67)
68)
69)
70)
71)
72)
7 3)
Literally 'standing images of Buddhas all three persons, which are on the south
side, the north side, and go on to the west side. • (llf 15-16.)
barasukra (II/ 17) = sukravara 'Friday.'
Literally 'seeing the shadow (of the gnomon) fifteen feet ~in length) when the
sun was rising. •
.. "'
'llll11nff (II/17-18) = citra.fk~a.
About 9 a.m. on Friday, February, 15, 1370 (Julian). We.are indebted to Mr
Roger Billard for calculating this date and hour. It will be observed that work
to prepare the settings for the three new statues started just five weeks after
that for the old statue.
sc. the three new statues, begun in CS 731, were finished in the year of the
dog, CS 7 32. As any part of a year counts as a whole one, the time that elapsed
between the beginning of the first of the three new statues and the completion
of the last one could be anything between two days and two years; cf. below,
note 81.
i.e. a ceremony was held at each of the three sides in succession to dedicate
the statue on that side when it was finished; nm1~ at II/ 19 is the same word as
'll!'IM at II/ I, but here it means 'to hold a dedication ceremony.'
'fJIHl'lJlll'011 (11/21), for Pali anha parikkhara (cf. Skt. a~~ha pari~kara); according
to the usual List, the eight requisites of a monk are the three robes, the
alms bowl. a razor, a needle, tbe girdle, and a water-strainer.
mabadiina (11/22), the classic meaning of which is a special great offering of
food and presents made by a layman to the monkhood, usually lasting a week
or more; here it may be used in a less specific_ sense.
i.e. at the side .of the mar;9apa where that particular ceremony was being held.
n~'lU Il/23, modern fint~.
sc. during the building operations.

140 A.B. Griswold and Prasert ~a Nagara
[II/23-26.] The day his Lordship placed the finial on that statue,74
the holy (relic)7S performed a miracle, shooting out a blaze of rays76 of
six colors,77 clear and bright7 8 in appearance in the middle of the sky,
beautiful as the rays of a rainbow. 79 The whole throng of people who
sawso it were struck with immense astonishment.
[II/26-36.] When the last standing statue of the Lord was dedicated,
on the full moon day of the sixth month, a Thursday,si King Dharmikaraja
presented a prasada, which was built and adorned with (such)
74) The word could be either singular or plural; if singular, it doubtless means the
last statue. Probably fjjV~ {Il/24), modern ua~, means a flame-finial (rasmi)
which most Sukhodayan images of the Buddha have on top of the head.
75) vm: (at the middle of Il/24) is the relic which Sumana had discovered long
before (see JSS 60/1, pp. 52, 60-65,67, 68); cf. below, II/29 f., where the
relic is mentioned again, this time specifically designated as vm:1!1911UUL~1.
76) aa~'lflM·H; (11/24-25>; .ffa~ means 'to throw out light', and 'lflt'lt-lri,'jalaransi,
is presumably for Pali ransijiila, which the PTS Dictionary (s. v. rai1si) glosses
as 'a blaze of rays.'
77) 11f1U'IHI (11/25), 'six kinds.' As the relic was identified with the Buddha, the
light it emitted would be equivalent to the buddharasmi (cf. above, note 74),
the 'ray of enlightenment' or halo around a Buddha, consisting of six colors
(chabbatl!lal; see PTS Dictionary, s.v. railsi; cf. JSS 60 I I, p. 130 and note 159.
78) l'l11 (Il/25) is certainly the same word as rm (loser. 2, II/57), which corre·
sponds to l~fllJ, 'shining' (ibid., l/90); see JSS 60/1, pp. 98, 103, 118 and note
I 0 I, p. 130 and notes 150, 159-160, As a color of cloth we hazarded the
translation 'iridescent', and by extension used the same translation for one of
the six colors of a relic's rays in the same inscription (ibid,); but in the present
context we think the word means nothing more specific than 'shining' or
'brilliant'.
79) !fltJf1~~ (11/25), i.e. triun{~, which Mahli Charp glosses as ;;~ ('colors of a
rainbow').
'
80) m.n.J (II/26), i.e. tt"u, is equivalent to u1u, 'to see.'
81) The full moon day of the sixth month is the day of the great Buddhist festival
of Visakhapilja. As we have seen (note 67), the last of the three statues was
completed in CS 732. Prasert pa Nagara observes that if CS 731 had an intercalary
month, the full moon day of the sixth month of CS 732 would fall on a
Thursday, namely Thursday, May 9, 13 70 (Julian). This is evidently what
happened; and only about three months elapsed between the day the first of
the three new statues was begun (February 15, 1370) and the day the last one
was dedicated (May 9, 1370).

EPlCRAPHlC AND HISTORICAL STUDIES 141
immense beauty and excellence that, if we are to make a comparison, it
was sureJysz like the Mahavaijayantaprasada.s3 Then be bathed the
relic of the Lord in a stream of perfumed water,s4 and did homage to
the relic with many offerings of immense distinction for three entire
.days. When King Dharmikaraja bathed the relic in a golden vessel the
last day,ss the relic performed a miracle, whirling back and forth in the
gold bowl and emitting brilliant rays of ligbt86 of different colors. The
King, filled with faith, invited all the monks to come in and see the
miracle ....... , which was so appropriate, so beautiful,· and so excel-
,Jent, that it caused them immense astonishment.
[II/37-41.] ................... erected a great metal image87
·Of the Buddha .................... in the eleventh month, on the
£rst day of the waning moon ..........••............. sa the Era
................................ in that year .............•
•• ••• f ••• I. I. I I. fl. I I I It I I. I J I. I I •• I I I
82) ~1fl (II/29); see JSS 61/1, p. 95 note 2.
83) mahiibaijayantaprasada (11/29), Skt. mahiivaijayantapriisada, Pali mablivcjayantapiisada,
the name of Indra's palace in the Tavatiipsa heaven (see Malalasekera,
Dictionary of Pali Pro pet Names, London, 19 38, reprinted 1960, Vol.
II, p. 915).
:84) siigandhasisildharli (11/30), for sugandbasrisindhudhiira (Malia Cbaip); Coedes's
reading is a little different, but results in the same translation.
:85) 11HiftU (II/ 32); in Sukhodayan inscriptions the word ftU usually means 'later' )
or ar'terward'; in the present context it seems to ha~e a related but slightly
different meaning, i.e. the last one of a series (of days) which has just been 1
referred to.
~

Fig. 1. The inscription of Wat Pra Yun, obverse.

NOTES
THE WAI KRU CEREMONY OF THE NANG YAI
by
Michael Smithies & Euayporn Kerdchouay
The nang yai or giant shadow play, which we have described
elsewberet, has all but disappeared and with it its elaborate reverence to
teachers ceremonies (wai kru). Unusually these centre around written
texts. The texts are of unknown origin and in their present form date
from the beginning of the Ratanakosin period, but may well have been
reconstituted then from memories of an Ayuthian form. The entertainment
was well known in the Ayuthia period and the earliest reference
to it is in a law dated 1458 when the nang yai is mentioned several times
among the court entertainments.
Nicolas 2 compared the ceremony to the Nandi sequence in Indian
drama and found it analogous to the prayer uttered by the Javanese
dalang before presenting his figures on the screen. Prince Dbani3 admitted
to finding the texts 'very difficult to understand' because of the
archaisms in which they abound and translated some passages of the
three thuay or sections into rhyming quatrains; he drew the attention of
his readers to the Thai article which Nicolas had used as his source and
which Prince Damrong was of the opinion came from the pen of Kromamun
Sthitya or Prince Tosini4.
The ceremony starts5 with the master of the nang yai troupe receiving
from the sponsor of the performance the wai kru offerings, consisting
1) Euayporn Kerdchouay & Michael Smithies, 'The giant shadow play of Thailand',
Orientations (Vol. 4 No.8 August, 1973), pp. 47-50.
2) Rene Nicolas 'Le thell.tre d'ombres au Siam', JSS (July 1927, Vol. XXI part 1),
pp. 37-51.
3) H.H. Prince Dhaninivat, Kromamiim Bidyalabh Bridhyakorn, The Nang (Thai
Culture New Series No.5), Fine Arts Department, (Bangkok, BE 2501 (1958) ),
PP· 16.
tV "- ~ 1 J. o 1 rv 1
4) {l\'11!111liJ11-ltl3J\IlH '1 fl1f'l\'1 6 ; \11111lllU111-l~ U~1UlJHHl"''l
5) The ceremony described here is that performed by the only known surviving
nang yai troupe in 1973 directed by the aging Nai La-or Tongweesit in the temple
of Wat Kan9n in the villa~e of Soi Fa 1
near Pot?ram i!l Rajburi provinc;:Q,

ilefmat~~,
middle:
·rhc
me
the nHI.Jler ;md
dtclnimin.r¢ the ~

TilE WA! KRU CEREMONY OF THE NANG YAI 145
"1 shall pay respects to the mighty king Totsarot, the almighty god
of the earth. I shall pay respects to the king, to whom no one in the
whole country can compare, for he stands guard over all his people, the
slaves, farmers, officials, and he protects even the lords. But before
going to have an audience with the king, I must according to the old
tradition let my wife know of my departure. After this I shall pay respects
to my teachers, from whom I learned all that I hww.
"When my teachers were instructing me or were with me, I seized
the reins of knowledge, for they were all truly skilled. Sometimes they
would gather in a circle and teach the art of dancing. Some of them to
do this would put mortars and pestles in the centre, bend the bows with
their feet, and carry at the same time live charcoals in their mouths.
Some of them would tread on the edges of swords, and carry swinging
lanterns from their mouths. Some would tie their bodies in three places
and stab themselves with swords, and show their magic arts by scattering
their guts over the ground. Then they would quickly start to shoot
their ur.rows, but these would be transformed into soldiers.
''With the very best musicians, I pay respects to the great king.
Then I pay respects to our lord. When he ordered it, then I commanded
that the search be started for the cow's skin to be brought in and I made
it into a shadow figure. I fashioned the skin into the figures of Rania,
and also Sita his wife along with him; and also a strong Lakshana was
made. Before the playstarts today, there must be special offerings. On
my left, I shall pay respects to Rawana and on my right I shall pay
respects to Rama.
"I wish the powerful almighty hermit, whose skills are so famous,
to bless me with bountiful grace; May success, prosperity, happiness,
please come to me in victory.
"I pay respects to the Buddha, who through his compassion for all
living creatures attained Nirvana. And also before starting, I pay respects
to the legendary king Anirutb. I pay respects to the spirits living
in the remote jungles, the spirits of the forests, streams, and of every
valley in the mountains. I pay respects to the gods of the river, of all
the caves and the woods. I pay respects to the teachers who instructed
me and the old masters who are still alive.

146 Michael Smithies & Euayporn Kerdchouay
"I am going to play the story of Rama. I asked my teachers to help
me to draw cleverly and guide the art of cutting. I beg my teachers to
help me to sing superbly, and also the help the dancers to give a marvellous
performance. I want to play the shadow play and to receive the
admiration of the audience.
"Cut down four wooden posts and set them up to raise the screen
on them; the screen will have a red border on its four edges and white.
cloth will be at the centre. Bring on the figure of Siva, surrounded by
stars, on a chariot riding through the sky, where the sun seems to shine
so brightly. And show the pictures of Lanka, the city of the demons,
and also the large powerful city Ayuthia : all this I shall show for you
to see.
"Now is the time to begin and hear the gongs, drums and long drum
which will play for you and make you bappy. Our shadow play is not
bad, and has been played for quite a long time, and no one has ever
been discontented with it.
"I beg the good spirits to protect me from any evil powers and aid
me from any one who criticises my shadow play for being bad, or for
not being beautifully performed. I beg the goodness of Rama and
Lakshana to enter into every figure of the shadow-play.
"After finishing this introduction, I shall mark, check and add
the finishing touches to the figures, in honour of Rama. I shall bring on
the cutout figures, so that all of you can see with your own eyes. I
invite you all to come to see only the shadow of these figures of this
eternal story on the screen.
"My old master taught me the art, my teachers instructed me and
I ask for the protection of our lord to help me not to be defeated and
shamed. If anybody tells me I am beaten by the others, I shallnot
despair or be frightened, for if someone else wins, I shall take lessons
from him. Now, make baste my friends, make up the fire behind the
screen and do not obstruct the light. Now I shall perform the shadow
play for you all to see."7
7) This translation is interpretative in the sense that it tries to make the English
version coherent,

'l'HE WAI KRU CEREMONY OF THE NANG YAI 147
The incantation over, however, the play does not start at once.
There are still some rituals to be gone through. The music stops once
more, the master takes a candle to the two figures remaining, of Narai
and Isuan, and wafts the flame of the candle with his band towards the
· · ankles, arrows and other weapons of the figures, inviting them to conquer
{chaiya) over evil and be protected from the harm which the black powers
from the other troupes could cause. After this be places the two figures
against the bamboo poles, one at either end, and then the performance
proper starts.
These ceremonies are far more elaborate than those preceding a
nang talung performance or for that matter any other theatrical wai kru,
where a simple prayer, said before the shrine to the teachers if the theatre
is in a fixed location, suffices. With the nang yai there is a good deal
of mumbo jumbo which one must assume derives from the period when
performers were also in some respects magicians, as the text indicates.
The written text with all its obscurities (and, as Prince Dbani has mentioned,
its occasionally humorous passages) makes the ceremony unusual
as well as lengthy. Modern audiences are restless during this wai kru,
but performances of the spectacle are now so rare that the initial tedium
is forgiven. Nearly half a century ago Nicolas pointed out that the
medium was too slow for contemporary Siamese and noted that the
nang yai was about to disappear forever. That it has survived at all is
something for which we must be thankful, but its wai kru ceremony,
howsoever unusual, has not helped it gain populari.ty with more sophisticated,
less gullible audiences than those of fifteenth century Ayutbia.

A NOTE ON AP NAM AP THA (aTU:1B1tJ~1)
by
Hans Penthl
Com~enting on jingling sounds and meaningless repetitions in
Siamese expressions, Prince Chand 2 cites, as an example, the well-known
idiom tnuJ1 ~nmh However, I think there is reason to doubt that the
choice of just this example was a lucky one.
Prince Chand does not elaborate on his example, but it seems
evident to what he is referring : the incongruity between the first and the
second parts of the expression, the obvious meaning of which is : "To
wash {oneself) with (or: in the) water, to wash (oneself) in (or: at) the
harbour". Such a meaning is indeed not very satisfying, although
evidently there is some connection, because a harbour has much to do
with water. Still, the expression makes some sense if one does not think
"harbour" in terms of Hamburg or Khlong Ti:ii-why should villagers not
have their bath at a place where their boats are moored ?
The meaning of J1 is "liquid" in a b'road sense; but mostly the
word is used in the restricted sense "water".
If one looks up ~1 in some of the major dictionaries, one comes
across the following entries :
Pallegoix 3
1. Bank of a river
2. Road for going down to the river
3. ~-'~,{1 to go towards the river, towards the water
4. ~11in landing place for boats ·
5. 1-11111
!i '
water o f a stream, o f a nver, . o f a great nver .
6. ~u~1 road towards the river
Plang 4
1. Landing place
2. J1~~ fresh water
3. ~u'l'h landing place
1) Faculty of Social Sciences, Chiang Mai University
2) M.C. Chand. Chirayv Raj ani, A.B. Griswold and Prasert na Nagara, "Epigraphic
and Historical Studies No. 9 and No. 10'', JSS (61.2) 1973 p. 167-182. The
expressiQn is referred to on p. 171.
3) D~J.B. Pallegoix, Dlctionarum linguae Thai, Paris 1854.
4) tJt"l 1'1MtJ1'111111 1
WflU1U,fl'lJJlrll1,-B~flqY, 1'11:il-lfll (!!1'11 1 Wl1tl1) W.fl. 2502.

McFarJamJS
A NOTE ON AP NAM AP THA
1. A place for boats or ships to approach the 1 , d
, "'

150 Hans Penth
It is ·difficult to decide, which of the four meanings of 111
~ I
referred to in tl1Ul-lltJ11l1'11, because all of them make sense:
"To wash (oneself) in the water, at the landing"
"To wash (oneself) on the water, at the ford"
"To wash (oneself) in the water, in the water"
"To wash (oneself) in the water, in the river".
is the one
All four meanings are in keeping with the usual construction of Siamese
idioms which often make use of repetitions or duplications.
But if one considers two similar expressions, viz. 111nJ1 111m11
and iluJl nt.nl\ which are commonly understood to mean "to fall into
the water" and "to drink water", then it appears that vi1 either is a
11
synonym to \.11 or h as a more spec1 'fi c meanmg . t h an tn,
t'
r.e.
• Ul'il\11 g "' " f resh
(not salty) water", because one does not drink salt water, neither from
1,'
I
the ocean nor from a well. 'il1UU1 El1Ul'11 therefore seems to have the
meaning of "to wash '(oneself) in (fresh) water", or "to have a (fresh
water) bath".
It is perhaps possible to go one step further in the interpretation
of the expression. In some of the Northern Thai dialects, such as Yuan
or Dioil o, 1~ 1 has the meaning of "river" and some of the above mentioned
quotations indicate the same meaning. In classical Yuan, ,j,
also has sometimes the meaning "river". If it is true that these dialects
and quotations represent a more ancient state of language, then the
expression v11JJ1 mu~1 must originally have meant ~·to wash (oneself)
in the water, in (of) the river", or perhaps "to wash (oneself) in the
river, in the river'\ i.e. "to take a bath in the river".- If one takes into
account that the countryfolks,. having no bathroom, still take their bath
in the river-at a shallow place, from where they also carry the water of
the river to their houses for consumption, usually not far from their boats
that mostly lie half on the sand and half in tbe water-then these latter
interpretations seem even more likely, and the other meanings of ~, may
be secondary derivations.
rnuJ1 v1u~1 thus contains either a repetition (J1 = vh) or first a
word with a more general meaning (J1) and then a word with a more
specific meaning (~1). Whatever the precise original meaning, at its
· time and place, the expression does not seem to have been a meaningless
repetition.
10) Jos. Esquirol ~tO~~~· WiJlil;ltte~ Essai de qictionnfjire Dioi Franqais, HongkOOI}
J908, ' .

REVIEW ARTICLES
A PERSIAN MISSION TO SIAM IN THE REIGN. OF KING NAR
'b M I d AI
1 n . U)ammu lbrahim, The Ship of Sulaiman, Translated from the
~ers1~n by John O'Kane (Persian Heritage Series, No. 11; London:
out edge & Kcgan Paul, and New York: Columbia University Press
1972). X, 250 pp. '
Some years ago, intrigued by comments I had made about the
origins of the Bunnag family, one of my students suggested she might
study the Persian language and investigate Thai relations with Persia in
the seventeenth century. My response must have carried with it a hint
of ridicule, for she never mentioned the subject again. 1 am now embarrassed
to have to tell her that the study of Persian would have repaid
her efforts, for John O'Kane has brought to light a previously-unsuspected,
major source for the history of Siam with his translation of The Ship of
Su/aiman, published in the impressive series of English, French, and
Italian translations in the "Persian Heritage Series" edited by Ehsan
Yar-Shater of Columbia University.
The Safina'i Sulaimani was written by ibn Mu~ammad Ibrahim,
secretary of a mission sent by Shah Sulaiman the Safavid (1666-94) to
King Narai in 1685. The work must have been written shortly after the
mission's return to Persia in May, 1688. O'Kane says virtually nothing
about the original manuscript bearing on its provenance, save that "it
bas been sitting in the British Museum for many years now." In a
fourteen-page Translator's Preface be presents the work primarily as an
example of Persian literature. Although written as an official report, it
is a work of considerable imagination, contrived and stylized, and littered
with cliche. This Preface succeeds remarkably well at conveying to the
reader some understanding of a style that might easily be taken as
eccentric, but which in fact is fairly typical of the official style of a
cultivated man of the author's day.
The work is divided into four main parts or "jewels," preceded by
an introduction in which the author praises God and his ruler and outlines
the background to the mission. Here he explains tha: King Narai se~t a
certain l;Hi:ji Salim Mazandarani as an envoy to Iran m 1682, to which
the 1685 mission was the Persian response.
Part I, the "First Jewel," describes the early portion of the mission's
journey, from Bandar 'Abbas on the Persian Gulf on27 June 1685 through

152 REVIEW ARTICLES
their short stay in India. Of some interest here are the author's comments
on his contacts with Europeans in India.
Part II, the "Second Jewel," begins with the mission's departure
from India on 16 September 1685. The mission then traversed the Bay
of Bengal to Siamese Tenasserim, where they landed at Mergui and
travelled by way of Tenasserim town, Jalang (in the headwaters of the
Tenasserim River?), Paj Puri (Phetburi), Suhan (Suphanburi ?), and
Shahr Nav (Ayudhya) to Lubii (Lopburi), where the mission was received
by King Narai. Tbe mission was entertained in Lopburi for some time,
hunting elephant and tiger, and then followed the king back to Ayudhya.
Remaining quite a considerable space of time there, the envoys finally
took their leave of the king in formal audience and sailed for their return
home on 18 January 1687.
Part III, the "Third Jewel," is an extremely interesting attempt at
"recording some facts about the local conditions." In particular, the
author recounts what had been related to him as recent Siamese history.
He gives a brief account of "The war between Siam. and Paigii [Pegu],"
and writes at some length about the role of the Iranian community in
Siam in the seventeenth century. He ascribes to them a major role in
bringing King Narai to the throne on a date he gives equivalent to 17
October 1657.1 Two Persians are mentioned as having held the office
of"prime minister" subsequently filled by Constantine Phaulkon: 'Abdu'r­
Razzaq of Gilan and Aqa Mul}ammad Astarabadi. The latter, long in
favor with King Narai, introduced into the court an Iranian Guard of
200 men apparently similar to the Japanese Guard of Ekatbotsarot's
reign and the French of 1688. After discussing briefly the rise of
Phaulkon, he moves through a long series of desultory comments about
life in Siam, and particularly on Buddhist religious belief and practice,
the legal system, the character and religious faith of King Narai,
marriage, debt bondage, and various festivals. He includes nearly four
pages on the Macassarese and their revolt of 1686, and has an even
longer section on court administ~ative procedure, the income and
expenses of the Crown, and trade in various commodities.
Part IV, the "Fourth Jewel," bas very little to do with Siam or the
Iranian mission. It is a miscellaneous collection of information on winds
1) The dates given by the Royal c'lutograph Chronicle of Ayudhya for Narai's
"victory over his enemies" and invitation to become king are, respectively,
equivalent to 29 October and 4 November I 657,

ttnd tides, various forms of animal life, notes on Ceylon At· h h
A d d N' b ' Je • t e
n. ~~an an tco ar Islan~s, Spanish Manila, Japan and Dutch
act!Vlttes there, Pegu, and Chma The last portion of th' ·
. d ·r .
h
1
. . , · . 1s sectwn,
owevet, etm s t 1e rmsston s return JOurney from Siam beg' · · h
· b · _ ' , mmng wrt
th~tr. em ~rcatt~n aboa~d a Sura t vessel on 21 December 1686. The
mtsswn sailed vta Patam and Malacca to Cochin, and eventually returned
to Bandar 'Abbas on 14 May 1688.
A short final section entitled "The Case of Abti'l-Hasan and the
Fall of f:laidarabad" briefly recounts "The latest news fr~m India"
The ~u?ience for ~hich The Ship of Sulaiman was intended may
have read tt 111 several dtfferent ways. Although formally written as an
official report of the mission, it is little more useful in that regard than
John Crawfurd's Journal of an Embassy from the Governoi·-General of
India to the Courts of Siam and Cochin China, for the author's account of
official business takes second place to his description of unfamiliar
peoples and places. His account is written more as an expression and
affirmation of his own society's Islamic religious beliefs and values.
Most of all, however, it must have been read for its style, for its
inventive metaphor,' for its learned borrowings from Islamic, Persian,
and Indian literature, and for its incessant cleverness. It is not, perhaps,
a style with which most English readers will at first be comfortable, but
as one proceeds through the book it assumes a weight and form that
bring its author alive.
The importance of The Ship of Sulaiman to those interested in Thai
history is considerable. Its evidence bears on three main themes: the
foreign policy of King Narai, the Persian community in Siam, and the
rise and fortunes of the Bunnag family in the seveqteenth century.
The connection with Persia is treated only in passing in the
conventional accounts of King Narai's reign, and much of its significance
often is lost in general references to "the Moors." The Ship of Sulaiman
expands upon, and renders more concrete, vague references in such
accounts as that of Pere de Beze, which mentions Pbaulkon's supervision
of a mission to Persia at some unspecified date, 2 which on the evidence
of the Persian account must have taken place in 1682. Even cursory
examination of the history of the Persian mission of 1685-87 suggests
that it might be useful to consider Narai's foreign policy within an inter-
2) E. W. Hutchinson, 1688 Revolution in Siam: The Memo£r of Father de Bclze, s.j.
(Hong Kong, 1968), pp. 11-12.

i54
national framework much broader than the Thai-French-Dutch-English
pattern within which it usually is viewed.
MuJ:lammad Ibrahim's frequent references to the Persian community
in old Siam are a real eye-opener in many ways. He mentions the
presence of Persians wherever he went in Siam, beginning with high
public officials in the Tenasserim province, Phetburi, and Suphanburi,
and including numerous merchants and officials including the highest
officials in the kingdom. He explains that ''From the time merchants
first arrived until just before the present king came to power, about
thirty Iranians had settled in Siam due to the great profits to be made in
trade" (p. 94), and later notes that 200 Iranians were recruited in India
for service in the royal bodyguard. The community subsequently was
racked with dissension and lost permanently its grip on public affairs
when Phaulkon succeeded to the office of prime minister previously held
by three successive Iranians. The significance of Mul;ammad Ibrahim's
numerous references to the Iranian community in Siam is that they
enable one to begin to see better, in ways not previously possible; some
of the details of Ayudhya's social and economic structure, particularly
as that structure incorporated immigrant communities. His account is
the first we have had from within any Muslim community of Ayudhya,
and is of assistance not least in enabling us to see how Dutch and
English traders of the time were treated like other Asian traders.
Finally, material contained in The Ship of Sulaiman provides
important information that goes a long way towards solving the mystery
of the origins and early history of the Bunnag family, a noble family
powerful in the affairs of the kingdom of Siam for more than three
ce.nturies,3 At the same time, it provides startling confirmation of the
validity of some of the historical work of the much-maligned K. S. R.
Kulap.4
Of the. Persians specifically mentioned by Mu~ammad Ibrahim,
there are the following individuals:
( 1) J;Iaji Salim Mazandrani, Siamese king's envoy to Persia ( 1682),
pp.2~ 4~46, 53,104-5
3) See O.K. Wyatt; "Family Politics in Nineteenth Century Thailand," Journal of
Southeast Asian History IX: 2 (September 1968), esp. pp. 211-12, 214.
4) See Craig J. Reynolds, "The Case of K.S.R. Kulap : A Challenge to' Royal
Historical Writing in Late Nineteenth Century Thailand" Journal of th.e Siam
Society 61 : 2 (July 1973), pp. 63-90.

(3)
(4)
(5)
(6)
fll!:VlEW ARTICLES
(unnamed), former governor of Tenasserim or Mergui (?), p. 46
Mu\mmmad ~adiq, son of (2), pp, 46-47
Sayyid Mazandarani, governor of Phetburi, p. 50
~ajah Chelebi, "from among the people of Rum" (i.e., Ana to­
Ita), rajah of Suphanburi, pp. 50-51
Khwaja J;Iasan 'Ali, from Khurasan, "presently holds the
held and as such is
the head of the Iranian community in Siam," pp. 55, 69, 74-75,
144 (?)
ministerial post which Aqa Mu~ammad
155
(7) A~ a. Mul.1ammad Astarabadi, [see quotation above under (6)]:
ongmally from Astarabad, settled in Siam to trade, became
minister (ca. 1660 ?), fell out of favor; "has been dead for a
while now" (p. 101); Pbaulkon was hired when he was still in
office (p. 103); cf. pp. 55, 58, 59, 77, 98, 100-103, 126, 151,218
(8) 'Abdu'r-Razzaq, "whose family is from Gilan," made prime
minister by King Narai in 1657, continued in office several
years, then was imprisoned and died; pp. 97-98
(9) Chu Chi, and (10) ChiT Kia, sons of (8), sent into exile; pp.
101-102
(11) (unnamed) prime minister, originally from Shush tar, lineage
traced to the MulHi I;Iasan 'Ali of Shush tar, assassinated, shortly
after appointment as premier; pp. 102-103
( 12) Sayyid Dardmandi, poet from Khurasan, commissioned by
Narai to present a written summary of the Sbahnama; p. 127.
The conventional accounts of Bunnag genealogy mention none of these
individuals.s The only detailed information on Bunnag genealogy in
this period is provided in a rare book compiled by K.S.R. Kulap in the
early years of the current century.6 On the basis of this, the following
genealogical chart may be constructed :
5. Vl1ttJ1'ilW1:i1'll~llllli, 'ilfilfJJWfi!WV'J::fJJJ'NflntJJ.J,till?'fl (Vilthlfll, 2482)j L'illWn:tl1
~w1m;~~
,
flntltfWfJHJtw ( ci'1~:1JIYfll111l1lJ1~!l'nt~
t ; r I.SI
tl1fl 3; l'J'H:um, 2473).
0 IV tf' 1::~'
6. n.fi.1. nm11u, JJ11?JJ'/JJJ7Plf111Jfiti'Nfl lti3J 1 17fi'Jlffl??llf'Nfftn1::~ti~U11HlneJnviW
1 7 ttl
7uur/u~Ut1CJ?JJ (m::mfll, 'l'.l'l. fftnlJU~ZLiln, 1.1'1. 124, Vl.l'l. 2448).

156
EARLY ANCESTORS OF THE BUNNAG FAMILY
A. Sheik Ahmad
( 1543-1631)
arrived Ayudhya 1602,
v
acting Phraya Chula,
acting Pbrakhlang,
Samuhanaiyok,
retired in 1630
I
Merchant family of
Ma-ngon Muslims,
of Mtiang Kuni
I
I
B. Mu~ammad Said
C. chaophraya Aphairacha (Chtin) D. Aka Muhammad
(? 1600-1670) acting phraya
Chula 1624-30 under title phraya
Worachetphakdi; Samubanaiyok
fr~m 1630
E. chaophraya Chamnanpbakdi
(Sombun, 1630-
c. 1683); palace official
under Narai; Samuhanaiyok
1670-1683
F. chaoplzraya Si Chaiban- . G.
narong (Yi); phra Anurakracha
in Narai's
reign; ca. 1689 made
'C!zaoplzraya and governor
of Tenasserim; rebelled
phraya SI Naowarat of Cen t:ral
Phrakhlang Department (lcrorn
thii klang) in reign of Narai
I
I v
phraya Chula: (F'.aeo)
in reign of Narai

REVIEW ARTICLES
151
!he only firm correspondence between the list. of individuals mentioned
m The Ship of Sulaim(m and the genealogy provided by K.S.R. Kulap is
between the former's· (7) and the latter's (D)-Aqa Muhamm d ( h' 1
K 1- 11 ~ . a w 1c1
~ ap spe s as t:~1fl1lJ:JH:J11lJI'l). Several other tentative identifications
might also be put forward :
(2) the former governor of Mergui or Tenasserim may be Kulap's
~), although we might expect that individual's descent from
Aqa Mul)ammad would have been mentioned;
(6) apparently refers to the position of phraya Chularatehamontri
head of the Right-hand Department of the Phrakhlang (kro~
tha klzwa), a post consistently held by Bunnags in the nineteenth
century. This might be Kulap's (G); and
(8) might be identified with Kulap's (C), although the latter's dates
are suspicious.
Even if only the identification of Aqa Mu~ammad holds, this is sufficient
cause for us to take most seriously the enormous quantity of genealogical
and historical information published around the turn of the century by
K.S.R. Kulap which, among other things, includes extensive discussion·
of Chinese commercial families in Ayudhya early in the eighteenth
century.
There are many small points on which O'Kane's translation of The
Ship of Sulaiman might be criticized. Notes on Siamese aspects of the
book are wholly inadequate, especially in the failure to id~ntify relatively
simple toponyms and Thai words (e.g., mahalak lJl1Hlllln, ~alah Iakiin
fl1f11f10'IJU Kurum Kan nnJm1, Kawam m1lJ, Yam Pra ,~mm~). The
v , ' .
index is incomplete : it lists, for example, only four of the mne or ten
references to Aqa Mul1ammad. And a fuller account of the origins and
provenance of the British Museum manuscript would have been apprecia.
ted. Thes~. are, however, only minor faults.
The Ship of Sulaiman deserves to be included amon~ the m~st
important· primary sources for the history of Siam in the re1gn of Kmg
Narai. It is particularly welcome because it sbo~ld serve to open up
new avenues of inquiry that have previously been neglected.
Carn(!ll Uni'f)ersity
/)avid K. W)l(ltt

158 REVIEW ARTICLES
Robert B. Jones, Thai Titles and Ranks Including a Translation of Traditions
of Royal Lineage in Siam by King Chulalongkorn (Data Paper:
Number 81, Southeast Asia Program, Department of Asian Studies,
Cornell University, Ithaca, New York, June 1971 ), ix, 147 pp.
The title of the present Data Paper is certain to excite the interest
of historians of Southeast Asia, for, as Prof. Jones remarks in his
Introduction, "A thorough description of the elite hierarchies would
seem to be a necessity for any comprehensive understanding of the social
and political institutions of a nation ... but as yet no very complete
understanding ... has been forthcoming ... " (p. 1). As part of the reason
for this lack of knowledge, Prof. Jones mentions that "Thai sources of
information have not been easy to find" (p. 1).
Now the problems posed in Southeast Asian studies by the lack
of sources are well known, but it seems to me that before definitely
attributing gaps in our knowledge to such lack, scholars should first do
everything possible to extract information from the sources which are
known. In the case of Thai ranks and titles we have a voluminous raw
source in the 1805 compilation of Thai laws for which, unfortunately,
"The best discussion has been that of Wales" (p. 1 ), who too often
resorted to speculation and a priori assumptions rather than clear analysis
of his sources.
As it is presented, the work under consideration here could lead
one to expect something going beyond the work of Wales and providing
at least a preliminary treatment of the problems involved in study of
the titles contained in the laws, chronicles and inscriptions; and readers
are therefore warned not to expect a new study of Thai ranks and titles
complementing and improving on Wales' Ancient Siamese Government and
Administration. What Prof. Jones' book provides, and what would have
been a better title is, "Text and Trm1slation of 'Traditions of Royal
Lineage in Siam by King Chulalongkorn' Including Some Comments on
Thai Titles and Ranks". It touches only lightly on some of the stickier
problems in the history of Thai titles and administration, such as the
idea that, "the Palatine Law of King Trailokkanat was derived largely
from the Khmer system" (p. 2), and that "most of the Khmer titles for
the mandarinate had been borrowed and adjusted until they were

REVlE\V ARTlCLES
operating in the same relative hierarchy in Thailand as they did in
Cambodia" (p. 3).
This question of Khmer influence is a subject which 1 particularly
wish to discuss, but first a few remarks need to be made about King
Cbulalongkorn's essay, composed in 1878.
The essay, which forms the major portion of Prof. Jones' book, is
conc.erned with Thai royal titles as they were used in the 19th century,
and tts purpose, as Prof. Jones suggests (p. 5) was clearly, it seems to
me, related to the shift of power from nobility to royalty and the Front
Palace Incident of 1874. It should perhaps also be related to the birth
in 1878 of King Cllulalongkorn's first cawfda son, Vajirunhis, whom
according to Prince Chula Chakrabongse, he intended to make his heir in
spite of the existence of an uparajal (Jones' ?uparaad).
As tbe reader will observe, most of the essay is devoted to the
exaltation of dwjtui princes and the setting up of hierarchies among
them and other royal relatives which are nowhere justified in the
traditional law texts and in many cases are specifically tailored for the
living relatives of King Chulalongkorn. As a result King Chulalongkorn's
cousin and uparaja, by birth belonged in a category far down the list,
obviously too low to be entitled to the position into which he had been
thrust at the insistence of King Chulalongkorn's regent.
Although the 19th-century system had been much modified, King
Chulalongkorn referred nevertheless to the Pa/atz'ne Law as authority,
but treated its provisions in an interesting way, by saying that "In that
law caw (royalty) are divided into four ranks" ( p. 11 ). As Prof. Jones'
note 3 makes clear, the law lists five ranks, and the one King Chulalongkorn
omitted was the second, that of uparaja, reflecting, I should say,
his preoccupations with contemporary conflicts among members of the
royal family.
Transcription: Unless otherwise specified} ~hall follow, as nearly as the
limitations of typesetting permit, the transcrtpttons used by Prof. Jones, except
for well-known names. .. h' ..
1) This is based 00 Prince Chula Chakrabongse's .s~atement that Vawun ts was
created Crown Prince .•• an entirely new posttton and an unprecedented step
seeing that the Uparaja was still alive ••• " (Lords~~ Life, P· 221-2), altho~g.h
the official proclamation to this effect only came tn 1886 after the UparaJa s
death.
159

160 REVIEW AU'l'ICLES
King Chulalongkorn cited the Palatine Law further as "Evidence
of the antiquity of the ranks of the royal family" (p. 11 ), but; with the
exception of uparaja which be chose to ignore, none of the four royal
titles in question are found anywhere else in the laws or chronicles and
thus were probably not commonly used by Thai royalty. King Chulalongkorn
was of course aware of this and offered a partial explanation in
noting that "In time the rank of s~mi'M n':J:; phraphUdthacaw completely
disappeared" because "kings seldom had a supreme queen with rank
higher than the others" (p. 17).
An alternative explanation is that the Palatine Law, at whatever
date it was first composed, 2 represented, like King Chulalongkorn's own
essay, the situation of one particular royal family rather than a general
statement about the ranking of royal children.
Another example of King Chulalongkorn's attempt to reconcile
contemporary practice with confusing statements in the laws is his
discussion of caw!aa. The statement that, ''According to the Palatine
Law there were only two kinds of dwfaa" (p. 15) is not quite accurate,
for nowhere in the Palatine Law is the t.erm c&wfaa mentioned. In fact,
in the whole corpus of laws dated before the reign of King Rama I, I
have found caw!aa only once, used for King Naresuon in the Law on
Treason, article 68, IV, p. 156.
As Prof. Jones states in his Introduction (p. 3), it is generally
believed that c!Jwfiia was brought into Siam from Burma, or at least
from the Burmese Shan states, since the term itself is Thai rather than
Burmese; but King Chulalongkorn's remarks on the shift in meaning of
the title (p. 15), and Prof. Jones' comment on the same subject (p. 3),
are speculation, there being no precise evidence on the matter. King
Chulalongkorn's problem was to reconcile the contemporary fact of
2) References to the law texts are from the 5-volume set published by llfwru saphii,
copied from tbe Lingat edition, and thus preserving the original orthography.
The citations will be by volume (roman numerals) and page. The Palatine Law,
I. 69-159, is dated 720, which if cula era, would mean 1358 A.D. Quaritch
Wales, Anc1ent SiamPse Government and Admmistratirm, pp. 19, 22, following
Prince Damrong, said the date should be 1458, or 8 20 cula. David Wyatt, "The
Thai 'Kata Mandiarapala' and Malacca", JSS LV (2), July 1967, pp. 279-286,
identifie~ this date as Clllammii era which would make it equivalent to 1468
A.D.

REVIEW ARTICLES 161
c&wfaa being the highest rank for royal children, a belief that the title
had originally meant a ruler or at least a provincial viceroy, and the
statement of the Palatine Law implying that only princes of the third and
fourth ranks were sent out to govern provinces and were thereby cawfaa,
The reader should be a ware that His Majesty's remarks are of unquestionable
accuracy only in so far as they concern the 19th century situation
and that the historical parts of sections 9-12 are speculative and may or
may not be true.
In section 20 (p. 23) the details on krom ranks and dignity of cawf a a
are taken from the Law of the Civil Hierarci1y which, we should note,
although dating, in the conventional view, from the same reign as the
Palatine Law,3 gives quite a different picture of royal ranks, and again
King Chulalongkorn has interpolated details from 19th-century actuality.
Thus, for example, the law says nothing about cliwf4a or phra? mJdw.
but rather calls the king's highest ranking younger brother phra? anuchathirat
instead of phrac&w ~~~~'IJjaathaacawfaa, and does not indicate that
the differences in rank among brothers, sons and grandsons corresponded
to the 19th-century use of caw!aa and phra? o'IJcaw.
The intention of the text as a description of the royal family at a
specific time comes through clearly in the remaining sections devoted to
the ranking of its members (up top. 67), particularly with respect to some
of the lower ranks, apparently devised for the childern of specific
individuals. We may note with interest that King Chulalongkorn's
Prince of the Front Palace, in this system, would have been merely a
worawo'l)thiJa, fourth class (section 58, p. 57), and thus only in the 14th
rank of all phra? o'l)c&w, far below the seven levels of c&w!da.
In the remainder of the essay devoted to the krom ranks of. princes,
order of precedence, and ranks of women, the reader should. still be
aware that its value is as a description of 19th century practice, and
3) Tha date in the preamble of this law is 1298, which would no.rmally be construed
as saka era, equivalent to 1376 A.D. However, there ts certamly an
error, for the animal yeads off by 6 years. Quaritch Wales, op. ctt., PP· 22,
34, followed Prince oamrong in assuming the date should be one equal to A.D.
1454 in the reign of King Trailokkanat. Phipat Sukbatbit, in "sakaraat curamal).i",
Silpakqn 6 (5), Jan. 1963, pp .. 47-57, p. 56. said the date inten.ded must
have been 1278, which he assumed to be in the cult:i.mMJi era, thus eqmvalent to
1466 A.D.

162 REVIEW ARTICLES
that the historical details are largely speculative and need to be checked
against the laws and chronicles. The system of krom ranks, for example,
is nowhere set out in the old laws and the history of its development is
not at all clear.
In addition to text and translation of King Chulalongkorn's essay,
Prof. Jones' volume also includes a section on "Development of Royal
Titles" and sections on other types of titles, such as "nobility", which
contain historical remarks and comments on the relationships between
Thai titles and those of neighboring countries, chiefly Cambodia. It is
on these sections that I wish to introduce several observations.
For the history of the titles Prof. Jones notes his indebtedness to
Prince.Damrong who consecrated "a few all too brief statements" to the
subject (p. 115). In fact the brief statements are largely speculative and
do not always fit the evidence of available documents. For instance,
that "the first use of cawfau in Thailand comes in the middle of the
sixteenth century when ... King Bayinnaung of Burma established
Thammaraja as King of Siam with the Shan title of c&wfaa" (pp. 115-116),
is not borne out by the chronicles, in which Thammaraja is given titles
of traditional Thai type. Neither are there any laws of his reign in
which the title cawfaa might be found, and the first use seems to be that
which I cited above, for King Naresuon. Perhaps Prince Damrong was
influenced by a Burmese source, but that would merely reflect Burmese
usage rather than titles actually used in Ayutthaya. Of course, the
reigns of Thammaraja and Naresuon are the most likely periods to look
for Burmese influences, but since cllwjaa is a Shan, that is Thai, title, it
seems more likely that it had always been known to the Thai of Siam
even if it has not been preserved in extant texts and inscriptions.
One would also like to see some specific references for the statements
that King Thai sa "establ is bed that children of caw fda princesses
should also bear that same title ~y vtrtue of their mother's rank", thereby
setting aside the rule of declining descent (p. 116), and that the title
of phra ? or,~caw was established by King Petracba (p. 116), since sucb
information is not to be found in the chronicles.
As for m?>mcaw being introduced by King Barommokot and m~mraadchawov
by King Mongkut, both are listed in the Law of the Civil Hierarchy

REVIEW ARTICLES 163
dated 1298 (1376), but currently attributed to King Trailokkanat (1448-
1488)4. Of course, since the extant edition of the laws dates only from
1805, m:>mctm could still have been introduced by King Barommokot, in
which case we have evidence for a late interpolation into the law; and
since in the law m5mrlladch&wO?J is mixed in with the mahlitlek, it may have
been an old title to which King Mongkut gave a new function.
Concerning the relationship with Khmer titles and practices, which
is the subject of my remaining remarks, some introductory comment is
necessary.
The conventional view for some time has been that the massive
Khmer borrowings in Thai administrative and royal vocabulary result
from an influx of Cambodian scholars and brahmans to Ayutthaya following
the final conquest of Angkor by the Thai in 1431, the date given
in the hlvmi prasro'(h (Luang Praso't) chronicle. The Khmer influences
reaching Ayutthaya at that time were then formalized a score or so of
years later in the adtninistrative reforms of King Trailokkanat.
In the days when Prince Damrong was devoting his attention to
the chronicles this explanation seemed to account for most of the facts,
but such is no longer the case. Attention has been drawn in recent years
to certain pieces of evidence showing that from pre-Angkorean times
there were localities on territory which later formed the core of the
Ayutthayan kingdom, using Khmer, and apparently independent of any
polity in what was to be the Angkor Empire.s
This situation continued in certain places into Angkorean times as
is proven by the inscription on the Buddha ofGrahi and the 1167 inscription
from Nakbon Sawan.6
Together with this long tradition of the local use of Khmer, parts
of the Menam basin came under the direct control of Angkor-Lopbburi
under Suryavarman I ( 1006-1050), and probably the lower Menam basin
and contiguous territory under Jayavarman VII (1181-1220). 7
4) See note 3 above ·
5) G. Coedes, "Nouvelles Donnees Epigraphiques sur l'Histoire de l'Indochine
Centrale", Journal Asiatique 246 (2) 19 58, pp. 125-142, see 127-128.
6) Ibid; and Recueil des Inscriptions du Siam, deuxieme partie, pp. 29-31.
7) Coedes, Etats H.indouises d'Indochine et d'lnda11esie, 1964, pp. 252-3, 314, 320·
321; and Recueil des Inscriptions du Siam, deuxieme partie, PP· 21-31.

164 111•:\'IE\V AI\TIC!.EH
Even more interesting is that the early kingdom of Ayutthnyn
reserved an important place for the Khmer language which appeurs in
the mujority of original Ayutthayan documents preserved from before
the 17th century.s
The logic imposed by these pieces of evidence is that Khmer
innuence in Ayutthayan language and administration does not have to
be accounted for by borrowing from Angkor or the pre-Angkorean
states of Cambodia proper, but may be due to a long, independent, local
Khmer tradition; and that even if due to direct Angkorean influence the
process was not necessarily contingent on a Thai conquest of Angkor in
1431 or at any other date, but could have resulted rather from the
extension of Angkorean power into the Menam basin in the Il-13th
centuries (It is interesting to note that recent writers on the subject who
accept that King Trailokkanat instituted important reforms in the
1450's-1460's, and that these reforms were Khmer inspired, also accept
Prof. O.W. Wolters• new reconstructions which place the final conquest
of Angkor in 1389, nearly u hatf.century earlier than the hitherto accep.
ted date, and yet fail to discuss whether the longer period between
presumed initial cultural impact and resultant reforms is consonant with
received views on King Trailokkanat's reforms or should force revision
of our ideas about them. This is the sort of thing I bad in mind when
I introduced the term" scholastic involution" into an earlier review).9
8) Michael Vickery, "The Khmer Inscriptions of Tenasserim: a Reinterpretation",
JSS 61 (! ), Jan. 1973. Ayutthayan inscriptions of this period are extremely
rare. One which seems to have gone unnoticed is on the pedestal of a bodhisatva
image currently believed to be one of a set cast by King Trnllokkanat in I 451:1.
See smlapakam m!lulay ayutlwyaa, published for National Children's Day, 2514,
p 65 and fig. 25. The inscription, which is not visible in the photograph,
reads, in graphic translitteration, anakfil brahm r.si, "he/the one/a persc>n, as/
who is a brabma r.ishi".
9) 0. Wolters, "The Khmer King at Basan ( 13 71-3) and the Restoration of the
Cambodian Chronology During the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Centuries", Asia
Major I 2, 1 (1966), pp. 44-89.
Akin Rabibhadana, The Organization o.f Thai Socifty in the Early Banl!kok Period
1782-1873, Data Paper 74, Southeast Asia Program, Cornell University, July
1969. see pp. 21. 27, n. 60, 190.
David K. Wyatt, "The Abridged Royal Chronicle of Ayudhya of Prince Paramanuchitchinorot",
JSS 61 (I), Jan. 1973, pp. 25-50. See pp. 33, n. 10; 34, n.
17; and Wyatt, op. cit, note 2, above.
Jones, n. 2.
Hall, A History of Southeast Asia, pp. 130, 178-80, seems both to accept Wolters'
view and yet maintain the date 1431, but does not repeat the suggestion
that the reforms of Trailokkanat were a result.

Ri;:VIEW ARTICLES 165
In addition to the foregoing theoretical considerations of Khmer
influenc? in Ayutthaya, a few pertinent facts relating to the possible
connectiOn between the Ayutthayan and Angkorean administrative
systems require emphasis. As Prof. Jones noted (p. 115), the Angkorean
administration and its titles have been insufficiently studied. In fact,
we know next to nothing about Angkorean administration, not even
having lists of titles comparable to the Thai laws of civil, military and
provincial hierarchies. 9 a
However, any student reasonably familiar with Ayutthayan titles
and who has even casually leafed through the several volumes of
Inscriptions du Cambodge and Coedes' other epigraphic studies should
have been struck by the almost complete absence of similar titles in the
two areas. Certain Angkorean royal titles were apparently adopted in
Ayutthaya, but scholars have generally ignored them and they have not
figured in any treatment of the subject.IO Mention of vra~ kralahom is
found in Angkorean inscriptions, but its meaning is not certain.! I The
famous oath inscriptions of Suryavarman I contain long lists of tamrvac
(Thai damruot), whose function, aside from being somehow territorial,
has not been determined.I2 Some Sanskrit titles such as purohita, guru,
and senapati, are found both at Angkor and Ayuttbaya, but Sanskrit
titles occur all over Southeast Asia as well as in India, and a case may be
made for borrowing from one specific place to another only if the title
is both identical and applied to the same function. The Khmer royal
and sacred title, kamraten, which is hidden away in an odd place in the
Ayutthayan laws,13 is also found in Sukhothai inscription no. 4, in the
Grabi inscription, and in tl1e 1167 inscription from Nakbon Sawan, and
9a) At the present time the best compilation of information, from inscriptions and
secondary sources, relating to Angkorean administration and titles is, Sachchidanand
Sahai, Les Institutions Politiques et l'01·ganisation Administrative du
Cam hodge Ancien Wl-XI II siecles), where the reader familiar with Thai titles can
easily see the great difference between the latter and Angkorean terminology.
10) These titles are lri .~r7.ndra and jayavarmmadeva. See Vickery, "The Khmer
Inscriptions of Tenasserim ... ", p. 69 and p. 57, n. 25.
II) Coe.des variously treats the term as "l'aire du homa", "salle de l'oblation",
''l'aire des oblations", and ''nom de fonction". G. Coedes et P. Dupont, ... Les
Steles de Sdok Kak Thorn, Phnom Sandak et Pral] Vihilr", l:IEFEO 43 (1943-46)
pp. 56-1 54, see pp. 1 07, n. 1; 118, n. 4; 144, n. I; G. Coedes, "Stele du Vat
Pnih That de Tu'k cba", 1nscriptions du Cambodge V, pp. 222-228, see pp. 225,
228.; and G. Coedes, ••Stele de Saq~rtn", IC IV, pp. 175-205. seep: 197:
12) George Coedes, "Etudes Cambodgiennes IX Le Serment de.s F~~ctton.na~res de
Suryavarman r. BEFEO 13 (6), 1913, pp. ll-.17; and Coedes, Inscnpt•on du
Gopura Oriental du Phi'meanakas", btscriptions du Camhodge Ill, pp. 205-214.
13) Laws r. 249. Six relatively low-ranking (sakdina 600) officials in the Registrar's
Department had the title kzuit('taen (graphic)

166 R!i:VIEW ARTICLES
is thus evidence for my contention that Khmer influence in Ayutthaya
was independent of any presumed invasion and conquest of Angkor.
Apart from these few examples and possibly others which may
appear when a list of Angkorean titles is eventually compiled, the great
mass of the latter consists of terms which have no counterpart at all in
Ayutthaya.
As a provisional conclusion we must admit that at the present time
nothing may be said about Angkorean influence on the Ayutthayan
administrative system at any time, pre- or post-Trailokkanat, but that
preliminary observation of the material tends to indicate that very few
titles were borrowed and that it is certainly mistaken to state that, "By
this time [Trailokkanat] most of the titles of the Khmer mandarinate
were in use in Thailand ... " (p. I 15 ).
It is likewise very risky to use post-Angkorean Cambodian evidence,
as Prof. Jones did, to show Cambodian influence at Ayutthaya on the
grounds that in "the latter part of the nineteenth century the Thai and
Cambodian systems are very similar" and "Khmer influence on tbe Thai
system thus seems clear". (pp. 2-3).
In fact, there is a nearly complete break in contemporary Cambodian
source material between mid-14th century, the time of the last
Angkorean inscriptions, and the 16th century when the so-called Modern
Inscriptions of Angkor and a few other· scattered texts begin to appear.
These consist of short inscriptions at Angkor Vat in 1546 and 1564, then
inscriptions at Angkor Vat and in Kompong Cham in 1566, some 30-odd
inscriptions, a few of considerable length, at Angkor Vat dated from the
end of the 16th century to 1747, plus a dozen or so inscriptions in other
parts of the coun try.J4 Other documents relevant for the study of Cambodian
titles and administration are law texts, some apparently dating
from the 17th century, and chronicles written in the 18th and 19th
centuries.
14) G. Coedes, "Deux bas-reliefs tardifs d' Angkor Vat", JournaMsiatique 1962,
pp. 23 5-243. .
Jean Filliozat, "lJne inscription Cambodgienne en Pali et en Khmer de 1566
(K 82 Vatt Nagar)", Academie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres, Comptes Rendue.~
des seances de t'annee 1969 janvier-mars, pp. 93-106.
sila carik na[.(ar vatt (Inscriptions Modernes d' Angkor) 2 eme edition, Phnom Penh,
Institut Bouddhique 1958.

REVIEW ARTICLES 167
As one wo~ld expect, the Khmer language changed significantly
between Angkorean times and the 16th-17th centuries.Is What is less
expected is evidence of an almost complete break in administrative
traditions and even of toponymy. There is as much difference between
the titles found in post-Angkorean material and those of Angkor as
between the titles of Angkor and Ayutthaya, and the place-names found
in post-Angkorean inscriptions are nearly all readily identifiable, while
most of those from ~he Angkor period are still a mystery.
However, there is much similarity between post-Angkorean Cam~
bodian titles and those of Ayutthaya, which together with clear linguistic
borrowings from Thai to Khmer, seems to indicate that the similarities
are due to Ayutthayan influence in post-16th century Cambodia rather
than the other way around.
Specifically, with respect to Prof. Jones' remarks, the institution of
krom was indeed known in Cambodia, and the word itself is Khmer,
meaning "department, gr.oup, etc.", but in Prof. Jones' explanation
(p. 117) information for Ayutthaya, Angkor and post-Angkorean Cambodia
has been garbled. Part of the confusion is due to Prof. Jones' use
of a phonemic transcription in which krom bears a superficial resemblance
to Sanskrit grama, "village". Graphic translitteration would have shown
that Khmer krum, written form of the word pronounced krom, could not
have have derived from Sanskrit gram a, which, if it had been maintained
in Khmer, would be pronounced today as kream. The Pali form, gama,
is however known in Khmer with the expected pronunciation,. keam,
although still written gama, and is also found in Sukhothai inscriptions.
Thus, Punnagavarman, in his A.D. 1019 Sanskrit (not Khmer) inscription,
founded a village (grama), not a krom, and if krom in Ayutthaya really
"functioned as villages" (p. 117), it is not pecause they had at one time
been such. The relationship between Thai and Cambodian krom, like
the whole subject of the administrative history of the area~ must await
detailed exploitation of tbe Angkorean inscriptions to this end. ·
15) Saveros Lewitz "Textes en Khmer Moyen'' BEFEO 57 (1970), seep. 102.
For a description ' of some of the processes of change see S averos L ewttz, . "L a
Toponymie Khmer", BEFEO LIII (2), 377-450; see pp. 384-390; and for the
post-Angkorean absorption of Thai influences Saveros Lewitz, "Recherches sur
le Vocabulaire C!lrobod~ien (III), Joztrnat Asiatique 1967, .PP· 285-304i. see
~8Q·7'

168 REVIEW ARTICLES
Prof. Jones is also in error in attributing a Khmer origin to some
of the Ayutthayan titles of nobility (p. 128). I shall comment on ph6jaa
below. As for the rest, only phra ?, old Khmer vra~, is of fairly certain
Man-Khmer origin. The titles mhn and phan are numerical terms
belonging to several Thai languages. Kh'ttn and luav are not known in
Khmer titles until after Ayutthayan influence had permeated Cambodia,
and although I have never seen any discussion of their origin, the latter
seems always to have been treated by linguists as a Thai term, and the
use of the former in Thai traditional histories as far afield as the Luang
Prabang and Ahom chronicles seems to be fairly good evidence for it too
being and old Thai term. The Luang Prabang chronicles, we will
remember, place a long list of rulers entitled kh'fm in a more or less
legendary period before the 14th century. The late date of the extant
versions of these texts of course makes it impossible to completely
exclude Khmer influence, but the use of khun in the Ahom chronicles
as the title of the two ancestors who first descended from heaven to
b~come kings on ea;th shows conclusively, I think, that no Khmer
borrowing is involved,i6
The prefix?a:>g, like khun an·d luay, is only found in Cambodia in
post-Angkorean times and is thus probably a borrowing from Ayuttbaya.
As for its origin, if it is not Thai, the logical place to look would be
Burma, where the term, generally writton ok, is used in official titles.
For the sake of completeness we should note that one of the ?;Jag titles,
?3ag phujaa (graphic ok haifa), has been omitted by Prof. Jones. It was
given to the ministers of khlaiz and van in the Law of the Civil Hi~rarchy
(I, 233, 237), and may thus have been at one time equivalent to c~w
phajaa.
A certain amount of confusion occurs in Prof. Jones' treatment of
phdjaa and phrajaa and their compounds with c&w and somd'ed. He
considers phUjaa to be a Khmer borrowing which replaced khi:tn as a
title for Sukhothai kings {p. 3) and later became a title of nobility (p.
128). He also seems to think that phfdaa is different from phrajaa,
although his remarks on that point are not entirely clear to me (p. 128),
16) Ahom Buranji, translated and edited by Rai Sahil) Golap Chandra Barua 1
Catcutt;l19301
pp. 3-1~.

REVIEW ARTICLES 169
and that the 'titles caw phrajaa and somd!Jd caw phrajaa came into
existence in the late Ayutthaya period and the reign of King Taksin
respectively (p. 127).
As I read the evidence phajaa and phrajaa, which are not found in
Cambodia until the post-Angkor period and are thus probably due to
Thai influence, represent two forms of a single title which has a long
history, including the forms with caw and somd!Jd, in the Thai-Mon area.
The evidence, which I cite in graphic form for clarity, is (1) the
inscription of vat bralJ yu'n, no. 62 of the Thai corpus, which shows
bra'iici as the title of three rulers of Chiang Mai; (2) Sukhothai inscriptions
nos. 1,2,3,5,7,8, 11, 14,40,45, and perhaps others, using bra'iia as a
king's title; (3) The use of bana as a royal or noble title in a number of
Mon inscriptions;t7 (4) the law texts of 1805 which consistently show cau
bana, bana, ok bana (1. 224,229,237, for examples), and even contain a
list like those of Jones (pp. 127-8) showing the titles without ok (?3.?g)
and reading, haifa, bra~, hlvan, khun, hmu'n, ban (I. 314); (5) chronicle
manuscripts of the 19th century which consistently use ba'if'a for titles
which in updated spelling, such as 'round in published editions of the
Royal Autograph chronicle,. are written with bralfya (Jones' phrajaa).
I would thus suggest that we are faced with a single title generally
written bana by the Mon and in Ayutthaya, braii'ii in the north and at
Sukhothai, and that in the later 19th century the unusual spelling bra~ya
(phrajaa) was officially adopted due to its conformity with contemporary
pronunciation and perhaps also through a false etymology linking it with
bra~ (pra ?), old Khmer vra~.· Two early exceptions to this pattern of
regularity are inscription no. 9 with bra~na, which in this case may be
due to spelling conv.entions associated with the use of Khmer script, and
no. 49 which has the modern form bral]ya (phra}aa) and which is in other
respects linguistically anomalous (see. review of Sukhothai glossary in
this issue).
As for the combined titles with cau and samtec (caw, somd!Jd), they
are also attested as early as the 14th century. Specifically, but not
17) For the use of ba11U in Mon see H.L. Shorto, A Dictionary of the Mon Inscriptions,
''bana"; "The Kyaikmaraw Inscription", Bulletin of the School of Oriental
and A/dean Studies 21 (2) 1958, pp. 361-367; "The Dewatau ~otapan: A M~n
Prototype of the 37 Nats" BSOAS 30 (1), 1967, pp. 127-141; The 32 Myos tn
the Medieval Mon Kingdom", BSOAS 26 (3), 1963, pp. 572-591.

170 llEVlEW ARTICL~S
exclusively, cau braii.a is found in inscription 8, dated between 1359 and
1370, referring to the ruling prince of a mo'atl; inscriptions 45 and 49
have cau braiiafbra~tya "the grandson"; and in nos. 13 and 14 we find
cau bralia sridharrmasokaraja, possibly a local ruler. The Vat Pamok
inscription, the "earliest documentation" for such a title of nobility (p.
127) has, in fact, cau ba'iia, not caw phrajaa, and the Dutch record of
1622 (?) also shows this title in its transcribed form "Chaw peea"
(Jones, p. 127). Prof. Jones has apparently misunderstood this last
document. The title "Chaw peea" is not what "the editors have
suggested", but is the title of the original text. The editors' suggestion,
in a footnote, is that. this individual was the same as the bra~ glan
designated in the laws as ok bana (not ?:J3gjaa) [Laws I, p. 233 ], and the
close correspondence of the remaining elements of the title in the laws
and the letter shows that the identification is certain. The interesting
feature about this letter is the evidence that cau banli was in use as an
official title before the time of Van Vliet and Loubere, who both mention
ok titles, and that both types of title were used concurrently for a time
before the latter became obsolete.
The higher~ranking title, samtec cau bralia, is given in inscription
no. 40 to a person whom Griswold and Prasert believe to be King of
Ayutthaya, and in a short inscription from Nan published by G. a,nd P.
the ruler of Nan in 1426 is also accorded thistitle,Is
What may then have been the innovations of the Ayutthaya and
Thonburi periods was to use these formerly royal titles; attested from
the very beginning of recorded Thai history, as titles of nobility, thus
illustrating very clearly the phenomenom to whic~ Prof. Jones alluded
in his remarks about the declining value of titles over time (pp. 3, 115).
18) Vat Pamok: A.B. Griswold and Prasert {Ia Nagara, "Devices and Expedients
VatPaMok 1727 A.D.", In Memoriam Phya Anuman Rajadhon, pp. 147-220;
see pp. 18 2, 185; and prachum cotmaihet smnay ayuthaya phak 1, p. 56. ,
The Dutch doument : Records of the Relations between Siam and Foreign Countries
Vol. I, p. 131.
Inscription 40: "Epigraphic and Historical Studies no. 5", JSS 58 {!),Jan.
1970, pp. 89-114; seep. 92.
Nan inscription: "Epigraphic and Historical Studies no. 3", JSS 57 (1) Jan.
1969, pp. 57-108; seep. 105.

REVIEW ARTICLES 171
Along with his analysis of the development of titles Prof. Jones
includes a description of the Thai and Cambodian rules for declining
descent which is generally very clear and should prove very valuable for
students in their first contacts with the subject.
In the search for
. parallels in neighboring countries it would be useful to note, "Les titres
et Grades Hereditaires a la Cour d'Annam", by A. Laborde, Bulletin des
Amis du Vieux Hue, 7 (4), oct-nov 1920, pp. 385-405, which depicts a
declining descent system almost exactly like that of the Thai court.
F
However, the comparison whith the Cambodian royal family
structure as set up by the edict of King Ang Duong may not be very
meaningful, for the latter was very likely modelled on the Thai system,
even including some Thai titles such as caw c:JJm, and is even more
theoretical, since between King Ang Eng ( 1779-1796), when the
chronicles begin to provide rather full information on royal family
unions, and King Sihanouk, no reigning king, with a single exception,
took a wife who was already a princess by birth, and the highest rank
for princes and princesses was in fact preah-q:Jr;-mcah, which, according
Bitard's article on the Ang Duong edict, would only have been given to
children of wives lower than fourth rank.
The sole recorded exception
was King Norodom's union with Princess Snguon, daughter ofNorodom's
uncle, King Ang Chan, but no children of this princess, if any, were
significant enough to have found a place in extant records.
Norodom's
brother Sisowath, long before he was king, married a half-sister, Princess
Cbongkolani, but both being of commoner mothers their own ran~ at the
time was preah-q:Jv-mcah, and their son Essarovong, direct ancestor of
Sirik Matak, was therefore also only a pr~ah-q:Jv-mcah.
The case of Sihanouk's parents is not an exception either, for
. Suramarit at the time of his marriage was a preah-q:Jv-mcah prince wh~se
parents, half-siblings, were both preah-q:Jv-mcah children of Norodom;
and Princess Kossomak, although daughter of King Monivong, was still
only a preah-q:Jv-mcah.
Sihanouk himself had at least three royal wives,

172 REVIEW ARTICLES
but all were of preah-q:Jv-mcah rank and his children have always been
referred to as preah-q:Jv-mcah.19
As for the supposedly higher ranks for children of royal wives,
they appear to have been given indiscriminately according to royal favor.
In 1845, for example, Ang Duong gave two of his daughters, both of
common~r mothers, the ranks, s:Jmdac-pr~ah-rlec-thiidaa pr'eah mahaa
ksatrey and s:Jmdac-preah-rlec-thiidaa pr~ah srey vo ksatrey respectively.20
Thus, concerning the table on p. 124, there is really nothing in
Cambodian practice which corresponds to Thai ctmjaa, and the title
sJmdac is not a separate rank, but an honorific title which may be granted
to any preah·q:Jv-mcah as well as to commoners.
After the foregoing remarks it is only fair to note that the weak
points of this data paper may be due to its presentation in a form differing
considerably from the author's original intention. Judging from
Prof. WyatPs Foreword it was compiled first of all as a first-year study
aid, and as such it is very good. I wish I had had something like it
several years ago to facilitate the. transition from Mary Haas' Reader
to· the Phongsawadan Krung Ratanakosin. Of undoubted value for this
purpose, in addition to the main essay and its translati~n, are the very
last sections (pp. 131-143) on "The Corps of Royal Pages", "The
Ministries", "Military and Police Titles", "Rank Correlation ofTitles",
"Titles for Women~', "The Inner .Palace", and "Appendix.: Royal Kin
Terminology", some of which of course are pertinent only to the 20th
century. If the data paper bad been limited to this there would be no
grour;tds for criticism.
-----------------------------------------
19) This information comes from a variety of sources: J. Moura, Le Royaume du ,
Cambodge; Eng Sot ekasar maha p11ras khmaer, copied from the most recently
compiled Cambodian Chronicle; the various Cambodian chronicle manuscripts
in the Buddhist Institute, Phnom Penh; numerous published accounts of royal
l!f family activities in Cambodian language newspapers for the years 1945-19 70; and
Princesse P.P. Yukanthor, "Genealogies des Familles Princieres du Cambodge",
Ft·ance-Asie no. 113, octobre 1955, pp. 248-258.
20) Eng Sot, op. cit., p. 1074.

REVIEW ARTICLES 173
It is of less value, however, for the community of scholars working
in Thai history, and I assume that this is the level for which data papers
are intended. The late 19th century is a period for which there is
relatively little mystery regarding titles and administration, and the
remarks on historical explanation and relationships with neighboring
countries, fields for which the current published material is woefully
inadequate, nearly all require modification.
Of course Prof. Jones cannot be faulted for repeating the conventional
wisdom in fields not his own, such as Angkorean administration,
Cambodian titles, and their relationships to Thai systems, but colleagues
on the Cornell faculty should have been able to warn him about the shaky
foundations underlying some of the current assumptions. The Cornell
Southeast Asia Program has also missed a chance to use its considerable
resources of linguistic and historical talent in a collective effort toward
a historical study of Thai titles and "elite hierarchies" for the whole
Ayutthaya period. There is a serious need for this type of study, and a
valuable beginning would be an index of all the occurrences of all titles
in the laws, chronicles and inscriptions, something that would fill several
data papers and would be of immense value to all students of Ayutthayan
history.
Michael Vickery
School of Humanities,
Universiti Sain& Malaysia,
Penang

174 REVIEW ARTICLES
BACKGROUND TO THE SRI VIJAYA STORY-PART I
Paul Wheatley, The Golden Khersonese (University of Malaya, Kuala
Lumpur, 1961), pp. 338, maps.
O.W. Wolters, Early Indonesian Commerce (Cornell University; 1967),
pp. 404, maps.
To discuss the early history of Southeast Asia without first identifying
the relevant placenames with some degree of certainty is an
exercise in futility. Try to imagine the confusion that would reign in
discussions of European history if the location of Rome were a point of
controversy. This is precisely the state of affairs in discussions of early
Southeast Asian history. Sri Vijaya is a case in point. In 1918, Professor
Georges Coedes advanced the hypothesis that southern Sumatra was the
seat of an empire that lasted from the seventh to the thirteenth century.
This hypothesis, since its inception, bas become an article offaith among
a number of scholars working in the field to the extent that unbelievers
are scoffed at rather than argued with. But, like many articles of faith,
this hypothesis plays havoc with reality, defying geography and meteorology,
archaeology and written evidence, both internal and external. Those
scholars, however, do not seem to be discouraged be these enormous
inconsistencies. Instead, they are prompted to ever more dazzling feats
of intellectual contortionism. With all due recognition of their skill, it
seems to be time to call a halt and root out this orthodoxy.
The starting point for this paper is. an examination of three books
by two of the latest practitioners of Coedes' school of acrobatics : Paul
Wheatley, The Golden Khersonese, and O.W. Wolters, Early Indonesian
Commerce, and The Fall of Sri Vijaya in Malay History. The paper
will go on to offer a corrective to Coedes' hypothesis, to argue that
Chaiya and ,Nakorn Sri Thammaraj in peninsular Siam, rather than
Palembang in Sumatra, were the centres of a medieval civilisation. This
alternative hypothesis is based on equating Ptolemy's Aurea Kbersonesus
with the Thai Laem Thong (both names mean the Peninsula of Gold);
and ranges from the 2nd century A.D. to Marco Polo at the end of the .
13th. The main argument is based on the evidence ofi-Ching, a 7th
((en.tur~ Chinese monk who did his writin€> at a place h~ call~d foqhc

REVIEW ARTICLES 175
(short for Chele-!oche, which is thought to have referred to Sri Vijaya.)
I-Ching's first-hand evidence can be supported by the science of meteorology
(see section 3 below), while the Sri Vijaya inscriptions of South
Sumatra of the same period are so controversial that they have been
treated as subsidiary evidence. !-Ching's evidence, then, runs like a
red thread through a rather rambling story that purports to lay the ghost
of Professor Coedes' theory of a Sri Vijaya Empire in South Sumatra but
at the same time to review certain aspects of Wheatley's and Wolters'
books.
1. Langkasuka
Wheatley's The Golden Khersonese is divided into seven parts, of
which the first four deal- respectively with Chinese, Western, Indian and
Arab records; Part V deals with Three Forgotten Kingdoms (Langkasuka,
Takola and Kedah); Part VI, called the Isthmian Age, seems to be a leadin
to the last part on Malacca (Part VII). The book ends about 1500 A.D.
with the arrival of the Europeans. I will first comment on two of the
three kingdoms of Part IV (Langkasuka and Kedah), bringing in such
sources from Chapters 3 and 4 of Part I to bear as may be relevant to
the Sri Vijaya story. After that I will comment on the third Forgotten
Kingdom, Takola Emporium, and on Ptolemy's two islands, Iabadieu and
Sabadabai, which are not treated in Wheatley's book.
In an Appendix to Chapter 16 on pages 266-7 there is a list of
names, with their sources, dates and locations, starting with the Chinese
Lang-ya-hsiu and Lang-ya-hsu of the 7th century to the Langkasuka of
the Hikayat Marong Mahawamsa of the late 18th century, Alang-kah-suka ·
(Kedah folklore) and Lakawn Suka (Patani folklore) both of the early
20th century, all of which Wheatley equated with Langkasuka. If the
names are put into chronological order and a line. drawn at the Indian
1/angasoka of 1030, then the Chinese names in the first lot, starting
with the Lang-ya-hsiu and Lang-ya-hsu already mentioned, all end with
a sibilant sound· while those below the demarcation line, starting with '
Ling-ya-ssu-(cbi~) in 1225 and Lang-ya-hsi-chio in 1349, all end with a
harsh ka sound. So the two sets of names did not refer to the same
place : the first lot, with the sibilant ending, referred to Lakorn Chaisri,

176 REVIEW ARTICLES
while the second of course was Langkasuka. As the sources for these
two names are different, I will deal with them separately.
Wheatley gives the Chinese evidence, as well as Arab, Indian,
Javanese and Malay, but no Thai evidence. There is a long quotation,
of both text and translation, from the Hikayat Marong Mahawamsa or
Kedah Annals (pages 260~2), but Wheatley has left out the beginning of
the story and only starts from the time Raja Marong Mahawamsa, the
founder of Langkasuka, landed on the coast of Kedah. The first part,
rather mythical in nature, serves to date the story, and presumably the
reason Wheatley has left it out is because he is more concerned with
determining whether Langkasuka was a west coast state (Kedah), or an
cast coast one (district of Patani) than in any fairy tale; and certainly
Raja Marong is a fairy from out of the top drawer. I will start with
the Thai evidence, most of which has not been translated. The story
can be dated about 1200A.D., which is older than the Chinese toponyms
below the demarcation line ending with the harsh ka sound.
Curiously enough, the name Langkasuka does not appear in any
Thai chronicle or legend, though Raja Marong, its traditional founder,
does (in the Chronicles of Nakorn Sri Thammaraj and the Chronicles of
the Phra Dhatu Nakorn); nor did the Portugese writers mention the name
despite the fact that Tome Pires (1512~15) was writing a full century
before the last Chinese mention in 1628 (as Lang· hsi-chia in the Wu~peichih
Charts). Raja Marong Mahawamsa, or Raja Marong for short,
was the emblem of one of the cities under the hegemony of Nakorn Sri
Thammaraj. There were twelve such cities, known as the Twelve Naksat
Cities. The full list of the cities with their emblems is :
The Naksat Cities Present locations The Naksat Years
Muang Sai(buri) Patani province Chuad Rat
Muang Tani Pat ani Chaloo Ox
Muang Kelantan Kelantan Khan Tiger
Muang Pahang Pahang Tho a Rabbit
Muang Thrai(buri) Kedah Marong Big Snake
Muang Patulung Patalung Mas eng Little Snake
Muang Trang Trang Mamia Horse

l:mvmw ARticLn:a 171
The Naksat Cities Present locations The Naksat Years
Muang Chumporn Chum porn Mamae Goat
Muang Ban tai Smoe Krabi Vog Monkey
Muang Sa-u-lao Ta Chana Raga Chicken
Muahg Takua Talang Bbuket Chor Dog
Muang Kra(buri) Kraburi Ghun Pig
I might explain that naksat is the name of an animal which repre~
sents a year in the cycle of twelve and the Naksat Cities each used the
animal of its year as the city's emblem. The fifth city in the list, Muang
Thrai or Thraiburi, is Kedah and the emblem of this city is Marong, the
year of the Big Snake, which is the same as the Raja Mahawamsa of
the Kedah Annals. The story of Marong can be given roughly as follows.
In the time of the wise king Solomon, a prince of Rome was betrothed
to a princess of China. The prince set out by sea on the long
journey for his marriage, having in charge of the expedition one Rajah
Marong Mahawamsa, another prince of the royal blo9d of Rome.
Near the island of Lanka (Ceylon), Garuda, the mythical bird that
is the god Narai's transport and whose favourite food is snakes, had his
abode. When Garuda heard of the Prince of Rome's trip and purpose,
he decided to wreck the whole scheme. Also possibly he was very, very
hungry, not having had a good meal of big snakes for a long time. So
he kidnapped the Princess of China and hid her on a remote island.
Then be attacked the convoy and there was a running sea and air battle
in which Garuda rained down stones, boulders and possibly mountains,
while Marong's anti-aircraft fire consisted of magic arrows. In the end
the ships were sunk and Marong managed to get ashore at Kedah, where
he later founded Langkasuka. At this point Wheatley starts his quotation
from the Kedah Annals (pages 260-2).
Meanwhile the Prince of Rome was washed ashore at the island
where the Princess of China was kept prisoner and she hid him from
Garuda. The story finally came to a happy ending in the court of King
Solomon, whom throughout Ourada had kept informed of his intentions
and actions. Solomon's one and only comment was "It is the will of
God,>•

118 i1EVIEW All.TICLES
The above version is based on a .not very good transiation of the
Hikayat Marong Mahawamsa, so it may not be very accurate. At any
rate, the whole story smacks of many religions, and I would say from
Solomon's remark "It is the will of God," that the source is Islamic (for
Solomon's remark, read "It is Allah's will.")
Of tbe Twelve Naksat Cities, most of the places in present-day
Siam give no difficulty because they are provincial capitals. Of the
others, Muang Sai is Saiburi, an Amphur or District on the border of
Naratiwat province; while Muang Kra is Kraburi in Chumporn province,
located on the portage between-that province and Victoria Point. Ta
Chana or Victory Harbour (of the Maharaja) is on the Bandon Bight.
There is a tradition still told down there ofahill wheretheJavakaraja(the
Arabs' Maharaja of Zabag) manufactured the anchors for his fleet .. One
chronicle gives Takua Talang (Bhuket Island or Junk Ceylon) as the next
city in the list, while the other chronicle gives Takuapa, which is a
district on the west coast in Pang-gna province. Of the three cities in
present-day Malaya, Kedah and Kelantan give no difficulty, but Pahang
obviously does not refer to the present location. The Naksat Cities were
called Muangs, i.e. cities or towns, and were not districts or provinces.
If Malay scholars can locate this lost city, the!f perhaps the history of
Malaya will go back a couple of centuries before Malacca was founded.
This would be a good half century before the Sri Intaratit Dynasty came
to the throne of Sukhothai.
The Twelve Naksat Cities were a sort of outer shield surrounding
the capital, Nakorn Sri Thammaraj (as well as Chaiya and Singora, which
are not in the list), and they were connected by land so that help could
be sent from one city to another in case of a surprise attack. Very
possibly these cities came into existence after, or perhaps as a result of,
the Chola raids in 1025, and disintegrated in about the middle of the
13th century when 'Chandrabanu was defeated in Ceylon. If Muang
Pahang is still lost in the jungles, Malay scholars should look somewhere
near. the Panarikan Pass which connects the east and west coasts. (See
Appendix 2 to Chapter 10 in Wheatley's book, pages 163-172). But I
think more likely the city is under water, so what I suggest is that Malay
scholars should leave thejr books for a while, put on some skin-diving

REVIEW ARTICLES
equipment and jump into some recently formed lake. They could easily
find a whole city, or at least the remains of some chedi or vihara-but not
a mosque, I am afraid, because the Twelve Naksat Cities were far older
than the Muslim period.* But to take Langkasuka all the way back to
the Chinese toponyms of the 7th century, as Wheatley has tried to do,
is quite impossible. Let us now look into this problem, starting with a
note on Wheatley's book.
2. I.akorn Chaisri
The first or Chinese part of The 'Golden Khersonese is divided into
eight chapters, of which the first five, from earliest times to the Tang
Period, comprise what one scholar has called a witch-hunt for names.
Playing the Chinese word-game is another description of this process.
The next chapter (6), which deals with the 13th century, is a lot better,
though Wheatley's identifications of Chao-ju-kua's placenames cannot
be accepted with full confidence (see map on page 64). The last two
chapters seem as accurate as can be judged by one who knows neither
the Chinese language nor the coasts of Malaya.
By the nature of the evidence the first two chapters must be a
witch-hunt for names. In the second chapter, Wheatley has located some
names in the Funan story (evidence of Kang-tai and Chu-ying in the
middle of the 4th century), but the location of Funan itself is a highly
controversial subject. Groeneveldt in 1880 located Funan in Siam
(Notes on the Malay Archipelago and Malacca compiled from Chinese
sources). Then Professor Coedes moved it to Lower Cambodia. Coedes'
theory, which might be called the French Colonial Period Theory, was
not very good because Professor Jean Boisselier, in what might be called
the Post Colonial Period Theory, moved Funan back to Siam again,
though he says the capital later was in Cambodia. The Thai however
locate Funan in the Jsan or Northeastern Plateau of Siam, Prince
Damrong putting it in the vicinity of the Dhatu Panom, and Nai Manit
Vallipotama placing it further north in the Nong Harn district. Wheatley
has followed Coedes so some of the places he has located in the Malay
' .
Peninsula might well have been placed further north in the Central Plain
* On this topic; see also Ivfom Chao Chand, "Lang-Ya-Shu and Langkasuka: A
Reinterpretation", Nusa 11 tara, (Kuala Lumpur), No. 2 July 1972, PP· 277-284,

iBo
imVtEW Airrtd .. Es
of Siam if he had followed the Thai location of Funan. On the othef
hand, if he had followed Groeneveldt and Boisselier, he could never have
located any of his placenames anywhere at all.
Wheatley has also treated the three middle cbapte~s on the Tang
Period as a witch-hunt, though if he had used some other material as
well as written evidence, he could have located several other toponyms
with more certainty. I will deal with the two chapters on the 7th
century, namely Chapter 3 on Chang Chun's trip to Chih-tu in 607 A.D.,
and Chapter 4 on the evidence of Huanchang and !-Ching, leaving Fa­
Bien of the 5th century to be considered later.
Wheatley has equated Lang-ya-hsu with Langkasuka, as we have
seen, and he has accepted Coedes' identification of !-Ching's Chele-foche
as being the Sri Vijaya of the South Sumatran inscriptions. This is what
I mean by playing the Chinese word-game because it is contrary to the
written evidence of the period. Not playing the Chinese word-game,
however, is for Wheatley to write Shih-li-fo-shi'lz for !-Ching's Sri Vijaya
when other and older Sinologists give the name as Chele-foche. Those of
us who know no Chinese must assume that all Sinologists are correct,
and this is something that is sent to try us. The reader is requested to
take it in the sarpe light-hearted fashion.
I will start my comments by giving the identifications that I accept,
at least two of which agree with Wheatley's, namely Pan-Pan on the
Bandon Bight and Chieh-ch' a as Kedah. If any of the new identifications
proposed can be accepted, then perhaps Sinologists, in particular
Wheatley, might be able to extend them to cover other toponyms of the
same period.
Shih-tzu-shih
Lang-ya-bsu
The Mountains of
Lang-ya-hsu
Chi-lung
,Pan-Pan
Chele-foche
Ho-ling
Chih-tu
Mo-lo-yu
Chieh-ch'a
Laem Singh, outside Chandaburi
Nakorn Pathom (Lakorn Chaisri)
Kbao Sam Roi Yod, Prachuab Kirikhand
Province
Koh Rang Kai, Chumporn Province
on the Bandon Bight
Chaiya (Sri Vijaya)
Nakorn Sri Thammaraj (Tambralinga)
in the Singora Inland Sea
Muara Takus, Central Sumatra
Kedah

181
Nz1kom Pnthnm i~ u new name. The old name in the chronicles
is Nakorn nr Lulam~ Clmi!i.ri. h was the chief city of a kingdom on the
western side the ('entr

182 REVIEW ARTICLES
There is confirmation of the above from the Tang Histories, dating
from 618 onwards. Wheatley's translation, page 48, is from the Old
Tang History:
"The kingdom of P'an-P'an is situated to the southwest of
Lin-i (Champa) on a bay of the sea. To the north it is separated
from Lin-i by the Small Sea. One can reach it by boat from Chiaochou
(Tongking) in forty days, and it adjoins the kingdom of
Lang-ya-hsiu.''
Pan-Pan was on the Bandon Bight, first at Viengsra on the Tapi
River, then it was moved to Pun Pin on the same river nearer the sea.
One of the outlets of the Tapi is called Pak Pan Kuba (Pak = mouth,
Kuha = cavern.) The geographical information in the Old Tang History
is not as specific as in the New which Wheatley did not translate, so in
his map on page 53, he bas placed Lang-ya-hsu above Pan-Pan, that is,
south of Pan-Pan, because for some curious reason that I cannot guess,
many of his Chinese maps are printed upside down. The following
translation from the New Tang History, Chuan 222, was made by Mr.
Peter Bee of the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of
London:
"P'an-P'an is on the bend of the Southern Sea (Gulf of Siam).
To the North, it goes as far as the surrounding king's border (and)
a small amount of sea connects it with Lang-Su-Shih. From the
crossing of the mainland it takes forty days of sea-travel to arrive
(at P'an-P'an). The king is called Yang-su-Shih.''
1-Ching (671-95) too mentions Lang-ya-hsu, and also relevant is
the evidence of another 7th century Chinese monk, Huan Chang
(629-45):
"Southwards from this, and bordering the sea-coast is the
kingdom Shi-li-ch'a-ta-lo (Srikshetra). Further to the south-east
is the kingdom of Lang-chia-shu. Further east is the kingdom of
. She-ho-po-ti. In the extreme east is the kingdom of Lin-i (Champa)".
"Thence north-eastwards is the kingdom of Shi-li-ch'a-ta-lo
(Srikshetra), Next, to the south-east, in a recess of the ocean, is
the kingdom of Chia-mo-lang-chia (Kamalanka). Next, to the
east is the kingdom of To-lo-po-ti (Dvaravati). Next, to the east
is the kingdom of I-shang-na-pu-lo (Jsanapura). Next to the east
is the kingdom of Mo-ho-chan-po (Mahacampa), which is the same
as Lin-i."

BEVIEW ARTICLES 183
!~Ching's She-ho-po-ti and Huan Chang's To-lo-po-ti are thought to
have been Lbe same place and that place was Dvaravati. Dvaravati was
then thought to have been located at Nakorn Pathom. But from the
foregoing evidence Nakorn Pathorn was Nakorn Chaisri, or the Langchia-shu
of 1-Ching. So To-lo~po-ti must be moved to the eastern side of
the Menam Chno Phya: Plain, and if this Chinese toponym was really
Dvaravati, then its location was perhaps in the district of Ayodhia/
Ayudhia, that is to say, it was an older name for Ayodhia as Ayodhia
itself was an older name for Ayudhia.
ln the same way Huan Chang's Kamalanka has been thought to
have been the same as !-Ching's Lang-chia~shu, and in turn identified as
Langkasuka. Wheatley writes on page 257.
"Clearly Karnalanka (suka ?) was situated in the same position
relative to Sriksetra and Dvaravati as was 1-ching's Lang-chiashu,
and presumably these places were identical."
There are several sites on the western side of the Chao Phya
River with archaeological remains going back to the 7th century, so there
is no need to think that Kamalanka was the same as Lang-chia-shu (or,
from now on, Nakorn Chaisri.) I myself would locate Kamalanka at the
present U-thong, but this is not relevant to the present study. As for
Nakorn Chaisri, I do not know who was the first scholar to equate this
name with Langkasuka. If it was not Professor Coedes, then he certainly
accepted it. This is against the written evidence, for the record is quite
specific that Nakorn Cbaisri was west of Dvaravati; whereas of course
Langkasuka would be south, except that Langkasuka was at least five
centuries after Nakorn Chaisri (at that time Nakorn Chaisri had disintegrated,
as had U-thong.) 1-Chin·g mentioned Lang-chia two or three
more times, but there is no need to continue because the evidence all
agree, so I will end this section on Nakorn Chaisri with a short quotation
from Professor Coedes {The Indian/zed States of Southeast Asia, pages
76-77).
"West of Dvaravati and southeast of Srikshetra, the .gre~t
pilgrim Hsuan-tsang places the countr.Y of ~amalanka, wh~ch ts
"near a large bay" and is perhaps iden uc~l wttb the Lang-chra-shu
{i.e. Langkasuka) of !~Ching. In any case 1t must be located on the
Malay Peninsula."
I
I

184 REVIEW ARTICLES
3. 1-Ching's Evidence
I-Ching was at a place he called Foche (short for Chele-foche)
between 671 A.D. and about 694. He wrote two books, called in translation
A Record of the Buddhist Religion as practised in India and the
Malay Archipelago, and Memoir on the Eminent Monks who sought the Law
in the West during the Tang Dynasty. The latter gives the biographies
of some sixty Buddhist monks who went to India. Of these monks,
thirty seven travelled by sea. The practice in those days was to set
sail when the Northeast Monsoon set in, and to make a landfall on some
place on the east coast of the Malay Peninsula. Of the 37 monks who
travelled by sea, Roland Braddell cites 15 case histories in his Notes on
Ancient Times in Malaya, of whom 9 arrived at Foche (Chaiya), including
!-Ching himself; 6 arrived at Ho-ling (Nakorn Sri Thammaraj) and two
at Lang-chia (this goes to show further that bang-chia was Nakorn
Cbaisri off the main route, and not located at Langkasuka as was previously
thought.) The experts have equated Chele-!oche with Sri Vijaya,
only unfortunately they, or more specifically Professor Coedes and the
experts who have followed him, have located this Sri Vijaya in the
environs of Palembang in South Sumatra, while Ho-ling they have located
· in Java. This is against the written evidence in both cases. I will deal
with the two place-names together.
Two pieces of information from the New Tang History serve to
locate both Ho-ling and Chele-foche above the equator. The first is that
the products of Ho-ling included tortoise shell, gold and silver, rhinoceros
horns and ivory. As Java has never been known to produce gold, we
can say that wherever Ho-ling was located, it was not in Java.
The second piece of information is that at noon on the day of the
summer solstice, a sundial 8' (sh'ih) in height casts a southern shadow
2'5" (fs'un) in length. This information is to be found in both the
sections on Ho-ling and Foche, so we can say that wherever these two
places were located, they were not below the equator.
Chinese astronomical evidence is not considered good evidence, so
it is either ignored altogether or the facts manipulated to suit the
experts• pet theories. In this particular case, the summer solstice of the
record is changed to winter, and the southern shadow is changed to a

REVIEW ARTICLES 185
northern one to enable Ho~ling to be placed in Java and Foche in South
Sumatra. The only factor tbe experts have not changed is the time
factor, because they still accept midday and have not changed it to
midnight.
But two scholars refused to accept all this monkey business. Sir
Roland Braddell placed Ho-ling somewhere on the west coast of Borneo,
but he accepted Chele~foche to have been in the environs of Palembang
in South Sumatra, where it has generally been located.* J.L. Moens
located Ho-ling at Kedah (Sri Vijaya, Java en Kataha), while Chele-foche
he first located at Kelantan, then it was moved to Maura Takus on the
Kampar river in Central Sumatra. Again this is based on Chinese
astronomical information, Kedah and Maura Takus on the equator will
come into the story when we get to !-Ching's evidence, and on this
evidence Ho~ling could not have been at Kedah, or anywhere on the
west coast of the Malay Peninsula for that matter.
I myself prefer to locate Ho-ling at Nakorn Sri Tbammaraj, which
at that time was called Tambralinga, while Chele-foche, if this was
really Sri Vijaya, was Chaiya. Presumably the (supposedly ignorant)
Chinese sailors called Tambralinga Ho-ling, while the Chinese who knew
Sanskrit called the place Po-ling, and at a later period they called it
Tan-ma-ling. Both Nakorn and Chaiya have produced many and varied
archaeological remains going back to the 7th century and beyond.
Nakorn and Chaiya also produced an inscription each bearing
these two old names. (Also there is a hill near Chaiya called Khao Sri
· Vijaya, and the name Chaiya itself is of course the shortened form of
Sri Vijaya). The inscription from Nakorn is dated 1230 A.D. and bears
the name Tambralinga, only unfortunately Coedes has stated that this
inscription came from Chaiya. This is contrary to the records of the
National Mus~um which says it came from Nakorn. The Chaiya or Sri
Vijaya stele is dated 775 A.D. and came from Wat Hua Vieng in Chaiya.
This is the inscription that Coedes says came from Wat Serna Muang,
Nakorn Sri Thammaraj. Again this is against the Museum records,
*Sir Roland Braddell, "Notes ·on Ancient Times in Malaya" Jo~trnal of _the
Malayan Branch, Royal Asiattc Societ:r.. (Singapore), Vol. XXIll, Part l, {1950),
P .1 S et passim. .

186 HEVJEW ARTIGLES
which says it came from Vieng Sra, but the Chaiya people who prepared
the stele for shipment to Bangkok maintained it came from Wat Hua
Vieng in their district. But of this subject more later.
We now come to !-Ching's evidence and only the account of his
own voyage is necessary to kill Professor Coedes' theory of the Sri Vijaya
Empire. In fact this can be done in a couple of sentences because the
theory is based on equating I-Ching's Che./e-foche with the name Sri
Vijaya, and then locating that Sri Vijaya in South Sumatra where several
inscriptions of the same period have been found. Put another way, if
1-Ching's Foche was not located in South Sumatra, then Coedes' theory
will simply not hold water, even without knowing what the actual
inscriptions say. (The South Sumatran Inscriptions will be dealt with
later in Part li of this paper.)
While in Canton in 671, !-Ching arranged for a trip to the south in
a Po-ssu (Persian) ship. The ship sailed in the lith month (December)
when "the east wind blew" and arrived at Foche in about twenty days.
1-Ching's east wind is the Northeast Monsoon which blows from the
direction of Japan towards the equator (Singapore). This same wind
below the equator blows from the southeast, from the direction of
Australia to the south coast of Java. Around the equator the winds
are vanable, and in this season the doldrums extend down south to the
north coast of Java. On this evidence, as well as on the Chinese astronomical
evidence already cited, !-Ching's Foche could never have been
at Palcmbang in South Sumatra, or anywhere below the equator.
So Professor Coedes' theory of the Sri Vijaya Empire, which he
put forward as long ago as 1918, was not only unscientific, but also
thoroughly illogical. Trading in !-Ching's time was probably coastal,
with frequent stops for reloading and taking on of food and water. But
there were also ocean-going vessels. !-Ching took passage in one such
ship (a Persian one.) Is it likely tbat a ship fully loaded with valuable
cargo from the Celestial Empire for the Mediterranean market would
make a detour of several degrees below the equator to South Sumatra?
The average voyage in Tang times from Chtna to the Malay Peninsula
took between 30 and 40 days, while !-Ching's own trip in 20 days was
probably the fastest on record. The aim of such a ship (Persian) would

Map I
Windchart for November when !-Ching set sail from Canton for Chele-foche in 671 A.D.

188 REVIEW ARTICLES
be to slip round the Malacca Straits as quickly as possible and catch the
same Northeast wind across tbe Ten Degree Channel to India or Ceylon.
After passing Ceylon there would be no difficulty in getting home to one
of the ports in the Middle East. The ship might make a short stop on
the turn of the Peninsula (somewhere near the equator), and another on
the west coast before crossing the Bay of Bengal, but the main aim would
be not to miss the Northeast Monsoon, otherwise there might be a delay
of a full year before the next monsoon season. All this can be seen
clearly from I-Cbing's own trip to India and back to China (Wheatley,
page 42). The outward trip was delayed .a year till the following
Monsoon season because I-Ching stopped off at Sri Vijaya.
"In less than twenty days we reached (Shih-li)-Fo-shih (Sri Vijaya)
where I spent six months learning the Sabdavidya (Sanskrit
grammar). The king befriended me and sent me to the country of
Mo-lo-yu (Malayu=Jambi), where I stayed for two months. Then I
changed direction to go to Chieh-ch'a (Kedah). In the twelth
month I embarked on the king's ship and set sail for India. Sailing
northwards from Chieh-ch'a for more than ten days, we came to
the Kingdom of the Naked People (Nicobar Islands) ... From here,
sailing in a north-westerly direction for half a month, we came to
Tan-mo-li-ti (Tamralipti)."
"(Tamralipti) is the place where we embark when returning.
to China. Sailing from here towards the south-east, in two months
we come to Chieh-ch'a. By this time a ship from (Shih-li)-Po-shih
will have arrived, generally in the first or second month of the
year ... We stay in Chieh-ch'a until winter, and then embark on a
ship for the south. After a month we come to the country of
Mo-lo-yu which has now become Po-shih. We generally arrive in
the first or second month. We stay there till mid-summer, when
we sail to the north and reach Kuang-fu (Kuang-tung) in about a
month. The voyage is completed by the first half of the year."
Chieh-ch'a is generally accepted to have been Kedah, while Mo-lo-yu
has been located at Jambi in South Sumatra (to the north of Palem bang.)·
i think Mo-lo-yu was Maura Takus on the Kampar river in Central
Sumatra. !-Ching's outward journey would then be to Chaiya, then on
to Maura Takus on the equator, and "changing directions" on to Kedah
on the west coast. · The phrase in the second paragraph reading Mo-lo-yu·
has Mw become Po-shih" is difficult to understand. This might mean.

REVIEW ARTICLES 189
that Mo-lo-yu had now been conquered by Sri Vijaya, w~ich would not
be contrary to the text of one of the Sumatran inscriptions, except that
it is difficult to see how a ship sailing from the equator could reach
Canton in one month. Alternatively the ·sens~ might have been that
from Kedab !-Ching went to' Maura Takus and made the turn up to
Cbaiya without putting into port there. This would accord more with
!-Ching's account of his own trip from Poche back to China.
1-Ching returned from India to Poche in 685, and there started to
do his writing. In 689 he found he had run out of paper and ink, and
money to hire scribes, so he wrote a letter for these things and took it
to a ship that was moored in the Poche river. At that time the wind
started to blow, so the ship raised its sails to the full, and I-Ching was
conveyed back to China. ''Even if I had wanted to stop the ship," be
remarked, "there was no way of doing so." He arrived at Canton in
about a month.
The evidence of the sudden wind and one month's sailing time
would indicate that the sbip sailed from Chaiya or somewhere on the
east coast of the Peninsula, and not from the equator 8 degrees below
Chaiya, where there would be variable winds to deal with, or from
Palembang a couple of degrees below the equator. Moens however says
that !-Ching spent ten years at the 'new Sd Vijaya' where he did his
writing. This was on the equator, based on !-Ching's statement that
'Mo-lo-yu has now become Sri Vijaya' and some astronomical evidence,
namely that at the new Sri Vijaya, on the summer and winter solstices
there was no shadow thrown at noon. The last sentence sounds impossible,
but anyway Moens placed the new Sri Vijaya at Maura Takus. I
do not know any Chinese so I cannot say whether I-Chings spent ten
years at Moen's new Sri Vijaya or at Chaiya as on his outward trip.
Maura Takus was an important location in the Sri Vijaya story, and the
excavations being carried out there,' or about to be carried out by the
University of Pennsylvania, should produce new evidence of importance.
'
4. Takola Emporium /
Takola is in Aurea Khersonesus, or what the Thai call Laem Thong.
This Thai name is old but I cannot say how old it is, though it should
' '
-certainly be older than when. the Thai first heard of the Golden Khersonese
I

190 REVIEW ARTICLES
or of Ptolemy, which I presume, was only early in this century. Needless
to say, the Thai thought Laem Thong was, and still is, in present
day Siam. As a member of the land today called Sri Thailand, I too
think Aurea Khersonesus was in Siam-in fact exactly where my compatriots,
past and present, have placed Laem Thong.
To locate Aurea Khersor.esus, it is only necessary to locate Takola,
and this can be done even without Ptolemy's evidence. The first writer
to mention the Golden Khersonese was Josephus in his Antiquities of the
Jews, and the first man of whom there is any record to have actually
sailed to the Khersonese was one Alexander the Sailor. Alexander's
evidence was used by Marinus of Tyre in his handbook, and while both
the evidence of Alexander and Marinus have been lost, Ptolemy, who
was writing in approximately the middle of the 2nd century, quoted
from Marinus' handbook in the first of the eight books that comprised
his Geography. Alexander's evidence is very short and clear-cut. He
stated that from Takola in Aurea Khersonesus one sailed for twenty days
along a land that faced south (i.e. eastwards) and arrived at Zabai, where
one made a turn, and in another twenty days or a little more, one got to
Cattigara which was in Sinai.
Sinai was South China (North China being Seres), and Cattigara in
Sinai was Canton, or a city before Zayton as. Zayton itself was a city
before Canton. Zabai was the southern tip of Chama (South Vietnam),
probably where the Vo-:Cahn inscription, dated not later than the 3rd
century A.D., was found. The land that faced south referred to the
coast of Siam and Cambodia, where at least one very ancient port was
located. This was Oc-eo where archaeological finds including Mediterranean-type
beads have been found. Ptolemy called this port Akrada.
The location of Takola has produced some of the dreariest argum-ents
imaginable. General opinion today seems to locate the place at
Takuapa or Trang on the west coast of the Peninsula. But I think on
Alexander the Sailor's evidence, Takola should be placed on the east
coast, because if the location had been on the other coast, then Alexander,
in sailing due east, would have had to sail overland, which I doubt any
self-respecting sailor would do. Then Ptolemy has a Cape beyond
Takola, which be placed two of his degrees below Takola, and nearly

REVIEW ARTICLES 191
two degrees to the west. The only location that would fit this toponym
is the Bay of Bhuket on the west coast. If Takola is located at Chaiya
, on the Bandon Bight, then the latitudes and longitudes would fit because
Chaiya is to the east of Bhuket .. and actually two degrees north. This
would indicate that there was, or rather that Alexander the Sailor and
Ptolemy thought there was, a sea route through the Peninsula from the
Bay of Bhuket on the west coast to Bandon Bight on the east coast that
turned Malaya into an island. There are traditions of Malaya having
once been an island.
The newspapers have recently been saying that the Government
has ordered a feasibility survey for a "Kra Canal" to be cut through the
Peninsula between Bhuket Bay and the Bight of Bandon. Unfortunately,
as far as I know, no archaeologist has been attached to the survey.
Cbaiya on the Bandon Bight has produced some very old remains, and
on the other side of the Peninsula in Bhuket Bay, Mediterranean-type
beads have been found at Khao Javabrab in Krabi province. A few years
ago Cambridge University excavated some kiln sites in Singora province
and discovered a •Ceramic Industry in the Sri Vijaya Period.' The finds
from a site called Koh Mob are undergoing radio-carbon and thermoluminescence
tests for their exact dating. An archaeologist attached to
the feasibility survey mentioned above might be able to collect more
examples of Sri Vijaya pottery before they disappear for good. This is a
subject that has not been studied to any extent, and the survey could
produce, new evidence to change the present thinking on the Sri Vijaya
story.
Meanwhile starting with the supposition that there was a sea route
through the Peninsula, Ptolemy's placenames and co-ordinates of Aurea
Khersonesus fit into a pattern that can be recognised on modern maps.
But as Ptolemy's Geography has produced such extraordinary arguments
over the ages, it would be as well to add a few words.
Ptolemy's Geography is divided into eight books, with 26 maps
appended. The maps have all disappeared, and the oldest reconstruct
is a Roman map dated 1477, or thirteen centuries after Ptolemy ..?b­
viously not very much sense can be expected from such reconstruc~wns.
Of the eight books, the first, which contains Alexander the Sailor's

192 REVIEW ARTICLES
evidence on Takola, is a treatise on how the maps were made, while the
last contains a list of 8000 placenames with their co-ordinates. These
placenames were an appendix to the maps and not a list from which the
maps were made. The reconstructions fpllow this list, and thus Ptolemy's
two islands, called Iabadieu and Sabadabai, do not appear on any of the
reconstructs I have seen (see frontispiece in The Golden Khersonese.)
We will leave Wheatley now, and I will end with a few words of
appreciation. I think The Golden Khersonese is a very fine piece of work
because it gives both texts and translations of the sources. But there
are too many omissions, not the least important being the Thai sources.
In the first or Chinese part, it would have been nice to have had I-Ching's
evidence on Chele-foche in full, but unfortunately Wheatley accepted
Professor Coedes' equation ofi-Ching's Chele-foche with the Sri Vijaya
of the South Sumatran inscriptions, and considered Poche outside the
scope of his work. Coedes was a great epigraphist and the Thai are
grateful to him for the pioneer work he did on the Sukhothai inscriptions,
but his interpretation of these and other inscriptions is simply
a disaster because western writers tend to follow him blindly, not only
on the Sri Vijaya story but on several other stories as well.
The second part of The Golden Khersonese, dealing with the western
writers, is divided into two chapters. The first (Chapter 9) deals with
the pre-Ptolemaic, evidence, where neither Alexander the Sailor nor
Marinus of Tyre is mentioned. .The second chapter deals with the
Golden Khersonese itself, but here again Ptolemy's two islands, Jabadieu
and Sabadabai, are omitted. Another chapter might have been included
on the post-Ptolemaic evidence (Marco Polo, Friar Odoric, Nicolas di
Conti etc.) The title of Wheatley's book, The Golden Khersonese, is
derived from Ptolemy's Aurea Kbersonesus, but he does not seem to
think very much of Ptolemy's work. (His identificationsonpages 151-7
of the Ptolemaic placenames and co-ordinates in Aurea Khersonesus are
a complete farce.) If Wheatley had equated the Golden Khersonese
with the Thai Laem Thong (a name he also failed to mention), then most
of Ptolemy's placenames and co-ordinates could be located without much
difficulty, including some other names like Samarade and Perimula which
have been left out of the map on page 148. But in thi~ way very few

REVIEW ARTICLES 193
of the Ptolemaic names, including the title of the book itself, would be
in present-day Malaya, and this might not have been the object of
Wheatley's treatise. What Wheatley should do is to revise his book,
and with the material he already has in hand, he could easily produce a
minor classic in this particular field. Students of Southeast Asian history
would surely welcome identifications of placenames made without
conjectures, because an anthology of wild surmises made by the masterminds
of the past is not really of much use to anybody, particularly
students who are starting to learn their job.
5. Javadvipa and Java
Ptolemy's Iabadieu island has generally been equated with the Indian
Yavadvipa and Yamadvipa, and with the Javanese Javadvipa, all of
which names were located outside India proper. Yavadvipa, along with
Suvarnadvipa, the Island of Gold, appears in the Ramayana; Yamadvipa
(thought to have been a gloss for Yavadvipa) in the Vayu Purana, as well
as Malayadvipa, a name that will appear later in the story; and Javadvipa
in a Central Javanese inscription dated 732 A.D. The Indian texts do
not give any geographical evidence for the names, but the description of
the locations are similar enough for all the placenames to be identified
as the same locality. And that locality was not the present island of
Java because Yavadvipa and Yamadvipa both produced gold, and gold
was a commodity that Java has never been known to produce. The same
applies to the Javadvipa of the Central Javanese.inscription.
The lowest place in Ptolemy's Aurea Khersonesus was Sabana, 30"
South latitude and 160" East longitude. I would be inclined to place
Sabana at the present Kedab, where there was probably another passage
or portage bet ween the Perlis river to the Singora Inland sea. Both
Nakorn Sri Thammaraj and Kedah Peak have traditions of having been
islands.
Before going on to Ptolemy's two islands (labadieu and Sabadabai),
I will say a few words about his latitudes and longitudes. In Ptolemy's
time, those who did not think the world was flat thought it was far smaller
than it actually is. It was only at the end of the 15th century when
Colombus sailed across the Atlantic and arrived in the Americas, which

194 REVIEW ARTIC'LES
be thought was India that it was realised the world was much larger than
was previously thought. This was confirmed by Megellan and Drake
when they circumnavigated the globe. Wheatley says that the Ptolemaic
.cJegree is five-sixth of a true degree (page 153), and there was a displa­
·cement of 230 nautical miles. This may be correct for some latitudes,
but I think those nearer the equator were shorter than those further
north. Ptolemy's latitudes can be manipulated to a certain extent by
studying the movements of the sun in the seasons, but his longitudes are
hopeless beyond saying that one place was east or west of another place.
Anyway, if Ptolemy's co-ordinates of his placenames are plotted and,
bearing in mind the geographical knowledge of the time, a much better
pattern emerges relative to present-day maps than Wheatley allows forproviding
the Golden Khersonese is moved lock, stock and barrel further
north than the present-day Malaya.
Ptolemy did not know very much about his two islands. He gives
-only two co-ordinates for Iabadieu and one for Sabadabai, but tbey are
:sufficient to locate the two places.
Longitudes
LatitudE's
Takola 160. East 4· 15' North
Cape beyond Takola 158' 20' East 2· 20' North
Saban a 160' East 3' South
Sabadabai 160' East s· 30' South
Iabadieu, west 167' East 8" 30' South
Iabadieu, east 169" East s· 10' South
If Takola is located at Chaiya and Sabana at Kedah, then Iabadieu
island, lying southeast of the Khersonese, would fit in as Malaya Island.
:Sabadabai, lying due west of Jabadieu would then be Sumatra, or at least
the northern part of Sumatra .. If Jabadieu can be equated with the Indian
Yavadvlpa, then Sabadabai can probably be equated with the Indian
:Suvarnadvipa, the Island of Gold. (Sumatra is called Pulau Mas in the
Malay language, which also means the Island of Gold.) Needless to add,
there are overlaps between the locations of the various names, especially
·between the south of the Golden Khersonese and the north of Javadvipa.
This we shall see in the evidence that follows on the names Java and
Javadvipa.

HEVIEW :\HTICLES 195
In the time of Ptolemy, the Chinese recorded that in 132 A.D. Yehtiao,
a land or island in the southern seas, sent an embassy. Yeh-tiao
has been equated with the Indian Yavadvipa and Ptolemy's Iabadieu
(see Wheatley page 177), but as there is no geographical evidence, I will
let this pass, though if it was on the main route between China and India,
Wheatley is probably right. Pelliot identified it as Java, and he is
probably right too, except that this Java was not the Java island of the
present day, which is well out of the sailing route dictated by the Northeast
Monsoon. The name Java is also very old. It appears in the
Maha Nidessa alongside Takola and Tamalinga (the Holing of the Chinese
records already mentioned.)
"Further, a man who is the slave of greed and thinks only
of what he may acquire, sets sail on the oceans in search of wealth,
suffering cold and heat, is tormented by gnats and insects, wind
and sun, small snakes and big ones, and enduring hunger and
thirst, arrives at the various ports, such as the port of Takola,
Taksila, Java, Tamalinga and Suvannabhumi.,
Three centuries after Ptolemy, there is more definite evidence from
Fa-Hien, a Chinese Buddhist monk of the 5th century. Fa-Hien left
China in 399 and travelled to India by the land route. After remaining
in India for 15 years he returned by sea, sailing from Ceylon for Ye-po-ti.
The ship set sail in September 413 during the Inter-Monsoon period, and
sailed eastwards before a fair wind for two days. After that it encountered
a Bay of Bengal Cyclone and was in it for J 3 days, when the ship
arrived at a small island where the leaks were stopped.
Then, proceeding on the correct course for Ye-po-ti, the ship ran
into a storm and was blown before the wind (northeastwards) for 90
days before arriving at, or perhaps "crawling into", Ye-po-ti. Fa-Bien
stayed five months in Ye-po-ti to wait for a change of winds between
January 414 A.D. and May, before he embarked on another ship for
China. The ship then ran into a China Sea Typhoon, and after ninety
days arrived in China. The story is recounted on pages 37-41 in The
Golden Khersonese.
It used to be thought that Ye-po-ti referred to the Java of the present
day, that is, Fa-Hien was blown down south of the equator through

198 REVIEW AHTICLES
A decade after Fa-Hien, another 5th century monk named Gunavarman
sailed from She'po direct to China. The Emperor Wen-ti (424-
453) invited Gunavarman to go to China. At that time the monk was
at She'po and the Emperor offered to send a ship to fetch him. But the
monk took a merchant ship that was already going to China and, as the
wind was favourable, the ship sailed non-stop to its destination. Slze'po
is thought to refer to Java and has generally been located in the island
of that name. This is impossible. She'po must have been on the east
coast of the Malay Peninsula or the northwest coast of Borneo because
it is not possible to sail from Java direct to China, or from anywhere
below the equator. The New Tang History stated that Ho-ling is also
called She'po, and as I have already identified Ho-ling as Tambralinga
(Nakorn Sri Thammaraj), Guna_varman's She'po was therefore the same
as Fa-Hicn's Ye-po-ti. But the point is, if She'po was really Java, then
Java was a generic name that could refer to several places. The same
applies to Javadvipa. In the 13th century, Paragramababu VI set up
an inscription which referred to a Simhalarama (Ceylonese church)
established by Samarottunga on the Ratubaka Plateau in Central Java.
The text, as translated by Dr. Paranavitana, reads: "By King Samarottunga,
the forehead ornament of the Sailendra family, has been caused
to be constructed the Simhalarama, the ornament of Javadvipa (Java)."
As for Java being a generic name, I am afraid it will not be easy to
convince Sinologists of this because these experts do not take into
consideration things like prevailing winds and sailing distances; but even
so I will have to try because while the location of Java is not of great
import in the story of Sri Vijaya, the correct location of the seat of the
Javakaraja is, and this seat cannot be located unless Java is first accepted
as a generic name.
Java as a Generic Name
At the end of the 13th century, Marco Polo, after spending more
than half his life in China, returned to Europe by the sea-route. He set
sail from Canton (Zayton as he called it, or Alexander the Sailor's
Cattigara), in the usual period of the Northeast Monsoon for a landfall
on the east coast of the Peninsula, probably at the island of Malaiur,
which is mentioned h1 the text. Polo first got to Champa, which he

HEVIEW AHTTCLES 199
called Ziampa (Alexander's Zabai), then to Pentan island, where the
water was very shallow, and then on to Malaiur. Polo mentioned three
places, of which the third was Locac, 500 miles to the north; as well as
four islands, which he called Java Major, Java Minor, Condur and Sondur.
Sondur is the larger of the two latter islands. From his landfall,
Marco Polo went further south to Samara in the island of Java Minor,
where he waited five months for the change of winds. At this place
"the Northern Star does not appear; nor do the northwest stars appear,
neither much nor little." This would indicate that Samara was well
down the Peninsula, but the evidence is not clear whether it was on the
east or west coast. From here Marco Polo went up the Malacca Straits,
and then through the Ten Degree Channel between the Nicobars
(Necuveran) and Andamans (Angaman) to Ceylon (Sei!an).
Of Marco Polo's three places, Malaiur was Nakorn Sri Thammaraj.
"The City", says the text, "is very large and noble." Nakom at that
time was the largest and noblest city in the Peninsula. A century before,
the Twelve Naksat Cities surrounding the capital extended to Muang
Pahang, and Pahang was the name used to designate the whole of Southern
Malaya. The contemporary Yuan History also mentioned Malaiur on
the Peninsula, and this place should not be confused with the 7th century
Mo-lo-yu, which was in Sumatra. The island of Penton was probably
Bandon. Traditionally Nakorn was an island and Bandon would be the
northern part of that island. Marco Polo would appear to have reached
the east coast of the Peninsula at about Bandon, and then he sailed for
60 miles between two islands where the water was very shallow (Koh
Samui and Koh Panggnan) and then another 30 miles to Malaiur. Locac,
the third place mentioned, is a "continental province", 500 miles north
of Pentan. This can be identified as Lopburi which the Chinese called
Lokok. I don't think Marco Polo was at Locac, but he told of, it before
Pentan and Malaiur, directly after telling of the three islands which he
never visited (Java Major, Condur and Sondur). This was to give his
story more continuity. After Malaiur he told of the island of Java
Minor, where be visited six localities, before crossing the Indian Ocean.
Of Marco Polo's four islands, three come immediately to mind,
pamely Borneo 1
Java and Sumatra. Java Major, "the lar~est island in

200 Hf•:VIE\\' AHTICLES
the world, having a compass of 3,000 miles", and lying 1,500 miles
south-southeast of Champa, was obviously Borneo. 700 miles southsouthwest
of Java Major (Borneo) lie two islands called Sondur and
Condur. Sondur, the larger island, was Sumatra while Condur was the
present island of Java. The names Sondur and Condur sound very like
Sunda, where the passage between them is called the Sunda Struits.
This leaves Java Minor as Malaya Island, or what Ptolemy called
Iabadieu and Fa-bien called Ye-po-ti.
These identifications are not what the experts think at all. Ramusio,
who died in 1557, identified Java Minor as Borneo, and Java Major as
the present Java. This is contrary to the directions given in the text,
and Borneo, the proposed Java Minor, is a larger island than the present
Java (Java Major). I do not think Marco Polo would have got the sizes
of his islands wrong. More modern scholars (by three centuries) have
moved Java Minor from Borneo to Sumatra, and here again Sumatra is a
larger island than Java. There are many discrepancies in the Marco
Polo story, but a new consideration of the facts based on the true sizes
of the islands and the sailing directions would give an interpretation that
fits a modern map better than any of the old theories.
Marco Polo passed through these islands in 1292 A.D. and died in
1324. The oldest map of a Ptolemy reconstruct still extant is dated
1477, or 153 years after Marco Polo's death and thirteen centuries after
Ptolemy. None of the constructs that I have seen show the two islands,
Iabadieu and Sabadabai.
There is new evidence on Marco Polo, consisting of three pages of
texts and three maps where the two islands appear.* The maps bear no
resemblance to Ptolemy maps, and I will deal with only one of them
dated 1338 A.D., which is 14 years after Marco Polo's death. This map
bas some Chinese writing on the margin, and the names are Ptolemaic,
viz. Cattigara, a port on the Yangtze River (Canton); Seres (North
China); Sinai (South China) and India Gangem (c.f. India extra Gangem
for Southeast Asia.)
* Larry Sternstein and John Black, "A Note on Three Polo Maps" I in, Felicitation
Volumes of Southeast-Asian Studies. fJrasentecl to His Highness Prince Dhanini-vat
Ktomamun Biclyalabh Briclhyakom. Honorary President The Siam Society mzcler
Royal PcLtronage. On the occasion of his eightieth birthday (The Siam Society,
Bangkok, 7th November 1965), Vol. II, pp. 347-349. The three maps appear a11
Fill· I., Fi~. 2., and Fi$· ~.

HEV!EW AHTICLES 201
The map was not drawn by Marco Polo himself, but probably by
one of his immediate family. Dr. Mote, a Sinologist, has pronounced
the Chinese text to be 'blind copying', that is, it was written by someone
who did not know the Chinese language, and while the characters can be
read, no sense emerges. Two small islands appear below Malaya,
aligned like Malaya and Sumatra in modern maps.
Without beating about the bush, I think the maker of this map
had a Chinese map in front of him, as well as a Ptolemy map (not a
Ptolemaic construct). If Marco Polo had brought back a Chinese map,
it would have been similar to a Yuan Dynasty map, such as the Yu-ti-t'u'
(World Map, 1311-20 A.D.) drawn by Chu szu-Fen (1275-1335 or 40),
though this map was actually completed after Marco Polo left China.
But this Yuan map was possibly based on the Fo-teu tung-chi (1269-71),
edited by Chih-P'an, a Buddhist monk of the Southern Sung Period. The
map maker might have thought the names Marco Polo used would be
strange to his readers, so he substituted Ptolemaic placenames instead.
(Another map, very similar to this one, had "Polo" names, such as
Zipangu for Japan.) So the two islands on the map were Malaya Island
and Sumatra, or Ptolemy's Iabadieu and Sabadabai, or Marco Polo's Java
Minor and Sondur.
The point of all this is that Java was a generic name. It covered
Borneo (Java Major), Malaya (Java Minor and Javadvipa), possibly
Sumatra and certainly Java, if for no other reason that it does now. Ibn
Batuta, a few decades later, had Java and mul-Java, which would seem
to support this theory. Unfortunately 1 do not know when the name
Java was first used for the present island. In the time of Marco Polo,
Kublai Khan sent an expedition to Java (in the Singasari and Majapahit
period), but I cannot remember what the island was called in the
. Chinese text.
One step beyond the problem of Java is the problem of the
Javakaraja, the king of Javaka, whom the Arab records call Maharaja of
Zabag, or just Maharaja. The Ceylon chronicles called Chandra Banu,
a name that also appears in the Tambralinga inscription of Nakorn Sri
Thammaraj dated 1230, a king of the Javaka. There is argument about
where the Maharaja or Javakaraja had his seat, because the Arab records

202 HEVIEW ARTICLES
are external evidence. Of the internal evidence, the name Maharaja
appea1's in the Wat Hua Vieng inscription of Chaiya dated 775, and the
Thai chronicles have one Phya Jivaka of Nakorn Sri Thammaraj. Phya
Jivaka of course was the same as Jivakaraja, or Javakaraja, or the
Maharaja of Zabag of the Arab records. He came on the scene early in
the 1Oth century A.D.
6. Wolters' first book on Sri Vijaya
Professor Wolters' two books are: ( l) Early Indonesian Commerce
(subtitled) A Study of the Origins of Sri Vijaya, and (2) The Fall of Sri
Vijaya (subtitled) in Malay History. Both books have two themes, as
suggested by their titles and subtitles.
When I undertook to write a 'heterodox view' of the Sri Vijaya
story so that scholars could reassess the facts of the case, I thought
Wolters' two books would be a good starting point. So while I was
waiting for the books to be sent, I sketched in a very broad background,
thereby using up all the space that the Hon. Editor of this journal could
. spare me. But when Wolters' books came to band, I found they bad
nothing to do with the Sri Vijaya story. The Sri Vijaya story started in
671 A.D. when 1-Ching set sail from China and arrived at a place he called
Foche, and ended 600 years later when Chandra Banu of Nakorn Sri
Thammaraj invaded Lanka in 1270 or 71, and was slain on the field.
Wolters' first book, subtitled A Study of the Origins of Sri Vijaya, deals
with the centuries before and including the 7th, while the second book
deals with the founder of Singapore and Malacca a full century after
Chandra Banu's death.
A Study of tfle Origins of Srivijaya
Presumably soon after the ancients learnt how to sail cross-wind,
people from China set sail on the Northeast Monsoon and made a landfall
at some port on the east coast of the Malay Peninsula; and other people
set sail from the west coast of the same Peninsula through the Ten Degree
Channel to some port in North India (such as Tamralipti), or in South
India (Negapatum), or in' Ceylon. When the monsoon changed, people
from India and Ceylon set sail to the west coast of the Peninsula; and

R.EVJEW ARTICLES 203
other people set sail from the east coast for China. This rhythm of the
monsoon, as some writers have called it, had been operative long before
historic times, in fact probably long before proto-historic times too.
The main reason for all this journeying was trade, though there
were also envoys who went to China to pay tribute to the emperor
(another form of trade), as well as Chinese monks who went to India on
pilgrimages. The travellers included Chinese and Indians, Greeks and
Persians (or Arabs), as well as indigenous people who lived by the sea
and could sail a boat. Of these peoples, the Indians left the most formidable
imprint on these lands, culturally speaking. The reason was
because the journeys were dangerous and the travellers bad to pray to
their favouritegods for protection against untold dangers, particularly
pirates. These gods might have been Avalokesvara, Kuan Yin or the
Golden Calf, depending on what ethnic group adored which god. The
Indian traders and sailors however did not like to say their own prayers
so they brought with them their own shamans (technically called
Brahmans) to do their praying for them. Portable Indian images have
been found scattered over wide areas of Southeast Asia. In those days
vandalism in the form of collecting ancient art for private museums had
not come into fashion, so presumably the shamans brought by the traders
in turn brought their portable gods because, speaking for myself, I would
much prefer my shaman to pray to a physical god that I can see rather
than to some abstract gods that no doubt the shamans prayed to in their
private shrines. Then, when trading. centres were set up and kings came
into existence, these same shamans, or perhaps their descendants, became
court soothsayers and officiated at ceremonial functions. In this way
Indian culture in the form of religions and art, languages and writing,
was transplanted to Southeast Asia. Such, or something like it, is the
view that Indians themselves have told me, though I understand it is not
necessarily accurate and that other scholars hold other views.
I do not know how old the earliest records of these journeys are,
but the Chinese recorded that Yeh-tieu, a state in the Southern Seas,
sent tribute in 132 A.D. Yeh-tieu might or might not have been on the
Peninsula, but if this toponym referred to Javadvipa, then it probably
was. In the same period Alexander the Greek Sailor sailed from Takola

204
in the Golden Kbersonese and arrived at Cattigara in South China in
about 40 days,
Three centuries later Fa-Hien sailed from Ceylon for Ye-po-ti, and
from Ye-po-ti to China. Fa-Hien bad a stormy trip and the whole
journey took him the better part of a year, but he had with him Kuan
Yin, the Hearer of Prayers, and in this way arrived safely at his destination
withot encountering any pirates, "to meet whom is death". The
ships on both legs of the journey were large vessels that carried two
hundred persons. On the second leg, which took 75 days instead of 50,
there were Chinese merchants returning home, as well as Brahmans. A
few years later another monk named Gunavarman, who had a smoother
trip than Fa-Hien, sailed from She-po and reached China non-stop. The
number of days the trip took is not stated.
The 7th century produced many records, starting with Clwng Chun's
trip to C!zih-tu in 607 and culminating in !-Ching's non-stop trips to Foche
and back. The out ward trip, made in a Persian ship, took 20 dayli, while
the return trip took 30. I-Ching gave a very sympathetic account of
Foche, and he said that the king had his own ships. All this evidence
goes to show that there were Greeks and Persians, Indians and Chinese,
as well us the natives of Peninsular Southeast Asia engaged in this
traffic.
The northwest coast of Borneo (above the equator) and the northcast
coast of Sumatra (also above the equator) probably entered into
this scheme of the rhythm of the monsoons, though more likely in a
subsidiary manner because they were not quite on the main sailing route.
The cast coast of Borneo and the west coast of Sumatra, as well as the
southwest coast of Borneo and the southeast coast of Sumatra below the
equator, would not have came into this scheme because they were off the
monsoon track, and to go to them could mean a delay of a whole season.
My concept of these places is that they are isolated coasts, swampy
with but little cultivable land to suppon any substantial population.
So if any Chinese went there, they were probably pirates rather than
envoys and merchants. Pirates played an important role in the Sri
Vijaya story, from Fa-Hien~s fear of thpm in the fifth century till the
fifteenth century a thousand years later. With lairs in South Sumatra

REV!E\'.;' ARTICLES 205
these pirates could raid the main traderoutes above the equator, and
when they became too much of a nuisance, as they did at the end of the
7th century, the king of Sri Vijaya attacked them with 20,000 men and
took their strongholds in Palembang, Jambi and Bangka, where be put
up 'imprecation stones' to keep them in order. The South Sumatran
inscriptions containing these imprecations will be dealt with in the
second part of this paper.
Professor Wolters' Early Indonesian Commerce, like Professor
Wheatley's The Golden Khersonese, was a doctoral thesis submitted to
the University of London. There are other similarities, as well as
variations. Wheatley located places in the peninsula from earliest times
to 1500 A.D., while Wolters located places in Western Indonesia from
earliest times up to and including the 7th century. Wheatley used all
sorts of sources including Chinese, while Wolters· used mainly Chinese
sources. Wolters' three penultimate chapters deal with the locations of
Chinese placenames in the 3rd century, the 5th and 6th centuries, and the
7th century. I have said previously that the first five chapters of
Wheatley's first part on the Chinese evidence, from earliest times to the
Tang Period in the 7th century and after, were a witch-bunt for names.
Wolters, whole book, which purports to deal with the origins of Sri
Vijaya, is a witch-hunt for an empire.
Wolters locates the three related Chinese toponyms of the 7th
century, She-po, Ho-ling and Chele-foche, in Java and South Sumatra
below the equator, and he calls them Western Indonesia. Actually this
theory is quite logical, but it is unscientific. A Chinese record stated
that Ho-ling was also called She-po and on its west was To-po-teng;
another that the King of Ho-ling lived in She-po; still another that Holing
was four days' sailing distance to the east of Poche. If Chele-!oche
(Sri Vijaya) is equated with the contemporary South Sumatran inscriptions
where the name Sri Vijaya appears, then Ho-ling, four days' distant
to the east of Sumatra, would be in Java, and as ·Ho-ling was the· same
as She-po, so She-po must have meant Java too. Then To-po-teng to the
west of She-po must have been back in Sumatra, though nobody has
quite succeeded in dealing with this toponym. This is what I mean by
sayin~ that thv theory is quite lo~ical beca\lse the Chipe~v records, bein~

206 IlBVIF.W ARTIC.LES
external evidence, must be equated with some internal evidence, in this
case the South Sumatran inscriptions. On the other hand, if !-Ching's
Poche, based on the evidence of the prevailing winds, is placed above
the equator, then Ho-ling, She-po and To-po-teng must have been above
the equator too. And if we locate Foche and Ho-ling at Chaiya and
Nakorn Sri Thammaraj, then to go from Chaiya to Nakorn it is necessary
to sail due east before turning down south, and the journey takes four
days. As for To-po-teng to the west of Ho-ling, this would be Tnmg,
the old name of which was Tuptieng. Using !-Ching's first-hand, onthe-spot
evidence as basis, no doubt many other toponyms could be
located with more certainty than previously.
Professor Wolters' arguments on the 7th century evidence are set out
in his chapter 13. This chapter is called "The favoured coast of early Indonesian
commerce," though Wolters admits the coast was swampy. But
it became 'favoured' because the Malays were good sailors. I wonder
how he knows this, and in any case were the other people who lived by
the sea not good sailors too? The reader is invited to the whole of this
key chapter. I will quote just one short paragraph from the chapter
(page 219), and I will number the sentences and comment on the paragraph
sentence by sentence, This comment is on Wolters' methods and
not on his conclusions.
"(1) No reason has been found for disagreeing with Pelliot's
major conclusion in 1904, which was that the Chinese knew only
of the island of Java by the name of 'Java.' (2) Students in Indone~
sia need not be perplexed by the variety of views expressed on the
meaning of She-po. (3) Any attempt to search for the She-po of
these centuries elsewhere than in Java must be founded on new
and convincing evidence, while the suggestion that She-po was
sometimes used as the name of a kingdom on the Malay Peninsula
must be regarded as extravagant. (4) The Arabs, and perhaps the
inhabitants of mainland Southeast Asia, may have understood
"Java" in a different sense, but not so, apparently, the Chinese who
rec·orded details about the tributary kingdoms."
( 1) I have no doubt that Pelliot was a great Sinologist. Southeast
Asian studies require the use of many languages, of which Chinese is by
far the most important, so any scholar who knows that language must
surely be the object of envy amon~st his collea~ues in the same field.

REVIEW ARTICLES 107
~ut ?elliot's work was pioneer work, and in the half century since be
wrote, so much new evidence has come forward that it might be asked
why his conclusions should be accepted rather than those of, say, Gerini,
who knew so many languages and had such a flair that he could run the
gamut of Southeast Asian placenames without batting an eye. He also
knew the topography of the places he was talking about. I thought I was
the first to put forward the suggestion that Malaya was an island in historical
times, but I found later that Gerini had come to this same conclusion
years ahead of me, for he wrote in 1909: "I believe, therefore,
that I am the first to proclaim, after careful consideration ..... that the
Malay Peninsula, or rather its southern portion, had been an island before
assuming its present highly pronounced character." There is geological
evidence that would seem to support this possibility.
(2) Considering the mass that has been written over the years on
the subject of She-po, I think students in Indonesia, as well as students
anywhere, should be perplexed by the problem. After traversing this
jungle, perhaps by taking a short cut by reading Wolters chapter 13, the
student should be able to come to his own conclusion. But before be
starts on his journey, be should make one of three suppositions, namely
that She-po was in Java (as Wolters thinks), that it was on the Malay
Peninsula (as I think) or that Java was a generic name (as I also think).
I am by no means the first man to suggest that the Chinese She-po was
in the Malay Peninsula or that Java was a generic name, so the writing
of my predecessors with this line of thought-presumably including
Gerini, J.L. Moens and Sir Roland Braddell, the Three Greats of Southeast
Asian studies-should also be studied to see exactly why their
theories have not been accepted.
(3) I wonder what Wolters means by "new and convincing evi·
dence"? Would a more scientific consideration of the existing data be
considered new evidence? If so, locating She-po on the Peninsula cannot
be regarded as extravagant.
(4) Leaving aside the inhabitants of mainland Southeast Asia,
surely the Arabs and the Chinese, who were recording the same places,
must have understood 'Java' in the same sense. Perhaps any difference
in the understanding was not due to the facts of the case so much as

208 llEVIEW ARTJCLES
the interpretation of those facts. What Wolters is trying to do in this
book is to piece together a story of Sri Vijaya without using the Arab
records or the records of "mainland Southeast Asia' (central and northern
Thai inscriptions and chronicles); and even without the South Indian
and Sinhalese inscriptions. The Chinese word-game is a wonderful
passtime, so Wolters has strong views on the location of Java, but he
has no view on the Javakaraja at all. The Sri Vijaya story without
the Javakaraja is rather like a whiskey and soda without the whiskey.
Early Indonesian Commerce
The second theme in Wolters' book is Trade. The six middle
chapters (5 to 10) deal with what he calls the po-ssu trade. The location
of products is not important. What is important is the correct
location of placenames. I have said at the beginning that to write any
kind of history of Southeast Asia without first correctly identifying some
of the toponyms was an exercise in futility. I am not convinced that
Wolters has identified the main locations with certainty, so the title of
his book, Early Indonesian Commerce, is a misnomer. This is not a major
problem because aH he has to do is to change the title of the book to
"Early Southeast Asian Commerce".
My general impression of the fauna and flora of Southeast Asia
is that what one land produces can be duplicated by another. For
instance, what Siam produces can be duplicated by Burma, the Shan
States or Laos. Of course there are exceptions, such as the sea fishes
that Siam and Burma produce cannot be duplicated ·by the Shan States
or Laos. In the same way in the Archipelago, what is produced in
Wolters' Western Indonesia could probably be duplicated in Malaya or
any of the islands. In any case, if any product is not available, say some
rare spice from the Moluccas, it would be transported to an entrepot on
the main trade-route .. In this respect negative evidence is more important
than positive. For instance, Sumatra has two-horned rhinosceros but
not the one-horned variety, whereas Malaya has both kinds. So when
~arco Polo said that he saw in the island of Java Minor "great numbers
of unicorns, hardly smaller than elephants in size ..... and in no way
iike what we think and say in our countries, namely a beast that lets

REVIEW ARTICLES 209
itself be taken in the lap of a virgin" (meaning a one-horned rhinosceros ),
Marco Polo's Java Minor was not Sumatra because that island does not
have any one-horned rhinosceros. It could only have been "Malaya
Island".
Another point that I personally would like to know about is that
while Wolters gives an extensive list of the exports from parts of South
east Asia to the Middle East (pa-ssu trade), what were the imports from
the Middle East, particularly to his Western Indonesia. Mediterraneantype
beads have been found in several localities, at Oc-eo in Indochina,
at Nakorn Pathom, U-Thong and two or three other places in the Central
Plain of Siam, at Khao Javabrab in the Bay of Bhuket, and on the north
west coast of Borneo (on the equator); but Ihave not heard of any beads
having been found anywhere in Java or Sumatra. Then again what did
the ancients use for money ? What we call 'Funan coins' have been
found in the Mekhong Delta, in the Nakorn Panom district, in the Central
Plain of Siam as far north as Tapan Hin and Sawankalok, and at Pagan
in Burma; and •Namo coins' have been found in the south, particularly
at Nakorn Sri Thammaraj; but I have not heard of any ancient coins
having been found in Malaysia or Indonesia. This is an interesting
question that should be looked into, otherwise the problem of the pa-ssu
trade could nevet· really become convincing.
Summary
Professor Coedes' theory of the Sri Vijaya Empire, with its capital
at Palembang, is based on equating the evidence of !-Ching (671-695)
and the South Sumatran inscriptions (683-686), ond of which has the
name Sri Vijaya. I-Ching set sail from Canton when the Northeast
Monsoon set in and arrived' at a place that he called Foche in South
Sumatra. But on meteorological grounds, this toponym could never have
been below the equator (see section 3 above.) The Th~i locate Foche
at Chaiya where an inscription bearing the name Sri Vijaya bas also
been found, though dated a century later. 1-Ching did his writing at
Poche, and what he wrote about the place cannot be applied to Palembang.
That is all that is necessary to kill Coedes' Sri Vijaya theory,
but I will also quote a few sentences from a long paragraph on page 293
of Wheatley's The Golden J(hersonese:

210 HEVIEW ARTICLES
"A simple relief map of pentral and southern Sumatra is
apt to induce an erroneous impression of fertility, for at least a
third of the eastern lowlands are forested swamp which defies even
modern technological control. Offshore a chain of flat marshy islands
are building seawards by accretion of marine sediments, while westwards
rise the foothill of the Barisan Range. At the inner edge of
the swamp belt, at a point where a line of low hills runs out towards
the Musi River, was the city of Sri Vijaya .....
"Situated some seventy-five miles up the winding Palembang
River and separated from the sea by leagues of marshland, at least
three or four days' sailing from the Malacca Strait and almost as
far from that of Sunda, the original settlement of Sri Vijaya was
thus sundered from the great trade-routes of South-East Asia .....
"At this time we hear more of the intellectual eminence of
the capital than of its commercial activities-because, of course,
our informant is a religious scholar-but such a development could
only have occurred in a milieu of economic prosperity. That Sri
Vijaya was in direct communication with places as far distant as
Canton and Tamralipti is attested by I-Ching.''
The above sentences, shorn of Wheatley's explanations or what
might even be called his excuses for locating !-Ching's Chele-foche
(Shih-lo-/o-shih) in South Sumatra, serve to show that his Shih-li-!9-shih
could never have been at Palembang. The capital of an empire must
~be located in a district that could grow enough food to feed a considerable
population. Also Sri Vijaya was a sea-faring empire, and Palembang
was too far off the regular trade-routes to have been the capital of such
an empire. I am sure that if Wheatley bad concentrated on the purely
geographical aspects of the evidence as a geographer should, instead of
following Coedes' unscientific perigrinations as he has done, he would
have come to these same conclusions himself. But I do not consider
pulling Professor Coedes' Sri Vijaya theory apart is of great importance
in the overall history of Southeast Asia compared to locating the ancient
toponyms correctly. Here Wheatley has produced another major geographical
misconception. He says on page xviii of his book, "During the
first fifteen hundred years of the historic period (from earliest historical
times to the coming of the Europeans) this function (of the Peninsula
,being a causeway) fell largely into abeyance, and the Peninsula assumed

1\EVJEW ARTICLES 211
the role of a barrier." A better concept is to think of the Peninsula as
a bridge between India and China rather than a barrier. If this is correct
then we should expect to find more history (or perhaps I should
follow Professor Coedes and say 'more Indianization') on this bridge
than on its periphery. The rest of this paper aims to find a part of this
early Indianized history in the Peninsula where the more important
toponyms were located.
The second part begins with the Sri Vijaya inscriptions of South
Sumatra in the 7th century and goes on to the Sailendra Period of the
story in the 8th and 9th centuries. In this part another of Professor
Coedes' glaring errors-namely his mixing up of two important inscriptions
from Chaiya and Nakorn Sri Thammaraj-will be corrected at some
length. A thesis is also submitted that there were two branches of the
Sailendra family ruling in Central Java and the Malay Peninsula. Then
Prof. de Casparis' theories that there were two contemporary dynasties
in Central Java (Prasasti Indonesia I), and that there was a decline and
fall of the Sailendras (Part II) will also be considered. This will then
take us to the threshold of Dr. Paranavitana's Ceylon and Malaysia
covering the lOth to the 13th centuries, and Professor Wolters' The Fall
of Sri Vijaya covering the 14th, which will be dealt with in the third part
of this paper.
M.C. Chand Cllirayu Rajaui
Chiengmai University

REVIEWS
Lucien M. Hanks, Rice and Man: Agricultural Ecology in Southeast Asia
(Aldine-Atherton, Inc.; Chicago & New York, 1972), 163 pp., index.
Rice can be and, over the centuries, has been cultivated in numerous
different ways. In this interesting book, Dr. Hanks first describes the
principal ecological relationships man can share with rice. Then, shifting
his focus from the general and theoretical to the specific and
empirical, he sketches a history of the village of Bang Chan. Changes
in mode of rice cultivation have been, Hanks argues, crucial to Bang
Chan's development over the past century. He draws upon the extensive
research carried out there since World War II by himself and others
from Cornell University to make his case. Although Rice and Man is
written with an undergaduate audience in mind, it should nonetheless
attract wider attention because, first, it draws together diverse, though
limited, data to support conclusions about differences in the requirements
and yields of the alternate modes of cultivation, and, second, it presents
probably the most thorough history of a rural Thai community yet
published.
In Part I of the book, Dr. Hanks gives his rather general description ,
of rice and its cultivation. A discussion of the characteristics and needs
of the plant is followed by specific detail with regard to the three modes
(shifting, broadcasting, and transplanting) of cultivation. To the
standard view of the different requirements and yields of these diverse
modes of cultivation, Hanks adds a helpful ecological perspective. The
energy expended by a community in developing its ecological "holding"
must, be emphasizes, be in harmony with the natural characteristics of
that holding. The yield of a crop depends not solely on man's inputs
but also on the natural givens of the crop's setting.
Beyond this descriptive level, Hanks has gathered data which
support his conclusions. His findings are not surprising, but it is not
clear to me that the data presented here prove them conclusively. The
statistics are rather limited (between 8 and 17 cases are used to support
different conclusions), and were gathered by numerous different researchers
using different techniques in all parts of Asia over a period of some

thirty-five years. Surely there is much room here for unexplained
variables to have influenced the results.
A second problem in Part I has to do with sequential relationships
between the different modes of cultivation. The logic of Hanks'
argument and the evidence he provides clearly suggest that, if geographical
conditions are appropriate, increasing population and intensification
of settlement in a given area will be paralleled by transitions, first,
from shifting to broadcasting and, later, broadcasting to transplanting
cultivation.
This is so because increasing population density not only
enables a community to perform the tasks necessary for the cultivation
of the "next" mode, but also requires that it do so in order to obtain
yields high enough to sustain itself.
Yet, having clearly established
these relationships and, seemingly, this sequence, Hanks is reluctant to
draw the conclusion that as a population expands and its settlement
becomes more permanent, it·will, as ~general rule, change from shifting
to broadcasting and then from broadcasting to transplanting cultivation.
To the contrary, Hanks writes, "Rather than stages in development or
evolution, these modes of cultivation are manners of adapting to a
changing environment. The increasing populations offer a greater work
force to sustain a more demanding ecological holding, yet this is not a
one-way road." (p. 66) This assertion is followed by a pair of isolated
examples-exceptions, I would argue, which tend to prove the ruledescribing
those who have clung to traditional techniques while their
societies as a whole have moved on to the "next" mode. This reluctance
on Hanks' part can, I think, be related both to the village perspective of
Part II and to his conservative approach to which I will return shortly.
Part II presents a periodization of Bang Chan's history in which
mode of cultivation is the distinguishing characteristic: 1850-1890 are
the years of shifting cultivation; 1890-1935, years of broadcasting; and
1935-1970, years of transplanting. The differing modes of production
are related to the community's development in general, but not in a
· predictable, causal manner. Mode of cultivation is sometimes cause,
sometimes effect, of other historical developments.

2i4
Interspersed in Part II are sections which, while not directly
relevant to the development of rice cultivation as such, round out the
picture presented of Bang Chan as a rural Thai village. Hanks combines
his own insights with a heavy reliance on already published research of
others in these descriptions of the monastic, commercial and governmental
communities, as well as in the sections dealing with kinship
systems and other institutions of rural life. Like the historical sections,
they are well-written and entertaining. Obviously, Hanks has spent
much time not only in rural Thailand, but also thinking about it. His
descriptions of villagers, their houses, canal-bank scenes, and so forth
are charming and, I think, accurate.
The history presented here draws heavily on the research of the
Cornell Bang Chan project and it provides, as far as it goes, a valuable
picture of change in rural Thailand over the past century. But, whereas
the data used to buttress his arguments in Part I were not entirely
convincing, in Part II Hanks' account is severely limited by the neglect of
important historical resources. He may be justified in writing that, for
the 1840's and 1850's, "There are no records, thanks to mildew
'
centipedes, and termites with their appetite for paper." (p. 72) But for
the bulk of the years involved in this study, certainly from 1890 on,
extensive written documentation does exist, most notably in the form of
ministerial records in the National Archives. Whether documents
relating specifically to Bang Chan exist or not I do not know, but I
would estimate that those which provide information on all aspects of
life in immediately neighboring areas number in the thousands, and that
those pertaining to rural areas of central Thailand as a whole are many
times more numerous. Hanks' relation of events in Bang Chan itself is
probably quite accurate, but the wider context in which those events
are placed is much less so. Had he supplemented his oral sources of
history with either a closer reading of the published material or a perusal
of archival materials he would have avoided numerous errors. A few
examples will illustrate the point. For one,_ on p. 113, he gives an
incorrect figure for the rice-land tax. For another, on the following

HEVmws 215
page he praises an Englishman (presumably W.A. Graham) for reforming
the system of land registration in the early twentieth century,
whereas in fact credit for this important reform should go to several
Thai officials in the Ministry of Agriculture and Ministry of Interior. A
further example is his absurdly inaccurate, almost completely unfactual
treatment of the development of the Rangsit area to the north of Bang
Chan. (p. 114)
It may be that these and several other inaccuracies are not important
because they are not vital to the history of Bang Chan itself, but I
believe otherwise. First of all, if his oral sources provided inaccurate
information on these matters which can be checked against written
sources, how is one to judge the accuracy of their information not subject
to such verification? This difficulty is aggravated by Hanks' failure to
support his account with footnotes or specific references.
In addition, these inaccuracies point to the limitations Hanks bas
imposed on himself by confining his perspective to that of a single
village. Because of this limited perspective, Hanks misses, I think,
much of the larger picture of rural Thai history in the past century.
For example, he describes those who came to settle in Bang Chan largely
as refugees cast out from an expanding Bangkok. In Bang Chan, this
may have been the case, but those who rushed eagerly into the areas
between the Chao Phraya' and Bang Pakong rivers all through the 1870's,
1880's, and 1890's, were, I think, less outcast refugees than peasant
opportunists re~ponding to the potenttals of the expanding rice economy.
Behind this boom were international demands for Thai rice which Hanks,
from his v~llage perspective, fails to mention even once.
Thus, while the particular facts gathered here about the history of
an individual community are important data for any history of rural
Thailand as a whole, such a broader history cannot be derived from
that of Bang Chan alone. Its peculiarities must be matched and
balanced against those of hundreds of other villages before some
general picture will emerge.

216 REVIEWS
The fact that Hanks' rural history emphasizes the particular at the
expense of the general is related, I suspect, to his reluctance in Part I to
view the different modes of cultivation sequentially. A particular case
can be used to argue against any general trend-any uni versa! developmenl-and
one may choose to emphasize either the particular case or
the general trend. Emphasis on the general trend is consistent with the
view that an understanding of history as a progressive, progressing
phenomenon is possible, while emphasis on the particular case conforms
to a more conservative estimate of our ability to achieve an orderly
historical understanding of our past and future.
To me, therefore,
there is a conservative tone to the whole of this book, of which the
reluctance to draw the general conclusion in Part I and the emphasis on
the particular in Part II are two examples. A third example can be seen in
the conservative approach to politics and social change implicit in the
suggestion that social stability and order are necessarily the highest goals
a society can strive for. (p. 117) And a final example consists of the
numerous references to some ill-defined, mystical "Asian" approach to
life and society. Because this approach stresses harmony with nature
rather than development at its expense, Hanks implies, Westerners have
much to learn from it.
Obviously, there is much that is worthy of consideration in each of
these separate aspects of Hanks' approach. Because it is representative 1
of much currently fashionable thought, however, it is important to point
to its conservative nature.
David B. Johnston
Yale University

HEVJf.WS 217
M. Rajaretnam and Lim So Jean, Eds., Trends in Thailand : Proceedings
and Backgrouud Paper (Singapore University Press, 1973), 144 pp.
Trends in Thailand is the published paper of the Fifth Seminar
arranged by the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, Singapore, on May
5, !973. The Institute bas in fact been conducting a series of seminars
under the overall title of "Trends in Southeast Asia" since November
1970, with the aim of "keeping abreast of the latest political, economic,
social trends in the individual countries of Southeast Asia". (Preface)
But for the dramatic turn of events in October 1973, this noble
objective in Trends in Thailand would have been amply rewarded. As
it is, many of its analyses, observations, propositions, and predictions
must be read with qualifications, i.e. the reader must bear in mind the
significance of the overthrow of military rule in Thailand.
This little book is divided into four parts. The first part contains
the background studies done by the Institute's research officers namely
Messrs. Raja Segaran Arumugam, Patrick Low, and M. Rajaretnam; the
second part brings into focus Thai society and economy, with Mr. Sulak
Sivaraksa expounding on "The Role of the Intellectt.i'als", while Dr.
Boonsanong Punyodyana, and Dr. Amnuay Viravan presenting papers on
"The Changing Status and Future Role of the Chinese" and "Trends in
the Thai Economy" respectively; the third part concentrates on Thai
politics and foreign relations : two speakers, Mr. Saneh Chamarik and
Dr. Thanat Khoman, exploring (the former) "Questions of Stability and
Security in Thailand", and (the Jut ter) "Thailand in the Midst of Changes".
The last part is the windin,g up of the seminar with "Proceedings of
Forum''.
The Background studies reflect an admirable effort on the part of
the research officers in welding together numerous aspects of Thailand
with great precision, constructive analysis and relevant comments in a
concise and readable statement. For example, the main reason for the
1971 coup has been correctly pointed out as originating in "the domestic
sphere" and not in "the realm of international politics" as claimed in
the official version. But, as commonly happening to all works hindered
by both time and space limitations, the sources become over-exhausted

218 REVIEWS
when the writers attribute to Field Marshal Prapas Charusatbien the
role of the master.puppeteer of the majority of the elected members in
the Lower House. Police Major-General Sanga Kittikachorn publicly
declared not so long ago that the in-fighting of the UTPP with a result
heavily in the Maj.-General's favour, who is well-known for his not-sohappy
relationship with Field Marshal Prapas, was one of the first causes
leading to the coup as a means to strenghten Prapas's rein. Subsequent
events before October 1973 tend to support Sanga's claim, for example,
the promotion of Prapas from the rank of a General to that of a Field
Marshal, the big shuffling of top military personnel as late as September
1973-all to enhance Prapas's power and prestige as the country's strong
man.
The subsection on the Thai students up to the seminar period is a
fair account of their role in society. Be that as it may. one cannot help
suspecting that the factor overclouding deeper and more penetrating
findings has been the writers' a priori vision of Thai students as "rarely
(being) noted for a high degree of political activism and radicalism".
It is true that, 1111 comparison with radical and activist students in the
West, the Thai counterparts present a somewhat diluted element of the
fiery youth. But in the context of the Southeast Asian students, Thai
students have much to commend themselves. It was the collective
demand of students in 1957, heavily overshadowed by the military in
the later stage, that set the political ball rolling, culminating in the
overthrow of the much-despised Pibul-Phao clique, and paved the way
for Sarit to seize political power. Even before the great showdown
with the Thanom Government last October, the National Students
Centre of Thailand had scored a weighty success in their demonstration
on behalf of "academic freedom". The decision to take up the cause of
constitutional rule, plus the gross miscalculation on the part of the
Government as to the staying power of the unified students against
violent measures, logically led to the historic events of October 1973.
Among the contributions from the Thai speakers, two papers srand
out for their lucidity, realistic approach and coherent theme : "The
Changing Status and Future Role of the Chinese" and "Questions of

HEVIEWS 219
Stability and Security in Thailand". Dr. Boonsanong has done tremendous
work in bringing studies of the Chinese community in Thailand to
date. Many sensitive questions have been tackled with great tact and
understanding (pp. 61; 62-9). One only wishes that the dealing with
the minority ethnic groups bas been more thorough so as to present the
true nature of Thai society as well as to keep a balanced account of the
seminar proceedings. The Vietnamese ethnic group, for example, has
also played not so insignificant a part of late, and therefore deserves to
occupy at least no less attention than that accorded the Chinese ethnic
minority.
The reviewer feels that the other Thai contributors could have
rendered their statements more justice. The paper on "Trends in the
Thai Economy" which is well-supplied with relevant indexes of statistics
and useful informations (pp. 75-79), impresses one more as an annual
report than an analytical paper. (Dr. Amnuay, nevertheless, proves
himself very constructive in the discussions later, see pp. 136-7; 138-9).
Mr. Sulak's account of "The Role of the Intellectuals", on the whole,
leaves the reader much perturbed; for one thing, it is too much of a
black-and-white painting of the nature of the Thai intellectuals, (it takes
a great amount of courage and confidence of a man to divide arbitrarily,
as Mr. Sulak has done, "the Thai intellectuals"), and for another, its
objectives are val!uely, at times confusedly presented. The questions proffered
in the discussion may be employed as indicators of the impression the
reviewer wishes to convey (pp. 127-128). The statement on Thai foreign
affairs by Dr. Thanat probably unjustly suffers more from the author's
command of credibility than from the substance of the text. Nevertheless,
it is bard for the reader, such as the reviewer, who has made a study
of Dr.' Thanat's role as Thai Foreign Minister for a period of 13 years,
and who, it must not be forgotten, has witnessed his zeal as the greatest
"hawk" ever in the cabinet, to have much faith iri what he now advocates.
After all, Dr. Thanat himself relates enough incidents in his presentation
(pp. 98; I 02-8 l to prove that he had stayed on at the Foreign Office in
spite of the fact that his better judgements and principles were time and
again r.ebuffed. Any responsible politician with so strong a conviction,
as Dr. Thanat now projects himself, would have gladly resigned under
these distasteful circumstances and would not have waited to be

220 REVIEWS
ignominiously dropped after the November coup of 1971. Perhaps
it is unfair and unrealistic to raise this kind of objection as, though it is
by no means an unheard of political etiquette in Thailand, such a moral
code of conduct has so far failed to find favor among leading politicians
in power.
Trends in Thai/and contains numerous viewpoints of interest. The
study of Thai society by Messrs. Sulak and Saneh, for instance, leaves no
doubt that "Thai society is a society of government officials" (p. 57), and it
is not surprising consequently to find that "when it comes to the issue of
power and privilege within the social hierarchy in society, not only does
the issue of power system become closed in terms of upward mobility for
other Thais but it also somehow compels the uppe'r class Thais to become
introspective and ........ (cut off) from the real problems and needs of
the public at large" (pp. 93-4). The NBC attitude, since the November
1971 coup when the Thai leaders most consistently turned a deaf ear to
the growing demands of the people and stumbled from one mistake to
another without bothering to learn from tlleir past short-comings, has
proved beyond measure how accurate their profound criticism is.
By the middle of 1973 it became self-evident that the Thai leadership
cut no figure internally or internationally. The Thai speakers have
not failed to. comment on this unfortunate aspect of the country. Mr.
Saneh's narrative of Col. Narong Kittikachorn, the heir-apparent to the
Thanom-Prapas politico-military legacy, and Dr. Thanat's allusion to
''the personality next in the line for political succession" serve to drive
horne effectively the irreparable harm done to the regime's credibility.
The muddled-headedness not only prevailed in the domestic sphere
but also in the field of foreign affairs. Dr. Thanat's presentation has
left no question about the inability on the part of the Foreign Office to
initiate any far-sighted policy to safeguard national interests, even before
the "militarisation" of the Office. It is true that Dr. Thanat had advocated
for a considerable period a policy of forming a 'modus vivendi with
the People's Republic of China which was taken up by the Thanom
Government after 1971. Since then a long spell has elapsed and still the
Sino-Tbai negotiations have not got off the preliminary round of sports
diplomacy, while others, Malaysia for example, have already signe.d one
form or other of commercial agreements with the PRC. Dr. Thanat's

REVIEWS 221
critical opinion of the cause of this seemingly inexplicable lack of progress
must be given full credit (p. !08). It also reminds one of King Chu1alongkorn's
wise recommendation to his Minister of Metropolitan Affairs
on the policy towards the Chinese as far back as 1910. "Perhaps, once
making up our mind to go along with the Chinese, we must be firm and
courageous. We must not let them see that we are in anyway shaken
or hesitant at the prospect of such step. This, I think, is the most essential
point to put across (to the Chinese) ...."
The Thanom-Prapas Government could have profited more from this
royal directive than the one it favoured as referred to by Dr. Thanat (p.
108). Instead, as Trends in Thailand has made clear, it only managed
to hold on to the policy of one step forward and two steps backward,
which has, in turn, successfully discredited the whole regime.
Great hopes and promises have emerged with the departure of
military dictatorship of the Sarit-Thanom-Prapas clique, which has with
a brief interval between 1969-1971, dominated the political scene since
1958. Yet one only has to read various 'Narnings in Trends in Thailand,
such as, "Apart from the problem of Jack of technical expertise, the main
challenge for Thai policy makers is to work out a development strategy
which will try to redress the social and regional imbalances existing in
the society following a penod of rapid growth ...... a development
plan to harmonise the objectives of growth with social justice also
requires some kind of political and institutional structure which has a
clear sense of purpose and which will be innovative enough to bring
about the necessary reforms .... unfortunately this is something that
seems to be completely lacking in contemporary Thailand ..... ", (p. 89)
to realise that "one cannot feel very optimistic for the future of the
country". (p. 96)
To make effective and flowing reading, one is strongly advised to
read part 1 of this book with its various subsections each together with
the corresponding presentation in the two following parts.
Kobkua Suwannathat-Pian
Faculty of Humanities,
Chiengmai University

222 REVIEWS
Pongpen Sakuntapai, Ed., Politics for the Citizen (a series of booklets)
(Department of Government, Faculty of Political Science, Chulalongkorn
University, Bangkok, 1973).
' d cv "=\ 4~ 0 "" '"I\
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UflA'HH f)!llg;l~ftlff\lll ~W11:1~fl'HUJJ11l'JV1tl1!HJ I..&., b)
1) Kamol Somvichian, What is Democracy ?
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2) Sujit Boonbongkarn, The Citizen and His Political Role
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3) Jaroon Subbab, Parliamentary Democracy
en) 'il~qj ~fi1Vl 1h::: '117 r11ll '11 tJ u v m) fl m
4) Prapanpong Vejjajiva, Ombudsman
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v
This attempt by the Department of Government, Chulalongkorn
University to make available to the public certain ideas about politics
and government in an economical and readable form is praiseworthy in
that it shows the authors' willingness to descend from their ivory towers
to bridge the gap between the politically-oriented minority and the
apparently as yet apathetic (for a variety of reasons) majority. The
extent to which this series will encourage reasoned analysis and criticism
of the Thai political scene depends first on its marketing efficiency,
secondly and importantly on the books' understandability and thirdly on
their academic quality. This review will pay attention to the last two
issues.
\The reviewer's suitability to the task may indeed be questioned on
the ground that he is a member of staff in the same department as the
authors. However, since I have only recently joined this department, it
may be said that I am less socialised into its 'culture' than would have
otherwise been assumed. Furthermore, my academic background, being
in sociology, is at variance with that of most of the authors who are
political scientists. Therefore, I might venture to suggest that, whilst
sympathetic to their cause, I still retain a critical view of their products.
* * *

HEVIEWS 223
Dr. Kamol Somvichian, the author of What is Democracy?, begins
by dispelling the myth that the existence of a constitution and an elected
assembly are the hallmarks of a democratic polity. This is an important
point to make considering the history of Thai politics since 1932. The
book can then be seen to be divided into two interrelated parts. First,
be deals with the meanings political philosophers and political scientists
give to democracy and subsequently turns his attention to the level of
society and more specifically to the problem of the relationship between
individuals and groups in a democratic society. Throughout the book
the author is concerned to point to the philosophical assumptions about
human nature which underlie each of the approaches he mentions.
Thus, in the second section, he also deals with the polemics between the
Western democratic tradition and the Marxist (equating this with Communist)
tradition.
Dr. Kamol, being conscious of current misunderstandings, delineates
three basic tenets of democracy. First, the rulers must have received a
mandate to rule from the ruled. Secondly, the ru,led must have the right
to change their rulers from time to time. Thirdly, basic human rights
must be safeguarded. As a summary to the section on the political philosophers'
notions of democracy, he points out two basic assumptions
that, on the one hand, there is a belief in the abiiity of each ordinary
person to know how to choose a leader and, on the other hand, that the
individual might use the power given him in the wrong direction. Thus,
in a democracy, both the individual's and the government's freedom of
action need to be limited. The individual must be prevented from doing
things against the public interest and the government has to be controlled
by independent organisations which provide the means for the individual
to complain about the government's encroachment on his freedom. This
is then used to stress the author's disagreement with Saul Padover's idea
of majority rule without regard to minority rights. At the same time,
Dr. Kamal argues that although he himself does not make explicit his
ideas about equality, it is already implicit in his notions about the people's
mandate, occasional change of rulers (in that each has equal political
right in "one man one vote") and the safeguarding of basic human
rights.

224 HEVIEWS
The second section, dealing with the societal level of democracy,
brings the topic closer to the life of the individual reader. The practice
of democracy at this level is seen to involve three basic tenets. First, it
involves respect for each other's rights. This in turn means respect for
the rule of law without exception, each citizen having the duty to safe·
guard the law. The practice of democracy is also expected within the
family and the educational institutions. In other words, the family is
seen as an agent of socialization of the child into a democratic society.
Obviously, this does demand that such a one exists at the national level.
It is indeed the author's hope for Thailand, as is illustrated by his dedi·
cation of the book to his children: "with the hope that they will grow
up in a democratic system."
The second tenet demands that there is in a democratic society the
use of peaceful means of reaching a decision. The author skates over
the problem of equating "peaceful" with "rational" and with "majority
opinion", whilst at the same time he gives prime importance to "peace.
ful." It may be said that the belief in peaceful means may provide the
necessary conditions for rationality to operate, but it is by no means
sufficient; nor can it be said tba t "majority opinion" is always "rational".
That the complexity of this problem is not gone into might be understandable
in terms of the prevalent power of minority opinion in Thai
political decision-making, but it cannot be justified on academic grounds.
This issue perhaps shows up clearly the dilemma faced by an author
trying to produce a book for the general· reader from an academic
standpoint.
The author turns finally to the issue of social justice in a democratic
society. The arguments between the Western democratic and Communist
traditions is here illustrated by the notion of "equality of
opportunity". Though Dr. Kamol is not explicit on this distinction,
"equality of opportunity" to democrats means "equality of provision",
whilst communists as a matter of principle demand economic equality
as a prerequisite to "equality of opportunity". Dr. Kamol puts it in
terms of the communists preferring revolutionary means of changing the
economic structure of society, whilst democrats prefer reforms through
the political system. The equation of Marxist with Communist is

HEVIEWS
225
regrettable because it ultimately leads him to miss the point that both
Marx and the democrats hold the common assumption that man is
naturally "good", and thereby overstresses the incompatibility between
Marxism and Democracy.
On the whole, this brief discussion rightly raises many questions
in the reader's mind, but does not and cannot, within its framework
suggest ways of resolving them. The problems centre on the questi 01~
of the relationship between the political system and the social system,
one which was recognised by Marx and is an important concern of
sociologists such as Parsons and is central to Political Sociology. It is
not a simple matter of a particular kind of social structure giving rise to
a particular kind of political system. Furthermore, it cannot be assumed
that one can build a democratic political system out of the social and
economic structures of present day underdeveloped countries, dependent
as they are on the operations of the international market and aid from
the Big Powers. It is not surprising therefore that Dr. Kamal, who can
find no scientific support for the notion that man is a rational animal,
turns to mere hope or belief in democracy and asks for the opportunity
to learn about democracy by practising it in Thailand.
* * *
The theme of the relationship between the individual and the state
is continued in Dr. Sujit's The Citizen and his Political Role. It is,
however, the author's explicit intention to draw attention to the need
for group formation which will mediate between the individual and the
state ..
He devotes some time to laying out the arguments for and against
political participation. Those who do not favour it argue that nowadays
the process of government is too complex for the o~dinary citizen, not
having the knowledge and technical knowhow, to understand. T~e
electoral process usually produces people who, though popular, are
administratively incompetent. Their decision making is governe~. by
self-interest, creating a difficulty for the government in reconc1ltng
conflicting interests. Finally the rise of political awareness is seen as a

226 REVIEWS
double-edged sword, that is, participation by "legitimate" and "illegitimate"
means; the latter is then seen as leading to political instability.
On the other hand, those who favour political participation argue
that it would lead to real governmental responsibility to the public;
which is certainly capable of reviewing broad policy aims. Greater
political participation would make the citizen more willing to grant
legitimacy to the government. Instead of leading to instability, the
absorption of those who are politically aware serves to reduce disaffection.
Most importantly, the allowance of political participation would
encourage various groups to come together to solve important societal
problems, whilst its restriction would tend to accentuate fragmentation
within society.
Given that there is already some political awareness, the author
believes that the advantages of allowing political participation outweigh
the disadvantages. The level of demand for political participation
would depend on cultural tradition and attendant socialization processes
on the one hand and the availability of the means for political participation
on the other. Importantly, real political mobilization only arises
when political parties and elections can really affect the choice of
political leaders, this providing the incentive to participate.
However, it is not always the case that the politically aware do
become involved in politics. lnvol vement requires a belief that one
could influence the government and bring about change in policy. This
belief may arise through education creating self-confidence, encouragement
by others such as intellectuals, mobilization by political parties
and joining interest groups. The latter, though not specifically political,
usually become involved in politics in order to safeguard their interests.
Thus, it is usual that political parties and interest groups work in
conjunction.
Turning his attention to the Thai situation, the author observes
that neither the military nor the civilian governments have seriously
tried to change the people's orientation to politics. It remains unclear
as to what is the structure of the political system. It would seem that
"the constitution or the permanent system of government is temporary,
while temporary constitutions or temporary systems of government are

HEVIEWS
permanent" (p. 40). However, with the now increasing demand for
political participation it seems clear that the Thai brand of democracy,
whatever else it might be, must recognise the people's right to choose
their leaders. In other words, widespread political participation i~ a
necessary prerequisite of democracy. Given that political power in
Thailand lies with the bureaucrats, both military and civilian, it cannot
be expected that they will represent the people. Representative institutions
still have to be built; and the author emphasises two of them, the
political party and the interest group.
In the past, political parties were lacking in strength and in support
from the people. Strength depends on having a viable structure, faithful
members and responsible leadership. It would not be possible to snatch
power abruptly from the bureaucrats. It is important to estimate one's
resources in relation to what can be achieved and then act step by step.
Strength and support are mutually dependent, and have to be built up
together.
In talking about interest groups in Thailand, the author notes that
there arc a number of clubs and societies but they are not politically
active. This is so because people seek to influence political leaders
through personal channels rather than through the strength of interest
groups. On both sides, personal gains are obtained through the bureaucratic-commercial
complex, rendering interest groups to be no more than
a nomenclature. Dr. Sujit finds this regrettable. He argues that from
small beginnings, with clear ideology, endurance, practical assessment
of resources, real cooperation and commitment, real interest groups with
political influence can be formed. Intellectuals are clearly called upon
to 'come down' to the people and help them to begin this task which has
to be worked through step by step.
Dr. Sujit clearly believes that political development (with political
participation as a necessary prerequisite) cannot come about without
. the building of political institutions involving not only the rules of the
game but also the organization by which players can team up to play
the game according to the rules. This contention rests on sound
academic judgement;' but 1 cannot help feeling that we in Thailand have
hardly begun the academic work necessary for understanding the
227

228 REVIEWS
characteristics of what we call "interest groups" as they exist in Thailand.
We sometimes talk about patron-client relationships, but we
confine our definition to two persons and do not develop a picture of
the patronage system in specific contexts. If we do not know the exact
nature of existing ';interest groups", we can hardly hope to change them.
In any case, some of them seem to be changing already in the direction
of having real interest group features, particularly noteworthy are
university students and some groups of industrial workers. Yet, we are
still in the dark as to their organizational features, whether they have
"intellectual" patrons or not, etc. The answers to these questions are
surely relevant to our assessment as to whether it is realistic for us to
bope for the formation of real interest groups and ideologically-oriented
political parties.
On the whole, Dr. Sujit's prose is easy to under~tand. The book
is clearly written with a conviction, showing his bias but giving a fair
presentation of alternative ideas. The latter part of the book reveals
his conviction that power is best kept with the people and his slight
impatience with his colleagues whd remain in their ivory towers or who
seek personal gains through patronage, that is, with those who are
concerned purely with individual rather than group advancement.
* * *
Attention is turned to a particular method of achieving democratic
government in Mr. Jaroon's book Parliamentary Democracy. Its selection
for exposition is an arbitrary one. This means that there is in this book
virtually no attempt to show its advantages and disadvantages as
compared with other methods.
The author emphasises the fact that, in Parliamentary Democracy,
the electorate chooses members of Parliament and the latter in turn
nominate the Executive or Government. The source of all power,
therefore, lies with the people. Because of the . non-comparative
framework, the extent to which this is true is not made clear.
Looked at formally, there is a two-way process at work; one, the
people's control over the Executive and the Legislature (Parliament) and

HEVIEWS 229
two, the responsibility Parliament and the Executive have towards the
people. Through the electoral process the people both choose and
control members of Parliament. The latter then has the duty to legislate
according to the wishes of the people and to exert pressure. on the
government to act in order to satisfy the needs of the people. The
Parliament being in theory supreme, the government cannot remain in
power unless it is approved by Parliament.
This point about Parliamentary control over the government is
particularly important in the case of Thailand where the opposite is
usually true. The author points out that the degree of success in the
execution of this duty by Parliament depends on a number of factors.
First, the relationship between Parliament and the Government has to
rest on reasoned arguments and the consideration of the needs of the
country as the ultimate goal. Secondly, members of Parliament should
obviously know the needs of the people and thus be able to safeguard
their interests. Furthermore, they must be trustworthy, always thinking
of public rather than private interests and must not use their positions for
personal gains. Thirdly, the process of election itself should be clean.
There should not be pressure, such as from bureaucrats, for the people
to vote for a particular candidate, or the buying of votes either by
promises or money.
Finally and importantly, Mr. Jaroon points out, the "quality" of
Parliament depends on the "quality" of the people. "Quality" in this
case means interest given to politics, to the safeguarding of rights, etc.
If these qualities are lacking, then there is a high risk that Parliamentary
Democracy would be in form only, but in content would be government
by' an elite oligarchy. The latter can then use the mere fact of form to
say that there is democratic government whilst in fact there is concentration
of power within a small ruling group. When the level of political
consciousness is low, as is the case with most underdeveloped countries,
then it is easy for those with intelligence and know-how to exploit the
majority of the people who are much less knowledgeable.
Mr. Jaroon seems to put a greater percentage of the blame for the
failure of Parliamentary Democracy on the people's apathy, to the extent
that he says : "Underdevelopment is usually the factor which has such

230 REVIEWS
influence as to change an originally well-intentioned politician into a
person who later acts to the detriment of the country". One might well
retort : given that in an underdeveloped country there is by tradition
little political participation, is it not the duty of the well-intentioned
and more knowledgeable to encourage the people's interest in politics and
to show them how to play the democratic game ? Is it not more plausable
to say that these elites have always seen political apathy as a good
thing in so far as it creates no challenge to their own positions.
It is interesting to note that Mr. Jaroon sees tl1e development of
political parties as serving the function of coordinating Parliament and
the Government. It is argued that since the people elect members of
Parliament and the rule being that the party with a majority in Parliament
form the Government, it is therefore usual that the majority of
members would agree with the Government. This method works well
when there is a clear majority; but when there is not, there is usually a
coalition government which usually has internal conflict and is much
less stable.
Mr. Jaroon is of course writing from the point of view of theory
and explicitly assumes that political parties have clear ideologies with
little internal conflict. It is pertinent to point out here that this conception
of the political party is only a model which may or may not correspond
with reality in underdeveloped countries. If non-correspondence
is discovered, it would be the duty of academics to fashion concepts
which better describe political parties in particular situations. In writing
about ideal states, we may indeed be forsaking our responsibility of
describing and accounting for reality.
'
On the whole, however, Mr. Jaroon achieves a readable text-book
description of the "ideal-type" Parliamentary Democracy.
* * *
The safeguarding of public interest particulaily in individual cases
is the theme pursued in the exposition by Mr. Prapanpong on The Ombudsman.
I am not entirely capable of reviewing this work and can
therefore only make certain observations about the relevancy of this topic
to the current Thai situation. The Swedish ombudsman is appointed by

HEVIEWS 231
the Legislature rather than by tbe Executive. The Thai 'equivalent' is
obviously contrary to this model. The ideal would seem to be tbe
independence of the ombudsman from the influences particularly of the
Executive and the Administration, and in the case of the consumers'
ombudsman from that of the industrialist. Only in this way can the
ombudsman function to safeguard public interest. This book is of value
in providing the information on the original model. In view of the.
increasing need in Thailand for the safeguarding of public interests, it
deserves a far more competent and extensive review than I have the
ability to do here.
* * *
All in all, this series of booklets is providing relevant information
for those who wish to think about political affairs. Some of the books
stimulate much thought, others less so. After four issues, it is interesting
to watch and see whether the standard can be kept up. There would
also seem to be the problem of wider-scale marketing, one which may
prove unresolvable by this department which is after all a part of the
Thai bureaucracy. The marketing organisation is by nature amateurish
and involves the misuse of manpower. Unless this problem is solved,
however, the impact of these booklets on the reading public would
remain minimal.*
Prudhisan Jwnhala
Department of Government,
Political Science Faculty,
Chidalonglwrn University
* This review was completed in October 1973 but before the events of October
14-15. Ed.

232 REVIEWS
Jayanta Kumar Ray, Portraits of Thai Politics (Orient Longman, New
Delhi, 1972), pp. 225.
Were the facts of Thai politics for the past four decades to be laid
bare, romantic contemporary historians who thrive on the cloud of
mystery surrounding Thai political processes would surely be thrown
into despair. For such historians, the publication of Portraits of Thai
Politics need cause no alarm.
It is a tantalizing book in its casual finales where curiosity longs
for denouement, and it is an important book in its uneven but generous
smattering of first class primary source material. One wonders if it will
just add another set of myths to untangle. If that should be the case, it
is no less welcome, for, as the author notes, there is a dearth of primary
sources avail~ble in this field. In a political milieu so dominated by
personalities, memoirs are of special interest.
l
The heart of the book is the "political memoirs" of the late Thawee
Bunyaketu, Mom Rajawongse Seni Pramoj, and Lady La-iad Pibul Songgram.
All three have been important personalities in contemporary
Thai politics and close to the decisions as they were being made. While
not thorough in a biographical sense, the memoirs aim at the highlights.
Thawee's memoirs are excellent. Making up the longest section
of the book, they are relatively thorough and extremely candid. Beginning
with his sojourn as a student in France, he describes the ideals of
the 1932 coup group as they were forming, the preparations, how new
members were screened, how finances were arranged, the secrecy of
planning and timing, the events of the actual day of the coup, followed
by the troubles with Phrya Mano, the Pibul guided resignations of Phahon,
Phrya Song, Phra Prasert, the gesticulations of Pibul and Pridi, and the
frustration with Pibul which led to Phahon's resignation. Thawee also
spends time describing the events leading to ·the Japanese invasion of
1941 : for instance, P1bul's delayed return to Bangkok before the crucial
Cabinet meeting. the outline of the intra-Cabinet struggles over the correct
stance to take vis-a-vis Japan, and the eventual dismissal of Pibul.
Much of this account is discordant, however, with the later memoirs of
Lady La-iad.

REVIEWS 233
There is also a section devoted to recounting how Tha wee several
times outmanouvered Pibul on issues ranging from saving two office
girls accused by Pibul of not wearing hats to thwarting Pibul's attempt
to discredit him before Parliament in 1944.
Thawee's account of the Free Thai Movement also conflicts on
several points with that ot Lady La-iad. Police General Adul Aduldejarat,
for example, was, according to Thawee, acting under Pridi not
Pibul. We also learn of the use of robbers to harass the Japanese and
of the extent of connections with the Allies.
Post-war developments-the problem of the rice commitment, the
overseas Chinese actions, the British interference, and the excesses committed
by Thai soldiers which led to a struggle between civilian and
military elements in the government-all these too receive special treatment.
Finally, there are three sections: one, describing Thawee's short
stay in jail shortly after the coup of 1947 and his subsequent stay in
Penang; another describing his relations with Sarit; and lastly, one telling
of his successful struggle to speed up the promulgation of the 1968
Constitution.
The account is packed with intriguing details.
insights into personalities, it all makes fascinating reading.
Seni's memoirs are curious.
Even more for the
They are no less excellent for that,
but one is nevertheless left a bit disconcerted. The four years during
which Seni did "the hard, tedious job" (p. 148) of codifying Thailand's
laws are dismissed in three sentences. Half of a paragraph later he has
already accepted the assignment as ambassador to Washington. Any
curiosity about early working relationships with Pridi and Pibul is left
in a crippled heap as the narrative rushes on. And yet, a whole section
near the end centers around the 1292 stone inscription of King Ram
Khamhaeng of Sukhothai. The impression that this latter section is
simply used to launch into his rambling discussion of the inadequacies
of the '1968 Constitution leaves one still more perplexed over where it is
aLl meant to take us. The finale is a highly rhetorical admonition not to
despair, in spite of the apparent lack of democracy in Thailand. Instead
he reassures us that "the people of Thailand have already attained democracy
in their hearts." (p. 185) Coming from a constitutional lawyer,
and a brilliant one, it is a curious statement.

234 HEVIEWS
Sandwiched in the middle ase descriptions of Seni's experiences as
the Free Thai Movement leader in the United States, as Prime Min is ter
after the war, and the eleven years from the signing of the post-war
treaty to the rise of Sarit in 1957. In the first section, Seni argues that
at the time of Pearl Harbor he had to decide between keeping quiet (i.e.
getting sent baclc to Thailand by the US and having no chance to organize
a Free Thai Movement) and organizing a Free Thai Movement (i.e. taking
a chance with the wrath of the Pibul government). The choice, albeit
tempered by hindsight, seems a bit overly clear-cut, but why, after he
had chosen the latter alternative and had his nationality "proscribed"
by the Thai government, that same government would ask him to declare
war on the US seems even more mystifying-especially when Seni admits
that they had cut off financial support.
Having agreed to talce the post-war Prime Ministership after a third
telegram from Pridi had raised the spectre of British occupation, Seni
tackled the problem of getting foreign troops out of Thailand. Many of
these anecdotes-of the nullification of the first treaty with the British,
the belligerence of the British at the subsequent negotiations, the stalling
and eventual leak to the press required to get a suitable treaty-have
been circulating for some time, but it is good to have them in print, and
from Seni himself.
For the historian, anxious for new facts, Seni's description of the
Kuang Aphaiwong government and the successful campaign to discredit
Pridi in the wake of the regicide is frustrating. A number of people are
praised with a flare (including Seni himself), but th~ dynamics of situations
are summarized in sentences like: "That coup [Pibul, 1947], through
a series of events, led to the exile of Pridi (and the banishment of the
spectre of a Communist state) from Thailand." That is quite a packed
sentence to leave without comment! Similar sentences follow in rapid
succession.
It is an impressionistic picture which Seni paints. Flamboyant
yet blurred, it reveals on close examination skillful strokes but few details.
It is no less important for that.
Lady La-iad Pibul Songgram, as she admits at the start, has set
out with a specific purpose in mind: to defend her husband. She argues,
first, that Pibul's disposition was that of a scholar, not a strongman-in·

REVIEWS 235
direct opposition to the impression Thawee conveys. She emphasizes
the significance of the Boworadet rebellion in boosting Pibul to prominence.
On the touchy issue of the Chinese minority, she is adamant
about the laudable nature of Pibul's motives and the comparative moderation
in the methods employed.
Defending Pibul's pre~war policies toward Japan, she informs us
that he had made it clear to the Cabinet that he would accept their
decision on whether to fight Japan. The Cabinet, she says, not wanting
to appear opportunistic, rejected early on the Japanese proposal of
reacquiring "the lost territory". Pibul was not the leader of some "fascist
faction" which dominated the Cabinet. "This assertion," she
writes," is simply false." (p. 202) In fact, we are told that it was Pibul
who initiated the first anti-Japanese underground movement during the
war and that his close associate, Police Chief Adul Aduldejarat, was
eventually assigned the task of providing "protection and assistance"
for Pridi's Free Thai group.
Continuing, she recounts the refusal of Pibul to join the 8 November
Group, what eventually changed his mind, and what transpired in
the final phase of Pibul's career (particularly concerning his relations
with Phao and Sarit). Throughout are sprinkled tantalizing quotes from
Pibul's diary. The overall effect of Lady La-iad's memoirs is a portrayal
of Pibul quite out of the ordinary. One wishes it was longer, and much
more liberally sprinkled with diary quotes.
The lengthy introduction by Jayanta Ray is really a fourth section
and deserves some comment. The bulk of Mr. Ray's introduction is
concerned with reciting, occasionally at point blank range, what is found
in the subsequent memoirs. The setting is a chronological survey of
the modern period and intertwined is Ray's argument that Thailand
exemplifies Lucian Pye's "transitional society" model, but rates low
marks in the Almond-Verva "civic culture" scheme.
For those with a semi-careful knowledge of contemporary Thai
history, the introduction is liable to have a slightly somniferous effectparticularly
for those who follow G.B. Shaw's dictum and read the
introduction last. In attempting to spotlight differences between other
published interpretations and those found in these memoirs, Ray is occasionally
over-enthusiastic. For instance, Wilson indeed argues that
Pridi's Economic Plan created divisions in the People's Party but Wilson's

236 REVIEWS
interpretation does not conflict so drastically with the testimony of Thawee
and Lady La-iad as Ray suggests. In fact, Thawee's assertion that
"the plan caused no split in the People's Party" and Lady La-iad's
comment that "the infant ruling group was split in bitter dissent", are
quite contradictory on the surface. Wilson's measured handling of the
situation seems all the more appropriate. This may be a trivial point
in itself but it reflects the inclination in the introduction to become
enraptured with the glare off the wave rather than with the motions of
the wave itself. What is really interesting, for example, is the description
of the extent to which the plan as an ideological entity became
entangled in the web of petsonal power struggles.
A second criticism concerns the application of the models of Pye
and Almond-Verva. Professor Pye's model, though neatly built, must
be handled with caution if it is to have much meaning. Politicians contending
primarily on terms of personal prestige rather than on issues,
for instance, is something which, without refinement of definition, is not
only hard to measure but is frequently to be found in "sophisticated"
societies as well as transitional ones. In spite of repeated statements
by Thawee and Seni that they were motivated by certain principles
rather than personal ambition, Ray calmly points out that, indeed, "Thai
politicians exhibit this tendency [to compete] not primarily on issues of
alternate policies but on those of personal influence and 'prestige." (p.
28); and, therefore, Thailand fits this part of the model. The assertion
itself would have thrown us to the wolves of over-prediction, but the
testimony seems to condemn it first. The conclusion that Thailand fits
the mold of political parties frequently being "the projections of influential
personalities" (p. 30) is at least readily confirmable in some cases,
but it is virtually useless in the Thai context as a solid predictive tool.
Likewise, the fact of national leaders performing a variety of roles in a
transitional society seems to fit Thailand; unfortunately, at this level of
subtlety, it also pinpoints the Untted States as a transitional society
(although, granted, the conflicts of interest in Thailand are, generally
more obvious). Anyway, we are, in short, left with little more than a
fine example of the amorphous nature of the Pye model a la Ray.
The Almond-Verva model fares a bit better-with more thanks,
however, to the arrow and the target than to the archer. Almond-Verva's

HEVIEWS 237
point that ordinary citizens must find an equilibrium of pressure on and
deference to the political elite is never really discussed. Instead, an
extrapolation is inserted positing the need, and tbe favorable prospects,
for a balanced active involvement in politics and deference to those in
power by the non-governing elite. Seni is sighted as an examplar.
Almond- Verva's original point has a special potency for a country whose
politicians have never taken mass-based politics very seriously. It also
opens the door to an investigation of how opposition is expressed in Thai
society. The extrapolation, instead, accepts the Western norm of
expressing opposition and consequently should, by its own standard, be
at pains to find a niche in a milieu characterized by a vigorous distrust
of the notion of "loyal opposition". Patience and virtual political silence
for the non-governing elite remains a necessity, not a virtue. Ray
suggests that a good non-governing elite "should patiently wait their
turn, until, for instance, they win a General Election" (p. 52) They are
not holding their breath for such an occurrence in Thailand, in spite of
Mr. Ray's optimism. Reasons for optimism reside elsewhere.
Interpersonal trust and co-operation, a balance of consensus and
cleavage-these other two points of Almond-Verva mentioned are likewise
discussed at the level of the elite and are found lacking. It all adds up
to a rather scathing judgement of Thailand's chances for democracy.
The gymnastic handling of the argument and the model, however, makes
the exercise moN exhausting than enriching. The impact leaves one
skeptical, not only of the conclusion, but of the formula. It is too bad;
Thailand and the Almond-Verva model deserve more of a chance.
All in all, Portraits of Thai Politics is still a really fine book, a solid,
welcome addition to the primary source material on contemporary Thailand.
The task of collecting remembrances from prominent personalities
who have been at the heart of Thai politics for many years is a crucial
task, and one that cannot be delayed for long. Portraits is an important,
stimulating beginning which should be read.
Institute of Pulitics,
Kennedy School of G'ovcnmzent,
Ha1'vm·d University
Martin Getze11da11er

238 REVIEWS
Chira Charoenloet, The Evolution of Thailand's Economy (Thai Watana
Panich Press, Bangkok, 1971), 262 pages.
The book under review is an extensive survey of Thai development
in the 1950's covering virtually all aspects of the economy. Two general
chapters on the geography, climate, resources, and nature of the economy
are followed by chapters on agriculture, industry, infrastructure, international
trade, monetary and fiscal policies, all leading to a concluding
chapter relating the first six-year plan (1961-1966) to the development
of the previous decade. In reviewing a book which covers so much
territory, one can only hope to cover a few ·of the most important issues
that it raises.
With respect to agriculture, the author correctly emphasizes the
continuing importance but declining role of rice in total agricultural
output, the slow increase in rice area planted during the 1950's and the
apparent reversal of the century long decline in rice yield per rai, the
need to concentrate efforts on increasing yields if rice output is to keep
up with rising population and incomes in the future, and the remarkable
increases in production of maize, kenaf, cassava, sugar cane and some
other more minor crops. Moreover, he feels that the rapid expansion in
area planted and output of new crops belies the commonly held view
that farmers in underdeveloped countries in general and Thailand in
particular are tradition-bound, unreceptive to new ideas, and unresponsive
to market stimuli. The agricultural sections of the book are at
their weakest when the author discusses possible government policies to
promote expansion. He stresses that agriculture cannot be neglected in
favor of industry in a strategy of development, thus correctly rejecting
a view popular seve.~;al years back that industrialization and import
substitution were the keys to absorbing excess agricultural labor and
raising the national level of well-being, but aside from saying that there
is need for more irrigation, more agricultural credit, and more modern
technology, etc. he does not indicate what crops or geographical areas
should receive priority, or what obstacles lie in the way of further
expansion, or the extent to which current government expenditures fall
short of desirable levels in these areas.

REVIEWS 239
In describing the growth of industry in Thailand, he points out the
small size of the manufacturing sector, its dependency on processing
agricultural outputs (e.g. rice mills, saw mills, sugar factories, spinning
and weaving), and emphasizes that the limits to industrial growth are the
small size of the domestic market, limited natural resource base, and the
lack of capitalist entrepreneurship and a supply of managerial talent.
To counter this last deficiency, he suggests that Thailand should adopt
a different strategy based on the Japanese model of the last third of the
19th century whereby the government assumes the role of entrepreneur
and establishes new industries where private initiative is lacking. To
anyone familiar with the Thai experience of the 1950's, this is indeed an
incredible recommendation. During that period over a hundred manufacturing
establishments were set up under government auspices-some
operated by ministries and others as separate state enterprises. By the
latter part of the decade, it was readily apparent that the effort was a
disaster. Badly managed, overstaffed, and inefficient, these enterprises
were a drain on the national treasury and a threat to prospective foreign
investment. This unfavorable experience led to a 1959 I.B.R.D. recommendation
that the government withdraw from competition with the
private sector and to the creation in 1959 of the Board of Investment to
implement an eariier government act ( 1954) to promote private industry.
While the author seems genuinely concerned that government policy only
afford protection (and other promotion advantages) to those industries
which are capable of becoming competitive in world markets in the long
run, he seems to feel that the government promotion and protection
policies have in fact been guided by this criterion (see p. 71). This
appraisal seems to be an unduly generous interpretation of Thai
government policies. The promotion policy groups industries into Class
A, "vital and necessary", to the Thai economy, Class B, "less vital and
necessary", and Class C "other worthy industries" and gives privileges
in the form of exemptions from import duties and business taxes on
capital imports to be used in the new plant, exemption from income
taxes for five years, exemption of import duties and business taxes on
imports of raw materials and other inputs for five years (the size of the
exemptions varying between .. the three classes), guarantees against
nationalization and competition from new state enterprises, privileges

240 REVIEWS
to own land and bring in skilled personnel, and the right to repatriate
capital and profits. Additionally the Board of Investment could give
the promoted firm protection from import competition by higher duties
or even a ban on imports. To this day, there is no clearly stated
criteria by which certain types of industries are selected for promotion
and certainly no criterion which states that such industries must be able
to compete with imports or able to export without special privileges and
assistance within some specified time period. Looking at Thailand's
overall strategy toward industry, it is apparent that it is one of import
substitution with the usual pattern found in less developed countries of
favoring final consumer goods with relatively high tariffs, intermediate
inputs with lower tariffs, and capital goods imports with still lower
tariffs. The result of such a structure of protection is to promote the
production of final goods and alter the structure of imports away from
consumer goods toward intermediate and capital goods imports, an
alteration in structure which the author notes occurred in the 1950's, and
which has continued to the present. Whether such protected industries
will eventually become competitive remains to be seen.
I would now like to turn to some overall impressions about this
book which in turn will engender some comments on parts that I have
not yet discussed. , The book contains on impressive array of statistics;
every major subject the author covers is accompanied by tables showing
the behavior of economic variables under discussion over the decade of
the 1950's. Such a lavish use of statistics is usually welcome (although
none will appear new to the serious student of the Thai economy as they
are from readily available sources), but the reader should be forewarned
that the author seems totally oblivious of the quality of the data he is
presenting. It is well-known that many Thai statistics are subject to
error or are possibly misleading (e.g. estimates of agricultural production
by different sources give conflicting results, estimates of the occupational
distribution of the labor force are subject to large margins of error,
estimates of government expenditure may or may not include that
expenditure financed' by foreign grants and loans, etc.) yet at no point in
the book does the author question the validity of the data he is presenting
or point out to the reader possible pitfalls in its interpreta'tion. A

Rt·:Vn·:ws 241
couple or examples may sullicc to make the reader cautious. about using
dma fr

242 REVIEWS
rates. Yet despite his advocacy of measures to reduce the regressiveness
of the overall tax system (p. 168), the author is still able to say on p.
170 that "it seems very likely that the tax [the rice premium] does not
act as a serious disincentive and that if it were removed, little benefit
would accrue to the farmer."
On what basis can he justify that
statement? Secondly, despite his strong emphasis on the role of investM
ment in capital equipment, in infrastructure (roads, irrigation, etc.), and
in human capital (e.g. education, health), the author nowhere sketches a
simple model explaining those factors which lead to economic growth
or explaining the relationship between rates of saving and inves!ruent
(say as a percentage of gross national product) and the rate of economic
growth.
Such a model, while admittedly crude, would give the reader
some idea what percentage of national income must investment be
before the economy can be expected to achieve a certain growth rate and
how far below that level the T'bai achievement of the 1950's was. As
the author's presentation stands, be is merely advocating more investment
in irrigation, roads, education and health facilities, etc. (which we
all would agree would be nice) without giving us any clue about the
extent to which such investment was inadequate in the 1950's and what
levels would have been desirable. ·As a consequence, his analysis of the
First Six-Year Plan ( 1961-1966) is nothing more than a description
of the objectives of the plan and the priorities for government invest~
ment as stated in the plan. He cannot tell us whether the levels of
planned saving and investment called for are likely to be adequate to
achieve the planned overall growth rate nor can he tell us the relationship
between the sectoral growth rates (for sectors within industry and
agriculture) foreseen by the plan and the levels of either past or planned
government infrastructure expenditure. Hence the reader comes away
with no clue as to whether the overall and sectoral growth rates planned
are realistic or not.
By now. the reader of this review may understandably be somewhat
puzzled as to why a book under review in late 1973 does not contain an

REVIEWS 243
ex post evaluation ofthe achievements of the First Six-Year Plan (1961-
1966) and perhaps a good portion or all ·of the Second Five-Year Plan
( 1967-1971) as well. The book, the author's dissertation from the
Indian School of International Studies, was first printed in 1971 but
reads like a book that was completed many years prior to that date, say
1965 at the latest (the latest reference in its bibliography is for 1963).
If I am correct that a substantial number of years elapsed between the
book's completion and its publication, it is puzzling why the author did
not update some of the material in the book. It would not have been
necessary to extend the entire coverage of the book to include the 1960's;
it would have been sufficient to relate the development of the 1950's to
the actual achievements under the First and part of the Second Plan
(thus requiring a revision of the final chapter alone) perhaps explaining
the extent to which the faster growth rate of the 1960's was dependent
upon the development of the 1950's. Had the author done so, his book
might have been a more valuable contribution. Without this alteration
and with defects outlined above, the book is a poor substitute for more
recent books covering the whole economy or substantial sectors over the
entire period since World War II.
William A. McCleary
Faculty of Economics,
Thammasat University

244 HEVIEWS
Ernst E. Boesch, Communication Between Doctors and Patients in Thailand.
Part 1 : Survey of the Problem· and Analysis of. the Consultations (Socio­
Psychological Research Centre on Development Planning, University of
the Saar, Saarbrucken, West Germany, 1972), pp. 157.
The publication under review is the first of three research reports
and as such summarizes and comments on the findings collected during the
first phase of the study (November 1970-June 1971) when initial hypotheses
were being tested in the field. Recordings made during medical
consultations are also analysed with a view to assessing to what extent
the protagonists' perception of their relationship is related to the actual
process of interaction.
This study of the relationship between doctors and patients in Thailand
is part of a larger programme, concerned with investigating the role of
elites in the development process, being sponsored by the German Research
Foundation (Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft). Aside from its intrinsic
interest this interdisciplinary study is significant as being specifically
action-oriented in that it is intended that the research findings be implemented
in the training of doctors at a number of Thai medical faculties
(see Outline of Follow-up Projects. Saarbrucken May 1973)
Data was obtained by interviewing doctors about their work and about
their patients; through interviews with patients about their illnesses,
their experiences with the health services and the general circumstances
of their lives; and by making tape-recordings of medical consultations
in progress. The interviews and recording were collected in hospitals
and health stations in Bangkok, Ayutthaya, Lopburi and Nakorn Sa wan.
Twenty-eight doctors' between the ages of 28 and 58 were interviewed,
whilst 154 interviews were made with patients.
In his discussion of research techniques adopted Dr. Boesch is quite
frank about their possible limitations and the consequent likelihood of bias
in the data collected. He discusses, for example, the implications for his
research findings of the status differences between interviewers and respondents
(both doctors (p. 13) and patients (p. 25) ), the human element
is of course an irreducible in all interview situations but is of special
significance in a society where there is cbnstant overt recognition of status

245
differem:cs, and great awareness of their implication for social interaction.
Previous research has shown that the Thai medical service is strikingly
under-utilized relative to that of other countries both developed and
under-developed.
"In Africa, the average person visits a health facility about
two tunes per year. In the United States the figure is around
four, but in Thailand it is about 0.2 (Bryant, 1970 p. 56)"
With referem:c to an article on "Western Medicine in a village of
Northern Indian by Marriot, Boesch postulates that interpersonal com~
munication is a crucial variable in determining the speed and extent to
which rncdical innovution is accepted and new services utilized.
Moreover difllcultics in communication cannot be reduced to mere differences
in language skills, but may arise from the fact that each participant
operates witltin a totally different universe of meanings and
behavk>ur, in medical as in all other spheres.
One symptom of the fact that dot:tor and patient inhabit, in effect,
different subcultures is the fact that their expectations relative to their
own nnd to the cHher's roles are incompatible.
The tll>Cl(ll' perceives hi msclf as hampered by his patients' ignorance,
and Jm:k t.>f education; they do not consult him at a sufficiently early stage
in their illness; they cannot describe their symptoms with any precision;
they fail to full ow the advice prescribed and change doctors very
frequently.
B

246 REVIEWS
Dr. Boesch hypothesizes that the length of time allotted to a consultation
reflects the doctor's attitude more than his workload. He has
got into the habit of forming his diagnosis too quickly because he does
not enjoy interaction with his patients; he is impatient of them and
considers attempts at explanation a waste of time. He further expects
them to act "rati~mally"-by which he means to follow his directive
which may not be at all "rational" in the patients' terms, (p. 17).
Of course as Dr. Boesch points out it is neither feasible nor necessary
that each patient achieve a technical grasp of their illness and its
treatment; but it is imperative that they be made to feel that the doctor
understands and cares, that he is credible and trustworthy. Which is
to say that in such a case effective treatment of the symptoms cannot be
a purely commercial transaction but must have a sound moral basis.
As patients are not yet convinced of the efficacy of Western medicine, or
of its supposed superiority to traditional methods, the relationship with
practitioner is clearly very crucial in determining their willingness to
follow the treatment prescribed.
Some of the misunderstandings which arise (in the absence of any
community of sentiment or belief) are based on purely semantic differences
which would seem to be easily soluble with a little imagination
and empathy on thet doctor's part. He may for example prescribe a
tablespoonful of medicine to be taken every four hours; an apparently
simple instruction in a modern urban context. But a farmer may not
have a tablespoon, or may not know which of the spoons he bas conforms
to that description. He may well have no means of telling the time
with any precision; he may think that this periodicity applies to nighttime
too (p. 20).
'On the other hand it is differences more serious than purely lexical
ones which prevent the patient for asking for clarification on these points
and so losing face.
It is not surprising that a course of treatment which seems both
incomprehensible and irrelevant is not closely followed, particularly
when its authority is also-in the view of the patient-open to doubt.
The persistence of the symptoms confirms the patients' original scepticism

REVIEWS
247
and he totally discontinues the treatment or seeks advice elsewhere;
the probability of a accurate diagnosis of his symptoms decreases
accordingly.
It is interesting to compare the doctor /patient relationship with
other superficially similar types of patron/client relationship existing in
Thai society. In the classic type of regularised patronjclient relationship
the status asymmetry is clearly defined and permanent. The patron
provides material and other support for his clients, in turn, they provide
him with a reserve of manpower he can call upon, which (in itself) is a
validation of his status superiority. Both parties can earn merit through
the enactment of this symbiotic relationship, as a by-product of the correct
performance of these recognised social roles.
The doctor /patient relationship at least in the contexts covered by
this study i.e. in government hospitals, clinics, and health centres also
exhibits cle~\r status asymmetry; neither party is in any doubt as to the
doctor's superiority. Whereas, in the orthodox patronjclient relationship
however, each party recognises a moral obligation (which is expressed in
idiom of merit-making) towards the other, this is not true between doctors
and patients. The doc tor in the context of government service does not need
to form any personal bonds with his patients, in fact his behaviour would
suggest that he shrinks from personal involvement, and tries (consciously
or otherwise) to keep the interchange as brief and impersonal as is possible;
he treats the symptoms rather than the patient. In a sense the
doctor's attitude to the relationship can be almost commercial, or rather
contractual, in that he sees no need to stabilize or prolong the relationship.
He does not need a large number of patients to validate his
professional standing, in that his career depends more upon his relationship
with his professional colleagues than upon those with his patients.
His primary loyalties are with them, and froin them he receives moral
and intellectual reinforcement (p. 23 ). On the other hand the doctor
acts upon the assumption that his superior status is sufficient to render
his advice authoritative; that patients should act "rationally" (p. 17) as
he directs, regardless of whether or not be has given them any reason so
to do in their own terms. The doctor, according to this survey appears
to want the noblesse without any attendant oblige!

248 REVIEWS
The patient on the other hand, in the absence of any real understanding
at least needs to know that the doctor understands and cares
before he will feel a commitment to following the course of treatment.
He needs in a word to create the moral bond which is unnecessary and
even distasteful to the doctor, but he has no apparent means of achieving
this. Some patients may try to pay more for the services than is demanded
in the hopes of securing "special" treatment (p. 32).
This study is very timely for Thailand in that doctors are being
used increasingly in development activities (FP and Health Education).
But it is important not to lose sight of the fact that the conditions he
describes are not peculiar to Thailand or to "developing countries";
patients in Europe and the States also complain that their doctors are
remote and "elitist", although the gap is narrower in that in most cases
it would not be true that the doctor and patient inhabit "different
subcultures."
It is inevitable that members of an elite highly specialised professional
group-lawyers, priests, doctors-are to some extent, and by
definition, and of necessity removed from the people to whom they
minister. Of all these professional groups it is perhaps the doctor who
deals most exclusively in human distress, and were he to become emotionally
involved with each case then he could not function; to some extent his
ability to treat the disease rather than its human vehicle is a defence
again~t such crippling involvement, and yet the disease cannot be understood
out of its context. The good doctor must strike a balance by
taking into account the patient's case-history and current personal/social
condition, and by providing treatment in a humane and compassionate
way without emotional involvement. ·
For the patient on the other hand the disease is him. His worldview
is completely changed by the fact of his illness. He needs both
psychological and physiological care and attention, and for this reason
may well attempt to obtain the doctor's emotional involvement in his
case. These inconsistencies and inequalities in supply and demand as
between doctor and patient would seem to be a feature of the relationship
universally, but there is no doubt that these difficulties are vastly
compounded in a developing country where the modern medical system
is alien and incompletely accepted.

REVIEWS 249
The study raises a number of questions for further investigation;
for example, it would be interesting to see whether doctors are prepared
to invest more effort in communicating with their patients in private
clinics where there is a direct relationship between their income and
their ability to attract patients. It is possible of course that the gap
between the doctors, and the patients who attend private clinics may
from the outset be appreciably smaller.
A further query relates to the role of the nurse in doctor/patient
interaction, is it possible that they can or do act as liaison between the
two parties, having in many cases a foot in each subculture?
The examination of this deep-seated lack of communication, and,
on the part of the doctors of an apparent absence of concern about this
lack, suggests limitations, in the short-term at least, on the doctor's
potential as a change agent, a function he bas currently been assigned
in the Thailand National Family Planning Programme. Although one
of the obvious solutions to the problem lies in improved general standards
of Health Education, it would appear that, at this stage, the doctor
is not best qualified to take any very significant part in this effort. If the
needs of the patient cannot surmount the barrier between the two, how
much more difficult would be the communication of unfamiliar and often
repugnant (e.g. contraceptive techniques new concepts).
In summary the fact that official medical practitioners are relatively
unutilized by the majority of the population suggests that further study
of traditional medical practitioners of all kinds is in order. In that they
apparently have the ear and confidence of the patient or potential patient
it is important to explore how if at all they might be incorporated in
official health development programmes without destroying the basis of
their support in the community. As they would appear to provide treatment
for physiological symptoms and at the same time give psychological
satisfaction interdisciplinary studies which both examined their social
relationsbi ps and analysed the techniques and remedies they purvey would
be of great value.
D.S.C.S.,
Bangkok
Jane B111mag

250 REVIE:WS
Nguyen Van Phong, La societe vietnamienne de 1882 a 1902 d'apres les
ecrits des auteurs /ranqais (Presses Universitaires de France, Paris, 1971)
pp. 388.
The author of this elegant and densely written book is a Roman
Catholic priest, educated during the colonial era in what is now the
Democratic Republic of Vietnam and, since 1954, at various universities
in France, where he is now a member of the prestigious Centre Nationale
de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS) under whose auspices, in part, this
study-originally a dissertation at the University of Paris-has been
published.
I mention these details because they help to explain what some
readers might find the peculiar angle of vision from which Dr. Phong
has chosen to analyze Vietnamese society at the end of the nineteenth
century. Scrupulously avoiding Vietnamese-language sources (except
wbere they have been rendered into French) he sets out to reconstruct
his own society through the testimony of a generation of French writers.
Using techniques absorbed in his French academic training (which
include heavy, but palatable, doses of sociological theory) Dr. Phong
describes Vietnam in terms that Vietnamese of the time would not have
used.
In his introduction (''Les auteurs et leurs ecrits") Dr. Phong moves
swiftly over some of the territory mapped out some forty years ago by
Louis Malleret in his classic study, L'Exotisme indochinois et !a litterature
fran~aise. The center of the book ("La societe vietnamien.oe dans son
organisation et dans ses transformations", pp. 65-264) is followed by a
short concluding section ( pp. 265-348) in which he evaluates his sources
and Vietnam's colonial experience as a whole.
As if the problems posed by an alien angle of vision, a vanished
society and severely limited sources were not enough to absorb him, Dr.
Phong, in what can only be called a tour de force, has selected the twenty
years of the colonial era in which the interaction between France and
Vietnam (especially in the north) was most intense, when the French
angles of vision, in many cases, produced the most distortions, and when
Vietnamese political, sopial and economic institutions were undergoing a
bewildering and revolutionary process of disintegration. In other words,
the "Vietnamese society" which he reconstructs is not the "timeless"
one which many Frenchmen of the time wanted, and professed to see,
but one that was tearing itself and was being torn apart.

REVIEWS 251
Because he has chosen these twenty years, rather than an earlier
period, most of his data comes from the northern parts of Vietnam.
This would seem to suit Dr. Phong's institutional bias, for the northern
parts of Vietnam were the ones in which Chinese influence, the mandarinate,
and imperial power (to name only three phenomena) were stronger
than they were then (or would ever be) in the south. In the north there
were fewer collaborators, many more people, less wealth, and more
prolonged, better organized resistance. The French response to the
Vietnamese in the north was different from their earlier response in
Cochinchina, but in both places, as Dr. Phong points out (p. 292), the
destruction of Vietnamese institutions that was taking place around them
was not seen as a tragedy but often as a "picturesque adventure".
A French writer in the 1880s argued that France was '~revolutionizing"
Vietnam. Certainly many of its institutions, especially at tl1e
pinnacle of society, and many of its commonly- held attitudes were
destroyed, or overturned, in the last two decades of the nineteenth
century. The emperor and his mandarinate, for example, never reemerged.
The "Indo-China" created out of whole cloth by Governor
Doumer at the end of the century was much more like the place the
. French abandoned fifty years later-institutionally, at least-than it was
like the place the French had first discovered, in some cases, barely
twenty years before.
Dr. Phong's surprisingly unpolemical book provides fresh insights
into Vietnam and the colonial experience. Its wealth of detail (see, for
example, the pages on food, clothing, and the theatre) is extraordinary.
As a dividend, the reader will encounter dozens of marvellous quotations,
such as Clemenceau's definition of a protectorate as "governing a
government", or a Figaro correspondent's complaint that Vietnamese
society was "from our point of view incomplete and even illogical".
The book's extensive bibliography is arranged, interestingly, in
terms of the years in which books or articles first appeared. The evolving
concerns and perceptions of the French, as revealed by the titles,
form the basis of an essay in themselves.
As the best analysis in a western language of Vietnamese society
in the late nineteenth century, Dr. Phong's book is also an absorbing
study, from both sides of the exchange, of the mission ctvilisatrice.
Monash University
David P. Chandler

252 HEVIEWS
The Crawfurd Papers. A Collection of Official Records relating to the
Mission of Dr. John Crawfurd sent to Siam by the Government of India
in the year 182I. (Bangkok Vajirafiana National Library, 1915, reprinted
by Gregg International Publishers, Ltd., Farnborougb, 1971), pp. xi, 285.
In 1821 Dr. John Crawfurd was sent by the Government of India
on a mission to the courts of Bangkok and Hue in an effort to obtain
more favorable trading conditions for British merchants going to those
countries in order to eventually open new markets for British manufactured
goods and to provide a stimulus to flagging British trade. From
the point of view of ac'complishing its aims the mission was a failure,
and at the Siamese court the mission generated so much suspicion that
the Phra Khlang, who acted as Foreign Minister, was moved to write a
letter of complaint to the Indian Government. Crawfurd's published
journal of this mission* though being a highly informative and valuable
account tends to be somewhat reticent about certain of the points of
tension between Crawfurd and the Siamese court. It was in order to
rectify this deficiency tl1at the Vajirafiana National Library in 1915 obtained
permission to publish the collection of documents in the archives
of the India Office pertaining to Crawfurd's mission (p. iii).
At the time of the mission both the political and economic fortunes
of the ruling faction at the Court of Siam were flourishing, and the
princes and ministers of this group were not inclined to look favorably
on Crawfurd's proposals, particularly as the effect of the measures proposed
in his original instructions would have been to sharply curtail or
even end the long-standing and lucrative royal trade monopolies from
which the Siamese court derived a large part of its revenue. The British
deprived themselves at the outset of the one bargaining counter that
might possibly have brought success, i.e. permission for the Siamese to
buy firearms in British territories (pp. 162, 177). With the Thai mood
as it was, the rumors that the British might use force if their demands
were not met acted not as a lever to persuasion but as an irritant, an
irritant which was exacerbated by the mission's surveying and information-gathering
activities ( pp. 84-87, 219, 268-269). Incidentally, these
documents hint that the idea of using or threatening the use of force was
* Dr. John Crawfurd, .Tom:nal of an Emha~sy from the Governor-General of India to
the Courts of Siam and Cochin-China, London, 1828.

1\EVJEWS 253
not altogether absent from Crawfurd's mind (pp. 45*46, 151*152), and
thu~ th~ rumors attribu~ed to Crawfurd's intrepreters and reinforced by
the md1screet conversation of the captain of the mission ship were per*
haps not entirely without substance (pp. 95*96, 269). Thai apprehensions
concerning British surveying activities were also perhaps not totally
unwarranted, despite Crawfurd and the Indian Government's dismissal
of such fears as groundless (pp. 84, 171 ), since the mission's survey of
the Sichang Island group in the Gulf of Siam was the basis for Crawfurd's
recommendation that one of these islands be obtained as a British
entrep6t (pp. 163-164), a measure that would undoubtedly have been
inimical to Thai interests. (See, for example, Crawfurd's suggestion on
pages 151-152 that these islands be used as a base to blockade the Thai
court into submission to any "just or necessary" British demands "should
the arrogance of the Siamese embarrass us.") Fortunately for Siam this
proposal, although endorsed by the Indian Government, was vetoed by
the Company directors in London (pp. 177, 219-220).
Perhaps the most enlightening aspect of the Crawfurd Papers, is
what they reveal, by the very nature of the points of tension between
Crawfurd and the Siamese and through the arguments advanced by
either side in defense of their own position or conduct, about the wide
divergency between the world-views of the Thai and the British at the
time, a divergency which encompassed ideas on such fundamental issues
as the rights of governments and the nature of diplomacy. In other
words this was not a case in which both parties while seeking their own
ends still subscribed to the same ground rules, but one in which each
party held fundamentally different ideas allout what the rules ought to
be. Thus, although both parties might appear on the surface to be talking
about the same thing, neither party understood the basic assumptions
which led the opposite party to take the positions it did. A prime
example is the case of the negotiations over the restoration of the Rajah
of Kedah. The Rajah, after being accused by the Governor of Nakhc;m
of treason and having suffered an invasion of his territory byforces fro~
Nakh9o, had fled to Prince of Wales Island to the protection of the Bntish.
Crawfurd, who was then on his way to Siam, bad been asked by
the government of Penang to seek the Rajah's restoration. Crawfurd
did so, expressing the British point of view that the Rajah's behavior
was excusable in light of his oppression by the Governor of Nakh9n.
In the eyes of the Thai court, however, the Rajah's behavior could not

254 REVIEWS
be so easily excused. Not only was he accused of intriguing with the
Burmese, who were preparing an invasion force at this time, and obstructing
the attempts of the Governor of Nakhn to mobilize for defense,
but he significantly chose as the occasion to announce his revolt the Water
of Allegiance ceremony.! Setting aside the question of whether or not
the Governor of Nakhc;m had fabricated or at least exaggerated the
charges against the Rajah of Kedah for his own purposes, if the Rajah
of Kedah were indeed int1ocent of the charges or unjustly maligned or if
he bad indeed been oppressed, in a traditional Southeast Asian context
his only resort to prove his innocence should have been to personally
lay his case before the king, trusting in the Icing's benevolence and wisdom
to give him just treatment. His very presence would have argued
for his innocence or at least in mitigation of his guilt. Therefore his
unwillingness to come to the capital was seen by the Thai court as a de
facto admission of guilt. Thus the Pbra Kblang's reiterated statement
to Crawfurd that "the Rajah of Queda is not a child, he knows the customs
of the country, and if be wishes to be restored, be must come into
the presence, and submit his cause to the King" (p. 36). To Crawfurd
this merely demonstrated the determination of the Rajah's enemies to
gain bodily control of him, Crawfurd making little apparent effort to
understand the principle underlying the Thai court's stand. The Thai,
in turn, saw British intercession on behalf of a vassal who knew what
was expected of him as being unwarranted interference. Thus the
Siamese court turned a deaf ear to Crawfurd's intercession.
Crawfurd's correspondence with his own Government contained
in the Craw!urd Papers makes it abundantly clear that he subscribed to
the Indian Government's opinion that countries not sharing the heritage
of Western ideas of diplomacy and statecraft were somehow "barbarous"
and needed to be dealt with somewhat in the manner of a parent admonishing
a wayward child. The Thai court returned the dubious compliment
of misunderstanding by viewing the British mode of diplomatic
procedure as being highly peculiar. Thus Crawfurd's attempt to negotiate
points not mentioned in the Governor-General's letter was seen by
the Thai as an attempt by Crawfurd to exceed his authority (pp. 83-84,
268). For the point here it is irrelevant whether Crawfurd asked for
1) Manuscript Division, National Library, Records of the Second Reign, C.S. 1184
(B.E. 2365), no. 3.

llEVIEWS
the establishment of a British consulship as he claimed or for permanent
residency for British merchants as the Thai court daimed since neither
was mentioned in the Governor-General's letter. The amount of discretion
which the Governor-General had allowed Cn~wfurd seemed to
the Thai officials to be most unusual and the Phra Khlang ''chose frequently
in conversation to make this very point the subject of personal
complaint to myself, artfully congratulating me on the confidence reposed
in me by so high an authority" (p. 84). Perhaps, as the Phra Khlang's
letter of complaint to the Indian Government implies, the Thai court
did not really believe Crawfurd's claims to independent discretion or at
least were entirely unsure of how far this discretion extended, and thus,
out of prudence perhaps, refrained from entering into any agreement with
so unusual an agent.
One of the most entertaining pictures conveyed in the Crawfurd
Papers is that of British officials, who found it necessary to take a "high
tone" in their dealings with Asian principalities, inveighing against the
"haughtiness," "arrogance," and "national vanity" of the Siamese. It
was a matter of representatives of two proud and self-confident' civilizations
confronting··one another. Within their own world the Siamese
bad legitimate reason to be proud. That this world was threatened
they were hardly aware at the time of Crawfurd's mission, as is evidenced
by Crawfurd's observation that the principal portion of the army was
kept on the Burmese frontier, no apprehension of invasion from any other
quarter (i.e. by sea) being entertained (p. 126). That such an awareness
was rapidly being awakened, however, is attested to by the anxious tone
and the astuteness of the Thai officials inquiries into the actions of the
British (pp. 93-99, 203).
There are very few Western-language accounts of Siam during
this period and thus the Crawfurd Papers are a valuable source to scholars.
This edition is a photolithic reprint of the original 1915 edition
published by the Vajiranana National Library and is to be welcomed for
making this interesting collection ofdocuments more generally available.
Lol'l·aiue M. Gesiclc
Cornell University

ln:vmws
Yoneo Ishii, Osumu Akagi, Noriko Endo, A Glossarial Index of the Sukltothai
Inscriptions (Discussion Paper No. 53, The Center for Southeast Asian
Studies, Kyoto University, November 1972) iii, 233 pp.
Along with H.L. Shorto's Dictionary of the Mon inscriptions, the
present work provides a second example of the type of' tool required for
the full exploitation of Southeast Asia's epigraphic record.
The inscriptions treated are nos. l-2-3-5-7-8-9-ll-!3-14-15-38-40-
45-46-49 of the Thai corpus, all in Thai and published in volumes 1 and
3 of Collected Inscriptions. All but nos. 9-13-14-15 have also been
studied by A.B. Griswold and Prasert qa Nagara in their "Epigraphic
and Historical Studies". I
Each word of the inscriptions is listed in Thai alphabetical order,
and in Thai script, and following it are indicated all of its occurrences
by means of sets of three numbers, for example, 1-2-3, indicating the
number of the inscription, the number of the face of the inscription and
the line in which the word occurs. Meanings are indicated for each
entry in English with the warning that they "arc given by way of exam~
ple and may or may not be applicable for every instance" (p. i).
The arrangement generally makes it very easy to locate and com~
pare contexts, but there is, I feel, one serious defect which should be
remedied in future compilations of this type. That is the presentation
of the material in modern Thai spelling which in many cases is very
different from the orthography of the inscriptions and may in certain
contexts disguise real difficulties of interpretation or involve un arbitrary
choice of definition. Such glossaries should always show the original
orthography whether compiled in a non~western script or in romanized
transliteration. In fact, since some Thai inscriptions, such as no. 9
among those treated here, are written in Khmer script, which is essential
to know when attempting to place them in their historical context, the
use of a "graphic" transliteration is perhaps to be preferred .
. In certain cases not all contexts of a word are placed together.
Take for example, the title written today Vlmn (bral]ya). In the Sukho~
thai inscriptions written in Thai script, with the exception of no. 49, if
1) Published in JSS beginning with vol 56(2), July 1968.

I nm not mistaken, this word is always written mqp (bra'ifa) but in the
257
glo%ary one finds on p. 119 the entry Ymrn, "a term placed before the
honorific name, a king", and references to inscriptions 1-2-3-9-40-45-49
in all of which, except f(1f no. 9, in Khmer script, and no. 49, the original '
spelling is bmiili. The same is true for the entry bana, "a king", on p.
115 with a reference. to inscription no. 14, and the entry bra~iiii, "the
king", p. 117 referring to inscriptions 5~7-8-9-11. This, however, does
not exhaust the occurrences of these titles. Others are found in the
entry ctw bra!tyii on p. 36, where in fact they missed one, 14-1-39, and
the entry .wmtec cau bra!IJ·a on p. 184.
lt would be much more helpful if all occurrences of brana, whether
associated with another title or not, were grouped together, and I would
also like to see sepnrate sections grouping all titles, all personal names
and ull place names.
Even as it stands, however, with certain features needing revision
and incomplete with respect to the whole body of Sukhothai inscriptions,
the glossary still provides the opportunity to make some interesting
comparisons with relative ease.
Tuke for example inscription no. 49, already singled out for its
unique use of bra{lya, which in the inscriptions and chronicles I have
examined d

258 REVIEWS
In Sorasak (in~arasakti) was a !!_rabtaeit in the krom of (arhrvac hn~ ~ay
with a sakdina of only 300 and thus an unlikely candidate for the position
of Chief Resident anywhere.4
M.C. Chand, as our glossary shows, was right in taking note of the
unusual language of the inscription, though whether it is due to the author
being Ayutthayan and unfamiliar with the language of Sukbothai must
await further research. It is the only one of the inscriptions listed in
the glossary to make use of the "pronoun" 'fi (db), originally written VI
(d), and glossed as "His Majesty, His Excellency, = ~1t.t", although I
have also found it in nos. 48 and 51, both from Chainat It is also the
only ihscription of the collection to show a title with vsn (ok) or the
e~pression 1l~11J ( ayii hua) in a king's title, as in bo ayii hua cau on p. 123;
both of which are of very frequeilt use in texts of a somewhat later date,
The possibility of this inscription representing a regional or dialectical
·peculiarity deserves further attention, and it is wi lh research tools such
as the present glossarial index that such investigation may be profitably
undertaken.
Kyoto University is to be complimented for undertaking this type
of work, and I hope we will see additional volurnes including the whole
corpus of Sukhothai, and eveiltually all Thai inscriptions.
School of Humanities,
Uuiversiti Sains }.1alaysia,
Penang
Michael Vickery
4) S,ee the g1mt sabhu edition of the old Thai I a ws ih 5 volumes, vol I, p. 28 8. Of
.course the law text may be very corrupt. The present consensus of scholarly
opinion seems to place the promulgation of this law in the reign of King Traiiok
(1448-88). If this is true, or if the section ih which the title insarasakti is found
is 811 evenlater insertion, the title might have been applied to some quite different
function in earlier times. It might even, by this reasoning, have been a purely
Sukhbthai rank in 1412, and the existence of "Hlvati Sa'rasakti (Luang Sotasak)"
as an Ayutthayan title at the end of the 17th century (EHS 1, p. 231, 11. 50) is
not sufficient to prove that the title Sorasakti (sarasakti) had always been Ayutthayan,.
any more than rama kaJnhae;L as the head of one section of the Aytittha'­
yan ktdcd!Om ministry (Laws I, p. 281) should be considered evidence that rama.
; g

REVIEWS 259
Phayaphrom, The Poem in Four Songs. A Northern Thai· tetralogy
translated by S¢ren Egerod (Lund, Studentlitteratur, Scandinavian Institute
of Asian Studies Monograph Series No. 7, 1971 ). 204 pp.
S¢ren Egerod, Professor of East Asian Languages at the University
of Copenhagen and Director of the Scandinavian Institute of Asian
Studies, has translated into English a lengthy love poem by Phaya Phrom
Wohan (vmu1wnt1JI':nm), one of the greatest poets of Northern Thailand.
The Poem in Four Songs is an excellent example of kh'daw (~11), a type of
Northern Thai verse somewhat similar to the Thai kl~~n peet (ntHJU!lUI'l).
In addition to his romanized transcription and translation of Four Songs
(pp. 10-121), Professor Egerod has provided a brief introduction
containing a sketch of Phrom's life (pp. 5-8) and a vocabulary list of
words found in the poem (pp. 124-203).
Egerod has based his translation on two printed editions of-Four
Songs: one by Sanguan Chotisukharatana which aiso contains Phrom's
vita, the other published by the Charoen Mtiang Press in Chiangmai.
The only printed text available at present bears the Sanguan copyright
and is published by the Prattiang Wittaya Store in Chiangmai. This
edition is virtually identical with Egerod's text and forms the basis of
this review.
Most of the information on Phrom's life on pages 5-7 appears to be
a direct translation from the Thai vita by Sanguan.· It can also be found
in Manee Phayomyong's The History and Literature of Lanna from which
the supplementary comments below have been taken.•
Phrom (1802-1887) evidently was quite a 'swinger'. Manee (p.
143) says he had a total of forty-two wives. Since only three are
mentioned by name, however, the others may have been mistresses or
simply brief affairs. A native of Lam pang where his father was a high
official. of the court, Phrom became a novice at the age of 17 and later
entered the monkhood. At age 22 or 23 heleft the monkhood and put
his temple education to use writing legal documents. He also built an
exceiient reputation as a composer and reciter oflove poetr~ .. He entered
the service of the king of Lam pang and was granted permtsston to study
...

260 REVIEWS
under and work with the royal poet, Phaya Lomawisai, a close friend ot
Phrom's father.
Phrom's troubles began when, as an authority on elephants, he was
sent to Phrae to examine and perhaps purchase a particular elephant for
the king of Lampang. According to the beast's owner, the price was a
'mere 2,000 rupees' (Manee, p. 144), but the king understandably wanted
the elephant carefully examined before parting with such a sum. On the
way to Phrae, Phrom gambled and managed to lose all the king's money,
a misfortune for which he was sentenced to death in absentia. The trip
was not an entire loss, however, since he met a lady named Chom, the
former wife of another losing gambler.
Phrom became a poet in the service of the king of Phrae. His
affair with Mom Chandra, a court lady and favorite of the king, led to
Phrom's imprisonment and sentence of death. While in prison he was
visited regularly by Chom who had been sent to the court by one of her
former husband's creditors to be a maid. Thinking to get a New Year's
poem out of Phrom before beheading him, the king postponed the execu"
tion. But Phrom used the time to escape. How he escaped is not
clear, though Manee (p. 147) writes that some sources said it was because
a monk in Lampang, Phra Kassapatherachao, put a spell on the prison
bars which caused them to· become flexible. The spell was written on a
piece of paper, hidden in a packet of sticky rice, and handed in to Phrom.
At any rate, Phrom fled to Lap Laeng (C!~ll!!M), also called Lap Lae
(Ci"'lJ!tCI), in Uttaradit, the faithful Chom fleeing with him.
How long Phrom and Chom lived in Lap Laeng is not known, but
it would seem to have been a period of not more than a year or two.
They were a happy couple until one day when Phrom, returning from a
business trip to dun some Mon and Thai clients, found Cham gone. She
had returned to Phrae, some neighbors said, under threat of punishment
by the king, but Phrom believed she bad run off with a new lover. Four.
Songs was written as a lament and love letter to Chom and expresses
Phrom's continued love for her and deep distress over her disappearance.
When and from what place the poem w;;ts writtep. neither E~erod nor
Manee mentioQ,

261
The lust twenty-six years of Phrom's life were spent in Chiangmai,
once again in service as a royal poet. "!-lis last wife was Princess Bua
Chandra by whom he had a daughter, Sri Wai, his only child. Mance is
not clear, but either mother or daughter had the nickname 'Pig Manure',
Sri Wai died childless in 1926.
In addition to his own compositions, Phrom worked~with Phaya
Lomawisai to revise the latter's lchaaw lchloofJ composition Hong Bin
(a~~~u) and was commissioned by the Princess Mother Thipkesontharong
(11lllll.JHI'II01:!1l1N " '" )
to adapt the Thai drama Phra Aphaimani by Sunthorn
Phu to khaaw style.
The publication of Professor Egerod's translation of Four Songs is
noteworthy in that it is, to our knowledge, the first translation into
English of a complete Northern Thai poem. Four Songs is a beautiful
poem which affords some glimpses of village life in the mid-ninteenth
century. There are passages describing personal emotions, aspects of
the culture, nora of the region, and the like. For example, there are
descriptions of disease (pp. 50, 98), fruits {pp. 75-76), desserts (pp. 77-
79), social relations (pp. 27-31 ), contempt (pp. 83-84), and of course
love-making (pp. 17-19, 45).
Egcrod's inclusion of a comprehensive list of vocabulary found in
the poem should be a considerable help to students who wish to read
other Northern Thai poetic works. The word /neem/ 'even though'
(43: 235), however, should be added.2
As a 'first' the translation might have been clarified and supported
by several types of supplementary information. Except for the excellent
vocabulary list, however, the information which is provided is very
inadequate. The lack will be most critical for students without an
extensive background in Standard Thai language and literature. Three
areas worth mentioning are an errata list, an informative introduction,
and notes.
Although an errata sheet has been included by the publisher, an
irritatingly large number remain. Our reading turned up almost 70
additional misprints and there may well be others. It is unfortunate
2) References in this review will be cited by page (43) and line (235).

262 llEVIEWS
that space in a jpurnal such as this must be tak~n to correct a text, but
inasrp.uch as Four Songs will be used by sttldents we include tP.e following
Hst.
Page: line
7
8
10:13
11 :53,57
13:95
13:97
13:101
13:122
14:128
14; 133
14: 1L~6
15:l84
17:22.1
17: 2/..J-2, 246
21 :36L~
22:385
24:458
26:508
31:677
31:688
34:773
34:783
36:9
37:32
37:43
37:54:
40:128
40:146
41:183
41:186
43~254
45:304
48:389
Erratum
intervowen
C hot is ukhara tang
?oon
faj
c~j
dew nc:Lm
nii
rna\)
pua, kan
naalJ
toYJ
d{.sp;
kan
'rhe lines aT.e reversed.
khwen
pyan
sould
ciaiJma,j
caj
khaw
thalJ
lyalJ
khE't:!J
Cit;)
tholJ
nan
Tihlia n6olJ
doolJ
hyy j~n Diab ph~
l]iab
daaj
tad
pyan.
Correction
interwoven
Chotisukharatana
?oon
raJ
ceen
dew
, .•
phaa nam
111.1.
maj
phua-, kan
naaj
tag
dhg
kam
Th.e correct order of
lines in the -passage
is 241, 246, 243·245,
242 ..
khween
pyan
'should
cial]ffia,j.
oaj
khaw
thalJ
lyalJ
kE't::!J
c l.lJ "
th5j ,
nan
phua kaw n6olJ
tool]
ko? m.aa fuu ta.an
lJ!.ab
taaj
tad
pyalJ

liEV!EWS 263
Page: line Erratum Correction
54:592 daj taj
....
59:117 pll
-piin
66:347 liib ht:£m
67:397 hoon h6on
69:457 .lib lya
74:620 ?aai'J '?aai'J
75 557 cag., ,m:lan 657 kan w~a cag kin
76:692 [ .....?aaw..• taan] [;?aawJ bOog taan
76:696 Chiengmai Chiengrai
77:712 lon lam
77:71.5 -pee "' baa
78:746 saj nom saj saj nom
8.1:838 kha:!J khaj
82:897 ky kyd
82:898 IDYI'J .nyr.)
84:956 khyn Khyn
85:981 From,,. Fr9m the ttme •••
89:83 by an byalJ
89:60 lean keen
100:419 near far
100:420 far near
107:662 hoj hej
111:781 natJ too na!J loo t~o
111:803 tool:J t60l'J
116:963 khwaH khwaj
1-16:9613 boo -poo
120:1084 tian tian
124:2 senerate separate
126 = boo mii = bbo mii
126 == boo naa = boo naa
131 s·e de~n deen see deEn. deen
136 hia hia
139 En-tries are out of Omit first jaag. Move
order,
jaaj and jaan j5'!J after
' \·· second jaag below,
193 too midday to on midday
I

264 REVIEWS
Professor Egerod's introduction to the khtzaw poetic style is very
brief and sketchy. It would have been much more helpful to the reader
if information on the structure of khttaw had been provided. Such information,
similar to that found in most Thai books on poetry, would have
included a diagram of the syllables comprising hemistitches ('J'JHl), lines
(1111'1), and stanzas- (flTJ, 'li'u); patterns of internal and external rhyme;
and tonal restrictions pn certain syllables. The single phrase describing
JchtJaw as 'a rather free poetical form, consisting of lines with 3, 4, 5 or
6 syllables and interwoven rimes' (p. 7) is both inadequate and
misleading.· ·
In the romanized·· text variant forms are placed in brackets. A
knowledge ·.o.f the, structural principles which apply in hemistitch- or
line-final position would have indicated, in over .a dozen cases, which
form was in fact the correct one and would have led to a revision of the
translation in one or twp places. For example, on the basis of the tone
and/or rim~ sys.ten:ithevariants which should be rejected are 21: 360,
34 ~ 759; 53': 567, 60: 143, 62:213, 72: 559, ancl'lll : 778. On the other'
hand, those varian~s which are actually the correct forms are 12: 87 and
24: 465 which need·.a high tone, 48:407 and 58:97 which need a short
falling tone, 90: 93 which needs a high tone, and 120: 1078 which needs
a final ~ad tp rhyme wit.h pad in 1080. In 23: 415 ·the variant form is
semantically more· appropriate. In 119: 1059 both mid and rising tones
are permitted in bemistitch-final position, though the latter, as in the
variant form, is more frequent.
A special case involving structure but without a variant form is
34: 783. The final tone of this hemistitch must be mid, not long falling
(cf. 54: 607; 85 : 987, 121 : 1124). Thus instead of ta?fee IPav 'A sea: of
stories' the texf should read ta?fee lyav 'The shimmering sea'.
In several places two hemistitches have been run together whereas
they should have been kept separa'te (I 0 : I, 28 : 596, 29 : 611, 31 : 674,
52: 545, 56: 1, 65: 335, 74: 641 ). In half of these the first hemistitch.
ends at the right-hand margin, thus making the break difficult to spot
unless on:e is counting syllables carefully.
Some explanations of the translation are provided and occur bracketted
in the text. There are a number of other places, however, where

265
a note is needed todarify certain cultural references in the text. For
instance, what b s(H!t:ial abuut Bungtuphan golden ear beads (10: 19-20)?
what is an elephant 11ag ( 11: 40) '! what is the meaning of 'like the
figure of an elephant which is placed in the satuang offering tray' (26:
525) '! docs the 'Glorious Mirror' (27: 570) have a literary reference?
does •Southern' in its frequent occurrences refer to the territory under
the control of' Bangkok ? where is 'the city of Long' (66: 357)? what
kind of mango is 'the mango-which-the-crows-sit-around' (75: 674) or
the dessert called 'squeezed-through-a-hole-so-it-has-a-tail' (79: 774)?
In what way is the language used by Phrom in Four Songs 'a skillful mixture
of an c.xtrcme Northern colloquial ... and a rather learned style
with mnny Puli and Standard Thai loan words' (p. 7)?
The translation itself is a prose rendering of Phrom's lengthy love
lament. Profcs~or Ege.rod stutcs that his translation, which
'does lh.) t at tcm pt to follow the meter or render the rimes, does
endeavor to catch the particular flavor of the constant change
of stylistic levels. Its guiding principle has further been to
c.rr, if err il must, rather in being too close to the original
\V

266 REVIEWS
do I enter your mind,
the way I, Phrommin, think of you ?
or
do you just live and eat,
not delirious or staggering
the way I am all the time,
talking to myself
like an idiot
of nothing but love ?4
And again, in 43: 258-261,
Of all human beings under the sky
in the whole wide world
nobody has
such grief as J.S
Nevertheless, the overall impression of Four Songs is that of a
literal wordiness which tends to destroy the 'flavor' of the poem.
Egerod
declines to 'follow the meter and render the rimes'-structural elements
in Northern Thai poetry-but vigorously pursues the repetition of near
synonyms-another structural element.
Repetition, especially when it
involves alliteration or internal rhyme, enhances the poem.
Translated
literally, however, the repetition produces a ponderousness which bogs
the English reader down.
Thus, in 10: 11-12 the text reads
4) 681 pen san daj caa n6o1J cll:n
682 flaiJ kyd htlod thaaiJ
683 1Wn]l991J pii can
681.!- myan m1ln I

ti?phUa ph~j
HEVIEWS 267
bo:J h8j hyad IJ6d
in which b);; 'not' is followed by three verbs.
The flowers will open
The line is translated as
and their fragrance will never evaporate
or dry up or cease.
But surely the line could be simplified to something like 'The flowers
will open and never lose their fragrance' or even 'The flowers will open
and be ever fresh', though the latter rendering departs more radically
from a literal approach.
Occasionally even idioms get translated literally. The idiom maw
lom means 'madly in love, crazed with love, love-drunk' but is rendered
as 'intoxicated with the air around me [from no other cause than love]'
(11: 60, 12: 63). Egerod translates c'b.a khw'tm 'to gossip' as 'speak ill
of your guardian spirit' (37: 48) and nintaa khwtm khaa 'to slander me'
by the ghastly phrase 'slander the ego that sits on top of my head' (34:
768) I
One of the worst of the mistranslations which occur from time to
time is 17 : 241-247.
Lines 242 and 246 were reversed in copying and
hence have skewed the entire passage. The passage should read
241 If it were only my bedpartner-
246 a brief, fleeting affair-
243 who had deserted me,
244 I would not be overly upset.
245 But my beloved wife !
242 I cannot find her anywhere;
247 she has slipped away, beyond the horizon. 6
A few others are the following: (1) 10: 8 (5n waatlta saj, given as 'Even
if you do not care about my words', should be 'if the wind blows'. The
word waataa ('J11111 from 'J1111) is 'wind'; Egerod treated it as waataa (111-11
6) 21ft kan wa.a. pen cuu
246 n!log n"§a paaj caj
243 tern nii caag paj
241J. Mo n:So j boo haj
245 mia khin tia.m ci:i.j
242 ca~ haa n~j daj
2Lf7 ~ooj Mj myy pa~ kh~og faa

268 REVIEWS
from :J1Vl) 'word'. (2) 10: 14 clza phlab kaw, given as 'My words will be
figurative', should be 'My words will refer to the past' and links up,
after a long parenthetical appositive, with 10: 28 'Even if you do not
remember ... '.
(3) 13: 96 !chaw slmn peey is translated as 'mixture of
rice and flour' but refers to the fermenting agent (peev law) used in making
rice wine. (4) 95: 255 b?>:1 naa ntty kh6b, translated as 'I am not in
the mood to wear all of those garments', is more accurately rendered as
'I cannot get myself to wear [any of] them'.
One problem area is that of appositional phrases used by Phrom in
referring to his beloved Cham. Most of the more than 60 phrases begin
with either mee or cuw, translated 'Lady ...', 'you .. .', or 'you my ...'.
Many of the renderings simply fail to convey the significance of the
compliment and are thus rather meaningless without some kind of note
or retranslation. Some unclear phrases are 'Lady of the Chinese silk
from the south' (15: 166), 'Lady with the colors of the daY, cooling toward
dusk' ( 19: 294), 'Lady Silk, Color of the Moon' (25: 486), 'Lady of the
Glorious Mirror' (27: 570), 'Lady with the oily eyepits' (38: 94}7, 'Lady
of the leaves shaking on the branches' (57 : 72), 'you whose skin is crawling
with chicken lice' (58: 72), 'you gem like a heavenly egg' ( 104: 573),
and 'Lady with the oblong face like the betel leaf' (115: 935).
Although this review is not the place to discuss Professor Egerod's
general principles of translation in the light of modern ·translation theory,
it seems quite obvious that his literal rendering is neither poetic in itself
nor able to capture more than a fraction of the spirit of the original work.
A careful literal prose translation can serve, however, as an intermediate
step, a 'meta-text's, toward producing a dynamic equivalence
poetic translation which recreates much more of the feeling which the
author intended to convey.
7) Or, ~;;u of such strong emo~ions' (m~e tiia man naj).
Dynamic translations from Thai to English
8) For a discussion of some of the theoretical issues see Eugene A. Nida and
Charles R. Taber, The Theory and Practice of Translation, Leiden, E.J. Brill,
1969. Also Howard A. Hatton, 'Cross-cultural Trans~ation of Poetry: A Thai
f..xam.ple' (unpublished paper).

liE\ lEWH 269
have b.:cn db~.:u~s~·d or pr~ttlm.:c.;d by Prince Prem Purachatra9, P. Na
Pmmuamnark1 11 , M.R. Scni Pramojt 1, and James N. MoscPz.
Without attempting lo either disparage the magnitude of the task
attempted by Prnfc~sor Egcmd or disregard the numerous passages be
has tmnslatcd ~:or redly, Four Songs suffers from three ills: insufficient
exegesis uf the i'ili!'!hcrn Thai text, hasty proofreading, and a literal
:tpproa..:h tQ translation. It is our hope that Professor Egcrod will produce
a thowugh rcvisi on of The Poem in Four Songs which will not only
do justice to Phaya J>hrom but will open up the beauty and richness of
kldiaH' poetry lo English readers.
llerbert C. Purnell & Pllairat W aree
L'fil'll.-f{ rtl!l J 1 1'UJ•'
'9) !'rem Purachntrll, lntnul111tion to 'J'I1t1i l.itenttun~, Chatra Press, 1964.
10) P. Na Pramuanrnnrk, 'Tmnsluting Thai Poetry', l'lwsa h1e Nt~ng:;ii Vol. 1, Pt. 2,
1959, pp. 50-52. . .
Ill M.R. Seni Pramoj, 'Poetic Translations from tl~e Siamese', .l~S Vol., XL~I, Pt.
2,1958, Jl[). 215-2!6; and 'APoetic Translat!OnfromtheStamese, .lSSVoi.
XLVH, Pt. 2. 1959, p. 179.
12) James N. Mosel, Tn~nds aml Structun• in ContemfJorary Thai Poetry, Data Paper
No. 43, Cornell University Southeast Asia Program, Ithaca, New York, 1961.
Especially see his free verse translation in 'A Poetic Translation from the
Siamesc',,7SSVol. XLVIf,Pt.l, 1959,pp. 103-111.

270
Vimolphan Pcctathawatchai, Esam Cloth Desigfl (Faculty of Education,
Khon Kaen University with financial support from the Ford Foundation,
1973 }, pp. 55, 18 photographs, 31 colored plates.
"t\ ~ .. 1)1 v "( 4 J '"\ .., • ..., "' ' j ~..,
'JIJftl'llHII U~1i'J'll'lffJ 1 ff7tJiiW (1'1011:!flfiH1fl1ffl'll lJ111'Jl1tl11\tl'UtJ1Hiflll 1JI•l1W\'I Vtt!lft
., "" I ' "" "' J""
:i1Jl1Ht11'l1ltl111l10lJi.'lHII1' tlHl l'Hi11Jl'll'i\"lllllfl nHLll\'1 '1
'I '1 , " "
mn{J1i'ltl ~d:" b).
Khun Vimolplmn is to be commended for her commitment to preserving
the rich cultural heritage of northeast Thailand. Her dedication
to this goal finds expression not only in her presentation of the varied
silk and cotton cloth designs identified as northeastern and the processes
involved in their production but in her beau geste to donate the proceeds
of tile sale of the book to the Faculty of Education, Khon Kaen University,
to assist in the establishment of a Center of Northeastern Art and
Culture.
The author has provided us with much detailed information in both
verbal and pictorial form concerning both cotton and silk spinning,
reeling, dyeing and weaving techniques. The designs depicted in highly
articulate colored photographs are representative of the most typical
pillow and sarong skirt designs of the northeast. Those who find the silk
sarong designs visually appetizing might be interested to learn that the
boiled worm, after the silk has been removed, is eaten as a favorite
delicacy of the villagers.
Unfortunately, the author has paid less attention to the customs
and traditions involved in the product ion of silk and cotton thread and
the subsequent weaving. One thinks of the magical chants that are
intoned after the silkworms have bred as well as the magical and practical
means used to assure that the worms are not touched by insects,
especially flies. The loom itself has meaning as an extension of the
female personality, and, in remote northeastern villages in the not too
distant past, a fine was levied if a male touched the loom.
A similar
fine was levied for touching a girl, the amount differing according to

REVIEWS 271
which part of the body was touched. Much of northeastern courtship is
carried out as the young maiden weaves to the accompaniment of the
poetic sallies of her suitor.
The. author should be encouraged to pursue her researches into
other aspects for the rich treasure of northeast culture: folk tales, folk
music, lullabies and the like. One hopes that Khun Vimolphan will not
only record in descriptive terms but attempt to understand such facets
of the northeast cultural landscape in their total socio-cultural setting
including the instructional role in molding ideal personality and character
traits.
The present volume Esarn Cloth Design merely whets our intellectual
appetite. One looks forward to more such efforts to illuminate and
preserve northeastern culture. The English translation is of high quality
as is the printing and color reproductions. The printers deserve our
praise as does the Faculty of Education for arranging for the publication
of this book.
William J. Klausner
Asia Foundation,
Bangkok

272 rmvmws
Amin Sweeney. Malay Shadow Puppets (Trustees of the British Museum,
London, 1972), 83 pp., bibliogmpbicalnote, glossury, 30 black & white,
8 color plates.
This little book is a finely cut gem. In both size and content it is
compact yet complete in a way that leaves the reader asking very few
questions. It is profusely illustrated with the set of puppets acquired
for the British Museum by the author, and the photographs have been
taken so as to show clearly the finest details of carving,! Too, the book's
value is deepened by its usc of comparative photographs, as when we are
shown puppets of the same cbaructcr carved by three different people,
and three puppets of the ~ame character type in transition from traditional
to modern style.
The standard of recent books on the shadow play has not been
uniformly high; indeed. at times the subject seems to be muster of the
author, leading him to cloak guesswork in the guise of fact, and to indulge
in more or less wild speculation at times, But in Sweeney's case
the opposite is so obviously true thut his is a most gratifying book to
read. In his research be bas lab,>riously followed every lead, leaving
nothing up to speculation. Sweeney clearly is master of his subject.
And what, exactly, is his subject? Sweeney offers us a flood of
information regarding much more than Malay shadow puppets alone,
an unsuspected treat were one to judge solely from the title, and in a
style that is forthright and uncluttered. He intentionally excludes from
consideration the type of shadow play known as Waycrng Jawa, or that
which derives its primary influence from Java, thus limiting his scope to
Wayang Siam.
In chapters on the social context of Wayang Siam, the puppets, the
performance, the repertoire, and the chief characters and the basic tale,
Sweeney not only gives us the broad outline of what Wayang Siam entails,-that
it is a medium for recounting The Ramayana, that it is basically
a rural rather than urban dramatic form, that there is both Thai
1) For those who may Wish to achieve similarly happy results in photogruphing
shadow puppets, Ibis is done by placing the puppet against a cotton scr~en wit4
a light directly behind lhll puppet, as well as one in front~

REVIEWS
and Javanese influence in evidence, etc., but he also includes a wealth of
detail. Thus we learn that some of this Javanese influence was derived
from cigarette cards depicting Javanese puppets and issued with the cigarettes
of Thomas Bear Co. Ltd., that the puppeteer's U$e of high-flown
language for the more refined characters is a ruse consisting merely of
linguistic distortions since he knows nothing of classical or literary
Malay, and that far from being limited to the basic tale of Rama, the
standard repertoire includes many inventive stories of peripheral relevance
to that epic.
Actually, the full extent of Sweeney's e.fforts is not manifest in this
book, which is in many ways a condensation of his Ph.D. thesis done for
the University of London.2 He knows personally almost every puppeteer
in Kelantan, and is thoroughly familiar with every dramatic motif
used in the shadow play there. His impeccable fluency in Kelantanese
Malay, acquired in nearly two decades of exposure, has been instrumental
in this respect. It has enabled him to conduct the first thorough-going
scientific inquiry into the Malay shadow play, and it will be quite some
time before his results are improved upon.
But though the savant may prefer to concern himself with the Ph.D.
thesis, for savant and layman alike the British Museum monograph is
rewarding in its reliably informative text and beguiling in its wonderful
illustrations.
Derek Brereton
Ithaca,
New 1'ork
2) Amin Sweeney, The Ramayana aud the Malay Sht~dow Play (National University
of Malaysia Press, Kuala Lumpur, 1972).

274 HE\YIEWS
Theodore Bowie, Ed., M.C. Subbndradis Diskul, A.B. Griswold, & Brian
Brake, The Sculpture of Thailand (The Asia Society, New York, 1972),
pp. 137, numerous plates.
I have mixed feelings both about this catalogue and about the
exhibition it accompanies. The exhibition, which consists of sculptures
from public and private Thai collections, opened in the full of 1972 at
the Asia House Gallery in New York and has subsequently been taken
to other cities in the United States and Canada. It is indeed wonderful
to see so many beautiful works of art become better known to a large
number of people, wbo have either attended the exhibition or enjoyed the
photographs in the splendidly produced catalogue. Such exhibitions and
catalogues, moreover, are monuments to the international cooperation
and financial generosity necessary if enterprises of this sort are to succeed.
My misgivings arise merely as the result of a sense of disparity between
this cooperation and generosity, on one hand, and the tinnl results, in the
exhibition and its catalogue, on the other. A show and a book that might
have been important surveys of the art of Thailand are less than that,
being merely an exhibition with some real masterpieces and a catalogue
which records the show. That perhaps is enough, and nothing more
ambitious was really intended. Yet the feeling remains that something
more might indeed have been achieved.
The character of the exhibition and of The Sculpture of Thailand is
largely the result of the varying points of view of the contributors to the
project. A prime mover in tJ1is exhibition, as in the one 'vhich was sent
to the United States in 1960, was Professor Theodore Bowie. lt was he
who made the original selection of objects, which initially were supposed
to consist only of newly discovered works. The final selection was the
responsibility of the director of the Asia House Gallery, Mr. Gordon
Washburn, a man of impeccable taste but with no claim to special knowledge
of Thai art. In the catalogue, similarly, different hands are at
work. Professor M.C. Subhadradis Diskul is given credit for the description
and dating of the objects, but it is clear from style alone that his
entries have been edited and revised by Mr. A.B. Griswold. In addition,
Professor Jean Boisselier, who has been studyingDvaravati art intensively

in recent ye>H~. m:t >' h;l\'c h,;;cn
;\lhtut the Jalt', t~f the pmblema.
tic stucco:>:> and tcu;t c~ltt.l::.. c
h 1'itt.' s~ulpnae til t'JwiltJml
are the 1\\lrk \.11' Mr. Cir
. (it plt,i':> :iiM't
essay on"lmagei> (•fib: Buddha", ;1 t.::kt. up mu;;!ivf I lie introdll(;'l\ll'Y
pages, is cunc.:mcd l,;q.tdy 1.11 il : llh•H;I•(~~.: 1:arwt:111. lt is a \aluable
summary 11f .Ht1Jlb ~h'. Un~'

REVIEWS
13. No satisfactory records were kept at the time of the recovery
·of the Khobua terra cottas and stuccos. According to a small book
published by the Fine Arts Department in !961 (Samut nam chom borcmwatthusathiln
samai thawarawadt !ambon Khftbua ~hangwat R(uburi), ~j 13,
ii6, and :ft26 were found at Stiipa 40, iP and ~13 at Stiipa 39.
15. This bronze is somewhat of a puzzle; though possibly Dvara­
'vati, it might also be later (even 13th century).
16. The pleated shawl which lies on the Buddha's left shoulder is
thought to suggest "a date around the middle of the Dvaravati period."
This motive surely bas some chronological significance, but what that
may be exactly is not easy to specify. The pleated mantle appears in
Java at Chandi Sewu but not at the Barabudur and in Champa at the 9thcentury
temple of D6ngdtiong. Perhaps the authors are right in assuming
a point of introduction during the 8th or 9th century.
17. In "An Ekamukhalinga from Peninsular Siam" (JSS LIV, 1
[Jan., 1966]), S.J. O'Connor said that "seventh through eighth centuries
would seem a reasonable guess" as a date for this object.
J , v ':
l8abc. The position of the Chula Pathon reliefs is a crucial problem
in Dvaravati chronology. Contrary to what the catalogue entry
states, there are no panels with specifically Mahayana scenes or figures.
If there are connections with the art of Java, they consist of schemes of
'composition which are like those of reliefs at the Barabudur. By no
means do these schemes necessarily indicate influence from Java. The
jewelry likewise fails to show "Srivijayan" influence; the crown and neckla:ce
of the personage identified as Kuvera on :JI. I8b can be seen, for
instance, entirely as a development from types found on the 7th-century
Cambodian Avalokitesvara of Rach-gia (l Boisselier, La statuaire khmere,
pis. 12, 15b). These considerations do not make the suggested 8th-9th
century date wrong; they merely broaden the range of possibility sufficiently
to include the 7th century. Fig. 18c may be a representation of
a scene depicted at Qlzll in central Asia (M. Bussagli, Painting of Ce11tral
Asia, p. 84, "600-650'').
22. Ayudhya period. Similar terra Cotta figures have been found
in the river at Ayudhya.

HEVIE\'i'S
23. Gray sandstone. Although Boisse!ier has said that none of
the Brahmanical images found at Si Thep is earlier that the 8th century.
("Rapport de Mission ... 1964," Sinlapak~n IX, 2, p. 53), the exploding
fullness of their volumes suggests a date before rather than after that
{ca. 700) of the Haribara of Prasat Andet. . .
25. Although it is hard to prove that certain types could not have
persisted as late as the 9th or lOth century, some features found on the
figures at the end of the Cam bod ian lintel of Vat Prahar-second half of
the 7th century (P. Dupont, "Les linteaux khmers du VIJe siecle," Artibus
Asiae XV [1952], fig. 25), namely the tiered arrangement of hair and the
broad sash, arc present on the attendant ligures here. It is not yet clear
what names should be given to these figures; to my knowledge there is
no example of the type in which either figure has Brabma's lateral faces.
The monster on which the Buddha stands should perhaps be understood
as a relative of Vi~r~u's Gnruda, intended to symbolize the Buddha'.s
power (bala: the Ahhic/harmakosa speaks of the Buddha's narayal}ahala).
I do not know who first culled this monster Banaspati or when. It is
curious that this name is used in Javanese to refer to kirtimukha (Bijdragen
112, p. 305), a usage which suggests some legitimacy for the Thai
nomenclature.
26. Taken as a whole, the stuccos from Sttipa 10 at Khfibua exhibit
a flattening of the facial structure and a two-dimensionality in jewelry
that suggest a date later than that of the CbGla Pathon reliefs, possibly
one in the 9th century. Justification for an extended rather than contracted
Dvaravnti chronology can be found in the conservatism of some
aspects of contemporary Cbam art.
28. Probably in part the result of Cambodian influences that seem
to have penetrated central Siam in the mid-lOth century.
32. This bronze probably dates from about the time of the construction
of Prasftt Hin Phin1ai (ca. 1100 A.D.). It represents an unidentified
Tantric divinity.
33. From a Naga-protected Buddha. 12th century.
35. Close in style to the carvings at Phimai and hence ca. 1100.
37. Perhaps 12th century.

278 REVIEWS
38-40. The dates seem too conservative. The necklace of the
Buddha #40 can be related to those on the Naga heads of the Buddha of
Grahi, and so for this piece a date in the second half of the 12th century
is entirely possible.
42. Perhaps mid-13th century.
43-44. Probably 14th.
45. Perhaps mid-13th century.
46. First half of the 13th century.
47. Perhaps second half of the 13th century. The form of the
incised line indicating the fold in the shawl relates the bronze to :jt45.
49. Or 15th century.
52. 16th century?
53. The circle is not so much a "Wheel of the Doctrine'' as a
representation of Mt. Meru, standing at the center of the Buddhist worldsystem.
Clearly identifiable are the sun and the moon (indicated by a
rabbit and a peacock), the concentric oceans and mountain ranges surrounding
Mt. Meru, and the figures with differently shaped faces who
represent the four continents.
64. More likely of Sukhothai than Northern workmanship.
74. Perhaps as early as the 15th century. Phraphutthad1p /ae
phraphim nai kruphraprdng Wat RatchabDrana, Bangkok, 1959, fig. 31 and
stucco figures at Wat Rfl.tchabGrana, both dating from the 1420s, are sty"
listically related.
76. Possibly late 11th or early 12th century (judging from the
modeling of the eyes). The pedestal is not original. This image was
the gift of King Prajadhipok; how the notion of a Chaiya provenance
arose is not known. The earliest images of this type were perhaps made
in the lOth century in northeastern Thailand, then under Cambodian
influence.
79. Possibly older than the catalogue suggests.
Hiram W. Woodward, Jr.
The University of Michigan

Philippe Stc.rn, Cnlonne.v lndlennes D'A}at](ii et d'Ellora (Published as the
lith research volum~ of the Guimct Museum, Paris, 1972), 188 pages,
193 iHustrathms \\'ith 13 plans and sketches.
279
Profcs~or Philippe Stern, the former Chief Curator of the Guimet
Museum, Paris, \\'HS the first person to have applied the method of using
the evolution of various motifs to date ancient objects and monuments.
Through thi-. "mclhod'', he has succeeded in correcting formerly held
chronology of Kinner and Cham arts. This work on India is, however,
the publicatinn of old research dating back to 1935 on which he has
already expounded for several years at the Ecole du Louvre, Paris.
At fir~t the writer explains that what he calls Gupta art in this book
refers especially to the Indian classical Buddhist art which might have
been created nftcr the time or the Gupta dynasty, whereas what he terms
post~Gupta urt is the art after the Gupta period and pertains mainly to
Hinduism. Tlm t is the reason why be classifies the Ajaq~a caves in the
Gupta period and the Elloril ones in the post-Gupta.
Prof. Stem begins by stating that the Ajaqta caves Nos. 9, 10 and
12 belong to ancient Indian nrt before the Gupta period. He then clivi"
des the rest of l he AjatJFi caves in to four phases: the first one comprises
ctwes Nos. 11, 7. 6, and 15; the second, Nos. 5, 4, 16, 17; the third, Nos.
2, 1, 19; und the fourth, Nos. 20 to 27. He also explains that caves 9, 10
and 12 nrc in the middle, nt the right of which (facing the caves) are
situated c~wes Nos. 7, 6 and on the left, caves Nos. 14 and 15. For the
second phasct coves Nos. 5, 4 continue No. 6 on the right and 16, 17
follow No. 15 on the left. For the third phase, caves Nos. 2 and 1
continue No. 4 on the right and cave 19 that of No. 17 on the left.
During the fourth phase, caves Nos. 20 to 28 are all carved after cave
No. 19 on the left. Prof. Stern then concludes that the sites of all these
caves support his chronology hypothesis.
He then goes on to describe his method of research by using the
evolution of motifs. For the first phase of the Ajaq!a caves which he
terms "beginning, he uses various motifs such as plans of the cav~s and
the three different forms of columns, For the second phase whtch he

280 REVIEWS
calls "modifying", he lists the evolution of the plan of the caves and
columns which show mixed forms from phase I and at the same time bear
more ornaments. For phase III, the best period oftbe Aja11ta caves for
him, there are again the continuation of the evolution of columns and
their respective order: those that are nearest to the shrine which is carved
into the back wall being the most decorated. Phase IV which is called
c•prolongation" consists of larger female figure brackets and a new kind
of capital, a piir1Jagha!a or flowering vase.
Prof. Stern also includes the first and third caves of Aurangabad
into this fourth phase of Ajal!ta as they possess many elements in common.
He also states that these characteristics continue into the first
phase of Ellora.
For the Ellora caves, Prof. Stern indicates that Hinduism flourished
at the expense of Buddhism and various caves belonging to different
religions were carved at the same time. For instance, in Ellora phase I,
Buddhist caves Nos. l to 10 were constructed at the same time as cave
14 (Hinduism of Saivism mixed with Vaishqavism) and cave 21 (Saivism
only). Each sect carved its caves further along the left side of the hill
(when facing the caves), Those of Jainism are of the latest and therefore
were carved on the extreme left.
Prof. Stern also divides the Ellora caves into 4 phases as those at
Ajarna. Phase I which includes Ellora caves 1 to 10, 14, 19, 20, 21, 26,
29 continues phase IV of Ajaqt~L There are however some differences
such as the new forms of entablature and columns, isolated shrines from
the back wall and the popularity of bas-reliefs in place of mural paintings.
Prof. Stern also includes in this first phase of Ellora the Elephanta cave
on an island in front of Bombay, caves 6 and 7 at Aurangabad, cave 3 at
Badami and also vlh'i~ra No. 18 at Sa:iichi.
Phase II of Ellora includes caves Nos. 11, 12 and 15.
Here most
of the columns are unfinished so Prof. Stern has to rely on other sculptural
motifs such as the belt and headdress of deity figures, the tail and
bead of makara, forms of garland and kudu (horse-shoe shaped ar~hed
win.qow),

REVIEWS
Phase III comprises only one cave, Kailasa or cave 16. It continues
the evolution of phase II with some new motifs such as a vertical decoratif
band, a narrative scene in a garland, and the first appearance of
two superimposed capitals: a turban on top of a pun 1
agha(a.
To phase IV belong all the Jaina caves. The two, superimposed
capitals have become frequent and sometimes the vase in the pi'irnaghata
motif is totally hidden behind leaf-motif or sometimes a vase is r~peat~d
twice one on top of the other. Prof. Stern has also suggested that the
decline of the Ellora columns exists only for large ones. This might be
because during that period Indian architects paid more attention to the
construction of durable temples in an open space. The caves' small
columns still preserve their elegance and beauty.
Next comes the conclusion chapter in which Prof. Stern explains
his four-fold intentions: to show the evolution of columns both at
Ajal}~a and Ellora, to determine their successive chronology, to detect
the evolution line from which one might try to date other Indian antiquities,
and to demonstrate the use of motif evolution to date ancient objects
and monuments in general.
The writer then goes on to describe the beauty of Ajal}ta and
Ellora caves in which he admires especially the mural paintings in cave I
of Ajal}ta and the bas-reliefs of cave 15 at Ellora.
Then follow two additional short chapters and five appendixes,
The first additional chapter deals with the contemporaneity of Buddhist
and Hindu sculptures in Indian art and the second one describes the
difference of motifs between the first and second phases of Ell ora. ·This
latter chapter is rather unnecessary as it more or less repeats what the
writer has already described.
The first appendix is very important. Here Prof. Stern explains
that his method of using motif evolution is able to contribute only a relative
chronology. It has to be hung, as he uses the word, to the dates in
inscriptions in order to be able to establish an absolute chronology. But
as there are no clear dates at Ajaqta or Ellora, one has to use inscriptions
at other sites that possess the same motifs such as cave 3 at Badami and
Khmer inscriptions at Sambor Prei Kuk. Through this method Prof.
Stern says that one can date the first phase of Ellodi about the second
28i

282 REVIEWS
half of the 6th century A.D. and its third phase (cave 16 or Kaiiasa)
about the third quarter of the 8th century.
The second appendix concerns the northern architecture of India
which is rather irrelevant to the subject of the book. The third enlarges
upon the "method" that the author has already explained. Here be
adds that it can be used along with other archaeological methods such
as ''stratigraphic excavation" and the motifs used in tracing the evolution
line might be just simple and unimportant motifs instead of very conspicuous
ones. The fourth explains the reason why this book came to be
published 37 years after the original research had taken place. The fifth
appendix states that the writer is not so sure about the date of rather
heavy sculptures carved in front of Ajarna caves such as those in front
of cave 19. He thinks that they might have been added during the first
phase of Ellora and carved on the space where there had originally been
mural paintings.
In writing this book, Prof. Stern bad probably not seen the book
entitled Ajat}{a to Ellora written by Dr. Walter Spink and published by
Michigan University, Ann Arbor, U.S.A. In that book Dr. Spink also
tries to date the caves at Ajaq~a and Ellora. Their results differ somewhat
as is apparent in the following table of comparisons.
Prof. Stern
Ajal!ta caves 7,6,15
16,17,4
19,1,2
20-27
Aurangabad Buddhist caves
Elephanta
Ellora caves 1-10,14,21
Badami
Ellora cave 16 (Kailasa) about
750 A.D.
Jaina caves at Ellora
Dr. Spink
Ajaqta caves 6,11, 7 (a bout 460 A.D.)
16,4,17
15, 18,2, 19,1,20
3,5,14,21-29
Aurangabad caves
Elephanta
Eilora caves 27,28,19,26
20,29,21
Badami
Ell ora caves 17, 14,5,6
1,2,7,8,9,3,4,10-12

Une ~.:un perceive that their Aja9Ui chronology is more or less the
same and the difference lies mo!>tly nt Ellora where Dr. Spink places the
Jaina caves of the last munber::; at the top in contrast to those of Prof.
Stern. Here the reviewer inclines to think that the chronology of Prof.
Stern is more justiticd because if one reads carefully Dr. Spink's book;
one will notice that he hall to try his bt:st to explain why these caves at
EHorii which he places at the end of the EllQra period resemble Elephanta
which he places more or lc:;s directly after Ajaf}~ft. This problem will
not occur in Prof. Stern's chronolllgy. lt is also noticeable that Dr. Spink
has not continued his research right down to cave 16 or Kailasa at Ellora
which is dated about the middle of tbc 8th century, otherwise his Ellora
chronology might have been along the same line as that of Prof. Stern.
This bo·ok of Professor Philippe Stern, though rather tiring to read
because it is full of dry detailed examinations of various motifs and
repeats itself too often, is very useful for the exposition of the "method"
used by the author for dating ancient objects and monuments. For those
who believe in applying this "method" in urt and archaeology, it should
be studied us one of Prof. Stem's classic contributions to the subject.
M.C. Suhhailradis Di.~ku/
Fm:ultj• uj i\rcluwolliHY•
Silpalwrn Unh•enit.v

liE VIEWS
Phra Khampbi Thupawong [w:nnuM~1h~~
l!J~o')] (Bangkok, 1968), 235 pp.
(Pinnui?Pi·wmutl'mv~:n~nli
N.A. Jayawickrama, editor and translator, The Chronicle of the Thupa
and the Thupavarpsa (Luzac and Co., (for the Pali Text Society, Sacred
Books of the Buddhists, vol. 28), London, 1971), 286 pp. 6 plates, map,
glossary.
The appearance of a Thai translation of the ThupavaitJsa, a late
Pali Buddhist chronicle from Ceylon composed probably in the thirteenth
century, together with a Pali text of the work from Thailand, provides
a valuable new addition to the body of printed editions of this work.
A new English translation of the same work by N.A. Jayawickrama
entitled The Chronicle of the Thupa and the Thupavattzsa now offers important
explanations and clarifications of the contents of the Thupavaq1-
sa. Thupas(Pali) or stupas(Sanskrit) as they are more commonly known,
are large mound-shaped structures which enshrine or commemorate a
relic of the Buddha. The most important early stupas were in existence
in India and Ceylon by the beginning of the Christian era, and accounts
of them are included in the main chronicles of the Buddhist faith such as
the MahavaqJ.sa, the Dipaval}1sa, and the Dathavatpsa. The Thupavamsa
is a later reworking of material in these earlier chronicles. Taken at
face value, the Thupava1psa is a confusing accumulation of details concerning
the building of particular stu pas, mixed with a thread of general
Buddhist history. It commences with details of the life of the Buddha
and of His predecessors, Dipankaraand Vessantara, then with the account
of the division of the Buddha's bodily remains, the emperor Asoka's
building of 84,000 monasteries, and the spread of Buddhism to Ceylon and
other neighbouring lands. The remainder of the work is devoted to the
construction of stupas in Ceylon.
The language of the Thupavat'!!Sa is stilted and stylized. It is full
of the conventionalized paraphernalia of Buddhist narrative, of flower
garlands, nectar, and fragrant ointments, pearls and golden bells, gems,
etc. and of the conventions of the monkhood and laity surrounding the
stupa building efforts. Magical events occur frequently. But from

285
Jnyawickramu•:s astute introduction to the work we learn thnt the Thupavam~a
is mure thnn a pious nmmtivc uf holy building works, for in its
later parts it comes to treat exclusively und in great detail the life of the
Ceylone~e warrior king DughagiTmaryf( l 01 ~ 77B.C.). Pi}pular trudition
here overcomes the religious scruples of thl! Buddhbt tjmmide.rs, and
the work encapsulates n heroic story in epic style.
In the context of Thailand, Buddhist ciH:nni(:!e traditions from
Ceylon were adopted in the creation of Jocnl traditions for important
Thai relic st.upas, most notably in the ca!-lc of Nakhon Sitbammarat
which houses un impot·tant relic ut Wat !'v1ahalhat. The old chronicles
of the city have borrowed and adopted from Indian and Ceylonese Buddhist
histories h) create a history for their own 1\lttpa. The Thai trunslation
oflhc ThupavuqlSa gives little background regarding the traditions
ofBuddhbt chnmicleH. Its briefintroduution by the Hne Arts Department
provide;; mlly :;cant information about the work and its context. It does
mention in passing a number or sourtcs fnJm wbkh the ThupavmJlSn
was allegedly compiled, i.e. the Mahitvmpsa and its ~·nmmcntary. the
Samantapasildikfi, jatuka commentaries, and Sinhalc:.~c l>mm:cs. Juyawickranm
olf~:rs a more detailed analysis of these possible sources und
reaches somcwha t difTcrenl conclusions. The Thai inr roduclion credits
the translation f'r

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MONUMENTS Olr THE BUDDHA
IN SIAM
By Prince Damrong Rijlinubhiib
Vice.Pntron of the Siam Society (1904-1943)
Translated by Sulak Sivaraksa and A.B. Griswold
with footnotes by Prince Subhadradis Diskul
and A.B. Griswold
First Edition, published 1962
under the title
A History of Buddhist Monuments irt Siam
Monogupll No. ti (revised)
The Slant Society
Under Royal Patronage
Bangkok
1973
40 baht

JOURNAL
OF THE
SIAM SOCIETY
JULY 1974
· volume 02 part 2

TilE SlAl\1 SOC IE lY
I' A'l' HO :"<
\'I< 'E·i'.\'l'H< l:"

I
JULY 1974
volume a2 part 2

©
ALL RIGHTS IU~SERVED
THE SIAM SOCIETY
JULY 1974

THE jOURNAl. OF TIIH Sll1A,J SOCIETY
contents of cnlurm~ 62 pmt 2 july 1974
Page
Articles
Puey Ungphakorn
james A. Hafner
Charnvlt Kasctsln
Benjamin A. S;mon
Thamsook NurmH;'IIItda
, Kennon 8reazeah~
David P. Chandler
A.B. Griswold and
Prasert ~:1 Nagara
Roxanna Brown.
Vance Childress. &,
Michael Gluckman
>. Anthony R. W:~lker
Notes
Hans Pcnth
Michael Vickery
The Society of Siam
Riverine Commerce in Thailand: Tradition in
Decline 7
The First Phibun Government and Its Involvement
in World War II 25
The Fall of the Phibun Government, 1944 89
The First American Advisers in Thai History 121
Inventaire des documents sur le Siam conserves
aux archives de Paris 149
Royally Sponsored Human Sacrifices in Nineteenth
Century Cambodia: the cult of nak ta
Me Sa (Mahisasuramardini) at Ba Phnom 207
Epigraphic and Historical Studies No. 14,
Inscription of the Siva ol' Kf.tq1beil Bcjra 223
A Khmer Kiln Sitc., .. ,Surin Province 239
The Divisions of the Lahu People 253
A Note on the History of Wat Umong Thera
Jan (Chiang Mai) 269
A. Note on the Date of the Traibhumikatha 275
I
/ Review Article
M.C. Chand Chirayu Rajani Background to the Sri Vijaya Story-Part II 285
, Communlcatiolf
P.J. Bee
l Reviews
Thak Chaloemtiarana
W. Scott Thompson
WilHam A. McCleary
The Hsin T'ang Shu passage about P'an-p'an 325
Claude E. Welch Jr. and Arthur K. Smith,.
Military Role and Rule. Perspectives on Civi/-
Military Relations
321.
Corrine Phuangkasem, Thailand and SEATO 331
G.A. Marzouk, Economic Development and
Policies : Case Study of Thailand 337

Charles F. Keyes
Benjamin A. Batson
Phra Rajavaramuni
Phra Rajavaramuni
William j. Klausner
S. Sivaraksa
Craig J, Reynolds
Lorraine M. Gesick
Hiram W. Woodward Jr.
Henry D. Ginsburg
Henry D. Ginsburg
Mattanl Rutnin
Chukrit Nathon Cedi 376
Prince Damrong Rajanubhab, Monumenrs of
the Buddha in Siam. Translated by Sulak
Sivaraksa and A.B. Griswold with footnotes by
Prince Subhadrudis Diskul ami A.B. Griswold 378
P.L. A min Sweeney, The R amayana and the
Malay Shadow-Play 380

THE SOCIETY OF SIAM*
by
Puey Ungphakorn
On this auspicious occasion of the seventieth anniversary of the
founding of the Siam Society, I am very grateful to the Council for having
granted me the opportunity to submit to this distinguished assembly my
views on the Society of Siam. Coming from a social scientist, this presentation
could be expected by my audience tonight to be essentially subjective
in contents. And, ladies and gentlemen, you will be absolutely right in
this expectation. Coming from one who is not in the habit of telling
lies-at least not too often, and from one whose finesse in the choice of
words is sometimes unintentionally and at other times deliberately, nonexistent,
this presentation runs the risk of appearing to be unduly critical.
I would however plead that since this Society of Siam is the one to which
I have belonged for the whole of my fifty-eight years, to which I hope to
belong for several years yet to come, and to which my children and grandchildren
will belong in the future long decades and centuries, I owe to
this Society of Siam no other sentiment than love, loyalty and devotion.
And true love, true loyalty and true devotion, we all know, must not be
blind, and must not be allowed to blind us to the possible defects of our
beloved.
In the short time at my disposal, therefore, I propose critically to
examine the various aspects of our Thai nation: ethnic, social, cultural,
economic and political.
In the course of our national history, we Thai people have been
generous in welcoming immigrants from: neighbouring countries; the
Chinese, the Mons, the Burmans, the Khmers, the Annamese, the Singhalese,
the Indians. Our Nor.therners and Northeasterners have close ties
with the people in the Kingdom of Laos; our Southerners with the Malaysians.
The ancestors of the vast Bunnag family, whose members were
* Address delivered at tbe Dinner to Celebrate tbe 70th Anniversary of the Founding
of the Siam Society, Era wan Room, Era wan Hotel, Wednesday, 27 February
1974.

2 Puey Ungphakorn
most prominent in the Government in the nineteenth century, originated
from the Middle-East.
The roles played by a Greek, and a band of
Japanese in our Ayudbya period are well known, and even nowadays
some of our Thai names can be traced to Portuguese and other European
origins. I submit that this ethnic variety enriches our national heritage
and enables each of us to adopt a wider and wiser outlook in life, on one
condition: that there should be harmony and cohesion among us. And
harmony and cohesion there have been in our Society of Siam thanks to
two important factors: the good fortune that our nation has never succumbed
to the colonial conquest of Western Powers, and the wisdom
of our Kings and rulers successfully to encourage and foster assimilation
and Cl·~ss-breeding among the various ethnic groups.
However, this happy state of affairs began to deteriorate in the
1930's, with the advent of militarism, nationalism and chauvinism.
People of Chinese or Vietnamese origins began to be viewed with suspicion
and apprehension because it was believed, with some truth, that
they were allowed too much control of the national economy and trade.
It bas been thought, especially since the 1950's that people of Malayan
race, professing Islamic religion, should be forced to come into line, in
religious, cultural, educational fields, with the majority. More recently,
the various peoples known by the generic name of hill tribes, were again
forcefully interfered with in their hab1 tats and ways of life. The emphasis
has been wrongly placed on discord, instead of national unity, or
national cohesion, as in the good old days. The result is that in the
current grave insurgency problems, quite a big proportion of those· who
fight against the government troops and police are not really communist
fanatics, but those minority groups fighting for the freedom to be left
alone in their ways of life.
Jn my mind, national unity is imperative in this country at this
critical time in international affairs. Every effort must be made to bring
it about through negotiation and reconciliation.
The task will not be
easy and different approaches must be adopted in different cases. One
thing is certain : the use of force for repression will not be successful, it

TilE !·\OC:IETY OF SlA~I
is very wa~tcful nf human lives and properties. The discrimination
against Thai ~:itil. llrartcd in the new Constitution will make tbe situation
wor:;c, !Wl bcW:L
!\fr. Ch~1irman, my appeal for national unity and reconciliation
must not be laken as an advocacy fur national uniformity or unanitnity.
Far from it. Unfurtunatcly, the Society of Siam is in many respects,
excc:-~sivcly C\mlbrmist, superficial and contemptuous of ideals.
Our nwn upbringing and educational system fosters conformity
which he)'tllld a point, becomes obsessive. Much of the nonsensical
events in cmr life happen in the name of custom and very few dare
challenge them. Bmhs, marriages and deaths are the occasions wben
somebody or nthcr will be ruined because ostentatious customs are
blindly observed. "The dead ruin the living", as we are able to reflect
in 1mr wbcr tnnmls. Our wedding ceremonies look charming and full of
meaning and purpu~c in their original, simple forms i.e. an intimate
nffair f'l>i fanuly and close friends. Nowadays this ceremony has gone
out of hand and has become grandioscr and grandioser. If you cannot
invite the: whole cahinet, the whole bureaucracy, the whole Bangkok
businc'is cnnmwnit.~'• the diplomatic corps to your son's or daughter's
wedding, then yuu will die of shame. It does not matter whether the
cahinet miutstcrs, privy coun!>cllors, high officials, bankers, millionaires,
businessmen and their wives have ever heard of the young couple or their
parents; it dm.:s Mt matter if some of your guests are notorious crooks;
it doe!:i not matter how much and for how long you submit bride and
bridegroom and lhe queuing guests to the utmost inconvenience and discomfort;
it docs not matter if this superb wedding causes traffic jams for
half of the Bangkok streets, this is the custom and one has to conform.
Worse still, Thai couples are only allowed to get married in certain
months of the year. The rest are taboo. And during those allowable
months only certain days are superbly auspicious, others mildly auspicious,
yet others unauspicious. Of course everybody has to plump for the
superbly auspicious dates and times. Result: guests, i.e. the whole of
3

4 Puey Ungphakorn
Bangkok's elite, have to jump like monkeys from one wedding to five
other weddings, and traffic jams spread all over the great metropolis.
Now, if a young man or woman or his or her parents, for that matter,
wish to depart from the custom in the slightest degree, like getting
quietly wedded as and when and how the couple feel like it or find it
convenient, the non-conformist will be ridiculed, attacked, cut from
inheritance, or deemed to b~ a communist, which is thought to be the
worst insult imaginable.
The wedding ceremony is only one example of the abuse of good
customs, and of the urge for conformity. I leave you to imagine other
instances : housing, clothing, drinking and eating habits, golfing, etc.
Talking about clothing, I wish, Mr. Chairman, that you would not have
told me to come here in a lounge suit. ~bile parking my car tonight
outside this hotel, I discovered that I lost my top shirt button.
If my
necktie now sways to the left or to the right, I can assure you that this
is no reflection on my personal political affiliation.
To my way of thinking,
conformism tends to impoverish society materially, intellectually
and spiritually.
By tolerating non-conformity, the society will give
itself a cbancefor fresh ideas and inventiveness. But then the non-conformist
needs to have rtot only initiative and intelligence, what be needs
most is courage.
Our society is superficial in character. We are unable to distinguish
between substance and form.
A young man with long hair is deemed to
be a baddie merely because his hair is long, irrespective of his moral and
intellectual worth.
necessarily knowledge or wisdom.
The aim of education is to obtain a certificate, not
A marriage certificate and a pompous
party are required, not necessarily a harmonious and affectionate
family life.
To give alms and offerings to the priest in full public view
is much more important than to serve society. Truth, justice, kindness
and honesty are not as useful as your neighbours's opinion of you.
In our Society of Siam, furthermore, pragmatism reigns supreme.
Ideal is synonymous to foolishness. Look at some of our proverbs which
'
are seriously and religiously observed in our daily behaviour:

THE SOCIETY lW SIAM 5
Bo not place your boat in the way of fast currents.
The most profound wisdom is to save oneself.
Who is going to bell the cat?
In this convenient way, oppression, tyranny, corruptive practices, injustices
are often tolerated in the guise of wisdom.
And when young men
and women are fired with enthusiasm to improve our society with new
ideas, to change our society to suit their present and future circumstances,
they are gravely discouraged by ridicules, calumnies and insults.
· In the field of economics and commerce, there is a large gap between
the rich and the poor, and this gap tends to widen more and more.
Bangkok and other cities, more and more luxurious buildings, more and
more expensive eating and spending habits are conspicuously developing
everyday and everywhere. In the nearby slums, more and more people
and their children go to bed everynight feeling hungry. In spite of the
success in the overall growth in income and wealth, the rural people are
not perceptibly better off and their livelihood and health are at the mercy
of the vagaries of the weather and the fluctuations in the farm prices.
Money flows one way from country to towns most of the year. Inferior
health, nutritional and educational services in the rural areas perpetuate
and aggravate the disparity.
Long years of dictatorship, albeit benign dictatorship, have left us
with two deep scars in our society.
We have almost lost our love for
freedom, in spite of the proud meaning of our name: Thai. Civic and
political freedoms are delicate plants to be cultivated, preserved and
tended with loving care and strong determination. We must begin to
learn that discipline means self-discipline, not rules and regulations or
decrees imposed by the people in power. We must get into the salutary
habit of challenging authority whenever the latter is arbitrary and lacking
in justice and decency.
The other political scar in our society is the excessive centralization
of administrative power in the Cabinet and bureaucracy, civilian as well
as military.
When everything depends on a small group of people, how-
In

6 Puey Ungpbakorn
ever wise and public-minded, the rest of the society cannot adequately
be cared for. Every effort should be made to open the way for each
member, each group of members, qf our society to play his part in his
own way in the conduct and care of our society.
Every man and woman
should be respected as a human being, endowed with personal dignity,
not to be debased or discarded by another human being, however
"superior" this latter might be.
Mr. Chairman, Ladies and Gentlemen, in my ideal Society of Siam,
there should be unity without forced uniformity; there should be room
for the non-conformist, the unique, the idealist even the cranky; members
of the society should be able to discern truth, beauty and goodness and
cherish them and discard superficial and false values; r,naterial and spiritual
welfare should be available for all, not for the few; human dignity
and freedom are each individual's sacred due, however humble he be.
Let us all work towards this end and transform the ideal into a
reality.
Long live such a Society of Siam, and
Long live the Siam Society.

~IVERINE COMMERCE IN THAILAND :
TRADITION IN DE~LINE
by
James A. Hafner*
"The water is the true home of the Siamese, and
it is on this, their native element, that their real
character and genius are best exhibited." Young,
1898; 25
There is little question, certainly, none raised by historical accounts,
of the importance of inland water transport for agricultural and commercial
activities in central Thailand. The impression this vast network
of canals and rivers made upon such early chroniclers as Bowring, Pallegoix,
Vincent and others is clearly manifest in their accounts of Siam
in the 18th and 19th centuries. Seldom, however, as Young's statement
suggests, have commentaries on the inland waterways been more than
subjective observations.l Even today little is known about the internal
structure of the water transport industry, the mechanics of riverine comtl).erce
and commodity flow, or the socio-economic and ethnic composition
of participants in riverine commerce.
Contemporary transport and development planning in Thailand have
largely ignored the water transport industry, except to acknowledge its
contribution to bulk commodity shipment and irrigation in the ecologically
homogeneous wet-rice landscape of central Thailand. As continued
emphasis has been placed on developing land transport systems there
has been a corresponding decline in water transport activities, the subsuming
of traditional water transport functions and services by land
transport systems, and an increasing displacement of riverine traders.
This displacement involves more than simply the subsuming of traditional
trade and transport functions performed by participants in riverine
* Professor in Geography, University of Massachusetts, Amherst.
1) The few notable exceptions to this situation are found in the studies by Van
Der Heide (1903) Thompson (1941), and more recently in the work of Skinner
(1957) and Jngra~ (1956). ·

IN
THE
SCALE I 1,000,000
0 25 50 MILES
M M- I
NOTE K INDICATE$ A CANAL
Fig, 1

HIVEHINE COMME!ICE IN THAILAND: 'I'RAilJTION IN DECLINE 9
commerce. The manner in which these individuals perceive of changes
in transport conditions, the range of cognized occupational and invest"
ment options open to them, and their capability to pursue these options
have significant implications for the continuation of riverine commerce
and the success of any coordinated transport planning in Thailand. One
participant in riverine commerce and trade which typifies the extent of
this displacement, the diversity in cognized and operational alternatives
among riverine traders, and the increasing decline of traditional water
transport in central Thailand is the storeboat merchant.
The Ecologic Context
The central plain of Thailand is a broad, flat alluvial flood plain
extending inland from the Gulf of Thailand for several hundred miles.
Superimposed over this alluvial plain is an extensive network of natural
and manmade waterways which exceeds 5,000 kilometers in length
(Fig. 1.) Historically this inland waterway network has served as a
medium for transport, commerce, and administrative control in this
dominant region of the country. The ecological requirements of wet
rice agriculture, the characteristic economic activity in this region, have
stimulated a trading and commercial system inherently linked to water
transportation. To the extent that the wet rice economy is seasonal so
also is the character of local trade and vessel movements on the inland
waterways. Distinct seasonal fluctuations in the type of commodities,
numbers and types of water transport units, and even the distribution
of these units can be identified. This interdependence of transpo~t.
agricultural, and commercial activities is an essential feature of this
region of the country.
The cultural component of this ecologic system is also unique in that
several distinct cultural groups participate in riverine trading activities.
The Thai, traditionally characterized as non-commercial in orientation,
engage in the less heavily capitalized and more common forms of riverine
trade such as movement of bulk agricultural produce, minerals, and construction
aggregates. Other ethnic and cultural groups like the Mon
are confined essentially to the production, and trading of earthenware
pottery. The Chinese, long a dominant factor in Thai commerce, appear

10 James A. Hafner
to be most prominent in the highly specialized and capital intensive areas
of rice trade, wholesale and retail trading of consumer goods, luxury items,
and marketing of fresh produce. It is this range of commercial activity
which has made the Chinese merchant such an essential element in the
Thai economy and so ubiquitous in rural Thailand.
Origins of the Store-boat Merchant
The evolution of riverine retail and wholesale trade cannot be precisely
defined, however, it appears to have emerged from the period of
rapid economic interaction between Tha.iland and the West in the nineteenth
century. Skinner (1956; 106) states that "the retail trade in Siam
was dominated by the Chinese both before and after the impact of
Western economic influence," with the prominent Bangkok markets for
imported goods at Sampheng on the Cbaophraya river as focal points for
Chinese junks and local traders.2 There were also numerous Chinese
houseboats which traveled rivers and canals while "most retail trading
was done on the water ...." (Skinner, 1957; 108). It should not be
assumed though that the Chinese as a prominent ethnic minority in Thai
commerce existed without some stratification of occupational activities.
Various Chinese speech groups, particularly the Hainanese, appear to be
the most likely early participants in riverine commerce outside of the
areas immediately surrounding Bangkok. While the Hainanese lacked
capital and social status which excluded them from the profitable importexport
trade, it was no hinderance to their activities in the collection of
local products for sale to exporters. Their role in trade along the inland
w·aterways in central and lower Siam may have been further facilitated
by their resistance to malaria which reportedly was a major factor in
prohibiting the entrance of Teochiu's into riverine commerce in these
areas (Skinner, 1957; 86).
By the 1880's the 'junk bazaar' along the Cbaophraya river in
Bangkok began to decline with mounting imports of Western goods,
expanding foreign trade. and the shift of commercial activities to New
2) The role of the Chinese in retail and wholesale trade clearly predates the 19th
century as Wales ( 1934) points out. It is also quite possible that' the development
of the store-boat trader may have been linked to the system of tax-farming
which evolved after 1780 (Wales, 19 34; 205-06).

HIVERINE COMMERCE IN THAILAND: TRADITION IN DECLINE 11
Road which linked the palace with trading firms and consulates further
down the river. The situation in the rural interior after 1855 saw the
Chinese rapidly subsume the expanding middlemen functions which arose
out of the growth of the exchange economy, especially the services
performed by itinerant Chinese paddy dealers. The introduction of new
taxes (bhasi) farmed out to Chinese enabled inland traders to increasingly
become agents of Chinese tax and revenue farmers as well a~ money
lenders. Skinner (108) adds a final note to these developments by indicating
that increases in internal trade, losses of village economic selfsufficiency,
and changing Thai peasant demands made rural settlement
in markets and towns increasingly attractive for Chinese retailers. And,
as Ingram notes, by the beginning of the 20th century it was impossible
to estimate the value of any single function since they were all so extensively
intermixed (Ingram, 1956; 72). Capping this complex of developments
has been the contribution of the rapidly developing irrigationcommunications
canal system. New canals, programs to canalize
portions of existing rivers, and various navigational improvements added
immeasurably to the accessibility of rural consumers and mobility in
rural areas. lt therefore seems likely that during this period of economic
and transport development the Chinese store-boat merchant cum trader
emerged as a prominent participant in rural trade and rnarketing
networks.
Whatever the origins of this unique commercial and trade institution
its contribution to rural trade and marketing have been substantial.
The ex: tent of these contributions has dwindled, however, as road transport
and road-expansion programs have developed in this region within
the past twenty-five years.3 Competition from road transport and tbe
advent of merchandising and distribution by trucks affiliated with large
commercial firms in Bangkok has increasingly diminished the retail and
distribution functions of traditional store-boat traders. The character of
this displacement and the general inability of riverine transport and trade
institutions to make competitive adjustments to road transport can be
conceptualized in terms of perceptions of occupational and investment
alternatives, patterns of trading activity, and spatial and temporal
dynamics of riverine commerce.
· 3) See Hafner, James A., "Highway Network Expansion in Central Thailand, 1917-
. 1967," in International Geography 1972 (Toronto :University of Toronto Press,
1972), pp. 1200-04.

12 James A. Hafner
The Store-boat Merchant : A Profile
The store-boat merchant is unique among the many small-scale
entrepreneurs engaged in riverine commerce in that he manifests numerous
linkages between the agrarian population, the market centered retail and
wholesale community, and the urban centered Chinese commercial sector
of the e11onomy. These links are manifest in both the scale of his capital
support and the range of activities he engages in. While there is no
homogeneous socio-cultural base from which these merchants develod,
the vast majority appear to be linked through kin and marriage bonds to
the Chinese community in Thailand
Whether through marriage, as children of. "pioneering" store-boat
traders, or as recent immigrants to Thailand, this trade and occupational
specialty is clearly a family activity. Frequently store-boat operators
were of the third and fourth generation engaged in this occupation, a
pattern resulting in continuity of routes traveled and contacts with established
customers. This maintenance of established trading circuits
also appears to have served to minimize the initial impact of competition
from road transportation.
Characteristically, the economic assets of the store-boat merchant
are somewhat more extensive and diverse than those of other participants
in riverine commerce. These individuals frequently owned in addition
to their store-boat, a retail-wholesale shop in provincial markets, homes
and land in urban centers, and in several instances were part-owners
of rice mills and trucking firms. Irrespective, however, of the variety
of their assets or occupational alternatives, there was almost unanimous
agreement that the future would require a progressive,expansion of shop
and market centered activities at the expense of riverin'e commerce. The
primary reason given for this change was the increasing competition
from the rapidly expanding road transport industry.
The store-boat as one type of vessel used in local trade and commodity
movement on the inland ·waterways is in some respects not easily distinguishable
from other boats. The type of boats used by these
merchants are usually small capacity (20-40 tons gross) cargo barges
made of local hard woods such as teak and powered by.outboard gasoline

I
I
I
HIVERINE COMMEHCE IN THAILAND: THADJTJON IN DECLINE 13
engines (Figs. 2 and 3). 4 Structurally, the major differences lie in the
construction of bins, racks, and shelves in the cargo bold for storage and
display of merchandise. A wide range of goods are also tied, hung, or
piled around and on the fore and aft decks, super-structure, and gunnels.
The boat, like many others, also serves as the home of the merchant who
lives in the small (6' x 12') stern platform over the rudder, where personal
possessions, cooking equipment, water containers, and bedding are
kept.
Dynamics of Trading Activity
The volume and variety of locally traded goods and the participants
in riverine commerce follow rather clear seasonal patterns. Like many
other aspects of Thai society, trade and commodity movement on the
inland waterways can be related to a variety of agricultural, economic,
spatial, and hydrologic factors. In an agricultural landscape dominated
by wet-rice production, the seasonality of this cropping system produces
a strong influence on the type and volume of trade activity. Fluctuations
in farm assets and credit, patterns of labor utilization, variations, in field
or farm-lot focus of agricultural activity, rural consumer demands, and
harvesting-planting cycles all impinge on the character of riverine commerce.
Of all the different participants in riverine trade, however, the
store-boat trader is the least affected by these factors and is the most
capable of adjusting his activities to maintain a reasonably consistent
trading pattern throughout the year.
The store-boat trader is a diversified contributor to local trade
in that be can and does engage in retail and wholesale activities. This
diversity is related to the breadth of his resource base through his links
to the larger ethnic Chinese commercial community and the different
scales of his commercial enterprises. His supply of goods and services is
essentially unlimited although in practice is confined to basic consumer
stapl~s. canned goods, rice, condiments, soap, assorted.housewares, cloth,
blankets, clothing, and various luxury items. Aside from goods the
4) Cargo barges may be grouped into categories by capacity. These categories are:
small, 20-50 tons; medium, 51-80 tons; and, large, 81-190 tons. The mean
capacity for all,cargo barges falls in the lower range of tbe medium category.
'

14 James A. Hafner
store-boat trader may also offer services ranging from retail functions to
money lender, rice broker, middleman, wholesale distributor and transport
broker. The manner in which this diversity in goods and services
benefits the store-boat trader .can be conceptualized in terms of several
factors.
Capital and labor components of the rice production cycle attain
specific peak or optimum periods throughout the year. Farm assets,
derived primarily from the sale of paddy stocks after harvest, reach a
peak during the months of January-March, Figure 4. Prior to this period
of peak farm assets are two seasonal peaks in agricultural labor inputs
for the planting and harvesting of vegetable crops and paddy respectively.s
Concurrent with the period of optimum farm assets is a time of
minimum activity among riverine traders. Several reasons can be
advanced in clarification of this pattern. With farm assets at a seasonal
peak and farm labor entering a pariod of lower utilization and greater
mobility goods and services of local riverine traders are both in less
demand and more difficult to distribute. Greater farm population
mobility means, ( 1) some labor will be employed' in off-farm activities,
and (2} consumer needs are met through purchasing items in local markets
and other locations rather than at or near the farm. A second
factor is the sales pattern of riverine traders. A substantial number of
small, local part-time and seasonal traders appear to operate primarily
on a credit basis, thus supporting the greater intensity of riverine trade
which occurs later in the year when ( l) farm credit is at its peak and
(2) farm populations are resident on farms or engaged in transplanting
and other chores associated with this period of the rice cultivation cycle.
Mobility on the inland waterways is also of some importance and conditions
are less satisfactory during and after the rice harvest tban they
are later in the year after the seasonal rains have begun. Restrictions
on navigability impose a relatively greater hinderance for small local·
traders who travel the small canals for full-time traders whQ stay
primarily to the,larger canals which are navigable year-round.
5) While vegetable and similar garden crops grown in the lower central plain are
planted and harvested almost continually, available data suggests a period of
more intensive planting of~hese ·crops from October-November.

Fig. 2 - Store boat, moored on a secondary canal near Bangkok.
taiJ9
...
\\1\~\~,.
Fig. 3 ·- Storeboat, awaiting lock passage at the Chainat Dam, upper Chaophraya River.

RIVERINE COMMERCE IN THAILAND: TRADITION IN DECLINE 15
FLUCTUATIONS IN AGRO-ECONOMIC VARIABLES
AND RIVERINE TRADE ACTIVITY
JAN FEB MAR APR MAY JUN JUL AUG SEP OCT NOV DEC

i
i
!
' I I
16 Jilmes A. Ilafner
In contmst to this overall pattern Llf seasonal fluctuations in riverinc
commerce is the pattern ()f trade activitil!s ror storc-bont merchants.
As Figure 4 suggests, these riverine tntders maintain an almost uniform
level of activity throughout the year. While some of these merchants
indicated that their sales declined somewhat during the period or optimum
farm credit wlwn farm pmchasing power was low and stocks of goods
in local shops were moving slowly, the majority found this not to be a
significant problem. This fact is not diflicult to understand when one
considers that a large volume of store-bout sales are on a wholesale
basis. No clear pattern of credit or cash sales is evident for store-boat
merchants, the predominance of one form of sales over the other is dependent
upon the type of trade they engage in, the character orthcir customers
needs, and whether they trade primarily on a wholesale or retuil basis.
The ability of' these individuals to move through various levels of commerce
from retailing to wholesale distribution of consumer goods to serving as
middlemen for transactions involving agricultural produce pnwidcs them
with considerable freedom from the kinds of economic and commodity
restraints which in hi bit other ri vcrine traders.
All traders, however, including the store-boat merchant nrc subject
t'o certain spatial limitations based on functional and ecological factors.
Throughout the evolution of the storc-bnat traders Hctivities, they have
established a distinct and regular trade circuit or route. The point of
origin, regular trading stops, and terminal point em the trade route is
clearly defined. Seldom does tile trader dcviute fwm this prescribed
route. Customers along trade routes are able to identify the time of
arrival of the store-boat trader, often as precisely as the hour of the day.
The length of time spent at each trade stop varies with seasonal demands
for goods, navigational condition!:i, and the whims of the merchant him~
self. He may remain in one market for as long as a week if business is
brisk and opportunities for retail or wholesale transactions ure plentiful,
although this is normally a maximum limit for any one location. Scheduled
movements along trade routes are influenced by seasonal climatic conditions
and hydrologic factors. Low water levels, irregular currents, and
various navigational obstructions can influence the regularity of his
movements along his prescribed route. The effect of these factors are

!UVERINE COMMERCE IN THAILAND: TRADI'I'lON IN DECL!Nb~ 17
most severe in the tidal areas within 50-60 kilometers of the Gulf of
Thailand, and because of these seasonal navigational factors store-boat
traders have made an effort to consider year-round navigability in the
selection of their trade routes.
The location and length of store-boat trade circuits also reflect
certain functional limitations imposed on the trader.
The linear extent
of trade circuits varies between 100 and 190 kilometers with the average
round-trip'distance approximately 150 kilometers.
The smaller storeboat
trader with lower sales volumes, smaller capacity boats, and less
powerful engines fall at the lower limit of this distance continuum.
These traders usually handle low value, high turn-over consumer goods
such as candies, fresh produce, pastry, toys, tobacco, cloth, and matches
which are essentially retail or low volume wholesale goods. Since their
stocks are depleted quickly and boat capacities are small, the length of
their trade Circuits is short. This fact is further supported by the low
percentages of unsold goods (5-10~) remaining after each trip.
At the
other end of this continuum are the more diversified store-boat merchants
who require 20-25 days to make a complete circuit of their trade area.
Larger boat capacities, more powerful engines, and more diversified
trading activities contribute to this pattern. Where the small store-boat
merchant may make three full circuits of his trade area per month, the
larger volume traders make no more than one.
In addition, the volume
of unsold goods after ~ach trip is also higher, often exceeding 40 percent
of the original volume,
Economically this pattern is reflected in a broad
range of incomes and profits although profit margins are limited to
between 8 and 10 percent.
Over the past ten years there has been a
sharp decline in store-boat income, especially among traders in areas
where there bas been an increase in competitive road transport services.
Route selection then, while initially a matter of tradition has in a number
of cases been modified to exclude markets where competition from road
delivery has made store-boat trade increasingly unprofitable.

;J
18 J um~s A. llllfner
Displacement Patterns
The progressive displm:t!mcn t of 1 raditiona I ;; tore- boat mcrchunts
from the system of riverine commerce by the development or road transpnrt
is a relatively recent development. Tr~1dcrs \>orking on the
Chaophraya ri\'cr bct\vecn the provincial capitab or Chairwt und Nakhon
Sawan indicated that in the 1930's unc Chinese family owned over
seventy store-boats v. hich operated between tllesc c.:cntcrs. As road
transport improved in the immediutc post-Ws of customers to
road distributors--.declincs in riverine traders. In the canal network
extending ea~t from Bangkok a similar decline in store-bout trade has
occurred~ but other rivcnne trade und tran~port unitll have suffered as
well. T~lw-boat companies operati11g along thc:-.c waterways once utilized
over twenty tow-bouts tel pull carg" barges carrying agricullural
produce and raw muterials between Chadwcng~1w ~lfld Bangkok. In 1967
tbe last tow-bout compuny ceased operations and in road transportation and the
inability of the water tran::;port indu~try to ucljust to this growing form
of competition there arc also a number of' secondary influences.
Improvements in inexpensive and elTiciem outboard engines which
are easily adapted to cargo barges ba vc ullio reduced the need for certain
specialized boats such as tow-boats. These engines enable the store-boat
merchant and many small, private cargo barge operators to structure
their operations free from the cost and functional dependence which
previously necessitated their use of tow-bouts. This new "innovation"
has also enabled store-boat merchants to reduce travel times; thus allow-

RIVEHINE COMMERCE IN THAILAND : TIIAD11'ION IN DECLINE 19
ing them to make more frequent circuits of their trade areas and operate
along waterways previously prohibited to them due J:o tidal flows, curw
rents, and other restrictions. To some extent the motorization of the
store-boat has also contributed to a prolonging of this trade since without
this flexibility of movement the effects of competition from road transport
would have been more rapid and extensive.
Another secondary factor in store-boat displacement is the general
improvement in mobility in rural areas. This factor is reflected in both
functional and attitudinal changes. The rapid improvement in the rural
highway network during the past ten years, supplemenLed by significant
increases in the registration of small vehicles and motorcycles has provided
the rural consumer with a new measure of mobility for both
personal and commercial activities. This changing mobility is also
reflected in the attitudes of rural residents toward a range of social,
political and COJ:I1mercial relationships. Greater feelings of participation
in the development of the country, membership in the nation state, and
ability to contact local and national administrative officials has widened
their traditional local perspective. This type of attitudinal change
carries over to marketing and consumption patterns which are rapidly
.extending beyond the boundaries of the village community and its esta-.
blished commercial mechanisms. In summary, this functional and attitudinal
reorientation is enabling the rural consumer and merchant to seek
alternative sources for credit, marketing, and consumer goods to those
previously provided by the ,store-boat merchant.
The Response to Change
Persons engaged in riverine commerce and transport identified many
different occupational and investment alternatives which they perceived
of as being available to them. Evaluation of these perceived options in
the context of socio-economic groups within the riverine commumty provide
some useful insights into the varying ability of water transportation
to modernize and make competitive adjustments to road transport.
Among the cognized options reported there was an explicit relationship
between the type(s) of options perceived and the general socio-economic
status of individuals in the riverine trade community. These

20 James A. Hafner
cognized options fell into three general categories : ( 1) no options, (2)
agricultural activities, and (3} market centered trade. Those individuals
with no perceived options were by far the most numerous, accounting for
54.9% of all respondents. The next largest group was in the second
category of agricultural activities (25.5%}, and the remainder ( 19.6%) fell
in the final category. 6
Individuals with no perceived options were primarily those comprising
the lower socio-economic strata in the hierarchy of riverine trade
participants. Their position in this hierarchy was characterized by (1)
high median age, (2) little capital or other resources, (3) strong kin ties
within the water transport industry, (4) long tenure in riverine transport
occupations, and (5) institutionalized attitudes toward their occupation.
Independently these factors are not necessarily significant, but in combination
define a group which is committed to water transportation as a
life-style, bas little social interaction outside 'of their occupation group,
and has become insulated from change by their low incomes and the
diminishing of occupational options through time. Their ownership and
operation of older small and medium capacity cargo barges minimized
their efficiency in the transport of bulk agricultural produce, construction
aggregates, and similar low value, high volume commodities. Since
profit per trip is small and capital accumulation difficult they are unable
to make competitive adjustments by purchasing larger and more costly
barges whicl:) would allow them to enter the specialized and •more profitable
forms of bulk commodity transport. Short-run adjustments are
possible by shifting to areas not served by road transport, but even this
is becoming increasingly difficult. As a group then, these individuals
manifest the lowest potential for occupational modernization and will
most probably be displaced entirely from effective participation in riverine
tra

RIVEillNE COMMERCE IN THAILAND; TRADITION IN DECLINE 21
ces, primarily farm land, (2) shorter tenure in riverine trade and transport,
(3) lower median age, and (4) few attitudinal commitments to water
transport as either a life-style of occupation. As ·a group they also own
and operate the larger capacity barges and engage primarily in specialized
transport of selected farm produce, and construction ·aggregates. The
rather widespread ownership of farm land among this group emphasizes
a characteristic link between riverine transport and agriculture; a linkage
which diminishes with time. 7
This agrarian link through land ownership
as an occupational alternative was markedly absent among individuals
who perceived of no options to continued participation in water trans-.
port.
As occupational tenure and age data suggest these people are
relatively recent entrants into this occupational field and consequently
their agrarian ties, manifest through land ownership, provide them with
occupational alternatives as yet undiminished by time and a hardening
of attitudes and their economic position. Although they constitute a
relatively small percentage of the entire community of riverine traders
they appear to have the best potential of pursuing modernization of
their occupation and making competitive adjustments to road transportation.
The greatest variety in cognized occupational alternatives was
f~und among individuals engaged in specialized retail and wholesale
trade on the inland waterways. Foremost among this group were the
store-boat merchants. Their perceived options included such diversified
activities as rice milling, saw milling, and operation of trucking firms,
7) In a homogeneous agrarian landscape like the central plain few occupations are
entirely unrelated to the wet-rice economy. Changes in the conditions of agri-
1 cultural employment may have at 'various times induced farmers to seek alternative
employment on the inland waterways, an area not unfamiliar to them.
The average occupational tenure among the older, no option riverine trader
corresponds to a period in the late 1930's when the expansion of rice cultivation
bad ceased and rates of pure tenancy in agriculture were at a maximum. More
recently, agricultural tenancy has again risen from a postwar low in 1963 which
suggests similar conditions may have effected the movement into riverine
activities by the younger trader who still maintains occupational options in
agriculture. (See Ingram; 1971 : 268).

22 James A. Hafner
however, they considered market based trade as their primary occupational
alternative. This option is both logical and economically sound
considering the extensiveness of their resource base, diversity of economic
activities, and their ties to the wi~er urban marketing and trade networks
dominated by ethnic Chinese. Implicit in their anticipated shift from
riverine to market trade is the recognition of a continued decline in the
competitive position of riverine traders and transporters of bulk commodities.
This situation is also indicative of the differential abilities of
riverine traders to exercise their occupational and investment options.
The store-boat merchant, unlike the small cargo barge operator, has the
economic capability of pursuing options which are viable alternatives to
his traditional activities. Economies of scale are also important in
influencing this ability to make occupational changes. The full-time
trader finds it unprofitable to operate below a minimum profit margin
and his flexibility in remaining competitive is minimized by fixed economic
limits. Less profit oriented individuals do continue to operate even
under increasingly unfavorable conditions.s These two extremes are
representative of the store-boat merchant with multiple options on one
hand and the small cargo barge operator with no options on the other.
This differential ability to pursue occupational alternatives outside of
riverine commerce and transport is linked, therefore, to both social and
economic factors which variously condition an individual's ability to
respond to the growing competition from an expanding road transport
system.
Participants in riverine commerce and transport are almost
unanimous in their perception of the changing structure of the transportation
system in central Thailand. Competition from trucks has
diminished the traditional riverine monopoly on back- haul trade,
improved rural merchant flexibility in merchandising, increased the
numbers of urban merchants using trucks to sell and distribute goods in
rural areas, and reduced the relative proportion of total commodity
8) Riverine commerce at many levels is highly seasonal and irregular, therefore
opportunity costs are low since there are few alternatives for the use of free
time. A low profit is consequently preferable to allowing free time to be was'ted
or used for unrelated or low.preference actiVIties. (See, Alice Dewey, Peasant
Marketing in Java, Glencoe, Ill.: The Free P~ess, 1962; 4-12).

HIVE!\!NE COMMEBCE IN THAILAND: TRADITION IN DECLINE 23
shipment by water. 9 Only the small-scale, local vendor and hawker of
seasonal luxury goods and prepared foods seems to be unaffected by
improvements in road transport. Their immunity from these problems
is representative of conditions which prevailed throughout the entire
water transport industry prior to the transport revolution which bas
occurred 'during the last twenty years. While these problems are best
exemplified by the difficulties confronting various riverine traders they
extend beyond the inland water transport industry and solutions can
only be found at the level of development planning.
The task now facing development planners in Thailand who must
draft and implement transport investment programs has many dimensions.
First, they must acknowledge the need for more effective coordinated
transport planning, especially with regard to the contribution of
water transportation. To date this fact has shown little evidence of
being accepted. Secondly, they must show a greater understanding of
the patterns of transport interaction and complimentarity if investment
funds are to be used effectively and optimum transport services provided.
The provision of optimum service assumes a continued role for water
transportation and greater support for this industry from the public
sector of the economy. With capital and organizational support many
essential low cost services which cannot be duplicated by road transport
will continue to be displaced. The rural population will continue to bear
the economic and convenience costs of this displacement. A final dimension
of coordinated transport planning involves making greater provisions
for the social and human displacement engendered by transport develop.
ment. Individuals who lack viable occupational alternatives must either
be provided with initially subsidized options within water transportation
or given assistance through occupational re-training. Coordinated
transport planning, judicious investment of development funds, and
provisions for the human and social dimensions of transport development
and change should contribute to the achieving of a modern and effic~ent
transport system which is one goal of Thai development planning.
9) Rural marketing and merchandising by trucks is an increasingly common phenomena
in rural Thailand, a development described in a recent study of marketing
in Thailand. (See, Dole A. Anderson, Markrting and Development: The Thatlanci
Experience. East Lansing, Michigan : Michigan State University Press, 1971;
136-42.)

24 James A. Hafner
REFERENCES
Hafner, James A., "Highway Network Expansion in Central Thailand, 1917 to
1967", International Geog1·aphy 1972, Toronto : University of Toronto Press
(197 2); 1200·04.
Ingram, James C., Economic Change in Thailand Since 1850. Stanforci : Stanford
University Press, 1955.
Skinner, G. William, Chinese Society in Thailand.
1957.
Ithaca : Cornell University Press,
Wales, G.Q., Ancient Sianiese Government and Administrqtion. London: H.Q. Wales.

THE FIRST PHIBUN GOVERNMENT AND ITS
Introduction
INVOLVEMENT IN WORLD WAR II
by
Charnvlt Kasetsi ri *
The period of the first Phibun government (1938-1944) has conventionally
been viewed in the West as an era of aggressive and expansionist
Siamese nationalism. Partly this is because Siam moved into areas on
mainland Southeast Asia which bad been satisfactorily divided up
between two European powers : France and Britain.t Partly it is a
result of military actions which humiliated the West in Asia, especially
the French and the British. Partly, too, it derives from the fact that the
Siamese joined the Japanese "enemy" in eliminating Western influence
by proclaiming war against the United States and Great Britain. This
view of Siamese foreign policy, however, omits all consideration of the
complex internal political and social developments which gave that
policy its inner rationale. Only a perspective based on domestic changes
in Siam can provide a broad and objective view on. Siamese foreign policy
in that era.
It should never be forgotten that less than a decade passed between
the overthrow of absolute monarchy to the coming to power of Phibun
Songkbram. These were years of great political turmoil and instability
in Siam which also coincided with the wider world economic and political
crisis of the 1930s. These two· factors were to influence the type of
government emerging in Bangkok and its foreign policy.
* History Department, J,..iberal Arts Faculty, Thammasnt University.
I) In a much wider perspective Japan's role in Southeast Asia during the war years
has been conventionally seen in the West as one of aggressive militarism,
because Japan expanded into areas already under Western domination, Japan's
role would be viewed differently if it was not for its conflict and war with the
West. See the argument presented in Anderson, B.R. O'G., "Japan: 'The Light
of Asia", in Silverstein, J., ed., Southeast Asia in WorM War II: Four Essays,
Monograph Series No. 7, Southeast Asia Studies, Yale University, 1966,
especially pp. 13-15.

26 Charnvit Kasetsiri
The Coup of 1932
The year 1932 is undoubtedly one of the most important dates in
Siamese history. In June of that year a group of middle-level civilian
and military officials, led by four colonels, seized power from the ruling
King Rama VII and established a constitution. This event was not a
revolution nor a fundamental change in the Siamese political style:
governing power merely changed hands from the Chakkri princes to a
new oligarchy. The whole affair was strongly reminiscent of traditional
Siamese coups wherein discontent within the Army against the monopoly
of power by the ruling family led elements within it to seize the throne
and establish a new dynasty. The 1932 coup differed mainly in the fact
that it did not abolish the existing royal family.
The chief complaint of the coup members was that governing power
was monopolized by the royal family. Most of the important government
posts were occupied by close relatives of the King. 2 On the other
hand less important members of the royal family were moved in to
various lower-level posts. Thus most officials from common and
bureaucratic families discovered that even with a high level of education
there were few avenues open for advancement in government service. 3
It is striking that most of the 1932 coup leaders had received relatively
advanced education in Europe. The leader of the coup, Colonel Phabon,
spent nine years on a government scholarship studying in Germany and
2) The four most important ministries, Defense, Interior, Finance, and Foreign
Affairs, were controlled by the King's close relatives. Hom Ronran, luang,
Mua khaphachao ko kankabot (When I staged a coup), V. I, Nakornchai, Bangkok,
1949,p.2,
3) One of the general complaints among middle-level officials was that they were
caught in the middle between senior and junior me~bers of the royal family.
According to one author these junior members were a great problem since they
were installed in various government posts without any consideration of their
education. While the senior members were relatively highly educated the junior
men were not. This pattern was most obvious in the Siamese Army, which was
largely controlled by both senior and j'unior members of the royal family. At
the beginning of the 20th century it was popular practice in Siam for minor
members of the royal family to be sent abroad to Europe for a few years to
dabble in military science without getting proper training or degrees. Upon
their return they were usually siven po~ts in either the Army or the Ministry
of Defense. Ibid., p. 6.

·!'i-tt: FlllST PHI BUN GOVEHNMENT AND ITS INVOLVEMENT IN \'\IORLD WAR II 2'
Denmark,4 Other members of the coup group, whether they were Army
or civilian officials, had a similar experience of education abroad;
The growing discontent among these men eventually burst out wheti
the world economic depression reached Siam in the early 1930s. In ordet
to balance the government budget King Rama VII requested a good
number of his officials to resign. Others were faced with cuts in their
salaty.s This was felt most keenly among the middle-level officials of
commoner origin and finally led to the coup.
After the coup the King was invited to remain as a constitutional
monarch, a figurehead without real power. Powerful relatives of the
King were encouraged to go into exile. At the same time an Assembly
of seventy appointed members was set up, though the oligarchic character
of the new power group was regulated by a decree forbidding the
formation of political parties. Phraya Mano, an old aristocrat who had
taken no part in the 1932 coup, was asked to head the new government,
in which the coup leaders merely held posts as ministers without port~
folio. The coup leaders nevertheless were at first willing or felt it
necessary to maintain some continuity with the old order. Real power,
however, now lay not in the Cabinet but in the Army and the Assembly,
which were dominated by the coup group.
Problems facing the new elite
Although the initial 1932 coup was bloodless, its aftermath was
very different.
to struggle to remain in power.
The major issue facing the coup group after 1932 was
bun took over the office of Prime Minister.
This struggle lasted until the time Phi~
The new elite felt that
their security was physically threatened first by the "aristocrats",
4) Thai noi (pseud.), Phraya Phahon, Prae Pitthaya, Bangkok, 1954, pp. 47-8.
5) Phahon, the coup leader, was demoted and his salary was cut down, according
to him, without any cause being given. This episode occurred only a few
months before the coup of June 24, 1932. Ibid,, pp. 58-9.

28 Charnvit Kasetslrl
secondly by the "royalists ", and lastly and surprisingly by the
Assembly. G
The attempt of the new elite to share power with the aristocrats
resulted in failure. Conservative elements among the aristocrats,
especially the newly appointed Premier Phraya Mano, increasingly came
into conflict with the more radical members of the new elite. In this
conflict the aristocrats were supported by some more conservative members
of the coup group itself. Within a few months of the 1932 coup an
open split between the new elite and the aristocrats on the one band and
within the new elite itself on the other hand developed. The famous
episode which finally ended co-operation between the aristocrats and the
new elite was the controversy which arose over the Economic Plan drafted
by Pridi, a radical civilian member of the coup group. The Plan was
condemned by the aristocrats as communistic and the drafter was forced
to leave the country temporarily. 7 The aristocrats' next move was to
dissolve the Assembly since it was dominated by the coup group and
their sympathizers. Finally the coup leaders themselves were forced to
resign from their posts in the Army.s
--------------------------------
6) As a matter of convenience the present writer will use general terms such as
"royalists", "aristocrats", and "the new elite", to describe the factions str uggling
for power. However, it should be noted that political affiliation under
such complex and disturbed conditions are not easy to pinpoint. By "royalists"
I mean members of the royal family as well as people long in their service and
still loyal to them. Being a royalist does not necessarily mean he always preferred
an absolute to a constitutional monarchy. Many royalists felt that they
would not be against a change toward constitutionalism in Siam but they could
not approve the way in which the change had been carried out by the new elite,
By "aristocrats", I mean a group of people from old established families who
had traditionally served the absolute monarchy and who generally had higher
ranks and social status than the new elite. They remained neutral at the time
of the 1932 coup, thus were asked to share power with the coup group. The
first Siamese Prime Minister, under the constitutional monarchy, was froiU this
group. However, the aristocrats later turned against the new elite and tried to
seize power for themselves. After 1933, royalists and aristocrats shared the
same enemy, the new elite, and therefore one finds that the two groups frequently
worked together.
7) See David Wilson, Politics in Thailand, Cornell Paperbacks, Cornell t.Jn i versity
Press, Ithaca, N.Y., 1966, pp. 16-7.
8) After the coup of 1932, Phahon, the coup leader, occupied the post of Commander
in Chief of the Army. The aristocrats replaced him with someone more
sympathetic to their outlook.

+UE FIRsT ilumtJN GOVERNMENT AND ns lNVOLVI!:MEN'l' IN woULD WAR II 29
On June 20, 1933, almost a year after the 1932 coup, another coup
was staged in order to remove the aristocrats and their supporters from
power. In this transition period of Siamese politics it is often difficult
to distinguish clearly the political affiliation of various contenders for
power. It seems that the aristocrats joined with the royalists in opposing
the new elite, while at the same time some discontented members of the
new elite broke off and supported the aristocrats. Thus after this second
coup two of the four colonels who led the 1932 coup were expelled from
the country ostensibly because of their association with the aristocrats.!l
The third colonel was shifted to a post without real power. Thus only
Phahol). was left to take charge of the government.
Within a few months of overthrowing the aristocrats the coup group
was faced with a new challenge, this time from the royalists who deeply
resented the power monopoly of the new elite and its treatment of the
royal family.
Led by former Minister of Defense Prince Boworadet, the
royalists tried to seize the capital in October, 1933, demanding that tbe
Phahon government resign within the hour. Although the government
managed to defeat the "rebels'', psychologically, the clash had a serious
effect on its attitude towards its rivals.I 0
In particular, the Boworadet counter-coup had severe repercussions
on the relations between the throne and the government. After the
incident the King decided to leave Siam for England. The new elite was
sensitive to the opprobrium they might incur if it was thought to have
forced the King to leave his country. Its claim to have brought constitutionalism
to Siam by ,peaceful means would also be jeopardized.
9) These two colonels were Ph1·aya Song Suradet and Phta Prasat Phitthayayut.
Although they were two of the four most important leaders of the 19 32 coup
very little is known about them. The two colonels had to leave the country in
1933 but managed to return in 1935. They had to go into ex:ile again when
Phibun became the Prime Minister in 1938.
10) The government lost 59 soldiers during the fighting. The Coinmander in
Chief of the "rebel" army was killed in the battle. Thirty four members of
the ''rebel" leadership, including Prince Boworadet, fled to Indochina to seek
political asylum.
Samut Surakksaka, 26 Kanpatiwat thai lae ratthaprahan, 2089-2507, (26 Thai
coups, 1546-1964), Bangkok, 1964, pp. 216-17.

Charnvit t

THE l•'lltST PHIJJUN GOVERNMENT AND ITS INVOLV!i:MENT IN WORLD WAR II 31
Besides these two attempted coups the government claimed that
the lives of its individual members were repeatedly threatened. Phibun,
by this time appointed Minister of Defense, alleged that he had lived
through at least four assassination attempts. Other members of the new
elite claimed to have had similar experiences. Although it was difficult
to know how genuine these attempts were, since tbey served the government
as a good excuse to avert suspected oppositions, a general feeling
of insecurity on the part of the new elite is comprehensible. There is
some evidence that one member of the government died of poisoning and
some of Phibun's claims of attempts on his life can be corroborated. In
1935 he was wounded by gunfire while leaving a soccer field, and in 1938
he and some friends were apparently poisoned. They were immediately
taken to a hospital and their lives were saved.l3
The 1932 constitution contained provisions for the establishment
of a National Assembly. Its membership was to consist of equal numbers
ofappointed and elected representatives. The first "general" elections
took place at the end of 1933 and 78 members were elected.I4 In all
there were three general elections before Phibun came to power in 1938.
The second election was held in 1937 and 91 representatives were elected.
But since the Assembly was dissolved the following year, another election
had to be held in which almost 50 per cent of 1937 representatives were
re-elected. IS
Almost from the beginning the Assembly was regarded as a threat
to the government, whether of the aristocrats or, later, of the new elite.
In 1933 the aristocrats had dissolved the Assembly since it voiced the
hostile opinion of the new elite against the government. This act of
opposition was one of the reasons for the 1933 coup which overthrew the
aristocrats. The coup group declared they had been forced to stage the
coup in order to save the life of the Assembly, a vital organ in any
I
13) Thian Pratbipasen, op. cit., pp. 50-I, 74, 80-1, and 84.
14) It should be noted that these representatives were not elected directly by the
people, District representatives were first elected by universal suffrage; then
these district representatives would elect one or two provincial representatives
(depending on the size of the population of the province) to sit in the
Assembly.
15) Withetsakorani, op. r;it., p. 600.

32 Charnvit Kasetsiri
democratic order. However, this was more pretext than reality as
events were to show. The aristocrats were not so much against the
Assembly as such as against a particular Assembly controlled by the
followers of the new elite.
After the first general elections in November, 1933 (this was immediately
after the defeat ofBoworadet) 78 representatives were elected,
equal to that same number which bad been previously appointed by the
government. These elected representatives soon became the opposition
to the new elite now in power. For the first time in Siamese history
local politicians had an opportunity to voice their opinions at the national
level. Many of them took their parliamentary responsibilities seriously
and were active in checking abuse of power by the government and at
the same time demanding more attention for their provinces. The
government, however, consisted mainly of what one might call "Bangkokians"
or their sympathizers, depended largely on centrally-appointed
members for support, and was generally incapable of understanding these
demands.
The elected provincial representatives' actions were often
regarded as a threat to the government, not as a complementary activity
in the democratic process.
During the period of 1933-1938 while Phahon held the office of
Premier, the elected representatives induced him to resign three times.
On two of these occasions, however, these resignations were largely a
matter of parliamentary formality and Phahon returned immediately to
form a new government. Nevertheless, these clashes indicated that even
with half the Assembly members being appointed, the government had
no guarantee against parliamentary opposition. In part this was because
the government could not rely completely on the members it appointed.
According to the 1932 constitution, once a member was appointed he
could only be removed by a vote of two thirds of the whole Assembly.
In other words expulsion required support from the elected members.
Accordingly the appointed members had some freedom of manoeuvre
and the elected members' action in opposing the government could,
sometimes, persuade some of them to cooperate with the opposition ..

THE FIRST PIIIBUN GOVERNMENT AND ITS INVOLVEMENT IN WOULD WAR li 33
The first action of the Assembly that caused Premier Phahon to
resign occurred in !934 when the Assembly refused to ratify the Treaty
on International Rubber Cartel. The second time was after a debate,
in 1937, on the sale of crown property. Many members of the government,
including Phibun, then Minister of Defense, bad acquired crown
land at very low prices through a nominal sale. The matter was brought
to the Assembly and one elected representative from Ubol, a province
in the Northeast, led the attack on the government.t6 The scandal was
so great that both the Premier and the Prince Regent resigned. This was
the first serious debate in the Assembly concerning the government's
conduct and it was most damaging to its reputation. It was also the
first in a series of events leading to a major split between the appointed
and elected representatives. This split between two types of representatives
matured early in 1938. The Director of the Fine Arts Department,
also holding the office of minister without portfolio, made an
anti-Chinese speech implying that the Chinese minority problem was
comparable to that of the Jewish problem in Germany and suggested
that the Nazi solution could well be applied in Siam. 17
The speaker was
condemned by the elected representative from Ubol, but defended by
some of the appointed Assembly members. The Ubol representative was
punished for his outspoken manner by being thrown into the pond in
front of the Assembly building. The incident led to a strike, of some 30
elected representatives who refused to attend sessions with the appointed
members.ts
Only one year later a group of elected representatives caused Phahon
to retire from politics for good. A Northeastern representative induced
the Assembly to vote no-confidence in the government budget,l 9 Phahon
16) Ibid., p. 547.
17) G. William Skinner, CMnese Society in Thailand: An Analytical History, Cornell
University Press, Ithaca, N.Y., p. 261.
18) Nai Honhuai (pseud.) C!zaofa Prachathipoh (Prince Prachathipok, Rama Vll),
V, II, Thaikasem, Bangkok, 1948, p. 351.
19) The role of the elected representatives from the Northeast was all along rather
unique. In his I san: Regionalism in No1·theastern Thailand, Keyes divides the
elected representatives of that reg'ion into two groups. The first consists of
people descended from traditional ruling families who seek an avenue to power
at the national level. The .writer of this paper believes that these representatives
t~nr;l tg aUy themselves with any sovernment ill Bap.gkok and thus .do not

34 Charnvit Kasetsiri
retaliated by dissolving the Assembly, but decided to retire himself and
handed his power to Phibun, his Defense Minister. In effect the
Assembly had brought about the resignation of the coup leader. It is
interesting to see that although the Assembly had little effective power
given to it, it could be a serious annoyance to the government.
Since it
had the constitutional right of opposition, it was much more difficult to
suppress than the royalists or the aristocrats who could be conveniently
charged with treason.
One could conclude that the transition period of Siamese politics
paved the way for rule by a strong military government. The six years,
between 1933-1938, when Phahon was in power, was the period that
decided what kind of regime Siam would have in order to overcome
internal political unrest and governmental instability.
Phibun's rise to power
When Phahon decided to retire from the Premiership it was quite
clear that Phibun, the Defense Minister, would succeed him. Although
there was some initial suggestion that Pridi, a prominent civilian member
of the new elite then serving as Minister of Foreign Affairs, should take
over the office, the Army was in a strong position to insist on its own
candidate. By 1938 the Army had consolidated its administrative control.
This, combined with the world political crisis, strengthened its
claims to lead the nation. Accordingly, other candidates were by-passed
and Phibun became the third Siamese Premier after the 1932 coup.
Phibun was born in 1897 of humble origins. At the age of twelve
he was sent to the Bangkok Military Academy where he graduated six
form a real opposition to it. The second group comes from humble origins and
constitutes a genuine opposition, voicing local demands in order to get the
support of their constituencies for future elections. Their struggle at the
national level has been a long one and they tend not to ally themselves with
the regime in Bangkok. They were heavily suppressed in the late 1940s
when Phibun came back to power after W.W. II. At least five of these representatives
were mysteriously mur

years later. 20 In 1924 Phibun won a government scholarship to study
military science at Fontainebleau. He spent three years in France and
in 1927 returned to Siam and joined the Army. In 1932 he was a mem~
ber of the group which overthrew the monarchy. Although he was one
of the original members his role at the outset was not a leading one;
After the 1932 coup, however, he took an active part in suppressing the
aristocrats and the royalists in the following year. Furthermore, the
expulsion of other military men, Phahon's rivals and sympathizers of the
aristocrats, eventually made Pbibun the only remaining prominent Army
member of the new elite. Subsequently he became Phabon's personal
aide and was appointed Defense Minister in 1934. He was then only
thirty seven years old. He held the post until 1938 when be became
Premier.
In his new Cabinet, besides the Premiership, Phibun also held the
Ministries of Defense and Interior. These two posts assured him close
control over the Armed Forces and all provincial governors. Subsequently
he took over the office of Minister of Foreign Affairs.
As one of the original members of the 1932 coup Phi bun inherited
the general outlook and the political problems of the new elite. But
within the group be was associated with the more radical and activist
factions. These people tended to see themselves as building a new
society in Siam; in other words, Siam was, in their view, entering a
period of "nation building". Since this period of "nation building"
coincided with a time of world crisis, the Army must provide strong
leadership for solving the problems facing the country. Phibun's own
thinking, as suggested by his writings, focussed on the need for powerful
and authoritarian leadership. As early as 1934 the Defense Ministry's
magazine, Yuddha!cot, frequently published articles by him to the effect
that during the time of "nation building" and world crisis Siam needed
a strong leader as much as "an animal herd needs its leader". 21 Phibun
20) It was the practice of the Bangkok Military Academy, at the turn of the century,
to expand its recruitment to young boys of humble origin. Upon their graduation
these military cadets could take jobs either in the Armed Forces or the
civil service. There was no clear border line between services in the Armed
Forces and civil service; the two merged and overlapped. See David Wilson
in Johnson, op. cit., pp. 254-55.
21) Thian Prathipasen, op. cit., P· 53.

36 charnvit :Kasetsiri
was perhaps the first politician to popularize the word phunam (leader)
in the Siamese language.
Although one of the ideological justifications for the 1932 coup had
been to bring democracy and a constitution to Siam; by the end of the
1930s these issues were rarely mentioned. The obsessive desire of the
hew elite was to consolidate its power, especially through the Army; and
at the same time to eliminate all opposition factions. Within one month
of assuming the Premiership Phibun arrested some 40 people on charges
of treason. It was his first major action against the royalists, the aristocrats,
elected members of the Assembly, and personal rivals within
the Army. Eighteen of these people were immediately executed, twenty ..
six were condemned to life imprisonment, and others were expelled from
the country.22 This grim episode served as a warning to other potential
opposition elements.
In a further effort to strengthen the new elite's position and consolidate
its claim to be the sole leading force in the nation Phibun worked
to undermine the prestige and strength of its ultimate adversary, the
monarchy. Traditionally the Ministry of the Royal Household had been
one of the most important governmental agencies, since it was in charge
of the elaborate ceremony and protocol which formed an essential
element in the power and prestige of the monarchy. Its ancestry can be
traced back to the middle of the fifteenth century.23 When the new
elite first came to power it decided to abolish the Ministry in the hope
of thereby undermining the importance of protocol, ceremony, and court
22) Withetsakorani, op. cit., pp. 673-681. The prisoners consisted of members of
the royal family, aristocrats, Assembly representatives, and some Army rivals
of Phi bun, a good sample of the people who were regarded as a threat to the
security of the new elite, They were tried by Court Martial, despite some
slight protest about the way the trial was carried out on the part of certain
elected members of the Assembly. Phraya Song Suradet, a leader of the ~932
coup and a major Army rival of Phi bun, was expelled from the country at this
time. This was the second and last expulsion of Phraya Song Suradet from
Siam. He died in 1944 while in exile. in Cambodia. Phibun thus attained
undisputed supremacy within the Army.
23) D.G.E. Hall, A History of South-East Asia, 3rd edition, St. Martin's Press:
N.Y., 1968, pp. 179-80.

'J'Hl~ £• 1 IRS'1' l'IitllllN GOVERNMENT AND ITS INVOLVEMENT IN WORLD WAR II 37
tradition, as well as eliminating a good number of royalist officials
employed within it.24
In the assault on the monarchy, however, Phi bun went to much
greater lengths than Phahon. He prohibited the display in houses of
any pictures of ex-King Rama VII, who was in exile in England.2s Ih
addition in 1939 the ex-King was accused of misusing some six millioh
baht (about $ 2,000,000 at that time) of the crown property. The
government filed suit in the civil courts and eventually won their case.
The ex-King's property and his private residence were confiscated.~6
Thus the first year of Phibun regime was mainly devoted to an
active campaign to strengthen the new elite's position, by either eliminating
or weakening older elements in Siamese politics to the point where
the new elite became the only organized political force within the
country.
Nationalism
While Phibun's first move to consolidate his power was the negative
one of crushing old hostile political elements, be soon shifted his
main energies to the more positive task of building popular support for
his regime among the mass of the population.
24) The Ministry was renamed the Bureau of the Royal Household, and was thus
deprived of ministerial status. Since 19 32.many of the traditional court
ceremonies were suspended, It was not until the early 19 60s that some of these
ceremonies were revived under the present King, Rama IX. This was only
possible after the expulsion of Phi bun from Siam in 1957, as a result of a
military coup against him. For the first time in almost thirty years the Royal
Barges Ceremony was held. This is one of the most important Buddhist
ceremonies for it celebrates the end of the Buddhist Lent and the giving of
yellow robes to the monks. In the ceremony the King takes command over a
flotilla of some fifty ancient barges floating down the Menam River to the
Temple of Dawn which is situated across the river from Bangkok, and there
presents yellow robes to the chief abbot.
25) Nai Honhuai, op. cit., V. II, p. 391.
26) Ibid., pp. 374-5. The case was heard behind closed doors. The judge presiding
over the court voiced some objections to the way the case was carried on.
He was later dismissed from his post. As mentioned in the text that the
government won the case and the King's property was confiscated, it was not
untill946 that the new civilian government, which succeeded Phibun's first
regime, decided to return the property to the Dowager Queen.

3s
. . 'l
Charnvit t

THE FIHS'f Pll!BUN GOVERNMENT AND l'{S INVOLVEMENT IN WORLD WAR II 39
At first the movement in the direction of more intense nationalism
did not, of course, have much effect on the way of life of the people.
Government action was concerned with more or less formal matters,
such as new names for race, nation, and new words for the National and
Royal Anthems, in an effort to create a psychological feeling that the
country was entering a new era.
Subsequently, this nationalistic campaign was broadened to involve
organized political education of the population. The Office of the Prime
Minister and the Department of Public Information took the active role
in this campaign. These two offices, especially the Department of Public
Information utilized a variety of means for this program of mass education.
For example, one of the most famous programs on Radio Thailand
was a series of conversations between two fictitious characters, Mr. Mann
and Mr. Kong. 30 The conversation program involved almost every
aspect of governmental activity, trying to explain them or persuading
people to accept the government's point of view. It became an excellent
instrument for sounding out public opinion before some certain projects
were to be embarked upon. It became highly popular during Phibun's
campaign to reclaim former Siamese territories in Indochina.
During this period drama, song, and literature, were also used for
nationalist purposes. A good number of plays based on Siamese history
were produced by the government. Most of the stories were about the
struggle for Siam's independence and glorified heroes whose duty and
love were only for the nation. 3 1 The government encouraged people to
30) The names Mann and Kong combine to form one Siamese word, Mannkong,
which literally means stability. This program was carried throughout, almost
every night, tl1e Phibun era from 1939 to 1944. According to a man who
worked for this program Premier Phi bun took an active role in directing it.
Most of the time he initiated the subjects of the conversation himself. Sang
Patthanothai, Khwamnuk nai krong khang (Thoughts in prison), Klangwitthaya,
Bangkok, 1956,pp. 71 and205.
31) Actually these plays were the work of one man who was then the Director of
Fine Arts, Luang Wichit Wathakan. He was later appointed Minister of Foreign
Affairs and toward the end of World War II was sent to be the Siamese ambassador
to Japan. Luang Wichit Wathakan (1898-1962) demonstrated outstanding
ability in cooperating with whatever government iri power. His works are
still popular and frequently put on stage today. A list of his yt~ys for that
period gives a clear picture of what the government was campatgnmg for.
They are: . . .
1, Laat Saphan (Suphan Blood), ftrst staged m 19 36. It ts the story of some
vHla~ers in th~ late 18th century, who fol!~ht against the :eunnese inva-

40 Charnvit Kasetsiri
see these plays. Some of the play scripts were circulated to government
schools in the provinces to encourage students to perform them locally.
At the same time modern popular songs and literature were introduced.
ders until they were all killed. The play was so popular that the Fine
Arts Department was able to build a new theatre on the basis of tickets
sold. The play script was sent to all government schools so that students
could perform it for local audiences. In addition the Ministry of Defense
required every Armed Forces cadet see the play.
2. Ratm.amt (Rajamanu), 1936. This is the story of a leading warrior in the
16th century. It is based on the history of Siam and Cambodia during
the period when Cambodia was conquered and reduced to the status of a
vassal to Siam.
3. Phracha.a [(rung Thon (The King of Dhonburi), 193 7. King Taksin, or the
King of Dhonburi, was the man who restored Siam after its capital was
sacked by the Burmese in 1767. The play had a two-fold purpose. At
first glance it was a conventional story of Siam's fight for independence.
However, the story also was intended to damage the reputation of the
Bangkok Dynasty, since its founder, Rama I, came to the throne as a
result of a coup against the King of Dhonburi.
4. Suk Thalang (The Battle of Thalang), 1937. When the Burmese invaded
southern Siam at the beginning of the 19th century, two women led the
popular resistance in the island of Junk Ceylon (Phuket). The two women
were later awarded titles as heroines by the Bangkok Dynasty.
5. Chaoying Senwi (The Princess of Senwi), 1938. This is a story about two
Thai principalities in the Shan States of Burma during the 12th or 13th
centuries. Although the story has nothing to do with fighting against
outside invaders, it lays emphasis on the Thai race and the Thai's love
for their country. The play is still extremely popular nowadays and many
songs from it are still regularly sung in Siam, These songs are often used
by the Siamese government during periods of difficulty, such as during
the Laotian crisis in 1960·6 2 and during the dispute with Cambodia over
the temple, Phra Viharn, on the Thai-Cambodian border in 1962.
6. Maha Devi (The great queen), 1938. Maha Devi was the queen of
Chiengmai, a northern Thai state, in the 16th century. In historical
reality she fought impartially against the Burmese and the Siamese of
present-day central Thailand. However, in the play, history is somewhat
dis.torted : she is depicted as helping to unify Siam into one great
country.
7. Nanchao (Nanchao was supposedly a Thai kingdom in Yunnan before the
13th century), 1.939. This is perhaps the most popular and important
play of the period. It is the story of how this Thai kingdom in southern
China was destroyed by Kublai Khan. The play is an ultra-nationalistic
saga of how the Thai race was driven out of their original homeland. The
play had powerful political effe~ts by popularizing a hitherto obscure

•
THE FIRST PHI13UN GOVEHNMENT AND ITS INVOLVEMENT IN WOULD WAR II 41
Their themes were like those of the new drama, and emphasized above
all patriotism and the glory of the Thai race.32
In this process the Department of Fine Arts underwent a severe
change in the nature of its work. Its school of classical dance and
music was forced to devise new art-forms to serve nationalist purposes.
Classical plays and music were ignored, and the school was compelled
to perform a mixture of c!assical dance and western music. It had to
stage musical nationalist historical "musicals" instead of the traditional
types of drama and music based on Indian epics and simple Siamese
stories.
By 1940, the nationalist program began to have conspicuous external
effects on the mass of the population. This developped through what
was known as the campaign for an ideal "Thai culture". The government
passed a series of laws on national culture forcing the people to
wear "proper" dress and to behave in a "proper" manner. Wearing
western trousers, skirts, and hats was first encouraged and later made
mandatory. Some old customs, such as eating betel nut, were prohibited.
episode of ancient history into a national myth. Even today most Thai
historians believe that their ancestors were driven out of Yunnan by the
Chinese, who are thus the Thai people's worst enemy.
8, Anusawari Thai (The Thai Monument), 1939. This is the only one not
based on ancient history. It is a story of nation buildi~g and resisting
threats from an unidentified outside enemy. Perhaps it was the least
popular one.
9. Pho Khw1 Phamuang (The Lord of Pha Muang), 1940. This was the last
political play of the period, since the playwright, the Director of the Fine
Arts Department, was appointed Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs after
Siam joined in a military pact with Japan. It is a story of a Thai prince
who overthrew his Cambodian overlord in the 13th century. Subsequently
the Thai established their first historical kingdom in the Indochinese
peninsula.
It should be noted that all these plays require at least three hours for one
performance. The plays are a combination of classical Siamese dance, modern
music, and songs. Most of the basic stories were already well-known to the
population, making it easy to popularize the plays.
Wichit Wathakan Anuson (In memory of Wichit Wathakan, 1898-1962), V. II,
Bangko~ 1962,p.294. •
32) The government opened a contest for the best new words for the National
Anthem, and the Army came first in tbis competition. The Army words are
still in use

42 Charnvit Kasetsiri
The government believed that by doing so the Siamese would appear
"civilized" to the outside world. Phibun believed that one pretext used
by the colonial powers for intervening in a country was the "uncivilized"
character of its people. In facing the world crisis of the 1930s the
Siamese bad to be prepared to avert such dangers. Phibun was also
convinced that Siam had so far managed to maintain its independence as
a result of conscious modernization by two of its greatest kings, Mongkut
and Chulalongkorn.33 The aim of the two monarchs had been to accommodate
to the Western powers at a time when their aggressive thrust
threatened Siam's survival. Although it is by no means certain that this
policy of adaptation was the main reason whY Siam was not colonized,
,Phibun believed it to be so, and accordingly enforced his own program
of adaptation on the people.
It might be asked why Phibun wanted the people to adopt western
customs at a time when his government was strongly anti-French. For
Phibun there was no conflict between the two policies. His explanation
was that there was much good in the West as well as much that was evil.
It was the duty of the government to select the good things and introduce
them to the people. These good things, he believed, would help the
country in the process of "nation building". Accordingly, a judicious
combination of eastern and western customs was felt to be appropriate
and highly acceptable. In photographs of the period, one can see that
the "proper" dress for a Siamese girl was a combination of western shoes,
traditional sarong, modified Siamese blouse, and western hat and gloves.
The policy of Thai-ification and the Chinese minority problem
Up to the beginning of the 20th century Chinese immigrants were
generally welcomed in Siam. There was no immigration law unti11927.
The Siamese court and nobility regarded them as bringing profit and
wealth to the kingdom. The Chinese engaged in almost every aspect of
business and in return they turned over a part of their profits to the court
33) It is certainly true that during the period of high colonialism these two monarchs
had abolished many old Siamese customs, such as kneeling and crawling
in the presence of the king, and the Siamese court itself had adopted many
Western customs. Nonetheless this was done within the limited circle of the
cour~ and the ma~s of poputation was not affected,

·hiE thRST PH113UN GOVERNMENT AND ITS INVOLVEMENT IN WORLD WAR II 43
and nobility in the form of various taxes. The Siamese considered the
Chinese less foreign than other foreigners and they, the Chinese, lived
under the same laws as the Siamese.
Anti-Chines~ discrimination has been a phenomenon of the 20th
century. It was first introdced into Siam by the nationalist-minded Rama
VI (reigned 1910-1925) who compared the Chinese in Southeast Asia to
the Jews in the West. It was not surprising therefore that some of the
post-coup elite revived this idea in their nationalist campaign. But
whereas the anti-Chinese policy of Rama VI was mainly verbal and no
drastic action was taken against the Chinese under his rule, during the
Phibun government the Chinese became the victim of active discrimination.
From the early 20th century on there was a growing fear among
sophisticated Siamese that the size of the Chinese population and thei1·
control over the Siamese economy was creating a real problem of "a
state within a state".34 This fear arose for two main reasons: the rapid
growth of the Chinese population and the increasing difficulty in its
assimilation. It has been estimated that in the peak years 1918-1931
Chinese immigration into Siam totalled roughly 95,000 a year. This was
due both to the economic boom in Siamese rubber arid tin and to bad
social conditions in South China. 35 The number of Chinese immigrants
dropped between 1932-1945 to about 33,800 per year.3 6 It is believed
that toward the end of the 1930s Siam had a Chinese population of
between 2-3 million, or about 10 per cent of the whole population. This
Chinese minority, though comparatively few in numbers, constituted
about 70 per cent of all skilled and unskilled non-agricultural labor.37
Probably more than 80 per cent of the Siamese economy was in Chinese
hands.
Since part of the economic policy of the post-coup elite was to
provide jobs for unemployed Siamese, the strategically placed Chinese
were regarded as a major obstacle to its impl:~entation. The Phahon
34) Josiah Crosby, "Observation on a Post-war Settlement in South-East Asia",
Intenwtional Affairs, XX, (July, 1944), p. 364.
35) Skinner, op. cit., pp. 172-74.
36) lbi'd.,p.176~
37) Ibid., pp. 219-21.

44 Charnvit kasetsiri
government initiated a policy of discouraging Chinese immigration. In
1932, it raised immigration fees by more than 59 per cent. 38 At the
same time the government encouraged Siamese to replace the Chinese in
many aspects of business. Nonetheless, by and large Phahon's policy
was in practice more words than action. Most Chinese went on with
their daily lives as usual.
But it was not only the growing numbers of Chinese which concerned
the Siamese leaders but also their increasing political self-consciousness.
Traditionally Chinese immigrants to Siam consisted almost entirely of
males, who were easily assimilated into Siamese society by marrying
local girls. About the beginning of the 20th century, however, Chinese
women started to migrate too. From this time on the Chinese tended
increasingly to marry among their own people and bring up their children
as Chinese. Furthermore the aftermath of the revolution of 1911 created
a new sense of identity among the overseas Chinese. Sun Yat-sen's
campaign among the overseas Chinese also contributed to a growing
nationalism. The result of all these factors was that the Chinese community
tended to isolate itself from Siamese society far more than ever
before. There was great emphasis now placed on remaining Chinese
rather than being assimilated into Siamese society. To this end Chinese
schools were built and Chinese studies were encouraged for Chinese
children.
During the 1930s the Sino-Japan~se conflict exacerbated this
minority problem in Siam. The Siamese governments of the period were
anxious to keep on good terms with the Japanese since it was obvious
that they were a major contender for dominance in East Asia. Accordingly,
secret societies and political organizations formed among the
local Chinese, strongly anti-Japanese in outlook, became a major concern
of the Siamese government. The efforts of these organizations were
greatly intensified after the Sino-Japanese war broke out in 1937. Many
Chinese trading companies refused to handle Japanese goods, thereby
undermining Siamese-Japanese trade relations. Such was the situation
of the Chinese minority on the eve of Phibun's rise to power.
·-------
38) In 1937/3 8 the fee was increased by a further I 00 per cent. Ibid., p. 17 7.

•dJE FlllST PHIBUN GOVERNMENT AND ITS INVOLVEMENT IN WORLD \'liAR 11
4S
But whereas Phahon's government had been "passively" hostile to
the Chinese Phibun's immediately went on the active offensive as part of
his campaign to mobilize all forces of Siamese nationalism behind his
leadership; in a larger sense his policy was designed to justify the postcoup
elite's claim that it took power from the absolute monarchy with
the object of doing a better job for the country.
In his first year of office Phibun passed a considerable number of
laws attempting to force the Chinese out of business, by discriminating
against them in such traditional areas of Chinese business as rice-milling,
salt production, fishing, and retail trade.39 Many professions were
reserved for Siamese citizens. Chinese schools and newspapers were
put under restriction and many of them were finally closed down. The
Chinese were prohibited to ·buy land and reside in areas which the
government regarded as strategic. They were thus cut off from the two
most important factors conducive to assimilation into Siamese societythe
rights to own land and to settle anywhere in the kingdom,4o
The Nationalist Chinese government protested about the way in
which the local Chinese were treated and proposed to establish official
diplomatic relations with Siam. This was the first time that China had
tried to re-establish diplomatic relations since the ancient contacts
between the two countries were cut off by the penetration of the Western
powers in the early 19th century. The Siamese government, however,
ignored the approach, fearing that official relations with China would
only complicate the problem of dealing with local Chinese.
An anti-Chinese policy served the Siamese government both internally
and externally. Internally, the measures against local Chinese
helped to mobilize the majority of the people to support the government.
It seemed to confirm the government's intention of working for the
Siamese nation and Siamese people. Although there was some opposition
to the policy expressed, especially in the Assembly, the protests
lacked conviction and stature. Externally the anti-Chinese policy fitted
in well with the government's aim of conciliating Japan and opening a
way for close co-operation between the two countries.
----- --------------·-·------·--
39) Ibid., pp. 261-63.
40) Ibid., p. 276.
41) It should be noted that the Siamese government did not recognize any Chinese
government after the revolution of 1911 until after W.W. II.

Siamese territorial expansion
charnvit kasetsiri
Under the Phibun government Siam entered one of the fuosi expansionist
periods in its history. This expansion can be divided into two
stages. The first occurred before the Pacific War and involved the
annexation of territories from French Indochina, with. the mediating
assistance of Japan. The annexed territories consisted of three areas of
Laos and Cambodia. The first was the area known as Sayaboury, across
I
the Mekong from the royal Laotion capital of Luang Prabang. The
second was Champasak (known to the French as Bassac) in the southern
part of Laos, also on the right bank of the Mekong. The third, in Cambodia,
consisted of the two provinces of Siemreap and Battambang.42
(See Map III).
The second stage of Siamese expansion occurred during the Pacific
War. In 1943, through negotiations with Japan, Siam received some
territories from both British Burma and British Malaya. From Burma
Siam incorporated part of the Shan States, the area around the city of
Kengtung. From Malaya Siam took the four northern states of Perlis,
Kedah, Kelantan, and Trengganu. (See Map III).
Of all his nationalist activities, Phibun's expansion into French
Indochina was the most popular. It is no exaggeration to say that this
expansion policy was accepted virtually unanimously, and mobilized the
vast majority of the people behind the regime. Significantly, it was the
one area of Phibun's policies which his opponents tried to follow up after
they engineered his downfall in 1944. Knowing that an abandonment
of the Siamese claim to the three areas of Sayaboury, Champasak, and
Siemreap-Battambang, would severely damage their popularity they
tried, though in vain, to retain the annexed territories. The claim was
only withdrawn when France threatened to veto Siam's application for
membership in the United Nations Organization, by which it was hoped
Siam's international respectability would be restored.
The expansionist policy of the Phibun government into areas under
French control had a long historical background. In Siamese politics
Laos has always had a special place because of the two areas' close
42) Siemreap is the province where the great monuments of Angkor are situated.
According to the treaty negotiated in 1941, the French Vichy government was
entitled to retain the ancient monuments aud the areas adjacent.

THE FIHST PHIBUN GOVERNMENT AND ITS INVOLVEMENT IN WORLD WAH II 47
identity in race and language. After the 17th century Laos had declined
into a weak and defenseless kingdom, and was forced to accept vassal
status to Siam, whether under Ayudhya or Bangkok. At the time of
Rama I ( 1782-1809) Laos was divided into three small states : Luang
Prabang (north), Vientiane (central), and Champasak (south). Siamese
military expeditions placed the three Laotian states under the control of
Bangkok. The two principalities of Vientiane and Champasak tried to
regain their independence through rebellion, but were suppressed. The
rebel capital at Vientiane was destroyed, and the ruling family of Vientiane
was eliminated. After 1827 Vientiane and Champasak were
incorporated into Siam proper. Only Luang Prabang was left as a vassal
state.
The same pattern developed in Cambodia's relations with Siam.
At the beginning of the 19th century Cambodia, heir to the once powerful
Khmer kingdom of Angkor, was caught between two powerful and
hostile neighbors, Siam and Vietnam, and was forced to accept both as
its overlords. Cambodia had to pay tribute to Bangkok as well as to
Hue. The two northern provinces of Siemreap and Battambang were
given to Bangkok in return for the help given by the Siamese king in
settling a succession dispute among the Cambodian royal family.
It was not until the European penetration into the mainland of
Southeast Asia that this situation changed. To escape the threat from
his two powerful neighbors, the Cambodian king, in 1863 decided to put
his country under French protection. Four years later Siam and France
signed a treaty by which Siam renounced its claim to suzerainty over
Cambodia, but retained the areas of Siemreap and Battambang. This
treaty was the result of peaceful negotiations without the use of force.
In 1893 further territorial losses occurred as a result of a small
naval battle between Siam and France. Two French gunboats entered
the Menam River and headed for Bangkok. The Siamese offered only
slight resistance and later complied with French demands. A treaty was
signed with France whereby Siam gave up all claims to territories on the
left bank of the Mekong River, i.e. the whole of present-day Laos except
for Sayaboury and Champasak, which are on the right bank of the river.
ln order to force the Siamese to comply with the treaty France stationed

48 Charnvit Kasetsiri
troops in the eastern region of Siam. In 1902 the French troops refused
to leave unless Siam also renounced its claim to Sayaboury and Champasak.
When these areas were surrendered, the French broke their word
and remained in the country. In 1907 they demanded the cession of
Siemreap and Battambang as the price of their final withdrawal. All
these territories were incorporated into French Indochina.
Siamese relations with Great Britain, in the same period, were considerably
better than with France. It is true that the four northern
states of Malaya bad accepted Siamese suzerainty throughout the 19th
century. But control over the Malay states was considered less important
to Siam than control of Laos and part of Cambodia. Siamese
suzerainty over northern Malaya was simply a reflection of the vigorous
power of the Bangkok dynasty and did not involve a strategic area as in
the case of Laos and western Cambodia. In 1909 Siam agreed to sign a
treaty with Great Britain which transferred the four Malay states to
British Malaya. We shall see that Phibun's annexation of these states
was an unintended result of the Pacific War, not part of a long-term plan
of conquest.
This historical background may help to explain why Phibun, in the
early stages of his nationalist foreign policy, decided to embark on a
policy of hostility toward the French. To Siamese leaders, especially
among the new elite, the loss of territory to France was considered a
deep humiliation. Siam's boundaries had been unilaterally determined
by the open use of force, thus inviting reprisal from the Siamese when
an opportunity came. As France's international position weakened in
the late 1930s, the new Siamese government felt no obligation to respect
the European arrangement of Southeast Asian state boundaries.
While the revision of the boundary with French Indochina was a
long-term project of the new elite, its forcible implementation was not
seriously considered until World War II drew near. Both in 1936 and
1939 the Siamese Government asked France to adjust the boundary along
the Mekong river. 4 3 The proposal was considered moderate since the
Siamese only asked to have the Mekong established as a natural boundary
43) Sang Patthanotbai, Suk thai nai roi jJi, 2885-2485 (Thai wars in the hundred
years between 1842-1942), Bangkok, 1944, pp. 198-99,

THE FIHST PBIBUN GOVERNMENT AND ITS INVOLVEMENT IN WORLD WAR 11 49
between Siam and French Indochina, with the two right-bank areas of
Sayaboury and Champasak reverting to Siam. (See Map II) However,
there was no response from the French government.
Thereafter, there were at least two immediate factors which spurred
on the Siamese to take forcible action on their claims in Indochina. The
first was the surrender of the Paris government to German troops in June,
1940. A week before the French surrender, Siam and France bad agreed
to sign a non-aggression pact with the understanding that negotiations
on boundary revision would follow. 44 In the two months which followed
the French surrender a series of negotiations between the two governments
was opened, but in the end the French Foreign Office declded that
France could not consider the return of Sayaboury and Cbampasak. In
response the Siamese government refused to ratify the non-aggression
pact and pn?pared to use force. ·
The second factor which contributed to Siamese military action
was the entry of Japanese troops into Indochina. Under the terms of
the agreement of September, 1940 (and later again in July, 1941) between
the Japanese and Vichy governments Japanese troops were permitted to
be 'stationed in Indochina, primarily in Vietnam. 45 Although Japanese
attitudes were generally sympathetic to Siamese claims, the Phibun
government feared that Japanese troops would eventually move from
Vietnam into Laos and Cambodia and might prove an obstacle to Siamese
aims. Phibun therefore decided to invade Laos and Cambodia at once,
concentrating on the areas of Sayaboury, Champasak, Siemreap and
, Battambang.
Fighting along the borders of Siam and French Indochina broke
out in

50 Charnvit Kasetsiri
declared on February 3, I 941 aboard a Japanese ship, anchored in front
of Saigon. On May 9, 1941, a peace treaty between France and Siam
was signed in Tokyo. From the Tokyo treaty Siam obtained Sayaboury,
Champasak, Siemreap and Battambang, an area of about 90,000 sq.
kilometers, from French Indochina.47 (See Map III and Appendix I).
For its mediation services Japan obtained commitments from Siam and
France that neither would enter into a treaty with any third power
against Japan. (See Appendix II).
The success in Indochina was of great benefit to the Phi bun government.
His career as the leader of Siam was at its height. 48 His
government emerged stronger than ever before. His policies were
acclaimed by the great majority of the people. There were frequent
demonstrations of university students in support of the government
program.
The Indochinese campaign also had an effect on the future of the
country's foreign policy. It was the first major incident that moved Siam
into conflict with the West and paved the way for future close co-operation
with Japan. During the crisis the Siamese government bad sent a
number of diplomatic missions to sound out international opinion.
Both
Great Britain and the United States made it clear that they preferred
the status quo in Indochina. Irritation at this response was heightened
subsequently by th~ so-called "aeroplanes episode". The Phibun government
had bought some ten bombers from a private American firm. While
the planes were in Manila on their way to delivery in Bangkok, the
United States government decided to block the delivery because of the
4 7) After the peace treaty Siemreap was renamed the province of Phi bun Songkhram.
The reason for this was to honor the Premier and to replace the ancient
Cambodian name which literally means the Defeat of the Siamese (Siem=Siam,
and 1'eap =defeat), a name which is rather inappropriate for a new Siamese
province!. Sayaboury was ren.amed the province ofLanchang (million elephants),
an old name for the northern part of Laos.
48) Phibun promoted himself from Major General to Field Marshal, skipping the,
two ranks of.Lieutenail.t General and General. He was the first man to be appointed
Field Marshal after the coup 'of 1932.
49) John L. Christian, "Thailand Renascent," Pacific Affairs, XIV, (June, 1941),
p. 193.

TH£ FIRST I'HtnUN GOVERNMENT AND ITS INVOLVEMENT TN WORLD WAR TI 51
deteriorating situation in Indochina.so Japan immediately offered the
same number of planes to the Siamese government.
The Siamese government thus became convinced that there was
nothing to be gained from working with the West. The traditional anti­
French attitude of the Siamese broad.ened into a general anti-Western
feeling. In Bangkok the government encouraged anti-American demonstrations.
At the same time Japan stepped in to be the "real" friend of
Siam. In August, 1941, a few months after the signing of the Tokyo
treaty, the Phibun government recognized and later established diplomatic
relations with the Japanese puppet state of Manchukuo.st
Siam, Japan and World War II
To the Siamese, as to other Asians, the Japanese had long been
regarded as the only Asian people who could match the West. Japan's
industrialization and its military success over Russia in 1905 made a
deep impression on Siamese leaders. The common observation that
Siam is always attracted by power is perhaps demonstrated by the fact
that ever since the beginning of the 20th century Japan had been the
object of serious thought to Siamese foreign policy-makers. Japan was
a third, new power in Southeast Asia, alongside Great Britain and France,
to which Siam would have to adjust. Siamese leaders hoped that eventually
Japan, with its anti-Western attitudes, would help to counter
Western influence. By using Japan, Siam's awkward position, squeezed
in between the British and French Empires, might be improved.
After 1932 Japan's importance to Siam increased still more.
Phahon, the leader of the 1932 coup, had spent two years in Japan between
1919 and 1921.52 Japan's importance to the new elite became evident
50) James V. Martin, Jr., "Thai-American Relations in World War II", The .Journal
of Asian Studies, XXII, (August, !963), pp. 454-55.
51) Wanwaithayakon, prince, Prawat l

52 Charnvit Kasetsiri
early in the diplomatic field. After the 1932 coup Siamese ministers to
Great Britain and the United States were simply ordered to exchange
posts : the Siamese minister in London was sent to Washington and vice
versa. But a new man trusted by the coup group was sent to Tokyo to
replace an appointee of the monarchy; his task was to observe developments
there closely and cement warmer relations with the Japanese
leaders. Siam was the only nation to abstain from voting on the Lytton
Report in 1933 in effect therefore avoiding any condemnation of the
Japanese invasion of Manchuria.s3
But the real turning point in Siam-Japan relations only came during
the Indochina border crisis of 1940-1941, during which the Siamese armed
forces received supplies from Japan and the Franco-Siamese dispute was
mediated by Japan clearly in favor of the Bangkok government. It was
not surprising that, after the crisis, Bangkok-Tokyo relations improved
immensely and that Siamese leaders began to give serious consideration
to the Japanese slogan of "Asia for the Asians".
'
However, it would be an exaggeration to say that the Siamese
government was ready to sacrifice its freedom of action and fall into the
Japanese orbit w'hen World War II started in Asia. The government
decided to join Japan only when the country was invaded and there was
no prospect of help from the Western democracies, especially from Great
like the celebrated Baron, and that he had later tried on the Baron's trousers
himself and found that they fitted him very well. This, he felt, was a good
omen for the success of the coup which would eliminate the absolute power
of the Siamese monarchy. These stories should perhaps not be taken literally
but seen as a traditional kind of self-created legend about a new charismatic
leader. Such a leader gives out the story in order to impress people with the
idea that his role is a predestined one. The same sort of stories were given
out by two great kings of Siam at the end of the 18th century, Taksin and Ram a
I. Both Kings, like Phahon, were of humble origin. The interesting thing
about Phahon's "legend" is not the legend itself, but the fact that Japan is so
prominent in it. This indicates the aura of power Japan generated in the
period.
53) On the other hand it should be noted that the government was careful to avoid
giving an impression of being against the dominant Western democracies.
When the League of Nations voted for an embargo on Italy to punish it for its
invasion of Abyssinia, the Siamese government went along with the resolution.
In October, 1935, Siam banned all imports from Italy and stopped sending tin
and rubber to that country. When World War II started in Europe, however,
Siam reversed this policy and put in orders for Italian shipping.

TEll': FIHS'I' I'IIIBUN COVEHNMENT AND ITS INVOLVE~IENT IN WORLD WAR ll 53
Britain. The one indication of a special Japanese attitude towards
Bangkok was the fact that of all the countries invaded by Japan, Siam
was the only one given official warning in advance. At about 10.30 p.m.
(local time) on December 7, 1941 the Japanese ambassador asked to see
Phibun and presented an ultimatum to be answered within one hour.
The ultimatum proposed three choices for the Siamese government. The
first was to give passage to Japanese troops on their way to Burma and
Malaya. The second was to sign a military pact between Japan and
Siam which would require Siamese co-operation in the war. The last
was to declare war against the United States and Great Britain.s4
The Siamese government was unable to give an answer to these
demands due to the absence of Phibun, who happened to be touring in
the newly acquired ·area of Battambang. At 2.00 a.m. on December 8,
some Japanese troops landed in some areas along the Gulf of Siam and
others crossed the border from Indochina and fighting broke out. It was
not until about 7.00 a.m. that Phibun returned to Bangkok and held a
Cabinet meeting. Both military and civilian members of the government
agreed that to fight the Japanese under present conditions would be
"suicide." The Cabinet meeting was accordingly cut short (it lasted
only half an hour) and Phibun announced a cease-fire at 7.30 a.m. and ·
agreed to give Japan right of passage. 55
At this early stage of the war, then, the Siamese government chose
the first alt~rnative proposal, and gave passage to the Japanese troops
on their way to invade the British Empire in Burma and Malaya. 56
However, the rapid series of Japanese victories in the Pacific War,
54) fl)ireck Chainam, Thai kap sougkhmm lok khrang thi 2, (Thailand and W.W. II),
Bangkok, 1966, V. I, p. 197.
55) One author comments that "It is said that the factor which finally persuaded
the Cabinet to accede to Japan's demands was the receipt of a military telegram
from Singapore to the general effect: "Fend for yourselves. Sorry we can't
help you" .... With no assistance coming from abroad, the Government felt
justified in giving the required permission for the passage of (Japanese)
troops." John Coast, Some Aspects of Siamese Politics, Institute of Pacific Relations,
New York, 1953, p. 18.
56) Roughly 50,000 Japanese troops were stationed in Siam. These troops usually
kept to themselves in their camps and seld~m mingled with the local population.

54 Charnvit Kasetsiri
especially the assault on Pearl Harbor and the sinking of two British
warships, the Prince of Wales and the Repulse, soon convinced the Siamese
government, especially its military members, that Japan would be the
final victor. Accordingly, they decided to co-operate more fully with
Japan. On December 21, 1941, a military pact was signed with Tokyo. 57
Subsequently, on January 25th of the following year, the Siamese government
declared war on the United States and Great Britain. 5 8
The decision to move from passive acceptance to active military
alliance with Japan caused a split within the Siamese government. This
disagreement began to develop as early as the day of the Japanese invasion.
Although the civilian members agreed with the military that
passage should be given to Japanese troops, they were upset by Phi bun's
willingness to make further hasty concessions. Pridi, the leader of the
civilians, was alarmed by the fact that some military ministers were
already strongly in favor of a military alliance with Japan. He urged
the government to insist that Japan accept the giving of passage to be a
final act, which would preclude and further commitment such as a military
pact. The Minister of Foreign Affairs, another civilian and a close
friend of Pridi, protested the trend of Cabinet decisions and refused to
appear at the Ministry after the Japanese invasion. Ironically, he was
later sent to be ambassador to Tokyo, while his post was assumed by
Phibun himself. Growing disunity within the Cabinet made a reshuffle
inevitable. Pridi was "kicked upstairs" to become a member of the Board
ofRegents, essentially a non-political function. Subsequently, two other
57) There was a secret protocol attached to the treaty by which Japan agree to
give some British-controlled territories to Siam. This was disclosed by the
Japanese war-time ambassador to Bangkok, after the war. Direck, op. cit.,
p. 203.
58) According to the Siamese constitution a declaration of war had to be signed
by the king and counter-signed by the Premier. In 1942 a three-man Board
of Regents was acting on behalf of the young King Rama VIII who was still
living in Switzerland. Phibun was able to get two Regents to sign the declaration
of war on the Allies, but he failed to get the third to comply. The. third
Regent was Pridi, Phi bun's civilian rival, who had recently been removed as
Minister of Finance and promoted to the Regency. The absence of Pridi's
signature was later used in negotiating with the Allies to convince them that
Phibun's declaration of war had been unconstitutional. See appendix III,
paragraph II.

'!'!IV FIBS'!' l'lliBUN !:tWEUNMEt-;'1' AND ITS INVOLVEMENT IN WOHLD WAR II 55
leading civilian ministers, Thawee Bunyaket and Khuang Aphaiwong
resigned from the Cabinet. (Both men later became Premier after the fall·
of Phibun in 1944). These ministerial changes took place within two
weeks after Pearl Harbor. Phibun now had a free hand to pursue his
policy of close co-operation with Japan.
The expulsion of the civilian members from the Cabinet, however·,
ultimately redounded to their advantage. They regained their freedom
of action and were able to begin organizing an anti-Japanese movement
in the country. Their first plan was to form a Siamese government in
exile, possibly in Chungking. For such a government to be taken
seriously by the Allies, the civilians wanted Thawee and Khuang to be
appointed President and Vice President of the National Assembly. If
this could be accomplished, Thawee, as President of the Assembly, Pridi,
as Regent, and various representatives in the Assembly, would flee to
China, where their high official status would make the formation of a
Siamese government in exile credible. This plan proved abortive since
Phibun refused to put Thawee and Khuang in charge of the Assembly.
Accordingly, the civilians turned to a second plan, which was to form a
Free Siamese Movement within the country and try to get in touch with
the Free Siamese movements already in existence in the United States,
England, India, and Australia.6o
59) Direck, op. cit., pp. 364-65.
60) The Free Siamese Movement in Siam itself was formed rather belatedly,
emerging formally only at the beginning of 1943. In Washington, a Free
Siamese Movement was started soon after the Siamese deClaration of war on
the United States. The Siamese minister, Seni Pramoj, refused to hand the
declaration to the American State Department; he also rejected the Siamese
government's order recalling him to Bangkok. He proposed to the State
Department the establishment of a Free Siamese Movement and stated that he
would act "on behalf of all Thais, since the Thai government is no longer in a
position to voice the true will of the people". (Martin, Jr., op. cit., p. 461)
He also persuaded the American government to disregard the declaration of
war. His Free Siamese Movement received help from the Office of Strategic
Services, which began training Siamese students in the U.S. in guerrilla warfare.
It has been estimated that the movement numbered roughly one hundred
members. (Direck, op. cit., p. 472) Some of them were later sent to India and
Ceylon to work with their counterparts from England. From Allied headquarters
in Kandy they were dropped into Siam and were able to co-operate
with Pridi's movement.

56 Charnvit Kasetsiri
Japanese Impact on Siam
The major areas of Japanese influence on Siam were a change in the
Siamese view of the West, the spread of a new style of nation-building
emphasizing the role of authoritarian leadership, and the politicization
of the masses by appeals to nationalism, and a new self-respect in
international affairs.
Japan had shown that the West was no longer invincible. If they
were willing and able to improve themselves as the Japanese had done,
other Asians should also be able to match the West. Many Siamese
leaders believed that this had been demonstrated during the Indochina
border crisis. Like Japan's victory over Russia in 1905, Siam's success
in Indochina was a triumph of Asians over the West. In the Siamese
language of the time, there was an exhilarating feeling that farang mai
chai thewada yang thi khuai nuk (white foreigners are not deva (gods) as
we thought).61
Japan had also served as 'a kind of ideal example of building up a
weak and technologically backward nation. Walter Vella has remarked
that "Japan in particular, an Asiatic state tbat had grown into a world
power, seemed a relevant example for Thailand. Many young Thai
military men, including Phibun Songkhram, felt that nations with dictators
and strong armies were doing better in the world of the 1930s
than the great democracies."62
Likewise in England a movement was formed amoug the Siamese
students, but it did not enjoy the same status as its counterpart in the United
States. The Siamese minister to London returned home on Phi bun's orders
leaving Siamese citizens in England without effective leadership. Moreover,
unlike the Americans, the British accepted Siam's declaration of war and
Siamese citizens were regarded as enemy aliens. However, the British
government was eventually persuaded to co-operate with the embryo Free
Siames·e Movement. Members were attached to the British Armed Forces with
the status of a Pioneer Corps. This was the same treatment given to German
and Italian exiles in England. (Direck, op. cit., p. 381).
61) Sang, Khwamnuk, op. cit., p, 23 3. During the fighting some 60 French soldiers
and their artillery were captured. The Siamese government encouraged the
people to, have a close look at these prisoners in their jails. According to the
same author who was a high government official in the Department of Public
Relations during the war years, this was designed to eliminate fear of "white
foreigners" among the Siamese.
62) .. Walter F. Vella, The Impact of the West on Government in Thailand, University
of California Press, 1955, 382. ·

TilE FIRST I'IIIRUN GOVERNM~NT AND ITS INVOLVEMENT IN WOI\LD WAR II 57
The importance of the military in Japanese national development
seemed to justify Phi bun's stress on a central political role for the Siamese
Army, and himself as its commander. Not surprisingly, therefore, in
Phibun's prescriptive slogan for building up Siam, thtee major factors
were listed in order of their importance to the nation's progress : the
Army, the economy, and lastly the culture.63
The Japanese example was also emulated in the policy of mass
politicization along military lines. Civilians were encouraged to accept
military-style discipline : for example they were required to salute the
Siamese flag at eight o'clock every morning. An official youth movement
was established, known as the Yuwachon Tahan (Young Soldiers), to
ensure that high school and college students received appropriately military-type
training. The boys involved were given army uniforms, very
similar to those of military men. Another obvious emulation of the
Japanese model was the promulgation of the Vira Dharma or the Code
of the Brave, along the lines of Bushido, the traditional feudal samurai
ethic. These codes applied to all~Siamese,~not just to military men.64
-----------------------------·--------------------------
63) Wanwaithayakon, prince, op. cit., p. 63.
64) The V ira Dharma was announced by the Office of the Prime Minister on May
2, 1943. It ran as follows:
1. The Thai love their nation more than their lives.
2. The Thai are excellent warriors. '
3. The Thai are good to their friends and bad to their enemies.
4. The Thai love Buddhism more than their lives.
5. The Thai are sincere.
6. The Thai are peace-loving.
7. The Thai are gr~teful.
8. The Thai are industrious.
9. The Thai are an agricultural people who grow their own food.
10. The Thai bequeath good things to their children.
11. The Thai enjoy a good life.
12. The Thai are well dressed.
13. The Thai have respect for children, women, and the aged.
14. The Thai are united and follow their leader.
This code was immediately abolished on September 18, 1944, when the new
civilian government came to power.

58 charnvit kasetsirt
Japan's concept of a New Orc;Ier in Asia and its slogan of Asia fot
the Asians were certainly attractive to many Siamese leaders. In working
with the Japanese these leaders believed that they could stand together
as equal partners in overthrowing Western domination in Southeast Asia.
The Japanese government took a number of actions which seemed to
confirm this belief. Japan was the first nation to raise diplomatic
relations with Siam from ministerial to ambassadorial level. This move
was psychologically extremely important and helped convince many
Siamese leaders that only Asians would be willing to recognize the equal
status of other Asians. For although Siam remained independent
throughout its history, virtually all Siamese leaders felt that in relations
with the West their country was regarded and treated as a "second class"
nation. The fact that all Siam's diplomatic relations with the rest of
the world were conducted at the ministerial level was deeply resented
as a sign of international discrimination.
Another example of Japan's skilled diplomacy was the cultural
agreement signed on October 28, 1942. The agreement was to confirm
the two nations' mutual respect for each olher's culture and to promote
better understanding between the two peoples. This agreement was
considered a major diplomatic success by Siamese leaders who interpreted
it as meaning that a world power finally recognized Siam's
culture. 6 6 They were very conscious that such a recognition had never
been forthcoming from the West.67
65) Ambassadorial relations were established on September 2, 1941.
66) At least three agreements were officially signed by Siam and Japan during
this period. These three agreements were:
1. A Pact of Alliance between Thailand and Japan, signed on December 21,
1941.
2. An agreement between Thailand and Japan concerning culture, signed on
October 28, 1942.
3. A treaty between Thailand and Japan concerning Thai territories in Malaya
and the Shan States, signed on August 20, 1943, See Appendix IV.
67) It should be remembered that in the world of the 19 30s there were very few
independent African and Asian nations and their position was often uncomfortable
and marginal. Although Siam was one of the original members of the
League of Nations, it was an organization so dominated by Europeans and
their interests, that it is understandable that the Siamese delegates were on
better terms with the Japanese than with the Westerners.

THE FIRST PHillUN GOVERNMENT AND ITS INVOLVEMENT IN WOI\LD WAH II 59
In its proposed New Order for Asia from which the West would be
excluded, Japan appeared to offer Siam an important and respected place.
Indeed as a result of the Japanese role in the Indochina border crisis,
many Siamese leaders belived that in the New Order their country would
naturally assume the position of "champion nation" in mainland
Southeast Asia. The war-time Siamese government expected that, if
France finally collapsed and lost control in Indochina, Laos and Cambodia
would be returned to Siam.6 8
It seems that Phibun foresaw no political
change in Indochina once Western influence was destroyed. In spite of
his own strong nationalism, he did not envisage nationalist independence
movements emerging in these areas directed as much against Siamese
as French domination. 6 9 For the Siamese government, especially the
military men, the political change envisaged in Southeast Asia meant
simply the eviction of the West and the restoration of the power of Old
Siam which had once held sway over large areas of mainland Southeast
Asia. In many respects Phibun's policy can be seen as a revival of the
traditional policy of the early Bangkok kings- attempting to exert
Siamese imperial control over Laos and Cambodia with a sphere of
influence in the Shan States and northern Malaya.
On the strength of the military pact with the Japanese, Phibun
began to carry out the second stage of his .expansion plans. In May,
1942, Siamese troops marched into the Shan States and occupied the
area around the old city of Kengtung. By the treaty of August 20, 1943,
68) This was stated in a Siamese message to the French government on September
13, 1940. Sang, Suk., oj>. cit., p. 204.
69) The ideology of the Siamese·military was somewhat different from that of the
civilians in this respect. It has been suggested by many scholars that the
civilians foresaw independence movement$ among the colonized Southeast
Asians and were willing to work co-operatively with these new forces. The
Free Siamese Movement, led by civilians, was almost cert.ainly in contact with
the nationalist organizations of both Ho Chi Minh and of Prince Souphanouvong
in Laos. Keyes states that "Pridi and his followers were anxious to have
Thailand associate with, and perhaps even lead, the national forces which were
beginning to appear in Indonesia, Burma, and Indochina." See Keyes, ]san, of>.
cit,, pp. 28-29,

60 Charnvit Kasetsiri
Japan recognized Siam's suzerainty over the Kengtung area.
As a result
of these military operations Phi bun could claim that for the first time in
Siamese history Bangkok had established its control over the Shan States,
whose population was of the same race as the Siamese.
On three
separate occasions, in 1850, 1853' and 1854, the early Bangkok kings had
attempted to achieve this, but had never succeeded. 70
The Phi bun
government naturally took great pride in attaining the historic objective
of its predecessors.
Phibun could also claim that his diplomacy had brought the Malay
states once again under Bangkok's authority, since the treaty of August
20, 1943, also turned over the administration of Perlis, Kedah, Kelantan,
and Trengganu to the Siamese. 7 1 Thus the government's decision to join
forces with Japan had resulted in the restoration of the power and glory
of Old Siam.
Siam's voluntary participation in the New Order was ultimately
based on a perceived complementarity of interest between Bangkok and
Tokyo and a common desire to eliminate Western influence in Southeast
Asia.
On one side, Japan accepted Siam as the leading nation in mainland
Southeast Asia.
It not only respected Siamese integrity and
independence, but also encouraged and supported Siam's territorial
expansion.
By so doing Japan hoped that Siam would maintain peace
and order in important areas of Malaya and Indochina, which, as major
producers ·of tin and rubber, formed the very heart of the Co-Prosperity
70) Sang, Suk., op. cit., p, 258.
71) It should be noted that Siamese troops did not enter Malaya as they did the
Shan States. Actually the return of the Malay states was initiated by Tojo as
a compliment to Siam for joining the New Order. The Japanese Premier came
on a two-day semi-secret mission to Bangkok in July, 1943. The result of the
meeting between Tojo and Phi bun was the .treaty of August 20, 1943 by which
Japan accepted Siamese suzerainty over the Shan States and northern Malaya.
Back in Japan Tojo was criticized for handing over the Malay states to Siam,
since it was in conflict with Japanese anti-colonial propaganda. Sang,
Khwamnuk., op. cit., p. 453.

'HIE FIHST Pli!BUN GOVERNMENT AND ITS INVOLVEMENT IN WOULD WAR 11 61
Sphere. 72 In return, the Siamese government agreed to accept Japan's
leadership of the New Order in Asia and demonstrated this formally by
recognizing Japanese-controlled puppet governments in 'china and
Manch ukuo. 7 3
The Fan of Phi bun
The fall of the Phibun regime was closely connected with the decline
of Japan. Two days after Tojo resigned as Premier, on July 20, 1944,
the Siamese Assembly turned on Phibun and voted down his proposed
plan to move the capital from Bangkok to a malaria-infested area in the
north. It is now believed that Phi bun foresaw an Allied invasion of Siam
and decided to make a last stand by moving the capital away from the
sea so that Siam could fight from a strong base in the hinterland. By
this time, however, many civilian members of the elite, together with the
elected Assemblymen, believed that Siam would do better to negotiate
with the Allies, particularly since the Free Siamese Movement was now
a functioning force both at home and abroad.
At this juncture Phibun had to decide whether be would resign or "
dissolve the Assembly an'd hold new elections. It is probable that Phibun
did not want new elections since his critics among the elected members
would certainly be returned by their constituents. Furthermore, be
seems to have been so convinced of his own power and indispensability
that he was confident his resignation would never be accepted as final by
the Board of Regents. He therefore submitted his resignation, expecting
to be called on immediately to form a new cabinet. Unluckily for Pbibun,
one member of the Board of Regents, Pridi, was the leader of the underground
Free Siamese Movement and, thanks to his influence, the resignation
was accepted as final. Phi bun then had no other course open to him
72) Jones, of>. cit., p. 370.
73) Siam recognized the governments of Manchukuo and China (Nanking) on
August 8, 1941 and July 8, 1942, respectively. Later on, the Siamese government
recognized the German-sponsored puppet governments of Croatia {April
30, 1943) and Slovakia (May 8, 1943), Wanwaithayakon, prince, op. cit.,
P.· 66.

62 Charnvit Kasetsiri
but to retire. The civilians with their Free Siamese Movement and the
support of the Assembly formed a new government to await the arrival
of the Alligs.
Conclusion
What conclusions can be drawn from this study of Siamese politics
during the first Phibun regime ?
In the first place, it is clear that Siam's pro-Japanese foreign policy
during this period was inextricably rooted in its internal politics. The
political instability which resulted from the intense struggle for power
after the 1932 coup convinced key members of the dominant military
faction of the new elite that the maintenance of internal order and their
own tenure of power required the mobilization of popular nationalism
and the crushing of all opposition.
For this type of politics, post-Meiji
Japan provided an excellent model. In addition, Japan and Siam shared
a common interest in destroying Western power in Southeast Asia and
replacing it with their own. Accordingly, a pro-Japanese forei'gn policy
seemed eminently sensible to Phibun and his associates. It cannot be
denied that for a while at least the policy helped the Siamese government
to develop a very strong internal and external position. Nonetheless,
undue reliance on one external power during a time of world crisis inevitably
made the maintenance of this position highly dependent on the
fortunes of that power. When Japan's power began to decline, the
Siamese government could not avoid being seriously affected.
Secondly, the ruthless measures taken by the government in pursuing
both internal and external policies created fundamental cleavages within
the post-coup elite which were never subsequently to be bridged. The
Phibun government's alliance with Japan was possibly the single most
.important cause of this cleavage.
common adversary in the absolute monarchy.
In 1932, the coup group had faced a
there was growing lack of unanimity on basic policies.
Subsequently, however,
Some members
of the elite, especially the civilians, did not consider that the Allies or
th~ Western powers were permanent enemies of the country; They saw

ho reason, therefore, why Siam should commit itself totally to the
implacable enemy of the Allies. And such commitment would only
bring down on Siam the concerted hostility of two or three imperial
powers. For a country in Siam's position, total commitment to any one
power was a major tnistake. One friend gained would mean at least
two enemies created.
The Phibun government erred in trying to revive bid Siain by
military means, with too much reliance on external support and without
any understanding of the new nationalism growing in other parts of
Southeast Asia besides Siam.

;-• \1
o•
~
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IOo~
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MAP I.
"-~ 0 ~C)()~
105 4
-
Areas considered
1ost
Th
to France
•
ese inc~uded
part of Vietnam,
laos, and Cambodia
;;•

------------7.----------
105
o•
MAP II.

(
PEP.LIS
.. ":
A:t:eas armexect
by Siam in J.9'H
. IO!i &
0 •
MAP III.

TilE Fli\ST l'IllBUN t:OVEHN:VIENT AND ITS INVOLVEMENT IN WOULD WAR II 67
APPENDIX I
Convention De Paix Entre La France Et La Thai'lande
Le Chef de l'Etat Fran

68 Charnvit Kasetsiri
ARTICLE 1.
Les relations amicales sont retablies entre la France et la Thallande
sur la base fondamentale du Traite d'Amitie de Commerce et de Navigation
du 7 decembre 1937.
En consequence, des negociations diplomatiques directes seront
engagees dans le plus bref delai a Bangkok pour la liquidation de toutes
les questions pendantes resultant du conflit.
ARTICLE 2.
La frontiere entre l'Jndochine Franr,:aise et la Tha!lande sera
rajustee ainsi qu'il suit:
En partant du nord, la frontiere suivra le fleuve Mekong depuis Ie
point de jonction des frontiercs de l'Indocbine Frant;:aise, de la Thallande
et de la Birmanie, jusqu'au point ot't le Mekong coupe le parallele du
quinzieme grade. (Carte du Service Geographique de l'lndochine-Echelle
de 1: 500.000).
Dans toute cette partie, la frontiere sera constituee par Ia ligne
mediane du chenal de navigation principal. Toute-fois, il est expressement
convenu que l'ile de Khong restera territoire de l'Indochine Frant;:aise,
tandis que Pile de Khone sera attribuee a la Tha'ilande.
La frontiere suivra ensuite, vers !'ouest, le parallele du quinzieme
grande puis, vers le sud, le meridien qui passe par le point d'aboutissement
au Grand Lac de la limite actuelle des provinces de Siemreap et de
Battambang (embouchure du Stung Kombot).
Dans toute cette partie, la Commission de delimitation prevue a
!'article 4 s'efforcera, s'il y a lieu, de rattacher la frontiere a des !ignes
naturelles ou a des limites administratives, voisines du trace defini
cidessus, de maniere a eviter, dans la mesure du possible, des difficultes
pratiques ulterieures.
Sur le Grand Lac, la frontiere sera constituee par un arc de cercle
de vingt kilometres de rayon joignant le point d'aboutissement au Grand
Lac de la limite actuelle des provinces de Siemr6ap et de Battambang
(embouchure du Stung Kombot) au point d'aboutissernent .au Grand Lac

TilE Fll!:iT 1'1111.1:\ l:0\'1-:ll:\'IJo::\T A\ll ITt; JNVOL\'E~IENT IN WOULD WAH II 69
de Ia limi tc actuelle de~ provinces de Battambang et de Pursat (embouchure
du Stung Dontri).
Dans toutc l'etcnduc du Grand Lac, la navigation et la peche
scron t libres pour les rcssortissunts des deux Hautes Parties Contractantes,
sous reserve du respect des installations fixes de pecherie etablies Je long
du rivage. Il est entcndu que, dans cet esprit, les Hautes Parties Contractantcs
elaboreront, dans le plus bref delni, une reglementation
commune de la police, de la navigation et de la peche sur les eaux du
Grand Lac.
A partir de !'embouchure du Stung Dontri, la nouvelle frontiere
suivra, en direction du sud-ouest, !'actuelle limite des provinces de Battambang
ct de Pursat, jusqu'au point de rcncontre de cette limite avec
la frontiere actuelle de l'Indochine Fran

68 Charnvit Kasetsiri
ARTICLE 1.
Les relations amicales sont retablies entre la France et la Thallande
sur la base fondamentale du Traite d'Amitie de Commerce et de Navigation
du 7 decembre 1937.
En consequence, des negociations diplomatiques directes seront
engagees dans le plus bref delai a Bangkok pour la liquidation de toutes
les questions pendantes resultant du conflit.
ARTICLE 2.
La frontiere entre l'lndocbine Fran

THE FIUST PlllBUN GOVERNMENT AND JTS INVOLVEl\IENT IN \'\'OHLD WAH 11 69
de la limite actuelle des provinces de Battambang et de Pursat (embouchure
du Stung Dontri).
Dans toute Petendue du Grand Lac, la navigation et Ia peche
seront lib res pour les ressortissants des deux I-Iautes Parties Contractantes •
sous reserve du respect des installations fixes de pecherie etablies le long
du rivage. Il est entendu que, dans cet esprit, les Hautes Parties Contractantes
elaboreront, dans le plus bref delai, une reglementation
commune de la police, de Ia navigation et de Ia peche sur les eaux du
Grand Lac.
A partir de !'embouchure du Stung Dontri, la nouvelle frontiere
suivra, en direction du sud-ouest, !'actuelle limite des provinces de Battambang
et de Pursat, jusqu'au point de rencontre de cette limite avec
la frontiere actuelle de l'Indochine Frarwaise et de la Tha!lande (Kbao
Koup) qu'elle suivra ensuite sans modification jusqu'a la mer.
ARTICLE 3.
Les territoires compris entre la frontiere actuelle de l'Indochine
Frant;aise et de Ia Thallande et Ia nouvelle ligne frontiere definie a
l'article 2, seront evacues et transferes conformement aux modalites
prevues au protocole annexe a la presente Convention (Annexe I).
ARTICLE 4.
Les travaux de delimitation de Ia frontiere de l'lndochine Fran

70 Charnvit Kasetsiri
1. Ils seront demilitarises dans toute leur etendue, a !'exception
des territoires limitrophes du Mekong, faisant anterieurement partie du
Laos franc;ais ..
2. En ce qui concerne !'entree, 1' etablissement et Ies entreprises,
les ressortissants franc;ais (citoyens, sujets et proteges franc;ais) jouiront,
dans toute l'etendue de ces territoires, d'un traitement absolument egal
a celui qui sera accorde aux nationaux de Ia Thailande.
Il est entendu que, en ce qui concerne les ressortissants franc;ais,
les droits acquis resultant des concessions, affermages et permis obtenus
a la date du 11 mars 1941, seront respectes sur toute l'etendue des territoires
cedes.
3. Le Gouvernement de la Thallande assurera plein respect aux
tombeaux royaux qui se trouvent sur la rive droite du Mekong en face
de Luang Prabang et donnera toutes facilites a la Famille Royale de
Luang Prabang et aux fonctionnaires de la Cour, pour la conservation et
la visite de ces tombeaux.
ARTICLE 6.
Dans les conditions prevues au Protocole annexe a la presente
Convention (Annexe lii), les principes suivants seront appliques ala zone
demilitarisee etablie en vertu du point 1· de l'article precedent:
1. Dans la zone demilitarisee, la Tha!lande ne pourra entretenir
d'autres forces armees que les forces de police necessaires au maintien
de la surete et de l'ordre public.
Neanmoins, la Tha'ilande se reserve le droit de renforcer momentanement
ses forces de police dans la mesure ou des operations de police
extraordinaires le rendraient necessaire. Elle se reserve egalement la
faculte d'effectuer sur son territoire, a travers Ia zone demilitarisee, les
transports, de troupes et de materiel qu'exigeraient des operations de
police dans Ies circonscriptions voisines ou des operations militaires
centre de tierces Puissances.
Eilfin, dans la zone demilitarisee, la Thallande sera autorisee a
faire stationner en tout temps, des aeronefs militaires non armes.

THE FIHST PHI BUN GOVEHN~IENT AND 1ST INVOLVEMENT IN WORLD WAH IT 71
2. I1 ne pourra exister dans la zone demilitarisee ni places fortes,
ni etablissements militaires, ni aerodromes a l'usage exclusif de l'armee
ni depots d'armes, de munitions ou de materiel de guerre, a !'exceptio~
des depots de materiel courant et de combustible necessaires aux
aeronefs militaires non armes.
Les divers casernements des forces de police pourront comporter
!'organisation defensive normalement necessaire a leur securite.
ARTICLE 7.
Les Hautes Parties Contractantes sont d'accord pour supprimer
les zones demilitarisees existant de part et d'autre du Mekong sur la
partie du cours de ce fl.euve ou il forme la frontiere entre le Laos franc;ais
et la Thai:lande.
ARTICLE 8.
Des que le transfert de la souverainete sur les territoires cedes a
la Tballande sera definitif, la nationalite de la Thallande sera acquise
de plein droit par les ressortissants fran

72 Charnvit Kasctsiri
ARTICLE 9.
La France et la Tballande sont d'accord pour renoncer definitivement
a toute pretention d'ordre financier, d'Etat a Etat, resultant du
transfert de territoires prevu a l'article 2, moyennant le paiement, par
la Tha'ilande a la France, d'une somme de six millions de piastres indochinoises.
Le paiement de cette somme sera reparti, par tranches egales,
sur six annees a compter de la mise en vigueut de la presente Convention.
Pour assurer !'application du paragrapbe precedent, ainsi que pour
regler toutes questions monetaires et de transfert de valeurs que peuvent
poser les cessions de territoires faisant l'objet de la presente Convention,
les administrations competentes de l'Indochine Fran~aise et de la Tha1-
lande entreront en negociations dans le plus bref delai.
ARTICLE 10.
Tout conflit pouvant surgir entre les deux Hautes Parties Contractantes
au sujet de !•interpretation ou de !'application des dispositions de
la presente Convention sera resolu amiablement par la voie diplomatique.
Si le conflit ne peut etre ainsi resolu, i1 sera soumis a la mediation
du Gouvernement du Japon.
ARTICLE 11.
Toutes dispositions des Traites, Conventions et Accords existant
entre la France et la Thallande, qui ne sont pas incompatibles avec les
~ispositions de la presente Convention, sont et demeurent maintenues en
vigueur.
ARTICLE 12.
La presente Convention ·sera ratifiee et les ratifications en seront
echangees a Tokyo dans les deux mois suivant la date de sa signature.
Le Gouvernement Fran9ais pourra, le cas echeant, substituer a son
instrument de ratification une notification ecrite de ratification; dans ce
cas, le Gouvernement Fran~ais enverra son instrument de ratification au
Gouvernement de la Tballande aussitot que faire se pourra.

'!'HE F!HST PHIBUN GOVERNMENT AND ITS INVOLVEMENT IN WORLD WAR II 73
La presente Convention entrera en viqueur le jour de l'echange des
ratifications.
En foi de quoi, les Plenipotentiaires respectifs ont signe la presente
Convention et y ont appose leurs cachets.
Fait en triple exemplaire, en langues fran~aise, japonaise et thaie,
a Tokyo, le neuf mai mil neuf cent quarante et un, correspondant au
neuvieme jour du cinquieme mois de la seizieme annee de Syowa, et au
neuvieme jour du cinquieme mois de la deux mille quatre cent-quatrevingt-quatrieme
annee de l'ere bouddhique.

74 Charnvit Kasetsiri
APPENDIX II
Protocole entre Ia Thallande et le Japon concernant
Ia garantie et ]'entente politique
Le Gouvernement de la Thallande et le Gouvernement du Japon,
egalement desireux de maintenir la paix en Asie Orientale,
s'inspirant de l'espit pacifique et amical qui a preside a l'etablissement
du traite du 12 juin 1940, et egalement animes du desir sincere de
persister dans cette voie,
soucieux d'assurer la stabilisation des relations amicales qui
viennent d'etre retablies entre la Thallande et la France,
sont convenus de ce qui suit :
1. Le Gouvernement du Japon garantit au Gouvernement de la
Tha'ilande le caractere definitif et irrevocable du reglement du conflit
entre la Thallande et la France, tel qu'il resulte, ala suite de la mediation
du Gouvernement du Japon, de la Convention de Paix entre la Thallande
et la France du 9 mai 1941 et des documents y annexes.
2. Le Gouvernement de Ia Tha'ilande accepte la garantie susmentionnee
du Gouvernement du Japon. Jl s'emploiera au maintien de la
paix en Asie Orientale, et en particulier a l'etablissement de rapports
amicaux de bon voisinage, ainsi qu'au developpement des relations
economiques etroites entre la Thallande et le Japon.
Le Gouvernement de la Tha'ilande declare en outre qu'il n'entend
contracter aucun accord ou entente avec une tierce Puissance, prevoyant
une cooperation politique, economique ou militaire de nature a l'opposer
directement ou indirectement au Japan.
3. Le present Protocole sera ratifie et Ies ratifications en seront
echangees a Tokyo dans Ies deux mois suivant la date de sa signature.
Le present Protocole entrera en vigueur le jour de l'echange des
ratifications.
En foi de quoi, les soussignes, dfiment autorises par leurs Gouvernement
respectifs, ont signe le present Protocole et y ont appose leurs
cachets. ·
Fait en double exemplaire, en langues thaie et japonaise, a Tokyo,
le neuvieme jour du cinquieme mois de la deux mille quatre cent quatrevingt-quatrieme
annee de l'ere bouddhique, correspondant au neuvieme
jour du cinquieme mois de la seizieme annee de Syowa.

Hl£ FIRST PmiiuN GOVERNMENT AND 11·s INVOLVEMENT IN WORLD WAH n 75
APPENDIX III
Royal Proclamation issued by the Regent of Thailand in
the name of King Ananda Mallidol on August 16, 1945
"Whereas Thailand bas pursued a fixed policy of maintaining strict
neutrality and of combatting foreign aggression by all means, as is clearly
evidenced from the enactment in B.E. 2484 (1941) of the Law 'Defining
the Duties of Thais in Time of War,' this fixed determination was made
clear when Japan moved her forces in Thai territory on the 8th, December,
2484 (1941), by acts combatting aggression everywhere,• and numerous
soldiers, police, and civilians lost their lives thereby."
"This circumstance, which stands as evidence in itself, shows clearly
that the declaration of war on Great Britain and the United States of
America on the 25th, January, 2485 (1942), as well as all acts adverse
to the United Nations, are acts contrary to the will of the Thai people
and constitute an infringement of the provisions of the Constitution and
the laws of the land. The Thai people inside as well as outside the
country, who were in a position to help and support the United Nations
who are lovers of peace in this world, have taken action by every means
to assist the United Nations as most of the United Nations are already
aware. This shows once again that the will of the Thai people does not
approve of the declaration of war and of acts adverse to the United
Nations as already mentioned."
"Now that Japan has agreed to comply with the declaration of the
United States of America, Great Britain, China and the Soviet Union
which was made at Potsdam, peace is restored to Thailand as is the wish
of the Thai people."
"The Regent, in the name of His Majesty the King, hereby openly
proclaims on behalf of the Thai people that the declaration df war on
the United States of America and Great Britain is null and void and not
binding on the Thai people as far as the United Nations are concerned.
Thailand has resolved that the good friendly relations existing with the
United Nations prior to the 8th, December, B.C. 2484 (1941), shall be

76 Charnvit Kasetsirl
restored and Thailand is ready to co-operate fully in every way with the
United Nations in the establishment of stability of the world.
"As for the territories the occupancy of which Japan entrusted to
Thailand, namely the States of Kelantan, Trengganu, Kedah, Perlis
Kengtung, and Muang Phan, Thailand has no desire for the territories
and is ready to arrange for their delivery as soon as Great Britain is ready
to take delivery thereof."
"As for any other provisions of the law having effects adverse to
the United States of America, Great Britain, and the British Empire,
their repeal shall be considered hereafter. All damages of any kind
resulting from those laws will be legitimately made good."
"In conclusion, all the Thai people, as well as aliens who are in the
Thai Kingdom, are requested to remain in tranquility and not to commit
any act which will constitute a disturbance of public order. They should
hold steadfastly to the ideals which have been laid down in the resolutions
of the United Nations at San Francisco."

1
hiE FIRSt PIIIB\.JN GOVEHN~1EN1' AND ITS INVOLVEMENT IN \~1 0RLD WAR ll 77
APPENDIX IV
Pacte 11' Alliance entre
le Japon et Ia Tha'ilande
December 21, 1941
Le Gouvernement Imperial du Japon et le Gouvernement Royal de
la Thallande, fermement convaincus que l'etablissement du nouvel ordre
dans 1' Asie Orientale est le seul moyen de n~aliser la prosperite dans
cette sphere et la condition indispensable au redressement et renforcement
de la paix mondiale, et animes de la volonte ferme et irreductible
d'eliminer a fond toutes les mauvaises influences faisant obstacle a ce
but, sont convenus des articles suivants:
ARTICLE 1.
Une alliance est etablie par le Japon et la Thai:lande entre eux sur
la base du respect mutuel de l'independance et de la souverainete.
ARTICLE 2.
Au cas ou le Japan ou la Tha'ilande se trouvera dans le conflit arme
vis-a-vis d'une ou de plusieurs tierces Puissances, la Thallande ou le
Japon se rangera immediatement du cote de l'autre comme son allie et
lui pretera l'aide avec tous ses moyens politique, economique et militaire.
ARTICLE 3.
Les details relatifs a !'execution de l'article 2 seront determines,
d'un commun accord, entre les autorites competentes du Japan et de la
Tha!lande.
ARTICLE 4.
Le Japon et la Thallande, en cas de guerre poursuivie en commun,
s'engagent a ne conclure ni l'armistice ni la paix que par le commun
accord complet.
ARTICLE 5.
Le present Pacte entrera en vigueur des sa signature. 11 aura une
dun~e de dix ans. Les deux parties se consulteront au sujet du renouvellement
du present Pacte au moment convenable avant !'expiration de
ladite duree.

charnvit kasetsiri
En foi de quoi, les soussignes d(tment autorises a cet effet par ieufs
Gouvernements respectifs, ont signe le present Pacte et y ont appose
leurs cachets.
Fait'en double exemplaire, a Bangkok, le vingt-et-unieme jour du
douzieme mois, de la seizieme annee de Syowa, correspondant au vingtet-unieme
jour du douzieme mois de la deux mille quatre cent quatrevingt
quatrieme annee de !'ere bouddhique.
L' Ambassad eur Extraordinaire et
Ptenipotentiaire du Japon.
TEIJI TSUBOKAMI (L.S.)
Le President du Conseil des Ministres
et Ministre des Afjaires Etrangeres
de [a Thallande.
P. PIBULASONGGRAM (L.S.)

THE FIRST PHIBUN GOVERNMENT AND ITS INVOLVEMENT IN WORLD WAR T1 79
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80 Charnvit Kasetsiri
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THE FIRST PHIBUN GOVERNMENT AND ITS INVOLVEMENT IN WORLD WAH II 81
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86 Charnvit Kasetsiri
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THE FH\ST PHIIJUN GOVEHNMENT AND ITS INVOLVEMENT IN WOHLD WAR II 87
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THE FALL OF THE PHIBUN GOVERNMENT, 1944
by
Benjamin A Batson*
Although it occurred only thirty years ago, the change of government
that took place in Bangkok in the summer of 1944 remains an obscure
episode. This is but a particular instance of a more general propositionthe
war years as a whole are something of a blank in modern Thai history.
Relatively little news filtered out of the country, and internally the amount
of material published was limited. Most government publications were
suspended, and much of the press, either voluntarily or by government
fiat; ceased publication. Only one English-language paper continued to
publish, the Chinese-language press virtually disappeared, and the number
of Thai-language papers was cut substantially. (A Japanese-language
paper appeared, but its circulation was limited almost entirely to the
Japanese community, very few of whom were permanent or long time
residents.) Of the small number of books published during the period
most are now difficult if not impossible to find. And there are problems
in using some of the materials that have survived, both because of the
poor quality of the paper and printing in the last' several years of the
war, and because most of the Thai-language materials were published in
a governmeot-sponsored 'modernized Thai' that was used only during·
the period 1942-44. Of works dealing with the wartime period published
subsequently the great bulk have dealt with the activities of the anti­
Japaneseresistance, both in Thailand and abroad. With a few exceptions.
those associated with governments allied to Japan have had little to say
about the period. Other than the activities of the resistance, most
aspects of life in Bangkok-to say nothing of the countryside-have
remained enveloped in silence.!
* *
The war years, and particularly the government of Field Marshal
Luang Phibun Songkhram, must be seen against the background of an
assertive Thai nationalism that had its roots in the 1920's and reached
* Cornell University
1) The most prolific author on the war years in English has been the British jurist
Gerald Sparrow, who in a series of semi-autobiographical works (The Golden
0/'chid, Land of the Moonflower, Not Wisely But Too Well, The Star Sapphires,

90 Benjamin A. Batson
its full force in t4e late 1930's and early 1940's. This nationalist movement
was a curious blend of East and West. Its models were clearly
Western and its major promoters all Western-educated members of the
Thai elite, but on the other hand it looked to the Thai past and took its
ideology in part from the writings of King Vajiravudh (reigned 1910-
1925), who while a strong proponent of technical modernization had also
stressed 'Thai ness' and the dangers of blind copying from the West.
The mixture of elements from East and West was often rather incongruous:
while non-Buddhist, and particularly Christian, Thai were being
pressured to convert to Buddhism, all Thai were being told that only
Western dress, including hats for both sexes and gloves for women, was
,civilized. When strong public opposition developed to the various
government decrees regulating dress, Phi bun defended his use of coercion
by appealing to the examples of such historic 'modernizers' as King Ram
Khamhaeng (thirteenth century) and King Chulalongkorn (reigned 1868-
1910), whom he said had also had to force the Thai people to abandon
Lawyer at Large, Opium Venture) has given a set of vivid sketches of the last
years of the absolute monarchy, tbe Siam of the 1939's, and the period of
Japanese ascendancy, which he spent as a prisoner in Bangkok. While these
works are valuable for the atmosphere of the times, their usefulness to the historian
is limited by the author's strong biases on many subjects, notably Japan
and the Japanese, and by the fact that in addition to a number of errors the
works are not even internally consistent, the same episode appearing in completely
different form in different works.
There is also a brief but interesting description of life in Bangkok during
the Allied air raids in Princess Rudivoravan's The Treasured One (London,
1958).
, Some of the relatively few works in Thai on the war years will be mentioned
in the course of this paper. In view of the usual reluctance 'of most
Thai writers to deal with aspects of the period other than the resistance, it is
worth noting that last year 'Khu Kam' ('r1nn:w' ; The Destined Couple'}, a featurelength
Thai film taken from a novel ~nd set entirely in the war years, was
well received in Bangkok. Particularly surprising was the ,relatively sympathetic
treatment of the Japanese in tbe film; while there was some criticism, the Thai
heroine eventually married and fell in love with (in that orderi a kind and
cultured Japanese officer, to the disappointment of her Thai childhood sweetheart,
_who after years in the West had just parachuted into Thailand to join
the anti-Japanese undergro)lnd.

THE FALL OF THE PHIBUN GOVERNMENT, 1944 91
old ways. 2 The change of New Year's Day from the old April 1 to the
Western January 1 was justified by a dubious argument purporting to
show that the ancient Thai year had begun on (or about) January 1.
And Luang Wichit Wathakan, who in the late 1930's was Director-General
of the Department of Fine Arts and the moving spirit behind many of the
nationalist programs, argued that King Ram Khamhaeng had favored the
'walking Buddha' style of Sukbothai image to encourage his people to
lead a more active and energetic life, which Luang Wichit saw as a good
example for modern Thai.3
A symbolic culmination to the nationalist program came in the
change of name from 'Siam' to 'Thailand' in the summer of 1939. In a
speech before the National Assembly advocating the change, Pbibun
argued that internally the name 'Thailand' would make clear that the
country belonged to the Thai (a reference presumably aimed primarily
at the large Chinese minority, and to a lesser degree at Western economic
domination), while others noted that externally it would advertise
Thailand as the natural home of all the Thai peoples, giving expression
to a nascent Pan-Thai movement that envisioned uniting the Thai of
Thailand with various Thai peoples of Laos, the ShaJ! States of northern
Burma, and adjacent areas, in a single Thai state. 4 The change in name
was accompanied by a series of regulations restricting the activities of
Chinese and other minorities and by the beginning of a campaign to press
for a revision of the border between Thailand and French Indochina.
This originally envisioned only a minor adjustment involving some
islands in the Mekong River and navigation rights, but both sides took
an increasingly hard line and, following the defeat of France in Europe
in the summer of 1940, hostilities broke out between Thailand and the
Vichy French regime in Indochina, in which the Thai had some success
-~-·· ·-~---~-. .... I IV JJ ~
2) M.C. Song Wutthichai, Kantaeng Kai Samai Sang Chat (mmlll~n1EH\'lJUfflN'UWii
Dress in the Era of Nation Building), Bangkok, 1941, PP· 127-141.
3) Bangkok Times, February, 20, 1940, August2, 1940; March 22, 1940. During
the war years Luang Wichit held a variety of positions, including Mini~ter of
Foreign Affairs and Ambassador to Japan.
4) The text of Phi bun's speech is in Rai-ngan Kanf-•rachum Sapha Phuthaen Ratsad?n
(11U~l'Wf1lnh:::'lllJffll1N!I'VI!l11'hl~p; Proceedings of the National Assembly),
August 26, 1939.
•

J
92 Benjamin A. Batson
on land and the French at sea. With Japanese mediation a treaty was
-concluded that made the Mekong the boundary line from the Burmese
border to the Cambodian border, thus transferring to Thailand two areas
on the west bank of the Mekong opposite Luang Phrabang and Pakse,
and that also gave Thailand a large area in northern and western Cambodia.5
It should be noted that although by 1940 the Thai leadership
was to a degree split into two factions, one favoring the continuation of
Thailand's traditionally close economic and political ties with the West
and the other a more independent and nationalist policy, tending to look
toward Japan as the emerging dominant power in Asia and an ally with
whose aid Western influence in Thailand could be reduced, there was
virtually unanimous agreement on the justice of the Thai claims and a
willingness to use all measures, including force if necessary, to secure a
revision of the frontier. Thus Thai of various political persuasions supported
the policy of the Phibun government in the fall of 1940, members
of the National Assembly usually critical of the government toured the
front, and Khuang Aphaiwong, ~civilian moderate not closely identified
5) All of the areas involved, with the exception of a strip in northern Cambodia,
bad been ceded to France by Siam in the early twentieth century. It is rather
ironic that although most of ·the Thai propaganda had centered on the
injustices of I 893, ~hen a French naval display at Bangkok forced the cession
of Laos east of the Mekong, none of the 'recovered' territories, ·nor even any
of those claimed until rather late in the affair, had been involved in the !893
dispute. The final settlement, involving less territory than many Thai felt
their historic claims and military victories deserved (few were aware of the
magnitude of the losses incurred in the naval action against the French in the
Gulf of Siam in January 1941 ), the payment by Thailand to France of a substan·
tial sum in the guise of compensation for French capital improvements in the
returned areas, and a demilitarized zone on the Thai side of the new border,
was accepted by the Thai with reluctance and only after strong pressure from
the Japanese', which resulted in;a temporary but marked setback to tbe developing
Japanese-Thai entente. For criticism of the settlement in the National As·
sembly, and the government defence of the treaty as the best obtainable, see
Rai-ngan Kanj,raclwm Sapha Phuthaen l?atsad7n, June 9, 1941 (pp. 4-29).

TilE FALL OF THE PHII3UN GOVF.RNMENT, 1944 93
with the Phibun military faction, headed the Thai delegation to take
possession of the former Thai territories in western Cambodia. 6
Following settlement of the Indochina frontier question, Thai dissatisfaction
with Japan's role in the negotiations and concern over the
Japanese advance in French Indochina led to a period of somewhat improved
relations with Britain and the United States, and to attempts to
secure promises of support for Thailand in the event of war between
those two countries and Japan. In the end there were no concrete results,
and when confronted with overwhelming Japanese force on December
8, 1941, the Thai government ordered an end to a brief armed resistance
and free passage for Japanese forces to attack Western colonial
possessions in Southeast Asia. The arrival of the Japanese in force in
Bangkok was followed by a series of successively closer treaties of aid
and alliance between Thailand and Japan-one even being signed in the
Temple of the Emerald Buddha-culminating in the Thai declaration of
---------------------------- -----------------·--·--------
6) Most of the opposition members in the National Assembly were from the
Northeast, where the loss of the Lao and Cambodian territories to Fran.ce was
particularly strongly felt.
The choice of Khuang was a bit of symbolic propaganda. !

94 Benjamin A. Batson
war on Great Britain and the United States on January 25, 1942,7 The
reasons behind this action, as for so many other things in wartime Thailand,
have been a matter of controversy. Phibun bas argued that the
government had no choice, while critics have claimed that it was an
opportunistic act taken in the belief that Japan would win the war, and
that reportedly even the Japanese were surprised by the Thai declaration.
Government announcements at the time explicitly denied either that the
declaration was the result of Japanese pressure or that it was made in
the hope of sharing in Japan's victories, citing instead the past history of
Western, and particularly British, imperialist oppression of the Thai and
more specifically Allied air raids on 'neutral' Thailand subsequent to the
arrival of the Japanese forces. s
7) There is a detailed account, based largely on Japanese sources, of the background
of these events in Thadeus Flood, "Japan's Relations with Thailand:
1928-41" (unpublished doctoral thesis, University of Washington, 1967).
It would seem that very little Japanese writing on Thailand during the
war years has appeared in English. One example is Masanobu Tsuji's Under·
ground Escape (Tokyo, 19 52), the first three chapters of which relate the
experiences of a Japanese staff officer in Thailand in the latter part of the war
and his escape in disguise through Thailand, Laos, and Vietnam after the
Japanese surrender. There is an excerpt from this work, set partly in Bangkok
in the summer and fall of 1945, in Jay Gluck, editor, Ul

TilE [1,\LL OF Tl-IE 1'11\RUN

96 Benjamin A. Batson
land, primarily to Indochina, Malaya, and Singapore.ll
In addition,
Japanese demands on the Thai economy, which included large loans and
the establishment of an artificial rate of exchange between the baht and
the yen which amounted to a substantial devaluation of the baht, were
highly inflationary.
Figures prepared by the government in 1944 to use
in arguing against Japanese demands for further inflationary credits
showed that taking 1938 as the base year(= 100) the cost of living index
for Bangkok had risen as follows :12
January
February
March
1941
1942
!943
1944
1944
1944
132.00
I 76.99
291.56
301.12
327.46
409.07
On top of the economic difficulties, there was public resistance to many
of the 'state conventions' (ratthaniyom), decrees regulating dress, language
and culture.
After the early Japanese successes, the news from the war fronts
turned steadily worse. A great deal of news from Allied sources circulated
clandestinely in Bangkok, but it was not necessary to have access
to these illegal sources to judge the true situation. All war news in the
11) In 1941, when the war in Europe had already had an adverse effect on shipping,
406 ships with cargo urrivcd·at the port of Bangkok and 533 departed.
The figures for 1944 were 51 and 72 respectively. The value of goods imported
through Bangkok in 1941 was 151.8 million baht and the value exported 238.8
million baht, while the 1944 figures were 57.7 million baht and 43.5 million
~aht respectively, altbollgh the decline in imports was partially offset by an
increase in imports through other ports of entry. Thailand, Statistical Year
Book, B.E. 2482 (1939-40) to 2487 (1944) (Bangkok, 1950), pp. 156, 295, 304.
12) Direk Chaiyanam, Thai kap Songld>ram Lo.k Khrang Thi 2 (lVitlfl~lHHfn1~JiM
~~ '
fi~~VI 2; Thailand and the Second World War), Bangkok, 1966, vol 1, p. 303 .
. Direk was Foreign Minister when Japanese troops entered Thailand, but
known for his pro-Western sympathies he was soon removed. He was then
sent to Tokyo as Ambassador-whether to watch the Japanese or to have the
Japan,ese watch him is unclear. In the fall of 1943 he returned to Tbailand
and once again became Foreign Minister, serving until the fa,llof the Phibun
government in July of 1944. (See also note 68.}

THE FALL OF THE PHIBUN GOVERNMENT, 1944 97
controlled press in Bangkok was from Japanese or, to a lesser extent,
German sources. The Japanese reporting on the European war made
little or no attempt to conceal German reverses (the Japanese-German
alliance having always .been more symbol than substance) and in June
and July of 1944 the Allied invasion of France and advance toward Paris
were reported in detail in the Bangkok press. Japanese coverage of the
Pacific theatre was much more slanted, but as the Japanese despatches
from 1943 onward reported an unending series of 'victories' moving ever
nearer the Japanese home islands it required only a little knowledge of
geography, or a map, to see the likely outcome. Simultaneously, Allied
air raids on Thailand increased in intensity. Italy had left the war in
1943, and on July 18, 1944, the Tojo government resigned. While this
was presented as only a matter of Japanese internal politics, its relati

98 Benjamin A. Batson
Free Thai movement.14 In March of 1944 Wanit Pananon, a close ad.
viser of Phibun generally acknowledged as the most pro-Japanese figure
in the government, was charged in connection with a gold profiteering
scandal, and in May it was reported that he had committed suicide.ts
In June, government commentators pointedly insisted that, despite wartime
inconveniences, the Thai people were not anxious for a change in
the government.i6 But dissatisfaction with the Phibun regime was ob.
viously widespread, and the fall of the Japanese government in July
appeared to remove its major external support and thus make its position
even more precarious.
* *
The immediate issue over which the Phibun government resigned
on July 24, 1944, six days after the fall of the government in Tokyo, was
the refusal of the National Assembly to accept two government bills
concerning the government plans to build a new national capital at Phetchabun
and a huge Buddhist city near Saraburi.
Speculation about
possible transfer of the capital bad gone on for a number of years. As
early as 1939 a French writer bad reported that the capital would be
moved to Lopburi, where Phibun as Minister of Defence bad constructed
a large military complex.17
In 1942 the government announced plans
for a new capital at Saraburi, but in November of 1943 it was reported
that the site would be Pbetchabun instead. IS
The government had already
been working to modernize Pbetchabun and now construction was
started on an even larger scale, including a temple designed to house the
14) SuphabSatri ('1'fl1WU~i), cited in' the Bangkok Chronicle, April 12, 1944. At
the end of 1943 Free Thai sources estimated that four members of the cabi'net
and "the overwhelming majority of the National Assembly, civil servants,
military personnel, and businessmen were either active members of the Under~
ground or sympathizers". (James V. Martin, Jr., "Thai-American Relations
in World War II", Journal of Asian Studies (August 196 3, p. 46 3.)
15) Bangkol1 Cht·onicle, March I 0, April 18, and May 23, 1944.
16) Bangkok Cht·onicle, June 15, 1944.
17) L. Chorin, Dans le Haut Siam (Bangkok, 1940), p, 18.
18) Bcmgkok Times, July 3, 1942; Bangkok Chroni~;le, November 17, 1943,

+rm FALL OF 'l'HE I'rmluN GOVERNMENT, 1944
Emerald Buddha image, the palladium of the kingdom.19 The plan for
a Buddhist city at Saraburi had been announced in July of 1943.20 In
1944 in the last week of May and the first week of June; while the
National Assembly was not in session, the government issued two emer•
gency decrees providing for the reorganization and upgrading of the
" administration of Phetchabun and for the construction of the Buddhist
center at Saraburi. 21 After the Assembly began its regular session on
National Day, June 24, the government, as required by the Constitution,
submitted bills requesting the Assembly's acceptance of the two emergency
decrees. It was the defeat of these two bills on July 20 and July
22 which precipitated the resignation of the Phibun government.
The motives of the government in proposing these two major
projects in the midst of war and economic crisis have been variously
described. At the time the government cited Allied air raids, which had
made Bangkok increasingly dangerous, and the desire to demonstrate
Buddhist piety; critics suspected another example of the expensive extravagance
that characterized what they saw as Phibun's visions of
grandeur.22 Since the war Phibun and his supporters have maintained
19) Bangkoll Chronicle, November 11, 1943; April 10, April 26, May 29, 1944.
Phibun's 1945 account says that the image was actually transferred from
20)
21)
22)
Bangkok to Phetchabun. 'Withetsakorani', Thai kap Sathanakan Songkhram
~ ~ d' i ~.. .
Lok Khrang Thi 2 ( I'VIVfllJfft:l1tl::fl1H11ll'~m11J !1flfl'~ 11 2; The Thar and World
War II), Bangkok, 1972, p. 471.
Bangkol1 Chronicle, July 29; 1943; June 8, 1944. The government plans envisioned
a world religious center, a Buddhist equivalent to Rome or Mecca.
Complete texts of the two emergency decrees are given in Prida Dantrakun,
~ ' ~ .t 'I
Nai Klwang lwf' Maethap Yipun (ll1flfl'l~fllJ!!IJ1'1Wn.Jlltlj Khuang and the Japanese
Generals), Bangkok, 1949, pp. 127-130 and 167-171. This detailed account
of the situation in Bangkok in 1944-45 was written by a journalist who was
present at some of the events he describes.
,Khuang adds that in addition to planning to move the capital, Phibun planned
to reintroduce titles of nobility, giving himself the rank of 'Somdet Chao Phya'
(and extremely high title rarely used in Thai history), that official historians
were at work trying to show that Phi bun was descended from the sixteenth
century hero King Naresuan, and that various other semi-royal trappings for
'The Leader' (as Phibun was known during the war years) were introd~ce"d or
contemplated. Khuang Aphaiwong, Kan Tq Su khqtzg Khc!pat·hao (nmtV~'U!N
,l,w 1 ~",; My Struggle), Bangkok, 1958, Chapters 5 and 6. See also the Bangkok
Times, October 22, 1941.

too
Benjamin A. Bats6ti
that both projects were part of a grand scheme for a planned uprising
against the Japanese. In Phetchabun, several hundred miles north of
Bangkok and in a relatively inaccessible valley ringed by mountains,
the government and national treasures such as the Emerald Buddha
would be safe from seizure by the Japanese. And the Buddhist city at
Saraburi would serve the dual purpose of forestalling a planned Japanese
military move into the area, which would have limited the effectiveness
of nearby Thai military units, and providing a sanctuary for Thai civilians
once fighting broke out between the Thai and Japanese forces.23
The National Assembly debate on the Phetchabun bill took place
on July 20, the attack on the government being made primarily by representatives
from the Northeast. The main point stressed was the suffering
of laborers conscripted throughout the country for the construction at
23) Phibun's 1945 testimony in defence of his wartime policies has recently been
republished in Thai kap Sathanakan Songkram Lok Khrang Thi 2, pp. 415-474.
(The author adds (p. 477) that only Phi bun himself really knows the truth or
falsehood of this account, but that in any case it is of historical interest.) The
parts in question are on pp. 459-46 3. In English see also the memoirs of
Thanphuying La-iad Phi bun Songkhram in.Portraits of Thai Politics, pp. 204-208
(including passages translated from her husband's account cited above.)
Phibun's account is in part corroborated by the memoirs of General Net
-\"'
Khemayothin, Chi wit Nai Phon ( ~'H11.J11'.1Vl"; Life of a General), Bangkok, 1954
and 1967, and Ngan Tai Din llhqng Phan-ek Yothi ( •31lli~~U'Utl~W~~~~"E!n it~ri; Underground
Work of Colonel Yothi), Bangkok, 1957 and 1967 (2 vols.). (References
here are to the 1967 editions.) See especially Chapter 2 of the latter
work, which is cited by Thanphuying La-iad in Portraits of Thai Politics, p, 203.
The 1967 edition of Chiwit Nai Phon contains a substantial introduction by
Thawee Bunyaket, which includes (pp. 6-7) a list of four objections-ranging
from military considerations to malaria to the appearance of the government's
abandoning the population-which Thawee says the Seri Thai had to Phibun's
plan to make a stand against the Japanese at Phetchabun; the work also bas
(pp. 344-352) an excerpt from Phibun's 1945 testimony corresponding, with
minor variations, to pp. 456-463 of Thai kap Sathanakan Songkhram Lok r!
Kll1'ang Thi 2.
Ngan Tai Din kh~ng Phan·ek Yothi contains the well-known story of how
Phibun, when asked in 19.42 by Net ('Colonel Yothi') against whom Thai military
planning should be directed, is said to have replied, "Which side do you
think is going to lose this war? That side is our enemy." (pp. 1, 11).

i'ili;; FALL OF THE PH!BUN GOVERNMENT, 1944
the new capital site, which was described as a malarial jungle. Figures
were given for the large numbers conscripted, and for the numbers who
had died or contracted disease. The expense of the project and the unsuitability
of the site were also criticized, as well as the government's
questionable procedure of issuing an emergency decree only days before
the Assembly was scheduled to reconvene.24 At the end of the debate
the government bill was defeated by a margin of 48-36.25
Two days later the Assembly took up the bill to establish a Buddhist
city at Saraburi. There was no objection to the principle of supporting
the Buddhist religion, but the government was once again criticized for
having issued the emergency decree only a few days before the opening
of the Assembly, especially as the government itself said that the project
would take years to complete. When the government explained that it
had timed the decree to coincide with wisak!zabucha, a Buddhist holy day,
------·-------
24) Nai Khuang l~ap Maethaj; Yipun, pp. 130-167, gives the texts of the speeches
of Th9ngin Phuriphat (Ubon), Kbemchat Bunyaratanaphan d~oi-et), Liang
Chaiyakan (Ubon), and F¥n Suphanasan (Ayutthaya). No source is given,
which is unfortunate as even the National Library (Bangkok) apparently bas no
wartime proceedings of the National Assembly, and there is some evidence
that th.ey were never published (see the Bangkok Times, February 6, 1942, and
the Bangkok Chronicle, December 30, 1944.) There is also a brief account of
the Assembly debate in Bunchuai Sisawat, Phant1'i Khuang Aj>haiwong, Nayok
1 .,-\ lll'.r/~
Ratthamontri 4 Samai (vrwm fi'H flflfn~fl
GO 1:\
fJI'l~\.l1tJn7ljlJ\Hl'J
ral
4 Ullflj Major
Khuang Aphaiwong, Four-time Prime Minister), Bangkok, n.d., pp. 201-202.
(Khuang's military title was honorary.) The author was a member of the
National Assembly, and his source may have been the Assembly's own records.
Thc;>ngin claimed that at least 100,000 laborers had been conscripted in
ten changwat's, of whom 10,000 had died, and various other figures were given
for specific areas, particularly in the Northeast. Charles F. Keyes, in lsan:
Regionalimi'"in Northeast Thailand (Cornell, 1967), p, 28, n. 9, notes that, whether
it was true or not, many Northeasterners at least believed that most of the
labor conscripted came from the Northeast. On the fall of th9 Phi bun government,
Keyes quotes from John Coast, who he says provides "a good summary."
In fact Coast's account, including tbe passage quoted in Keyes, has a nu~ber
of inaccuracies. (!san, pp. 28-29, and Coast, Some Aspects of Siamese Polit·ics
(New York., 1953), pp. 26-27.)
25) Phantri Khuang Aphaiwong, Nayok Ratt/~amontri 4 Samai, p. 202; Bangkok
Chronicle, July 21, 1944,
ioi

Benjamin A. Batson
critics replied that the government had announced that it was abandorling
the 'superstitious' practice of invoking auspicious occasions. It was
pointed out that the plan involved large scale expropriation of land and
eviction of the former owners, which was seen as incompatible with
Buddhist principles. And the question was raised as to how such a large
~eligious establishment could be supported in a rural area, when even the
monks at Wat Phra Sri Mahathat, a large new government-sponsored
temple on the outskirts of Bangkok, had to buy food rather than relying
on the usual offerings of the laity.
A representative from Ayutthaya
noted that the area to be expropriated included his home town of Tha
Rua, a populous river market on the railroad just south of the Saraburi
provincial border, and recommended that the project be reduced in area
and moved north to center around the historic Buddhist shrine at Phra
Pbutthabat.26 In the end the government bill was defeated, 43-41, on a
secret ballot.2 7
On the face of it, it is difficult to see how the government could ever
lose a vote in the National Assembly. In 1944 the Constitution of
December 1932 was still in force, which had established a National
Assembly that was half elected and half appointed. A provision in the
26) The speeches of Liang Chaiyakan (Ubon), F~n Suphanasan (Ayuttbaya), and
Th~ngin Phuripbat (tJbon) are given in Nai K.huang kaj> Maethaj> Yipun, pp.
172-190. See also Phantri [(huang Aj;/wiwong, Nayok Ratthamontri 4 Samai,
pp. 202-204, and Hat Daoruang, Chiwit lae Ngan khong Si ,1clit Ratthamontri
~-- .\ ~ ~ ~ '
'll'Jillll~t~1Wlltl~ffu~m:lllll-11'17; Lives and Works of the Four Former Ministers),
Bangkok, 19.65, pp. 244-264.
The government case was presented by the police generai Prayun Phamonmontri,
Minister of Education and bead of the paramilitary yuvachon youth
movement, who was generally regarded as pro-Axis and particularly pro·
German. However, according to General Net, Prayun was chosen by Phibun
as a member of a secret mission that was to have been sent to negotiate
with the Chinese Nationalist Government in Chungking. The fall of the Phibun
government resulted in the cancellation of the proposed mission. Ngan
Tai Din kh?ng Phan·ek Yoihi, pp. 3 3, 41 ). (The Thai military did baV'e secret,
friendly contacts with Chinese military units in the Shan States region (see
Chiwit Nai Phon), and the Free Thai movement sent agents from Bangkok to
Chungking.)
27) Nai Khuang kap Maethap Yipun, p. 9, and Bangkole Chronicle, July 24, 1944.

TilE FALL OF THE PHJBUN GOVERNMENT, 1944 103
original Constitution had provided that when one half of the electorate
bad attained a certain level of education, and in any case within a period
not to exceed ten years, the National Assembly would be composed
wholly of elected members. However, in 1940 a government-sponsored
amendment had extended the transitional period to twenty years, at the
same time dropping the educational criterion that could have made
possible an all-elected Assembly at an earlier date. The term of the
Assembly had been set by the original Constitution at four years, and
the first election had taken place in November 1933, and the second as
scheduled in 1937. However, following a defeat in the Assembly in
1938 the government had dissolved the Assembly and called a new
election in the fall of that year. In the normal course of events the next
election would have been held in the fall of 1942, but the government,
citing the wartime emergency situation, pushed through a measure extending
the terms of office of the members elected in.1938 an additional
two years. In the fall of 1944 a new two year extension was passed, on
the same grounds as the earlier one, and new national elections did not
take place until after the war.
Thus in 1944 the Assembly was made up of equal numbers of
appointed and elected members, the elected members having been chosen
in 1938, or in a few cases in by-elections held to :fill vacancies that had
occurred in the six intervening years. 28 The total number of elected
seats was ninety-one, although at the time of the defeat of the Phibun
government there were several vacancies. 2 9 The appointed members
were predominantly military and usually supporters of the government.
28) Vacancies had occurred through death (including a suicide, and the arrest and
execution of one member on political charges), resignation, and expulsion by
the Assembly. And early in 1944 a member had been killed in an air raid
(see Bangkoll Chronicle, May 10, 1944).
29) There is a list. of the membership as of August 1944 in a booklet issued by the
Public Relations Department with the texts of the decrees establishing the new
government and of official policy statements (Prakat Tallg Plwsamret Ratchakan
Thaen Phra-ong Tang Nayok Ratthamontr.i lae Ratthamontri Nayobai ldlf?ng
~ 91 0 ri r! ~ ~ ""' 61 "'\
Ratthaban . •. · t.h::::mlHHN!l'1!1m'l71'llfl11!U'l1-JW'S~il~f'l l'lH11tlfl1111Jl.Jf'l1 un::'S nuum
' .
uitJ'IJ1tl'll'fl~imnn •••• (Bangkok, 1944), pp. 31-42). The list gives the names
of 88 elected members and 91 appointed members.

104 Benjamin A. Batson
The government normally had considerable support among the elected
membership also, and in the brighter days of 1940-42 most government
measures had passed by large majorities.3 0
But, despite the apparently insuperable advantage that governments
since 1933 had held in being able to name half of the Assembly, there
were precedents for rejection of government measures by the Assembly.3t
A number of minor bills bad been defeated at various times, and others
had been withdrawn by the government because it appeared likely that
they would be voted down. And in several cases, the government bad
resigned after losing on what it considered important issues. In 1934
the Assembly had voted by an overwhelming 73 to 25 against an interna-
. tiona! rubber agreement endorsed by the government, leading to the
rysignation of the Phahon cabinet, while in 1938 the Assembly had passed,
by a vote of 45-31, a budgeting measure opposed by the government, and
the government had again submitted its resignation. In the 1937 royal
lands scandal, in which members of the Assembly had sharply criticized
certain government figures, the government had resigned before any vote
could be taken.
The reasons for the defeat of the government bills on Phetcbabun
and the Buddhist city in July 1944 have been variously interpreted, and
it would seem that a number of factors played a part. The fall of the
Japanese government only days earlier has already been mentioned, and
it is not likely that the timing was just a coincidence.32 Tbawee Bunyaket
bas written that rumors circulating in Bangkok and Allied broadcasts
from Ceylon, which named names, threatened members of the Assembly
with possible treatment as war criminals if they continued to support
the Phibun regime.3 3 The basis of all these external pressures was the
30) In January 1942 a motion of confidence in the government had passed unanimously.
Bangkok Times, January 30, 1942.
31) The government advantage was somewhat reduced by the fact that the appointed
membership of the Assembly had always included most of the cabinet, who
usually did not take part in votes.
32) According to his own account, Khuang at the time made several explicit
references to the Japanese case as a precedent. Kan Tr; Sr,t, pp. 110-111.
33) Portraits of Thai Politics, p. 83. Thawee says that, "Pridi played an important
role in engineering these rumours and broadcasts" in order to pressure the
Assembly into ousting Phibun.

THE FALL OF THE PHlllUN GOVERNMENT, 1944 105
growing conviction that the Allies were going to win the war. It has
been noted before that in most periods since 1932 no substantial segment
of the National Assembly bas dared to oppose the government unless it
bad, or at least thought it had, the backing of some significant military
force; the special circumstances of 1944 show that this force need not
necessarily be inside the country.
Various accounts stress that by the summer of 1944 the growing
public dissatisfaction with the Phibun regime had spread to both elected
and appointed members of the Assembly. A particular cause of Assembly
resentment against Phibun was the rather highhanded manner in which
in the previous year he had forced the members' choice to head the
Assembly, Thawee Bunyaket, to step down in order that a candidate
more to his liking could be chosen,34 Furthermore, even the Japanese
were becoming disenchanted with Phibun, both because they suspected
that he was making plans to go over to the Allies' side and because he was
so publicly identified with the Japanese cause that they feared his growing
unpopularity would also affect them,3s It seems likely also that at least
some of the issues raised by critics of the government in the Assembly
debates, notably the hardships of the labor force conscripted to build
the new capital, were genuinely felt. Phibun and his followers later
blamed their defeat on the need for absolute secrecy, which made it
impossible for them to reveal the true anti-Japanese purposes of the
projects in the Assembly. And Phibun even defended the Phetchabun
labor conscription on the grounds that it gave him an excuse for not
providing the Japanese with a labor force they wanted for construction
in the southern peninsula.36
34) Pran10t Phungsunthon, editor, Bang Ruang ldeokap P!waboromawongsanuwong
' ~ ~ ~ J
nai r·awang Songl1hram Lok Khrang Thi 2 (llH!Hl~!IHJ'Jfllll'fH~U1lJ'Nft1lD~fliU
:r~tt"J
'
Hff~1'111l.J
'l'
&flflm~l'l
~" 2; S orne A ccounts Concernmg ' t h e Royal Family Dunng • '
the Second World War), Bangkok, 1972, p. 67. {The section pp. 38-101 is by
Pridi.) See also Kan To Su, pp. 102-104, 109.
35) Pridi in Bang Ruang, pp: 64-66.
36) Thai kap Sathanakan Songkhram Lok Khrang Thi 2, pp. 454-455, 460-461; Portraits
of Thai Politics, p. 204. On p. 208 Thanphuying.La-iad writes that
Phi bun was bitter that he received no credit for his contributions to the anti­
Japanese cause, and particularly that two key elements of ·his plan, the Phetchabun
and Buddhist city projects, were "debunked by civilian politicians."

106 Benjamin A. Batson
Whether or not there was actually a conspiracy to oust Phibun
through a parliamentary coup, presumably masterminded by Pridi,37 is
unclear. Thawee writes that the Assembly was "prodded by Pridi," and
Khuang says that Pridi sent agents to get in touch with appointed members
of the Assembly.3s On the other hand Liang Chaiyakan, one of
the leaders of the anti-Phibun group in the Assembly, emphatically denies
that there was a plot, and says that the defeat of the government was
as much of a surprise to the opposition as to the government. He notes
that at this time he was not close to Pridi, and sums up Phi bun's fall and
replacement by Khuang Aphaiwong as a "fluke."39 It is possible that
both accounts are correct, Pridi and his group relying on the largely
Northeastern 'opposition' to lead the attack, and trying to add enough
3 7) Pridi, leader of the civilian faction of the 1932 coup group, had long been a
rival of Phibun. In the 1930's Pridi had served as Minister of the Interior and
Minister of Foreign Affairs, and when the war broke out he was Minister of
Finance. He was removed from this post and made a member of the Council
of Regency, both because the Japanese wanted someone more sympathetic in
the key economic position and because, according to Phi bun, it was felt that
he would be safer in a non-political office. The Regency Council, headed by
Prince Aditya, acted for the young King Ananda (who resided in Switzerland
throughout the war). In 1942 a third member of the Council died and was not
replaced, and thus in July 1944 Pridi was one of two members of the Regency
Council, while also covertly the head of the underground 'Free Thai' movement.
38) Portraits of Thai Politics, p. 81; Kan Tq Su, p. 110,
39) This information comes from conversations with Nai Liang, and notes on the
subject which be wrote for the present author in August 1973, for which the
author wishes to express great appreciation.
Liang has had an extraordinary career in Thai politics, having been
elected to the National Assembly from his native Ubon in every election from
1933 through 1957, and he is perhaps the only living member of the first
elected group of representatives. At various times in his career he has been
associated with almost every major party in Thai politics, including one of his
own, and he has also served in sever11l cabinets. In the 1930's and 1940's he
was a leader of the largely Northeaster[l 'opposition' group in the National
Assembly, and he initiated the attack on sovernment figures allegedly involved
in the 1937 royal lands scandal.

THE FALL OF THE PHIBUN GOVERNMENT, 1944 107
votes from other factions to defeat the government.4o Absenteeism
may have also played a part; because of the war situation many military
members of the Assembly, Phibun's greatest source of support; were
away from Bangkok, and Liang adds that on the day of one of the crucial
votes an important cremation resulted in the absence of a number of
government supporters. On both bills the number of votes for and
against totalled less than half of the total number of Assembly members.
Following the defeats in the National Assembly on July 20th and
22nd, Phi bun submitted his resignation to the Council of Regency on the
24th. There has also been considerable speculation about the reasons
for this action. According to the Constitution, the government was
required to resign only if it lost a formal vote of no confidence, which
had not happened. In the past government measures bad been rejected
occasionally with no particular consequences, 41 and in practice governments
since 1932 had resigned only over defeats on 'important' questions.
However, it was up to the discretion of the government itself to decide
what constituted an 'important' question, and the Phibun government
had not indicated in advance that the Pbetcbabun-Buddhist city bills
were 'important' questions on which the government would stake its
existence. 4 2 Phi bun, in his letter of resignation, said that in rejecting
two major government projects the Assembly had shown that it no longer
trusted the government, the equivalent of a vote of no confidence. 43 His
wife has written that he did not have to resign and that many advised
against it, and suggests that alternatively Phibun could have dissolved
the Assembly. She attributes his resignation to respect for constitutional
process, and also to Phi bun's conviction that Thailand's postwar situation
40) There were no political parties at the time, but Liang describes the Assembly
as consisting of three groups: the 'opposition' already described, a group of
hard core supporters of the government, and a middle group that might go
either way depending on the issue.
41) See for example the defeat of a minor government bill reported in the Bangkok
Chronicle, January 3, 1944.
42) In the 193 8 budgeting crisis, for example, Phya Phahon had warned in advance
that the government would resign if the Assembly voted a bill the government
deemed unacceptable.
43) The text of Phibun's letter to the Regents is in the Bangkok Chronicle, July 29,
1944. See also Phibun's letter to the Assembly in the July 31 Chronicle.

168 Benjamin A. Batson
would be easier with a new Prime Minister, as "He had declared war orl
the Allies, and the Allies were going to win." 44 Pridi says that a majority
of the cabinet thought that political 'etiquette' required that the government
resign, but also that it was possible that Phibun would be reappointed
Prime Minister, a common practice in Thai politics.4s Most
critics of Phibun have argued that he resigned only because he thought
that the lack of any acceptable alternative would force the Assembly and
the Regency Council to call him to form a new government. 46
The resignation of Phibun was only the beginning of the political
crisis. Pridi, of course, accepted the resignation at once, but the head
of the Council of Regency, Prince Aditya, whose signature was also
required, refused to sign. Prince Aditya was in the awkward position
of being closely identified with Phibun both personally and in policies,
and also having incurred Phi bun's displeasure on several occasions in the
past. He probably doubted whether Phibun, with the military behind
him, would really allow his government to be overthrown by a vote in
the Assembly, and he had had past experience with Phibun 'resignations'
which were submitted one day and withdrawn the next. But Prince
Aditya was finally persuaded to give his signature and, after some further
complications, on the 26th the Council of Regency formally accepted
Phibun's resignation. The National Assembly was now consulted about
the selection of a new Prime Minister, and, as had been anticipated from
the beginning, the clear choice of the anti-Phibun forces was Phya Phahon,
the venerable elder statesman who had led the military forces in the 1932
44) Portraits of Thai Politics, pp. 205-206.
45) Pridi in Bang Ruang, p. 67. Phya Phahon, for example, had resigned four times
between 19 33 and 19 38 (and had tried to resign several other times), in each
case being reappointed Prime Minister. (The resignations bad resulted in
some reshuffling of cabinet ministers.) One resignation had followed the government
defeat on the rubber issue in 1934, and another the controversy over
the royal lands transactions in 19 37.
It was in 1938, after the government defeat on the budgeting bill,
followed by the dissolution of the Assembly and the holding of new national
elections, that Phahon left the Prime Minister's office for good.
46) Liang and Thawee both support this view. See Porttaits of Thai Politics, p. 100,
and also Chiwit lae Ngan kh9ng Si Adit Ratthamontri, pp. 264-266.

'i'Htt FALL OF THE PHIBUN GOVEIH~MEN1', 1944 109
coup and had served as Prime Minister from 1933 to 1938,47. But Phahon,
who was in poor health and had repeatedly vowed never to. enter
politics again, flatly refused to serve. 4 8 Phi bun, who still held the position
of Supreme Commander of the Armed Forces, had meanwhile moved
to his military headquarters at Lopburi, and speculation was rife in
Bangkok as to what would happen next.
The Assembly was again called into emergency session, and this
time the choice, from among three names mentioned, was Khuang Aphaiwong.
Khuang attributes his selection to Pridi's influence;49 Pridi says
47)
48)
49)
The account in Nai Khuang kap Maethap Yipun, p. 16, says that the Japanese
diplomats favored Phya Pbahon as Phibun's successor, while the Japanese military
preferred Luang Sinthu Songkhramchai, an admiral considered to be pro­
Japanese, but that neither Japanese group interfered in what was regarded as a
matter of Thai domestic politics. In 1942 Phya Pbahon bad headed a high
level Thai goodwill mission to Japan.
Khuang, in Anus'?n nai N gan Phraratchathan Phloeng Sop Phantri Khuang Aphai-
( 'i " ..

ito
Benjamin A. Batsoft
that he and his followers would have preferred Thawee Buny~1ket, wbd
was experienced, popular with the Assembly (his forced withdrawal as
Assembly President has been mentioned above), a leader of the I:~- rcc Thai
movement, and one of the early members of the 1932 coup grollp,so but
that it was felt that he was too forthright and outspoken to nHHHl.gc the
delicate problem of relations with the Japanese. Khuang, '"' ho bad u
considerable reputation as a witty and resourceful speaker, .... vns chosen
instead, largely for his ability to dissemble with the Japanese.s t Despite
his later career in party politics, Khuang at the time was a relatively
non-political figure popular with all factions. His training had been in
engineering (his role in the 1932 coup had been to cut the telephone lines),
and his previous government positions had been relatively technical nnd
non-political ones such as Director-General of the Post and .. relegraph
Department and Minister of Communications. He was also popular
with the Assembly, of which he was an appointed member and Vice­
President at the time of his selection to be Prime Minister.
However, further difficulties developed, for Prince Ad i tya now
refused to sign the decree appointing Khuang Prime Minis t cr. By
Khuang's ~ccount, Prince Aditya tried to persuade him to turn d(:>wn the
position, and repeatedly brought up the possibility of a military nwvc by
Phibun. When Khuang refused to withdraw, Prince Aditya solved the
impasse by resigning himself on July 31. 52 The National Assembly
50)
51)
52)
AlthoughKhuanghad been in France in the mid-1920's with Phi bun Pridi
and other early leaders of the coujJ group, he had joined the grour., onl~ 11
fe~
months before the couj> took place. The more radical students in f~'rancc had
tended to be wary and suspicious of Khuang because of his family ties· not
only was he descended from an old provincial ruling family (sec n 01 e 6)' but
he was related by marriage to King Vajiravudh and, worst of all, wa 9
a,: bro·
ther-in-law of Prince Charoonsak, the Thai Minister in Paris in the n:\ id-19 .20's
with whom Pridi and his group clashed repeatedly.
Pridi in Bang Ruang, p. 68. See also Thawee's account in Portruit;~ /' Tl ;
11
Politics, pp. 100-10 I. · , lilt
Anusqn •••• K.huang Aphaiwong, p. 129. There has been much speculation
about the motives behind Prince Aditya's resignation. According to Kbuno
Prince Aditya didn't dare sign the decree, presumably for fear of t> h. b a 8 J
warned Khuang that he would resign first. Pridi says that PriQ 1 u~d·t
1
believed that Phibun would soon return to power, and recall hill::l. ce t ya
(Pridi in Bang Ruang, p. 70). A rather obscure passage in a cremE\ ti :s l egent
for Prince Aditya says that many people have misunderstood his l"l:to ~ vol urn:
that the results, even of a miscalculation, if it is made with the ~ 0 t 1 ves, ao
coun1ry in mind and things work out satisfactorily, should be forgi '-"e od ~~ the
(!Wlll-1), Bangkok, 1946, pp. 21-22. (This is a translation of the ~Q nl' asa~
"Hassan," with a biography of Prince Aditya, pp. 1-35.) g 1sb war

THE FALL OF THE PHIBUN GOVERNMENT, 1944
Ill
immediately named Pridi sole Regent and Pridi installed Khuang as
Prime Minister, with Thawee as his main deputy with special responsibility
for Free Thai affairs, and with a predominantly civilian cabinet
composed largely of Pridi's supporters. In his address as Regent to the
new cabinet, Pridi advised them to continue the worthwhile programs of
the Pbibun regime, but to drop those that were "unpopular with the
people" or "premature."53
Khuang had experienced considerable difficulty in forming a government,
and particularly in finding someone willing to serve as Minister of
Defence, a position that impinged on Phi bun's personal preserve. In the
end Luang Sinthu Songkhramchai of the Navy was persuaded to take the
post, and Phya Phahon, while firmly refusing to take charge of any ministry,
finally agreed to join the cabinet as a minister without portfolio,
on the condition that his name be listed last. Bringing Phahon into the
government considerably strengthened Khuang's rather precarious position,
for Phahon was the only military leader whose influence could rival
that of Phi bun. However, rumors continued that Phibun would lead the
army on Bangkok to overthrow the new government. It was decided
that the only way to end the tense situation .was for Khuang to talk to
Phibun, so in a borrowed car (Phibun had taken the Prime Minister's
cars with him) Khuang went to Lopburi. At a cordial meeting Khuang
succeeded in getting a signed statement from Phibun saying that he had
no intention of leading his forces on Bangkok to oust Khuang, whom he
looked on "like a younger brother." The government publicized the
statement widely in the media, and the immediate crisis subsided. 5 4
However the government felt that no lasting political stability was
possible so long as Phibun remained in command of the military~at any
time he might change his mind or his supporters might well take the
initiative in the hope of forcing him to act, and there was also still the
possibility of complications with the Japanese. Therefore Khuang again
made the trip to Lopburi 'to see the tiger in his cave', but when asked to
53) Pridi Phanomyong, Kham Prasai khqng Phanathan Pridi Phanomyong (fl'nl-:mr"u
'litH Wtl:l~1U tli'~ WtllJf.l~~; Address by Pridi), Bangkok, 1944, p. 3. ·
54) The text of Phi bun's statement is given in Thai in Anusqn .•.. Khuang Aphaiwang,
pp. 64-6 5, and in English in the Bangkok Chronicle, August 21, 1944.

112 Benjamin A. Batson
resign his post as Supreme Commander of the Armed Forces, Phibun
refused. Upon Khuang's return to Bangkok an order was prepared in
great secrecy abolishing the post of Supreme Commander of the Armed
Forces and naming Phya Phahon 'Commander-in-Chief', the change in
title being made to preserve the fiction that Phi bun was not being replaced.
As soon as the order was issued, Phahon circulated a pointed message to
all military units instructing them that only his orders were to be obeyed,
and that they should have "absolute proof" that any orders received were
genuine before acting upon them. 5 5 The government then prepared what
little military force it had at its disposal, mainly naval units loyal to
Pridi, and awaited the worst. Khuang and the ailing and partly incapacitated
Phahon were spirited across the river to naval headquarters in
Thonburi, Phahon grumbling dejectedly about what kind of Commanderin-Chief
had to go into hiding in his own capital city, where Khuang
spent the night sleeping on a table.s6 But the expected move on Bangkok
did not materialize, and Phibun sent a personal letter to Khuang
saying that he did not regret that he had been dismissed from his post,
but bad been unwilling to quit voluntarily for fear his military supporters
would think that be had abandoned them. 5 7 At the time Phibun's military
position had been abolished he had been given the high sounding but
meaningless ti.tle of 'Adviser of the State', and he soon left bis military
headquarters at Lopburi for quiet retirement near Bangkok. The columnist
'Alethea' wrote with scarcely concealed satisfaction that his new
position would allow Phibun "a well-earned rest."58
55) Bangkole Chronicle, August 24, 1944. The text in Thai is in Phantri Khuang
Aphaiwong, Nayok Ratthamont1·i 4 Samai, pp. 228·229.
56) There is a detailed account of all the~e events in Kan T~ Su, Chapters 11-13.
There is another version, differing in some respects from that of Khuang, in
Phantri Khuang Aphaiwo'ng, Nayok Ratthamontri 4 Samai, Chapter II.
57) Anus?n ••.• Kh1

THE FALL OF THE PHlllUN GOVERNMENT, 1944 113
The common interpretation, both in Thailand and in the West, of
the replacement of Phibun's government by that of Khuang was that
Japan's deteriorating military position had led to the fall of a pro-Japanese
regime and its replacement by one which, while still unable to break
openly with the Japanese, was as pro-Ally as circumstances permitted.
Thus a United States Office of Strategic Services report entitled "Trend
Toward Democracy in Thailand" hailed the overthrow of the "collaborationist"
Phibun and his replacement by the "anti-Japanese" Khuang.
Pridi was identified as "the strong man of the new government," and
the spirit of the new post-Phibun Thailand was said to be "a renascence
of the democratic movement which framed the Constitution in 1932." 5 9
---------------~-------------- -------
had run afoul of the government censors. 'Prem Chaya' was the well-known
'pen name of Prince Prcm Purachatra; 'Alethea' was in fact none other than
Prince Prem and his wife. (For information on this point, as well as other
subjects of the period, the present author is greatly indebted to Prince Prem.)
After the war a collection of The Passing I-I ours was published by 'Prem Chaya'
and 'Alethea' (Bangkok, 1946), with the apt subtitle "A Record of Five Amazing
Years." The published collection includes notes elucidating references
that were intentionally obscured in the original texts to get them past the censors
(even so they did not always get by), and provides a unique picture of
wartime conditions in the capital. Alethea's columns ranged over a multitude
of topics and mixed humor with satire and subtle criticism, particularly of the
Phi bun government and the Japanese. Thus for example "The Passing Hours"
of July 22, 1944, the day the National Assembly rejected the Buddhist city
bill, discussed a partial eclipse of the sun that had been observed in Bangkok,
the history of astronomy in Siam, and ended with the suggestion that the government
establish a School of Astronomy so that the public could be told in
advance when eclipses were due, "and especially a total .eclipse of the sun,
which I am told is a grand sight." In a note, 'Prem Chaya' observes that the
total eclipse of the Rising Sun occurred on August 15, 1945.
59) United States, Office of Strategic Services, "Trend Toward Democracy in
Thailand" (Washington, mimeographed), pp. 1-2, 13. This report is undated,
but from internal evidence was probably written in October 1944. Despite
some minor errors, it is a good indication of how accurate and complete OSS
intelligence on Thailand was during the later years of the war. Part of the
data came from the monitoring of radio broadcasts, but part could only have
come directly from sources inside Thailand, presumably through the Free Thai
underground. (Another useful OSS report is .Japanese Domination of Thailand,
dated September 18, 1944, a detailed study of Japanese control in various sec-

114 Benjamin A. Batson
However, the account of Khuang himself gives exactly the opposite
impression. Khuang argues that by the summer of 1944 the Japanese
had become highly distrustful of the Phibun regime, and that there was
a real and immediate danger that the Japanese military would seize control
of the whole Thai civilian and military administration, as they did
in French Indochina in March of 1945. Khuang even claims that if the
old government had remained in office another 24 hours the Japanese
would have acted.6o All of the various Thai factions have agreed in
their praise for the Japanese commander in Thailand, General Nakamura,
tors of Thai life. An appendix includes lists of Japanese officials, civilian
and military, and Japanese organizations and businesses active in Thailand
during the war.)
For a similar interpretation of the change of government in Bangkok see
also Sir Josiah Crosby, Siam : The Crossroads (London, 1945), pp. 166-168.
(The author was the last prewar British Minister in Bangkok.) Crosby's
account is the basis for a considerable part of the section on wartime Thailand
in Great Britain, Foreign Office and Ministry of Economic Warfare, Siam, Basic
Handbook (London, 1945), pp. 66-94. This work includes an appendix with
useful, though often critical, brief biographies of 44 wartime Thai leaders (pp.
84-94), and a valuable section on the Bangkok press (pp. 50-52).
The Japanese, publicly at least, professed to see no significance in the
change of government. For instance The Voice of NipjJon, an English-language
weekly published in Djakarta, on August 14 ran a story datelined Bangkok,
Augu~t 3, under the headline "l':l"o Change in Basic Policy of Thailand: Rapid
Progress Assured Under New Cabinet." It said in part: "There will be no
change in Thailand's three basic economic policies of supplying goods to Japan
and other areas of Greater East Asia, establishment of a self-sufficient economy,
and stabilization of the people's livelihood.
It is repo.tted from Tokyo that the Domei Political Correspondent commented
that the new Cabinet was definitely pro-Japanese, as ..• numerous
pro-Japanese elements were included."
The Japanese did, however, immediately send one of their most experienced
diplomats to take charge of the embassy in Bangkok.
60) Kan 1'c; Su, pp. 124, 13 3. In the foreword and Chapter 1 of Umlerr; 1·o 1
md
Escape Colonel Tsuji discusses at length Japan's distrust of the Thai, and
Japanese plans-to which he was strongly opposed-to strike first and disarm
the Thai military and police, but he gives no details about timing. Tsuji believed
that any Japanese move against the Thai would be a dishonorable
betrayal of the alliance, and that "It was imperative that we keep Thai(land)
as an all~ as Ion~ as possible, if failing that, to keep her neutral,"

THE FALL OF THE PHIBUN GOVERNMENT, 1944
as a moderate and reasonable man, but the Japanese commander was
under pressure, both from his superiors in Saigon and from his more
zealous subordinates in Bangkok, to take stronger action against the
obvious Thai double-dealing. 6 1 What was needed, in Khuang's view,
was not less cooperation with the Japanese but more, at least, superficially.
Phi bun's ill-concealed attempts to play both sides of the fence,
Khuang believed, were likely to result in the loss ofwhat remained of
Thailand's independence, and Kbuang made the re-establishment of good
relations with the Japanese one of his top priorities. Thus Free Thai
matters were left to Pridi, Thawee, and Luang Adun, and Khuang preferred
to know as little as possible about the details of what they were
doing, which could only complicate his dealings with the Japanese.62
(When potentially embarrassing issues did arise, Khuang was usually
successful in talking his way out of them, sometimes with rather preposterous
explanations.) One of the six points of the first policy
statement of the new government affirmed the treaty commitments to
Japan as the basis of Thai foreign policy, and while after the war Phi bun
went to lengths to show the extent to which he bad betrayed the Japanese,
Khuang has denied doing ~o.6 3 Khuang even offered repeatedly to make
61) Cf. !lnusqn .... Klmang Aphaiwong, p. 77, Thai !wj> Songlihram Lol1 Khrang
Thi 2, p. 308, and Thawee's account in Chiwit Nai Phon, pp. 19-20. The
Japanese knew a great deal about Free Thai operations, and on occasion might
casually ask a Thai official about last night's parachute drop or whether a
certain Allied agent were enjoying his stay in Bangkok. That they did not do
more about it has been attributed in part to General Nakamura, who was sympathetic
toward the difficulties of the Thai situation, particularly once the
war was clearly lost for Japan.
62) Pridi in Dang Ruang, p. 70, and Thawee in Chiwt Nai Phon, p. 18.
63) Thai lwj> Sathanalum Songlihram Lok Khrang Thi 2, PP· 414-474; AllliSflll
Khuan,Lf Aphaiwong, p. 131 ff, (Nevertheless, Phi bun spent his last years in
exile in Japan, where he died in 1964.)
Acqording to Col. Tsuji, when Khuang discovered that his movements
were being shadowed by Japanese agents the "furious" Prime Minister remonstrated
with the Japanese as fo!lows: "I have faithfully adhered to the Japan­
Thai Alliance, despite being seriously misunderstood by a portion of the Thai
people. But now what do I find? If you have no confidence in me I shall
resign immediately." The threat of resigning was one of Khuang's strongest
weapons in dealing with the Japanese, and one which he used often. Tsuji
11 s

116 Benjamin A. Batson
the trip to Japan which Phibun had always refused, even though by 1944~
45 the journey had become an extremely hazardous one, and only
circumstances prevented his going.64
The two interpretations of the change in government are not necessarily
incompatible, and the difference can be seen as a difference in
tactics rather than in goals. Khuang was not so much pro-Japanese or
anti-Japanese as pro-Thai, and while clearly favoring the Allied cause
he (and Pridi) apparently believed that in the circumstances the interests
of the country were best served by a government that maintained good
relations with the Japanese, while the activities of the anti-Japanese
underground were kept out of the sphere of the Prime Minister.
Even
his critics have conceded that Khuang played his difficult role well, and
it is a measure of his success that while his government was improving
Thai relations with Japan it was at the same time regarded by the Allies
__ as being _:.:__ anti-Japanese. ___:___________________________________________
notes that Khuang "enjoyed the overwhelming confidence of the Thai Parliament.
When he spoke, even the Opposition listened to him with close attention
and applause," and "In the face of the critical war situation, the resignation
of Prime Minister Apaiyon (Apbaiwong) would stir up Thai's political world
into a hornet's nest."
Tsuji was astonished at Khuang's simple manner and life style. On his
first visit to Khuang he found Kliuang's house "a ,small and unimposing
structure. I could not bring myself to believe that the PrimeMinister of 1111
independent state could live in such a place." Nor could he believe that the
"unpretentious and rather thin youth" in a sport shirt who answered the door
was none other than the Prime Minister himself. On a late~ occasion Allied
planes raided the central Bangkok railroad installations, and bombs landed
near Khuang's house (located,in a lane opposite the National Stadium). Tsuji
rushed to Khuang's rescue, only to find "the youthful 44-year-old leader of
the Thai busily brushing away the sparks falling on his clothes and supervising
the fire-fighters and the fleeing people. He seemed .oblivious to the falling
bombs." (Underground Escape, pp. 10-14.)
64) Anus~n •••. K.huang Aphaiwong, p. 71. The _picture of Khuang's relations with
the Japanese given here is based on Kmz T~ Su, Chapters 8-17, the accounts in
Anus1;n .•.• Klwang Aj>hahe•ong, and Nai [{.huang lwj> l\1aethap y ipun.

TilE FALL OF Tim PlllBUN c;OVEHNMENT, 1944 117
At the end of the war in August 1945 Kbuang, still maintaining
that his government had been in alliance with the Japanese and hence
had been 'defeated', insisted that it was only proper that he resign.
Domestically, the new government proceeded to dismantle most of
the programs which had characterized 'The Leader' phase of Phibun's
rule. The Phetchabun and Buddhist city projects, the immediate issues
which had led to the fall of the Phibun government, were abandoned.
Decrees regulating dress and behavior were repealed, and 'modern Thai'
was dropped in favor of the traditional spelling. The l4wiratham's, a list
of what were supposed to be characteristic virtues of the Thai, including
such admonitions as 'follow the Leader', were rescinded.
The traditional
Thai wai salutation was reintroduced, replacing the more characteristically
Japanese bow. Titles of nobility bestowed under the absolute monarchy,
which holders had been pressured and finally compelled to give up, were
restored. Freedom of religion was guaranteed. The radio commentators
'Nai Man' and 'Nai Khong', who had been leading spokesmen for the
Phi bun government, were dismissed. Gs
On the occasion of King Ananda's
birthday in September an amnesty was declared for political prisoners,
who included several princes.
Even the dead were not excluded-the
ashes of Phya Song Suradet, a leader of the 1932 coup and rival of Phibun
who had been exiled in 1939, were returned from Phnom Penh with
government honors.
The finances of the old government were scrutinized,
and an Assembly committee, dominated by Northeastemers, was
set up to make recommendations as t~ which existing laws were in need
of revision. And the investigation was reopened into the collapse in
65) 'NaiMan Chu"chaC and 'Nai Khong Rakthai' did didactic dialogues. The last
names mean to 'uplift the nation' and to 'love the Thai race', while 'Man' and
'Khong' when written together as one word mean to be 'steadfast' or 'firm'.
The lengthy memoirs of 'Nai Man' (Sang Phatthanotbai, Khwam Nttl< uct£
Krong K.hang (A?1:W~O'hln1~91"~; Reflections in Prison), Bangkok, 19 56, but
written immediately after. the war) deal in large part with the war years. 'Nai
Man' followed Phibun to his military headquarters at Lopburi in August of
1944; his account (Chapter 37, pp. 481-498) of events at this time parallels
Khuang's accounts factually but differs sharply in interpretation, praising
Phibun and criticizing Khuang.

118 Benjamin A. Batson
I 943, before it was even finished, of one of the buildings in the complexes
that still line both sides of Rajadamnern Avenue. 66
Under the new regime there was also greater freedom of the press
and a more open expression of opinion. In August, at a time when the war
news could hardly have favored the Axis powers, 'Alethea' commented
on "stirring news" from the war fronts.67 Prince Wiwat, a career
official in the Ministry of Finance, wrote several' memoranda on postwar
finances for the Bank of Thailand, all based on the assumption of a
return to the prewar link between the baht and sterling. In a paper
dated August 15, 1944, be noted; referring indirectly to the yen, that of
Thailand's reserves, a "substantial part is in the form of a currency the
post-war value of which may well depreciate, nor is it likely to be easily
convertible into gold or sterling."6B In the National Assembly a bill
66) Bangkok Chronicle (all1944), March 1; April29; May 19; September 14,"16,
18, 21; October 24; November 2, 18, 25, 29; December 2. 4, 12, 16. 20, 22,
23, 25, 27, 29, 30. Two innovations of the Phibun era which have survived
are the salutation 'sawatdi' and the 1·amwong dance, a modified version of the
traditional ramthon.
One consequence of the dropping of titles of nobility during the war years
is that Thai leaders generally known by their title names appear in the documents
of the period under other names (sometimes derived from title names,
sometimes from their original names), some of which might not be immediately
recognizable. Phya Phahon, for example, became Phot Phahonyothin,
and Lrwng Sinthu Songkhramchai used Sinthu Kamonnawin. Most of those
who had had titles reclaimed them in 1945; a few, like Khuang and Admiral
Sinthu, did not.
67) Bang!wh Chro11icle, August 26, 1944. Even before the change in government,
'Alethea' was often outspoken. When a government broadcast urged the public
to strive for a higher standard of living at a time when runaway inflation was
making maintaining even the former standard virtually impossible, 'Alethea'
compared the advice to Marie Antoinette and 'let them eat cake', and castigated
the official theory that 'supply will follow demand.' Bangkok Ch1·onicle, April
12, 1944.
"' u ~ J
68) Wi-watt!umachaiyannson (1'JI"J11H'IiV11.1'1'~!11; Prince Wiwat Memorial Volume)
'
Bangkok, 1961, p. 414. This memorial
'
volume includes several of Prince
'
Wiwat's memoranda (in English) on Thailand's wartime currency and finances,
and .another on the establishment in 1942 of the Bank of Thailand, the country's
first central banking institution, and Japan:s role in this undertaking.
On p. 424 there is an index of wholesale prices from 1938 to mid-1944
with monthly figures for the last year.
'

THE FALL OF THE !'Hill UN GOVERNMENT, 1944 119
was introduced that would have permitted the establishment of political
parties.
conditions.
The government successfully opposed the bill, citing wartime
As Khuang put it during the debate, "Whether we shall see
the birth of political parties here or not depends on how cleverly you
dodge the bombs."69
effect.
The reversal of the policies of the Phi bun era was to have a lasting
Backed by the military, Phibun again became Prime Minister
early in 1948 (rather ironically, it was Khuang that he replaced), and he
continued in office for nearly a decade.
But in the changed circumstances
of the postwar world, the policies, both domestic and foreign, of the
later Phi bun regime were very different from those of the war years.
Moreover, the change in government in 1944, in addition to leading
to significant changes in domestic policies and, to a lesser degree, in
foreign relations as well, also set two important precedents for postwar
Thai politics.
This was the first political crisis in which the lines of
conflict were fairly clearly drawn between the army and the navy,
rather than between factions within the army.
And it was also the first
political crisis in which, excepting the cases of a few non-partisan figures
like the 'elderly, unaggressive' Phahon, 70 there was an open split between
the civilian and military leaders .of the 1932 coup group, and the threat
of a violent confrontation. Phibun's wife has written ;71
This was in another way, then, a very significant event in the
life of the Promoters of the 1932 Revolution. For it was the
first time that Pibul (Phibun) and Pridi took the opposite
stands openly. It was becoming clearer, too, that the breach
69) nangkok Chronicle, December 11, 1944.
70) The phrase is from the OSS paper cited in note. 59. At the time of his death
shortly after the war, it was said of Phahon that he was 'the only person in
Thai politics about whom there were not two opinions'.
71) Portraits of Thai Politics, p. 205. Going even further, Thawee Bunyaket, one
of the leading members of the civilian faction, called the change of government
in 1944 "one of the most important events in Thai history." (Chiwit
flai Phon, pp. H-12).

120 Benjamin A. Batson
between the civilian and the military factions of the Promoters
was getting too wide to bridge. Henceforward, the
unity of the 1932 Coup Group would gradually be dissipated,
as the line was distinctly drawn between the civilians and
the military.
The fall of the Phibun government in 1944 is a little known episode in
modern Thai political history, but an important one whose consequences)
both immediate and subsequent, have been considerable.
'I

THE FIRST AMERICAN ADVISERS IN THAI HISTORY
by
Thamsook Numnoncla*
The eventful forty-two year reign of King Chulalongkorn of Thailand
(1868-191 0) was a landmark in Thai history. It was the period
that Thailand began to develop herself into a modern state, with the
abolition of extrality (extraterritoriality), the negotiations of treaties,
the reform of law and judicial administration, and the reorganization of
governmental agencies. The achievement of these aims was, in fact,
partly due to the work of the "foreign advisers" who shared roles in the
affairs of this small Asian country.
In 1868, when King Chulalongkorn came to the throne, he was only
fifteen years old. The King was under the "supervision" of the Regent
who was the head of the most influential noble or ministerial family in
the early Bangkok period. Being a nominal authority himself, the King
was furthermore confronted with some other problems, for example, the
loose structure of administration and the fact that Thailand's independence
was being threatened by the two strong colonising Powers, England
and France.
King Chulalongkorn believed that the maintenance of internal
stability was essential in the face of threat. He also believed that the
monarchy was of prime importance for the progressive development of
the country. Therefore, the King's first effort was to strengthen the
power and position of the monarchy. Once that institution was secure,
the King took further steps to lead the country towards modernization.
The best be could do was to groom new men who bad both initiative
and a strong sense of responsibility. But the major obstacle to modernization
in Chulalongkorn's time was the lack of able and responsible men
capable of taking on constructive jobs. True, there were some capable
men like Prince Dewawongse and Prince Damrong, his brothers, and
* Head of the History Department, Faculty of ~um~nities •. Chiang Mai Universi.ty.
This work was, completed with the generou~ fmancral assrstance of SEATO wbrch
was granted in the form of a schol!usbrp up.der tbe Cl!ltural(Programme fo).'
1972-1973, '
I

122 Thamsook Numnonda
some of his cousins, but they were far too few. · Explaining the situation.
the King concluded :
" Our country lacks nothing more than human
resources ... "1
"Our men a:re really useless, they are useless not
because they run out of energy or are incapable but
because their knowledge is totally non-existent ... " 2
Time did not allow the King to wait to develop human resources.
Thailand urgently needed internal reforms to maintain her strength and
security. The threat against her independence was imminent. She was
having serious difficulties with France which was then settling firmly in
Indo-China. The French ambition was to secure complete control of
the great river Mekong which, for part of its course, formed the boundary
between French and Thai territory. The result was constant friction
between Thailand and France, in which jealousy between Great Britain
and France also played a part. British activities in the Shan states to
the north of Thailand had aroused the suspicions of the French who
concluded that the British were contemplating a movement from the
Shan states eastward across the upper reaches of the Mekong into Laos.
In the midst of these troubles, the Thai Government had to find a solution
which was to be friendly with the colonial neighbours and to draw
advantage from the rivalry existing between them and from the country's
geographic position in order to reach more favorable negotiated settle~
ments. The best means to avoid a crisis was to look for foreign advisers
whom Thailand could rely upon and whose advice the country badly '
needed. King Chulalongkorn gave as his reasons that:
"... to employ foreigners is like having ready-made
textbooks. It means that we have in hand men whose
qualifications have already been proven and guaranteed."3
1) King Rama V to Phya Visutsuriyasak, Jan. 21, 1899. Phraratchahathlekha lae
nangu krap bangkhom tun llhong chao Phraya phrasadet snrentharathibodi r.s.
113-118 (Correspondence between King Rama V and Chao Phraya Phrasadet
Surentharathibodi 1894-1899) (Bangkok, 1961 ), p, 294. .
2) King Rama V to Phya Visutsuriyasak, Feb. 3 1
1899,/bid., p. 306.
3) Ibid, .

THk FIRST AMERICAN ADVISERS IN 1·HAI HISTORY
The tradition of foreign advisers and officials was an old one in
Thailand. As early as the sixteenth century Indian legal experts were
called in to revise ancient Thai laws, and in the seventeenth century a
Greek and a Japanese were employed as chief ministers ofKingNarai and
King Songtham of Ayudhya, while many Englishmen have been in governmental
service. However, it was during the reign of King Chulalongkorn
that the important Departments became full of foreign advisers
and experts. Among these advisers, the British formed a majority as a
.tradition. They penetrated all the branches of the civil service, being
appointed to the Ministries of Finance and Commerce, including the
Mint, Internal Revenue, and Customs and Excise Departments, the
Ministries of the Interior and of Lands and Agriculture, comprising the
Land Registry, Survey and Irrigation Departments, and, in addition, the
more important posts in the Ministries of Education and of Local
Government, and the Department of State Railways.
Other nationalities were Danish, Italian, French, American, Portuguese,
Dutch, Russian, Belgian, Norwegian and Spanish. But they, of
course, formed a minority. The Danish served mostly in the marine
and police departments. There were Danes in the navy from the time
of the eminent Admiral Richelieu, the Danish adventurer, who came to
Thailand during the reign of King Chulalongkorn and made a brilliant
career while amassing enormous wealth in Thailand. The Italians were
chiefly architects and engineers. They were given posts in the Palace
Works Department of the Ministry of the Royal Household. The French
shared work with the British in the Ministry of Justice, while there was
a written agreement that the city engineer in Bangkok would always be
of French nationality. Apart from that, other nationalities seemed to
find themselves in the Thai Government service by accident. For
example, in 1918, there were two Russians. One was a school-mistress
and the other a railway employee.4
4) In 1907, the total number of foreigners employed in the Tllai service was as
follows:
British 126 Danish
French 5 Swedes
American 4 Norwegians
German 36 Japanese
Italian 12 Dutch
Belgian 5
From British Foreign Office Papers 371/333 No. 9761 (Hereafter cited as
F.O. 371/333)

124 'fhamsook Numnondll
Among these positions, there was one post which was regarded aS
above and beyond the influence of any office. That was the post of
General-Adviser whose functions embraced foreign policy, home legislation,
finance, and the general order of the country.
The office of General-Adviser was created in 1892 with the appointment
of a distinguished Bdgian jurist and statesman, M. Rolin-Jacquemyns.
Formerly, there were individuals acting as consultants and
formulators of some policies. For example, Henry Alabaster, a British
Consul during the reign of King Mongkut (1851-1868), was called back
from England in the first few years of King Cbulalongkorn's reign to
become the King's personal secretary. His work dealt directly with
correspondence and there is evidence that he had some part in the restructuring
of governmental organization and in the formulation of policies.
Upon the death of Alabaster in 1884, the Thai Government had
to find a replacement. At first Mr. Mitchel Innes, an English barrister,
was hired but he was too aggressive and unpopular with the Thai. 5 It
was also during this period that the difficulties between France and
Thailand were approaching a rupture of relations. The Thais had to seek
help from outside, and the natural consequence was that they tended to
rely upon an unbiased nation. King Chulalongkorn remarked that:
"... our friendliness towards both France and England
can cause us concern when coming to the question of
appointing our advisers. . If we appoint a British as an
adviser, the French will be very concerned about this,
or if we appoint a French to such a post, this will also
cause concern among the British. Therefore if we
choose to appoint some national of a neutral country ...
things will be easier ."6
As a result a Belgian was called in. Rolin-Jacquemyns remained in his
post for nearly ten years. He resigned in i901 because of poor health.
After a Belgian, an American came to take his place and there
followed an unbroken succession of Americans as General-Advisers to
the Thai Government until 1916 when the title was reduced to that of
the Adviser in Foreign affairs.
5) Sarn Somdet, (Correspondence between Prince Naris and Prince Damrong)
(Bangkok, 1958), Part 44, p. 41.
6) National Archives, Fine Arts Department, Bangkok, 5th Reign, FileT. {Ill. ~N
tlna'l'lfl), V?l 2/1, Prince Damrong-Prince Dewawongse, January 30, 1891.
(Hereafter ctted as NA. R5)

'i'HE l>'IRS'r AMERICAN AbViSERS IN THAI HISTORY 125
II
The three American General-Advisers, sometimes referred to by
foreigners as the "original modernizers" of Thailand and, at times, as
"American Kings of Siam," were Edward H. Strobel, Jens I. Westengard
and Wolcott H. Pitkin. Strobel was appointed in 1903 and on his death
in 1908, was succeeded by Westebgard who served untill915. Pitkin
followed Westengard, first as Acting General-Adviser and, after 1916,
as Adviser in Foreign Affairs.*
The choice of Americans as chief advisers came for several reasons.
In the first place, Thai officials felt certain that there was no political
motivation behind the Americans' efforts. Prince Devawongse, the Thai
Foreign Minister for 38 years, confided that Thailand turned to America
because "there is no danger from America of annexation".7 The Thais
thought that it would be wise to employ Americans, whom they always
regarded as "the nationality of future" and "the disinterested friends" in
the work of developing the country. They realized that they had to call
in the new world to hold the balance between two parts of the old.s
King Chulalongkorn said :
"When Chao Phya Apai Racha (Rolin Jacquemyns) was
still in office he could see all injustices Siam had to
bear and could not ask help from any country. A
country like Belgium could not help us because she
always has to depend on England and France while
our suffering means nothing to her. I believe that bad
Chao Phya Apai Racha been American, the American
government and all the Americans would have been
quite concerned with his ordeal."9
--·--··-------=-----------------------
* The exact dates are: Edward Henry Strobel, General Adviser to His Majesty's
Government and Minister Plenipotentiary, Dec. 8, 1903-Jan. 15, 1908, died in
office; Jens Iversen Westengard, Assistant Secretary at the Foreign Office, then
Acting and later General Adviser to His I';fajesty's Gover~ment, Aug. 1, 19?3-
Aug. 14, 1915; Wolcott Homer Pitkin, A ctmg General Ad vtser, and later Advtser
in Foreign Affairs, March 10, 1915-0ctober 26, 1917 .
.7) Reports of the Department of State Relating to the Internal Affairs of Siam 1910·
1929. Microfilm No. 729, Roll 6, United States Archives, (Hereafter cited as
US Archives 729/6) No. 892. OIA/33, Ingersoll-Secretary of State, January 2,
1918. .
8) The Spectator, (London), July 20, 1903. Editor's reply to correspondence from
"K." .
9) NA. RS, FileT. 2/1, Phya Suriya-Phya AkaraJ, June 10, 1902.

Thamsook Numnonda
In the second place, the attitude of the Americans toward the Thais was
usually a less condescending one than that of some Europeans, particularly
the British who had an attitude of superiority toward Asians whom, no
matter what their social, educational or other qualifications, they refused
to regard as social equals. In the third place, there was deep gratitude
on the part of the Thais for the important educational and medical work
which the American Presbyterian missionaries had done in Thailand. In
the beginning of the 20th century the number of Americans in Thailand
was 125, of whom 113 were engaged in missionary work. It should also
be remembered that when the mission was established in Thailand in
1840 there was practically no education or medical treatment available
along western lines.to
The policy of employing expert American Advisers was entirely
the voluntary decision of the Thai Government, and the selection was
made solely on merit. There was no pressure of any kind exerted by
the State Department in Washington or by the American Legation in
Bangkok.!'
The choice of Strobel was made through the recommendations of
Phya Akaraj V'arathon, the Thai Minister in Washington, and the American
Secretary of State, John Hay.t 2 Strobel was recommended because
of his excellent academic record and his wide experience. He was Professor
of International Law at Harvard, on the faculty of the law school
for eight years and had been in the diplomatic service. An American.
newspaper said of Professor Strobel:
"He is a recognised authority on international questions
and his mastery of the subject while in the
service of the country at various Embassies led to his
selection for the professorship at Harvard."I3
Strobel had travelled extensively in Europe and South America and spoke
five languages. The Secretary of State, the Thai Minister in Paris and
the Thai Crown Prince, who was studying in London, were asked to
10) Records of the Department of State relating to the Political Relation between Siam
and the Unit7d States 1910-1929, Microfilm No. 7 31, United States Archives,
(Hereafter ctted as US Archives 7 31 ), Charles H. Albrecht-Department of State,
February 21, 1925.
11) US Archives 729/6 N. 892, OIA/ 19, Hornibrook-Secretary of State December
. 14, (1915). '
12) N~. R.s. F~le T. 2/2, Phya Akaraj-Phya Suriya, September 30, 1902.
13) C1ted m Smgapore F1·ee Press, February 31, 1907· .. ·

TilE FIRST AMERICAN AUVISERS IN THAI HISTORY 127
investigate Strobel's personal manners. Strobel came to Paris for an
interview in 1902. Soon after, a contract was signed in Paris between
Strobel and the Thai Government. The salary was 3,000 pounds a year,
in addition to which a residence was provided and travel expenses to and
from Thailand were paid. The contract at first was for two years only,
at the end of which time, if both parties were agreeable, the contract
could be renewed. 14 Strobel continued in the post upon the expiration
of the first period and served the Thai Government until his death in
early 1908.
Westeogard became the General-Adviser through promotion. He
had been for some years a teacher in the Harvard Law School and was
always regarded as an exceedingly able man. Westengard was a friend
of Strobel. He came to Thailand in 1903 as Strobel's assistant and acted
as Strobel's substitute during the latter's leave of absence. It was by
virtue of this experience that he became the General-Adviser.
While Westengard was on leave of absence in the States in 1909,
he received instructions from the Thai Government to bring back one
or two Americans to be his much-needed assistants but he failed to do
so.IS It was only upon his return from leave in 1914 that Westengard
made two or three unsuccessful attempts to secure the services of a
suitable person to follow him. He finally selected an American lawyer,
Wolcott H. Pitkin Jr. Pitkin was a former Attorney-General in Puerto
Rico. He came to Thailand in early 1915 as Assistant General-Adviser
and became the Acting General-Adviser a few months later when Westengard
resigned from the service to take up the Chair of International
Law at Harvard University.l 6
Pitkin signed a one-year contract with the Thai Government Upon
its completion a new contract was signed for a second year's service in
1916 but the title of the Office of Geneal Adviser to the Thai Government
was altered to that of the Adviser in Foreign Affairs, though practically
this Office continued as before with all the related responsibilities, duties
and powers.l7
14) NA. R5, FileT. 2/2 Part 1, "Papers cencerniiJg the employment of Mr. Stro·
bel", October 21, 1903.
15) lJS Archives File 12293/1, Mr. King-Secretary of Strobel, March 3, 1908.
16) F.O. 317/2464, Crosby.-Grey, No. 53, April.26, 1915. . .
17) us Archives 729 ;6, No. 892, OJA/24, Horntbrook-Secretary of State, Aprtl 3,
1916.

128 Thamsook Numnonda
The responsibilities of the General Adviser were wide. Rolin-
Jacquemyns explained his role as follows :-
"... his (General-Advisers) functions do not by themselves
involve any particle of executive power. And
it is better that it be so; because the General Adviser
bas to consider himself as a disinterested friend, who
had to look everywhere, to the utmost of his ability,
for what may promote justice and public works, without
any pretension to public power for himself
personally. His functions are thus merely consultative,
but they are so in the broadest sense of the word,
because they may give his advice about suppression of
abuses or introduction of desirable reforms, without
waiting to be consulted either by His Majesty or by his
Ministers ..." 18
In 1903, with the arrival of the two Americans, Strobel and Westengard,
the role of General-Adviser became increasingly important.
As the British Consul in Bangkok at that time reported to Sir Edward
Grey, the Parliamentary Under-Secretary:-
"With the introduction of M. Rolin Jacquemyns as
the first General-Adviser ... the management of foreign
affairs passed to a certain extent into the Advisers
hands. But the Belgian h'ad neither the breadth of
view nor the tact to gain entire confidence ... since
the arrival of the American Advisers the relations of
the foreign Representatives with the Siamese Government
have undergone a complete change ... the whole
conduct of foreign affairs has now passed into the hands
of Strobel.I9
In a letter to President Eliot of Harvard University Strobel gave
"as complete an account as possible" of his work in Thailand. Excerpts
from his long letter reveal his role and his style:-
"The post is one of great importance. The King, as
soon as I arrived, appointed me General Adviser,
which gives me supervision not only over foreign
relations but over all the departments of government.
The work may, therefore, be divided into three heads:
18) NA. R5 FileT. 2/3, Rolin-Jacquemyns-Numa Droz, June 1 O, 1899.
19) F.O. 371/333, General Report in Siam for the year 1906, Paget-Grey May 27
0
1907, I

Tf!P. FIHST AMERICAN ADVISERS IN THAI HISTORY
129
( 1) Foreign Relations; (2) Legislation and Internal
Reforms; {3) Opinions ....
(1 ). Foreign Relations-Under this head the
relations with France stand first in importance .... I
took charge of the negotiations, and after more than
three months of very difficult work I succeeded in having
the treaty signed .... My plan bas been to be personally
on as friendly relations as possible with the
foreign representatives here, and to settle all questions
(vvherever it is possible) unofficially. I also go to the
Foreign Office every afternoon and see that correspondence
is promptly attended to. The result has been
that all questions which were pending on my arrival
have now been disposed of and the complaints of the
foreign representatives largely resulting from delay
and neglect of business, have entirely ceased ....
(2). Legislation and Internal Reforms.-There
is here a great field for good work, not only in an improvement
in the Siamese general law but also in
securing the enactment of special legislation .... The
system that I have introduced is quite different. I
now consult the foreign representatives beforehand
and take up the provisions of the Act that I wish passed,
with them unofficially. The result is that I think
I shall shortly be able to have passed a Companies Act,
Harbor Regulations Act, Hackney Carriages Act, and
a Secret Societies Act. I hope to get these through
before the end of the year, and this is only the beginning
. . . The principal reforms which I would like to
accomplish would be to reduce the gambling ...
(3). Opinions.-Questions are daily sent to me
for opinion, some referred to me by the King himself
on general policy, as, for example, the advisability of
making a foreign loan, upon which I have just bad to
make a long report. Cases also come from the different
Ministers upon questions arising in their departments
and upon claims against their departments. A
number of these cases had accumulated before my
arrival. These I have disposed of, but the regular
work under this head requires considerable time and
labor. .." 20 ,
2o) Quoted in Kenneth T. Young, "The Special Role of American Advisers in
Thailand 1904-1949", Asia (New York, No, 14. Sprin~ 1969,), pp. 12-q,

130 Thamsook Numnonda
III
It is impossible to understand and to appraise the work of the
General-Adviser without some account of the foreign relations of Thailand
which resulted in the British Treaty of 1855 and the treaties which
were modeled upon it in succession to 1870, for it was to the modification
of these that a very large part of the efforts of the General-Advisers
were directed.
By the treaty of 1855, called the "Bowring Treaty," Thailand
agreed that all British subjects in Thailand should be exempt from the
jurisdiction of Thai courts and that Thailand would never raise its import
tariff on British goods beyond three per cent. Neither of these provisions
was felt to be burdensome at the time. Consular jurisdiction seemed a
measure wisely framed to meet the exigencies of a day when Thai courts
knew nothing of western justice or western ways, and a three per cent
import tariff was then amply sufficient to provide for the simple needs
of the undeveloped state. But, with the expansion of western power
into the countries neighbouring Thailand, the whole situation changed.
Asians claiming foreign protection became the proteges of the treaty
nations and thus were invested with all the privileges of the Europeans.
They were subject to their own consuls and not to Thai law. This
system of extrality {extraterritoriality) thus constituted a real grievance
in Thailand for in no other country where foreigners were by treaty
excluded from the jurisdiction of the local courts did Asian proteges of
treaty nations receive such exemptions. Also the commercial restrictions,
such as the three per cent tariff limitation became intolerable. As
progress cost money, internal reforms of Thailand were slowed down by
the inability of the country to finance improvements as a result of the
fiscal restrictions of the early treaties. Practically speaking, with the
attainment of modern methods of Government, Thailand became imbued
with the thought of abolishing all unequal treaties:
With the era of American Advisersbip, the future of Thailand
became more hopeful. Handicapped by none of the questions, territorial
or political, that affected the European advisers, the American Advisers
were in a position to estimate accurately the true political interests of

THE FIRST AMERICAN ADVISERS IN THAI HISTOHY 131
Thailand. They knew the Thai position was dependent on the good will
ofBritain and France; they also knew that Thai policy had to be subservient
to British and French interests. 2 1 Therefore, their role was mainly
that of impartial mediators between those countries and Thailand. From
1903 to 1915, while Strobel and Westengard "ruled over the destinies
ofSiam" 22 , treaty after treaty was signed with the two foremost Powers,
bringing solutions to the frontier questions and a partial abolition of
extraterritorial jurisdiction over French and British nationals.
Strobel's crowning achievement was in foreign policy. Three
years after his arrival in Thailand, Ralph Paget, the British Consul in
Bangkok, gave the following report to Sir Edward Grey in London :-
''It is difficult adequately to describe the contrast in the
methods of the Thai Government before and subsequent
to Strobel's arrival. I have mentioned that
supineness, prevarication and tortuous dealings often
led to misunderstanding and consequent friction.
These methods have now been succeeded by promptitude,
straight forwardness, and rational discussion
of any difficulty that may arise ...,z 3
Hamilton King, the American Minister in Bangkok, also spoke
very highly of Strobel's work :-
"A very large amount of work with the foreign representatives,
work that bad been accumulating for
years, have been cleared up, and promptness and
dispatch in this department with an evident endeavor
for even-handed-justice, have resulted ·in an improved
feeling all alohg the line of Siam's Foreign Relations." 24
Strobel's first work was the completion of the Franco-Thai Treaty
of 1904 which brough about a .better understanding in the relations
between France and Thailand.
21) P.O. 371/333, General Report on Siam, 1906.
22) US Archives 4150/1, King-Root January 26, 1907.
23) P.O. 371/333, Paget-Grey, May 27, 1907.
24) US Archives T. 172 Rol19, No. 255, Hamilton King-Elihu Root, January 8,
1906.

. 132 Thamsook Numnonda
It should be noted that during the second half of the nineteenth
century Thai relations with the French were in a constant state of dis~
cord, and periodically the situation became tense. After the crisis of
1893, when the French carried out a blockade of the Menam River,
relations between the two countries went steadily from bad to worse.
Thailand suffered a serious blow from the stipulations of the 1893 Treaty.
Since 1900, Chantaboon, a Thai province on the eastern coast, had been
occupied by French troops who gave no signs of evacuating. The 25
kilometer neutral zone which had been established along the Mekong
had become a place of lawlessness and disorder. Questions of jurisdiction
and the registration of French subjects in Thailand became more
serious.
In early 1900 France and Thailand opened negotiations in Bangkok.
The issues were two : the re-organization of the registration scheme and
the evacuation of French troops from Chantaboon. A year passed and
nothing could be agreed upon. At the end of 1901, discussions were
transferred to Paris. After six months of discussions, a convention by
which, among other stipulations, Thailand agreed to cede a considerable
portion of territory to France in return for the evacuation of ChanUlbaou
was signed. For some reason, however, the Convention failed to secure
ratification in the French National Assembly.2s
Negotiations once again were resumed in Paris in May 1903 in
order to render the 1902 Convention acceptable. At this stage France
demanded the complete abolition of Thai suzerainty on the right bunk
of the Mekong, the establishment of French Consular Agents with full
power of jurisdiction at Siemreap and Sisophon and over the Cambodians
residing in Thailand. In reply, Phya Suriya, Thai Minister in Paris
refused practically every French demand. French authorities therefore •
threatened to break Glff negotiations unless Thailand took a more reasonable
attitude.26
25) F.O. 69;247, Classified. Docu,m~nts Diplo~atique~~---Affaires de Si-~;-is9~
1902, Delcasse's letter circulated to Foreign Consuls, October 7, 1902.
F.O. 422/57, Paget-Lansdowne, May 1, 1902.
F.O. 69/245, Paget-Lansdowne, May 1, 1903.
26) F.O. 422/57, Monson-Lansdowne, September 14, 190 3,

TilE l 1 1RST AMERICAN ADVISERS IN THAI HISTORY 133
At the height of the crisis, Strobel reached Paris on his way to
Bangkok to replace Rolin-Jacquemyns as General-Adviser to the Thai
Government. Witb his assistance, the tone of the negotiations was
softened. Strobel knew full well the necessity of finding a solution to
the ever-growing pressure on the eastern frontier, and thought that
Thailand had to be prepared to make a few concessions. So, upon his
arrival in Bangkok, Strobel put all his efforts into convincing the King
and his ministers that a refusal to co-operate with the French at this
time would only result in demands of greater severity in the years to
come.
Strobel succeeded. A month later the Fr~nco-Tbai Treaty of 1904
was signed. The Thais looked upon this treaty as a major accomplishment
since it provided for a new delineation of the entire frontier between
Thai and French territories. In the eyes of the Thais, the unwarranted
occupation of Chantaboon by the French, situated as it was in the heart
of Thai territory, was a constant irritation to the Thai national spirit;
and they had come to believe that there was no possible way to remove
this menacc.27
The next move of Strobel was to break the judicial ties Thailand
had with France. During Strobel's trip through Paris on his return to
Bangkok from leave of absence in early 1907, some hints were thrown
to him by the authorities at the Quai d'Orsay that France would be glad
to have a reari·angement of the boundaries on the Cambodian frontier. 28
On his arrival in Bangkok Strobel was met with a French demand for
Battambang, Siem Reap and Sisophon in exchange for Krat which France
got in 1904, and the islands of Donsai, a wedge of land cutting into
Thailand on the north-east frontier. As the proposed exchange appeared
very much in favour of France, Strobel suggested the extension of negotiations
to include the abandonment of French jurisdiction over French
Asian subjects in Thailand. It was Strobel's view that Thailand would
not suffer from a loss of these Cambodian provinces so long as her pride
was satisfied by obtaining jurisdiction over the subjects of a foreign
21)us Archi~es T. 172, Ro119, No. 225, King-Hay, March 30, 1905.
28) F.O. 422/61, Paget-Grey, March 27, 1~07.

134 Thamsook Numnonda
power. Battambang, Siem Reap and Sisophon were according to the
American Minister, Hamilton King, "French" in sentiment, language,
location and many other ways, and they bad proved to be a constant
source of difficulties. On the other hand, again according to Minister
King, Krat and the islands of Donsai were as definitely Thai as the other
places were "French".29
Strobel's proposal met with a favourable reception by the French
authorities. The negotiations then proceeded with unexpected rapidity,
reaching a conclusion on March 23, 1907.
The French treaty of 1907 constituted a very considerable advance
in the political status of Thailand. It was a landmark in Thailand's
struggle for freedom from extraterritorial jurisdiction, inasmuch as it
saw the submission of French Asian subjects in Thailand to the jurisdiction
of Thai tribunals.
Judging from the haste with which the Treaty of 1907 was concluded-the
actual negotiations covered a period of barely one monthand
in view of the fact that since the latter half of the nineteenth century,
French policy towards Thailand bad consistently been based on the
principle of a strict and jealous assertion of extraterritorial rights, the
explanation for this sudden abdication of these rights, as far as her
Asian proteges were concerned, w,ithout any precautionary guarantees,
rested on Strobel's capable handling of the situation. It was, indeed, a
master stroke on the part of the General-Adviser for Thailand.
Strobel's other great work was the Anglo-Thai Treaty of 1909
which brought an end to misunderstandings and disagreements between
the two countries. By this treaty, England relinquished her extraterritorial
rights over her subjects, European and Asian alike, in Thailand.
In return Thailand transferred all her rights and suzerainty over the
four northern Malay states, namely Kelantan, Trengganu, Kedah and
Perlis to England. The Anglo-Thai Secret Convention of 1897, which
required Thailand to obtain sanction before granting prospecting licences
over land in the Malay Peninsula, was abrogated. Also Britain gave
. ·---···-- ·-""···- - ------ ·-· ·----~~- -·-·· ·--- ___ _._ --··-······--·-· ------- ··- - ---------- --··-·- -------
~9) US Archives 5359/1-4, No. 312, King-Root, March 28, 1907.

THE FIHST AMERICAN ADVISERS IN THAI HISTORY 135
Thailand a loan of £4 million at four percent interest, for the construction
of the Malay Peninsula Railway up till its completion.3o
True, Strobel died before he could see the fruits of his negotiations.
But it should be remembered that he masterminded the whole process.
He also kept detailed knowledge of the negotiations almost entirely in
the hands of the King and himself, and would no doubt have kept them
going to their successful conclusion had be lived, in spite of opposition
in some high circles of government. In the course of the negotiations
Strobel did not hesitate to bring his influence to bear on a policy which
he considered to be to the advantage of Thailand. Of the provinces that
Thailand had to give England Strobel said:-
"I look upon them very much as I did upon the territory
we ceded to the French. They are territories
over which, on account of language, religion, prejudices
and location we have but limited control, are constantly
the cause of irritations and difficulties, and
were it not for appearances, personally, I would
rather give them away for nothing rather than be compelled
to hold them with the difficulties they entail .. ;31
In fact, apart from the loss of face, the Thais hardly regretted letting
these states go. The words of King Chulalongkorn on his visit to
these states in 1891 should be recalled :
"... we have no particular interest in the states .
. . . If we lose them to England we would miss only
the "Bunga Mas". Apart from this there would not
be any materialloss.32
With regard to the Anglo-Thai Secret Convention of 1897 Strobel
thought that its abolition would achieve for Thailand the consolidation
of her dominions in the Malay Peninsula and their protection against
future danger .. In his opinion the 1897 Convention was the m?st "deplor-
3o) See Thamsook Numnonda, "The Anglo-Siamese Negotiation.s 1900-1909",
Unpublished Ph. D. Thesis, University of London, 1966.
31) US Arch~ves 10883/4-9, King-Root, March 4, 1908.
32) King Chulalongkorn, Raya.thang saclet phraratchadamnern fJraj>hat tlwng bog
thang ruea rob laem malcLyu, r,s. 1.09 (Royal Tour of the fenipsula in 1891)
(Bangkok, l~~2), p. 323, ,

136 Thamsook Numnonda
able document" Thailand had ever signed.
anxious to see it go, root and branch.
Thus Strobel was ex trcmcly
On the judicial side, the Treaty of 1909 raised Thailand to a higher
position among Asian powers. At least the Thais were proud to say
that their country had attained her ambition to become, in legal matters,
on a par with Japan and European countries. She could also congratula tc
herself that she had brought to a conclusion, within less than a decade,
a revision of her treaty system with England which Japan bad accomplished
only after laborious negotiations extending over twenty years.
Most important, this partial freedom of jurisdiction fostered among the
Thais, at least those in the official classes, a national consciousness that
they had lacked before.
In domestic affairs, Strobel accomplished many reforms. He was
elected a member of the Commission for revising the Penal Code of the
country. At the same time many new laws were enacted, for example,
a law providing for abolishing gambling throughout Thailand while the
land tax laws were revised to meet the resultant loss of revenue. The
new Harbours Regulations came into use from which foreign shipping and
home revenue benefited. Provisions were made for abolishing the remnants
of debt slavery in the country. The Post and Telegraph Department
was reorganized on a business basis. The state railways were
extended. These improvements gave confidence and a feeling of security
to all private interests. The Thai Tramway Company Limited opened
a new line; and lumber mills increased in number. To sum up, as
Strobel's work had to do with all departments, the general result was the
development of a unity of purpose and a harmony of action throughout
the Government never before known.
Minister King made the following report to the Secretary of State
in Washington in 1905 :-
"The position of Siam today is more hopeful than at
any time during the last eight years. Her internal improvements
are going forward at a healthy pace, money
is plentiful at home ... while the able handling of the
political interests by her General Adviser is creating
increased confidence in the future ... 33
~3) lJS Archiv~s T, 172, Roll9, No. ?48, Kine;-Elihp Root, NoveP.lber 28, 190$,

TilE FIRST AMERICAN ADVISERS IN THAI HISTOR~ 137
IV
Westengard proceeded along the same lines as Strobel : foreign
relations, legislation, internal reforms and advisory opinions. However,
the work which gained him much confidence among the Thai officials was
the Anglo-Thai Treaty of 1909. At the time of Strobel's death in 1908,
these negotiations had started only a month earlier. The treaty was very
unpopular among Thai Court officials who hated the idea of giving away
territory as proposed by the treaty. Those officials also felt humiliated
at not being kept informed or consulted. Moreover, the projected
negotiations were felt to be too broad to stand any chance of success. A
year after Strobel's death, discussions between the two contending parties
still dragged on without any sign of compromise. Westengard,
however, saved the situation. Through his close association with Strobel
he was well acquainted with the latter's views on the various pending
questions and be bad, to a large extent, absorbed Strobel's methods.
Ralph Paget, the British negotiator, grasped the situation. He
demanded that if the Thai Government did not negotiate through Westengard
he would abandon the negotiations and return home immediately
since he had no other business in Thailand.34
With this lever in his bands, Westengard's influence carried weight.
After much strenuous effort, with infinite patience and with the use of
his extraordinary powers of persuasion, he finally obtained the King's
approval. On March 10, 1909, the Treaty, which was characterized by
Mr. King as an "epochal step for Siam", was signed. Mr. King said
about the episode after the signature of the treaty that:
"In reply to a brief note of congratulations, which I
sent to Paget as soon as I learned that the treaty
had been signed, occurred these words:- And permit
me to congratulate you on having such a fellow citizen
as Jens I. Westengard ... " 35
Four years later, as a result of Westengard's negotiations, a similar
treaty was concluded with Denmark which, although it had few nationals
in Thailand, bad a very strong position in Thai trade.
34) US Archives, 12293, King-Root, January 29, 1908.
3S) us Archives, J0883/26-28,.No, 4.70,.King-Robert Bacon, April 3, 1909.

138 Thamsook Numnonda
Once Westengard had proved to the satisfaction of France and
England that Thailand was fit to exercise jurisdiction over subjects of
those countries, he saw it as a blow to himself and to American prestige
in Thailand that he, as an American citizen, was unable to persuade his
own Government to grant what nations possessing greater material
interests in Thailand had already yielded. Therefore, throughout his
tenure of office, Westengard put all his efforts into opening the question
with the American Government.
In fact, it was Strobel who manifested the desire that the United
States should be the second Power, next to England, to take up the question
of a treaty. The subject' was first unofficially raised by the Thai
Government through Mr. King, the American Minister, in 1907, asking
for the surrender of American consular jurisdiction. But the issue took
a more serious turn after Strobel's death. In 1909 and 1910 Westengard
went to Washington to urge the matter upon the attention of the State
Department. The question centered around the surrender of consular
jurisdiction in return for which Americans in Thailand would be given
a recognized right of freedom of travel and ownership of land beyond
the limits prescribed in the existing treaty.
It should be borne in mind that American interest in Thailand was
chiefly of a missionary character, and the majority of these missionaries
were willing to pass under Thai jurisdiction. The Presbyterian Board
in New York also expressed its willingness to have American consular
jurisdiction withdrawn. In their opinion, they would gain considerable
advantage by so doing since, under the new treaty, missionaries would
have the right to travel freely in all parts of the country and to own
real property. Under the existing treaty they were restricted to residence
in the vicinity of Bangkok and were allowed to own or lease property
only within a distance from Bangkok of twenty-four hour's journey by
native boat. It was true that missions were established elsewhere than
within the limits assigJ,Ied by treaty, but it was by courtesy of the Thai
Government and not by right.36
36) US Archives M, 730, 711.922/37, Comment by Williams, February 9, 1916,

THE FIRST AMERICAN AD\TJSERS IN THAI HISTOHY 139
~the State Department, however, felt that it was still premature
to renounce consular jurisdiction before the Thai Codes were completed
and before some time had elapsed in which to test the working of the
courts under the new arrangement. As a result, an informal proposal
was made to Westengard that the question of a new treaty could be
taken up on the understanding that a protocol be attached reserving
the surrender of jurisdiction until the Codes were completed and in
satisfactory operation.
The proposal was not satisfactory to Prince Devawongse. His
reason was that Thailand could not afford to enter into any treaty which
retained jurisdiction since the surrender ' bad already been made by England
and in part by France.37 While the matter was pending, Mr. King
died.
In 1913 the original proposal of the Thai Government regarding a
revised treaty to include "an arrangement for the present surrender of
consular jurisdiction instead of postponing that event until the completion
of the Thai Codes" was revived. 3 8 The support for the issue was based
upon the conclusion of the Treaty with Denmark of 1913 and upon the
fact that the arrangement with England of 1909 had worked out
satisfactorily.
· Mr. Hornibrook, the new American Minister in Bangkok, was asked
to sound out the attitudes of the American- residents in Thailand. In
reply he reported :
"Both the missionary and business interests now appear
to be in accord upon the proposal and it is also significant
that for the first time since the proposal was made
several years ago by Siam, officials of both Legation
and Consulate General are united in making the recommendation.
Sentiment in regard to the entire matter
has undergone a most decided change during the past
year and it is my firm opinion that the Department
will have the approval of almost the entire American
colony in Siam in the event that treaty negotiations
are carried through to a successful conclusion."39
31) US Archives M 7 30, Westengard-R.S. Miller, January 24, 1910.
38) us Archives M 7 30, 711.923/99, Department of Far Eastern Affairs, (April
3 0, ·1913), Drafted on April 24, 1913 by Prince Traidos Prabandh.
39) US .Archives M 7 30, No. 25, 711.923/111, Hornibrook-Secretary of State, November
22, 1915.

140 Thamsook Numnonda
Westengard once again acted as negotiator on behalf of the Thai
Government. He went to Washington in 1913, 1914 and 1915 to conduct
the negotiations. After many meetings with the officials at the
State Department, the draft of the proposed treaty was issued. One of
the provisions was that International Courts or American-Thai Courts
would be set up. Any case in those courts not covered by a code already
promulgated might be opposed by the American Consul, if an American
citizen was the accused or defendant in the case, and thereafter the
Consul alone would be competent to try such case. Thailand also agreed
to appoint an American Adviser to the International Courts. 40
The whole atmosphere of the negotiations was harmonious and
friendly. Part of a personal letter which Ransford S. Miller, the Head
of the U.S. State Department's Bureau of Far Eastern Affairs, wrote to
Westengard, reads:-
" ... so far as I am able to judge, this Government is
disposed to do all that it consistently can to help the
modern progress of Siam, and that desire is all the
stronger because of the fact that a representative
American like yourself holds such an important advisery
position in the Siamese Government ... "41
In 1917 success seemed close at hat;d. Sadly enough, however, the
European War suddenly brought an end to the negotiations. A year
later Westengard died in his hometown in America. Had he lived two
years longer he would have witnessed the Thai-American treaty which
was then concluded by Dr. Eldon James, his successor.
Westengard also took a keen interest in Thailand's internal development.
His "pet scheme", as the American Minister called it, was the
financing and construction of railways south to Singapore. He was
selected a member of the Royal Commission whose function was to
increase revenues and control expenditures, which helped the modernization
of Thailand's fiscal operations. Westengard also held two other
40) US Archives M 730, No, 25, 711.923/111, Hornibrook-Secretary of State, November
22, 1915.
41) US Archives M 730, Personal, Miller~Westengard, June 1 o, 1913.

i4i
important positions. He was appointed judge of the Supreme or Dika
Court in 1911. The same year he was appointed Thailand's Member to
the Hague Permanent Court of Arbitration.
Wolcott Pitkin replaced Westengard in 1915.
But in estimating
his work one finds it was regrettably the least successful. Pitkin served
the Thai Government during the reign of King Vajiravudb, a Britisheducated
monarch. It was a time when a somewhat aggressive spirit of
nationalism flourished among the Thais. The Thai Government seemed
to be determined to dispense with foreign advisers except where they
were absolutely necessary. Moreover, Pitkin lacked the genial personality
of his predecessors. He suffered from the Thai climate, was irritable,
very deaf, and possibly for that reason, a trifle slow of apprehension.42
The Thai officials accused him of being devoid of tact. They also criticized
his appointment on the grounds of his youth as he was only thirtyfive
years old. At the same time, Thai officials hardly understood
Pitkin's pronoucect New England accent.43 The King was not favourably
impressed with his manners either.
Pitkin's work to a considerable extent.
All these circumstances hampered
In 1917, the second year of Pitkin's service, Thailand decided to
enter the war on the side of the Allies.
Pitkin was entrusted with the
work w bich would pave the way for the success of the Treaty negotiations
then in abeyance. This resulted in a book entitled Siam's Case for Revision
of Obsolete Treaty Obligations, which appealed to the conscience
of the treaty nations. It was printed immediately after the war and was
presented by the Thai delegation at the Paris Peace Conference in
1919.
Upon studying the role of these American General-Advisers one
would not hesitate to say· that Strobel was the most successful function-
-----
42) F.O. 371/3364, Derring-Balfour, March 4, 1918.
43) F.O. 371/2464, No. 88, Derring-Grey, July 19, 1915.
F.O. 371/3864, Derring-F.O., May 9, 1918.

i42
ary.
Thamsook Nuri:lnonda
He was selected for both his ability and his integrity and hence
enjoyed a close understanding with the King.
Strobel was given the
right of direct approach to the King without the intermediary of a Thai
minister,44 And in his capacity of confidential adviser he had a say in
all matters. 45
Apart from this paramount influence, Strobel's personal character
and his judicious conduct of affairs were the main elements of his fame.
It was Strobel's desire to adopt an attitude of complete independence
towards the Thai Government. For example, in the case of the Franco­
Thai Treaty of 1904, Strobel was well aware that his advice would be
distasteful to his employers, but he stated his views with absolute fearlessness
assuming complete responsibility for the consequences of his
policy. He said that should the Thai Government not follow his advice,
or should he prove to be mistaken, be feared he could no longer consider
himself competent to advise the Thai Government and would resign his
post. Naturally, when subsequent events proved him correct he carne to
earn the unlimited confidence of the King and, with His Majesty's
authority and support, all opposition on the part of other Ministers and
officials gradually collapsed. 46
Apart from that, Strobel's own sound common sense, frankness
and sincerity were so evident that he inspired a feeling of confidence in
all who came into contact with him. Up to his death, Strobel was bard
at work, throwing himself with tremendous energy into everything.
Thus he was cognizant of and his influence made itself felt in every
aspect of the administration. Prince Devawongse said of Strobel that:
"His Majesty can only entertain a feeling of gratitude
to the American nation which has given so honourable
and faithful a servant to Siam."47
44) US Archives 892, OIA/50, No. 1 is, Curtis Williams-Secretary of State, November
16, 1921.
45) US Archives M 730, J.C. White-Secretary of State, April 17, 1919. Singapore
Free Press, Thursday II, 1907,
46) F.O. 371/522, Paget-Grey, January 18, 1908.
47) US Archives, No number, Devawongse-King, January 20, 1908.

THE FIRST AMEIUCAN ADVISERS IN THAI HISTORY
King Chulalongkorn bimselhemarked:
"· • · -- Mr. Strobel bas served Siam so well that he
seems indispensable to us and to our administrative
machinery to function smoothly. I have not seen any
European or American who is so thoughtful and so firm
in character as Mr. Strobel. Furthermore, he is loved
by all, including me. "48
143
When Strobel died in 1908 in Bangkok his death was not only a loss
to Thailand but it was felt as a personal grief by the King and by everyone
who had come into contact with him.
The King sent a letter of
condolence to Mrs. Caroline Strobel; his mother, in America, saying that:
"It is needless for me to say how much I deplore the
loss of so excellent and so accomplished a man,
he had been a devoted servant and true friend of my
government, I rather doubt being able to find another
man equal to him in every respect to fill his place.
There is for us only one consolation, that is, that the
memory of his and of the good he had done for my
country will ever remain in the history and in the
minds of the people of Siam."49
The Siam Observer of January 16, 1908 reported the popular sentiment
towards his death as follows:
"In Mr. Strobel Siam has lost one who was not only
faithful official but an earnest friend, and we in Bangkok
mourn his death with a sense both of public and
of personal loss. He was in manner the most unassuming
of men, in character the most lofty, and the words
which come irresistibly to mind are the stately words
of Holy Writ-t,hat "a prince and a great man hath
fallen amongst us." 50
) NA. RS, FileT. 2/6, Draft of a letter to Prince D.evawongse, September 24,
48
1905.
49
) NA, R5, FileT. 2/8, His Majesty the King-Mrs. Strobel, September 6, 1908.
50) The Siam Obser-ver, January 16, 1908.

144 Thamsook Numnonda
The American Minister, Mr. King, wrote:-
"Truly the King loved this man, Siam has paid him high
tribute, and through him we feel that our country has
been honored."Sl
For being a trusted adviser, King Chulalongkorn conferred decOI·ations
and signal marks of his confidence and favour upon Strobel. There
were also many touching episodes that showed the sincere and close
relationship between King Chulalongkorn and Strobel. For example, on
one occasion, soon after he bad returned from Europe in 1908, the King
wanted to see Strobel right away.
But; knowing that Strobel was ill, the
King refused to listen to Strobel's request for an audience in the Palace,
and insisted on going to see him at his private residence.
stayed for nearly two hours.
His Majesty
He presented Strobel with a watch made
from a gold 100 franc piece, bearing on the reverse the King's monogram
and an inscription, and which the King said was the thinnest watch in
the world.s2
The most moving event was perhaps the official funeral which was
given Strobel. The King attended the ceremony in person. It was the
first time His Majesty had attended the funeral of any foreigner in Thailand
and his presence was therefore a very special mark of esteem and
affection. The words of Minister King who was present at the ceremony
should be recalled:-
"The representatives who were appointed to arrange
the details of the ceremony were considering the question
of the character of the religious services to be
observed, when His Majesty entered. As soon as. he
learned the nature of the question under consideration
he remarked : "Gentlemen, there will be Christian
51) US Archives, 5402/55-56, King-Root, February 9, 1909.
52) F.O. 371!737, Beckett-Landley, Memorandum of Conversation between the
King of Siam and Strobel on November 23 as described in a letter t~ Beckett
on November 26, 1907.

'fHE FIRST AMEi.UCAN ADViSERS IN THAI HISTORY
services at the cremation of Mr. Strobel. Siam is tolerant,
and whatever faith a man who serves this Government
may hold, whether he be a Mohammedan a
Buddhist or a Christian, when we come to express our
'
appreciation of his services in the last sad rites shown
him, his faith should be respected. Mr. Strobel's great
company of friends throughout the world are Chris~
tians and it will be to them a pleasure to learn that at
the last sad honours paid to him by our Government
his faith was respected.
With high appreciation of this courtesy, service
brief, simple and appropriate were prepared for the
occasion, and later we were informed that it was the
wish of the Government that the American Minister
should conduct the services.
Up to the hour of the ceremony it was not known
whether His Majesty would be present at the reading;
as the appointed hour approached the Under Secretary
of State for Foreign Affairs said to me: "His Majesty
will be present at the service to-day. . I have just
received a message from the palace in which His
Majesty says "Tell Mr. King I may be a little late but
I would have him wait for me for I wish to be present
when the services are read."
His Majesty came into the pavilion at the base
of the pyre, and bared head stood next the reader,
surrounded by the representative prince of the realm.
Another mark of respect, that has never before
been paid to any but the nearest and dearest of the King's
own family, is worthy of mention-From one who
stood beside him I have these words :- "As His Majesty
ascended the large Royal pavilion he stood a moment
in silence, looking at the silver fuse that connected this
pavilion with the pyre and the long wand with which
it is the custom for the King to apply the electric
spark, then with evident emotion be waved his hand

146 Tbamsook Nurilnondli
and said-"No I loved this friend, take these a way.';
They were removed, and His Majesty accompanied by
the Princes took his position in the small pavilion at
the pyre, listened to the reading of the Christian
services and then, alone, ascended the steps of the
pyre, lighted the fire with his own hand passed out.
This is the highest honour that can be shown by the
King at such a time.s3
Almost equal in prestige with Strobel was Westengard.
His long
residence and intimate knowledge of the Thai character and Thai institutions
enabled him to render valuable services to the Government which
had full confidence in him and clearly relied on his judgment. In fact,
when Westengard was first left as Acting General Adviser in 1907 much
anxiety was felt on account of the remarkable success of Strobel with
whom he was compared. But from the first the Government gave him
its full confidence and he responded in a masterly manner.S4
Evidence
of the Thai Government's trust in Westengard was clearly shown on the
occasion o(a personal visit that King Chulalongkorn paid to Westengard.
The King took Westengard in his automobile to the Royal Gardens on a
private outing with the children of the Palace.
His Majesty told the
Adviser of the anxiety felt by the Government at the time of Strobel's'
death and assured him that the anxiety had been entirely dissipated and
that His Majesty had only words of approval to express.ss
Upon the strength of his qualifications, honours were conferred
upon Westengard time and again by the Thai Government. In 1908 on
the occasion of the celebration of the fortieth anniversary of His reign,
King Chulalongkorn conferred upon him the Second Class of the Ratanaphorn
Medal. This order was given only in recognition of personal
services to the King and held by very few fbreigners indeed. The auto-
53) US Archives 5402/55-56, King-Root, February 9, 1909.
54) US Archives 41 50/1, King-Root, January 26, 1907.
55) US Archives 4150/4, King-Root, March 28, 1908,

Tlm FIRST AMERICAN ADVISERS IN THAI HISTORY 147
graphed letters in recognition of his services spoke in the highest terms
of Westengard. 56 Throughout the waves of "Siamization" during the
reign of King Vajiravudh, Westengard continued to hold the confidence
alike of the King and the Thai Government. In 1911 Westengard was
granted the title, Phya Kalyan Maitri, the second highest title of nobility
which could be bestowed upon any individual in Thailand not a member
of the Royal family. 57 Prior to his departur~ in 1915, Westengard
received the insignia of a specially high class of the Order of the White
Elephant, which was rarely conferred on Europeans, as a mark of Royal
favour.ss
The King expressed great regret at Westengard's departure in 1915.
Upon learning of the death of Westengard in America three years later,
Prince Mahidol, who was then studying at Harvard University, was
asked to represent the King at the Thai-style funeral being held for
Westengard in accordance with the wish of the deceased. 5 9
However, in spite of all the achievements of Strobel and Westengard,
there was still a drawback that very often deterred them from
complete devotion to their work. Strobel was not at all adjusted to the
Thai climate. During his four-year term he bad to take home-leave
twice; each lasted almost twelve months. These absence from a high
office like his were, of course, noticeable,_ as it was the practice of the
Thai Foreign Office and other offices to defer, whenever possible, all important
questions which arose while be was away until his return.60
Strobel was also often an ill man. During one of his trips home in 1906
56)
57)
58)
59)
60)
US Archives 8291/31, King-Root, November 18, 1908.
us Archives T. 729, Roll 6, 892. OIA/10, King-Secretary of State, July 18,
1911.
F.O. 371/2464, No. 88, Derring-Grey, July 19, 1915 ..
Foreign Ministry Archives, Bangkok, File No.7 part 5, Phya Prapakarawongse~
Prince Devawongse, October 5, 1918. ·
us Archives 729./6, No. 130, 892. OIA/27, Frank D. Arnold-Secretary of
State, February 5, 1917.

.I
148 Thamsook Numnonda
he apparently contracted a severe form of blood-poisoning, from which
he never entirely recovered. On his return to Thailand a year later,
Strobel was virtually a doomed rnan.6t
Westengard's case was equally serious.
He left his family in
America and hence had to make several trips horne. Moreover, after a
few years in Thailand his health gradually broke down under the long
strain imposed upon him. But this handicap was probably not significant
in view of his remarkable successes.
American officials aswell as American citizens, who witnessed the
highlights of the "good old days" for Americans in Thailand, later often
mentioned that they were far from the powerful positions which were
held in the time of Strobel and Westengard.62
61) Singapore Free Press, January 16, 1908.
62) US Archives M 730, No. 16, 711.9 22/3 3, Curtis Williams-MacMurray A
l, 1921, . ' ugust

INVENT AIRE DES DOCUMENTS SUR LE SIAM
CONSERVES AUX ARCHIVES DE PARIS
par
Kennon Breazeale*
Les archives diplomatiques, dont 1' ensemble est dirige par un
ministrc plenipotentiaire, ferment un service du Ministere des Affaires
Etmngeres. La salle ou sont communiques les documents dans le ministerc
au Quai d'Orsay est ouverte aux personnes autorisees par le
ministre du lundi au vendredi de 14 beures a 19 beures et le samedi de
9 heures a 13 heures. (Pour obtenir une carte de lecteur, les etrangers
devron t presenter un passe port et une lettre de recommandation de leur
ambassadc ~~ !'exception de tout autre document.) Les archives sont
ouvertcs aux recherches historiques en ce qui concerne le Siam jusqu'en
1918.
On peut diviser en trois parties par ordre chronologique les series
des documents se rapportant au Siam. Les documents anterieurs a
1R55~ 1856 (date du premier traite des temps modernes entre la France
et le Siam, et de !'organisation du peste consulaire franvais a Bangkok)
sont f1 peu pres inexistants. La vingtait1e de pieces sur le Siam qui ont
survecues des annees 1680-1688 et de 1738-1740 ont ete integrees dans
la serie Asie (volumes 2, 3, 4 et 6) du fonds Memoires et Documents. Un
volume de plus dans cette serie (le numero 88) est la redaction originale
d'un oeuvre bistorique en langue portugaise du fin du 17e (ou commencement
du 18°) siecle par le vicaire og€meral dande royaume du Siam.
La correspondance entre le Ministere des Affaires Etrangeres et
les postes diplomatiques au Siam a partir de 1856 se divise en trois
series.
( 1) La serie Correspondance Politique (dite "l'ancienne serie") du
fonds Siam comprend la plus grande partie de la correspondance entre
le ministere et le paste de Bangkok. La serie prend fin en 1896, et se
poursuit dans la Nouvelle Serie du fonds Siam.
* St. Antony's College, Oxford.

150 Kennon Breazeale
(2) La serie Correspondance Consulaire et Commerciale comprend
les rapports du poste de Bangkok ayant trait aux affaires strictement
commerciales. Cette serie ne prend fin qu'en 1901. Les rapportscommerciaux
posterieurs a 1901 sont integres dans Ia Nouvelle Serie. Ilest
a remarquer que l'on n'a pas su supprimer les doubles nombreux qui se
trouvent dans cette serie de me me que dans Ia serie de la Correspondance
Politique.
(3) La serie Correspondance Po/itique des Consuls ne corripte que
deux volumes pour l'annee 1895, date de !'organisation des postes consulaires
de Korat et de Nan a l'interieure du royaume. , La suite de cette
serie est integree dans la Nouvelle Serie.
En ce qui concerne l'Indochine et ses relations avec le Siam, la
plupart des documents anterieurs a 1896 est rangee dans la serie Asie~
dans laquelle ont ete integres les dossiers sur le Laos, le Cambodge, Ia
Cochinchine, etc.
L'ancienne serie prend fin en 1896, et toute la correspondance du
fonds Siam posterieure a 1896 (sauf la partie de la Correspondance
Consulaire et Commerciale pour les annees 1896-1901) a ete divisee par
matieres plus precisement definies dans une Nouvelle Serie.. Le nouveau
fonds Indochine etabli en 1896 est egalement range dans une Nouvelle
Serie, bien qu'aucune "ancienne serie" du fonds Indochine n'existe plus.
Les series Guerre 1914-1918 et Paix ne contiennent qu'une seule
Hasse de documents non-relies sur le Siam, les autres dossiers ayant ete
enleves par les allemands pendant la deuxieme guerre mondiale et
n'ayant jamais ete retrouves. Plusieurs dossiers de la Nouvelle Serie du
fonds Siam ont souffert du meme sort.
Cet inventaire se borne a tine liste des volumes des documents
concernant exclusivement le Siam et les territoires sous sa domination,
et de quelques volumes en plus des autres fonds que le chercheur aura
grand a vantage a consulter. Aucun inventaire ne pourrait jamais aspirer
a une liste complete de tous les documents sur le Siam. II existe par
exemple des volumes sur les pays avoisinants .le Siam-dont 2 volumes
de Correspondance Commerciale du poste de Rangoon pour les annees
1883-1901, et 8 volumes du poste de Singapour pour les ann~es 1839~

iN

Kennon Breazeale
volume sont numerates par folios. (Un folio est ]'equivalent d•une page
recto-verso a pres reliure.) La date de la reception du document au
Quai d'Orsay est enregistree sur chaque piece.
Le fonds Siam comprend les copies originales et authentiques de ln
correspondance des agents diplomatiques au Siam revues par le ministere.
Le reste des documents re

H·o~VENTAIRE nEs nociJMENTs sun LE siAM coNsEnv~s Aux Ailcmvt:s nE PARis i sj
par le Conservateur du lundi au vendredi de 9.30 a 13.00 heures et de
14.00 a 17.30 heures. Tout nouveau chercheur devra presenter sa carte
de lecteur des Archives de France. Pour obtenir ur~e carte permanente
le lecteur devra remettre deux photos et sa carte nationale d'identite
(pour les etrangers un passeport et une lettre de rec'ommandation de leur
ambassade). La salle est fermee l'apres-midi pendant Ie mois d'aout.
En ce qui concerne le Siam, les documents deposes sont les archives
de !'ancien Ministere des Colonies. Bien que les observations deja faites
pour les documents du Ministere des Affaires Etrangeres soient valables
pour cbacun de ces documents aussi, la composition et !'organisation des
fonds de Ia Section d'Outre-Mer ne presentent pas le meme caractere de
continuite que les archives diplomatiques. Les relations du Ministere
des Colonies et du Gouvernement de l'Indochine avec le Siam contrastaient
beaucoup avec celles que le Quai d'Orsay lui-meme entretenait: le Gouverneur
General de l'Indocbine n'ayant pu maintenir des agents permanents
au Siam pour se renseigner d'une maniere contenue. Les
documents, qui ne sont ni relies ni numerou~s, forment en effet un ensemble
de dossiers sur des affaires particulieres dans lesquels se trouvent
tous les documents relatifs a uncertain sujet. On y trouve de nombreux
doubles de la correspondance diplomatique, y compris la correspondance
avec lc Quai d'Orsay. Une fois l'affaire menee a bon terme, le dossier
etait ferme. Les dossiers se concentrent done en generale sur l'epoque
des grands differends entre l'lndochine et le Siam, c'es t a dire de 1885 a
1907. A pres cette date ils deviennent plus rares. ·
Le fonds Siam contient la plupart de la documentation sur les relations
entre l'Indochine et le Siam pour les annees 1856-1920. En outre,
15 pieces contemporaines de la fin clu 17e siecle forment les dossiers 1 a
15 de cette serie.
Le fonds Asie Orientale a ete integre en grande partie dans les fonds
Siam ou Jndochine.
11 en reste 2 cartons de documents sur la Mission
Pavie pour Jes annees 1888-1896, et un seul carton sur la Birmanie qui
offre une certaine documentation sur les affaires du Siam.

B4
kennan Bteazeaie
Les series de la Cochinchine, du Cambodge, du Laos, etc. ont ete
integrees dans le fonds Indochine, qui est ouvert au recherches jusq u •en
1920. Le fonds se divise en deux ·parties. L'ancien fonds Indochina est
subdivise par matieres en nombreuses series. En ce qui concerne le Siam
il prend fin en 1914. 1.e Nouveau Fonds Indochine contient quelques
dossiers de documents anterieurs a 1915, la suite du fonds Indoc/Jine pour
les annees 1915-1920, et les quelques documents dont la consultation est
autorisee jusqu'aux annees 1940. Il existe dans la salle des lecteurs un
inventaire complet du fonds lndochine sur fiches.
Le fonds Missions contient plusieurs dossiers qui n'ont pas ete integres
dans les autres fonds.
Le fonds de 1' Ecole Coloniale comprend 57 volumes relies pour
1885-1943, dont un seul sur le Siam.
Enfin, le fonds de l'Agence qes Colonies contient 2liasses subdivisees
en 7 dossiers d'une selection de divers documents sur le Siam pour la
periode entre la premiere guerre mondiale et les annees 1940.
Les lecteurs peuvent demander la reproduction par xerographic,
microfilm ou photographic des documents des archives diplomatiques ou
coloniales.
Representation diplomatique du Siam en France
date de designation
decembre 1882
juillet 1887
· janvier 1892
avril 1897
decembre 1906
decembre 1909
decembre 1912
mai 1929
Envoye extraordinaire et ministre plenipotentinire.
Prince Prisdang
Phya Krai Kosa
Prince Vadbana
Phya Suriya
Prince Charoon
Prince Bovanidej
Prince Charoon
Phya Vijitavongs

l!WENTAIHE DES DOCUMENTS SUR LE SIAM CONSERVES AUX ARCHIVES DE PARIS 155
Representation diplomatique de Ia France au Siam 1855-1920
date de designation
aux fonctions
10 octobre 1855
1858
12 octobre 1863
septembrc 1865
1869
1871
16 mars 1872
13 mars 1877
25 fevrier 1880
7 octobre 1881
5 juillet 1883
5 aoCtt 1887
15 fevrier 18 92
ll juin 1895
1 cr fevrier 1898
30 juillct 1901
10 juin 1903
14 octobre 1904
2 aoCtt 1906
16 juillet 1907
30 juillet 1909
6 janvier 1912
5 mai 1920
Charle~ .de Montigny, consul en mission et plenipotentlarre
Le comte de Castelnau, consul
G. Aubaret, consul
Grapinet, gerant
Gustave Duschene de Bellecourt, consul general et
plenipotentiaire (en mission 1867)
F. Dillon, consul
G. Lefebvre-Duruf'le, gerant
Frederic Benoit Garnier, consul et commissaire du
gouvernement franc;ais a Bangkok
Charles Couturier de Vienne, consul et commissaire
Ernest Jules Blancheton, consul et commissaire
Franc;ois-Jules Harmand, consul et commissaire
Alexandre le Jumeau, comte de Kergaradec, consul et
commissaire
(le m~me), consul general et charge d'affaires
Auguste Pavie, consul general et charge d'affaires
Le Myre de Vilers, envoye extraordinaire et ministre
plenipotentiaire (en mission aoflt-octobre 1893)
Jules Defrance, ministre resident
(le meme), ministre resident et plenipotentiaire
Antony Klobukowski, ministre resident et plenipotentiaire
Jean-Baptiste Boissonnas. charge d'affaires
Auguste Riffault, envoye extraordinaire et ministre
plenipotentiaire
Victor Collin de Plancy, envoye extraordinaire et
ministre plenipotentiaire
Pierre Jacquin de Margerie, envoye extraordinaire et
ministre plenipotentiaire
Jules Lefaivre, envoye extraordinaire et ministre
plenipotentiaire
Pierre Leff:wre-Pontalis, envoye extraordinaire et
ministre plenipotentiaire
Gaston Kanh, envoye extraordinaire et plenipotentiaire
(en mission decembre 1918-mai 1919)
Fernand Pila, envoye extraordinaire et ministre
pleni paten tiaire

156 Kennon Breazeale
Archives du Ministere des Affaires Etrangeres
Serie Correspondance Politique
numero
du
volumes folios date
1 498 1855-1857, nov.
2 421 1857, dec.-1863
3 370 1864-1867, mars
4 326 1867,avril-1869
5 467 1870
6 388 1871-1874
7 424 1875-1879
8 298 1880-1882
9 391 1883-1885
10 470 1886-1887
11 373 1888-1889
12 359 1890-1891
13 303 1892
14 305 1893, janv.-mars
15 330 I 893, avril-mai
16 436 1893, juin-aoQt
17 376 1893, sept.-dec.
18 38p 1894, janv .-mai
19 280 1894, juin-dec.
20 360 1895, janv.-juin
21 474 1895, juillet
22 263 1895, aout-sept,
23 377 1895, oct.-dec.
24 329 1896, janv.-avril
25 459 1896, mai-aofit
26 409 I896,.sept.-dec .
Fonds Siam
Serie Correspondance Consu!aire
et Commerciale
volume folios date
1 399 1857-1865
2 367 1866-1868
3 380 1869-1870,juin
4 473 1870, juin-1875
5 508 1876-1882
6 409 1883-1886
7 386 1887-1889
8 418 1890-1897
9 407 1898-1901
. S~rie Correspondance Politique des Consuls
1 (Korat) 309 1895
2 (Nan) 599 1895

INVliN'l'AIHE llES DOCUMENTS SUR LE SIAM CONSERVES AUX ARCHIVES DE PARIS 157
Nou1•elle Seric
numero
du
volume folios date
matieres
1 218 1896-1897, juin politique interieure (13 folios pour
1896)
2 226 1897, juil.-1901, dec. idem
3 233 1902-1906, avril idem
4 200 1906, mai:-1910 idem
5 209 1911-1917 idem (pas de folios pour 1916;
122 pour 1911)
6 271 1897 et 1907-1917 armee, marine, politique etrangere
7 146 1897-1898 dossier general (5 folios pour 1898)
8 222 1899, janv.-1900, juin idem
9 200 1900, juil.-1902, juin idem
10 168 1902, j uil.-1903, dec. idem
11 149 1904-1907 idem
12 206 1908-1916 idem (seul document pour 1911
et pour 1912)
13 257 1917 idem
14 76 1896-1897 relations avec Ia France
15 168 1898, jatw.-juil. idem
16 170 1898, aoot-nov. idem
17 188 1898, nov .-dec. idem
18 183 1899, janv.-avril idem
19 166 1899, avril-juin idem
20 177 1899, juil.-dec. idem
21 186 1900-1901, juin idem
22 151 1901, juil.-oct. idem
23 134 1901, nov.-dec. idem
24 226 1902, janv.-juin idem
25 210 1902, juil.-,dec. idem
26 244 1903, janv.-juin idem
27 236 1903, juil.-dec. idem
28 251 1904, janv.-juin idem
29 160 1904, .juil.-dec. idem

158 Kennon Breazeale
Nouvelle Serie
numero
du
Volume folios date
30 143 1905, janv.-mai
31 157 1905, mai-dec.
32 193 1906
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42
43
44
45
46
47
48
49
50
51
52
53
54
187 1907-1908, avril
179 1908, mai-1910, avril
198 1910, mai-1917
185 1898-1899; 1901-1902; 1907
224 1908-1913; 1915-1916
135 1907-1913; 1915-1917
192 1897-1906
146 1907-1917
271 1897-1917
232 1897-1903, juin
209 1903, juil.-1908, juin
174 1908, juil-1917, nov.
187 1896-1897; 1900-1902
191 1903-1904
194 1905-1907
165 1908-1913
189 1896-1911
107 1897-1917
139 1914-1917
207 1900-1903; 1905-1907
223 1908-1912
207 1913-1914; 1916-1917
matieres
idem
idem
idem
idem
idem
idem (2foliospour 1913;8pour 1914;
10 pour 1915; 8 pour 1916)
relations avec l'Angleterre ( 108 folios
pour 1898; 3 pour 1899)
idem (104 folios pour 1909; 1 pour
1910; 4 pour 1913; 5 pour 1915)
relations avec la Chine (20 folios
pour 1907-1909; 16 pour 1911·
1913; 4 pour 1915)
forets de teck
idem
industrie et travaux publics
chemins de fer
idem
idem
finances (7 folios pour 1896)
idem
idem
idem
missions catholiques ( 1896-1909);
affaires culturelles (1908-1911)
dossier g€meral
finances (suite)
relations avec la France (2 folios
pour 1903; 7 pour 1905)
idem
idem (6folios pour 1914; 6 pour 1916)

INVEN'l'Ailm DES DOCUMENTS SUR LE SIAM CONSERVfrS AUX ARCHiVES DE PARIS 159
Seric Asie
nmnero
du
volume folios matieres
Fonds Memoires et Documents
2 498 Correspondance au sujet des Indes Orientates ( 1635-1734),
Documents sur le Siam comme suit: Lettre du roi Louix
XIV aux vicaires apostoliques des royaumes de Ia Chine,
Cochinchine, Tonkin et Siam (28 decembre 1680; copie).
Lettre de Louis :XIV au roi de Siam (10 janvier 1681; copie).
Ordres de Louis XIV au sujet des ambassadeurs siamois
(18 mars 1682; copie). Idem (21 mars 1682; copie).
Lettre du Phra Khlang du Siam a Colbert (1684; traduction).
Lettre de Colbert au Phra Khlang et liste des presents
pour le Phra Khlang ( 18 fevrier 1685; copie). Lettre
de Vacher au sujet de son reception par le roi de Siam
(20 juin 1686; extrait). Liste des presents envoyes au roi
de Siam (1686). Lettre du Phra Khlang a Colbert (1684;
traduction). Lettre du Phra Khlang au sujet de l'ambassade
( 4 octobre 1686; traducti?n). Lettre des ambassadeurs
siamois au roi Louis XIV ( 14 janvier 1687; copie). Memoire
du roi au sujet de Sieur de La Loubere, envoye
extraordinaire aupres du roi de Siam (18 janvier 1687).
Lettre du Mgr. a Constance (13 mars 1688; copie). Lettre
de Louis XIV au roi de Siam (13 mars 1688; copie).
3 273 Indes Orientales (1664-1733). Ce volume contient deux
documents sur le Siam : Memoire au sujet de !'audience
donnee aux ambassadeurs du roi de Siam en 1686. Lettre
de Louis XIV au roi de Siam (sans date; copie).
4 463 Indes Orientaies (1687-1810). Un seul document sur le
Siam : observations pour servir a !'instruction des envoyes
royaux de la France au Siam ( 1687).

160 Kennon Breazeaie
6 445 Indes Orientales (1735-1762). Documents sur lc Siam :
Lettres de M. Combes, superieur des Missions Etrangeres,
au sujet des missions au Siam (21 octobre et 14 novem bre
1738). Lettre de Louis XV au roi de Siam ( 11 novcmbre
1738; deux copies). Correspondance avec M. Combes au
sujet d'une nouvelle lettre au roi de Siam (novembre-decembre
1740).
29 407 Indochine (1864-1866). Documents sur le Siam: Notes
s.ur l'lndochine. Ratification du Traite de 1863 avec le
Cambodge. Rapports de l'amiral de la Grandiere. du
commandant d'Aries, du lieutenant Ansart. Mission
Aubaret. Situation du Cambodge. Traite avec le Siam
au sujet du Cambodge. Consuls etrangers au Cambodge.
29-bis 334 Indochine (1867-1869). Documents sur le Siam: Projet
de traite avec le Siam au sujet du Cambodgc. Notes sur
le Cambodge.
30 268 Indochine ( 1869-1870). Documents sur le Siam: Negocin~
tions avec Ie Siam au sujet du Grand Lac. Delimitation
de Ia frontiere nord du Cambodge.
31 446 Indochine (1871-1873). Documents surle Siam: Ambassade
cambodgienne au Siam (1871). Politique de la Cochinchine
vis a vis du Siam ( 1871 ).
48 609 Indochine ( 1880-1885'). Documents sur le Siam :relations
avec le Luang Prabang (1882). Delimitation du Siam et
du Cambodge (1885).
50 468 Birmanie (1864-1882): correspondance et notes divcrses.
67 526 Archives de la commission de delimitation franco-chinoise
(1886-1887).
68 333 Idem (1885-1887).
71 444 Indochine (1886-1887). Documents sur Ie Siam: Projet
d'etablissement de droits de douane entre Battambang et
le Cambodge. Troubles sur la frontiere du Siam.

IS\'~::'ITA.IIl£.: lli~S DOCUMENTS SUR LE SIAM CONSERVIcS AUX ARCHIVES DE PARIS 161
80 400 lnde (1840-1892). Documents surle Siam : Voyage de M.
Deloncle, comprenant des correspondances et notes sur
les frontieres de l'lndochine, du Laos, du Siam, de la
peninsule malaise, et du Xieng Mai (1884).
81 519 Indocbine (1843-1888). DocumentssurleSiam: Affaires
du Siam (1885). Exploration commerciale au Laos (1888).
Partage d'influence franco-anglaise {sans date). Notes de
M. Harmand ( 1885). Notes du comte de Kergaradec
(1888) .. Creation d'un vice-consulat a Luang Prabang
(1885-1886). Frontieres occidentales du Tonkin (1886-
1888}. Limites du Cambodge, de l'Annam et du Siam;
empietements des siamois (1886-1888). Delimitation du
Laos et de l'Annam (1886-1888). Mission a Stung Treng
(1886-1888).
82 409 Indochine {1889). Documents sur le Siam: Partage d'influence
avec l'Angleterre. Delimitation des frontieres
entre le Siam et l'Annam. Menees siamoises sur la frontiere.
Creation d'une residence a Stung Treng.
~{3 328 Indochine (1890-1892). pocuments sur le Siam: Delimitation
de la frontiere entre le Siam et le Cambodge.
Incident de Xi eng Kham. Syndicat fran9ais du Haut-Laos.
Politique anglaise en Indochine. Partage d•influence.
84 413 Indochine (1893). Documents sur le Siam: Agence commerciale
du Mekong. Frontieres entre le Siam et le
Cambodge. Canonnieres anglaises a Chantaboun. Occupation
de l'ile de Khone. Construction de deux canonnieres
pour le Haut-Mekong. Incident du capitaine
Thoreau. Armaments du Siam. Assassinat de Grosgurin.
85
Mission siamoise a Paris.
307 Indochine (1893). Documents sur le Siam : Notes et
correspondimce au sujet des frontieres de Luang Prabang,
de Xieng Houng, de Xieng Kheng. Question siamoise.
Organisation du Laos, .

162 Kennon Breazeale
86 476 Indochine (1893). Negociations franco-anglaises relatives
a la constitution d'une zone intermediaire.
87 355 Indochine (1893). Incident du 13 juillet 1893. Blocus des
cotes du Siam.
Mission de M. LeMyre de Vilers a Bangkok.
Traite du 3 octobre 1893.
88 275 "Epitome his to rique et notice de l'etat present du royaume
de Siam", par le reverand pere Frere Antonio Dos Prazeres,
vicaire general dans le royaume du Siam.
(Manuscrit
sans date, mais vers 1695-1709, en langue portugaise}
89 579 Mission Pavie: correspondance (1887-1893).
90 459 Idem (janvier-aoQt 1894).
91 572 Idem (septembre-decembre 1894 ).
92 350 Haut-Mekong: negociations franco-anglaises ( 1894-1895 ),
93 464 Haut-Mekong: negociations franco-chi noises ( 1894-1895 ).
94 451 Mission Pavie (janvier-avril 1895).
95 327 Idem (mai-decembre 1895).
96 443 Affaires du Siam (1853-1895): Negociation du Traite avec
le royaume de Siam; organisation du poste de Bangkok
(1853-1857). Affaires diverses (rapports du Siam avec la
Cochinchine, projet d'envoi d'ambassade a Paris, 1ettre du
roi de Siam au Pape, regime des spiritueux, etc.) (1860-
1863). Traite du 15 juillet 1867. Proposition relative a
la creation de vice-consulats fran9ais a Battambang et a
Angkor (1878).
Projet d'arrangement avec l,Angleterre
relatif au Siam (1895). Commissaires enquMeurs au Siam
et agences commerciales de la rive droite (1895).
Envoi
des traductions des documents decouverts dans Ies arcbi ves
de la principaute de Nan etablissant la suzerainete du
Siam sur Xieng Kheng et Muong Sing (1895).

iNVENTAIUE DES nocuMENi's sbn LE SIAM coNSERV~s AUX ARcr-nvE:s DE PARIS
i63
Nouvelle SJrie
numero
du
volume folios date
8 250
9 241
10 282
28 297
1896-1902
1903-1907
1908-1917
1901-1911
Fonds lndoclzine
matiMes
relations entre Plndochine, le Siam et
la Malaisie; situation au frontieres
Idem
Idem
subventions aux etablissements fran­

Kennon Breazeale
Serie A Paix 1914~1920
(Une partie de cette serie etait enlevee par les allemands et notl
pas retrouvee, dont trois volumes sur le Siam comme suit.)
numero matieres
1001 46. Le Siam dans le Congres de la Paix
1026 50. Le Siam dans la Societe des Nations
1335 3. Documents divers sur le Siam
Livres Jarwes
numero
168 Documents diplomatiques. Affaires du Haut-Mekong. Imprimerie
nationale, 1893. 9 pages.
169 -----. Ajjaires de Siam. Imprimerie nationale, 1893. 20
pages.
181 -----. Ajjaires de Siam et du Haut-Mekong. Imprimerie
nationale, 1896. 'to pages.
216 -·- --. Ajjaires de Siam 1893-1902. Imprimerie nationale,
1902, vii-80 pages.
Carton 1
Fonds Papiers ll' Agents
Mission Pavie
registre pages matieres (les registres du Mission Pavie sont numerates par
pages et non pas par folios)
134 Rapports de M. Pavie a Luang Prabang au Ministere des
Affaires Etrangeres (fevrier-juin 1887).
2 114 Idem (juin-septembre 1887).
3 313 Traductions des manuscrits laotiens des an.nales du Lan
Chang, et etudes diverses sur l'histoire du Laos envoyees
au Quai d'Orsay (30 aolit 1887).
4 197 Resumes de la situation politique a Luang Prabang ( 1 er
juillet et 9 octobre 1887).

f.lv~~Nhrrm ni~s DOCUMENTs suR LE srAM CoNsEllv~s AUX ARCHIVEs DE PARis 165
Curton 2
5 232 Voyage a Nan (octobre-novembre 1887). Situation a
Luang Prabang (decembre 1887).
G 178 Journaux du poste de Luang Prabang (decembre 1887-
janvier 1888).
7 185 Journal du voyage a Ngoi (janvier-fevrier 1888). Journal
du voyage de Ngoi a Pa-Nam-Ngoua (fevrier 1888).
Lettres du colonel Pernot; l'arrivee du colonne a Dien
Bien Phu (janvier 1888). Journal de voyage sur le Nam­
Ngoua et le Nam-Youm; arrivee a Dien Bien Phu (Muong
Theng) (fevrier 1888). Journal du voyage de Dien Bien
Phu ala riviere Noire (fevrier 1888).
8 115 Voyage de Hit Hang a Lai sur la riviere Noire; voyage de
Lai a Dien Bien Phu et a Luang Prabang; sejour a Luang
Prabang (mars 1888).
9 104 Voyage de Luang Prabang a Ngoi; voyage de Pavie et du
capitaine Cupet de Ngoi a Muong Son; voyage de Muong
Son a Nam-Ma (avril 1888). Voyage du Song-Ma ala
riviere Noire (mai 1888). Resume des evenements
(fevrier-mai 1888).
10 173 Lettres au general Begin et au Ministere des Affaires
Etrangeres (juillet 1888). Principales routes et rivieres
.
de Luang Prabang vers·~e Tonkin. Etude: ••ce qu'est la
region comprise entre la riviere Noire, l'Annam, le Yunnan
et le Laos au point de vue ethnographique, physique
et politique". Lettre de Begin a Pavie (juillet 1888).
Lettre au Ministere des Affaires Etrangeres (aoOt 1888).
11 139 Depart de la mission pour reconnaitre la navigabilite de
la riviere Noire (aout 1888). Voyage de Pavie et Lerede
de Suyut a Thakhoa (septembre 1888). Sejour a Van­
Kian; entente avec les chefs des bandes chinoises; voyage
de Van-Kian aLai (octobre 1888).

i ()/)
Kennon Breazeale
12 289 Sejour aLai; entente avec Jes chefs du pays (october 1888).
Itineraire de Lai a Te; lettre au sujet du rapport d u 2tl
commissaire siamois de Luang Prabang; envoi des journaux
de marcbe (novembre 1888). Lettre sur la mission
confiee ~ Pavie par le general en chef des troupes de
l'lndochine (decembre 1888). Sejour a Dien Bien Pbu;
entente avec les siamois {fevrier 1889). Varrivee de la
mission a Luang Prabang: Cupet et Garanger (janvier
1889). Voyage de Pavie du Mekong vers l'Annam (mars
1889).
13 168 Vacle: journal du voyage sur le Mekong; bois de teck
(fevrier-mars 1889). Rapport du capitaine Laffitte sur le
Tran-Ninh; creation des postes sur le haut Song-Ca (mai
1888). Lettre du Conseil secret a M.le resident de France
a Hue au sujet des renseignements sur le Nam-Chuong et
leVan Tuong (septembre 1888).
Carton 3
14 390 Cupet: journal de marcbe (Luang Prabang, Ngoi, l-Iang,
Ven, Sam Tai, Hat Bo, Xieng Khouang, You) (avril-juillet
1888). Idem: Luang Prabang a Kassy (juillet I 888 ).
Idem: Luang Prabang a Dien Bien Phu (aolit-septembre
1888). "Renseignements generaux sur les Sip Song Chau
Thai, les Houa Phan Ha Tang Hoc et le Tran-Ninh" par
Cupet (octobre 1888). Cupet: journal de marcbe de
Luang Prabang a Vien Souille et a Thoung Xieng Kham
(novembre 1888). Idem: de Xieng Kham a Son; reconnaissance
au Pou Loi et au Nam Suong (novembre-decembre
1888). Idem: de Son a Dien Bien Phu (decembre 1888).
Idem: de Luang Prabang a Son par le Nam Kane et Ie
Nam Suong (janvier-fevrier 1889). Reconnaissance du
Song-Ca; voyage au Tran-Ninh; voyage de Xieng Khouang
a Vinh (fevrier-avril 1889). ,"Dispositions des notables
au Tran-Ninh'' (traduction d'un rapport des gouverneurs
du Tran-Ninh aux mandarins de Nghe An) (janvier 1889).

IN\'fo:NTAIHE DES DOCUMENTS SUR LE SIAM CONSERVES AUX ARCHIVES DE PARIS 167
15 365 Cupet : journal demarche des officiers de Ia mission fran­

168 Kennon Breazeale
voyage de Pavie, Lefevre~Pontalis, Cogniard, Donnat.
Dugast Molleur Vacle et Le Dantec de Hanoi a Lai-Chau
(fevrie:-mars 18~0). Journal du sejour aLai Chau (avril
1890). Journal du voyage de Lai-Chau a Dien Bien Phu
de Pavie, Lefevre-Pontalis, Vacle, Molleur (avril-mai 1890).
23 154 Garanger: notes sur une tentative de voyage de Luang
Prabang a Mandalay (janvier 1889). Pacification par le
colonel Pennequin, adjoint ala Mission Pavie de la riviere
Noire (1888-1890). Idem du fleuve Rouge (1891-1893).
Lettres de Lugan, commissaire de residence a Bassac
(octobre-decembre 1891 ).
Carton 5
24 266 Massie: journal du poste le Luang Prabang (janvier
1890); notes sur Ia situation commerciale de Luang Prabang
(mars 1890); journaux du voyage de Luang Prabang ~l
Hanoi par Nongkbay, Lakhone et Vinh (juillet-septem bre
1890).
25 169 Cupet: journaux du voyage de Cammon a Luang Prabang
(fevrier-juin 1890); journal du poste de Luang Prabang
(juillet-septembre 1890). Itineraires leves par les membres
de la Mission Pavie (octobre 1890~janvier 1891).
26 142 Counillon: journal du voyage de Keng-Kiec a Luang
Prabang (mars-juin 1890); journal du voyage de Luang
Prabang a Tran-Ninh (janvier-mars 1891); sejour a Luang
Prabang (mars-juin 1891 ); voyage de Luang Prabang a Dien
Bien Pbu (juin 1891 ); corres'{londance (mars-juillet 1891 ).
27 273 Macey (mission industrielle et commerciale) : voyage de
Muong Hai a Takian (mars 1890); voyage de Ta Chan a
Luang Prabang (mars-mai 1890); voyage de Luang Prabang
a Nongkhay (juin-juillet 1890); marche a pied de Kern~
marat a Oubone (juillet-aou t 1890); voyage de Saigon a
Luang Prabang (octobre 1890-fevrier 1891); exploration
des Sip Song Cbau Thai et du baut Nam Hou (fevrier-mai
1891); voyage de Luang Prabang a Haiphong par Vinh
(mai-aout 1891 ).

!NVENTAIHE DES DOCUMENTS SUR LE SIAM CONSERVES AUX ARCHIVES DE PARIS 169
28
Carton 6
191 de Coulgeans: journaux du groupe de Stung Treng (marsoctobre
1890).
29 189 Molleur: journal demarche de Ta-Chan a Dien Bien Phu
(mars-avril1890). Pennequin, Donnat et Lugan: journal
de marche de Lai-Chau a Luang Prabang par Phou-Phang
et le Nam Hou (avril-mai 1890). Friquegnon : itineraire
de Hanoi a Luang Prabang (mars-septembre 1890).
Donnat : etude sur les moyens de repandre la langue
franc;aise au Laos; itineraire de Kemmarat a Oubone (aout
1890). Rapports : partes et telegraphies; route de Sonia
a Luang Prabang (janvier-fevrier 1891).
30 252 Cogniard: voyagedeLai-Chau a Phou-Phang (avril1890);
renseignements sur Lakhone (aoi.it-septembre 1890). Dugast
:journal demarche de Lakhone a OutEme {septembre
1890); journal de marche de Jottsothone a Sesane par
Oubone, Bassac, Siempang, Ban Laia et Ban Kebo (octobre-decembre
1890); reconnaissances chez les Sedangs,
Rengaos, Giarai, etc.; relations avec les siamois; retour
par la vallee du Se Bang Khan {janvier-mai 1890).
31 Ill Riviere: journal du voyage dans le Tran-Ninh (avril-mai
1890). Annexes concernant la mort du capitaine Riviere
a Ban Mouk (1895); notices biographiques (1902).
32 226 Lugan, commissaire de residence dans le Tran-Ninh :
journal (avril-juin 1_890). Cupet et Lugan ': journal du
voyage chez les Khas-Rades (decembre 1890). Lugan:
rapports sur !'organisation du poste de Bassac et la construction
de l'agence (mars-juillet 1891).
33
182 Malglaive: journaux des voyages du capitaine de Malglaive
(avril-decembre 1890); rapport sommaire sur
}'exploration de la region entre Hue et le Se Bang Bien
(decembre 1890-janvier 1891); voyage de Hue a Pnom­
Penh (f evrier-avril 1891 ); essai sur !'organisation eventuelle
des provinces Khas-laotiennes immediatement ·
revendicables par la France, comprises entre les paralleles
15° et 18°.

170 Kennon Breazeale
34 174 Lefevre-Pontalis : voyage de Dien Bien Phu a Luang
Prabang avec Pavie et Molleur (mai-juin 1890); sejour a
Luang Prabang avec Pie, Pennequin, Massie, Cogniard,
Molleur, Donnat et Dugast, et l'arrivee de Counillon,
Riviere, Cupet, de Malglaive et Lugan (juin-juillet 1890};
journal du voyage sur le Mekong avec Pavie, Pennequin,
Friquegnon et Donnat, de Luang Prabang a Kemmarnt
(juillet 1890); Idem de Kemmarat a Bassac par Oubone
(aofit 1890); Idem· de Bassac a Pnom-Penb (aoCt 1890).
Carton 7
35 102 Cambodgiens collaborateurs: journaux des voyages de
Luang Prabang a Dien Bien Pbu (juillet-septembre 1890);
voyage de Luang Prabang a Xieng Sen; lettres diverses
(1889 et 1891). Journal de sejour a Luang Prabang
(juin 1891). Courrier de Luang Prabang a Xieng Chan
( octobre-novembre 1891 )..
36 322 Vacle: journal du sejour a Lai (juillet-aoftt 1890);
voyage a Nam Youm (septembre 1890), voyage de Lai­
Chau vers MuongHou (octobre-novembre 1890). Diverses
pieces de correspondance (1890-1891).
37 217 Pavie, Massie, Lefevre-Pontalis: sejour a Saigon (septcmbre-octobre
1890); sejour a Bangkok (novem bre 18 90);
sejour a Hanoi (novembre-decembre 1890). Pavie, Vacle,
Lefevre-Pontalis : voyage sur la riviere Noire et sejour a
Lai (janvier-fevrier 1891).
38 297 Correspondance diverse (1890-1892): possibilite de francbir
les rapides de Khone; mission Guissez; renseignemen ts
sur la navigabilite du Mekong.
39 225 de Coulgeans: journaux du groupe de Stung Treng (novembre
1890-mai 1891). Reconnaissance telegraphique
entre Sambaur et Stung Treng (novembre 1890),

INVENhiRE DES DOCUMENTS SUR LE S!AlM CONSEil.VES AiJX ARCHIVES DE PARIS 111
Carton 8
40 150 Riviere: voyage de Hanoi en Annam pat Vinh, Nong­
Ma, Cammon, Keng Kiec, Outene (janvier-mars 1891);
note sur la principaute de Kham Keute; renseignetnents
sur les importations et expQrtations, sur les mines tie piomb
de la vallee du Nam Pha Ten (nombreuses photographies),
41 276 Cupet: reconnaissance chez les 'sauvages indepehdai1ts 1
(janvier-avril1891 ); considerations generalessurla region
exploree (description physique, populations, etat social,
moeurs et coutumes des sauvages) (nombreuses photographies).
42 236 Massie: journal de marcbe de Saigon a Haiphong (octobre-novembre
1890); journal demarche de Hanoi a Luang
Prabang (novembre 1890-janvier 1891); etude de Ia
region des Sip Song Chau Thai et de la riviere Noire;
journal de marche de Luang Prabang a Xieng Houng par
Muong Sai et retour par Xi eng Sen (fevrier-avril 1891 ).
43 237 Documents en caracteres sbans et cbinois, avec traductions
(1890-1891). Journal des voyages des cambodgiens
collaborateurs aux Sip Song Pannas et au Yunnan (fevriermai
1891).
44 308 Pavie, Vacle, Lefevre-Pontalis: voyage de Lai a Xieng
Houng par Muong Hou (fevrier-mars 1891). Pavie et
Massie: sejour a Xieng Houng (avril 1891). Pavie et
Lefevre-Pontalis : voyage de Muong Yane a Hanoi par
Lao Peu Kiai et Lai-Chau (avril-juin 1891).
Carton 9
45 316 Massie: etude complementaire sur le voyage aux Sip
Song Pannas (fevrier-avril 1891 ); journal de marche de
Hanoi a Luang Prabang par le Song-Ca et le Nam Kane
(aout-septembre 1891 ); journaux du poste de Luang Prabang
(septembre 1891-juin 1892); pro jet d'etude des
bonzeries par les siamois (juin 1892).

172 Kennon Breazeale
46 178 de Coulgeans: etude sur le bassin de la Se Sane (aspects
physiques et ethnographiques);journaux du paste de Stung
Treng (aoOt-octobre 1891); etude sur les ruines ct•Alom~
prah (Pean Shrevah).
47 340 Rapports de Pavie au Ministere des Affaires Etrangeres
(1890-1891): etudes des lignes telegraphiqucs de Stung
Treng et de Luang Prabang; voyages chez les sauvages
tribus du Laos, les Mois, les Sedangs, les Khas (missions
Cupet, Cogniard, Dugast, Malglaive); voyage de Pavie
dans les Sip Song Pannas avec Deo~van-Tri; le roi de
Xieng Houng (Sip Song Pannas); conclusions.
Carton 10
48 198 Caillat: voyage avec Pavie de Luang Prabang a Bangkok
par Vientiane, Kemmarat et Oubone (juillet~aottt 1894).
49 672 Pavie et Lefevre-Pontalis: voyage de Bangkok a Luang
Prabang par Phixai, Outaradit, Phre, Nan, Xieng Hai,
Xieng Sen et Xieng Khong (mars-juillet 1894). Lefevre­
Pontalis et Macey: voyage de Luang Prabang a Xicng
Khong (juillet-aoGt 1894). Lefevre-Pontalis: voyages
dans le Haut-Laos (aoOt·decembre 1894). Arrivec a
Lai-Chau de la Commission des frontieres chinoise ct
birmane; organisation des groupes (novembre 1894).
50 245 Situation a Battambang (juin 1883). Etude sur l'organisationde
l'anneesiamoisedepuis sa reforme a PEuropecnnc
(1880-1886). Traductions des inscriptions des pierrcs
commemoratives des montagnes de Thoai Son et de Vinh
Te (novembre 1877); copies en caracteres chinois. Rapports
sur Ies canaux de Vinh Teet de Vinh au Chaudoc
(1890-1891).
51 328 Douze cahiers des annales de Xieng Sen, traduites en
cambodgien par le collaborateur cambodgien Sommg a
Luang Prabang (octobre-novembre 1891); (pas de traduction
en franc;ais).
Carton 11
I 142 Cahier de Ia correspondance de Pavie (juin-septembre
1894).

lNVJt NTAiltE DES DOCUMENTS SUH LE SlAM CONSERV~S AUX ARCHIVES DE PARIS t7 3
II 277 Idem (septembre 1894-mai 1895).
III 45 Idem (juillet-septembre 1894).
IV 58 Telegrammes de Pavie at.i Ministere des Affaires Etrangeres
(21 juillet-10 octobre 1893) et du Ministere des Affaires
Etrangeres a Pavie (31 juillet-9 octobre 1893).
V 135 Telegrammes (juin 1894-mai 1895).
VI 57 Idem (mai-septembre 1895)
Car~on 12
Pieces annexes (non-reliees) :
I - - - Dossier relatif a }'organisation du 2e voyage de la mission
(1889); personnel (1890-1892); sejour a Bangkok (octobrenovembre
1890). Lettre de Rama V au Chao Fa de Xieng
Kheng a Muong Sing (copie photograpbique et traduction
en frangais) du 27 octobre 1892. (liasse de 166 folios)
II --- Correspondance relative aux affaires de Muong Sing et de
Xieng Kheng : lettres en caracteres shans avec traductions
(1893-1894). Lefevre-Pontalis: sejour a Dien Bien Phu
(octobre-novembre 1894). Caillat: journaux du voyage
de Hanoi a Muong Sing (octobre 1894-janvier 1895).
(liasse de documents non-numerates)
Carron 13
Rapport de Macey (janvier 1895). Journal du sejour a
Muong Sing. des membres de la Commission frangaise
(janvier 1895). Lettres originales, avec traductions des
rois de Muong Sing, de Xieng Kheng et de Xieng Houng
(janvier et mars 1895): questions des liens de dependance_
et des frontieres. Journaux des voyages a Xieng Kbong,
chez les Mou Seu, a Xieng Sen (janvier-mars 1895). Dossier
relatif a la delimitation de la frontiere sino-annamite
(decembre 1894-mars 1895). Journaux des voyages de
Xieng Khong a Dien Bien Phu (avril-mai 1895). Correspondance
diverse (mai-aoGt 1895). Documents en langue
laotienne: affaire de Prea Keo Ana (Bang Bien); indemnite
siamoise. Chronique d'un prince siamois. Note sur les
maisons de commerce protegees par la France a Bangkok.
(liasse de documents non-numerates)

Kennon Brea:ieaie
Archives Nationales, Section d'Outre-Mer
Fonds Siam
Carton 1
Dossier Matieres
1 a 15 Negociations avec le Siam 1669-1690. (15 documents
contemporains et une copie dactylographiee d'un traite.)
1) Extrait des registres des ceremonies: reception en
France des ambassadeurs suisses (1663), de Soliman Aga
Mustafavaga (1669), moscouites (1681). Maniere dont
pouvoir recevoir en France les ambassadeurs du Roi de
Siam.
2) Lettre du Pape Clement IX au Roi de Siam { 1669)
(copie).
3) Lettre du Sieur des Landes-Boureau au Siam (26 decembre
1682) (copie).
4) Traite fait entre le Chevalier de Chaumont et Constance
Phaulkon, Premier Ministre du Siam, au sujet des
missionaires (1685) (copie authentique, signee par de
Chaumont et Phaulkon, en langue portugaise; une copie
en plus dactylographiee).
5) et 6) Deux copies contemporaines de la traduction en
frangais du Traite (1685).
7) Copie du Traite de Commerce du 11 decembre et
"Observations pour servir d'instruction aux Sieurs de la
Loubere et Ceberet envoyes extraordinaires du Roy vers
Ie Roy de Siam" (25 janvier 1687).
8) Traite de commerce conclu par MM. de la Loubere
et Ceberet du 11 decembre 1687 (copie).
9) Conventions entre MM. de la Loubere, Ceberet, et le
Pere Tachard; clauses militaires (copie du texte et observations
des ambassadeurs; 16 octobre 1687).
10) Copie authentique signee par Louis XIV du Traite
avec modification de !'article secret (28 fevrier 1689). '

lNVENTAIRF IJE'S Dl)CU ,
• MENTS SUR LE SIAM CONSERVES AUX ARCHIVES DE PARIS 175
11) Copie authentique signee par de Seignelay et le Pere
Tachard (28 fevrier 1689).
12) Traite du 28 fevrier 1689 (copiecontemporaine avec
l'article secret).
13) Traite du 28 fevrier 1689 (copiecontemporaine sans
!'article secret).
14) "Observations sur le Traite de Siam" (28 fevrier
1689).
15) Instructions de Louis XIV et de Colbert pour le
Sieur Desfarges, marechal des camps et armee du roi et
commandant des pastes occupes par les franc;:ais dans les
Indes Orientales (14 janvier 1690). (copies).
Dossier Matieres
16 Copie du Traite d'amitie, commerce et navigation entre la
France et le Siam (15 ao(it 1856).
17 Copie du Traite entre la France et le Roi du Cambodge
(11 aoGt 1863).
18 Traduction en franc;:ais des extraits du Traite entre le Siam
et le Cambodge de decembre 1863, ratifte a Bangkok le
22 janvier 1864. Copie de la depeche de M. Aubaret du
5 octobre 1864.
18~bis
Depeche consulaire au sujet du commerce etranger au
Siam (2 mai 1864).
19 Convention entre la France et le Siam du 14 avril 1865,
signee par· M. Au baret mais non-ratifiee: correspondance
et texte de la Convention.
20 Projet de traite franco-siamois (1865-1867).
21 Documents concernants les droits de Cambodge sur les
provinces d' Angkor et de Battambang. Mission Doudart
de Lagree. Reception de M. Aubaret. Armee siamoise
et commerce etranger au Siam (1866-68). Traduction
d'une lettre du Roi Mongkut au Vice-Amiral de la Grandiere
du 2 decembre 1860.

176
Kennon Breazeale
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
Bulletin des Lois: texte imprime du Traite franco-siamois
du 15 juillet 1867 (ratifie le 29 fevrier 1868).
Delimitation des frontieres ouest du Cambodge en 1868.
Incidents et protestations du Roi de Cambodge. Projet de
delimitation des frontieres nord du Cambodge en 1869.
Question des armaments des batiments de commerce remontant
a Bangkok ( 1868). Question de ceremonial
soulevee par le Consul de France a Bangkok ( 1869-1871 ).
Rapports directs entre le Gouverneur de la Cochinchine
et le royaume de Siam (1868). Voyage de l'ex-Regent de
Siam en Basse-Cochinchine (1874). Couronnement du
roi de Siam; divisions administratives du Siam; rapports
indo-siamois (1874). Conseil d'Etat et reformes au Siam
(1874). Invasion des Has au Siam (1875). Conflit entre
les deux rois du Siam; demonstration navale franc;aise
(1875). Interim du Consul de France a Bangkok ( 1879).
Tentatives de Si-Votha, pretendant au tr6ne du Cambodge
(1878). Echange d'ambassades entre les cours d'Annum
et de Siam (1879-1880). Demande d'un medecin consulaire
pour Bangkok ( 1879). Agissements allemands au
Siam ( 1879).
Rebellion contre le Siam du gouverneur de la province de
Battambang. Everitualite d'une intervention fran9aise
(1882-1883).
Delimitation des frontieres entre le Siam et le Cam hodge
( 1885-1886).
I
Territoires contestes sur la frontiere franco-siamoise
(1891-1892). Pointe et baie de Samit (1885-1891).
Frontiere nord du Cambodge (Melou Prey, Tonle-Repou,
Stung Treng): rapport et carte (1886-1887).
Rapport de Filippini au sujet d'une mission a Stung 'Treng
Mission Saintenoy a Stung Treng (1886-1888).
•
:t
Note sur les agissements du Siam au Laos (1888). Exp • _
dition siamoise contre les Hos dans le Luang Prabang
le Tran-Ninh (1887-1888),

INVEN'I'AIHE DES DOCUMENTS SUR LE SlAM CONSERVES AUX ARCHIVES DE PARIS
31
Cfuton 2
32
33
34
35
36
37
Empietements siamois au Laos; colonne Pernot; occupation
de Dien Bien Phu (1888-1889). ·
Mission du Capitaine Luce : Rapports au sujet de la delimitation
des frontieres de 1' Annam dans la vallee du
Mekong, et droits historiques de l'Annam sur la rive
gaucbe (1888-1889). Cartes annamites. Correspondance
avec le Ministere des Affaires Etrangeres ( 1893).
Agissements des siamois sur les frontieres annamites
( 1889). Etablissement d'un detachement d'infanterie a
Bassac (1889). Activites de M. Pavie (1888-1889).
N egociations avec le Siam sur les droits sur les spiri tueux
(1881-1889). Arrangement entre la Grande Bretagne et
le Siam signe a Londres le 6 avril 1883. Personnel des
lignes telegraphiques (1887).
Etablisse;ment d'un droit de 3 pourcent sur les marchandises
entrant par Battambang (1886-1887).
Concession miniere Luzzati: mines d'or de Bangtapan
(1889-1890).
Partage d'influence au Siam avec l'Angleterre; intervention
eventuelle de la Chine dans la question du Laos (1891-
1892). Rapport sur les frontieres de l'lndochine et des
moyens de pacifier le Haut Laos, par Frangois Deloncle
( 1889).
38 Correspondance sur l'eventualite d'une prise de possession
par la France· des iles de Rango Salem dans la baie de
Samit; avis du contre-amiral Tournier (1892).
39 Historique des droits respectifs du Siam, du Cambodge et
de l'Annam sur le Laos, d'apres les chroniques etc. ( 1867-
1893). Inventaire de correspondance de la commission
d'exploration du Mekong de 1866 a 1869. Expose des
1droits historiques de l'Annam sur le Laos central. Correspondance
diverse (1893).
177

178 Kennon Breazeale
Carton 3
40 Correspondance Pavie: delimitation franco-chinoise et
etablissement d'un plan d'action vis a vis du Siam ( 1893).
Refoulement des siamois sur la rive gauche entre Camtnon
et Camlo (avri11893). Subventions au journal Siam Free
Press ( 1895). Occupation de Stung Treng, Khone, Camlo,
Cammon (mars-avrill893). Correspondance entre M. Pavie
et le Ministere des Affaires Etrangeres (1893).
41 Protestation du Siam; projets de modus vivendi; incidents
de Kh6ne; occupation des postes entre Camlo et Kemmarut
(1893). Evacuation de Camlo par les siamois (avril-juin
1893). Correspondance entre M. Pavie et le Ministere
des Affaires Etrangeres (fevrier-juin 1893 ).
42 Rapport general de M. de Lanessan, Gouverneur Gem era!
de l'Indocbine sur la question siamoise (9 juin 1893).
Missions des residents Bastard, Dufrenil, Luce (rnars~mai
1893). Situation au Laos (juin 1893).
43 Etude sur la situation militaire du royaume de Siam, par
M. le lieutenant Le Myre de Vilers et par le Ministere de
la Marine (mars-juin 1893).
44 Evenements de 1893. Armaments de Siam avant !•ultima~
tum (mai-juillet 1893).
45 Guet-apens de Keng-Kiec: assassinat de Grosgurin et
m.assacre de son escort par les siamois (5 juin 1893). Jugement
des assassins: extraits de presse {1894).
46 Projet de mission siatnoise a Paris. Protestation du Siarn
contre !'occupation de Samit. Projets d'operations (9
juin-19 juillet !893).
47 Correspondance de M. Pavie avec le Ministere des Affaires
Etrangeres (2 juillet-17 juilletl893).
48 Extraits de presse relatifs ala question du Mekong et au
conflit franco-siamois (avril-juillet 1893 ).
49 Ultimatum frangais du 20 juillet 1893. Blocus des cdtes
siamoises. Occupation de Chantaboun. Mort du lieutenant
de Puysegur. Levee du blocus. Occupation de

INVENTAii:iE DES oocuMENTs suR LE siAM coNsEiwfs AUX ARCHIVES liE PARIS i 7!J
Catton 4
Carton 5
Khong. Operations entre Khtme et la rive gauche en
juillet 1893. Correspondance de M. Pavie avec le Minis~
tere des Affaires Etrangeres (22 juillet-11 aoUt 1893),
50 Attitude de l;Angleterre (mars-novembre 1893).
51 Envoi de M. LeMyre de Vilers au Siam; projet de trait~
et de convention (1893).
52 Affaires diverses se rapportant au differendfranco-siamois
(1893).
53 Armaments du Siam (1893-1894).
54 Attitude de l'Angleterre vis a vis de !'occupation de
Chantaboun ( 1894).
55 Mouve~ents de l'escadre anglaise d'Extreme-Orient
(juillet 1893-juin 1894).
56 Attitudes des puissances etrangeres dans la question du
Siam: rapports diplomatiques, extraits de presse (juilletdecembre
1893).
57 Execution du Traite de 1893: Mission Pavie au Laos
(aout 1893-decembre 1894).
58 Accords franco-britanniques: partage d'influence dans la
vallee du Mekong (1892-1893); pl'otocole franco-britannique
du 31 juillet 1893 et institution d'une commission
mixte chargee de delimiter une zone neutre; Blue Book
britannique sur les affaires de Siam ( 1893-1894); Commission
du Haut Mekong (1893-1895); affaires de Xieng
Kheng et du Xieng Toung; navigation de la Grandiere sur
le Haut-Mekong (1895); declaration de Londres du 15
janvier 1896; Livre jaune ("Affaires du Haut-Mekong
1893,).
59 Situation dans la z6ne reservee; rapports des agents commerciaux
fran

tiio
61
Kennon Breazeale
Mouvements des siamois sur la frontiere de Cambodge.
Princes cambodgiens refugies a Bangkok (1894-1895}.
Carton 6
62 Maladie du roi de Siam. Eventualite d'une representation
navale (1894). Violation et inexecution du Traite ( 1894-
1895). Situation politique au Siam (avril-mai 1895).
Nouvelle organisation administrative a Nan (decembre
1895) .
. 63 Incidents de Nongkhay (1895-1896). Incidents de Luang
Prabang, Nongkhay, Saiaboury, Kemmarat dans la z6ne
reservee (1895). Situation politique a Oubone ( 1895).
Situation politique a Nongkhay (1895).
Carton 7
64 Rapport sur la situation. a Nongkhay (1896). Couronnement
du roi de Luang Prabang en juillet 1896. Affaires
de Xieng Sen (1896). Affaires de Xieng Khong ( 1896).
65 Politique anglaise vis a vis du Siam (1894-1897). Affaire
du lieutenant Christmas (1894). Rapport du vice-consul
anglais Archer ( 1892). Rapport de M. Herbert Warrington
Smyth au Royal Geographical Society ( 1894).
66 Aggression contre M. Michel a Ban Na Ho (1897). Conduite
de M. Michel (1897). Situation a Ban Dua Makheng
(1897).
67 Agissements siamois dans le Bas-Laos; royaume de Bassac;
situation a Lakhone (1896-1897).
68 Surveillance des c8tes du Siam (1895-1896). Projet d 1 action
contre le Siam; revendications franc;aises ( 1896-1897).
69 Occupation de Chantaboun; capture et vente de Ia chaloupe
siamoise le Phirom; route de Chantaboun' a Battambang;
mesures de police prises a Chantaboun (1894-1898). Renseignement
d'un correwondant du Times sur 1es mines de
rubis (1896). Assassinat de M. Jacquet (1899). Situation
d~s effectifs des postes de Chantaboun, de Pursat et de
Paknam au ler avrill901.

lNvF;NTArrm DEs ncicuMENTs suh LE siAM 6oNsERv~s A ox ARcHivEs DE PARis
t8i
Carton 8
69~bis Liquidation des depenses de Ia campagne de Siam de 1893:
correspondance, rapports et documents parlementaires
( 1895-1903).
69-ter Idem, correspondance et rapports (1893-1896).
69-quater Idem, l'abaissement du cours de change de la piastre et
la perte au change de la Cochinchine sur l'indemnite siamoise.
Correspondance, rapports et documents parlementaires
(1893-1897).
70 Affaires de Luang Prabang (1896-1904).
71 Territoire con teste de Kutsawadi. Rapports de la principaute
de Nan. Arrivee· a Nan des princes de Luang
Prabang. Protection aux laotiens en territoires siamois
( 1895-1897).
72 Territoire conteste de Kutsawadi (1897-1898).
73 Occupation de Muong Toung (partie de la principaute
de Luang Prabang situee sur la rive droite) par les siamois
(1896-1897).
74 Violations du territoire de Luang Prabang (1895-1896).
Affaire de Ban Bo Bia ( 1897). Occupation par les siamois
de Ban Na Hine (1897). Violation par les siamois de la
z6ne reservee (1897).
75 Affaires d~ Luang Prabang (1895). Refus par le colonel
Pennequin de la direction du Haut Laos (1895). Projet
d'organisation des milices et forces de police de Luang
Prabang (1895).
76 Affaire de Ban Tali ( 1898-1899).
77 Carte de la z5ne reservee (1895). Observations des siamois
sur Ie rapport de M. Siegfried (1896). Conflits entre
les autorites siam?ises et les representants diplomatiques
franvais a Ban Dua Makheng (1898-1899).
78 Laotiens proteges fr~nvais au Siam; rapatriement au Laos
(1895-1902).

i82
79
80
i

INVI•:NT:\Ilm DES DOCUMENTS ~UR LE SIAM CONSERVES AUX ARCHIVES DE PARIS 183
92
92-bis
Carton 10
Reprise des pourparlers avec le Siam; desiderata du De~
partement; lettre de M. Doumergue ( 1903-1904).
Correspondance au sujet du meutre de M. Prugna a Bat~
tambang (1903-1904).
93 Texte de la Convention franco-siamoise du 13 fevrier
1904. Documents parlementaires (1904-1906). Projet
de loi de 1906: conditions d'application de !'article XII
de la Convention.
94 Organisation de la Commission de delimitation de la
frontiere entre l'Indochine et le Siam: credits et candidatures
(1904-1907).
95 Accord franco-britannique du 8 avril 1904: felicitation
de la Comite duCommerce et de l'lndustrie de l'lndochine;
extrait de presse (1904).
96 Essai sur un trace de frontiere entre Chantaboun et Kratt
(execution de !'article III de la Convention du 13 fevrier
1904); carte (1904).
97 Occupation de Kratt (1904-1905).
98 Evacuation de Chantaboun (1904~1905).
99 Requete du Comite du Commerce et de l'lndustrie de
l'lndochine relative ala Convention du 13 fevrier 1904;
rapport du Gouverneur General au sujet de la requete
( 1904).
100 Pro jet d'organisation des postes fran

184
104
105
Kennon Breazeale
Commission de delimitation :rapports et proces verbaux
des seances en 1905-1906 entre le commandant Bernard
et le general Mom Chatidej Udom a Ban Houai Sai,
Muong Kop, Muong Paklay, Xieng Khan, Dan Sai~ Vientiane
et Savannakhet.
Commission de delimitation (2eme campagne) : region de
Luang Prabang; concessions sur Ia rive droite (1905-1906).
Carto11 II
106 Commission de delimitation (3eme campagne) : rapports
du colonel Bernard et correspondance diverse ( 1907),
ProjetdeTraite (1907). Agissements de PhyaKathathorn:
troubles dans les provinces cambodgiennes cedees par lc
Traite de 1907.
107 Commission de delimitation: resultats et liquidation
(1907-1908).
108 "Les origines et le reglement de la question siamoise'\
etude histodque par le colonel Bernard (204 pages dactylographiees,avrill908).
Note duMinistere des Affaires
Etrangeres sur la question de Siam 1863-1907. Reponsc
du Quai d'Orsay au sujet du memoire du colonel Bernard
(1908).
Carto11 12
109 Instructions du Ministre des Affaires Etrangeres it M. de
Margerie, ministre de France a Bangkok (1907).
110 Commission de delimitation derigee par Ie commandant
Guichard Montguers: designation des membres de la
commission et correspondance (1907-1908).
111 Texte du Traite du 23 mars 1907. Nomination des membres
de Ia Commission de delimitation; proces verbaux
de la Commission (1907-1908).
112 Rapport general du commandant Montguers; photos ( 1908).
113 Rapport du DC Cloitre, membre de la Commission; photos;
cartes de la frontiere ouest du Cambodge ( 1907-1908),

tNVENTt\I£11~ DES DOCUMENTS SUR LE SIAM CONSERVES AUX ARCHIVES DE PARIS
114
115
116
117
118
119
120
Rapport du capitaine Seneque; photos ( 1908).
Rapport du capitaine Juy: groupe geodesique; photos
(1907-1908)
Rapports de Petithuguenin et du lieutenant Defert (1908-
1909).
Rapport du lieutenant Dessemond (1907-1908).
Rapport du lieutenant Malandain ( 1908).
Cartes de la frontiere ouest du Cambodge.
Carte du Cambodge. Esquisse d'une carte geologique.
Lever de la passe de Chong Smet. Lever de la passe de
Chong Ta Ko. Feuille de projection des pointes geodesiques.
185
Carton 13
121
122
123
124
125
126
127
Organisation des provinces de Battambang, Siemreap et
Sisophon retrocedees par le Traite du 23 mars 1907 ( 1907-
1908 et 1910).
Influence etrangere au Siam: Orande-Bretagne, Russie,
Allemagne, Japon, Danemark (1896-1907).
Rapports diplomatiques divers avec le Siam: voyage du
P_rince Damrong dans les Montbons Oudon et Isan ( 1907);
voyage en lndochine du Prince Chira (1910); projet de
construction d'une nouvelle Legation a Bangkok ( 1911);
couronnement du roi (1912); complot militaire (1912);
consequences au Siam de la mobilisation generate (1914).
Rapports sino-siamois : agitation chinoise au Siam; envoi
des croisseurs chinois au Siam (1907-1912).
Note du bureau politique du Gouvernement General de
l'lndochine sur l'etat des relations franco-siari:Joises ( 1909).
Correspondance au sujet de Cao Dat, rebelle annamite
refugie au Siam (1909) et au sujet des agitateursannamites
refugies au Siam (1910).
Repression des delits commis en Indochine et au Siam
par les ressortissants des deux pays ( 1909-1910). Violation
des frontieres a Phre par les gendarmes siamois en
juillet 1906.

186
Kennon Breazeale
128
129
130
Ill
132
133
134
Carton 14
Condoleances du Gouvernement de l'Indochine sur la mort
du roi Chulalongkorn (1910).
Parliamentary Paper: Siam, Commercial Report for the
Year 1884. Rapport sur les finances siarnoises ( 1900}.
Douane siamoise (1900-1901). Organisation fiscale au
Siam (1894). Etat des capitaux franc;ais engages au Siam
(1903). Rapport commercial du vice-consul de France a
Karat ( 1904). Visite de la reine-rnere en lndocbine ( 1911 ).
ForNs de teck ( 1904). Rapport sur le papier rnonnaie au
Siam (1904). Projet de creation d'une Banque siamoise
( 1906). Mines de Pailinh et de Navong ( 1906). Situation
financiere au Siam (1909). Creation d'une Chambr

tNVl;NTAIHE DES DOCUMENTS SUR LE SIAM CONSERVES AUX ARCHIVES DE PARIS 187
148 Creation des consulats d'Oubone et de Ban Dua Makbeng;
consulat de Battambang (1896-1898).
149 Reformes consulaires dans les vallees du Mekong et de la
Menam: Battambang, Nan, Oubone, Xieng Mai ( 1903-
1907).
150 Situation militaire au Siam : correspondance entre les
Colonies et les Affaires Etrangeres (1894, 1897, 1901, 1904l
1905, 1906, 1913, 1914 et 1915).
151 Emigration des Khamous du Laos au Siam (1898, 1899l
1901, 1902, 1907 et 1908).
152 Traite franco-siamois du 13 fevrier 1904: extraits de la
presse franc;:aise (1904-1905).
153 Commission de delimitation de la frontiere du Siam et du
Cambodge (mission du colonel Bernard): cartes des fron~
tieres de Kratt, Pursat, Battambang et Chantaboun;
correspondance (1907-1910).
154 Trai tefranco-siamois du 23 mars 1907 : prise de possession
par la France des provinces de Battambang, Siemreap et
Sisophon (1907). Reglement de !'affaire du Phya Katha·
thorn (1917).
155 Revision du Traite de commerce franco-siamois de 1856:
projet de modification du tarif douanier siamois. Commerce
des armes et des munitions entre Battambang et
Pnom Penh (1902-1904 et 1906-1907).
1.56 Suppression des juridictions consulaires danoises (1913).
Cartoi1 16
157 Publication du dictionnaire siamois-franc;ais-anglais de
Mgr. Vey (1895-1896). Creation d'une chaire de siamois
a l'Ecole des langues orientales; projet de creation d'une
chaire a !•Ecole coloniale (1896-1899).
158 Chemin de fer de Bangkok a Karat (1895-1901).
1
59 Rapport sur les voies de communication reliant Bangkok
a Korat et au Laos (1907).

188
160
161
' .. I
Kennon Breazeale
Constitution d'tme nouvelle societe de mines d'or de
Sisophon ( 1906-1909). Achat d'actions par le Gouvernement
de l'Indochine (1906). Note sur les mines d'or de
Watana (1906). ,
Mines de pierres precieuses de Pailinh: concession du
Siam Syndicate Limited et reglement des difficultes avec
la France ( 1907-1909).
162 Ferme de !'opium au Siam: designation d'un agent frnn­

iN\rJ~NTAIIiE OE ' .i • · · · · · '
• ~s DOCU1v,ENTS SUR LE SIAM CONSERVES AUX ARcrnvlis DE PARis 189
4 2eme
.
M"
tsston
. p
avte
.
au Laos : dossier complementaire.
5 2eme M' . .
tsston Pavte au Laos : rapports de M. Pavie et de
M. Massie (fin 1889-1891).
6 Rapport de M. l'enseigne de vaisseau Guissez: travaux
d 'assainissement des rapides de Pla-Sdam ( 1891 ).
Carton 43 Birmanie (1824-1895).
Expedition militaire faite par 1es anglais au pays des Bir~
mans (1824-1826). Etats Sbans, routes de Birmanie et
divers : correspondance avec le Ministere des Affaires
Etrangeres (1884-1896). Delimitation sino-birmane; cession
de Xieng Toung ala Chine; Traite sino-birman ( 1885-
1895). Delimitation siamo-birmane (1885-1895).
Fonds lndochine
Serle A 00 : aj]aires politiques (generalites)
A 00 (4) Abre~e de l'histoire du Cambodge envoye par le roi de
Siam; pretentious siamoises ( 1864 ).
A 00 (5)
A 00 (7)
Note sur les relations politiques de la France avec les
royaumes de Siam et de Cambodge (vers 1864).
Rapports sur la situation au Cambodge (1866-1867).
Serie A 20 : rapports des gouverneurs
A 20 (7) Rapport pour !'Expose de Ia situation de !'Empire: rapport
annuel du gouverneur Obier (affaire de Rachgia, rapports
avec le Siam et l'Annam, affaires du Cambodge) (1868).
A 20 ( 13)
A 20 (55)
Rapports mensuels du contre-amiraldeCornulier-Lucinere
sur la situation en Cochinchine; rapports avec le Cambadge,
l'Annam, le Siam (1870-1871).
Rapport stir le territoire de Battambang; prise de possession
du pays (1907).
Serie A 30 : correspondance des gouverneurs
A 30 (12) Rapports avec le Siam (provinces de Battambang et d'
Angkor) (1867-1868).

1~0 kenli.on Breazea1e
A 30 ( 13)
Delimitation de la frontiere du Siam et du Cambodge
(1868~1869).
A 30 (26) Evasion de Si~Votha; lutte contre ce pretendant au Lr?me
du Cambodge; projets de reforme proposes it Norodom;
relations avec le Siam et l'Annam (1875~1877).
A 30 (45)
Voyage a Phnom Penh du gouverneur de Cochinchine Le
Myre de Vilers (1879). Impressions faites sur le court
de Bangkok et Ie roi Norodom par des articles de presse
anglaise au sujet des visees franc;aises sur le Laos ( 1880).
A 30 (60) Rapports entre Ia France et l'Annam (1884-1885). Mas~
sacre de chretiens au Tonkin et au Laos ( 1884).
A 30 ( 107) Projet de demembrementdu Laos (1903). Rebellion des
Khas Bolovens (1901). Rebellions contre les Siamois
(1902).
A 30 (111) Arrivee du gouverneur general Beau (1906-1907). Mouvement
insurrectionnel dans les territoires cedes par le
Siam au Cambodge (1905).
A 30 (114) Piraterie, brigandage et mouvement insurrectionnel dans
les territoires cedes par le Siam (1908-1910).
Serie A 50 : piraterie et troubles
A 50(-)
A 50 (7)
Arrestationetrenvoien Francedunomme Galley, accuse
de piraterie : correspondance entre la Marine, Pamiral
Bonard, le prefet de police et le consul de Siam (1862-
1865).
Assassinat au Cambodge de l'ingenieur Bruel, en mission
d'exploration de la region entre Saravane et la ligne de
partage des eaux entre l'Annam et le bassin du Mekong
(1883-1884).
Serie A 70 :relations diplomatiques avec les souverains indochinois
A 73 (2)
Voyage en Cochinchine et au Cambodge du prince Henri
de Bourbon (1888).
A 75 (2) Traite de protectorat sur le Cambodge du 11 aoG.t 1863.
Convention de Pnom Penh du 17 juin 1884.

IS\'FSI\IHF 111-:s llOtUMEN'l'!i SlJH I.E SIAM CONSEHVf.:s AUX AHCHIVES DE PARIS
Sirle A fW: presse
A HI (9)
A l-{2 (14)
A 82 (II'$)
Journal Le Mekong: delits de presse, diffamation, fausses
nouvelles ( 1895-1896).
"Le nationalisme siamois oppose au liberalisme franc;ais
dans l'Indochine centrale. Nos devoirs envers le peuple
laotien". (factum commercial, sans date·, au sujet de la
ereation d'un chemin de fer au Laos).
Articles de presse metropolitaine; incident de Houng-Bussay
(frontiere siamoise) (1906-1909).
A ~2 (.23) Troubles de Battambang; monument commemoratif de
l'uvenement de Sisowath et de Ia retrocession par le Siam
des provinces de Bat tam bang, Siemreap et Sisophon (1908-
1909). '
Serle lJ f/0 : relations exterieure.s (gfmeralites)
D 03 (I) Passage a Saigon du prince siamois Warongsef ( 1887).
Voyage au Siam du baron van Deden, charge de mission
du Gouvernement neerlandais (1894).
B 03 (2)
D 03 (3)
B 05 (2)
Mission en Extreme-Orient du prince Waldemar de Danemark,
commandant Ia Walkyrie, et de M. Andersen,
directcur de Ia compagnie danoise Ostasiatiske, pour
associcr lc Danemark, la Russie et la France contre Ia
concurrence commerciale anglo-allemande au Siam et en
Extreme-Orient (1899-1900).
Passage en Indocbine du prince Bovaradej, president de
Ia Commission siamoise de delimitation (1908). Passage
en Indochine du ministre de France au Siam (1909).
Plainte de M. Lefaucheur, negociant a Saigon, au sujet du
traitement dont il a ete victime ~e la part des autorites
siamoises a Stung Treng (1864).
i91
Serle B 1 o
B 1l (8)
: relations avec Ia Chine
Correspondance entre les Affaires Etrangeres, la Marine,
l'Jndochi~e, Ies consulats de France a Pekin et a Bangkok
au sujet des troupes chinoises sur les frontiers du Tonkin
( 1881-1883).

192
B 11 (9)
B 12 (15)
Kennon Breazeale
Note sur les bandes de chinois musulmans H6s au Laos
(1883).
Abornement de la frontiere sino-annarnite du Mekong a la
riviere Noire. Lettre du depute Deloncle sur Ia situation
au Laos. CQncentration de troupes chinoises sur lu frontiere.
Tentative d'annexion par la Chine des 13 m uongs
laotiens dependant de Semao. Offensive siamoise a Xieng
Khong. Installation du poste de Muong Hahin. ( 1894)
Serie B 20 : relations avec Ia Birmanie
B 20 (I) Situation dans les Etats Shans ou Douze Pannas. Attitude
de la Chine, du Siam, de l'Angleterre. Rapports du
Gouverneur General et du consul de France a Bangkok.
( 1889-1890).
B 20 (2) Negociations avec l'Angleterre au sujet de la constitution
d'une z6ne neutre dans le bassin du Haut-Mekong ( 1892-
1894).
B 20 (3) Empietements anglais sur la rive gauche du Mekong;
question de Muong Sing; incident de Xieng Houng; remise
ala France des territoires de Muong Hou ( 1895-1896).
Serie B 30 : relations avec le Siam
B 30 (1) Pretentions du Siam sur le Cambodge; demande par le
Siam d'extradition d'un cambodgien; delimitation des
frontieres; Traite siamo-cambodgien du 22 janvier 1864;
correspondance (1863-1865).
B 30 (2)
B 30 (3)
Relations entre la France, le Siam et l'Angleterre: uppre-
, ciations de la presse et du gouvernement anglais sur Ie
Traite du 11 aoGt 1863 et la politique franc;:aise au Camhodge
(1864-1866).
Suscriptiond'une lettredeNapoleon III adressee au roi "de
Siam et du Cambodge". Convention Au baret avec le Siam
au sujet du Cambodge. Rapport de Lagree sur la
suzerainete du Siam sur Battambang et Angkor. Protectoral
du Cambodge: limites du Siam et du Cambodge
ratification du Traite relatif au Cam hodge, correspondanc;
avec les Affaires Etrangeres, lettre du roi au vice-ami aJ
de la Grandi ere. ( 1865-1868) r

INVr:N'I'AIHg fll~S 110ClJMgNTS SUR LE SIAM CONSI':RVES AUX ARCH!Vgs DE PARIS 193
B 30 (4}
B 30 ( 5)
B 30 {6)
B 30 (7)
B 30 (8)
B 30 (9)
B 30 (1 0)
B 30 (11)
B 30 (12)
B 30 (13)
B 30 (14)
B 30 (15)
Situation au Siam. Mort du roi. Couronnement du
second roi. Attitude du Siam a l'egard du Cambodge.
Cremation du feu roi. Mission Senez. (1868-1870)
Neutralisationdu Grand Lac. Delimitation des frontieres
du Siam, du Cambodge et de la Cochinchine. Article
additionnel au Traite du 15 juillet 1867. Transmission
des cartes de la frontiere. (1869-1871).
Ratification de l'article additionnel du 14 juillet 1870 au
Traite du 15 juillet 1867. Decorations de l'Ordre de
l'Efephant Blanc attribuees par le Siam a des personnalites
franc;aises et de la Legion d'Honneur attribuees a des
princes siamois. (1870-1872)
Reclamation par le roi du Cambodge de deux jeunes
princesses cambodgiennes elevees ala cour de Siam ( 1871).
Retablissement des relations entre les royaumes de Siam
et d'Annam (1879).
Entrevue entre le roi de Siam et le Gouverneur de Cochinchine
(1885).
Mesures prises au Siam contre Si-Votha. Rapport du
consul de France a Bangkok sur le trafic d'armes au Siam
a destination du Cambodge. (1886)
Question des frontieres siamoises : empietements des
siamois sur le territoire de l'Annam sur la rive gauche du
Mekong (1888).
Remboursement d'avances faites par le consul de France
a Bangkok pour l'entretien de laotiens du Phoueun,
refugies au consulat en 1891 ( 1892).
Rapports du lieutenant de Labry sur la situationpolitique
et militaire au Siam (fevrier 1893) et en Chine (mai 1892).
Rapport du chancelier de residence a Kampong Tom sur
la delimitation de la frontiere du Siam et du Cambodge
(1894).
Projet de rapatriement de deux compagnies de la Legion
Etrangere au Siam (1895).

194
B 30 (16)
B 30 (17)
B 30 (18)
Kennon Breazeale
Application du' Traite franco-siamois du 23 mars 1907:
representation des fran

INVICNTAIUE DES tlOCUMENTS SUEt L~ SIAM C

196 kennon Breazeaie
C 10 (225)
Ruel-Pelletier: mission au Siam et au Bas-Laos; rapports
de M. Voitel (1893-1895).
C 10 (239) Spire: mission botanique au Tonkin, au Laos et au Siam
(1903-1907).
C 10 (242) Taupin: mission au Laos (1889-1890).
C 10 (247) Tixier et Bernard: mission au Siam; carte de la frontiere
siamoise ( 1907 -1909).
C 10 (252) d'Urville: etude sur la question du Mekong (1894).
C 10 (265)
Wyse: projet de mission au Laos et au Cambodge; rapport
sur un projet de mission au Yunnan, au Thibet, au
Laos et au Cambodge (1865).
C 10 (266) Yersin: mission dans la vallee du Mekong (1892-1894).
Serie D: administration generate et locale
D 61
Propositions et attributions de la Legion d'Honneur a
titre etranger ou indigene ... a des princes siamois, membres
de la mission siamoise en Cochinchine (1887-1912).
Serie F: domaine, concessions, enregistrements, travail, main-d'oeuvre
F 11 (11)
Proposition faite par la mission catholique a Oubone pour
la location d'un terrain destine a un dispensaire; refus du
Gouvernement General (1909).
Serie G: population et etat"civil
G 00 (4)
Legislation: lois sur la nationalite siamoise; etat-civil
indigene; extraits de presse (1914).
Serie H: inspection et contr6le
H 20 (4) Liquidation des depenses de la mission Fesigny en 1886-
1887 dans les rapides du Mekong.
Serie N: commerce et industrie
N 10 (10)
Syndicat fran9ais du Laos: installation d'agents com·
merpiaux au Laos; incident d'Outene; rapports des agents;
paiement de la subvention allouee par l'Indocbine au syn·
dicat (1891-1893).

lM"t.NicllllHI. llf:l'l nm:t"M!{!'tJ"S !lUll LR SlAM CONSF.l\V~S AUX ARCHIVES DE PARIS 197
N I 0 (ll) Syndical fran~ais du Laos: paiement et suppression de
la subvention de l'Indochine; projet de creation d'une
agence il Phi,.ai; allocation au syndicat sur le montant de
l'iodemnite siamoise; incident Champenois; retrait de la
qualite d'ageot commercial a Dombret; note sur le syndicat
(1894-1900).
SerieS: travaux publics
S 40 (J)
Construction d'une route de Tourane a Bassac: demande
de concession des travaux (1893).
Serie V : navigation
V 71 (3} Marine marchande: lignes maritimes et postales; ligne
subventionee Saigon-Bangkok ( 1882-1903).
V 11 ( 1 1)
v 82 (4)
v 90 (1)
v 90 (4)
D~p~ches du ministre de France a Bangkok au sujet de
la convention entre l'Ostasiatiske danois et le Siam Steam
Navigation Company, et des developpements pris par les
services maritimes danois entre !'Europe et le Siam ( 1908).
Concurrence maritime entre Ia China-Siam Navigation
Company et la Nord Deutscher Lloyd pour le transport
des coolies entre Swntow et Bangkok (1911).
Projets de creation des services de navigation a vapeur
au Laos: entre Kh6ne et Pak-Moun; entre Don Tane et
Don Kbone Tong (bief de Vientiane), par les Messageries
fiuviales de Cochinchine ( 1892-1894 ).
Etude sur le cours du fleuve Mekong (1865).
IiuutewMekong: mission Reveillere (1886); exploration
et pro jet de Camille Gauthier d'etablissement d'un service
de navigation entre Kbong et Sampana (1887-1889);
rapport du lieutenant de vaisseau Heurtel, commandant
!'aviso l'Ailouette sur sou voyage entre Pnom-Penh et
Khbne et le passage des rapides de Preapatang (1889);
etudes sur les chutes de Kbone par Guissez (1891-1892)
et par Leroy (1891).

i~S
v 90 (5)
v 90 (6)
v 90 (7)
v 90 (8)
v 90 (9)
v 90 (11)
v 90 (12)
v 91 (2)
v 91 (3)
v 91 (4)
v 91 (7)
v 91 (8)
t

'l'
INVENTAIRE DES DOCUMENTS SUR LE SIAM CONSERVES AUX ARCHIVES DE PARIS 199
NF 286 (3)
NF 287
NF 294
NF 301
• NF 314
NF 317
NF 321
NF 544
NF 570
NF 577
NF 615
NF 651
Assistance medicale au Siam: rapport sur l'lnstitut
Pasteur a Bangkok (1917); vacance du poste de pharmacien
a Bangkok (1919).
Contribution de l'Indochine aux depenses occasionees par
l'entretien de la legation de Bangkok et du consulat de
Battambang (1902-1904).
Designation de medecins a des postes chinois et siamois
( 1902-1913 ).
Projet de reouverture du poste medical consulaire a
Oubone (1923). Fermeture du poste ( 1928) .
Consulats franvais d'Extreme-Orient: intervention du
Comite du Commerce et de l'lndustrie de l'lndochine en.
faveur du retablissement des consulats de Xieng-Mai et
d'Amoy (1916).
Aide apportee par le Gouvernement de l'Indochine aux
ecoles frangaises du Siam (1900-1902).
Nomination de M. Coedes ala direction de Ia Bibliotheque
royale du Siam (1917).
Lettre de M. de Montpezat, delegue de l'Annam-Tonkin
au Conseil superieur au sujet du Traite avec le Siam et
de differentes questions de details (1902-1903).
Agissements du prince Yukanthor (1900-1916); correspondance
au sujet du transfert des cendres de ce prince decede
a Bangkok (1934-1935).
Campagne de presse du Bangkok Daily Mail .contre le
mariage suppose du roi du Cambodge avec une danseuse
siamoise ( 1928).
Organisation du Laos ( 1893-1895). Rapport sur Ia reorganisation
administrativedu Laos (1899). Institution d'un
Resident Superieur au Laos (1899).
Traite fr~nco-siamois du 23 mars 1907: texte et documents
s'y rapportant. Commission de delimitation de la
frontiere siamoise ( 1904-1908).

200
NF 652
NF 654
NF 655
NF 656
NF 657
NF 658
NF 659
NF 660
NF 661
NF 663
Kennon Breazeale
Service de navigation Saigon-Bangkok (1921).
Situation des provinces de Battambang, Siemreap et Sisophon
cedees ala France par le Siam en 1907 ( 1915).
Interdiction d'exportation du riz siamois (decembre 1919).
DecrN royal du 2 fevrier 1919 concernant le titre des
monnaies divisionnaires d'argent : depeche consulaire
(1919).
Ceremonie de la cremation des restes de la mere du roi
de Siam (1920). Arrivee de M. Pila, nouveau ministre de
France a Bangkok (aoCtt 1920).
Restrictions apportees a !'exportation du riz du Siam
(septembre et decembre 1919).
Voyage en Indochine du prince Svasti (1918).
Relations economiques entre le Siam et l'Indochine ( 1918).
Voyage en Jndochine du prince de Kampengpbet (1918).
Droits d'importation et d'accise au Siam sur les vins et
spiritueux ( 1918-1919). Transport de bagages destines au
f prince Charoon (1919).
Influence frangaise au Siam; le Siam et la queue economique;
disposition d'esprit des proteges frangais au Siam;
developpement de l'enseignement du frangais au Siam
(19!6). Entrevue du ministre de France au· Siam avec
M, Sarraut (1916-1917). Projet d'addition de la langue
siamoise a l'Ecole des langues orientales ( 1917). Demande
de traduction de messages radiotelegraphiques de source
allemande (1917).
Emigration au Siam des Khas-Mouk du Laos. Creation
d'une Chambre de commerce franco-cbinoise a Bangkok
(1917).
Croisiere de M. Lefevre-Pontalis avec le resident superieur
Baudouin sur les cotes du Cambodge; navigation dans les
eaux siamoises; retrait des navires de la Compagnie des
messageries tJuviales (1917).

INVENTAl!lg DES DOCUMENTS SUR LE SIAM CONSERVES AUX ARCHIVES DE PARIS 201
NF664
NF 665
NF 666
NF 067
NF 668
NF 669
NF 670 (1)
Mouvement revolutionnaire au Siam contre Ia Birmanie
( 1915). Pirates a la frontiere du Laos (1915). Agitation
sur les frontieres indocbinoises. Operations de la China­
Siam Navigation Company (1915-1917).
Rebelles annamites au Siam (1915). Attitude des autorites
siamoises du Mekong ( 1915). Politique anglaise au
Siam (1915). Intrigues allemandes avec Ies annamites au
Siam (1916).
Agitateurs chinois anti-japonais au Siam ( 1915). Concurrence
de la compagnie Ostasiatiske de Copenhague contre
les Messageries fiuviales au Siam (1917). Modification
dans l'echelle des droits d'accise au Siam (1917). Projet
d'acbat de terrain a Xieng Mai (1917).
Voyage a Saigon de M. Lefevre-Pontalis ( 1917). Inondations
au Siam et aide de l'Indochine (1917). Rapport
siamois sur !'instruction publique et l'enseignement dans
les ecoles siamoises des langues etrangeres ( 1918). Juridiction
fran9aise au Siam (1918).
Declaration de guerre du Siam a 1' Allemagne et a 1' Autricbe
(22 juillet 1917). Participation du Siam a l'effort
commun des allies (octobre 1917). Necessite d'un programme
d'action fran9ais. Vapeurs allemands internes
au Siam ( octobre-novembre 1917). Chemins de fer siamois
(1917).
Voies de communication entre le Siam et l'Indochine
(1916-1921). Projet de voyage de M. Lefevre-Pontalis
a Saigon (1917). Service militaire au Siam (1917).
Transport de contingents siamois (1918). Politique franc;aise
et indochinoise au Siam (1918).
Chemins de fer siamois : prolongation d'une !igne indochinoise;
chemin de fer de Bangkok a Battambang ( 1903).
Relations eco~omiques entre le Siam et l'lndocbine ( 1913-
1914). Carte de la region comprise entre Bassac, Oubone
et Pakmoun.

202 Kennon Breazeale
NF 670 (2) Chemins de fer siamois (1915-1920.) Politique siamoise
vis a vis de l'Indochine (1921).
NF 671 Rapport de tournee du gerant du consulat de France a
Oubone ( 1921). Cooperation des aviations siamoise et
indochinoise (1921). Communications maritimes entre
l'lndochine et le Siam (1921). Relations politiques entre .
le Siam et l'lndochine ( 1922). Arrivee d'aviateurs siamo;s
a Hanoi ( 1922 ). Deces de !'ex-gouverneur de Bat tam bang
Phya Kathathorn ( 1922). Police sur Ia frontiere francosiamoise
(1923).
NF 672 Rapport sur Ia revision des traites franco-siamois (1918).
Visite au Siam de trois avions indochinois (1921). Rumeurs
d'extensions territoriales fran9aise et britannique
au Siam (1921).
NF 694 Delimitation de la frontiere sino_-annamite (1893-1895).
Mission Pavie: delimitation entre Ia riviere Noire et le
Mekong (1895).
NF 695 Frontiere sino-annamite: abornement de Ia frontiere entre
Ia riviere Noire et le Mekong; commuhication de laConvention
du 20 fevrier 1895 et des cartes de la Mission
Pavie (1895-1896).
NF 699 Terrains situes sur les concessions de la rive droite
du Mekong mis a la disposition de la Compagnie des
Messageries fluviales ( 1909-1910).
NF 829 Menees anti-fran9aises dans la province de Battambang .
(1883). '
NF 830
NF 831
NF 832
NF 833
Relations entre la Siam et l'Indochine. Frontiere entre
les deux pays. (1892-1893)
Rapport du Gouverneur General de l'Iridochine sur le
Laos (1894).
Exode de la population de Kratt dans la province de
Chantaboun (1906). Evacuation du paste militaire de
Kratt-Lem-Ngop ( 1907).
Relations telegraphiques entre le Siam, la Cochinchine, et
la France (1900). Relations postales entre Saigon et
Bangkok (1902-1903).

INVENT A mE DEs oocuMENTs sul1 LE siA!J doNsErW~s Aux ARCHIVEs DE PARis
NF 834
NF 835
NF 836
NF 837
NF 838
NF 903
NF 968
NF 970
'
2o3
Delimitation de la frontiere du Siam avec l'Indochine
(1893).
Voyage de M. Pelligrini (vice-consul de France a Battambang)
de Korat a Battambang (1903).
Situation administrative de Luang Prabang (1893).
Mission Pavie: exploration dans le Haut-Mekong (1894).
Rapatriement des otages des principautes laotiennes qui
se retrouvent a Bangkok (1893). Reglement de !'extradition
entre le Siam et l'lndochine (1901).
Cession de mulets au gouvernement siamois (1912).
Projet de chemin de fer dans laChine meridionale (1918-
1919). Projet de chemin de fer entre le Siam et l'Indochine
( 1918 ).
Relations entrele Siam et l'lndochine. Politique exterieure
de l'Indochine. (1918-1919)
NF 1007 (3) Revision des traites franco-siamois et raccordement des
reseaux fem~s indochinois et siamois ( 1919).
NF 1050
Correspondance diplomatique relative au reseau de chemin
de fer de Birmanie et a son extension vers la Chine et le
Siam (1893-1906).
NF 1257 (1) Recompense demandee en faveur de M. Tran-Van-Chu,
secretaire de !'attache militaire au Siam.
NF 1501
Demande de remplacement pour le docteur Gayrard,
medecin du poste d'Oubone (1913). Demande de remboursement
d'avances faites par Patte, vice-consul a
Oubone en 1902 (1915-1917).
NF 1544 Demande de renseignements sur le petrole au Siam (1920).
NF 1582
NF 1595
NF 1795
Trace de la frontiere franco-siamoise du Mekong, etabli
par la Haute Commission permanente franco-siamoise de
delimitation du Mekong (apres 1931).
Idem.
Felicitations du gouvernement siamois adressees Iors de
son depart aM. Bose, resident superieur au Laos (1931).

204
. ' '
Kennon Breazeale
NF 1842
NF 1989
Correspondance au sujet du renouvellement du Trait~
franco-siamois : liaisons ferroriaires siamo-indochinoises
(1937).
Consulats de la France en Extrt!me-Orient (1930-39).
Consulats au Siam (1930-1931).
NF 2010 (1) Consulat du Siam: exequatur accorde a Lauretz Stang
(1905).
NF 2010 (2) Consulats du Siam en Indochine (1922-1939).
NF 2010 (3) Demande de subvention pour la publication d'un ouvrage
sur le Siam, formulee par M. Notton, ex-consul de France
a Xieng Mai (1922).
NF 2016
NF 2834
NF 2902
Extradition d'un chinois inculpe d'homicide demandee
par le Siam (1906).
Trace de la frontiere franco-siamoise d'apres les travaux
de la Haute Commission permanante franco-siamoise de
delimitation du Mekong, sessions de fevrier 1929 et de
janvier 1931.
Memorandum du ministere des affaires etrangeres siamois
relatif a des questions d'extradition (1931-1932).
Fonds Missions
Carton 64
Carton 66
Carton 70
Carton 74
Carton 80
Mission du colonel Bernard : delimitation des frontieres
avec le Siam ( 1905).
Mission de M. Leon de Rouge : projet de mission agricole
en Indochine et au Siam (1924}.
Mission du commandant de la Jonquiere : demande de
mission de delimitation des frontieres franco-siamoises
(1907}.
Mission du capitaine Malandain : carte franco-siamoise
(1909).
Missions de M. Charles Verrier en Malaisie, en Birmanie
et au Siam (1911..:1919).

INV~:NtAlllE DF.S DOCUMENtS SUR LE SIAM CONSERV~S AUX ARCHIVES DE PARIS
2fiS
Fonds Ecole Co/oniale
Volume 29 "De Tourane au bassin du Mekong, d'avril a aofit 1891.
Exploration des regions montagneuses de l'Indochine
franc;aise entre le 15' et 1e 17' de latitude nord", par G.
Trumelet-Faber, chef de batallion d'infanterie et collaborateur
de la Mission Pavie. (Rapport a 134 pages, carte,
et nombreuses photographies d'interet ethnologique; seul
volume relie).
Fonds Agence des Colonies
Carton 281
486
487
488
489
Carton 282
490
Generalites sur le Siam: rapport de M. Ernest Outrey,
"Situation economique et politique du Siam. Situation
de la France au Siam. Le Siam et l'lndochine" (mars
1918); extraits de presse et matieres imprimees (1933-
1951).
Pays voisins de l'Indochine : tourisme (messageries maritimes,
1932); chemins de fer du Siam (1923-1925, 1930 et
1933).
Situation commerciale du Siam: rapports ( 1925, 1929 et
1930); extraits de presse (1943-1944).
Ex traits de presse sur les affaires politiques du Siam ( 1932-
1952). Ex traits de presse sur l'isthme de Kra (1936-1941).
"Constitution du royaume de Siam (23 mars 1949)"
(bulletin imprime). "Le Siam: Imperialisme et ambitions
territoriales" (factum, Ministere de !'Information, 17
septembre 1945). Rapport secret sur !'organisation de
l'armee siamoise (1927).
Accords, conventions et traites entre la France et le Siam:
1856-1927 (receuil des textes). "Le conflit franco-siamois
et Ie Traite du 3 octobre 1893, par un ancien ministre"
(1902). Texte du Traite franco-siamois du 7 decembre
1937. "Accord franco-siamois (17 novembre 1946)" (texte
imprime).

206
Kenrton Breazeale
491
492
Relations entre le Siam~ la France et l'Indochine: extrait~
de presse (1920-1954).
"La securite de l'Indochine et
Pimperialisme siamois>~ (pamphlet, 1937).
Conflits entre le Siam et l'Indochine : extraits de presse
( 1940-1948). Notes documentaires et etudes au sujet de
la conciliation franco•siamoise (1946-1948).
REFERENCES
Archives Nationales, Section d'Qutre-Mer. "Guide du Chercheur". Dactylogra•
phie (19721; 10 pages.
Le Marquis de Croizier. Notice des manuscrits siamois de !a Biblioth~que nationale.
Challamel, 1887. 85 pages.
F erreol de Ferry. La serie d' Extreme-Orient du fonds des a1·chives coloniales conserve
aux archives nationales. Imprimerie nationale, 1958. 208 pages.
Ministere des Affaires Etrangeres. Etat numerique des fonds de la correspondance
politique de l'origine a 1871. Imprimerie nationale, 1936.
---· Etat numerique des fonds de la correspondance politique 1871 a 1896.
Imprimerie nationale, 1961. -
---· Etat numerique des fonds de la correspondanee consulaire et conimerciale de
1793 a .1901. Imprimerie nationale, 1961.
----· Etat nmnb·ique des fonds de la correspondance jJolitique et commercials
. 1897 a 1918. Imprimerie nationale, 197 3.
---· "Catalogue des volumes de memoires et documents". Dactylographic
(sans date).
---· "Inventaire de la serie Guerre. Plan de classement de la serie A Paix.
Inventaire de la serie Paix. (1914-1920)". Dactylographie (1970).
---· "Papiers d'Agents: Fonds des Missions Pavie". Dactylographie (sans.
date).
---· "Inventaire des livr.es jaunes". Dactylographic (sans date).

'-':'.',
ROY ALLY SPONSORED HUMAN SACRIFICES IN
NINETEENTH CENTURY CAMBODIA:
the cult of nak tii Me Sa

208 David P. Chandler
Phnom;4 at about this time~ also, according to the printed version of the
Cambodian chronicle~ two prisoners-of-war were 'offered up' nearby.s
The reference is obscure. It comes in a speech by the Cambodian
commander, Prince Sisowath, to his followers at the end of the campaign.
'I have fought with Prince Siwotha's troops [be said] for a day
and a night. Many have fled, many have been killed, and
many have been wounded. Two ordinary soldiers have been
taken prisoner. One is named A Prak and one is named A
Som. I have ordered ... [an official] ... to put them in a
boat and take them to be offered up in the province of Ba
Phnom.' 6
The chronicle says no more about the matter. One purpose of
this paper will be to suggest that the men were beheaded on Ba Phnom
in April or May, 1877 in the course of a royally-sponsored ceremony
known as loen nak ta ("raising up the ancestors") that honored the new
stac tran, the agricultural year, and a local ancestor spirit (nak ta) known
as Me Sa~ the 'white mother'.
The evidence comes largely from a Cambodian text, composed in
1944 and printed in 1971 by the Buddhist Institute in Phnom Penh as
part of a collection of documents dealing with the cult of nak t"a
throughout Cambodia.? The. central portion of this text** quotes an
elderly resident ofBa Phnom, Dok Than, as saying that human sacrifices
took place on the northeastern slopes of the mountain when he was a
boy, and he describes one of these-perhaps the last, and perhaps the one
in 1877 involving A Prak and A Som-which be attended. 8
** A translation of this text appears on pp. 218-222, below.
4) There were five of these 'royal delesates' in nineteenth century Cambodia.
Their largely ritual responsibilities c~nnected them with the areas, or dei, of
Ba Phnom, Kompong Svai, Pursat, Treang, and Thboung Khmum. See Etienne
Aymonier, Cours de Cambodgien, Saigon, 187 5, 124-125; Adhemard Leclere,
'Sdach meakh', Revue lndochinois VIII ( 1905 ), 1378-1384, and also Institut
Bouddnique (ed.) Bram racbz'dhi dvad sam:ls (Royal Festivals in the Twelve
Months), Phnom Penh, 1969, 86-88.
5) Eng Sut, 1157.
6) The boat voyage suggests that the prisoners were not native to Ba Phnom.
7) Institut Bouddhique, Brajum ri~en breh (Collected Old Stories), Phnom Penh,
1962-, Vol. VIII, 81·88.
8) Dok Than dates the ceremonies from the regime of Siwotha's grandfather, who
had died by 1877; Eng Sut, 1155.

HOYALLY SI'ONSOHED HUMAN S,\CRIFICES IN NlNETEi;;NTH CE~TURY CAMBODIA 209
The text begins by describing a small 'Chinese-style' cement temple
that had recently been built against the northeastern slope of the hill.
In 1944, the temple housed broken statues of several Hindu gods,
including a damaged one of a female divinity identified by Dok Than as
'Me Sa'. Perhaps a hundred meters to the east he said, in what was by
then 'an ordinary rice-field', human sacrifices had once been carried out.
The statue is described as follows:
'.... an upright human female, approximately sixty centimeters
tall, with her hair tucked up inside a diadem. The face
is well-rounded, even plump; the breasts are globular and
firm. The image [once had] four arms. The lower arm on
the right ... bears a rectangular object ... The upraised left
arm bears a wheel, while the lower one catches bold of the
tail of [an animal that resembles] a tiger or a lion. The
female presses against this animal with her feet ... [as if to]
lift it up ... and has a boastful expression.'
No photograph of the statue has been published, but this description
matches earlier ones by Aymonier, who visited the site in the 1880s,9
Parmentier ( 1934) and Mme. Poree-Maspero, who saw the statue in
1941, and is clearly right when she says that it represents Siva's consort,
Ume Mahisasuramardini, in the act of subduing the demon-buffalo
Mahisa. Dok Than's identification of the statue as 'Me Sa' moreover,
supports Mme. Poree-Maspero's additional assertion that the short
name is a corruption of the longer one.I 0
Uma (or Durga) Mahisasuramardini· appears to have entered the
Indian pantheon, along with other consorts of Siva, toward the beginning
of the Christian era, as part of the exchange of religious ideas that took
place in India between its Aryan and non-Aryan populations. II Images
9) Aymonier, Le Cambodge., J, 235. . .
10) Eveline Por6e-Maspero, Les rites agraires des cambodgiens. Paris and the Hague
: 1962, 8-9. · . ,
11) See R.C. Agrawala, 'The goddess Mahi.sasuramardi?.i i~ early .rndtan Art,
Artibus Asiae XXI (1958) 123-130; Sukimt BhattacharJ!, 7 he b1~1an Theogny,
Cambridge University Press, 1970, 167 and B.C. Mazumdar, Durga : her
origin and history', JouJ'nal of the Royal Asiatic Society 1906, 355-362.
R~gard
ing lndianization, 1 am using the arguments advanced ,by lao .Ma.bbett, .sa~-
r s th · t Asia' in press and Paul Mus, Cultes mdtens et tod!-
'i' t'
scn tza !On oh ou' eaBs ll t' 'd l'E''col~ Francase d'Extreme Orient (BEFEO)
genes au C ampa , u e m e

210 David P. Chandler
of the goddess were widespread in eastern and southern India during the
Pallava period in the second half of the first millenium AD.t2 A temple
at Mahaballipuram near Madras, for example, is dedicated to her.ll
This was the era, too, of the most intensive 'Indianization' of much of
Southeast Asia, and it is not surprising that images of the goddess are
plentiful in the art of early Java.14
During this same period, Uma Mahisasuramardini was a popular
subject of Cambodian sculpture. Over twenty free-standing statues,
and half a dozen bas-reliefs of her have been noted, IS ranging in time
from the seventh to the tenth centuries AD and over space from the
Camau peninsula in southernmost Vietnam (then populated by Khmer)
to a brick temple about thirty kilometers north of Angkor. By and large,
XXXIII (19 33) 3 67-410. For Indian myths surrounding Mahisasuramardini,
see P. V. Kane, History of the Dharmasastra, Poona, 19 58-1969, Vol. V. 157-
163; F.E. Pargiter (trans.) Markandeya Pnrana, Calcutta, 1904, 473-488; K.
van Kooij, Worship of the Goddess according to the Kalikapurana: Part I,
Leyden: 1971, 94 ff. and W.C. Blaquiere, 'The Rudiradaya, or sanguinary
chapter, translated from the Calica Puran', Asiatic!~ researches V (1799) 369-
391.
12) See A. Coomaraswami, The Al't of India and Indonesia, New York, 1965, 103
and Odette Viennot, 'The goddess Mahisiisuramardini in Kushana art', A.rtibus
Asiae XIX (1956) 360-373.
13) See Heinrich Zimmer, The Art of Indian .1sia, New York, 1954, Plates 210,
· 234, 284 and 288.
14) J. Knebel, "De Dorga-vorstellung in de Becldebouwkunst en Literatur der
Hindoes", Tijdscrift voor Inclische Taal-, Land-en Volkenkunde (TBG) XLIV
(1903) 213-240 lists over thirty Javanese images. See alsoP. Pott, Yoga and
Yantra, The Hague, 1966, 86: "The number of representations of Durga
Mahisasuramardini in Javanese sculpture is incredibly large. In Java, this
is the form par exellence of Devi.'
15) For a description of the cult in pre-Angkorean Cambodia, see Kamalswar
Bhattacharya, Les religions brahmaniqu1,s dans ['ancien Cambodge, Paris, 1961,
91-9 2 and 155-15 6. Pierre Dupont, La statuaire j)re-angkoriemze, Ascona,
19 55, 139-140 argues that the cult developed among the Khmer in the seventh
century AD, and Jean Boisselier, Le Cambodge, Paris, 1966, 293 agrees. For
notices or plates of the free-standing representations of the goddess, see Ay·
monier, Le Cambodge, II, 359; BEFEO XXXIV (19 34), 746 and XXXVII (1937)
62 7; Boisselier, loc. cit.; R. Dalet, 'Quelques nouvelles sculptures khmeres,'
BEFEO XXXV, (1935), 158; Dupont, Le statuaire, Plates 25B, 28B, 31B, 32,
38A, 38D, 39,43 A-C; Sherman Lee, Ancient Cambodian Art, New York, 1970,
Plate 15; Louis Malleret, L'arcMologie du delta du Melwng, Paris, 1959-1963,
I, 67, 159, 432-433 and figure 96; IV, 39, 56, 84 and plate 12; Henri Parmentier,
!}art khmer primiti.f, Paris, 1927, 313 and H. Parmentier, 'Complement
a l'art khmer primitif' BEFEO XXXV (193 5), 35.

HOY ALl. y SI'ONSOI\Ell I-lUMAN SACRIFICES IN NINETEENTH CENTUHY CAMBODIA 211
the statues arc of an earlier date than the bas-reliefs,t6 and all but two
of them come from southern and southeastern Cambodia and Vietnam
rather than from the neighborhood of Angkor, where all but two of th;
bas~relicfs have been found.
The statue at Ba Phnom seems to be in a transitional style, and
resembles another image of the goddess discovered in Kompong Cham
province in 1934 by R. Dalet.t7 Both depict the goddess mounted on
an unrecognizable animal carved in the round while other statues show
her standing on a square base where the head of a buffalo has been carved
in bas-relief. The livelier pose is popular in the generally later
bas-reliefs, like those from the temples of Bakong and Banteai Srei.
Tentatively, the statue of "Me Sa" can be dated from the second half of
the eighth century AD. There is no written evidence that the statue was
in situ earlier than the 1880s, when it was described by Aymonier.
However, the statue may well have been on Ba Phnom for
hundreds of years, for the mountain is an ancient inhabited site,ts and
George Coedes argued in 1928 that the capital of the early kingdom
known to Chinese travellers as 'Funan' was located at its base.t9 Although
this view was later modified20 a city was nearby in the tenth
century AD.2t The earliest inscription found on the mountain mentions
a devotion to Siva, and dates from 629 AD. 22 In the tenth century.
another inscription refers to Ba Phnom as a 'holy mountain'. 23 The
16)
17)
18)
19)
20)
21)
22)
23)
For bas-reliefs, see Bhattacharya, Les religions, Plates 9-11 and Parmentier,
'Complement', 35.
Dalet, 'Quelques nouvelles sculptures',loc, cit. . .. , . . .
For a discussion of the terms ba and me, see Francots Martlm, De la stgntft·
cation de BA et ME affix~ aux noms des monuments khmers', BEFEO XLIV I 1
(1954) 201-210 andL. Malleret, L'areheologie, I, ~56 ff ..
G. Coedes, 'La tradition geneologique des premters rots d'Angkor', BEFEO
XXVIII (1928), 124-144.
G. Coedes, 'Quelques precisions sur le fin du Funan', BEFEO XLIII (19.43-
1946), 4; Malle ret, L'arch6ologie, I, 423-425. On the absence of ar:heologtc.al
sites on Ba Phnom see Dupont, Le statuaire, 17-18 and the plates tn P. Pans,
'Anciens canaux ;econnus sur photographes aeriennes', BEFEO XLI (1941).
365-373. . · · 937 1966 VI
G, Coedes (ed.) Les Inscriptions du Cambodge, HanoL and Pans, 1 • , ,
115. 53 · · r 25 c 1
R.C. Majumdar, lnscdptions of Kambuja, Calcutta~ 19 , mscnp ton cassified
by Coedes, Inscriptions, VIII, 84 as K. 60). ·
Aymonicr, Le Cambodge, I, 283.

212 David P. Chandler
latest inscription there was carved toward the end of 1877; this inscription
celebrates Buddhist ceremonies sponsored in a local wat by the newly
installed stac trlin, and mentions the reassertion of Norodom's control
over the region.24
The phrase me sa, with the meaning of guardian spirits in general,
occurs in two nineteenth century Cambodian texts preserved by the
Buddhist Institute in Phnom Penh. One describes ·a purification
ceremony, sponsored by King Ang Duang, which was held at the royal
capital of Udong in July-August 1859.25 The other is an oath used in
Cambodian civil trials, known as the Pranidhan.26 Both texts contain
long list.s of me sa, associating each one with a particular site. The text
from 1859 begins its list with the me sa of Udong. The me sa of Ba
Phnom is not mentioned in this text, but the Pranidhan opens its list
with the me sa of Ba Phnom, putting the guardian spirit of Udong in
second place.27 Since Udong was abandoned as Cambodia's royal
capital in favor of Phnom Penh in 1866, the Pranidhan (which makes no,
mention of Phnom Penh) is probably at least as old as that. Both texts are
interesting in their own right, and would reward comparative analysis. 28
What is important for our purposes is that the phrase me sa meant something
like 'guardian spirit of Udong', if not of the whole kingdom, as
24) Aymonier, Le Cambodge I, 234; numbered by Coedes asK. 59. In the rubbing
of K. 59 in the Bibliotheque Nationale in Paris, the personal name of the stac
tl'aiZ is illegible.
25) Institut Bouddhique (ed.) Bram 1·ac pidhi dvad samas II, 172-179. For an incomplete
and often inaccurate translation, see Adhemard Leclere, Cambodge:
fetes civiles et religieuses, Paris, 1916, 8 1-95.
26) The text is numbered MCC 56.036 in the archives of the Institut Bouddhique
in Phnom Penh and dates from 1941. I am grateful to Pech Thinh for providing
me with a typescript. Leclere, Cambodge: fetes civilrs 634 ff. has a translation
of another version of this oath, from Kampot in the 18.90s.
27) In the list translated by Leclere (note 26, above), the first me sa is associated
with 'Phnom Bat' .
. 28) The toponyms in the 1859 text, many of which were identified by Leclere in'
his translation, include archaeological sites like Phnom Krom and Phnom
Bakheng near Angl

HOYAJ.LY Sl'ONSOHEO HUMAN SACHIFICES IN NINE1'EENTH CENTURY CA~1DOOIA 213
Guesdon suggests, 29 less than twenty years before the sacrifices recalled
by Dok Than in 1944 allegedly took place. The importance of Ba Phnom
as the central locus of the cult can be inferred from the fact that only
two small villages (and not hundreds) in Cambodia are called 'Me Sa'
and there is no evidence, from the printed corpus of Cambodian legends,
that a nak ta of this name was worshipped anywhere but on Ba Phnom.30
To this cluster of associations between Uma (Durga) Mahisasuramardini,
human sacrifice, royal patronage, purification, Ba Phnom and a
species of guardian spirit known in the nineteenth century as me sa, a few
supplementary points can be made. One is that the goddess Mahisasuramardini
was sometimes associated with ritual suicide, and perhaps with
human sacrifices in Pallava India-that is, at the time when Indianization
was most extensive in Cambodia and when images of this goddess were
most popular there. 3 ' Another point, reinforcing the links between royal
patronage, mountains, and human sacrifice comes from Wat Ph'u in
southern Laos, where a twelfth century inscription incidentally refers to
an image of Mahisasuramardini. 3 2 The site was the center of q cult
honoring Siva in very early times, and a Chinese visitor around 600 AD
reported that
•on the summit of the hill there is a temple, guarded at all
times by a thousand soldiers, This is dedicated to [Siva] and
human beings are sacrificed there. Each year the king goes
to the temple and makes a human sacrifice at night.m
29)
30)
31)
32)
33)
Joseph Guesdon, Dictimmaire C

214 David P. Chandler
Charles Archaimbault records that memories of this custom were
embedded in Lao oral traditions in the 1950s.34 Oral tradition from
the eleventh century Sivaite site of Phnom Chisor in southern Cambodia,
likewise, associates the temple with living, disembodied heads. 35
The beheadings witnessed by Dok Than, and mentioned obliquely
in the Cambodian chronicle, are examples of an ancient and at one time
nearly universal tradition, studied in many cultures by many authors,
whereby human beings are beheaded at planting time, often in honor of
a goddess of the soil. 36
Annual imperial sacrifices in China and Vietnam,
for example, are muted examples of this tradition, and so are the yearly·
buffalo-sacrifices that have been attested in so much of modern Southeast
Asia.37 What is unique about the nineteenth century sacrifices in Cam-
34) Charles Archaimbault, 'Le sacrifice du buffle a W'at P'ou' France-Asie (F-A)
118-120 ( 19 56) 840, See also Pierre Lintingre, 'Legendes du Sud-Laos',
Bulletin des Amis du Royaume Lao Nos 7-8 (1972) 213 ff. .
35) Jnstitut Bouddhique, Brajum riociz pren VI, 56 ff.
36) For general surveys of the phenomenon, see J.G. Frazer, The Golden Bough,
(12 vols.) London, 1955 and E. Hogg, Cannibalism and Human Sacrifice, London
1958. More specialized studies, dealing with eastern and southern Asia
include M.N. Das, 'Suppression of human sacrifice among hill-tribes of Orissa'
Man in India (MI) XXXVI ( 1956) 21-48; W. Eberhard, Cultures of South and
East Asia, Leyden, 1969; E. Erkes, 'Menschenopfer und kannibalismus in alten
China' Der E1·dball II I (1926) 1-6; Christoph von Furer-Haimendorf, 'Beliefs
concerning human sacrifice among the Hill Reddis', MI, XXIV (1944) 11-28;
£.A. Gait, 'Human sacrifices in ancient Assam', .Journal of the Royal Asiatic
Society of Bengal (JRASB) LXVIII (1898) 56-65; R. Heine Geldern, 'Kopfjagd
und menscbenopfer in Assam und Burma .. ' Mittelzmgen der anthtopologische
Gesselschaft in W ien XLVII ( 19 17) 1-65; R. Mitra, 'Human sacrifices in ancient
India', .lRil.SB XLV (1876) 76-118; Severine'Silva, 'Traces of human sacrifice
in Kanara', AnthrojJos L (1955) 577-592 and H.G. Quaritch Wales, Religion
and Prehistoty in Southeast Asia, London 19 57,
37) See, for example, Charles Archaimbault, 'Religious Structures in Laos', Joul'nal
of the Siam Society (JSS) LII/1 (January 1964) 57-74; E. Aymonier, 'Notes sur
les cofitumes at croyances superstitieuses des cambodgiens' E & R XVI (1883)
17 8; Georges Condominas, 'Notes sur le tam bo mae baap aa kuon", International
Archives of Ethnography XLVII, 127-159 and G. Condominas, L'exotique est
quotidien, Paris, 1965, 168 ff; P. Guillemenet, 'Le sacrifice du buffle chez Ies
Bahnar de Ia province de Kontum', Bulletin des Amis de Vieux I-Iue (BAVH)
XXIX-XXX (1942), 118-1 54; R. Hoffet, 'Les Mois de Ia chaine annamitique',
La Geographic LIX/1 (1933) 1-43, A. Leclere, Cambodge: fetes civiles, 577 ff;
Paul Levy, 'Le sacrifice du buffle et le prediction de tempts a Vientiane',
lnstitut lndochinois pour l' Etude del' Homme (IIEH) VI (1943) 69-91, and Andre·
Souyris Rolland, 'Contribution a I' etude du culte des Genies ou Neak ta chez
les cambodgiens du Sud', Bulletin de la Societe des Etudes Indochinoises (BSEI)
XXVI (1951) 162'·173.

ROYALLY SPONSOHED HUMAN SACHIFJC(;;S IN NINETEENTH CENTURY CAMBODIA 215
bodia is that they took place in a Theravada Buddhist nation and enjoyed
royal patronage. In tribal parts of Cambodia 1 in the mountains of
Vietnam, and in southern Laos, there is evidence that human sacrifices
of this general kind occurred from time to time in the nineteenth
century,3s But these sacrifices were among people not yet converted to
Theravada Buddhism (in Cambodia and Laos) or to any of the religions
with official standing in Vietnam.
The explanation for this anomaly does not lie necessarily in nineteenth
century Cambodia (or the region around Ba Phnom) being 'more
primitive' or 'less Buddhist' than other places on the mainland of
Southeast Asia. Instead, as the two texts and other pieces of evidence
reveal, there seems to have been a royal association with the mountain,
carried out in the person of the institutionally 'Hindu' stac tran, who
were the figures linking the king's ceremonial power with the surrounding
regions of Cambodia.3 9 Indeed, only three sites are associated with
ritual beheadings in nineteenth century Canibodia : Ba Phnom, Thboung
Khmum, and Kompong Svai;4° each was the seat of power of one of the
five stac tran.
3 8) Citations include R. Baradat, 'Les Samre ou Pear' BEFEO XLI (1941) 76;
Brengues, 'Notes sur les populations de Ia region des montagnes des cardamomes"
JSS II (1905) 32; Claeys, 'A propos d'un sacrifice rituel. . .',Far
Eastern Association of Tropical medicine, Tenth Congress, Hanoi, 19 3 8, Transactions,
848; Guillemenet, 'Lc sacrifice du buffle., .', 131; P. Guillemenet,
Crmtumier de la Tribtt Bahnar, Paris, 1952, 58 n.; Hoffet, 'Les Mois .. .' 42
and Erik Seidenfaden, 'Appreciation of the Callier of BEFEO' JSS XXXIII/I
(January, 1941) 45.
39) On the connections between stac tr7in and the court 'brahmans' or baku, see
Leclere, Cambodge : fetes civiles, 610. Aymooier, Cours de cambodgien, 125
states that the stac tri:in shared with the king (and with no one else) the power
to order capital punishment. In Le Cambodge I, 235, Aymonier writes that the
annual sacrifices to Me Sa at Ba Phnom took place in the month· of pisallh
(April-May) which, according to Leclere, Cambodge: fetes civiles 575 is sacred
to Kali-a statement echoed by a nineteenth century Khmer manuscript {Fonds
Indochinois 129 E) in the Bibliotheque Nationale in Paris.
40) Poree-Maspero, Rites agraires, 246, 248. See also Adh6mard Leclere, Recherche
str.r le Droit Public des C(ombodgiens, Paris 1894, 189, which associates
stac trl:in with human sacrifices, as they took .office, in the early nineteenth
century.

216 David P. Chandler
Another reason for the persistence of human sacrifices at Ba Phnom
may have been the coexistence, at the popular level, of Indian religions
there long after the conversion of the people to Theravada Buddhism.
Jean Moura, writing of the 1870s, calls the region the 'most Hinduized'
in Cambodia;4I in the 1860s, a German visitor, Bastian, had noticed
'local Brahmans wandering about or begging alms', 42 and prayers
invoking Siva and Kali by name were still being recited at village festivals
(especially ones associated with the nak ta) in this part of Cambodia
in the 1950s.43
The sacrifices at Ba Phnom came at the end of an annual ceremony
known as !oeil nak tii ('raising up the ancestors'). This festival still
occurs throughout Cambodia at the beginning of the growing season,
and its extensive regional variations have been studied by French and
Cambodian scholars. 44 Dok Than recalls that
'In former times the festival of /oen nak {a [at Ba Phnom]
occupied three, five or even seven days. All the officials who
were dependent on [the stac triin of] Ba Phnom assembled
and made their shelter on the grounds of wat Vihear Thorn,
about a kilometer northwest of "Me Sa".'
Buddhist monks were called in, he continues, to recite unspecified
prayers at the wat in the early days of the festival, and also to pray for
the dead (dar)4S at the cult sites of 'Me Sa' and at those of three other
nak ta, located respectively to the north, south and west. There was
Buddhist clerical participation, then, in the non-violent aspects of the
cult of nak ta. 4 6 In teres tingly, too, the sites of the 11 ak ta mentioned in
the passage stand at the corners of a roughly rectangular line, taking in
41) Moura, Royaume dzt Cambodge I, 173. See also Aymonier, Le Cambodge I. 174,
231 and 256.
42) A Bastian, 'Remarks on the Indo-Chinese Alphabets', JRAS III (1868) 69.
43) Institut Bouddhique, Brah racpidhi II, 183-184; Institut Bouddhique, Brajztm
rioei2 preh VIII 39-40; 56; 138 and 18 2. See also Souyris Rolland, 'Contribu·
tion', 171-172.
44) For a general analysis, see Institut Bouddhique Brah racpidhi IT, 1-36 and my
review of Institut Bouddhique Brajum rioen p1·en VIII, JSS LXI/2 (July 1973)
218-221.
45) Guesdon, Dictionnai1·e, 611.
46) Cf. Leclere, Cambodge: Fetes civiles, 576, where monks retire before a buffalo
is sacrificed to a nak ta,

1\0YA Lt. y Sl'ONSOHtW HUMAN SACRIFICES IN NINETEENTH CENTURY CAMBODIA 217
at least the eastern slopes of the Ba Phnom,47 just as the four other
regions governed by stac tran were located to the southeast, north, northwest
and northwest of Ba Phnom-that is, at the corners of a massive
rectangle surrounding the hill itself, suggesting that it was thought of at
one time as the central district of the five and, via the cult of 'Me Sa'.
the holiest and most important. 48
The sacrifices at Ba Phnom that seem to have taken place in 1877
were political ones, in a sense, which is perhaps why they are mentioned
in the chronicle. Prince Siwotha had been linked, through his mother's
family with Ba Phnom; he had a following there;49 and his rebellion
against Norodom might have succeeded had the king not benefitted from
timely and extensive French assistance.so Several millenarian rebels
earlier in the century had rallied forces around Ba Phnom.Sl Perhaps
possession of the cult-site, or sponsoring a sacrifice there, was synomomous
with legitimation. In any case, the rapidity with which Norodom
nnmcd a new royal delegate to the region, and the way that this reassertion
of political control is celebrated in the 1877 inscription, strongly
suggest that the cult site was politically important to him and to his
regime.
In closing, the persistence of a royally-sponsored cult honoring a
consort of Siva with human victims in the late nineteenth century would
indicate that Indian religion was less vestigial outside the confines of the
47)
48)
49)
50)
51)
See below, and Aymonier, Le Cambodge I, 161.
By tbe mid nineteenth century, the dei of Treang, greatly reduced in size, was
actually located west of Ba Phnom, rather than to the south near what is ~~w
the southern Vietnamese province of Soc Trang; see Maller~t, A1·cheolog1e, I
139; at one time, however, this dei probably inclu?ed most o~ th~ Mekong
Delta. The map enclosed with G. Aubaret's t~ansi,ahon oft~e Gw-Dmh. Tlwng
CM (Histoire et Description de Ia Basse Cochmchme.) ~am, 1863 hsts the
royal capital, Udong, as the capital of Treang, located to tts southwes;. .
M. de Villemereuil (ed.) Explol'ations et Missions de Doudart de Lagree, Pans,
1883,344.
Archival sources indicate that Frep.ch s~pport in putting down the rebellion
·a for Norodom's acceptmg a French-sponsored programme of
was a qm pro quo · 6 f
. ·n February 1877 See FOM Indochtne A-30 (2 ), letter rom
re f orms ear 1 ter 1 , • .
Duperre to Minister of Colonies, 12 February 1877.
For some examples, see Lecl~re, Histoire, 252,287, 334, 376,415 and 457;
Eng Sut, 1125, and Moura, Royaume, 143, 162 and 183.

218 David P. Chandler
court than has been thought. Likewise, the location of the cult-site of
•Me Sa• at the rough center of a rectangle marked out by the four other
locii governed by stac tran, and the occurrence of the words me sa, in at,
least two nineteenth century texts to mean 'patroness of the capital city'
all indicate that the cult of the goddess Mahisasuramardini at Ba Phnom
may have extended back for several hundred years and perhaps, under a
different name, to an era preceding 'Funan' and the introduction in
Cambodia of a recognizably Indian religion.
TRANSLATION
Nak Tii Me Sa (Ba Phnom)
A bout 1,500 meters to the east of the summit of Ba Phnom mountain,
and about 500 meters southeast of the district offices of Ba-Phnom,
there is a small hillock, approximately- 10 meters high, located at the
edge of the forest. On the top of the hillock, in the space between large
rocks lying helter-skelter against each other, there is a small shrine,
nicely made of cement, measuring approximately two meters on each
side. The building opens onto a field to the east, across which a cement
walkway has been laid, culminating in a stairway that zig-zags up the
hillock to the shrine. Inside the shrine the rear half is raised up approximately
a meter off the ground, flush against the stones of the bill, and
these stones have drawings of animals on them. Along this shelf there
are 'Brahmanical' images-some large, some handsome, but all stuck
together with cement to form heads,. arms and feet as the case may be.
On the ground in front of them is a jar for incense sticks, and two small
statues of elephants, carved out of marble. On either side of the statues
are va~es offered to the shrine by the Chinese. In front of them there
is an open space, paved with brick, wide enough for two people to kneel
side by side and make their offerings.
The shrine and its furnishings are in a Chinese style, because the
Chinese are the ones who most recently rebuilt the shrine. In former
times, the nak ta bad a (wooden) shelter (arsam) but it disappeared, and
was replaced.

ROYALLY SPONSORED HUMAN SACR!l'ICES IN. NINErEENTH CENTURY CAMBODIA 219
In the second of the three rows of statues at the back of the temple,
exactly in the middle, is the upright statue of a female, approximately
sixty centimeters tall, with her hair tucked up inside a diadem. The
face is well-rounded, even plump; the breasts are globular and firm.
The
image [once had] four arms. The lower arm on the right side, thrust
forward, bears a rectangular object, slightly indented ... the upraised
left arm bears a wheel. The lower one, reaching down, catches hold of
the tail of [an animal t4at resembles] a tiger or a lion. The female
presses down with her feet as if to lift the animal up. The statue stoops
a little to the right, giving the impression that it is trying bard to lift
up the beast; and has a boastful expression ...
An old man named Dok Than, seventy years old, from the village
of Rong Dam rei, near the northern slopes of Ba Phnom, who showed us
around the shrine, said, 'This is the statue of nak t'a MeSa, the most
important of all the nak ta in Ba Phnom. Her cult site is the one most
honored by the people of the district. This has been true since ancient
times, and it is true today.'
There are fourteen other statues of nak tii there, of secondary importance.
About fifty centimeters in front of the statue of Me Sa, there
are two (statues of) nak ta, on either side of a space opening in front of
her. These are [sometimes] called the nak t'ii of the gates; others call
them the nak tii of right and left.
Approximately ten meters in front of them (at the foot of the
stairs ?) is the place where buffaloes are sacrificed to the nak ta. A
hundred meters further east is the place where human beings were
sacrificed in former times. Nowadays, this is an ordinary rice-field.
1~ former times-1 have no idea ·of the date, for people's memories
are tmprectse-
· · t
ra
dt'tt'on asserts that a man was
.
beheaded
.
every year as
an o
· t k - Me Sa Sacrifices were sttll betng made (as recently
ff enng o na ta . _
as the 1860s and 1870s) in the era of kralahom Pang, thommadechou Haen
an d h d h Tel
. * who succeeded each other as governors of Ba
t omma ec ou ,
Phnom.
*that is, in the I860sand 1870s. See Eng Sut, Akkasar, pp.ll55·1156.

220 David P. Chandler
An elderly man, Dok Than, related that approximately sixty years
ago, during the administration of Tei (sic) he had twice been present at
sacrifices at Ba Phnom. According to him, men or animals were killed
and offered to the nak ta on a Saturday in the month of ches, (May-June)
either during the waxing or the waning phases of the moon. According
to ... the governing official [nearby] at Kompong Trabek, the sacrifices
took place on a Wednesday, during the waxing phase of the moon in the
month of ches; an old man named In Va, aged seventy-three, however,
who wor~s as an adviser (ajar) at wat Prasat in the district of Kompong
Trabek, s·aid that the festival occurred on either Tuesday or Saturday
in the waxing phase of the moon in the month of pissakh {April-May)
or che"s.
In former times, the festival of loe1i nak r""a used to occupy three,
nve or even seven days. All the officials dependent on Ba Phnom
assembled and made their shelters on the grounds of wat Vihear Thorn,
about a kilometer northwest of Me Sa. To this place monks were invited
to recite prayers. In the mornings, they would [perform the Buddhist
rituaL known as] dar* at various places, including the cult-site of nak .ta
Me Sa, the cult site of nak t'a krohom ko ('Red Neck') to the north of the
hillock; the cult site of nak ta sap than ('Everyplace') on the slopes of
the larger mountain, to the west, and nak ta tuol chhnean (Fishing-Basket
Mound') to the south. These prayers were recited every day until
Saturday, the day of the festival of loen nak ta.
As for the victims, only a man under sentence of death for a serious
crime was chosen. He was informed of the choice beforehand, and was
allowed to go and watch the activities [at the wat] just as if be were an
ordinary man.
On the execution day, the victim was put into a neck-stock.and led
off to the sacrifice-site. The file of people behind him made a clamorous
noise as they moved; in front and behind him were soldiers carrying
swords, spears and :fire-arms, followed by about a thousand people.
The file moved off [first] to the cult site of nak t'a prah sruk (Lord of the
district), about :five hundred meters east of wat Vihear Thorn. The people
paused there to honor the nak ta by setting off :firecrackers and rifles.
* prayer for the dead

ROYALLY SPONSORED HUMAN SACRIFICES IN NINETEENTH CENTURY CAMBODIA 221
When this was over, the victim was led off to Me Sa, approximately 800
meters to the south. Here the site was properly prepared for the sacrifice,
and the people humbly asked the ncik t'a to help them to be healthy
and fortunate, to help the governing officials and all their assistants, and
also the ordinary people. They joined together, too, in asking that enough
rain fall, and at the proper times.
When the prayers were finished, the crowd shouted yak oieu three
times, and then the exeutioner, who was entitled monu ('intelligence')
and whose given name was In, holding a sword, danced hesitantly around
the victim and then cut off his head with one stroke. The people looked
to see what direction the victim's blood fell. If it fell evenly, or spurted
up, then rain would fall evenly over the entire district. But if the blood
fell to one side, rain would fall only on that side of the district.
At this point, rifles were fired off, and firecrackers lit, and there
were all kinds of loud explosions. When people who had assembled at
· other cult sites-that is, those of nak ta krohom ko, nak ta sap than and
nak ta trw! clz!memi heard the explosions from the cult site of Me Sa, they
fired off rifles and set off firecrackers, too, in honor of these nak ta.
In the meantime, the victim's head was impaled and offered up
(thvay) to nak ta Me Sa, and so were a hundred pieces of his flesh. Fifty
pieces were impaled on a stick and offered to nak ta sap than and fifty
others were offered to nak ta tuol chhnean.
In the era of thommeadejou Tei, people gave up killing men, and
sacrificed buffaloes instead. Only rutting buffaloes were chosen, which
were valued at more than 50 riels.
The character of the festival, however, was unchanged, and people
made the same predictions about rainfall from a buffalo's falling blood
as from a man's. When the buffalo was killed, its flesh, too, was divided
up; one hundred pieces went to Me Sa; one leg was offered to nak ta
krohom ko and another was offered to nak ta sap than but nak ta tuol
chhneaiz, it seems, was no longer honored. Perhaps the cult of this nak
ta had been abandoned for a long time, since his cult site was far away.

222 David P. Chandler
There was one innovation in these buffalo-sacrifices. If at the time
it was being prepared for excution the buffalo ran off, this was a sign
that the nak {a would not accept it, and another buffalo was purchased
to be sacrificed in its place.
In the years of thommeadechou Plun, the sacrifice of buffaloes was
abandoned, and live ones were offered (symbolically) instead. About
twenty years ago (c. 1924) people began to sacrifice a pig instead of a
buffalo, but afterwards even this stopped, and now (1944) the sacrifice
takes the form of an offering of cooked pork, purchased at the market ....
from
Institut Boundhique (comp.) Brajum Rioeh Breh (Collected
oldstories)PhnomPenh, 1971-Vol. VIII, 81-88.

EPIGRAPHIC AND HISTORICAL STUDIES NO. 14,
INSCRIPTION OF THE SIVA OF KA~BEN BEJRA
by
A. B. Griswold and Prasert ~a Nagara
Introduction
The majestic bronze statue of Siva in Fig. 1, which was cast in 1510,
was the subject of a scandal in in 1886. A German merchant named
Rastmann had noticed it a year or two earlier in the ruins of the Brahmin
temple in the old town of Kat11ben Bejra ( Gampeng Pet), where it was
held in great esteem by the inhabitants; and wishing to acquire it for
the Berlin Ethnographic Museum, be cut off its head and hands; then,
upon his return to Bangkok, he made an official request to the Siamese
authorities for the rest of the statue. Instead of granting the request,
the authorities confiscated the head and hands; but in order to avoid
offending the German Government King Rama V caused a bronze replica
of the statue to be cast, which he sent as a present to the German Crown
Prince,!
The original statue, with its head and hands restored to it, was
placed in the Vuti. Hna Museum, which became part of the Bangkok
National Museum in 1924. The statue remained there until a few years
ago, when it was transferred to the newly opened museum at Ka!!lbeil
Befra.
'
Engraved on the upper surface of the bronze base of the statue is an
inscription of three lines, running counterclockwise around the god's feet.
Each line, because it makes a 90-degree turn at each corner, is split into
four sections. The arrangement is shown in the following diagram, in
which the Arabic numeral represents the number of the line, while the
lower-case Roman numeral after the slant represents the section: 1/i is
the portion of line 1 in front. of the god's toes; 1/ii is the portion alongside
the god's left foot (i.e. at the spectators's right); 1/iii is the portion
behind the god's heels; 1/iv is the portion alongside his right foot; and
so on.
1) Fournereau, Le Siam anciell, p. 180 ff.

224
'
\
w
'
....
<
I
I
I
I
'
1\)
\
\
'
....
<
' \
1-'
'
....
<
,_,..._.-- ,_,.,.....
)""'-
/
I
/
I'
/
/
lll/E
TH/

EPIGRAPHIC AND HlSTORICAL STUMlES 225
The inscription is dated in Sakaraja 1432, in the sixth month, i.e.
around April1510 A.D.
for the period.
The writing is just about what we should expect
The engraving is very shallow, and obliterated in places,
so the following remarks must be accepted with due reservations.
The
mai-han-akasa, which occurs frequently, is placed over the final consonant
of syllables rather than the initial: 11~; ( = i111i ), 1/iii; !llt ( = llU),
2/i (twice), 2/ii, 2/iii, 3/iii; 1i ( = •"'~'~ ), 2/i; ,; ( = i'l ), 2/iii; ui ( = Ju),
2/iii, 2/iv; 1'1{ ( = 1'1.,~ ), 2/iv; 1m~ ( ='fl.,, ), 3/iv. The mai-ban-akasa,
however, does not entirely supersede the older method of expressing the
same~: sound by reduplicating the final consonant : uuu ( = Ju), 3/i, ii; '11~"~
( = '11~ ), 2/iv, 3/iii, 3/iv. The mai-ek accent occurs in uri, 2/iii; d·:n", 2/iii;
miu ( = ~tltl ), 2/iii; ri ( =; ), 2/iii; qJfllJ, 3/ii; and perhaps .J,~, 3/i. The
mai-do ( ") has superseded the accent •, which was formerly used for
the same purpose, and it is usually, but not always, placed over the last
letter of the syllable; it occurs in the following words: ~ii' ( = ~u ), 1/i;
Ufll ( = !Ia') ), ljii; 1~", 1/ii, 1/iii; 'i'!tlj:J ( = CJielJ ), 2/1; W~~. 2/ii; a·n", 2/iii;
01
1M, 2/iii, 3/iii; ~~ ( = W'll ), 2/iv; t'\11 ( = '11 1') ), 2/iv; '11~"~ ( = '112:~ ), 2/iv, 3/iii,
3jiv; mi'u ( = ,fu ), 3/i, 3/ii; wi' ( = wr, ), 3/ii, 3/iii; but elsewhere in the
inscription some of these words are written without an accent. It is often
~ ~ . ~ ~
difficult to distinguish the vowel from . . The vowels and do not
occur.
The inscription was published in 1885 in the Saigon periodical
Excursions et reconnaissances, with an eye-copy and transcription by the
missionary Pere Schmitt, and a French translation by A. Lorgeou. 2 Their
work reappeared in 1895 in Fournereau's Le Siam ancien. 3 A new
Romanized transcription and French translation were published by the
late George Coedes in 1924.4 The Siamese text was published at the
same time in Prajum siliicarik Syam. 5 A version in modernized spelling,
2) ibid., p. 18 6 note 1. .
3) ibid., p. 185-188. . .
4) Coedes, Recueil des ilzscriptions dtt Siam, I, Bangkok, 1924, pp. 157-159 (XIII:
Inscription du Qiva de Klif!lbeh Bejra) ·
•.
5) ~rajum Silacari:k Syam, 1, Bangkok, BE 2467, p. 157 f. (No. 13); second edttton,
. Bangkok, BE 2500.

226 A. B. Griswold and Prasert !}a Nagara
together with the photograph we reproduce in Fig. 2, is printed in
J?rajum cat-hmay hetu samaya Ayudhyii. 6
So far as we have been able to discover, no rubbing of the inscription
has ever been published, and no complete photograph. The engraving
of the letters in the bronze is so shallow that a clear rubbing is almost
impossible. We have used a pencil rubbing kindly supplied by the Department
of Fine Arts; and though most of it is legible enough in itself,
it would yield nothing more than a blur if photographed for reproduction.
Instead we publish a reproduction of Pere Schmitt's eye-copy (Fig. 3).7
This might normally be considered a very risky procedure, as most of
Schmitt's work, done at a time when the study of Siamese epigraphy was
still in its infancy, falls far short of perfection, and his Romanized transcription
of the present text is full of faults; but the eye-copy (Fig. 3) is
surprisingly good, as we discovered when we compared it with the partial
photograph in Fig. 2 and with our rubbing. In Coedes's Rornanized
transcriptions and the Siamese text published in .frajum siliiciirlk Syiim,9
most of the indicators of accents and the mai-han-akasa are given their
normal modern position in relation to the ak~aras, whereas the eye-copy
in Fig. 3 shows them in the same relative position as in the bronze; and
in several places the eye-copy permits a better reading than appears in
any of the transcriptions published up to now. True, there are inaccuracies
in the eye-copy, but as far as possible we have called attention to
them in the Appendix (p. 236-237) and corrected them in our transcription
(p. 232). Some small errors, chiefly involving the presence or absence of
a mai-han-akasa or an accent, may have escaped us in passages where
our rubbing is indistinct; but these 1
we hope, will not cause any substantial
misinterpretation of the text.
The eye-copy in Fig. 3 follows a different arrangement from our
transcription: the portions of all three-lines in front of the god's toes are
shown in section I, those alongside his left foot in section II, and so on.
In order to read them in the proper sequence one must read the four
6) ,Prajum cat-hmay he!u samaya Ayudhya, p. 29 (with photograph between PP·
28 and 29).
7) Fournereau, p. 185.
8) Recueil, p. 158.
9) fraju~ silacar'ik Syiim, BE 2467, p. 39.

INt:RAN!l(: !IN!l HISTORICAl. STUDIES
..
227
Se·ctitUHJ f the linn.line one after another, then those of the second line,
and finally tho;"'e uf the third. 10 In Fig. 4, with the aid of scissors and
paster we lunrc lranspo:sed the four sections of the eye-copy to conform
lo tbe arrangement on the base of the statue.
The purptl!le of the inscription is to commemorate a number of
works of' merit performed by Cau Brafia Dharmasokaraj'a, the ruler of
K~il:nbe~n Bejra, and in particular the founding of the statue at whose
feet it is engru:ved: the date, equivalent to 1510 A.D., is that when the
statue wus erected and dedicated, evidently soon after its completion,ll
The text refeu to Brana Rvail (rm.)p1'

A.B. Griswold and Prasert Qa Nagata
Dbannasokaraja's works of merit, as recorded in the inscription,
deserve a few words of comment. They are not lis ted in chronological
order: the most important, founding the statue of Siva in 1510, comes
first; the others were probably performed at various times before that.
We shall discuss them in the order in which they are listed.
1) Founding the statue of Siva. Though Dharmasokaraja was of
course a Buddhist, it is not at all surprising that he should found a statue
of a Hindu god.t3 Siamese rulers, according to tradition, were protectors
of all religions, not only their own. Furthermore, almost every ruler of
an Indianizing state in Southeast Asia, whether Buddhist or Hindu by
In 1463 Paramatrailokaniitha·transferred the capital from Ayudhyii to
Bi~l}.uloka for the purpose of consolidating his hold on the Sukhodayan provinces,
appointing his son Paramarajii as Regent at Ayudhyii; and in 1485 he
appointed Prince Jettha to the post of Mahii-uparlija at Bi~puloka.
Upon Paramatrailokanatha's death in 1488, the throne went to his son
Paramadija, who transferred the capital back to Ayudhya, leaving Prince Jegha
to rule at Bi~!].uloka. Three years later, on the death of Paramaraja, Prince
Je~!ha succeeded to the throne, taking the regnal name Ramiidhipati (II) and
reigning at Ayudhyii.
In 1510, when our inscription was composed, the King of Ayudhya was
Ramiidhipati II and the viceroy at Bi~puloka must have been one of his brothers
or sons, though we do not know which one (his son Buddhiirikura was not
appointed to the position until 1526). We may consider three possible identifications
of 'the two kings' to whom Dharmiisokara.ia transfers the merit of
his benefactions in 1510 :
(a). Paramatrailokanatha and Paramariij!i III, both of whom were
deceased when the inscription was composed;
(b) Paramaraja III, who was deceased, and Riimiidhipati II who was
reigning at Ayudhya;
(c) Ramiidbipati II, reigning at Ayudhyii, and one of his brothers or
sons reigning at Bi~!luloka. We are inclined to prefer this identification; but
we cannot reject either of the first two conclusively.
13) An uninscribed bronze statue of the god Vi~~u, found in the ruins of the same
Brahmin temple (Fournereau, Pl. L), was very likely cast at the same time;
and two statues of Hindu goddesses, fragments of which were also found there
(Fournereau, p. 181), may have belonged to the same series. In casting images
of Hindu gods, Dharmlisokaraja was following the example of his ancestors
the Buddhist kings of Sukhodaya; see Griswold, Tow(lrds a Histot·y af Sukhodaya
At·t, pp. 13, 27, 28~ 32; also Princ.e Subhadradis Diskul, !l'l'J~UfflJq!1Vll'IJ"r.i
ffA'Ul'l"e~, Bangkok, 19.66 .
. .

imCI:\APHic AND hisToilicAr. stuDiEs 229
faith, would have a body of Brahmins attached to his Court, to advise on
statecraft, law and technical matters; to regulate the calendar and cast
horoscopes; to manage the Swinging Festival, the First Ploughing, and
rites for the control of wind and rain; to perform ceremonies; and to
discharge a host of other tasks. Theravada Buddhism takes no cognizance
of such things; they are not in conflict with it, but simply irrelevant
to it, and no more anti-Buddhist than consulting a doctor or a lawyer
today; and they were essential to the proper governance of a state. The
god Siva, according to the inscription, was to protect the four-footed and
two-footed creatures in the state of Katpben Bejra, and to help exalt the
three religions (Buddhism, Hinduism, and the cult of ancestral and tutelary
divinities): the founder expresses the wish that all three will function
harmoniously together.
(2) Restoration of the Buddhist temple of the Great Relic (Mahadhatu)
and other temples in and around the town (chiefly Buddhist
monasteries, but probably also a few shrines dedicated to Hindu gods or
tutelary divinities).
(3) Restoration of the boundary markers of landed property.
Perhaps chiefly to put an end to boundary disputes which might interfere
with the orderly course of agriculture, and to demarcate lands allotted
to officials and private persons.
(4) Restoration of the highway to Pan Ban, which had fallen into
ruin. This must have been a section of the 'Bra~ Rvan Highway,' which
led from Katpben Bejra to Sukhodaya, and continued northward to Sajjanalaya.
Tradition attributes the construction of the highway to Bra};J.
Rvan or Brana Rvan (Pra Ruang, Praya' Ruang), i.e. Rama G~ilphen or
some other king of Sukhodaya. Although it had probably been in
existence for a long time before Rama Gatp.beil, it seems likely that
Rama Gamheh was the first to turn it into an all-season road, raising
it above ~he flood-level by means of an embankment with ditches
running along one side or both for drainage, irrigation, and navigati();n
by small boats. Besides providing internal communications for
the kingdom of Sukbodaya, and serving for military transport, it
was parr of the regular route for travelers proceeding to Sukhodaya
from Martaban in Lower Burma : they would go by boat up the River

Ho
A.B. Griswold and Prasert !J.a Nagarli
Gyaing to some place near Kawkareik, then overland to ChOt (noW
Me Sot), ·then continue eastward to the riverine port of Jyail Don
(Chieng Tong) on the Ping, from where they could go downstream by boat
or raft to the southern terminus of the BraJ:l Rvan Highway at or near
Ka:rp.ben Bejra; and finally they would follow the highway northeast, via
Pail Ban to Sukhodaya.14 Pan Ban (Btmg Nm, UNmu), located on the
Bra!J Rvaf1 Highway about 14 km. northeast of KarpbM1 Bejra,Is must
have been an important stopping-place on the highway, achieving considerable
.Prosperity during the Sukhodaya period by offering hospitality to
merchants and other travelers; and it is mentioned in three of Maha·
dharmaraja l's inscriptions.1 6 It was probably repaired and maintained
by Mahadharmaraja I and other kings of Sukhodaya, but abandoned in
the 15th century. As Dharmasokaraja repaired the BralJ. Rvail Highway
only as far as Pari Ban, we should probably assume that the border
between his territory and that of the vassal ruler of Sukhodaya passed
through this town.
5) Dredging the river Trai (at?) Pail Bro. Doubtless to aid navigation
and the irrigation of fields.
(6) Putting a stop to the custom of selling cattle to the Lava. The
term Lava is generally used loosely to include various 'aboriginal' peoples,
whose ancestors controlled large parts of Siam before the Tai conquest.
Very likely the Lava mentioned in our inscription acted as butchers,
violating the Buddhist precept against taking life. The implication is
that DharmasoK.araja, out of respect for this precept, and perhaps out of
14) For the Brap Rvab. Highway, see Riiy-nin Sukhodaya, Bangkok, 2512, map
between pp. 92 and 93; also Griswold, Towards a History of Suklwdaya Art,
Map 4. For the route between Sukhodaya and Martaban, cf. JSS 60/1, pp. 140
and notes 20-22.
15) See the maps cited in the previous note.
16) loser. 3, H/ 57 (JSS 61 I 1, pp. 9 3, 111 ); Inscr. 4 11/22 (where the name is
written Pan Bar, ibid., pp. 13 3, 139); Inscr. 8, IV; 11 (under the nam!l Moan
Ban, JSS 61/1, pp. 111, 117, 123). Nah Don Hill, on the summit of which
Mah1idharmariija I placed a Buddhapada, is 2 km. northwest of Piib. Biin. (it is
shown on the map in Rii!•niin Sukhodaya, cited in note 13). ·

F.l'ICBAPHIG AND HISTOBICAL STUDIES 231
respect for the Hindu veneration of cows, prohibited the slaughter of
cattle. This prohibition is part of the program to protect 'four-footed
creatures'; see above, Item 1.
(7) Setting a good example to farmers: whenever he plants a
rice-field he always plants it with seed taken from the same field, rather
than taking rice from a granary to broadcast or to make a seed-bed from
which to transplant (i.e. he uses seed adapted to the conditions of the
field in question, rather than resorting to a granary containing rice from
miscellaneous fields).
(8) Restoration of the irrigation canal dug by his ancestor Brafia
Rvah to lead water to Pail Ban. This canal, which had got filled up so
completely that its course was no longer easy to discover, must have
originally paralleled that part of the Bral;l. Rvail Highway that led from
Karp. ben Bejra to Pari Ban. As the elevation of Kal.Jlben Bejra is almost
70 m. higher than that of Sukhodaya, and the canal between these two
cities ran a distance ofless than 70 km.,t7 the downward gradient must
have been something like 1:1000 on average, which would make maintenance
difficult. The portion from Katp.beil Bejra to Pail Ban bad evidently
been neglected for a considerable time, during which the farmers
along the way lost their main means of irrigation and had to depend on
rain for their crops. Restoring this canal for irrigation purposes would
greatly increase production. Dharmasokaraja presumably restored it
concomitantly with the highway (see above, Item 4), using the earth dug
from the canal to repair the embankment of the road.
· ·~re Essai d'immztaire arch!!ologique du Siam, Bulletin de la
17) L unet d e L aJonqUle , . .
Commission ArcMologique de l'Indocbine, Annee 1912, Pans, 1912, p. 83.

[1/i]
II f1rn,,"
Wl!if'lq
01!1 L
t
..
Yiei1H~t~r~
mm w1=flt111
Text
*"' - ~ .,,*
ttfH lf! t~m 'II Ji,,
[ 1 I iii 1 L thu i1iil 1 h"fl1tl Jttti'"1 nihuUUflt~ huiin JI~U 'l*hHl'~'fHta111D
LC'lf.)(l
et11!1tl11.1WrunMlmr:thwliinnm~fw1 tL~'1wnn.uu1"lMJu 1VI
•I
vum"l\11
...
uonuJn~utt
[ 2/n 1 ri uv1u non t1en~ nnr~nttn m,U thHl 1 n Tl.i. hhn-11n"' w1u ~muJ
lfl7tJ1",.,rfeii,;]
[2/m 1 L~flmmtt~DlJ1i1rn11ului~11nu"tl\il1nafl, mJu min ,.,,~m~
.... ... 0
'1J1Dfl~~.,~~mm
'II
[3/i]
[3/ii]
[3/iii]
[3/iv}
~nlttt)JfltJL1i1.WtL'lJ1h~u 1UIDJ~m~"~lfiUlU'lJ'i'1U~-3,tlVI11l-l
" • "' *"
~ tlfl1Vl" YhHI\-1C'I1El
m!>lYJtlth"'1t}J1'i1.Jrhm1ti 1l tJ~fi~ 111 JY41U um.mCJ1!11£1ft~HL~L 'JJ1
~ '
QJ~~111u ,.,,~wiun~1Yit~lntu-wum11r~mmlr 1L ,, 1 thau.Ju1
t ~L tl1un~ Vl~fl.Ju 1e.hun1flnJu ,;.Jwi nY~1rh'l~Ut111tJ~iz

ain. 25 The merit (accruing from) all these things that he has done, be
EPJCRAPHIC AND HISTORICAL STUDIES 233
[Translation]
[ 1] In sakaraja 1432, a year of the horse, on Sunday the fourteenth
day of the waxing moon of the sixth month, (when the moon bad) attained
~he rk~a of basta, at two nalika 1 after dawn, Cau Brafia Sri Dharmasokaraja
founded2 this (statue of the) Lord iSvara3 to protect the four-footed
and two-footed creatures in Moan Ka1p.beri. Bejra, 4 and to help exalts
the religions-the Buddha's religion, the Brahmanical religion,6 and the
Devakarma7 -so that they will not lose their lustre. a May [2] they function
harmoniously together !9
He restorediO the Mabadhatu,Il and the lesser temples 1 both inside
and outside the city, as well as the boundaries of household properties,
and the highwayt2 which bad fallen into ruint3 all the way to Pan Ban,t4
and he dredged the River Trai (at?) Pan Bro.ts
Moreover he put a stop to the custom of selling cattle to the Lava.I6
Moreover when he plants a rice-field he always plants it with seed
taken from that field itself;I7 he does not take rice from a granaryts to
broadcastt!l or (to make a seedbed from which) to transplant,2o as most
people do.
[3] Moreover, as the irrigation canal21 made by his ancestor22
Brai'ia Rvari to lead water to Pah Ban had got filled up 23 and altogether
lost, so that it was commonly believed the rice-fields were dependent on
rain,24 be searched for that canal, and when he found it he restored it so
as to lead water into the fields and irrigate them instead of depending on
presents to Their Majesties the two Kings.

234
I) lhe niilili:'."~ ut nli~i wu tm lnd~t~~i wcuurc: •~r wnc:, IU .!H I 'Iii. ""b1~b ""ll: HJllt:uhue Jlll'fuunded,'
is fwm th~: Ski. mlun ptilli~lhiiillJ~~. ':~~ ii1m • '(ound•Hion.' 'p,edes.
tal,' etc. tn Si!UIIt~e. in "''nM

fubdllAPlltC AND HISTORICAL STUDJES
i 3) ah..1~n11U (2/ii); ~!\'111.J is from Pali antaradhiina, 'disappearance.'
14) See Introduction, p. 229-231 above.
15) The name of the River !)ai recalls the town of Trai!rtnsa, about 15 km.
downstream from Karp.bei1 Bejra (see Griswold, Towards a History of Sukhodaya
Art, Map 4); but that may be no more than a coincidence. We cannot identify
Piiri Bro (B!lng Pro, 1JNrl1tJJ,
16) A more literal translation of the passage at 2/ii-2/iii would be: 'moreover it
was formerly the custom to sell cattle to the Lava, and those which would have
been sold as in the past he therefore forbade to be sold.' Cf. Introduction,
p. 230-231, above
17) In modern spelling this passage, occupying parts of 2/iii and 2/iv, would read :
~4o ~"'' .!\vj !ltl
tJ'IH!116YI1ll11'11HltJlJ!61Vl'II'IJ1'J llll11..1U fiOitJ~, literally: 'moreover when he
cultivates a rice-field, he regulary takes seed-rice from that field to plant
itself.' Note that the word Ltl1 in this passage is given in the eye-copy (Fig. 3)
·as Loll;, which is confirmed by our rubbing. As we cannot see how 1 '11"'1 could
make sense in the context, we assume that the intention was to write Ltl1.
18) u~ (2/iv), modern~~.
19) '
'
20)
21)
22)
23)
24)
25)
m1u (2/iv), modern ln' m.
~1, to transplant seedling rice in a flooded field that has been ploughed,
Madame S. Lewitz informs us that this word, til!l, occurs in Old Khmer, meaning
'to plant' or 'to transplant'; cf. Old Man tnamt tnaJ,llt 'a plant or tree'; and
Malay tanamt 'to plant.'
\'lfl (3/i), modern nn.
tl (3/i), modern J, which now means 'paternal grandfather'. The term is used
more loosely in S~khodayan inscriptions, and sometimes means no more than
'ancestor'; cf. Inscr. 45, I/3-12, JSS 57/1, pp. 75 and 80 ff.
ti (3/i), modern 1111.
w1 (3/ii, 3/iii) is apparently a dialectical form for ;[1, 1 sky,' here used in the
sense of 'rain'; and we understand 'l'lH (3/ii, written m~ at 3/iii) in the sense of
'by means of,' hence 'depending on •. The Matirayasatra, in the section entitled
~ • •

236
A fairly generous l'ilntpling of Vllfiant readings i~ given below. ibe
first column contnin!l our choice; the !}CC(md ill bllts,td un Pr~re Schmi!Ps
eye.copy (F'ig. 3), the third on ~raj~~tna ltllc:.._rik Sy,.um, Bf: 2467, p. 158,
the fourth on Coedes's Rmnanized Hanfj,cription in Rlltucll tltu iMaipt/ons
du Siam, 1924, p. !58, and the fn!il 1m the r~erltif rubbing fj,Upplied us by
the Department of Fine Arts.

A
fll'YlflEJ'V'l1'J
Vl'l!lfi
tl1~~mru
EP!CRAPHIC ANO HlSTORICAt STUDIES
Eye-copy
Prajum
Coedes
fln71'1f
\!akaraja
'1-\n'l!lm '1-l.n'l!lm
"'
nak~atra
"" A
'tl1'Yl\l1EJV'I1"J flll 'YlflEJ'\Al1"J adityabara
0
n1LL'Y'l\l
pratisthan
sa!va
ka:tp.bih'l
237
Rubbing
f1n-.i1'1f
um~m?
A
mmmvn-r
Vl'l!lf1
ll1fie~mm.
'V'l'Yl'fi'rl1'l!!U
~
buddhasa~ana
hmon
tyav
'II
11
"'"'
L"JJ1~'1f
tl
'II
I
11.,')
0
tl
....
11
I ""
t'l11
m
'II
....
11
1 ...
t'l11
f)~
'1
I
v
ntJUU'U
~
L'EJ1'V'l'lf
11
'II
I
11\1
0
tl
vat
vva
I ""
lava
tuc
I
kon nan
...
au bija
I,
rvan
tham
I ""
t'l11
fl'il
'IJ
?
?
0
tl
liail
fay
kan
I ..,
tJEJVI11
'II
I "
ayu hvva

A.B. Griswod and Prasert !}a Nagarli
Bibliography and Abbreviations
Coedes, Recueil des inscl'ij>eions du Siam, I, Bangkok, 1924.
Coedi:s, Recueil.)
(Abbreviated:
Fournereau, Le Siam ancien, Vol. I, Paris, 189 5. (Abbreviated: Fournereau.)
Griswold, Towm·ds a History of Sukhodaya Art, second edition, Bangkok, 1968.
BE 2511 (the date appears only on the last page).
Prajum cat-hmay he!u samaya Ayudhya bhag I, lh~~lJll~!1lJ1PJL111111lifHJfl1W1
' ' '
1111'1 •, Bangkok, BE 25 I 0.
~ ~ ~
Prajum siliiciiri:k Syam, I. l.h~'l1lJiHl1ll11nlltl1lJ tllf!Vl ., , Bangkok, BE 2467;
second edition, Bangkok, BE 2500. '
Ray-nan kar sliiJ:Hvac lelt khut !eil piiraJ?.a~
poral)avlltthusthana moan kau
0 ' i Oo' ~ I c;' IV
Sukhodaya, l1tl~11-ln1Hm~lli!~~~~II\11~~Hl!~ 1Jl1!ll'lll1~11'01!-lllJtJ~t01~ I~VJtl, Bangkok,
BE 2512. (Abbreviated: Ray-iliin Sukhodaya.)

u:" 1 ThP. ~iva of Ka.Q:~ben Bejra.

.· - - - I . . . . .
i:C>.

Fig. 4 The eye-copy in Fig. 3, with the sections transposed to correspond to the arrangement
on the base of the statue.

A KHMER KILN SITE-SURIN PROVINCE
by
Roxanna Brown,
Vance Childress,
&
Michael Gluckman*
For some years, Bangkok has been one of the few places in Asia
:"here Khmer potte~y can be purchased on the open market, and accordmg
to museum officmls and art-dealers, the source of the wares is lower
Northeast Thailand-primarily Srisakhet, Surin and Buriram provinces.
More.over, the number of kiln-wasters amongst the finds make it virtually
certam that some former Khmer kiln sites co-exist with former Khmer
habitation sites in the area. However, no kilns have actual been found
by anyone in authority.
The illusiveness of villagers protecting their monetary gains and
the silence of Bangkok dealers shielding their sources, in fact, make it
difficult to pinpoint even the district provenance of the wares or wasters.
Through the offices ofa sympathetic inhabitant of Ban Sawai village,
Surin province, however, the authors of this paper were able to make a
direct examination of one area where there were recent finds, and wish
to propose the distinct possibility of the area being a kiln-site, and
worthy of careful excavation.
Finds from Ban Sawai, located about 15 kilometers southwest of
the provincial capital of Surin (see Fig. 1 ), began appearing on the market
in about March of 1973-among them were some statues, numerous
pieces of pottery and some-kiln wasters. When the authors visited the
village in December of 1973 they were le.d to seven sites where the
villagers bad been digging in the rice-paddies, three kilometers west of
the village. The local people said that there were other sites nearby but
that it would take another complete day to see them all. Content for the
moment with the seven disturbed areas, the authors collected surface
sherds which they washed and attempted to reconstruct, and made.
* Roxanna Brown has recently completed a Master's thesis on Southeast Asian
ceramics at the University of Singapore.
Vance Childress, an architect who is directing the restoration of Prasat Ban
Phluang, Surin province. .
Michael Gluckman is beginning stuc;lies at Oxford University on Chineso export
wares.

240 Brown, Childress & Gluckman
measurements of the area in order to draft the accompanying map (Fig.2).
As a result a definition of the types of ware peculiar to the area, plus a
case for the existence of former kilns, can be made.
Judging by the number of Khmer edifices along the present Thai­
Khmer border and northwards to the Mun river, lower Northeast Thailand
once supported a sizeable Khmer population that was linked to the Angkor
metropolis by two main arteries.t Visible in aerial photographs on
the Cambodian side of the border, the roads led. from Angkor in fairly
direct lines towards the Mun River. Portions of the primary road to
Pimay are still extant in dense jungle on the Thai side of the border
just to the west of Prasat Ta Muang in Surin province; from there it ran
to Phanom Rung, Phanom Van and on to Pimay. A second road, the
closest to Ban Sawai, extended from Angkor to Prah Vihear, and then
north past Ban Phluang and on to Surin.
Heavy temple construction in the provinces adjacent to the old roads
(e.g. Prasat Ta Muang, Phnom Rung, Prasat Ban Phluang, Prasat Bing
etc.) during the 11th and 12th centuries, together with numerous manmade
lakes, indicates a stable and undoubtedly agrarian-based population.
Geographically, Ban Sawai occupies a central position within the area.
Any population, of course, requires storage vessels, and a sedentary
population often initiates their local production; in the case of Ban
Sawai, local production of pottery vessels of the Khmer type is hypothesized.
Pottery vessels could have met the requirements of both home
and ceremonial usage.
Khmer pottery has beenfairly well-defined by the excavations at
Angkor by Bernard Ph. Groslier. 2 It is wholly distinctive, uniquely
Khmer, highly traditional, and only found within the confines of
present or former Khmer possessions, except in rare instances. As far
as former kilns in Cambodia proper are concerned, however, only one
likely site has been documented : that on the plateau of Phnom Kulen,
which Etienne Aymonier found in 1883.3 The only types of wares
1) For a more complete description of the roads see Louis Finot, "DharmAqalas
au Cambodge" Bulletin de L' Ecole Fran~aise d' Extr~me Orient, VoL XXV (1925),
417-422.
2) For an outline of the types and their approximate dating see Roxanna M. Brown,
"Khmer Ceramics" Arts of Asia (May-June 1973).
3) see Etienne Aymonier, Le Cambodge, Vol. II (Paris, 1901), 412; and Victor
Goloubew, Le Phnom Kulen 1 (Hanoi, 1924), 14,

A l

Most of the shaper; HPJlettr tu Inn c been built by the coil method
and then turned on a wheel. The ba~e!l nrc Ul!lunlly fhH or slightly con.
cave, and on the footed vessel!i thickl}' pulled. lhe fcxJt of the small
jars and bottles often displays a thumb-print-like prlttern of ccmcentric
lines, which results from the piece~ being cord-cut from the turning table.
By comparison with wures tlf s.imihn !>lmpe!i nnd glazes found at
Angkor in dnted excavations by Groslicr, the u~m Stn'

A KHMER KILN SITE-SUR!N PROVINCE 243
Site 1.
Circumference:
Sherds found:
Related finds:
Site 2.
Circumference:
Shercls found:
Related finds:
Site 3.
Circumference:
Sherds found:
Related finds :
Site 4.
Circumference:
Sherds found:
Related finds :
APPENDIX
approximately 30 meters
- pale green glazed bowls
- brown-glazed large water jar, squat bulbous jar,
zoomorphic lime pot (owl), footed water vessels,
and covered urn
- blackish-glazed footed water vessels, large water
jar, and basins
- brownish olive-glazed large water jar
- unglazed large water jar
presence of fired laterite-bearing clay, and sherds
of 3 different Ch'ing pai covered boxes
approximately 40 meters
- pale green-glazed bowls
- brown-glazed footed water vessels
- blackish-glazed footed water vessels
abundant presence of fired laterite-bearing clay
and large rocks of sandstone
approximately 5 meters
-brown, blackish and unglazed large water jars
presence of fired laterite-bearing clay
approximately 10 meters
_ pale green-glazed bowls
-brown-glazed covered urn
_ blackish-glazed footed water vessels
- large olive- brown glazed water jar
_ presence of fired laterite-bearing clay plus large
sandstone rocks

244 Brown, Childress & Gluckman
Site 5.
Circumference: approximately 30 meters
Sherds found: - unglazed earthenware
Related finds :
presence of fired laterite-bearing clay plus some
chunks of fire-blackened sandstone
Site 6.
Circumference :
Sherds found:
Related finds :
approximately 8 meters
-pale green-glazed bowls
- brown-glazed footed water vessels, covered urn,
and bowl
- blackish-glazed footed water vessels
none
Site 7.
Circumference :
Sherds found:
approximately 30 meters
-pale green-glazed bowls
- brown-glazed bowls, footed water vessels, and
footed bottles
Related finds : the villagers claimed to have found in this spot 7
intact brown-glazed water jars and 2 small bronze
figures; the.y also led the authors to a nearby paddy
where they say they uncovered and then re-covered
a laterite block platform; chunks of fired laterite
bearing clay were in evidence, and also a worked
piece of stone that appeared to be a grinding pestle

A KHMER KILN SlTE-SURIN PROVINCE
245
Report on Analysis of Pot Sherds
Specimens:
15 specimens of various thicknesses and colours, some
with greenish, white, or dark glaze and others with black
coating apparently the remnants of a glaze.
Submitted by : Brick Corporation of South Africa Limited per laboratory
order no. 10896 on April 3rd, 1974.
Client:
Dr. J. Gluckman, P.O. Box 455, Johannesburg (Instructions
received from Mrs. Steele.
Laboratory Nos: 406226-406241
Separate analysis of the coating ("glaze") on the sherds and the body of
the sherds was required. The analysis comprised the detetmination of
ferrous iron, ferric iron, and copper.
Preparation of specimens for analysis
The coating ("glaze") was removed by careful scraping with a sharp
knife. In almost all instances clean glaze could be removed without
undue difficulty. The exception was the specimen marked No.2 (Site 1)
which was a thin sherd strongly glazed in white on both surfaces. It
was quite different from any of the other specimens. A very small
portion of the glaze was removed with a diamond-tipped glass-cutter.
The area of the sherds which had been scraped was divested of all
residual traces of glaze by grinding with a grindstone and the cleaned
portion then crushed in a mortar for analysis.
Analysis
Weighed-out portions of "glaze" and "body" were dissolved by digestion
with sulphuric and hydrofluoric acids in plastic volumetric flasks in a
neutral atmosphere protected from ingress air. After diluting to volume
aliquots were removed for the three determinations:

246 Brown, Childress & Gluckman
Results
Ferrous iron : Colorimetric method with orthophenanthroline.
Total iro11
Ferric iron
Copper
By atomic absorption spectrophotometry.
By calculation (by difference between total iron and
ferrous iron)
~Y atomic absorption spectrophotometry.
Tbe results of the analysis are set out in the attached schedules.

A KilMER KiLN S!TE.:....Si:JRIN PROViNCE
247
Report on Analysis of Pot Sherds
List of Shcrds
Site I
Site 2
Site 3
'Site 4
1) brown-glazed water-jar
2) ch'ing pai bowl
3) thick brown-black-glazed jar
4) thick pale green-glazed bowl
5) thick pale green-glazed bowl
6) thickly-black-glazed jar
7) thin yellowish-glazed footed urn
Site 6
Site 7
8) black-glazed funerary urn
9) thick black-glazed jar
10) yellowish-glazed footed urn
11) thin pale gr~en-glazed bowl
12) thin black-glazed footed urn
13) thick yellowish-green bow 1, pale colour
14) reddish unglazed earthenwar~, vessel shape unknown
15) yellowish unglazed earthenware, shape unknown

Anaiysis of Pot Sherds
Specimen Component Ferric iron Ferrous iron Coppef
as Fe as Fe as Cu
% % %
No.1. Site J.
Ridges with black glaze Glaze 2,39 1,30 0,085
& patches of brown glaze Body 1,60 0,32

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flgtfe ~ 4
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THE DfVISHlNS OF THE LIAHU PEOPLE
by
Anthony R. Walker*
The Lahu are a Tibeto-Burman-speaking people whose small villages
are scattered throughout the rugged Yunnan-Indochina borderlands.!
About sixty percent of their total today live in southwest Yunnan.
Originally they came from further north, and in recent centuries they
have migrated southward into eastern Burma, north Thailand and northwest
Laos. 2 Although a common language and a number of shared
cultural and social traits enable us to distinguish the Lahu from other
hill peoples such as Akba, Lisu, Meo; Yao, etc., they are by no means a
homogeneous "tribe". They recognize among themselves many named
sub-groups or divisions, e.g. Labu Na (Black Lahu), Labu Shi (Yellow),
Lahu Nyi (Red), Labu Hpu (White), and Lahu Sheh Leh (meaning
unknown), to mention only the better-known. The existence of such
divisions, and the variety of names given to them, has been the cause of
considerable confusion in the ethnographic literature, and even among
the people themselves. The purpose of this article is to attempt some
clarific~ttion of the available data and to point out areas where further
research is necessary .
...........................--..·----.....:...--------------
* School of Comparative Social Sciences, Universiti Sains Malaysia, Penang.
1) I conducted fieldwork among the Lahu (mostly Lahu Nyi) in north Thailand
from 1966 to 1970 while I was research officer at the Tribal Research Centre,
Chiang Mai. For making possible this long period of field research I thank my
sponsor, Her Britannic Majesty's Ministry of Overseas Development (now
Overseas Development Administration, Foreign and Commonw.ealth Office) and
the Director of the Tribal Research Centre, Khun Wanat Bhruksasri. I thank
Dr. James A. Matisoff, Dr. Dehnos J. Jones and Mr. Jairus Banaji for allowing
me to cite unpublished dissertations, and my wife, Pauline Hetland Walker, for
her skilful editing and typing. ,
2) ·Approximate population figures for Labu are as follows : China 180,000
(Moseley 1966:162); Burma 80,000 (Lewis 1970;80); Thailand 16,000 (United
Nations 1967:8); Laos 5,000 (Lewis 1970:80). The figures for Burma and Laos
are largely impressionistic.
I

,,....._.. /··~·.
\_ ..
'
H VIETNAM
,
.
I
\ '
.
\.
··~·-...,.,.,.
IS'
I
\ •• \ .
L A
LAHU SETTLEMENT AREAS
.--River
-··-tncern-;:.cional frontier
(J) provil'lCI~I sdmin. c.c~tre
.._"Jth~· cowr~· mentjohed i1IY"r~' il
La hu , • ct 1 c 11 ent «re.os (•pprr.~•n 1 Jl,

Tm: lliVISlONS OF THE LAHU PEOPLE
The first problem in the ethnographic accounts is that it is not
always cleur what group is indicated by eacM1ame. A division has not
only the nnmc by which its members identify themselves but also the
several names given to it by other groups, and a common mistake is the
assumption that different names represent different groups. On the other
hand, it may happen that two distinct groups use the same name.
Let us take for example the two largest divisions in Thailand, the
Lahu Nyi and the Lahu Sheh Leh. In both divisions _the people usually
refer to themselves as "Lahu'' or "Lahu ya" (Lahu people), and add a
distinguishing adjective only to the name of the other group._ Thus a
Lahu Nyi might say, "We are Lahu; they are Lahu Sheh Leh." The
Sheh Leb in turn give the name Lahu Pa Li to the Lahu Nyi. When
pressed to distinguish their own from other Lahu divisions, members of
the first group generally call themselves Labu Nyi.3
255
Those in the second
gmup seem to prefer the name Lahu Na rather than Sheh Leh for thernselves,'4
although they are quite different from the Lahu Na of Yunnan
and Burma, who comprise the largest of all Lahu divisions. According
to (:iordon Young ( 1962: 20), the author of a popular guide to Thailand's
l1ill peoples, the original name of the Sheh Leh in Yunnan was Lahu Na _
Moe.:~
But these are only the Lahu names for the two divisions. Adding
lo tbe confusion, the Northern Thai call the Lahu Nyi Mussur Daeng or
"Red Mussur" (mussur from Burmese through Shan to Northern Thai:
••hunter";

256 Anthony R. Walker
wear a black costume, but the Lahu Nyi women sew bright red bands
on their blouses and sarongs.
In Burma the Lahu Nyi reportedly are
sometimes called Lahu Meu Teu or "Southern Lahti" (from Shan meu teu
"southern country") in contradistinction to the Lahu Na who are called
Lahu Meu Neu or "Northern Lahu" (from Shan meu neu : "northern
country").6 These names refer to geographical distribution, the Lahu Nyi
living entirely in the southern area of Lahu settlement, south ofKengtung
and into Thailand. (Apparently there are no Lahu Nyi in Yunnan.)
Thus we find at least four different names for each division : Lahu Nyif
Lahu Pa Li/Lahu Meu TeufMussur Daeng. for one, and Lahu Sheh Leh/
Lahu NajLahu Na Moe/Mussur Dam for the other.
The picture is further complicated by a controversy over the Lahu
Sheh Leh. Young, as mentioned above, regards theSheh Leh as a distinct
group, who came originally from Shunning district of Yunnan and are
more properly called La?u Na Moe.7 Jones (1967: 16), having been
told by his Sheh Leh informants that they are really Lahu Na or Black
Lahu, dismisses the Sheh Leh category altogether and describes his study
villages as "Black Lahu" villages. Jones' claim that the Lahu Sheh Leh
and the Lahu Na are one and the same division is contested by Spielmann
(1968 : 295-7, 1969: 326-30), who argues, on the basis of field experience
with both groups, that the Sheh Leh people of Thailand are socially and
linguistically distinct from the Black Lahu of Yunnan and the Burmese
Shan State. These Lahu Na, he shows, are represented in Thailand by
a mere seven villages, all of them Christian. My own research supports
Spielmann's conclusion that the Sheh Leh are different from the main
Black Lahu division.
II
With several names for each group, and disagreement even among
the people themselves about which name to use, it is not surprising that
6) Information from Lahu Na Christian informants recently arrived from Burma.
See also Young ( l962:9n). Once again my spelling, following the standard
Lahu orthography, differs from Young's "Mong Taue" and "Mong Neu".
7) Spielmann (1969:327) disagrees, maintaining that "Na Moe" is simply the name
of the numerically dominant Sheh Leh descent group,

THE DIVISIONS OF THE LAHU PEOPLE
the ethnographic literature is confusing. In addition to the groups
already mentioned there is a host of others.s Which are the main divisions,
and how are the smaller groups related to them ?
Many early writers have stated that there are two main divisions
of the Lahu, but few agree on the names. "The Red and the Black"
says Woodthorpe (1896: 597); "the Great La'hus and the Yellow La' '
bus", say Scott and Hardiman ( 1900 : 580), adding "but a commoner
division is into the Red and the Black, and there are very many subdivisions
of them." Writing like these authors about Burma, Jamieson
(1909 : 1) regards Black and Red as the major groups and the K wi
(Yellow Lahu)9 as an "allied tribe", while Telford (1937: 90) fails even
to mention the Red Lahu and names Black and Yellpw as the major
divisions. I o Ruey Yih-fu ( 1948: 1) multiplies the confusion by telling
us that in Yunnan the Lahu are divided into "Great Lo-hei" and "Small
Lo-bei" (Lo-bei is the Chinese name for the Lahu people as a whole)It
8) Lahu Na Hpeh, Pa Nai, Hka Hka, A Leh, La Hu (there is a tonal distinction
between La" hu-, the people, and Lav Hu-, the subdivision), Hu Li, Ku Lao,
Ve Ya, La Ba, La Law, Ka Leh, Law Meh, Baw Fa, Na Moe, Kai Shi and
probably others. All these subdivisional names were given to me by Lahu
informants in Thailand, ex:cept for the Lahu Ka Leh and Lahu Law Meh who
are listed by Telford (1937:90). Khin (1968:30) lists two more, the Lahu Ba
Cho and the Lahu Mae Ne; his "Lahu Net" are presumably Lahu Na.
9) The Shan call all Lahu "Mussur", ex:cept for the Lahu Shi whom they call
"Kwi".
10) Although Telford admits that his simple classification might be rejected by
both Lahu Na and Lahu Shi, the total omission of Lahu Nyi seems strange in
this authoritative work by one who lived with t?e Lahu for more than twenty
years.
11) This name is probably derogatory. Scott and Hardiman ( !900:579) quote a
report that the Chinese use the name Lo-hei (Scott and Hardiman spell it
"Loheirh") "out of pure mischief". Their informant maintains that "'La'hu
would have .. been an equally easy sound, but to the Chinese mind it would not
have been so appropriate a designation, for it would not have conveyed the
contemptuous meaning cif Loheirh.' " "Bla~kness" is sugges~ed as the .contemptuous
connotrttion of this name. The Chmese anthropologtst Ruey Yth-fu
(1948:1) also implies that "Lo-hei" is somehow de:o~atory, for. he says that
although these people are referred to by this name, 1t 1s more pohte to add~e~s
th '''"lel'. hia" literally "Black Family". As the word "black" (fun) 1S
ern as

258 Anthony R. Walker
while in Burma, he says, they are divided into "Red Lo-hei or Great Lohei"
and ·~Black Lo-hei or Yellow Lo-hei". Another Chinese writer, Lin
Ping (1961 : 151) writes that they are divided into "the long-sleeved
Lahu tribe, the short-sleeved Lahu tribe, etc., four or five divisions."
Young (1962: 9-27) recognizes tl~ree major Lahu groups represented in
Thailand : the Black, the Yellow and the Sheh Leh; the Red, be maintains
(1962: 9n), are a splinter group of the Black. Jones (1967: 16), as
discussed above, dismisses the Sheh Leh category and says that the Lahu
comprise three divisions : Black, Red and Yellow.
One clear fact that emerges from the literature is that between
Lahu Na (Black) and Lahu Shi (Yellow) there is a major cleavage of
long standing. History, geography and language point to this conclusion.
Centuries ago, if the modern Chinese writer Ch'en Yin ( 1954 : 46) is
right, during the southward migration of Lahu in Yunnan the Black Lahu
took a westerly route while the Yellow and the White Lahu took an
easterly one. In recent centuries the population centres of Black and
Yellow Labu have been in far separated parts of Yunnan, that of the
Black lying towards the southwest in the present-day autonomous counties
of Lan-ts'ang and Meng-lien, while that of the Yellow is further east,
in the modern Hsi-shuang-pa-na T'ai autonomous area to the southwest
of Fu-bsing-chen (Ssu-mao) (cf. Young 1962: 24). The fact that the
Shan have entirely different names for these two divisions, Kwi for the
. Yellow and Mussur (Mussuh, Musso) for the Black and other Labu, further
implies an ancient division. Territorial separation is reflected in the
markedly different dialects of Lahu Na and Lahu Shi, the latter being so
divergent, according to the linguist Matisoff (1972), that "it is not easy
for the Yellows to communicate with their brethren who speak other
dialects."' 2 But although the distinction between Black and Yellow is
well established, lack of data for the Yellow Lahu makes it impossible
to pinpoint the sociologically significant differences between the two.
12) Noting the differences between Lahu Shi on the one hand and, on the other,
Lahu Na and closely related dialects, Matisoff (1972) writes: "'Yellow'
Lahu ... is clearly divergent ... The tonal, grammatical, and .lexical differ·
ences are pronounced, and the system of segmental phonemes, is quite idiosyn·
cratic as well . , ."

·rflE DIVISIONS OF 'rHE LAHU PEOPLE 259
~s for the ?t.h~r groups, large and small, it appears likely that they
are e1ther subdtvtstons or splinter groups of the Yellow Lahu or the
Black Lahu. Certainly among the Lahu Shi (Yellow) there are subdivisions.
In Thailand I was told of three of these : Lahu Shi Ba La, Lahu
Shi Na Keo and Lahu Shi Ba Keo. Telford (1937: 90) mentioned these
three (listed by him as Balang, Namkyo and Banceau respectively) and
added a fourth, Lahu Shi Meukeu. Young (1962: 24) says that the A
Do A Ga and the Na Tawn are other subdivisions of the Yellow Lahu
in the Burmese Shan State. My own experience of Yellow Lahu {limited
to Christian converts) is that these people identify themselves first as
Labu Shi and then as a member of a particular subdivision. A man does
not announce that he is a Lahu Ba La, but rather that he is a Lahu Shi
Ba La.
Other groups do not identify themselves by name with a parent
division as do the Lahu Shi subdivisions, but it is probable that many of
them are splinter groups of the Lahu Na.l 3 This is particularly so of
the Lahu Nyi and Lahu Sheh Leh. In the absence of adequate linguistic
and sociological data from Yunnan and the Burmese Shan State, which
are the chief Lahu settlement areas, it is impossible to determine the
relationship of all groups with any certainty. Nevertheless, I believe it
is possible to untangle some of the threads in the material we have.
III
According to Ruey Yih-fu, as m~ntioned above, theLahu in Yunnan
are divided into "Great Lo-bei" and "Small Lo-hei". This classification
is almost certainly Chinese rather than indigenous. Bruk (1960: ~1), a
Soviet ethnographer who had access to modern Chinese sources, reports
that the Lahu of yunnan are divided into the more familiar Lahu Na
and Lahu Shi. Ch'en Yin (1964: 46) mentions these two divisions but
includes also the Lahu Hpu (White Lahu). In the Burmese Shan State
the picture grows more com'plex. In the northerly areas of Lahu settlement,
it is reported, the major distinction is between Great L~hu_~~~
13) The flrst syllable '1wv (low-falling open tone) in the divisiona.l names Na Moe,
· ot to be confused with the word na" (high checked tone)
Na T awn, N a H pe h , IS n
meaning "black".

266 Anthony It. Walker
Yellow Lahu; in the south it is between Black Lahu and Red Lahu (Scott
and Hardiman 1900: 580).
These variations in nomenclature may be less complicated than they
first appear. The available evidence suggests that the people whom the
Chinese call "Great Lo-hei" are the people who call themselves Lahu Na
or Black Lahu, while the "Small Lo-hei" are the people who call themselves
Lahu Sbi or Yellow Lahu. The basis for assuming that "Great"
and "Black" Lahu denote the same division is that the Lahu Na are the
most numerous Lahu division and that some writers, particularly Young
(1962: 9), refer to the Lahu Na as the "great" or "root-stock" Lahu.
Moreover, the Great Lahu of Burma are said to have come from Mienning
and the Yellows from Ch'ing-tung T'ing (Scott and Hardiman 1900:
580); that is, respectively west and east of the river Mekong, as has been
reported for the Black and Yellow Lahu. Thus in the north of the
Burmese Shan State (near the Yunnanese border) the major distinction
among the Lahu people is, as in Yunnan, between Black and Yellow
divisions.
Further south in Burma, it appears, a major splinter group of the
Lahu Nahas come to be called the Lahu Nyi.i4 The fact that their two
dialects are extremely close is the basis for my assumption that the Lahu
Nyi come from the Lahu Na. I assume further that the Red Lahu broke
away from the parent Black Lahu in Burma rather than in the original
Chinese homeland, for there is no mention in the literature of Lahu Nyi
in Yunnan. The fact that they are also known as Lahu Meu Teu or
"Southern Lahu" (as opposed to "Northern Lahu" for the Lahu Na)
suggests that they have always been a southerly extension of the Lahu
people. Today, in fact, they are located in the southern areas of Lahu
settlement in Burma, east of the river HsiJJ?, and concentrated in the two
districts of Muang Hsat and Muang Ton, whence they stretch through
into the Thai provinces of Chiang Rai, Chiang Mai and Mae Hong Son.
The idea that the Lahu Nyi are an offshoot of the Lahu Na is by no
n1eans new. Young (1962: 9n) was the first, to my knowledge, to
14), Whether they first adopted the name "Red" Lahu (nyi: •~'red" in Lahul of their
own accord or because their Shan neighbours called them "Mussur Daeng"
(daeng : "red" in Shan) is unknown.

THF. DIVISIONS OF THE LAHU PEOPLE 261
suggest this. He maintains that these two divisions have been geogr~phicnlly
separated .for some 150 years, but unfortunately he gives no
ev1dence to support h1s estimate.
In Thailand, the recent literature refers to four major Lahu divi·
sions : Na, Nyi, Shi and Sbeh Leh. It is now clear how the first three
may be related to each other. The Lahu Nyi appear to be a group who
have broken away from the Lahu Na, representatives of the "Great Lahu"
of the western areas of Lahu settlement in Yunnan. These two divisions
resemble each other closely in language and custom. The Lahu Shi are
very different from both the Lahu Na and the Lahu Nyi, and it is a
reasonable conjecture that they represent a southerly extension of the
"Small Lahu" of the more easterly areas of Yunnan.
The Lahu Sheh Leh probably fit into this picture somewhere between
the Labu Na and Nyi on the one side and the Lahu Shi on the other.
Language is the chief factor in this hypothesis. The dialects of the Lahu
Na, Lahu Nyi and Lahu Sheb Leh are all quite similar, while the Lahu
Shi dialect is highly divergent. Of the three first-named dialects, Lahu
Na and Lahu Nyi are very close to each other, while Lahu Sheh Leh
differs somewhat, particularly in tone structure (Young 1962: 10, 22;
Matisoff 1972).
This linguistic evidence also suggests a chronology for the fission
of the Lahu people. First, there must have been a break between Lahu
Na and Lahu Shi. At a much later date, it appears, the Lahu Sheh Leh
broke away from the Lahu Na, while in more recent times still, there
was a break between Lahu Na and Lahu Nyi (see diagram). Historical
and geographical evidence cited earlier seems to fit this chronological
hypothesis.
Diagram ].
I.
I
Na
A Possible Chronology of Lahu Segmentation __
Lahu
I
I
Sheh Leh
1
Nyt
~
L_ __ ~-------~~~--~·---
Shi

262 Anthony R. Walker
Numerically, the dominant division in Thailand is the Red Lahu,
with Sheh Leh second; Lahu Na and others comprise a very small minority
.Is In Burma and Yunnan, however, Lahu Na are by far the most
numerous.
IV
While this analysis helps to clarify the data from Thailand, it fails
to show how the Lahu Hpu and numerous other sub-groups (Lahu La
Ba, Ve Ya, etc.) are related either to each other or to the two major
divisions, the Lahu Na and the Lahu Shi. There is little in the existing
ethnographic record that will help us. Telford (1937: 90) includes the
Lahu Na Hpeb, Hu Li, Ku Lao, La Law, Ve Ya, La Ba, Hpu and Ka Leh
as subdivisions of the Black Lahu. Until further research has been
conducted, I can only assume that he is right. Probably all these groups
have at one time or another broken away from the Lahu Na. However,
unlike the Lahu Shi subdivisions which seem to consider themselves
Lahu Shi first and a particular sub-group second, the Lahu Na splinter
groups do not necessarily recognize themselves as parts of a larger
entity. A roan who is a Lahu La Ba does not call himself a Lahu Na
La Ba.
The position of the Lahu Hpu or White Lahu is even less certain.
According to Lewis ( 1970: 81), a missionary with many years' experience
among the Lahu, these White Lahu are more properly called Lahu Ku
Lao and are known as "White" Lahu "since the men wear short, white
jackets." If these people are the same as the Lahu Hpu mentioned by
Ch'en Yin, and ifCh'en Yin himself is right in suggesting that they were
with the Lahu Sbi during their southward migration several centuries
ago, then their relationship with the Lahu Na must have been severed at
a very early date. Unfortunately I have no linguistic data for the Lahu
Hpu which might help us sort out ~his problem.
15) A rough estimate is Lahu Nyi 10,000, Labu Sheh Leh 3,500, Lahu Shi 700, and
Lahu Na 400. The Lahu Nyi and Sbi figures are approximations from Young's
old figures of 9,200 and 650 respectively (Young·t962:89J; Spi~lmann ( 1969;
32Z) is the source for the Sheb Leh and Na figures,

Among the major Lahu divisions for which we have some modern
information-the Black, Yellow, Red and Sheh Leh-it is evident that
these groupings are cultural rather than structural. Membership of a
division determines how a Lahu will speak, dress, perhaps build his house;
placate the spirits and worship his supreme supernatural, G'ui., sha.
The divisions have no corporate existence. There are neither divisional
chiefs nor divisional territories. A man need not necessarily marry
within his division, although he usually does, nor is it necessary that he
live with members of his division. The tendency is for each Lahu village
to be inhabited by members of a single Lahu division, but it is not
uncommon in a village to find a number of persons whose divisional
heritage differs from that of the majority. Members of other divisions
may comprise one or more households in the village, or they may be
spouses of members of the dominant division. Although they conform to
the customs of the majority and are identified with the majority by outsiders,
within the village these people-in my experience-continue to be
recognized as members of the group in which they were reared. But
although their ''difference" is noted, there seems to be no restriction on
their participation in village affairs.
In fact divisional affiliation shares many characteristics with ethnic
affiliation. It would appear that birth and, more importantly, childhood
rearing, are the chief factors in determining both the ethnic and the
divisional allegiance of an adult. But he is free to move elsewhere, to
marry into another division or ethnic group, and to identify himself with
another people if he so wishes. Alternative. options may be kept open.
For example a Lahu man who marries a lowland Thai girl and settles
in a Thai village may be considered by himself and by other Lahu to have
''become Thai", but if he returns to the hills he can easily reestablish
· his Lahu and drop his Thai identity.
Why colour identifications-Black, Yellow, Red, White-came to be
used is unknown. A common assumption is tbat they refer to the
d ommant
.
co 1 our o
f the people's clothes {cf. Woodthorpe
.
1896: 597;
v

Spielmann 1969: 321).
Anthony R. Waikef
This may be true for the "Red" 16 and even for
the "White" Lahu, but I have found no convincing evid~nce that the
designations "Black"l7 and "Yellow" refer to costume, either today or
in the past. Telford (1937: 90) suggests skin pigmentation as the basis
for the names, Black Lahu having swarthy skins and Yellow Lahu "being
of a yellowish turn".
fairness of the Yellow Lahu.
Young (1962: 25) also mentions the relative
But such racial explanations are difficult
to sustain in view of the oft-reported intermarriage among Lahu of all
divisions and indeed between Lahu and other ethnic groups.
We should
note that colour identifications, especially Black and White, are very
common among the peoples of southwest China.
But, as Feng and
Shryock (1938 : 106) observed, "the connotations must be separately
determined in each case."ls In some cases the designations are Chinese
rather than indigenous and refer either to the dominant colour ?f the
national dress or to the people's relative sophistication in Chinese eyes,
black signifying barbarianism and white, sinicism (Clarke 1911 : 17);
In other cases the colour names are i~digenous
meanings may be quite different from those of the Chinese.
and ancient, and their
Among the
16) But even this is disputed. Certainly my own Red Lahu informants indicated
the bright red stripes of their women's blouses and sarongs as the reason for
their name, wh(ch they accepted as a reasonable identification both in their own
language ("Lahu Nyi") and in Thai/Shan ("Mussur Daeng"). However, Young
(1962: 9) suggests that some Lahu Nyi resent this designation which is, he says,
a direct translation into Lahu of the Shan and Northern Thai ''Mussur Daeng"
in which daeng: red refers to "rawness" rather than colour of dress. I suspect
that this was an explanation given to Young by Christian Black Lahu with whom
he grew up.
17) Although Lahn Na do wear predominantly black clothes, this does not distinguish
them from the Lahu Shi, Sheh Leh and several other Lahu divisions who
also dress basically in black. It appears that the Sheh Leh are called "Mussur
Dam" by the Northern Thai because of their black clothes.
18) Banaji ( 1972), analysing the widespread use of colour names throughout Inner
Asia, shows that their symbolism is variable and complex. In his wide-ranging
survey of the literature he finds, for example, that "black" connotes variously
"uncivilized, barbarian . , , of superior descent, of pure descent ... poor,
simple, common, base, low-born, vulgar, , . great, foremost".

265
tolo, for instance, the Black Lolo are the aristocratic class wh , o sometimes
(at least in the not too distant past) marry their daughters to the
sons of Chinese officials or into distinguished Chinese families, while
all other Lola belong to the White division and are (or were) subservient
to the Black Lolo (Feng and Shryock 1938: 106).
Among the Lahu the
designations of the two major divisions, Black and Yellow, appear to
relate neither to dress nor to Chinese opinions. They are accepted by the
people as indigenous, but their connotations are unknown.
VI
Amid the profusion of ethnic minorities in northern Southeast Asia '
names alone have too often proved a source of confusion. It cannot be
lightly assumed that different names represent different groups, or that
similar names denote the same group.
Not long ago in Thailand, Lahu
hit the national headlines because of their part in a rebellion against the
Burmese administration of the Shan State. Some otherwise well-informed
people I met at the time were onder the impression that there was a
"Mussur rebellion" in addition to the "Lahu rebellion''.
Again, I know
of Red Lahu, patients at a Thai government hospital, who identified
themselves as "Mussur Daeng" and were castigated for ·their illegal
political affiliations. (The Thai press frequently labels those Meo who
supposedly have collaborated with Communist insurgents as "Meo
Daeng", Red Meo.) And the confusion is not confined to laymen.
Several students ofLahu society (cf. Scott 1906: 96-7, Soulie and Tchang
1908 : 355n, Grierson 1927 : 80, Seidenfaden 1930: 85) have mistaken
Musso, a variant spelling of Mussur, for Moso, which is another name
for the Na-hsi people of northwestern Yunnan. This confusion led
several of them to claim for the Lahu a recorded history dating back to
the eighth century (cf. Scott 1906: 96, Seidenfaden 1930: 85).
The existence of divisionst9 compounds the problems of identification
and description. To compare Lahu villages belonging to different
19) There are divisions also among other ethnic groups in this region, e.g. Blue Meo,
White Meo, Black Meo, Red Meo, Flowery Meo (de ~eauclair 1970:60-61); and
Skaw, Pwo, Thongdu and Kayah among the Karen (Htnton 1969:1).

Anthony it Walker
divisions without recognizing that the people themselves consider theit
heritages to be significantly different simply confuses the ethnographic
record. Whatever they call themselves or are called by others, the
subdivisions of the Lahu people maintain certain distinctive social and
cultural forms.2o If Sheh Leh communities prefer to call themselves
"Black Lahu" this fact in itself is significant, but it does not mean that
they are the same people as the Lahu Na of Burma and Yunnan. Of
course, it may yet develop that the Lahu Na are not a homogeneous
division, and that attempts to categorize them as such, in the way that
Sheh Leh or Nyi are classified, are mistaken.
alone will solve this problem.
Further field research
More ethnographic and linguistic field research is needed in all
areas of Lahu settlement, in order to identify and compare systematically
the salient characteristics of each division. Information from the Burmese
Shan State and southwest Yunnan, where the majority of Lahu live, is
'particularly vital but also difficult to obtain. North Thailand bas for
years been open to Western scholars, but unfortunately the two oldest
divisions, Lahu Na and Lahu Shi, are only sparsely represented; the largest
divisions in Thailand are Lahu Nyi and Sheh Leh, probably offshoots
of the Lahu Na.
The variety of socio-cultural patterns among the divisions militates
against any facile generalizations about "the Lahu ". In gathering and
collating data, students of hill societies in northern Southeast Asi~ must
be alert to divisional as well as ethn~c distinctions.
20) Compare, for instance, Jones' stu4y of the Labu Sheh Leb (Jones ! 967) with
my study of the Lahu Nyi (Walker 1970),

1'HE DIVISIONS OF THE LAHU PEOPLE 267
REFERENCES
Banaji, J. 1972, Ethnology and Social and Symbolic Structures in Inner Asia and
the Western and Central Himalayas with Special Reference to the Problem
of the Origin of the Caste System. Unpublished B. Litt, thesis, Oxford
University.
Bruk, S.I. 1960. 'Peoples of Chiua, Mongolian People'.~ Republic and Korea. New
York. U.S. Joint Publications Research Service. (Translation of Naseleniye
Kitaya, M.N.R. i Korei. Moscow: Institute of Ethnography imeni N.M.
Miklukho-Maklay. 1959.)
Ch'en Yin. 1964. La-hu Tsu [ Labu Race]. fviiu-tsu t'uan-chieh [Nationalities
Solidadty ], Peking 4:46-8.
Clarke, S.R. 1911. Among the Tribes of Southwest Chi11a. London.
de Beauclair, I. 1970. Tribal Cultures of Southwest China. Taipei: The Orient
Cultural Service, Asian Folklore and Social Life Monog~aphs no. 11.
Feng Han-yi and J.K. Shryock. 1938. The Historical Origins of the Lolo. Harvard
Joul'llal of Asiatic Studies 3:103-27.
Grierson, G.A. 1927. Linguistt'c Survey of India: Vol. I Part 1.
Calcutta.
lntt·oductory.
Hinton, P. 1969. The Pwo Karen of Northern Thailand : A Preliminary Report.
Chiang Mai : Tribal Research Cen.tre. Mimeo.
'
Jamieson, E. 1909. Description of Habits and Customs of Muhs'os CBlacl1 ancl Red)
also Known as Lahus. Ethnographic Survey of Burma, pamphlet 3. Rangoon.
Jones, D.J. 1967. Cultural Variation among Six Lahu Villages, Northern Thailand.
Unpublished Ph.D. thesis, Cornell University.
Khin Maung Nyunt. 1968. The Brave La'hus.
Magazine 15:29-32.
The Guardian: Burma's National
Lewis, P.W. 1970. The Hill Tribes .of Thailand. Chiang Mai: Faculty of the
Social Sciences, Chiang Mai University. Mimeo.
Lin Ping. 1961, Chuang·hua Mien T'ailn Pien Min-tm [Peoples of the China­
Burma-Thailand-Indi11 Borderlands]. Singapore.
Matisoff, J.A. 1972. The Grammar of Lahu. Introduction Part 1. Prepublication
draft.
Moseley, G. 1966. The Party and The Na#onal Question in China. Cambridge
(Mass.) & London.
Ruey Yih-fu. 1948. Yun-nan shi-nan bien-ching ti Lo-hei-jen [The Lo-hei of the
Southwest Frontier Area of Yunnan]. Kuo-chi Wen-htva [International
Culture], Nanking 1:1-2.

268 Anthony R. Walker
Scott, J.G.
1906. Burma: A Handbook of Practicallnfotmation. London.
_____ and J.P. Hardiman. 1900. Gazetteer of Upper Burma and the Shan States.
Part 1 vol. 1. Rangoon.
Seidenfaden, E. 1930. The Gospel of St. Marc in Musso. .Journal of the Siam
Society 24:84-7.
Soulie, G. and Tchang Yi-tch'ou. 1908. Les Barbres soumis du Yunnan. Bulletin
de l'Ecole Franqais d'Extrem~-Orient 8:149-379.
Spielmann, H.J. 1968. Review of Jones (1967).
56:295-7,
Journal of the Siam Society
1969. Note on the Literature on the Lahu Shehleh and Lahu Na
of Northern Thailand. Journal ofthe Siam Society 57:321-32.
SCMP. 1953. Lahu Nationality Autonomous People's Government Set Up in
Lantsang in Yunnan. Survey of the China Mainland Press 554. (Translated
from New China News Agency, Kunming 16 April 1953.)
Telford, J.H. 1937. Animism in Kengtung State. .loumal of the Bw·ma Research
Society 27:86-238.
United Nations. 1967. Report of the United Nations Sm·vey Team on the Economic
and Social Needs of the Opium-Producing Areas in Thailand. Bangkok.
Walker, A.R. 1970. Lahu Nyi (Red Lahul Village Society and Economy in North
Thailand. Chiang Mai: Tribal Research Centre. 2 vols mimeo.
Woodthorpe, R.G.
7:577-602.
1896. The Country of the Shans, The Geographical Journal
Young, G. · 1962. The Hill Tribes of Northern Thailand.
Bangkok.

Pl. !. Lahu Na or Black Lahu Girl
Photo: A.R. W alkd

Pl. 2. Lahu Nyi or Red Lahu Girl
Photo: A.R. Walker

Pl. 3. Lahu Sheh Leh Girl
Photo : A.R. Walker

NOTES
A NOTE ON THE HISTORY OF
WAT UMONG THERA JAN (CHIANG MAl)
by
Hans Penth
This "Note on the history of Wat Umong Thera Jan" is an abstract
of a part of an article which, due to other work, I shall not be able to put
into printable form for some time to come. However, since Jao Chlin
Sirorot, who spends so much energy, love and money in restoring Wat
Urnong, has asked me for at least five years to let him and the monks
know more about the place they enjoy so mucb, and since friends often
have asked me for some bare facts and the conclusions to which I have
come, without lengthy discussion of details, just something to ponder
about-! therefore agreed to set up this Note 1 •
Until now ( 1974) the history of Wat Umong Thera Jan (Monastery
with caves for the monk Jan) is still not well known.
Legend has it that the founder of Chiang Mai, King Mang Rai, in
about 1300 A.D. built the monastery for the highly learned but sometimes
'mentally deranged monk Jan (Pali canda "moon''). This monk,
it is said, used to stroll away from his monastery into the forest and
would then not be available for consultation when needed. Therefore,
the King had Wat Umong built, and the caves decorated with paintings
of trees, flowers and birds so that the monk could wander around in them
and could still. be easily found.
However, archaeological and historico-philological findings do not
quite agree with that.
1) This Note results from research work done by me at the Lan Na Thai Research
Centre, Faculty of Social Sciences, Chilfng Mai Universit!·-:Wat Umong Thera
Jan is about 5 km southwest of Chiang Mai, beyond the aafteld, at the foot of
Dei Suthep. One of its attractions is a network of vaults made of bricks and
decor&ted with paintings.

270 Hans Penth
Although the monastery is still awaiting proper archaeological in.
vestigation, I have been assured by experts, both Thai and foreign, that
the paintings in the caves as well as in the crypt under the jedi (P. cetiya),
do not go back to Mang Rai's time, but date from a later period,
perhaps between 1380-1450. According to the same expert opinion's,
the present shape of the jedi suggests an even more recent date, approximately
between 1450-1550.
None of the usual chronicles or inscriptions seem to mention Wat
U:mong. As far as I know, only one written source may perhaps refer
to the monastery: Banha Thera Jan, "The problems of (i.e. composed
or solved by) the monk Jan". This work, by an unknown author,
obviously was composed several hundred years ago. Its original is lost,
but a number of later copies still exist in the form of palm leaf manuscripts;
the hinguages used in them are Yuan (Kham Mi.iang, i.e. the
language of Chiang Mai and North Thailand) and Pi:ili; the script is
Yuan.
This work, in the form banded down to us, seemingly was not
intended to be a biography of the monk Jan, nor to be a history of Wat
Umong, but; as its title indicates, to present the "problems", which are
recorded in detail, including questions and answers. Still, it gives some
historical data. Unfortunately, these are not always chronologically
arranged but are scattered here and there throughout the text; which
often makes it impossible to place them in their historical context, and
even to say with certitude (at least from the versions known to me) that
the text indeed refers to Wat Umong. Moreover, the text mentions two
Wat Umong; besides, it contain~ a number of errors, and some of the.
manuscripts differ on certain points.
However, by comparing the facts mentioned in the manuscripts
with the usual historical sources and present-day toponymes, and then
trying to arrange them in chronological order, it seems to me that the
results of such an investigation may point to the Wat Umong in question
as.being one of the two Wat Umong mentioned in the text, and further
that the results harmonize more with the archaeological findings mentioned

Fig. I. The jedi of Wat Umong There Jan, seen from the south.
Foto: Hans Penth 1970.

Fig. 2. Wall painting in the crypt under the jedi.
Foto: Hans Penth 1970.

Fig. 3. Wall painting in the crypt under the jedi.
Foto : Hans Penth 1970.

Fig. 4.
Wall painting in one of the caves.
Foto: Hans Penth 1965. ·

A f'IOTE ON THE HISTdRY 01" WA1: UMONG THERA JAN (CHIANG MAl) 271
than with ~he legend. Her~ are the main events according to the text,
together With the conclusions at which I arrived:
Circa 1360-1370, the later monk Jan was born in a village which
the text calls Ban Phai (Bamboo-Village) and places in the MUang Wua
(Cow~District). I do not know where that was, but am inclined to think
that (a.) the village was not too far from Doi Suthep because later in the
text the monk is said to have ascended the mountain without making it
appear that it was a long journey, and that (b) the village was to the
south or southwest of Chiang Mai, because the teacher of monk Jan's
own teacher is said to have lived in Wat Doi Kham which lies about 4 km
southwest of Wat Umong.
In 1378, he was ordained novice iri the monastery of his home
village. At the age of 17, he came to Chiang ;M:ai or further studies, and
while there, he lived in Wat Phot Noi or Wat PhOi Noi at the Chiang
Mai market (kat chiang mai). Again, I do not know where that was,
but am inclined to think that it may have been either close to the present-day
Chiang Mai Gate (Pratu Chiang Mai) because many roads of
former Chiang Mai seem to converge on that spot, or close to Wat Phra
Sing which is known to have been a market place before it was founded
· in the middle of the 14th century.
He was ordained monk in Chiang Mai, presumably at the age of20.
Three years after his ordination, says our text, and seven years after the
Buddha's relic bad been brought from Wat Suan Dok to the top of Doi
Suthep, thus about 1380~85, he went up Doi Suthep and for several days
and nights recited holy texts, by which means he hoped to gain supernatural
intelligence in order to learn and understand quickly the Buddhist
Canon (Tipitaka). While he was thus reciting, a beautiful goddess
approached him, questioned him about what he was doing ,tb.ere and then
asked if he would leave the rnonkhood once he had gained intelligence.
When he replied in the negative, she handed him the desired intelligence
th
. 11 to
as some mg sma
eat
·
Taking the intelligence from
.
her, he
.
also
d h b d d ~or
graspe er an , an
this immodest act she told h1m that m the
l'
future, he would be mentally deranged.

272 iians Penth
Having returned to his village, he studied the Canon with great
success: He learned its three parts, including commentaries to the Vinaya, ·
within not quite three and a half months. He became famous in a short
time. Periodically, however, he was unconscious of his doings, became
restless and disappeared into the forest.
Towards the end of his reign, in the middle of the 1380's, King
Kii Na (r~ ca. 1355-1385) invited him to come and live in the Welukattbaram
(Bamboo-Monastery; P. veluka!tharama) under its head monk.
This monastery, our text says, derived its name from the fact that
when King Mang Rai came to found the city-state of Chiang Mai, on that
spot there was a small forest of eleven clusters of bamboo. King Kii
Na had caves built in the Welukattharam, so that the monk Jan could
live and wander around in them and still could be easily found. Hereafter,
this monastery was called Wat Umong Wihan (either "Monastery
with caves beneath the Wihan (P. vihara)" or "Monastery with a wihan
consisting of (or: located in the) caves").
In Chiang Mai, several times I have heard the opinion expressed
that this Welukattharam is identical with Wat Umong Thera Jan, but
nothing in our text seems to indicate this clearly. There are just a few
indirect pointers : The head monk, ca]ted a mahathera in some of the
manuscripts, is not included among the six mahatheras living in Chiang
Mai (see below); the site d,lthis monastery would be ideal for a monk
with the mental disposition of the thera Jan; there are no other similar
monasteries in the neighbourhood; the large caves of Wat Umong Thera
Jan and their sumptuous decoration would well point to an inhabitant
highly respected and honoured by the king and his followers; the farmers
in the neighbourhood still call the monastery Wat Umong Thera Jan; etc.
On the whole, it seems possible to accept the identification of Wat Umong
Thera Jan with Wat Umong Wihan of our text, but definite proof is
missing.
If the identification is,correct, then it seems likewise possible that
King Kii Na did not live long enough to see the construction and embellishments
of the caves finished.

A NOTF. ON nm HisTORY Or·' WAT UMONG THERA .iAN (cHIANG MAl)
H3
. Ac~ording to our text, the monk also lived in another monastery
Situated m the walled town of Chiang Mai, which monastery King KU
Na (or perhaps his successors) had placed at his disposal, together with
a number of servants.
The deep erudition of the monk became widely known in a short
time; he gave advice and made decisions in both religious and secular
matters, and high-ranking monks, princes and kings consulted with him.
In those days, according to our text, there were six mahatheras living in
Chiang Mui, all perfectly well versed in the Tipi~aka. "In that time",
our text continues, "the (Buddhist) religion had not. yet come to Chiang
Mai very much. When a problem arose, they (i.e. the six mahatheras)
went to consult with the thera Jan. He could solve any difficulty".­
For King KU Na, upon request, he composed a kind of "guide to proper
conduct", and he did the same later for King Ti Lok (r. 1441-1487).­
Between 1387 (King Kil Na is no longer mentioned) and 1402 he solved
a number of "riddles" or "problems", questions to test his knowledge,
sent to him from monks in Kampbang Phet; he likewise sent them riddles,
which they could not solve.-He established "guidelines" not only for
princely and high ranking personalities, but also for his own disciples.
Tbe thera Jan, whom our text also calls thera Janta or Jao Janta
Salam (Sanskrit sramana) died at the age of 77, around 1445, in the
Wat Umong Noi (Monastery with a small cave).
This monastery is perhaps identical with his above mentioned
Il}.onastery in town, and it may be possible that it is the same which is
called at present Wat Umong Ariya Monthon. I have been told by
some old Chiang Mai citizens tbat this monastery, about 50-60 years ago,
was likewise called Wat Umong Thera Jan.
Hereafter, we hear nothing more about Wat Umong, but I cannot
believe that the jedi and the vaults were neglected or uninhabited all the
time. Judging from the embellishments on the je~i, :aint re~ains or
"shadows" of w bich are still visible in places, I am mchned to tlunk that
a restoration took place perhaps between 1800-1840.

At uoout 1900, ae:

A NOTE ON THE DATE OF THE TRAIBHUMIKATH.A
by
Michael Vick~ry*
In no. 11, part 1, of their "Bpigraphical and Historical Studies"
entitled, "The Epigraphy of Mahadharmaraja I of Sukhodaya",t A.B:
Griswold and Prasert qa Nagara 2 make reference to. the date of the
Tebhumikatha or Traibbiimikatba, composed by King Lidaiya, "son of
King Lodaiya and grandson of King Rama Gat)lheit",3 According to
them this work, "~as completed in a year of the cock, sixth year of his
reign as Uparaja, i.e. 1345 A.D.".4 They also note that according to
the exordium of the work itself, it was composed in sakar'aja 23, "perhaps
meaning the twenty-third year of his life", although this is put forward
as a simple conjecture and further reference is made to an article by
Prasert for more comment on the subject.s
In an earlier note on the same subject G. and P. referred to the
colophon of the Traibhiimikatha, 6 and their switch to "exordium" may
have confused others along with the present writer, since the currently
available published edition of the work contains only a colophon. 7
However, as a recent article by Prasert makes clear, the original text
contains both an exordium and a colophon, which differ from one another
;-o~;;·~t";;~·t-~f-i-Iistory, School of Humanities, Universiti S.ains Malaysia, Penang.
1) JSS 61(1), Jan 1973, pp. 71-178
2) Cited hereafter as G. and P.; and their ~tudies, ·which began in JSS 56(2),
July 1968, will be cited as EHS and number.
3) EHS 11(1), JSS 61(1), January 1973, pp. 71-178; see 71-2, nn. 3,4.
4) ibid,, Although in EHS no. 4, January 1969, vol 57(1), p, 113, n. 6, they give
1340 as the date of its' composition.
5) ibid.
6) EHS 10, JSS 60(1), January 1972, pp. 21-15:_; se~ p. 6t,n. 3~ . . .
7) traibhii.mi bra~ ruon khbh bra~n'i'i lidaiya, chapap ho samut haen Jlitl, 4th pnnt.
ing; 2509

276 Michael Vickery
in some interesting details, 8 with the exordium requiring less explanation
and emendation in order to fit the accepted picture of Sukhothai history.9
The exordium says the work was composed in the year 23, a cock .
year, and that the author was "cau bra~iia Ledaiya, son of cau bra~na
Lelidaiya who reigned at Srisajjanalaya and at Sukhodaya. This cau
bra~na Lidaiya was the grandson of cau brahiia Ramaraja who belonged
to the solar dynasty".t 0
This shows a genealogy which generally conforms to that of the
inscriptions, except for corruption of the names, and this is perhaps ihe
reason why G. and P. now prefer it to the colophon.
The latter also gives the date of composition as the year 23, a
cock year, but describes the author as "bra~na Lidaya grandson of pu
brahifa [grandfather bra~iia] Lidaya who reigned at Srisajjanalaya a~d
Sukhodaya, who was grandson of brab Ramaraja who belonged to the
solar dynasty"~! I
Taken literally, the colophon provides a genealogy which is quite
different from the received views about the authorship of the Traibhii·
mikatba, but not completely fantastic for the grandson of the true
Lidaiya, or Mahadharmaraja I, was also called Lidaiya, or more properly
8) Prasert I).a Nagara, "vivli~hanakiir varrvakarrm samay sukhoday" in viv'!ujhanak

A NOTE ON THE DATE OF THE TRAJBHUMJKATHA
Sai Lidaiya.I2 The colophon then, if originally written as it stands
today, reflects a belief that the Traibhilmikatha was composed b Kin
Mahadharmara:ja III. y g
Another possibility, and one which permits association of the
Trai~hilm.ika tha with Mahactharmaraja I, is that the writer of the colophon,
had m mmd something like the list of ancestral spirits in inscriptio~ no.
45, assumed them all to represent generations, and in addition confused
the names llidai and lidai. The relevant part of this list is :
Eli brafia ramaraj
J2il sai sangrama
£i:i brafia lodai
J?IT braffa ilvva natp tha1p
Eil brana mahadharrmaraja13
All it takes for this list to fit the information of the colophon is to
assume the error of writing lidai for /Odai, a type of error which we have
already noted in the exordium. The writer would, of course, have
belonged to a later period, for a contemporary would have known that
sal sangrama and ;zvva nii1ft thart~ did not represent separate generations.
Another interesting point about the exordium and colophon is in
the titles they contain. The former, although showing greater conformity
to historical "truth" gives the kings the title cau bra~na, which is not
found in any contemporary inscription for Ramaraja (Rama Garp.heil),
Lodaiya or Lidaiya, and thus indicates composition at a later date, while
the latter, although apparently more corrupt, has the more appropriate
titles bra~'iia and bra~.l4
Whatever the scholarly consensus concerning these points may turn
out to be, it should be clear that neither the exordium nor the colophon
are unequivocal documents. The remainder of this paper, which is
12) EHS 1, JSS 56(2), July 1968, p. 218, n. 28
13) EHS 3, JSS 57(1), January 1969, pp. 57-lOS; and pral).jum sila caru'kbhiigdi
3, inscription 45, lines 9-11.
14) The title cau brah'na first appears in inscription no. 8, dating from the end of
Lidaiya's reign, but is not used for Lidaiya himself. It is also found in the
somewhat late' inscriptions nos. 14, 40, 45, and 49.
277

278 Michael Vickery
concerned with the date they contain, is intended to show that, in their
present form, they were composed considerably later than the Sukhothai
period and by a scribe who had only a hazy conception of t'rue Sukhothai
history.
Prasert has discussed the date of the Traibhumikatha in two different
articles. In the first he dealt with the year date 23, and his argument
was based on the following points :Is
-Lidaiya was up(!raja in Sri SajjanaHiya before ruling in Sukhothai.
-He had ruled there 22 years in 1283 saka and thus assumed the
position of uparaja in 1262, year of the dragon.
-According to the Traibhii.mikatha; he had ruled in Sri SajjanaUiya
6 years when he wrote it.
-Therefore the cock year in which it was composed was 1267
saka. (I am deliberately using saka rather than Prasert's own Buddhist
era dates because, as his own note, p. 51, indicates, his Buddhist era
calculations were wrong for the Sukhothai period.)
• With respect to the Traibhilmikatha era he says, "If the era 23 is
the era which was already cut, it means that the era was cut and the
year 1 established in ... pig year ...••,16 thus assuming that 23 is evidence
for the existence of"a special era established in the 13th century and for
which there is no extant evidence in the inscriptions. The latter show
use of the aula and saka eras, and a few Buddhist era dates, throughout
the Sukhothai period.
What is of interest here is that Prasert links the era of the Traibhumikatha
to the era of Nan Nabhamas, saying that, "If the era of the story
of Nan Nabhamas is true, Nan Nabhamas entered the palace in the year
6, year of the dragon ... etc" .I' This again implies that the year 23 of
the Traibh'Umikatha colophon represents a hitherto unknown era which
began in a pig year.' corresponding to 1245 saka { 1323 A.D.), and for
which there is no other evidence but the story of Nan Nabhamas.
15) Prasert !}a Nagara, "kar jalJlral). pral).vatisasy sukhoday" (Revising Sukhothai
History), sangamsiisfr parida§n (Th~ Social Science Review), Special nQ. 3,
1966, pp. 43-52j sell P· 46,
16) ibid.
17) ibid.

279
ln Prasert's second article he discusses the indications of month
and day given in the exordium and colophon, in the former, full moon
of the 4th month, thursday, and in the latter, full moon of the lOth
month, thursday. It is his contention that they were originally the same
and indicated the date on which the work was completed.ts Archaimbault
prefers the explanation that the date of the exordium is that on
which the work was begun and that of the colophon the date of completion,
although there would still be scribal errors in the extant text.
According to Billard's calculations, cited by Archaimbault, the cock
year 23 should be revised to dog year 24, but nq explanation i's offered
to connect either 23 or 24 with .§aka 1267 (A.D. 1345), the date which
has been assigned to the Traibhumikatha on the basis of information found
in the Sukbothai inscriptions,t9
Thus in spite of the recent scholarly attention to the Traibhfimikatha,
mystery still surrounds the date, sakaraja 23. Griswold's conjecture,
cited above, does not seem very likely, for there is no example, I believe,
of the term .§akaraja referring to someone's age. Of course, as Griswold
wrote, "the text may be corrupt",2° and if it is very corrupt there may
be no way of determining what the date should have been.
Before, however, attempting to emend the date arbitrarily to make
it conform to the known facts of Lidaiya's life, we should make certain
that there is no known dating system into which it fits as given.
It is clear of course that the year 23 in any of the commonly known
eras is impossible for the Sukhothai period. In certain other epigraphical
studies it bas been found that dates were occasionally abbreviated,
the unit for . hundreds or thousands being omitted, and which, when
restored, provided a date fitting into the expected system. 21
If we do
18) Pras~rt, op. cit. note 8 above, PP· 9-10.
19) See Archaimbault's translation, P· 2SS, n. 1
20.
21)
EHS 11(1 ), P· 72, n. 4 • · · · (II)" B II t ·
. . G ""'ltments d'Epigraphte Laottenne
des
u e 1 11
p 1 erre Mane agneux, n ~ · 74 M
2 · i1let-aout-septembre 1970, PP· 67- · r.
Amis clu Royaume Lao, no. ' JU ft found in the manu-
Archaimbault also informs me that such dates are o en .
scripts of northern Thailand.

this for the cock year 23 of the Traibhumikatha, we find, for tpe cui a era,
:23 as a cock year an~ from then on cock years ending in 23 occur every
300 years, in 323, 623! 923, and so on, none of which are possible for
the reign of Lidaiya. The first laka era cock year ending in 23 is 223,
and from then on they occur every 300 years-523, 823, 1123, etc. Again
none are suitable for Lidaiya.
As for the Buddhist era and the hypothetical
cul'ama1Ji era, there were no cock years ending in 23 at all.
One more possibility deserves examination.
Sometime during the
Ayutthaya period the belief arose that an old era bad been "cut" and a
new one established by·Pbra Ruang. On the one hand this was said to
have occurred in the year 1000 of the Buddhist era, although such an
era, beginning in 457 A.D. was never, as far as is known, in use.22
idea probably had its origin in the belief of a step-by-step deterioration
of Buddhism every 1000 years. Alternatively, Pbra Ruang was believed
to. have cut the "old era'' and established the cula era, a belief which is
reflected in the story of Nan Nabhama8.23
The
This type of story about the cutting of eras, and based on erroneous
beliefs about the sequence in which various eras were used, is found in
'
several areas of Southeast Asia. In Cambodia, Thailand and Burma the
traditional ide~;t is of one or more ancient eras followed by the Buddhist
era, the saka era, and finally the cula era, each introduced at a time
22) Sir John Bowring, The Kingdom a7Jd People of Siam, Oxford in Asia Historical
Reprints, 1969, val I, p. 36, translated from Thai sources, including the
Phongsawadan No'a/bansavatar hno'a, "It was in the one-thousandth year of
Buddha, A.D. 457, that King Ruang, whose advent ... had been announced
by .•. Gaudama himself ... introduced the Thai alphabet ... "; and, p. 40,
"In the year 1000 of the era of Phra-Khodom, Phra-Ruang abolished the Buddhist
era .... and ordained a new one, which is the era of the Siamese; and is
called chuulasakkarat-the lesser era".
See also Thai printed versions of baMciVat'iir hno'a and the so-called British
Museum Chronicle, bral!, rajabaMavatan knaisayam, Bangkok 1964, pp. 6.-17.
23) nun nabama.~ hro' tat?Wap dav M cu{al'i!k§n, silpaparrnagiir, Bangkok, 2513.

A Nil'l'E ON THE DATfu OF THE TRAIBHITMIKATH~
corresponding to its year 1,24 Epigraphy, however, shows that for
Cambodia and Thailand the sequence was saka era, cula era, Buddhist
era, and although no inscription as early as the period in which Naiz
Nabhamlis is situated has been found in Sukhothai, the entire· dated
epigraphic record of central Siam from the 9th century up to and including
the first inscriptions of Sukhothai makes use of the .faka era.
It is not known at what time the beliefs about Phra Ruang cutting
an era arose, but they were held by some people in mid-19th century,
and apparently even as late as a few years ago, since Mr. Piphat Sukhathit,
in his article on the culamaiJ.i era, felt obliged to insist that the old
stories of Phra Ruang cutting the era were JlOt true.2s ·
Thus although an association of Phra Ruang with 1000 B.E., or
with the beginning of the cula era is not true, it was for an undetermined
period of time part of Thai cultural belief, and it would not be surprising
to find reflections of it in traditional literature. As for the origin of the
belief, extant contemporary inscriptions indicate that the cula era was
first introduced into the area of present-day Thailand at Sukhothai in
the 14th century, probably from Burma, where its earliest use is recorded,
and this may have eventually led to the idea that the era had been devised
at Sukhothai.
The chronological system in question is presented most clearly in
the story of Nan Nabhamas, which, even though in large part a forgery,
as Prince Damrong indicated,26 nevertheless reflects beliefs held by late
Ayutthayan or early Bangkok individuals regarding the Sukhothai period.
Interestingly Prince Damrong made no comment on the dating system
of Nan Nabhamas.
~~----~~------~~~~--
24) See Thai sources in note 22 above. For Burma, Maung Htin Aung, Bzernese
Histm•y Refure 1287: A Defence of the Chronicles, the Asoka Society, Oxford
1970, p. 9; Shway Yoe, The Burman His Life and Notions, Norton, N.Y:, ~· .549.
For northern Thailand, statements about the squence of eras, some f1ct1hous,
are to be found in • 'baiisavatiir mo'ail no'n yliri chiao saen", prajum banstivatar
25)
26)
part 61· and tiimnan sii1hanavati kumar, ibid.
" k ~. z- ..,. S'ilpakon 6(5) January 1963, pp. 47-57; see pp. 47·8.
sa ara;a cu amal}t , , • .
. t f his commentary to the Royal Autograph Chromcle, transn
t h e f us page o . . ,
0
lated into English as "The Story of the Records of S1amese H1story , JSS
11 (2), 1914, pp. 1-20.
2si

282 Michael Vickery
The chronological statements of Nah Nabhamas are as follows !
1. p. 1. The story is set "at the time when the cula era was first
established, in the reign of samtec bra~} ruoiz".
2. p. 32. Her birth was in the 3rd month, year of the rat, seventh
of the decade, and in that year they were still using the ancient era
(pora 11 sakaraja). "His Majesty the King had not yet cut the era to establish
the cula era".
Note that in known eras a rat year is always evennumbered,
never seventh of the decade.
3. p. 93. "In cula era 6, year of the dragon, 6th of the decade"
her age "by years" was 17 and "by months" 15 years in the 12th month.
This difference is due to counting first by current years as in traditional
Thai practice and then by completed years as in modern western usage.
The 12th month of cula era 6 would have been just 3 months before her
16th birthday, modern style.
4. p. 158, at the end of the book. The date was, "cula era had
completed 18 years".
Worked out in tabular form these statements prove to be perfectly
coherent and in all details fit the cula era projected back to its theoretical
point of origin. Continued beyond the date of Nan Nabham(d we find
cula era 23, year of the cock, fitting easily into the lifetime of the "Phra
Ruang" of the Nan Nabhamas story.
era animal year decade remarks
poran rat 7 -Birth of Nan Nabhamas in 3rd
bull 8 month, 2 months before end of
tiger 9 year
hare 10
dragon 1
snake 2
horse 3.
goat 4
monkey 5
cock \ 6
dog 7 -Last year of poral} era

A NOTE ON THE DATE OF THE TRAlBHUMIKATHA 283
era animal year decade remarks
cut a 1 pig 1 -number of decade changes to
2 rat 2 conform to new era
3 bull 3
4 tiger 4
5 hare 5
6 dragon 6 -Nan Nabbamas age 17 by
7 snake 7 years, 15 by months
8 horse 8
9 goat 9
10 monkey 10
11 cock 1
12 dog 2
13 pig 3
14 rat 4
15 bull 5
16 tiger 6
17 hare 7
18 dragon 8 -End of the story of Nan
19 snake 9 Nabbamas
20 horse lO
21 goat 1
22 monkey 2
23 cock 3 -Date of the Traibhumikatha
The date in the Traibhumikath'ii exordium and colophon would seem
to be explicable in this way. As G. and P. emphasized, this work has
'
I
been known popularly, and from before Sukhothai history had been
reconstructed with the aid of inscriptions, as the Traibhumi Brah, Ruon.
The genealogical data also appear to have been distorted in one way or
another, and the best explanation would seem to be that the date in. the
exordium and colophon, whatever the age of the text as a whole, is due
to an Ayutthaya period copyist at a time when true knowledge of Sukhothai
chronology had been lost.

284 Michael Vickery
This conclusion has certain implications for the value of the
Traibhumikatha as historical source material. It seems that its attribution
to the Sukhotbai' period is based on the colophon and on its popular
designation as the Traibhumi Bra~z Ruoh. All scholars admit that its
language may be corrupt. Now if the date and genealogy of the exordium
and colophon are also corrupt, there is no way to attribute the
text to any period without. philological study and close comparison with
the certain Sukhothai language of the inscriptions. Let us hope that
competent Thai linguists and literary historians will soon undertake this
task, for until it is done the Traibhumikatha is not a proper source for
the history of Sukhothai or any other period anterior to 1778 when the
manuscript under discussion was copied. 27
27) This date comes from the same colophon which gives the date of copying as
"4th month, year of the dog, Sunday ... when the Buddhist era had completed
2321 years ... ".
Very recently an older manuscript of the Traibhiimikatbii bas been discovered
in Chiengmai and may provide valuable clues to the history of the work. It
was composed or copied in 1051 (A.D. 1689) and is listed as no; 3/5 in the
library of Wat Pra Singh, See A Catalogue of Palm-Leaf Texts in W at Libraries
in Chiengmai CThailand) Pal't l, by Sommai Premchit, Department of Sociology
and Anthropology, Faculty of Social Sciences, Chiengmai Unive.rsity,
April 1974.
Mr. Archaimbault called my attention to this catalogue,

REVIEW ARTICLE
BACKGROUND TO THE SRI VIJAYA STORY-PART II.
J.G. de Casparis, Prasasti Indonesia I : lnscripties uit de C 'I d ..
(Bandung, 1950).
, men ra-tz]d
J.G. de Cas paris, Prasasti Indonesia II: Selected Inscriptions from the 7tl
1
to the 9th Centuries A.D. (Bandung, 1956).
S. Paranavitana, "The Designer of Barabudur" The "'"alza B d' · v · k'
• •y" o m, azsa .rla
N umber (Volume 78, May-June 1970, Number 5-6 1970 Calcutta) pp
165-168, ' ' .
7. The South Sumatran Inscriptions
The Sri Vijaya Story, or what might be called the Sri Vijaya-Sailendra
Argument, is a triangular argument between South Siam, South
Sumatra and Central Java. A great deal of blood, sweat and tears, to
say nothing of ink, has b~en spilt on this subject, yet !be whole argument
would never have occurred if the internal evidence of the various locations
bad been kept separate from external evidence.
The Sri Vijaya Story can be divided into four main periods, namely
1) The 7th century, with internal evidence from all three localities;
2) The Sailendra Period, covering the 8th and 9th centuries, with internal
evidence from Central Java and South Siam (Cbaiya); 3) The Javaka
or Second Sailendra Period, covering the lOth and llth centuries; and
4) The Padmawamsa Period, covering the 12th and 13th centuries. The
only internal evidence from these two latter periods come from South
Siam (inscriptions and chronicles). This, the second of a review article
in three parts, deals with the first two periods only.
In the first or 7th century period, all three localities produced
internal evidence. 1-Ching's evidence is considered internal evidence
for South Siam because he was at Poche between 671 and 695 and did
his writing there, but it 1s external evidence for South Sumatra and Java.
The internal evidence of Central Java consists of some Buddha images
from Bogem and Bogisan. These figures are not rural or primitive in
any way, but the expression had not reached the high Classic of Boroburdur
or Sewu (Buddhist} and Prambanan (Hindu) a full century later.

286 REVIEW ARTICLE
The South Sumatra internal evidence consists of some Sri Vijaya
inscriptions. Originally there were four such inscriptions discovered in
South Sumatra and the island of Bangka, dated between 683 and 686
A.D. Lately a fifth inscription of the same period bas been discovered at
Telaga Batu, together with a few fragments which were published by Dr.
J.G. de Casparis in his Prasasti Indonesia II in 1956. One of the inscriptions
mentions the phrase Sri Vijaya Jayasidhiyatra, and another mentions
Bhumi Java. None of them are 'religious' in the proper sense
because they consist of curses and imprecations, while one records the
setting up of a park.
The first inscription came from Kedukan Bukit near Palembang
and states that on a day corresponding to April 23, 683 A.D., the king
embarked on a boat and 25 days later (May 19) conducted an army of
20,000 strong from some place and arrived some place else. The phrase
Sri Vijaya Jayasiddhiyatra would imply that whatever the expedition
was, it was successful and was of benefit to Sri Vijaya.
The second inscription, dated 684, was found some kilometers from
Palembang and commemorated a park called Sri Kshetra, setup by order
of King Sri Jayanasa (or Sri Jayanaga.)
The third, fourth and newly found fifth stones are similar to one
another in that they recorded an imprecation uttered on the occasion
when a Sri Vijaya army started on an expedition against Bhumi Java,
which had not submitted. I have already said that Java and Javadvipa
(Cho'po and Ye-po-ti in Chinese) were generic names and could refer to
Borneo,. Malaya (island}, Sumatra or Java, or to all of them. One stone
was found on the Jambi river on the east coast of south Sumatra; another,
dated 686, on the island of Bangka; and the firth came from Telaga Batu
slightly to the east of Palembang.
Basing his theory on these South Sumatran inscriptions (but without
the stele from Telaga Batu which was published after his retirement),
as well as on the external evidence of I-Ching and a Sri Vijaya inscrip­
·tion from Chaiya (see section 8 below), Professor Coedes in 1918 introduced
the Sri Vijaya Kingdom. According to his theory, the Sri Vijaya
Kingdom, which was located in South Sumatra with its capital at Palembang,
attacked Java (Bhumi Java in the inscriptions) and expanded

HEVIEW ARTICLE 287
n.ortln~ards to the Peninsula (Chaiya Inscription). Obviously a theory
ll~e thts: based solely on the written evidence and not taking into account
things hke the superb art of Central Java in the 8th and 9th centuries,
was bound to have people who disagreed. So we have Dutch wits writing
about "A Sumatran Period in Javanese History", and "A Javanese Period
in Sumatran History", but somehow they all failed to take in the whole
overalL picture. Professor Majumdar was the first to suggest that Sri
Vijayn should be located on the Malay Peninsula. That was in 1933.*
Then in 1935 Dr. Wales submitted that Chaiya was the capital of Sri
Vijaya,** onLy unfortunately be later withdrew his proposal. After that,
in 1937, Mr. J.L. Moens wrote in his 'Sri Vijaya, Yava en Kataha' t:
"The inscription of 683 A.D. (from Kcdukan Bukit) is not the year
of the founding of Sri Vijaya in Pal em bang, but the capture of Palembang
during that year by a force of 20,000 men."
Moens thought that Palembang was conquered by the •New Sri
Vijaya' located at Muara Takus on the equator (the 'old Mo-lo-yu' of!­
Ching's evidence. He located the 'old Sri Vijaya' at Kelantan on the
Malay Peninsula.) Moens' idea is worth following up in a little more
detail. The following version is essentially his, but I have modernised
it in the light of new data. The Kedukan Bukit inscription contains
three dates (23 April, 19 May and 16 June), which should mean that the
king of Sri Vijuya left his capital (Moens : Kelantan; Chand: Cbaiya)
on 23 April for Muara Takus (Malayu or Minana Tamvan in the text),
where he set up a base. From there be set out again on 19 May to attack
Jambi, Palembang and Banglca by land and by sea; and the whole expedition
was over by 16 June. The king then set up five inscriptions (so
far found, not counting some fragments), three of which contained curses
and imprecations against any infringement that any one might incur
*-R:C.-Maj~mdar, 'Les rois Sailendra de Suvar~tadvipa', (Bulletin de l'Ecole Franqaise.
d' Extrema Q,-zent, XXX Ill, 193 3).
** H Q 'ttch wales • A newly explored route of ancient Indian expansion',
. 0 . uar ,
(fndian Art and Letters, 9, I, 193S), I-JI.
"C · .. a Yava en Kataha" CTijdschrift voor lndisch Taal-, Land-en
t J .L. Moens, fiVIJaY · 'aasch Genootschap · van Kunsten · en w etensc 1 wppen, a atavta, ·
V CJ lk •en k un d e 1>an h e t B a· tavl · .
Deel LXXVII, 1937, p. 317-486).
h 1 t' on by R J de Touche (Journal of the Malayan Branch of
Abridged Eng I· ts trans a 1 · · •
theRoyalAsiaticSociety, 17, 2, 1940),1-108. ,

288 REVIEW ARTICLE
against his orders. The language used was old Malay, and the text stated,
''Sri Vijaya, victorious, successful in his expedition, endowed with
plenty ..."
I understand many people have tried but no one bas succeeded
in explaining these three dates, or two stages of the expedition
as I might call it, if Palembang is made the starting point. Coedes
himself submitted that the expedition from Palembang was made against
Cambodia. This was his last conjecture concerning his Sri Vijaya
theory.* 1 cannot follow his arguments very well because he brings in
too many conflicting details and has too mamy irrelevant footnotes.
Meanwhile of the people who disagreed with Coedes, and thereby
indirectly agree with Moens, I shall only mention two or three.
Dr. Soekmono, Head of the Indonesian Archaeological Service,
thought that Palembang was conquered by a Sri Vijaya based at Jambi,
where one of the inscriptions was found.~~'* Soekmono's theory that Palembang
was the place conquered and not the capital of Sri Vijaya was based
on two counts. The first is geomorphological, namely Palembang, today
located about 70 kilometers from the sea, was on the tip of a promontory
and therefore could not have been the capital of anything. The second
is epigraphic, namely that the Telaga Batu stele contained such "terrific
imprecations" that it was hardly a charter that one would set up in one's
own capital. It was more likely to have been set up in conquered
territory. I am not sure that I accept Soekrnono's geomorphological
evidence, or rather Soekmono's interpretation of that evidence, but I
think he has a good point concerning imprecations not being set up in
one's own capital. But then if Palembang had been conquered by Jambi,
why set up an imprecation at Jambi too? At any rate, Soekomono's
views, written with the full prestige and authority of his office, is of great
importance because it shows that Indonesian scholars do not accept Professor
Coedes' theory.
Meanwhile the Thai, in particular the Chaiya monk, the Yen.
· Buddhadasa Bhikku, and his layman brother, Nai Thammatas Panij, have
* G. Coedes, "A Possible lnte.rpretation of the Inscription at Kedukan Bukit (Pal em·
bang)", in, John Bastin and R. Roo! vink, Eds., Malayan and Indonesian Studies.
Essays presented to Sir Richard Winstedt on his eighty-fifth birthday (Oxford,
Clarendon Press, 1964), pp. 24-32.
** R. Soekmono, 'Early civilisations of Southeast Asia', (JSS, 46, 1, 1958), 17·20.

REVIEW ARTICLE
never accepted Coedes' theory from the first. They thought that in the
7th ~entury South Sumatra was conquered by Sri Vijaya from Chaiya,
and 10 the 8th Sri Vijaya under the Sailendras conquered Central Java.
Their theory, written in Thai and scattered in several journals over the
years*, is based on the Sri Vijaya inscription from Wat Hua Vieng,
Cbaiya, only unfortunately this stele is dated a full century after the South
Sumatran inscriptions. I think I-Ching's evidence is much more telling.
This evidence is one of the chief ingredients in ProfessorCoedes' theory
of his Sri Vijaya Empire.
289
If we take 1-Ching's evidence as being internal
evidence for Chaiya because !-Ching did his writing there, and external
evidence for Sumatra; and the South Sumatran inscriptions as being
external evidence for Cbaiya and consider the two pieces of evidence
separately, then Coedes' theory cannot bold water at all. On the other
hand, if we consider them together, we find that the geographic evidence
for locating !-Ching's Foe he at Chaiya is quite firm (see section 5), while
the Sumu tran inscriptions are so controversial that the Chaiya brothers'
theory of Palembang and Jambi being conquered by the King of Sri
Vijaya from Chaiya is not only tenable but it is also the only theory that
would fit the facts as we have them.
Without intending to, Professor
Wolters seems to lend support to this theory when he says on page 22
of his Early Indonesian Commerce, "The second impression was tbat·by
about 700 the headquarters of the empire was at Palembang, though
there has been no agreement about its earlier relationship with Malayu­
Jambi, a subject bedevilled by I-Tsing's mysterious statement that Malayu
was 'now' Sri Vijaya." I have not mentioned archaeological remains but
they are important too.
In this respect Cbaiya produced a great deal
while Palembang almost nothing, and Professor Coedes hiinself has
remarked, "the complete absence of archaeological remnants in Palembang
is a mystery which demands solution" Funny he never tried to
find any solution to such a simple problem himself.
'"' ~ '"'"'IV
* Thammatas Panij's views are collected in, nn:wVIlll' rl'JU'Ii, 'J'IUJ/'11'J7n')?l f'f'1111ll
(i11J.UWlJ~fll~nlfi, uvn'wYJu1, 2515), esp, Chaps. 3-7, and 10.

290 IU:VJEW ARTICLE
This covers the internal evidence of the Sri Vijaya story in the 7th
century. The views put forward are what Wolters calls heterodox, for
he says on page 22 of his Early Indonesian Commerce, "A few attempts
have been made to upset the view that Palembang was the original
headquarters and to look for it in the Malay Peninsula, but this form of
heterodoxy has never found favour with the veterans, and indeed in
1936 Professor Coedes felt moved to comment on 'the strangest vicissitudes
of the history of Sri Vijaya in these last few years' and to call a
halt to the tendency to look for its original seat anywhere except at
Palembang." Wolters then adds, rather naively I thought, "His advice
was not immediately heeded, but today there is little inclination to break
with traditional thinking on this subject." Perhaps a reassessment of
the evidence in a more scientific manner than Coedes brought to bear on
the question would turn this heterodoxy orthodox-not amongst veterans
of course, but only amongst young people beginning to study this
subject.
To summarise this section on Coedes' Sri Vijaya theory :by the.
end of the 7th century, Sri Vijaya on the Malay Peninsula had got complete
control of the Malacca Straits, and this control was to last for six
centuries. The main points of control were Muara Takus in Central
Sumatra and Kedah on the west coast of the Peninsula. It is difficult to
know what subsequent part Palembang played in this scheme because,
after the 7th century, South Sumatra produced no more internal evidence
until about 1286 A.D.
This was on the base of an image of Amoghapasa­
Lokesvara, which bad been sent by a King of East Java, and was not a
local record any more than were the 7th century South Sumatran inscriptions.
It has been suggested that the Malays set up a kingdom at Palem- .
bang, presumably because the South Sumatran inscriptions were in the
Malay language. This is very doubtful. As the eVidence will show, the
Sri Vijaya people were of the Javaka raye, and if this race was not
Malay, then the Malays of Palembangwere t~e subject race and not the
rulers. In any case West Java was in a better position to control the
Sunda Straits than South Sumatra. So on the meagre evidence we have,
I cannot yet accept that the Malay race played any very importantpart
in the Sri Vijaya story at such an early stage.

REVIEW ARTICLE 291
8. The Sailendra Dynasty in Chaiya and Central Java
The first Sai!endra Period, covering Central Java and the Malay
Peninsula, as well as Muara Takus on the equator in Central Sumatra,
lasted about two centuries. Some 7th cyntury. Chinese toponyms have
already been mentioned in section 3, namely Chele-foche (Sri Vijaya or
Cbaiya), Ho-ling (Tambralinga or Nakorn Sri Thammaraj), Chih-tu with
its capital Seng-shih (Sing ora Inland Sea), To-po-teng on the west coast
(Tuptieng or Trang) and Chieh-cha (Kedah). Some of the other Twelve
Naksat Cities (section 1) might have come i~to the story, though of
course in this early period the Naksat Cities had not come into being as
such. The main point to remember is that South Sumatra had dropped
out at the end of the 7th century, so any placenames in the story that
cannot be located in Java must be found on the Malay Peninsula or in
Central Sumatra. The names are confusing, but by keeping the geographical
aspects of the evidence in mind, most of them can be located
without difficulty.
The first and last inscriptions that are internal evidence for this
period are Sanjaya's Cangal Charter dated 732 A.D., and Bali tung's Kedu
inscription dated 907. The names of the kings of Mataram are given in
the latter stele, starting with Sanjaya and ending with Balitung himself.
The list as given in Professor Sastri's History of Sri Vijaya, is as follows:
Rakai mataram sang ratu sanjaya
Sri maharaja rakai panang karan
Sri maharaja rakai panung galan
Sri maharaja rakai warak
Sri maharaja rakai garung
Sri maharaja rakai pikatan
Sri maharaja rakai kayu wangi
Sri maharaja rakai watu humalang
Sri maharaja rakai watu kura (Balitung). .
. ' charter was set up at a mountain called Wukir in Central
S anJaya s Sh · ·
Java and recorded the establishment of a Linga, symbol of the aJVlte
faith. In the stele he also gave information about one Sanna.(or Sannaha,
. h b ti'oned Sanna.) The text contams 12 verses
whtch means t e a ove men

oumkd hy Gang;l und nephew: "'f h1s. kmg was
rmmcd Sri Snnj;i)tcr, m Sun~l)'a married
Sanna's. In n tran!>lid~

REVIEW ARTICLE 293
When the inscriptions from South Siam were collected and sent to
Bangkok, two were taken from Wat Hua Vieng in Chaiya. The base of
one inscription was still in situ at Wat Vieng the first time I went to
Chaiya, but since then it has been moved to the small museum at Wat
Phra Dhatu in Chaiya. This inscription is completely illegible and needs
no longer concern us. The second inscription from Wat Hua Vieng is No.
23 in Professor Coedes' Receuil II. Soon after the inscriptions arrived in
Bangkok the authorities wrote to the bead abbot of the Chaiya district
(the ecclesiastical nai amphur or district officer so to say) to ask for
measurements and other details of the Wat Hua Vieng inscriptions
because, they said, one of the inscriptions bad become mixed with an
inscription from Vieng Sra. The information was given, but when the
inscriptions were printed, No. 23 was said to have come from Vieng Sra
in the Thai version, while in the French version Coedes said that the
stele came from Wat Serna Muang in Nakorn Sri Thammaraj. (Presumably,
to take the place of the missing inscription from Wat Vieng in the
records, Coedes said that No. 24, which the records said came from
Nakorn, came from that wat in Chaiya.) The good folks of Chaiya
complained because they were certain of their facts. When the two ·
inscriptions were being moved to Bangkok, it was found that No. 23 had
some obscene writing on the uninscribed part. The pious folks of
Chaiya, and the folks of Chaiya are still considered pious today, washed
off the writing, which I presume was in chalk or charcoal. Surely such
a wealth of detail must have been founded on fact.
Many years passed and Professor Alexander B. Griswold went to
Chaiya. Thammatas told him about Coedes mixing up the two inscriptions
and Griswold told Coedes, who in turn wrote to Tbammatas asking
for fun details. The information was supplied, but when the second
edition of the Thai version of the inscriptions was reprinted, Coedes
added a note that a monk from Nakorn had told him that No. 23 came
from wat Serna Muang and thus there was no need for him to change
his opinion. Actually the official records do not have any inscription
that came from Wat Serna Muang, though there is one that came from
Wat Serna Chai next door, which has been moved to the small museum
at Wat Phra Dhat\1. Sema Cbai is today a deserted wat and I suppose

2.94
ut one time it was .integrated into that of Wut Setml Muang, though a
school now occupies most of tbe spur.:c. So very likely n monk from
Wat Serna. Munng not only mixed up the inscription~ but the w.ats as
well. Anywa)', Coodcs ncceptcd the word tlf this mmdescript monk of
Nakorn against those of Noi Thammatn :md the on.tbe-spot monks of
Chniyn, against the official rc,cords, and even llgninst the contexts of the
two .inscriptions.
For this paper I will give these two inscriptions new titles so that
there will be no further confusion; I will can No. 23 the Sri Vijaya
Inscription dated 775 A.D., or, in full, the Sri Vijaya.Stdlendra lnscrip..
tion from Wat Hun Vieng, Chaiya, dated 17S; ~md N. 24, which came
from Nakorn, the Chandra Banu Inscription of Tambralinga dated 1230.
This latter inscription will be dealt with in due course.
The Sri Vijnya~Sailendra inscription ctm!lists of two sides, and both
sides were written at the same tirne, in the same place, by the s.ante scribe
using the same language and style. Any interpreta.tion or argume.nt that
does not take this fact into consideration is just tl jc1kc thnt is not even
funny. One face consists of 29 lines of writing~ while the second face,
starting with the word Svasti, has only fuur line!!,
The longer or Sri Vijaya side contains n date oorresponding to 775
A.D. It records three brick building.s ~tet up by 11 King of Sri Vijaya to
commemorate s.ome victory or other. The building! each contained a
Buddha image and two Av.atokes.varas. 1·herc is uotbing in the text to
suggest that the king bad his seat a.nywhere other than at Cbaiya. and
the three buildings were probably at Wat Long, Wnt Kaeo and Wat
Vieng, where the inscription was set up. The second or Sailendra side
mentions a king narned Vishnu who was the head of the Sailendrawamsa,
(Coedes called him 'le chef de la famille Cailendrn,i) The two sides
together, then, recorded a King of Sri Vijaya named Vishnu, who was
the head of the Sailendra family, setting up three brick buildings at
Chaiya in 775 A.D. to celebrate a victory somewhere. What that victory
was will be submitted later. ·
The name Sailendrawamsa. also appears in three Central Javanese
inscriptions, once each in inscriptions from Nortb India, South India and

REVIEW ARTICLE
Ceylon. The South Indian stele, known as the Larger Leiden Plate, does
not concern this period and can be left for later treatment. In chronological
order, the other five inscriptions are:
1. Kalasan 778 A.D.: Panamkarana, an ornament of the Sailendrnfamily
(til aka Sailendrawamsa), builtChandi Kalasan and dedicated
it to Tara, a Buddhist goddess or possibly his mother or queen. This
inscription is dated three years after the Sri Vijaya-Sailendra inscription
of King Vishnu, who in contrast was called the head of the Sailendra
family.
2. Kelurak 782 A.D.: King Dharanindra, another ornament
(til aka) of the Sailendras set up an image of Manjusri. Dharanindra is
not in Bali tung's list of the kings of Mataram that started with Sanjaya,
while Panamkarana of the previous incription has been equated with Sri.
maharaja panang karan, the name that follows Sanjaya.
3. Kerangtenah 824 A.D. : Samaratunga, another ornament of the
Sailendrawamsa, appears in this inscription, as well as his father, Indra
(the Dbaranindra above), and daughter Princess Pramodavardhani.
4. Nalanda Copperplate circa 850 A.D.:. (or as late as 860, 39th
year of the reign of Devapaladeva, Pala ruler of Bengal) : Balaputr~deva,
a king of Suvannadvipa, built a monastery at Nalanda and the Pala king
made a grant for its upkeep. Balaputra was the son of a king of
Javabhumi (perhaps entitled Samaragravira), who was another ornament
of the Sailendra family (tilaka). Balaputra's mother was named Tara, a
daughter of Dharmasetu. She cannot be equated with the Tara of the
Kalasan inscription (if the latter was a queen.and not a goddess) because
the two dates are too far apart. Suvannadvipa meant Sumatra while
Javabhumi might have been Java or the Malay Peninsula.
5. Rambava Slab 15th century A.D. : Parakramabahu VI of Ceylon
referred to a Simhalarama temple built by Samarottunga (Samara +
Uttunga), an ornament of the Sailendra family (kula ketuna Sailendrawamsa),
on the Ratubaka Plateau in Central Java at t~e end of the 8th
century A.D. This king has generally been equated w1th Samaratunga
(Samara+ Tunga) of tbe Kerangtenah inscription and Samaragravira
(Samara, the brave in battle) of the Nalanda Copperplate above. If the

296 REVIEW ARTICLE
Copperplate is dated 850 A.D., fifty years would intervene between the
buildings set up by the father and his son Balaputra, which is as long a
stretch as can be reasonably accepted. If the dating of the Nalanda
inscription is moved forward a decade or so, then Samarottunga and
Samaragravira could not have been the same person.
But the main point about the five Sailendra kings in these inscriptions
is that they were all called 'ornaments of the Sailendrawamsa', in
contrast to Vishnu of the Sri Vijaya-Sailendra inscription who was called
'head of the Sailendra family'. Surely the use of the description 'ornament'
five times could not have been accidental. Put another way, there
must have been two branches of the Sailendra family, one on the Malay
Peninsula; and the other, called ornaments, in Central Java.
Nai Thammatas Panij of Chaiya has a theory. Sanna, the well-born
king of Kunjara-kunjadesa in Javadvipa (Chaiya), who was the brotherin-law
of Sanjaya, the author of the Cangal Charter dated 732 A.D., was
a Sailendra. The children born of Sanna's queen would be first-class
princes (Lords of the Sky, called Chao Fa in Thai). Vishnu of the Sri
Vijaya-Sailendra inscription dated 775, was one such Chao Fa, a son or
grandson of Sanna's queen. He was called the head of the Sailendra
family in the same way that the present king of Siam is considered bead
of the Cbakri dynasty. Into this scheme Sanjaya's sister would fit in as
a concubine (called sanom in Thai) and her children would be secondclass
princes (called Phra Ong Chao). When Sanna died and Sanjaya
became king of Java, his sister went with him, taking her children too.
Bhanu (Plumpangan, 752) was one such child. Then Sanjaya's children
. intermarried with their Sailendra cousins and the offspring were of the
combined Sanjaya-Sailendra dynasty. These would include Panamkarana
(Kalasan 778), Dharanindra (Kelurak 782) Samaragravira (alias Sa~aratunga
824, and Samarottunga who built Simhalarama in 794) and Balaputra
(Nalanda Copperplate circa 850). The kings were called 'ornaments
of the Sailendra family' because they were not of the direct male line,·
and the description was presumably used because the Sailendras were
internationally known, so to sa.y, while Sanjaya was a more local name.
Such is Nai Thammatas' theory for what it is worth, though of course
there could be other possible interpretations.

REVIEW ARTICLE 297
9. Tbe External Evidence of the Sailendra Period
Before dealing with the external evidence, I will mention a few of
the archaeological landmarks in the Bandon Bight district and Chaiya.
The reason is because external evidence must be equated with some
internal evidence, namely from the Malay Peninsula or Java, but not
both.
Chaiya is today a sleepy village several kilometres from the sea.
The main landmark is Wat Boromadhatu, whose stupa is considered one
of the most sacred in Thailand. A new finial has been added but the
original is said to be very similar to Chandi Pawon in Central Java. I
think perhaps a combination of the side chandis of Prambanan and Sewu
would be more similar, but this is a minor point. Several objects of
archaeological significance have come from this wat, of which the most
interesting is probably an iron bell dug up from fairly deep down. The
bell has some Chinese writing on it, and two others like it have been dug
up from Wat Chompupan and Wat Prasop, both in Chaiya.
Slightly to the east of Wat Boromadhatu is Wat Vieng or Wat Hua
Vieng; and south of Wat Vieng are Wat Long (Wat Luang) and Wat
Kaeo, set in a line equidistant from one another. Not very ~uch remains
of these three wats except a pillar and one of the sides of the stupa.
at Wat Kaeo. The stupa is said to be· similar to Chandi Kalasan in
Central Java, which was put up in 778. Vishnu's inscription dated 775
was set. up near a sacred well called Bob Mod (Ants Well) atWat Vieng,
and the three brick buildings mentioned in Vishnu's inscription probably
referred to the three stupas of these wats.
To the west of the village is a small hill called Anchor Chain
Hill, where tradition says that the Maharaja (called Phya Yumba)
manufactured the anchors for his fleet. To the east of Chaiya, on an ..
old bar in the Chaiya River, was an open-sided hall called Sala Mae Nang
Sundari (Queen Sundari's Sala.) The building has disappeared, and the
bar is now some way from the sea, but the. tradition of the queen's sal a
still remains. Princess Sundari will appear in the story in the next part
of this paper.

298 REVIEW ARTICLE
South of the Chaiya district is the Tapi River or Menam ·Luang,
which flows from the hills of Nakorn Sri Thammaraj province northwards
to the Bandon Bight. The water of the Tapi is considered sacred, and
when kings are crowned in this country, water is taken from this river
to be mixed with other sacred ~ater from all over the country and
used as lustral water in the ceremony. Other sacred watering places on
the Bandon Bight include Bob Mod at Wat Hua Vieng in Chaiya, already·
mentioned, and a pond called Sra Gangajaya to the north of the town.
Both the well and pond have dried up.
On the Tapi River is Vieng Sra, a very old site that was probably
Pan-Pan, which sent many embassies to China between 424 and 617 A.D.
At a later period Pan-Pan moved further down the river to Punpin,
where there is a hill called Khao Sri Vijaya.
Later still, when the southern
railway was cut, old Punpin moved back to a fork in the river
where the two outlets are called Pak Leelet and Pak Pan Kuha.
Another ancient city state where a king had his seat was Khantbuli
to the north of Chaiya. Khanthuli, which the Chinese called Kan-to"
Ii, sent embassies in the 5th and 6th centuries. Also north of Chaiya is
Ta Chana or Victory Harbour (of the Maharaja), where there is a wat
called Wat Ganesa. A mukhalinga (a linga with a human face) was
found at this wat and, according to J.S. O'Connor (An Bkamukhalinga
from Peninsular Siam, JSS, January 1966), this particular phallic symbol
has the same hair dressing as those from Oc-eo and Wat Sampou in
Cambodia. O'Connor thinks all three should be given an early dating.
Such are a few of the archaeological sites of the Bandon Bight, and
if some of them could be excavated, then we should know a little more
about th'e Sri Vijaya story.
The Phya Yumba and the Maharaja mentioned above referred to
the same character. According to the Yen. Buddhadasa Bhikkhu, the
southern folks are inclined to use the U sound a great deal, so a word
like khan, a man in the Central ·dialect, becomes khun in the Southern
language. So Phya Yumba was Phya Yamba (or Damba in some Ceylonese
chronicles) and Phya Yamba in turn was Phya Javaka, or Javakaraja,
or the Maharaja of Zabag of the Arab records.

REVIEW ARTICLE 299
The good folks of Singora province, however, think that the seat
of the Arabs' Maharaja of Zabag was in their province. The tongue of
land that divides the Singora Inland Sea and the Gulf of Siam is today
called the Satingphra Peninsula, though the local people call it Pan Din
Bok; and the people who live in the land are called Jao Bok (people of
the land). A Singora acquaintance of mine told me that he once asked
somebody :-vho knew how to write Arabic to put down into Arabic
characters the name Maharaja of Zabag. Then he got somebody else
who knew how to read .the language to pronounce the name, and the exact
pronunciation was 'Maharaja of Jao Bok.' So he claims that the Javakaraja,
or the Maharaja of Zabag, was really the Maharaja Jao Bok of
his province. What a wonderful word-ga~e all this is!
The External Evidence
I will start with the Arab writings. Ibn Hordabeh, who was
writing between 844-848 A. D., was the first writer to mention the
Maharaja of Zabag or Zabaj. He gives some fairy tales about the flora
and fauna of Zabag, and relates that the king was so wealthy that he
had a gold brick made every day, which he threw into the water, saying
"There is my treasury." Part of the king's revenue was derived from
cock-fights, when the king would win a leg of the winning cock and the
owner had to buy it back with gold. There is no geographical evidence
concerning where the king had his seat, whether in Central Java or the
Malay Peninsula. In the former case the Maharaja might have been
Pikatan or one of the kings appearing in the Perot and Ratubaka inscriptions
around the middle of the ninth century. In the latter ·part of the
eighth century, miscellaneous records and inscriptions found in Annam,
Champa and Cambodia give some loose information in connection with
Sd Vijaya.
In 767, the people from· Kun-lun and Daba (Java} pillaged the
Ngan.an delta (North Annam, the present Tonkin), as far as the capital
near the present Hanoi. They remained in possession of the region
until the military governor drove them out and built the citadel of Lothanh.
The ,evidence is not cle.ar whether the raid was made from Java
or the peninsula; nor is it clear whether it was a piratical raio or the

300
M11hnrnju ()f J1.vakn (lo cull him b~· 1he mum:. tlmt \\''ill come into
Ul!C n few decades Iuter) nttuckcd !llomc flirlilc~ \)JM::Hlling, in the Ngun-an
region on the main trade-route. Considering the prevailing winds the
ruid should lun·c been from the penimmln, t:ml if the Miltumljll had made
careful prepnrut.ions befc.l!·da1nd, the ntid C(lUid easily have been from
Jnvn, pnrticulurly if he had buses in lkm1eo.
In 774, n new Cham kingdom. l funn Wang. nppenred in the south
with its capital at Rujapuru ()!' lfirapum. In that sanne yenr, according
to the inscription of l)(J Nagnr, fenx:ious dluk sldtmed people who were
filthy in their eating hnbits ( evidence C(lllCerning from which Java the
raid was made.
ln 802, Jayavarman U set up his capitnl ~•t Angkor Emd founded
the Kambujun state in Cambodia. I~fore that Jayavarman was taken
to Java, probably as a hostage, and when be was returned he declared
his independence. He stayed at several capitals before actually founding
Angkor, which presumably meant that he wns playing a game of hi.de
und seek because he was afra.id of tbe wrath of the Maharaja. This
would indicate that the Javn that Jayavurmnn was taken to was the
Malay Peninsula because Java itself was too far away for him to fear
any wrath of the Maharaja rrom that island.

REVJE:W Aln!CLE
. An inscription dated 811 Maha Sakaraj (889 A.D.) has also been
found at Paniad in Chandaburi province on the east coast of Siam but
. '
tlm stone has not been read and I only mention it for the record.
Then there are the Chinese records, mainly records of embassies,
and they go back to very early times (Pan-Pan, Kan-to-li etc.). Many
of the placenames cannot be identified or located, and the names of the
kings who sent the embassies are even more difficult to interpret. But
these records are unbiassed and can sometimes be used to settle controversial
points, particulary in the later period dealt with in the third
part of this paper.
301
The Master Architect of Boroburdur
New external evidence has become available from Ceylon. Dr. S.
Paranavitana, whose book Ceylon and Malaysia will be dealt with in the
third part of this paper, bas also produced several articles based on
sources which he has recently deciphered. One of these articles, called
'The Designer ~f Barabudur', concerns the period under treatment and
was published in the 1970 Vaisakha Number of the Maha Bodhi. The
source for this article is chapter 34 of the Paramaparapustaka (Book of
Tradition), which was written down by order of the Ceylonese king,
Parakramabahu VI (1412-67). The original has been lost, but the same·
information was inscribed 'in minute characters' on stone pillars which
Paranavitana bas recently read. Parakramabahu VI, according to Paranavitana,
counted the Sailendras of Java amo~gst his ancestors, and so
had the information concerning them that could be collected at that late
period written down for posterity. There is nothing unusual in this.
The Khom inscriptions have many such records, for instance the story of
Jayavarman II, which was written down several centuries after the events
recorded; the Mon Kalyani inscription from Thaton was a similar affair;
and most local chronicles were collected at a much later date. The
main point about such sources is that while there may be a lot of inaccuracies,
there was also a bard core of history.
Paranavitana's sources are considered by some not to be authenticin
fact his critics claim that he invented the stOry himself, evidence and
all. The whole thi~g must seem like Zen to some people. Paranavitana

cluim-s to h~:~ able tu rc;u.i the hum '•hmcr• in mim11e
dmnu:le!!> i!ml wnucn ht~hH:~II the h!i~:!> w1n~ t:!U~htliSt
A"in, but thnl (:•f ("ejhm 1"' \\t:ll. 1 Vtl) much d~~ubt wlu:lhcr the
prufcli~ms whP tc;H:h E

303
I llmJJ!Iy ;1t Suvnmrmpura where Visnuraja was on
lhe thHmt.
1u Ute !i.Wry, Visnu was u sun of Sannaphulla,
who \Hl!l fruuu.:!cr the Sth1hnm dymmy, and he (Visnu) had
murricd 1he uf the Suv"rmmpuru kingdom (Sri Vijaya) and
succeeded tu the dl!jnity

llH
lmt;~a \lillli K;1kvrn Sri lh:unmanlJ, KlHill.i!pliHI l,\,i!li 1\hl!imun in Java,
Juvad111pa wn!l u tltmeric mmw, lU~d Jiau in lhc h:l'\1 mc·lcrn lh;uw,nH is n little
trkk.y. lf thi:> i!> lh$l" wili!lil.t: (in liH: rc>~dmt~ N the inh:!prcilwuld inwginc thai !he bualdmg thai Kunmigncd, culled
ure w be :.ctn t~l uf three 'ptang ~twmfc1ps' set
close tngelher, With u Huddhu l!tllil'C :wd twn Avulukc!i.vuno; inllide;
while the three bm:k buddm!J~ !>Cl up by Vl!!tiU :11 C hi1i)n in 775 were
pwbubly u l'itl t)f thrct: •du!tli mr1mlu1u'. !ltl fur npurt bu1 c:quidislluH to
one another und ugam curHuirm~s u Buddhu anmpe :m\1 1 Wtl A Vii !t.1ke~vnras.
Parunuvitanu'!l stmy kill~ rmmy uf the old ;u~umcnls zwd ut the
same time it intmduce!l new nrsumt~lll" uf u" thUt One example:
D1d the Suileudnl~A'tHrtMl rcl41ly !!tlcm from the Sikuhma dynm>ty?
According tu Profcs,.or Ctlt.te.h•lil, the Snihmdru 'Lurd!!t uf the Muuntains'
derived from Funan on the nminlnnd (funurL.,btHHllll muumuin); Professt'r
Majumdar, a North lndnw. thou):!ht the Sualcndnt!!t unginuted from
the Sailobhnva kings Clf Kahnga in North lndw; Prol"tl>

HEVIEW AHT!CLE 305
10. Dr. de Casparis' Prasasti Indonesia
Before starting to comment on Professor Paranavitana's story of
the building of Boroburdur, a little historical background is necessary, as
well as a few words on Central Javanese art. I will comment on Dr. de
Casparis' two volumes of Pras'asti Indonesia and at the same time bring
in these two aspects. Although de Casparis has produced some very
bright contributions about the kings of Java of the 8th and 9th centuries
in his two books, I cannot agree with his theories to any great extent.
However Nai Thammatas Panij of Chaiya seems to accept most of them,
and at the same time be has supplied one or two additional aspects that
seem reasonable and could well be correct. I will deal with only two
items in his thesis, one from each book. The first is that there were two
contemporary dynasties ruling in Java, and the second is that there was
a decline and fall of the Sailendra dynasty in the middle of the ninth
century.
At one time it was thought that the Sailendra or Buddhist period
in Central Java was squeezed in between two Hindu periods: Sanjaya's
Cangal Charter dated 732 A.D. and Bali tung's Kedu inscription dated 907.
ln this way all the Buddhist art was made afterSanjaya's reign and before
Balitung's; while the Hmdu art was created before Sanjaya and after
Bali tung. This is incorrect. It is not true that only a Hindu king would
p~t up a Hindu temple, nor that a Buddhist king would only put up
Buddhist buildings. In the classic period of Indian art, tbe Gupta kings
put up both Hindu and Buddhist structures; while in Thailand in the
Sukhothai period, a period that we like to see through rose-coloured
glasses and think that Buddhism was then at its purest, Hindu images of
natural size or larger were also cast. In the case of Java, Mr. J.L. :Moens
in his 'Sri Vijaya, Java en Kataha' thought that Sanjaya, who set up the
Cangal Charter to record the founding of a Shaivite linga, also founded
the Buddhist Chandi Mendut. Other cases will be cited later.
In order to provide a solid foundation for my discussion of Dr. de
Casparis' theories, I will first say a few words about Central Javanese
art. This art seemed to burst'suddenly into full bloom, but nevertheless,
as in all schools of metropolitan art, it must have had a pre-classic and

a po~H.:la~•llh: pcrivd, und the:Se f'liCih~th 1mnt be k;ok(:d ftj•l' in Jz1q1 itself.
Tztlong li~1ruhtu dur to he I he duMHC c~pn::.liiOII, "t' cm1 !lj llHU the
image!>ic.
About fifteen years ugn, m;,r rueun::h ,,.~lhlbor.uor, the hHe Khien
Yimiri, wh~> was >J .,,ulpwr und l rc~c~uch (m lmhmc!.mll ~1rt. I look the
opportunity of ~jor dmndi.r were built
His opiniun wa'i ha!.cd snltly tHl whal he t:r1Uid rt:;1d fwm the urt. As
one of the cla~;,.,ic ~:~tructurcll hii!-1 u dl be ulluwcd for in
the following dates.
u~Jgt:m• HugiMm
Puwon-lvlendut
Uuroburdur
Kalu~an
Chandi Sewu (Buddhist)
Prumbunun (Hindu)
Chundt Plnosun
650" 100 A D.
AJ).
A.l).
AJ)
A.D.
At).
A.D.
Most iu, told me that
they dtd rwt run Ctmtrury tc> the hHest evidence. lie ulso ~uid that a
new inscription had been found at (.:tmndi Sewu duted 792, which menw
tions the enlargement of Chandi Menjucrigr!m ('! Ills hundwriting is a
little difficult w re

REVIEW AHTICLE 307
Pawon, Mendut and Boroburdur are located in the same district,
while the remaining chandis in the list are located in what the Indonesian
Archaeological Service calls 'the Kalasan District'. (There is a small field
museum at Kalasan where the finds from these chandis are collected.) It
is to be noted that the contemporary Buddhist Sewu and the Hindu
Prambanan are located in the same district. As these temples are so
immense the kings who built them must have bad control of all the
manpower and resources of the whole country.
According to Dr. de Casparis' first theory (Prasasti Indonesia I),
there were two dynasties ruling in Central Java at the same time, namely
the Sanjayawamsa, who were Shaivite, and the Buddhist Sailend.ras.
The Sanjaya line consisted of the kings of Mataram in Bali tung's inscription
already given at ~he beginning of sections 8, while the Sailendra kings
seem to consist of names not in Balitung's list but wbo appeared in the
various inscriptions of the period (as far as the inscriptions were read
when de Casparis produced his Prasasti I in 1950). Two reasons for not
accepting this theory have already been given and I will now give a few
more.
I have already mentioned that Moens thought that Sanjaya, who
set up a linga in 732, also built Chandi Mendut.
If this is correct, then,
according to Khien's chronology, Mendut was built before or at the time
Sanjaya set up his linga. Then, Panamkarana, the Sailendra king who
built the Buddhist Kalasan, has been equated with Sri Maharaja Panang
Karan, the second name on the Balitung list.
And then, according to
firm epigraphic evidence, Pikatan of the Shaivite line, built or had a hand
in building the Buddhist Plaosan Lor (north complex). Finally, although
I may be mistaken on this point, I understand that the wbrd Sanjayawamsa
does not appear in any Javanese inscription. In any case the list
of kings in Balitung's inscription were ktngs who. bad their seat at
Mataram. That the list starts with Sanjaya does not necessarily mean
that they were all of that line, though the chances are that they were.
The kings of Ayudhia were certainly not of the same dynasty, and in the
story to come the kings of Nakorn Sri Tbammaraj were ·first of the
Sailendra dynasty, but later they were of the Lotus Line {Padmawamsa),
though all were of the Javaka race.

308 R8VJEW ARTICLE
Before going on to Dr. de Casparis' second theory (Prasasti II), I
will collect the more important names and dates from the inscriptions,
both of kings and art, and arrange them in chronological order. I will
not try to equate any names, most of which come from Javanese inscriptions
(the exceptions are the Nalanda Copperplate and Parakramabahu's
inscription). The list is not complete, and my hope is that I have made
no factual error that might lead students astray in later interpretations.
(The names in capitals are of chandis, while those in italics are the kings
who appear in Balitung's list).
BOGEM-BOGISAN
PA WON-MENDUT
Sanjaya (Cangal Charter)
BOROBURDUR
Bhanu (Plumpangan)
SEWU-PRAMBA NAN
Panamkarana (Kalasan)
Dharanindra (Kelurak)
Manjucrigrba (enlargement of Sewu)
Sa marottunga (Simbalarama)
Panang Karan
Panang Galan
Warak
Garung
CHAND! PLAOSAN
Indra (Kerangtenah)
Samaratunga (Kerangtenah)
Princess Prarnodavardhani (Kerangtenah)
Patapan (Kerangtenah)
Patapan (Gandasuli)
Queen Kahulunnan
Samaratunga
Samaragraitira (Nalanda)
Balaputradeva (Nalanda)
Patapan (Perot)
Pikatpn (Perot and Plaosan Lor)
650-700
700-725
732
725-775
752
775-825
778
782
792
794
825-850
824
824
824
824
832
842
847
about 850
about 850
850
850

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Kahulunnan (Plaosan Lor or north complex)
Kayu Wani (Plaosan north complex)
Pikatan (Ratubaka)
Khambhayoni (Ratubaka)
Jati-ning-rat (Ratubaka)
Valaputra
Kayu Wani (Argapura)
Watu Humalang
Watu Kura (Balitung)
850
850
856
856
856
856
863
907
907
309
Sanjayawamsa
Warak (? Patapan)
I .
Pikatan =
I .
K ayu Wam
P . I .
rmcess Pramodavardhani
(Queen Sri Kahulunnan)
Sailendrawamsa
Samaratunga
I
Prince Balaphtra
(Valaputra)
In de Casparis' theory, Sarp.arotttmga (794), Samaratunga (824 and
847) and Samaragravira (about 850) are considered the same king. It is
not certain whether he had died when the Nalanda Copperplate was set
up, but he had a long rdgn of over fifty years (794 to 847). . The king
had two children, Princess Pramodavardhani, who married Pikatan and
became Queen Sri Kahulunnan, ·and Balaputra, who left Java when he
was young, married a Sri Vijaya ,princess and became king of the country
(Suvarnadvipa). Such was the theory submitted in Prasasti Indonesia I,
which was published in 1950. After that new evidence became available,
for example the name Valaputra appears in a document dated 856 A.D.
So in Prasasti II, published in 1956, de Casparis amended his theory
slightly and this theory concerns ·the decline and fall of the Sailendra
dynasty.
The general drift of the theory is that the Sbaivite Sanjayawamsa
overcame the Buddhist Sailendras and acquired hegemony over Central
Java in 856 A.D. The main character in the story is Sri Maharaja Rakai
Pika tan of Bali tung's inscription, who had a hand in the building of the
Buddhist Plaosan Lor in 850. The main sources are the inscriptions
from the Ratul;mka Plateau dated 856, and an old Javanese poem of the.

310 REVIEW ARTICLE
same date where the name Valaputra appears. Pikatan (his regnal title)
is equated with Kbumbhayoni (his fighting name) and with Jati-ning-rat
(his hermit name), viz. be won a victory on the Ratubaka Plateau in 856
(Khumbhayoni), and after setting up three lingas (or one linga with three
inscriptions) to celebrate his victory, made over the kingdom to his son
Kayu Wani. After that the king became a hermit (Jati-ning-rat). All
this happened in 856, and the defeated king was Valaputra. This king
de Casparis equated with the Balaputra of the Nalanda Copperplate, who
escaped to Sri Vijaya, married a princess there and became king of that
country. In order to accommodate these new factors, de Casparis proposed
to move the date of the Nalanda Copperplate from about 850 to
860 or even nearer .870.. I think this is stretching the period too far
because we know that Samarottunga built Simbalarama on the Ratubaka
Plateau as long before as 794.
Then de Casparis bas looked at Javanese history in all its isolated
splendour. Balaputra of the Nalanda Copperplate was a son of Queen
Tara, who in turn was a daughter of Dharmasetu (or Varmasetu). An
attempt has been made to equate this name with one of the Pala kings
or princes, but the theory has not generally been accepted. Yet, as the
building was put up at Nalanda and one of the Pala kings, Devaputradeva,
made the grant for its upkeep, I think this idea of family connections is
worthwhile for scholars to look into in a little more detail.
Perhaps the following interpretation of the Nalanda Copperplate
would fit the .facts better. Samaragravira, the Sailendra king of Javabhumi,
sent his, son Balaputra to become uparaja in Suvarnadvipa (viz. to act as
harbour master and control one of the Straits on the trade-routes). The
seat of the prince might have been at Palembang, Jambi or Bangka where
Sri Vijaya inscriptions had been ,set up in the previous century; or at
Muara Takus on the equator. Then, for some reason which I will not
guess, Valaputra (if he is equated with Balaputra) invaded Java in 856
and was defeated. As we hear no more of this Valaputra, perhaps he
was killed in the field. In this way there is no need to change the dating
of the Nalanda Copperplate, ·

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. An alternative interpretation of the evidence might be suggested.
Prmcess P~amoda vardhani succeeded her father, King Samara, and became
Queen Sn Kahulunnan in her own right (like the present Queen of
~ngland), an~ Prince Pikatan was her consort. In this scheme, Patapan,
tf he was the father of Pikatan, would have played a very _important
part. Perhaps he was Prime Minister, in the same way that Gajah Mada
was Prime Minister in the Majapahit period a few centuries later. The
question of Balabutra of the Nalanda Copperplate invading Java is also
a little doubtful. Paranavitanas' source gives a Balabutra of Suvarnapura
who was defeated by his brother Panamkarana, and the two stories seem
so much alike that de Cas paris' theory seems a little unconvincing. That
Panamkarana, who was king of Java, should invade the Peninsula and
put down his brother seems reasonable, because the latter controlled the
wealth that accrued from the trade that passed through the Malacca
Straits; but for Balabutra II (Valabutra) to have invaded Java from
Suvarnadvipa, where he was barbour master, does not,seem quite logical
to me, though I admit it is possible. I will leave this problem to future
students, because unfortunately I do not know, or if I knew I have now
forgotten, the location of the Sailendras' capital in Central Java. It
must have been near the magnificent monuments that they put up. ,
So on the whole I do not accept de Casparis' theory of two contemporary
dynasties in Java, nor do I accept that there were any decline and
fall of the Sailendrawamsa. The Sailendra period in Central Java just
came to an end, and tbi s was probably what happened. Soon after
Balitung set up his inscription in 907 A.D., there was a general exodus
from Central Java. The reason for this evacuation was the eruption of
the Merapi, the active volcano of the district. Such is the view of some
Javanese scholars. In fact I have bedn told that when the Dutch first
saw Boroburdur, a great· part of it was covered with lava which had to
be cleared before the bas-reliefs could be studied. I cannot say whether
this is true or false, but I can say that soon after Balitung's inscription
the Sailendra story .in Java ended and a new period in Javanese history
started in Bast Java: Thi.~ history had nothing to do with the Sailendras,
so Java dropped out of the Sri Vijaya story at the beginning of the lOth
century and .the subsequent story concerned only the Malay Peninsula
and the Malacca Straits.
311

3i2
UEV!tW AllT!CLE
11. The Building of Boroburdur
We now return to Professor Paranavitana's story of the building of
Boroburdur (section 9 above). I will start with the 'cast of characters',
even if this entails a little repetition. This will make a fairly compli-
.cated story easier to follow. At the beginning of section 8 above, there
is a list of the Kings of Mataram from Balitung's Kedu Charter dated
907 A.D. The list starts with Sanjaya and the kings are thought to have
been of the Sanjaya dynasty. Meanwhile the Sailendras, according to
Paranavitana and other sources, are
1. Sri Jayanasa or Jayanaga (South Sumatran inscriptions, 683-86):
King of Sri Vijaya, but does not appear in Paranavitana's story. According
to Paranavitana be was not a Sailendra.
2. Sanna (Sanjaya's Changal Charter, 732): The well-born king
of Javadvipa who was Sanjaya's brother-in-law. Does not appear as
such in Paranavitana's story (see 4 below).
3. Bhanu (Plumpangan, 752): The inscription is Buddhist, but
the name does not appear in Paranavitana's story, nor in Balitung's list.
4, Sannaphulla: according to Paranavitana, was a Simhalese
prince who was the founder of the Silahara dynasty in India.
5. Vis~u (Chaiya, 775): The Sri Vijaya king who was head of
the Sailendra family. According to Paranavitana, Visnuraja, son of
Sannaphulla above, had married the heiress of the Suvarnnapura kingdom
and succeeded to the dignity of Maharaja. Then, according to Paranavitana,
Visnuraja invaded Java, defeated Sanjaya, the Saivite ruler of
Katakapura in Central Java, and stationed his son Panamkarana there.
6. ·Panamkarana (Kalasan, 778): An ornament of the Sailendra
family. This name bas generally been equated with Panang Karan, the
second name in Balitung's list of the kings of Mataram, but according to
Paranavitana, be was the son of Visnuraja of Suvarnnapura (Cbaiya).
above. .
7. Dbaranindra (Kelurak, 782): Another ornament of the Sai·
lendta wains a. Nai Thammatas Panij thinks he was the same person as
the name above, that is, Panamkarana was the name of the crown prince
in his father's life time, while Indra or Dharanindra was the regnal title.
This would imply that Visnu died sometime between 778. and 782,

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8 .. Balaputra I: Another · son of Visnuraja and, according to
Paranavttana, shortly after the father's death, there was fratricidal war
between Balaputra of Suvarnnapura and Panamkarana of Java, which
gave the opportunity for the Shaivite Sanjaya dynasty to recover its
strength temporarily.
9. Samaratunga (Kerangtenah 824 aud 847): Can be equated
with Samarottunga of the Ceylonese records and Samaragravira of the
Nalanda Copperplate dated about 850, because all three were called
'ornaments of the Sailendrawamsa'. According to Paranavitana, Saniarottunga
was the son of Panamkarana, while in the Javanese records he
was the son of Indra. This would support Thammatas' idea that Panamkarana
and Dharanindra were the same person. Paranavitana then
says that Samarottunga "by his 'brilliant victory over the forces of ·
Suvarnnapura and of King Sannaha of the Sanjaya dynasty, brought both
Sumatra and Java under his rule, and was acknowledged as Maharaja
by the kings of the Malay Peninsula." Sannaha does not appear in
Balitung's list of the kings of Mataram.
10. Princess Promodavardhani (Kerangtenah, 824) and Queen
Sri Kahulunnan (Kerangtenah 842) : Daughter .of Samaratunga, the
Sailendra ornament above. According to de Casparis, she became
· Pikatan's queen. Pikatan is the sixth name in the Balitung list, and he
was probably a son of Patapan, a name not in the list. He and his queen,
Kahulunnan, appear in some short inscriptions from the north complex
of Chandi Plaosan dated 850.
11. Balaputra II (Nalanda, circa 850): Son of the Sailendra
ornament, Samara'gravira, who was king of Javabhumi. Balaputra himself
was king of Suvarnnadvipa. According to de Casparis, he also
appeared as Valaputra in an old Javanese poem dated 856. In that year
he was defeated by his brother-in~law, Pikatan.
There are one or t~o discrepancies in the names above, of which
the first is whether there was one Balaputra or two. According to
Professor Nilakanta Sastri, the name Balaputra meant 'the youngest
son•. If this is correct, then there were probably two Balaputras, though
there seems to be too much similarity in the two stories for this to be
altogether convincing. Anyway, when Visnu left his son Panamkarana
313

314 REVIEW ARTICLE
in Java, he kept his youngest son (Balaputra I) by his side; and when the
father died, the two sons waged a war which Panamkarana won. Panamkarana
evidently remained in Java, but sent his son Samaratunga to the
Peninsula, because Samaragravira was able to marry a Pala princess,
Tara by name. (Experts are not in agreement about this point.) He
was described as King of Javabhumi by his son, Balaputra II, who was
King of Suvarnnadvipa. According to Paranavitana, Samarottunga
became the sovereign of an empire which included the Malay Peninsula,
Sumatra and Java. Evidently Samarottunga had to fight for l1is throne,
for the source also states that he won victories over Suvarnnapura
(? Suvarnnadvipa) and King Sannaha of the Sanjaya dynasty in Java.
Samaratunga then sent his youngest son to become king ofSuvarnnadvipa,
as has been mentioned; and after his death (according to de Casparis)
Balaputni II invaded Java and was defeated by his brother-in-law,
Pika tan. This brought the story of the direct line of the Sailendras in
Java to an end, but the Sailendras in the Peninsula still carried on, as
will be seen in the third part of this paper. Pikatan had his seat at
Mataram, too far from the north coast for the Javanese to have played
any further part in the Sri Vijaya story, a story that conc~rned a seafaring
people.
The relationship between Sanna, Sannaphulla, Sanjaya and Visnu
is rather tricky. My preference is to follow Sanjaya's record, which
says that he was Sanna's brother-in-law. (The reason is because
Sanjaya's record is internal evidence while Paranavitana's isnot. Also
it is contemporary to the events recorded.) If such is' the case, th'en
Sanna, who was king of Javadvipa, used Sanjaya in some capacity or
other, probably as Admiral of the Fleet, because according to a late
Javanese poem, the Carita parahvangan, Sanjaya was a great conqueror
who raided as far as Khmer and China before returning to Galuh:
(Galuh has been identified as Kedah, but Indonesian scholars say that it
is in the eastern part of West Java. This complicates the whole story
to such an extent that .I wish to be excused!) Anyway, a preliminary
W?rking genealogical table is submitted as well as a very' short Summary.

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315
Salna (? Sannaphulla, ? Sannaha)
Vl·s 1 ( s · V" · . I
nu T n IJaya prmcess) Bhanu (?)
Panamkarana Bala:putra I
(Dharanindra) (of Suvarnnapura)
I
Samjratunga (Samarottunga, Samaragravira =Tara)
I
Princess Pramodvadhani
(Pikatan•s Queen Sri Kabulunnan)
I .
Kayu Wani
I
I
Balaputra II
(of Suvarnnadvipa)
Without going back beyond I-Cbing at the end of the 7th century
we have King Sri Jayanasa or Jayanaga of Sri Vijaya invading South
Sumatra and setting up inscriptions at Palembang, Jambi and Bangka
between 683 and 686. Then early in the 8th century we have Sanna, a
king of Javadvipa who was Sanjaya's brother-in-law. Sanna was followed
by Visnu, a son who was called 'head of the family' at Cbaiya, though
according to Paranavitana Visnu was a son of Sannaphulla, the founder
of the Silahara dynasty. According to the story Visnu married a Sri
Vijaya princess (perhaps a daughter of Sanna if Sanna and Sannaphulla
were different persons) and became Maharaja at Suvarnnapura (Chaiya).
He then invaded Java, where he defeated Sanjaya and started the building
of Boroburdur. He left hts ~on, Panamkarana, as ruler there.
There is no difficulty after Visnu: he was followed by the son he left in
Java, who became King Dharanindra; then by a grandson, Samaratunga;
and a great grand-daughter, Queen Sri Kahulunnan. The names and
dates agree very well with the expression of the Buddhist buildings in
Central Java.
But the main discrepancy in Paranavitana's story is in the dating.
The whole story must be moved back three quarters of a century, from
Udaya l's reign (797-801) to Sanjaya•s Changal inscription in 732. Also
Visnu 'invaded Java' early in his reign and not towards the end, as in
th~ story. This wo4ld give Visn'1 a long reign of about 50 years,

316 REVIE,W ARTICLE
Now that the preliminaries are over, we can get on to the real job,
namely the story of the building of Boroburdur, My ideas on this
monument were formed many years ago-in fact when I saw Boroburdur
for the first time-but now that we have Paranavitana's story, I will
incorporate this evidence into my ideas, as well as Nai Khien Yimsiri's
dating of the various buildings in Central Java.
Boroburdur and the Images of Cbandi Mendut
Boroburdur as we see it today is a building in ten levels. The first
five consist mainly of open terraces with magnificent bas-reliefs. The
reliefs on the first stage however have been covered by stone casements
and can no longer be seen, though they were known to exist as early as
about 1885 A.D. During the last. war the Japanese took out a few stones
and a section' of the reliefs can now be studied. The subject shown is
of a mundane character and the handiwork shows art in its primitive
form. · A few words of writing criticising the art also came to light,
which we can translate freely as 'lousy work'. The reliefs on the other
four levels however are of an entirely different category. They show
the genius of Javanese art at its full bloom, and are as good examples of
Buddhist art as can be found anywhere. The story told is mainly that of
the life of the Buddha, with several episodes repeated several times, s~ch
as the episode of Sujata offering food to the Lord for his last meal before
Enlightenment. I will explain the reason for this repetition later, as
well as why the bottom row of reliefs was covered up, because it seems
illogical to cut the reliefs and then hide them from prying eyes even if
the art is 'lousy work'.
The sixth level of Boroburdur, built over a natural hill, consists
of a large plateau on which three round platforms have been built where
72 Buddha images of natural size have been placed (making a total of
nine levels). The images are covered by latticed stupas, while· at the
top or tenth level there is a: larger chedi that acts as a finial to the whole
mass. What the main chedi contained is no longer known.
Close to Boroburdur are two other chandis, namely Pawon and
Mendut. Pawon is today empty and we do not know what it originally
held, while Mendut b~s three wopoliths 1
a 13\.lddba ima~e in tbe preachin~

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attitude and .two Avalokesvaras. The name Mendut is probably derived
fron~ the l~d1~n Mandapa, or what the Thai call mondop. It is a square,
box.hke butldmg, and the theme of a Buddha image and t~o Avalokesvaras
is the same as that of the Three Prangs of Lopburi (prang mondops),
where the structures are placed close together; and the three brick
buildings set up by Visnu at Chaiya in 775 A.D. (chedi mondops), where
the structures are set apart but equidistant from one another. The three
chandis, Pa won, Mendut and Boroburdur, are considered to have been
related in some manner, and Khien Yimsiri, allowing a little overlap,
thought that Pawon and Mendut were built between 700-725, while
Boroburdur was built between 725-775 A.D. The expressions of the
Mendut figures and the Boroburdur bas-reliefs are the same and can be
given the same dating. Moens thought that Sanjaya, who set up· the
Cangal Charter in 732, was the founder of Mendut.
There have been many interpretations of the meaning ofBoroburdur.
Some have said that the ten levels of Boroburdur referred to the ten stages
on the path to Buddhahood; others that they represent the Ten Paramis
(acquirements necessary to become a Buddha); and still others that
they represented ten generations of the founder's forefathers. As for
Pawon and Mendut, these were places where the king was cremated, or
where his ashes were deposited, or where he meditated. All this sounds
like eyewash of the highest order to me. It does not take the esthetics
of Boroburdur into consideration, and while the mass of Boroburdur is
most inspiring architecturally, it lacks a basic unity. This suggests
that the plans had been changed while work was still in progress.
Sannaphulla (Paranavitana) and Sanna of Sanjaya's Charter were
probably the same person, and Visnu was his son. According to Sanjaya,
Sanna was his brother-in-law, but I doubt if Visnu was the son of
Sanjaya'S sister (more likely it was Bhanu o~ the Plum~angan inscription).
For all that, Visnu probably constdered SanJaya a sort of
honorary uncle. Early in his reign, Visnuraja listened to Karuna~aracarya's
idea of an island empire ~nd a gr.a~d ~on~ment, and etther
•invaded Java" or went there on a fnendly VlSlt to SanJaya. The scheme
for Boroburdur was put in hand. The roaster-plan ~alle~ for a grand
Bodhimanda (mondop) .with a stupa (chedi) and prattma (tmages)j and

318 REVIEW ARTICLE
the base was to cover a natural hill. The master architect made his
designs, drew the sketches for the bas-reliefs consisting mainly of
episodes from the Buddha's life, and bad the work started on the images
to be placed in the buildings. The Javanese at that time had reached
their classic expression, after producing some highly competent work
for Chandis Bogem and Bogisan in the previous century. Visnu then
returned to Chaiya (Suvatnnapura), putting in charge of the work Sanjaya
and Panamkarana, a son whom he left in Java. Karunakara either died
soon after or left Java at the same time as Visnu, because the sketches
he made for the bas-reliefs were not sufficient to cover all the walls. So
the Javanese artists repeated some of the compositions several times,
such as those of Sujata presenting the Buddha-to-be with his last meal
before Enlightenment.
When the hill had been covered and an immense platform had come
into being, where a huge mondop to bouse three images was to be built (or
three smaller structures to house the images separately) it was found
that the images were too large to cart up to the platform. So there
was a change of plans, and the three figures for the top of Boroburdur
were placed in Chandi Mendut, a building far too small for one image,
let alone three. I cannot agree with any idea that Mendut was a place
where the king was cremated, or that it was a depository for his ashes,
or that he meditated there. Mendut was, and still is, a go-clown pure
and simple.
The change of plans called for 72 Buddha images to be placed on
the platform, each covered by a latticed stupa. The expression of these
figures are younger than the bas-reliefs and the Mendut images, so. we
can say that the alterations were carried out in the latter part of Visnu's
reign. At that time Visnu was back in Chaiya, where be set up an
inscription in 775, so the change was carried out by his son. Panamkarana
(Kalasan, 778}. Visnu died about 780, and his son became King
Dharanindra (Kelurak, 782). According to Paranavitana, Samarottunga,
Dharanindra's son and successor, built Boroburdur. This should mean
that the new king put the final touch to the whole complex, namely the
top stupa that acts as the finial to l3oroburdur. As for tbe lowest level

319
of the reliefs being covered up, the explanation is quite simple. Cracks
appeared in the walls, so a casement of stone was added to keep the
whole thing from falling apart. Very likely this happened even before
the work was finished. Today cracks have again appeared on the walls
of Boroburdur, and it is to be noted that those on the lower levels (the
2nd and 3rd) are wider than those on the upper strata.
Dharanindra probably died about 790. He very likely started
Chandi Sewu also, because the images at this complex, though slightly
younger, are very like those of Boroburdur. Again the work was
unfinished, and again his son carried on. Samaratunga built Sirnbalarama
on the Ratubaka in 794, and be probaly expanded Sewu in 792, though
Sewu is said to be unfinished. Samaratunga himself started Chandi
Plaosan, where the images are younger than those of Sewu. The work
was unfinished when he died and his daughter, Queen Sri Kahulunnan,
carried the work forward. She dedicated the merit to her father, called
Dharma Sri Maharaja in a few short inscriptions from Plaosan Lor.
The side 'Chandis of the north complex contain short inscriptions starting.
with the word Anumoda and followed by the names of the donors.
Anumoda is probably the same as our Anumodana or Modana
Satu, and might be translated freely as "Rightful indeed is this merit".
The name of the Queen, as well as her husband, Rakai Pikatan, their
son, Ga.run Wani, his wife, Dyah Ranu, his mother-in~law (?) Rakai
Wanwa Galuh, and another unidentified prince, Rakai Layuwatang Dyah
Maharamawa, as well as a host of others, appear as joining in the merit
of the founding of Plaosan. The only name without the Anumoda is
that of Dharma Sri Maharaja, and this should refer to the founder,
Samaratunga. Plaosan is the last of the major chandis of Central Java
built by the Sailenaras. Khien's dating of the complex is 825-850 A.D.
This brings my comments on Paranavitana:'s story to an end, but
before leaving the subject let us see exactly what 'history• Paranavitana
has produced. At first Professor Coedes thought that the· Sri Vijaya
Empire, based in South Sumatra, conquered both Java and the Malay~
Peninsula. When it was pointed out to him that as Central Java
produced so much magnificent masonry like Boroburdur and several
other complexes, it was more likely that Central Java conquered Sumatra.

320 im\TIEW ART!CLfu
So Coedes accepted that the Sri Vijaya and Sailendra elements were
separate entities. This left the Peninsula in the air, viz. it was conquered
by both South Sumatra and Central Java at about the same time! In
this way, though it was on the main trade route between China and
India, the Peninsula has no history of its own. Not only that, but the
history of South Sumatra only had evidence covering about 30 years
between 670 and 700; while the history of Central Java lasted only two
centuries between 700-900 A.D. Yet the Peninsula came into the story
right from the beginning and was still there at the end after six centuries.
With Paranavitana•s sources these same six centuries become history,
where the events fit the dates, topography and art in a continuous story.
Such is Paranavitana's hard core of history, indeed a core so bard that
it is solid stainless steel.
Two questions come to mind. The first is: how do the kings of
Mataram in Balitung's inscription that started with Sanjaya (section 8
above) come into the story? And the second question is: why did Visnu,
who was king at Chaiya (Suvarnnapura), build Boroburdur in "Java and
not in the Malay Peninsula? Also of course why did two other Sailendras,
Balaputra (circa 850) and Sri Mara Vijayottunga-varmandeva (circa
I 000), set up viharas in North and South India respectively? I do not
know the answers to these questions, so I will supply a little guesswork
which scholars please reject at their pleasure.
If ever there was a Sri Vijaya Empire that covered Java, Sumatra
and the Malay Peninsula, then it was more a conglomeration of City
States. Mataram in Java was one such City State; Muara Takus in
Sumatra was· another; and Chaiya on the Bandon Bight was a third.
One of the kings might have been elevated to the dignity of an emperor
along the lines of the Holy Roman Empire before the advent of the
Hapsburgs. In the Chaiya-Java period under review, Visnu of Chaiya,
who sent his son Panamkarana to rule in Java, and Panamkarana's son,
Samaratunga, who sent his son Balaputra to rule in Suvarnnadvipa, were
both qualified to be called Emperors; while two centuries later, Samara,
Vijayottunga probably qualified also. In this period Java had dropped
out of the story and the period should be thought of as that of Nakorn­
Lanka. In this latter period the concept of a United City States of Sri
Vijaya will become much clearer.

idivtEw AtmcLJ~
'fhe J~vakas of the Malay Peninsula were a sea. faring people, and
se~-f

l.mVIEW AUTICLt\
Summary Part II and Preview Part IIi
The theme of this part is that internal and external evidence inust
first be kept apart, and then later integrated if possible. The internal
structure of the Sri Vijaya empire was non-existent: a handful of inscriptions
from South Sumatra in the 7th century, misinterpreted by epigraphists
to fit a misinterpreted external record; the magnificent structures
of Central Java in the 8th and 9th centuries, interpreted by art historians
as being located in the vicinity of the capital of a sea-faring empire against
the scientific facts of physical geography; and now historians are beginning
to dig into the economic aspects of the Sri Vijaya story, where the
Chinese evidence is a veritable goldmine, and the Arab records are not
to be sneezed at either. A new problem now comes to the fore, namely
where were the main entrepots located, as opposed to the capital or
capitals of the Sri Vijaya Empire? I have already suggested that any city ·
in South Sumatra or Central Java was too far from the sea to have been
the capital of any sea-faring empire. On this point, it is just possible
that I may be wrong. I now suggest that the main entrepots were
located in ~he Malay Peninsula, or were sufficiently near the Malacca
Straits to control the main trade-route between east and west.· There
cannot be the slightest doubt that this suggestion is or can be wrong.
Unfortunately it is not possible to develop this theme in the third part
of this paper, because there is so much 'political material' that must be
dealt with first, otherwise the pattern of the dynastic history of Sri
Vijaya cannot be seen in its true perspective. To deal with this economic
aspect would mean writing a fourth part to this paper, and this is
certainly something I am not going to do. And in any case I think a
religious history of Sri Vijaya is more important than its economic
history. But I will say a few words now, and at the same time give a
pr~view or road~~ap of what can be expected in the next part.
·Historians of Southeast Asia (to borrow the title of a book edited
by Professor D.G.E. Hall) have an altogether wrong conception of the
geography of their subject, particularly concerning Sri Vijaya. The
Malay Peninsula .was a bridge, or a resting place that acted as a bridge,
for ships sailing between China and India. So we should look for more
history and trade, more cultural and other Indian influences, in the
I

REVIEW ARTICLE 323
Peninsula than on its periphery in South Sumatra and Java th
· 1 d · ' , or on e
matn an li1 Indochina. For many centuries of the early histo · · d
tl s· . v·. k' nc peno '
1c .. n lJaya mgs of the Javaka race had a strangle hold on this b 'd
n· n~
lCir seats were mainly on the east coast-at Chaiya on the Bandon
Bi.g,hl where the Na~an Plain on the Tapi River could feed a large populatmn;
at Nakorn Sn Thammaraj; and at Singora where the Inland Sea
was a natur~\l harbour that could shelter the greatest fleet of those days.
But the two principal locations that controlled the main trade-route, the
Malacca Straits, were Muara Takus in Central Sumatra and Kedah on
the west coast of the Peninsula. The 7th century Chinese toponyms for
these five places were: Foche or Chele-foche (Chaiya, thought to have
been Sri Vijaya), Ho-ling (Nakorn, thought to have been Kalinga, though
it could have been Tambralinga), Chih-tu (Singora Inland Sea, with its
capital of Seng Shih, the Lion City), Muara Takus (Mo-lo-yu or theMalayu
of the inscriptions) and Chieh-cha (Kedah). _
In the next or third part of this paper which starts early in the
tenth ccn tury, this simple but logical concept based on physical geography
and meteorology-that the Malay Peninsula was a bridge or resting place
between China and India-must be enlarged considerably, namely that
the Peninsula. was one of two resting places between China and the
Middle East. The other of course was Ceylon, where ships also called
to take on food and water. According to Dr. Paranavitana's Ceylon and
Malay.ria there were contacts between Ceylon and the Peninsula from
1
very early times; and in the four centuries covered by the book, there
were alliances that presumably tried to maintain control of the two
bridges. Obviously the Javanese (the Sailendra period having ended in
the century before) and the people of Mainland Southeast Asia, as well
us the South [ndians-the Colas, Chalukyas and Pandyas-would attempt
to wrestle control of one or both these locations from Sri Vijaya and
Ceylon. The epigraphic evidence supplied by Paranav~tana niat.ches
what few local sources there are so well that the two mtght be satd to
be different sides of the same coin; so for a change the story can be told
· bt The whole tale is a· true medieval remance-complete
amos 1 t s t ratg . . . .
· h d 1 d' 1·n 1
stress abductions and assassmatwns-but wh1le one
w1t amse s ~ , . . .
tb r like the story of the War of the Roses in Enghsh bts tory,
part rea d s ra e h' · th fi t h 1f
another has its counterpart in modern European !story Ill e rs a

324 REVIEW ARTICLE
of this century, when a Triple Alliance was formed against two aggressive
nations. Such is the story to come.
Several new placenames come into the story early in the tenth
century: the Chinese records have San-fo-chi instead of Chele-foche
(Shih-li-fo-shih); the Arabs have Sribuza, the country of the Maharaja
of Zabag; the South Indians have Sri Visaya-Kataha (Sri Vijaya­
Kedah) and Kidaram (Kedah); inscriptions from South Siam have Grahi
(Chaiya 1183) and Tambralinga (Nakorn 1230); and the Ceylonese records
have Tambarattha and Kalinga, Suvarn-Java-pura and Suvarnpura (the
City of Gold), Malayapura and Simbalapura (the Lion City). I will
defer discussion of these names till later, though I will say now that
while I consider locating the toponyms correctly to be of the greatest
import, what those same toponyms refer to philologically is of secondary
importance. This is a question of priority and I think historians of
Southeast Asia, as well as archaeologists, epigraphists, sinologists and
zoologists, from A to Z, should give it more serious consideration. The
question of priorities is an important one. The historians of Southeast
Asia who appear in Professor Hall's book of that name do not include
any historian of Thailand. So there are four major 'missing links' in
the history of Southeast Asia, of which the most important is the Sri
Vijaya story because it concerns South Siam as well as Malaya and
Indonesia. The reason for this is because the external evidence of the
story has been given priority over its internal evidence. In this way, in
the histories of Sri Vijaya written in English that I have seen, a new kind
of history bas come into being. It is not political history as we know
it, nor is it social or narrative history as such, but it is something that
might be called conjectural history. Unfortunately these historians,
unlike their counterparts, the historical novelists, have not yet realised
their own achievement in creating this new kind,of literature.
M.C. Clla11d Cllirayu Raja11i
Chiengmai University

COMMUNICATION
The Hsin T'ang Shu passage about P'an-p'an
Sir,
I owe M.C. Chand and re.aders of this journal (JSS vol. 62 part 1)
nn apology. The translation I offered to M.C. Chand some fifteen years
ago of the Hsin T'ang Shu passage about P'an-p'an was a bad one. I
missed some place-name Proper Nouns, translations of which are as
wrong as writing "new castle" for Newcastle or "ford for oxen" for
Oxford. With the help of a S.O.A.S. colleague I present the unpunctuated
text and a revised translation:
llsfn T'cwg Shu, ch. 222 c, Lieh-chuan 147 c, Po-na-pen ed .
2 a 14:
2 b 1 :
.M_ f. A ® )'ig: -M1 ;I: ~ S?- J~L.:£. f~
:1· * ${. ~~ f 1'/t 4t- -m Jt :Ji·1 if#: -tt 'f!IJ -t
a JJ .f. .f. a~~ l~
(2 a 14) "P'an-p'an is in the Nan Hai. (If you steer) some
way off true North (you) get to Huan Wang's boundaries. (At the)
Hsiao Hai it adjoins Lang-ya-hsiu.
From Chiao Chou, travelling
by sea, (you) reach (it) in forty
(2 b 1) days. The king is called Yang-su-shih."
Nan Hai
Huan Wang
Hsiao Hai
Chiao Chou
is the "Southern sea", viz. the South
China Sea and all points outward
bound beyond it.
is Panduranga, South Campa of the
T'ang period.
is the "small sea".
is the Tonkin area.

326 COMMUNICATION
Depending on how the passage is punctuated, other renderings are
possible. May I make one comment on the "small sea" : most translators
have accepted it as the Gulf of Thailand. (For instance, see Paul
Wheatley, The Golden Khersonese, p. 50.)
The Hsin T'ang Shu references to the Southern shadow of 2 ch'ih 4
ts' un cast by an 8 ch' ih gnomon on the Summer solstice ( l. .f.) at Ho-ling
(ibid. 3 b 12) and a 2 ch'th 5 ts'un shadow at Po-shih (5 a 9) prompt me
to observe that a southern shadow would be cast by any gnomon south
of the Tropic of Cancer (it passes through Canton) where the sun is
directly overhead. A simple calculation gives the latitudes as 6' 46' N
and 6' 7' N respectively. The whole of Sumatra and nearly the whole
of Malaya lie to the south of this latitude. At the very least, the 6'
latitude reference should encourage more thorough surveys of old sites
in the Takbai area of Naradhivas, one in particular being at khbok-it
C!f'lflBJ), the "Brick Mound", near a field called uu-rya (o1in), "Harbour",
A I •
now well inland, beyond the thaa-phr(l'dk (V11UWH1) boat landing. .
P.J. Bee
The School of Oriental and African Studies,
London University

REVIEWS
Chiude E. V/elch Jr. and Arthur K Smith M'l't R l .d
• , z 1 ary o e an Rule.
Ptr.~pecu~·es em Cil'ii-Military Relations (North Scituate: Duxbury Press,
1974), Annotated Bibliography and Appendix, pp. 294.
''1/hile interest in the study of civil-military relations has been
gre.at, few works have attempted to formulate models which could be
ttpplied to all political orders. Welch and Smith have taken the above
to tusk. They remarked that "unlike other studies of civil-military
relations that have concentrated on the so-called developing countries,
this book develops a framework applicable to all states-modern, industri:.llized,
and urbanized; transitional, agricultural, and rural." (p. xi)
Another stated purpose of the book is to answer the question posed by
the Romun poet Juvenal some nineteen centuries ago: "Who is to guard
tbe guards themselves?, The authors maintain that civilian control
ewer the military could not be achieved without understanding why and
how military influence in politics becomes transformed into military
intervention and control of political power.
Mechanically, the book is organized into three main partspresentation
of the principle independent variables, generalizations and
model; five case studies; and the synthesis of theory and empirical
nndings. The authors also provide the reader with a brief annotated
bibliography covering both general and specific studies of the civilmilitary
phenomenon, and an appendix comparing military expenditures
to manpower of one hund1·ed and twenty countries.
In presenting their theoretical framework, the authors draw heavily
from Huntington's concepts of modernization, development, political
decay, and the ability of political institutions to. manage and direct
demands created by the processes of socio~economic mobilization.· The

328 REVIEWS
approach they use falls within the systems analysis school and the study
they present suffers somewhat from the limitations of their analytical
tool.
Four independent variables affecting civil-military relations are
isolated. These are: political participation, civil institutions, military
strength, and institutional boundaries between the armed forces and
other groups. While these factors have been previously examined by
several authors, Welch and Smith present interesting viewpoints of the
relative importance of those variables in determining the nature of civilmilitary
relations.
Looking at their model on page 43, a few things lend themselves
to criticism. While the extent of political participation and political
strength of the military are taken as independent variables, their
importance are not clearly demonstrated by the model. What appears
to be the crucial factors in determining the type of civil-military rule
are the nature of civil institutions (defined as civic, or 'praetorian'
polities), and the military institutional boundary (seen as integral or
fragmented in nature). The authors argue not too convincingly that in
·civic polities, civilian control over the military is prevalent, while in
'praetorian' polities, the likelihood of military influence and control of
political power is high (regardless of the level of political participation
and strength of the military). The reviewer feels that the major
contribution of the book centers around the question of the boundary
ofmilitary institutions and the potential penetration of civilian values
into the military's role perception. While the problem is difficult to
operationalize, the concept of integral and fragmented boundaries and
their interactions with civilian institutions which determine the type
of civil-military rule, does merit further serious thought and research.
Furthermore, twenty generalizations dealing with "stimulants and
deterrents" of military intervention are posited to be later verified by
the five case studies·. These geoerali~ations are a summary of observa.

REVIEWS
tions made by the authors and otb 1 1
er sc 10 ars. However the soundness of
many are questionable 'd d '
. . . as evt ence by the caveat offered by the authors
themselves In thet~ conclusion. Nevertheless, the generali~ations are simple
enough for tho~e tnterested in the subject to understand and appreciate;
also, t~ley pr~v.tde an adequate int_roduction to the subject of the political
role of the nulLtary. But as the major aim of the study is to provide
a framework for the analysis of all political systems represented by a
model of comparative military political roles and regimes, it is bard for
the general reader to make the connections between the generalizations
. '
vanables, and the model itself.
The study fails to integrate clearly the four independent variables
and the twenty generalizations-a drawback reflective of the sta~ic nature
of the model presented. The processes of change (in both directionsfrom
the rise of military influence to the "guarding of the guards
lbcmselvcs") was only peripherally dealt with. Also, implicit in the
main thrust of the study is the assumption that civilian control is possible
only if 'praetorian' polities shift in the direction of civic polities.
However, this process is never made explicit. Thus, what is interesting
in the study is not merely what is presented~ but the questions one could
further raise. For example: "What specifically are the withdrawal
symptoms of a military dominated society?"
Some minor points which need strengthening in

330 REViEWS
many instances, the facts are not clear and even incorrect. For exam pie,
in the Thai case study, Field Marshal Phin was not the Army Commander-in-Chief
at the time of the 1947 coup, but was on inactive duty as a
result of post- World War II demobilization. Furthermore, because of
recent political events, the Thai case study needs drastic revisions. The
conclusion that "government in Thailand is a.combination of military
power, self-serving bureaucracies, and traditional authority- which
forms a distinctive pattern of predatory military rule" (p. 81) must
undergo re-examination. Generalizations drawn from conventional
sources dealing with Thai socio-political culture must also be scrutinized
and revised. While realizing the limitations of the authors (financial,
time, and accessibility to local sources), this reviewer is not convinced
that the literature used for the preparation of the Thai case study was
adequate. The authors have ignored many recent studies concerned with
socio-economic changes and dissertations in English dealing with Thai
civil-military relations. Judging from the sources cited by them, they
fail to appreciate developing trends of Thai civil-military relations which
have been showing indications 'of a shift from a predatory military system
to one of rising civilian (and royal) influence in politics. Furthermore,
this process of system change is not satisfactorily explained by the
authors' model.
Despite its short-comings, the book is a healthy addition to the
growing literature on civil-military relations. Attempts at systematic
"theory-building'' has been lacking in the field, and the authors' endeavors
have raised many practical and theoretical issues which pose challenges
for future students to ponder and resolve.
Thak. Chaloemtiarana
Faculty of Political Science,
Thammasat U11iversity

Corrine Phunngkasem, Thailand and SEATO (Program ofP bl' t'
. . . u tea ton and
R esearch m Pollttcal Science Faculty of Polt't' 1 s ·
. . • . ' tea ctence, Thammasat
Umverslty, fhat Watana Panich, Bangkok, 1973), pp. 106.
Alliances traditionally had three main purposes.
T
. 1 o aggregate
m1 tury power among nations with parallel (if not identical) · t . t .
t 1 d . . m eres s,
• o en prectswn to the formulation of those interests with 11 th ·
1 . • , a etr
1m.p ~cat10os; and finally to sanctify, perhaps to freeze, the relationship
cxtstlng
.
between the parties. At the very least alliances were th
us
tntended to slow the alteration of commitments (or to prevent their
being broken) when the interests of one party shifted.
Following the second world war ~he functions of alliances changed.
At the central nuclear level, from the point of view of the superpower,
alliances ceased to aggregate power; British and French nuclear weapons
add nothing to the American strategic force poised against the Soviet
force, nor do the conventional forces of those states and of other of
America's allies add much.
Hi
They do add liabilities, or so American
statesmen have argued in European capitals. Still, the superpower must
have contracted the alliance for some reason.
What one usually finds is
that recent alliances have had a more purely psychological function than
heretofore.
Alliances in the post-war era aggregated psychological
power, which flows necessarily from the inability of the superpower to
use his supreme force.
Psychological manipulation of the potentials of
this force thus became the means for waging the struggle for supremacyor,
at tbe very least, fo~ survivaL For the superpower, alliances were
testimony of support for. its global conception of order as much as
forward positions for his bases.
To the small power the alliance was
reassurance, that if naked aggression occurred against it, friends would
come to its aid, and the object of superpower diplomacy was to keep
that reassurance credible.
When states manipulate images of intention, they usually begin
creating myths, and this too bas becme another dimens.io~ of the
psychological function of alliances. True, creating and susta1m~g myths
is one of tbe hoariest functions of foreign policy. Every nat10n self~

servingly develops myths about its behavior in order to influence the
behavior of others. The American myth, with respect to the alliance
system on which its global strategy is based, is that it will fight for
freedom everywhere. The 'freedom' of its allies is indivisible: there
are no second class alliances. In fact, the United States has been
extremely selective about where it fights for 'freedom', choosing according
to domestic needs and external contingencies, as one would expect.
Even the promise to invite attack against American cities to protect
Europe-perhaps NATO's most sacred myth-has never been entirely
credible.
The other part of the American myth is profoundly untrue also.
As Professor Marshall has felicitously argued, if there are no secondclass
alliances, then there are no first-class alliances either, this largely
because the contractive capacity of states differs, but also because
geographic position makes some states more able to affect a greater
space and number than their own size would imply.1 Asian signatories
always resented it, Americans just as fervently denied it, and it was
always true: SEATO, compared at least to NATO, .. was a second-class
alliance for the United States.
To Thailand, however, SEATO was always of vast importance,
and it is thus appropriate that a book should appear devoted exclusively ·
to this relationship. Ms. Corrine Phuangkasem's recent, short study,
Thailand and SEATO, takes adequate account of SEA TO's vital role in
Thai foreign policy. What perhaps is insufficiently stressed is the extent
to which SEATO's creation, sustenance, and form, in its heyday, was a
product of Thai efforts. Until the archives of all the signatory states
are open the causal relationships can only be conjectured, though the
'Pentagon Papers' give us a few clues. Thus the American Joint Chiefs
of Staff, ina memo t.ypical of the period, recommended to the Secretary
of Defense in October 1954 that their forces not enter into combined
military planning with Manila Pact countries, and not make known to
them details of unilateral American plans in event of Communist
1) Charles Burton Marshall, "Alliances with Fledgling States," in Arnold Wolfers,
ed., Alliance Policy in the Cold War, p. 216.

REVJEWS
ag,gressitm,l Thailand and the Philippines kept pressing.
333
In February
1955 nt a l~lec:ing in Bangkok they pushed for a secretariat and a NATO
type organ~znttOn. It was not until 1959 that they got the Secretariat
and .tmly m 1960, when Laotian defenses were crumbling, that joint
~onlmgenc~ plans were developed. The wonder is that they got it at all·
m substuntwl measure it is owing to their own efforts. · '
The problem for the Americans, clearly, was always the disparity
between the epoch in which SEATO was brought into existence and the
ensuing two decades of its existence. In 1964 C.L. Sulzberger, hardly a
foreign policy radical, wrote that "SEA TO was a classic example of
closing the door on a missing horse. In this case the horse was the
Anglo-1:-rench empire, SEATO was written on the assumption of
British and French armed strength that di.dn•t exist."3 It was always an
a\\lkwurd alliance, formed as it was when Secretary of State Dulles was
at the high point of his career, creating a network of alliances around
the globe as the basis of American foreign policy. It was skillful Thai
diplomacy in large measure that took advantage of that moment to see
to the formation of SEA TO. Thereafter, as America found itself overstretched
abroad and its adversaries increasingly powerful, it faced-as
George Liska puts it-"one of the most difficult tasks of diplomacy: how
to soft~pcdal awkward commitments without extinguishing the vital
ones. n.t Given, then, this basic tenet of Thai foreign policy, namely the
strengthening of SEATO, and increasing American resistance to this, the
author's statement that "Prince Wan [at the 1954 Manila Conference]
offered Thailand's service to SEATO by proposing Bangkok as its headqutl
rters"' leaves out rather a lot and is perhaps just a little ingenuous.
The author's observation that, "since 1950, Thailand has mainly
based its own security upon the United States," 6 may seem contradictory,
but is not, though the author unfortunately does not resolve the apparent
contradiction. Thailand could not get a unilateral security commitment
from the United States owing to adverse congresssional pressure in
a) See l;t:;,~;:;~n Papers, us Government Edition, Vol. 10, p. 885.
3) New York Times, 3 June 1964. .
4) George Liska Nations in Allt'ance (Balumore, 1962) pp. 284-8,5.
5) Corrine Phua~gkasero, Thailand and SEATO, p. 19.
1$) lbid, p. 7.

334 REVIEWS
Washington. Nor could SEATO be relied upon to act swiftly in case of
aggression against a signatory power, owing to the increasingly evident
lack of consensus among its number. The task of Thai diplomacy (and
particularly of the skillful foreign minister Thanat Khoman) thus had
to be to get an American commitment from the American executive,
whereby its multilateral SEATO commitment would effectively be made
bilateral. Thus in reality it was American power that was seen to be
guaranteeing Thai security-though Thanat Khoman was the first among
Thai to see the illusory basis of that commitment, and thus the first to
wish to move away from reliance on Washington.?
Many writers, seeing the centrality of American power (or the
appearance thereof) in SEA TO, came to consider the alliance a fiction.
But this is precisely the type of 'fiction' of which international relations
are often made. it was a convenient way on both sides of using an
existing institutional framework to do something each wanted, but which
was impossible by any other means. As the Vietnam war heated up
anew, the Americans for the first time since 1954 had a new need for
SEATO, as a framework of 'legality'. 8 Thailand was an essential
security backup to American operations in Indochina. Moreover, as
Washington saw it, in the early 1960's, there was a far greater equivalence
to the Thai and South Vietnamese susceptibility to communist aggression.9
Wishing therefore to secure Thai cooperation in the war, and
fearing for Thai security all the while, the Americans thus allowed themselves
to be negoti~ted into a corner (as they later were to see it) by the
(then) more adroit Thai; they made an executive, bilateral commitment
7) In knowledgeable circles Thanat was known to fear, as early as 1967, that Thailand
was 'in too deep' with the Americans; from 31 March 1968 (upon learning
of President Johnson's abdication) Thanat worked steadily to find an alternative
to the American alliance, and to convince his colleagues that reliance on the
Americans was not in Thailand's interest.
8) See F.M. Kail's recent book, What Washington Said, for a discussion of the
increased use of SEATO, particularly between 1964 and 1966, as a justification
for American involvement in Vietnam; pp. 142-53.
9) Thus Vice President Lyndon Johnson, as he then was, recommended to President
Kennedy, on his return from a trip through Southeast Asia, that $50,000,000 be
given to both Vietnam and Thailand, with which to strengthen their defenses.
See Pentagon Papers, all editions.

REVIEWS
335
to Thailand in March ' 1962 - tl 1e f amous Rusk-Thanat accord. The Thai
had what they wanted, the essence of an American commitment even if
wrapped in an increasingly unviable multilateral alliance. For~ decade
n{me of the other parties bad a sufficient motive to expose the 'fiction'.
In this sense SEA TO had accomplished the traditional end of alliances
. . '
gtvmg the relevant party, the Thai, the benefit of a certain lag before the
new realities would change (or eliminate) the obligations among all the
parties.
It is no surprise, given the disillusionment in America with the war.
in Southeast Asia, that SEATO should be denigrated or, worse, ignored.
France has ceased to contribute to the organization, Pakistan bas withdruwn,
Britain has ceased to matter, and the possibility of the introduction
of American ground forces to protect a signatory or protected state
is remote, owing to congressional strictures imposed in recent years. So
\Vhat is the function of SEATO? To many this situation may be compared
to the problem of new university programs, which are successes,
detinitiona lly. Their failure rnay be total, their appearance in relation
lC> their f'Qunding impulse a pale shadow. But to abandon the program
would be to admit failure, and worse, to invite the loss of job and
perquisites. Universities (at least in Am((rica) are thus cluttered with
programs whose usefulness has been outlived. On this analogy it is
often argued that SEA TO should fold up its tent, even if more viable
alliances remain alive.
Tbc states of Southeast Asia are in the process of taking each
other's measure, sorting out tbeit priorities, and seeking new ways of
associating together to maximize their security in this new era. SEATO
as such mny have only an indirect relation to this process. But as long
as it exists Thai (and, to a lesser extent, Philipptne) diplomats may
invoke the 'notion of collective security as Asian states~en build new
edifices. Destroying the old edifice before the new one 1s bUtlt would
make it less likely that any of the ends Thai statecraft s.oug~t to protect
1 h SEATO would be preserved. It may be highly tllogtcal to argue
t,uoug r h . t t
that a 'toothless' organization does, in fact, accomp ts . tmpor an
ational relations are not logtcal. Academtc programs
purposes. I n t er n · f ·
, t . fulness are not guarding the secunty o natwns,
that have ost tlelr use
1

336 HEVIE:WS
only the vanity of men. The academic. analogy thus does not hold.
Keeping SEATO going for the moment costs little. Dismantling institutions
can prove costly if the dismantling creates vacuums or problems
whose tilling or solution is highly difficult.
But once Thailand decides that it no longer needs SEA TO, an era
will end and SEA TO would assuredly close its doors. That this day
approaches rapidly is hinted at in Ambassador Anand Panyarachun's
brilliant recent study of Thailand's role in regional diplomacy. In
reference to the long-mooted Soviet proposal for a new regional security
system, Ambassador Anand noted that "security pacts have at times
proved to be somewhat ineffectual and tended to become obsolete. From
past experiences, security arrangements of this [multilateral J kind can
hardly be said to be satisfactory. In any case, a new military pact would
not be in keeping with the international climate of mutual accommodation,
compromise and negotiation now prevailing. It would retard and
even obliterate any progress which has been made thus far in this
direction, and would then put us back to where we were in the
beginning."l 0
So much of the international relations literature in the past
generation has been written by Americans that, inevitably, American
perceptions and points of view (and sometimes interests) have been
dominant therein. At best, and from a scholarly perspective absolutely,
the nationality of a writer should not affect one's judgment. It will
affect one's assessment of what is worthwhile writing about. In this
sense at the very least the international literature is excessively
'Americanized.' Though tb.e author is herself an American she does not
write from an American point of view, which in itself would make the
volume worthwhile.
The Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy,
Tufts Unive1·sity
W. Scott Thomps011
1 0) "Thailand's Role in Regional Diplomacy", The Natwn (Bangkok), 25 April,
1974.

HEVIEWS
(I.A. Marzouk, Economic Development and Policies: Case Study of Thailand
(Rotterdam: Rotterdam University Press, 1?72), 458 pages. .
. The book under review on the development of the Thai economy
In the postwar period was written by the former Deputy Director of the
Researc~1 and ~la~ning Division and Chief of the Regional Center for
Econom.tc ProJeCtiOns for ECAFE in Bangkok. As is proudly proclaimed
on the ttt\e page the book contains a foreword by Professor Jan Tinbergen,
Nobel-Laureate; lest the reader be tempted by an overwhelming
urge lo ret~d what Professor Tinbergen might have to say about strategies
of economic development particularly as they might apply to the Thai
economy, let me forewarn him that no hint of Tinbergen's considerable
knowledge on this subject is contained in the foreword.
As Dr. Marzouk states at the outset, a basic theme of his book is
efficiency in the use of economic resources. Hence time and time again,
the author asks the question whether factor prices in the Thai economy
correctly reflect the underlying real costs to society from the use of
resources, attempts to determine the nature of those distortions which
create differences between market prices and social costs, and seeks out
remedies which would make the Thai economy more efficient. An
introductory chapter which briefly summarizes the outstanding features
of Thai economic growth since 1950, stre~ses those aspects of the
economy which have accounted for its quite successful performance over
the period, and outlines the basic framework of the book is followed by
a ch~tpter on demography which covers those aspects of fertility and
death rales which have led to the rather alarming current population
growth rates and projections for the next twenty years and a chapter on
the behavior of national income which traces out the basic q·ends in
production, consumption, and capital formation since 1952 and provides
a critical review of methods used to estimate various items in the
national accounts.
With the foregoing background chapters out of the way, Dr. Marzouk
follows with three chapters on the agricultural sector stressing the
important theme that the decreasing availability of .agricu~tural ~and bas
led and will continue to lead to a shift from extenstve to tntenstve land
cultivation and an evergrowing need to find methods of raising the
productivity of resources in this sector. The important points.tbat are
made in these three chapters are seven in number: first, agncultural
337

smw·th up lo *l~llll H)SU ~an ~UHbulcd h~ 41 fll>t: in IUCll phm~cd n\:)l
lu prodm::!ivt!)" tlf fC'>.mUt:C'~>. • mHpU( HU fwm lhc app.Ht'll[
nf >.Hen
fw·..ter lhan fh;ilUlnllun, lh!C'tt:' nn d.il.rl PH "~;c
hl 19tiJ) llmdl;, J.m~:c 1 »:\U ;uca phmltd n\ cnl!l
rnp1dly than fh'jaullltlnll. \\ijh II'I.:C ~:uhn.ilht'fl ~~~~·• "'l~mly nnd
lht~ arcu phwtcd f,:•r o!hii:l' C'Hlf!!> ttr.mang '>'if:~)' lr!u.lw~ to
the u~o·hh~\'CIU!!Ill of t'tm"'JdCHibk th\'Ch!fkMiult til lllo.!l •IF:ntullure U\:Cf
th~! twn tkcudc,.. Fmulhl), wile nt:c }ucld f'•t:f rui
f;lli C•lll!.I">ICIHlj" U'\ lhC !'II/( of' '>C 1fi ;~ll h•lif Ul;ijOr
re~tinns f,f the cmuur> dm.~ w u ICM\
('»f h1h••r, oninml
rmd mtdmrm::nl pu·•n:r, ~md ~~ta uml '~I hllld t§!l. the sa;rc of
furm im.:reillitf>. h.hhl), !he lllllf~uml ;wd ~p. fHl'du~~:t c::f btb111' in
rice fnrmintt fil>Clll lUI the l>llt uf lu~•hl!fl!:!ll IUUt:'ll~t!\, intht:tlllllf> a
nmldiJUibtHion nf rtMJUft:t~ u llctcby thtrt l'fi> rchili\t:l) wn much hthor
on 11mtH furmili tmd ltll(l huh~ ''~' htq:e tnuuanmn1 being
(lbtained when the value of Htc m1Hli)m

REVIEWS 339
One need not be an opponent of agricultural reform in general or
the spirit of Marzouk's recommendations in particular to argue that
some of these proposals are difficult to swallow. Where does the 15 rai
ceiling per family come from? It seems to be the result of dividing the
total area under cultivation by the number of farm families. Is this the
optimum size for rice farms or any farm regardless of the type of crop
grown? The evidence; particularly for the latter, is very scanty. To
be sure rice yield per rai is larger on small holdings and the marginal
product of labor appears larger on large holdings (the latter is somewhat
less clear as it is not evident that all other factor inputs are being held
constant), but is this phenomenon true for all crops? Marzouk provides
no evidence on this score. Moreover, before accepting such a proposal,
one would like to know what family incomes would result from a IS rai
ceiling; such a ceiling might greatly raise the labor input per rai and the
yield per rai but it does not follow that the resulting incomes would be
large enough to support a typical family. Before setting a ceiling or
embarking on the major administrative effort necessary to carry out this
redistribution, one would like some notion of bow well off the average
family would be as tbe result of this scheme. Moreover, it is not
altogether clear bow a social structure strong enough to prevent progressive
land taxes can be forced to accept heavy inheritance and property
value taxes.
The following two chapters outline the growth and structure of
the manufacturing sector in Thailand and provide a critical analysis of
· the industrialization strategy of the Thai government. Over the twenty
year period. the rate of growth of this sector rose from 6. 796 per. annum
during the 1950's to 10.996 per annum during the decade of the sixties
raising the share of this sector in gross domestic product from 12-13%
to 16.4% by the end of the period. During the 1950's manufacturing
employment grew faster than output indicating a relatively rapid growth
rate of labor-intensive industries but the last decade bas seen heavy
industry growing more rapidly than light industry indicating a switch
toward more capital"intensive production, providing a slower growth in
employment opportunities and a rising import content in the form of raw
materials and capital goods in local manufacturing. Marzouk is highly
critical of Thailand's industrial strategy which bas overemphasized·

340 h£V!EWS
import substitution (i.e. the use of policies which encourage the replacement
of imports by domestic manufactures). High tariffs on final
consumer goods with low tariffs on raw materials and capital goods has
led to very high levels of protection for consumer goods industries which
are then unable to compete in world export markets, discouraged the
growth of industries producing raw materials and capital goods, and led
to balance of payments problems because of the high demand for
imported intermediate and capital goods by these protected industries.
Marzouk rightly recommends that this strategy be reversed by reducing
the import duties on final consumer goods and raising them on raw
materials and capital goods (perhaps in the overall process reducing the
average level nominal tariffs although Marzouk is not explicit on this
point) and making up for any revenue losses by domestic sales and
excise taxes which do not create differentials between domestic and
world price structures. One can only agree with such a recommendation;
clearly Thailand's future development will depend importantly on the
development of an industrial sector able to compete in world markets.
Such progress can only be thwarted by the creation of inefficient
industries behind artificial tariff barriers.
The next two closely related chapters trace trade policies and the
.balance of payments during the periods 1944 to 1955 and 1956 to 1970
respectively. These chapters cover the multiple exchange rate system
which characterized the period 1947-1955, the liberalization of trade
policies that followed during the succeeding few years, and the effects
on the balance of payments of the import substitution strategy already
mentioned above. Marzouk breaks the post multiple exchange rate
period into two parts: 1957-1964 during which exports and imports
grew roughly in balance at 6.0 and 7.696 annual rates- respectively and
1964-1969 when exports grew sluggishly while imports accelerated to
a 12.8% annual growth rate with raw materials and capital goods growing
at rates above this and consumer goods at rates below, the outc~me of
an import substitution strategy with the characteristics mentioned above.
The basic theme behind Marzouk's analysis of the multiple-exchange
rate and the import substitution periods, and indeed one of the most
important themes of the entire book, is "that considerations of efficiency
and cbmpetiveness rule out export and import taxes and.t>roduction taxes
that distort domestic costs and isolate them from world prices. Thus,

REVIEWS
fiscal policy for demand management has to be confined to net income
taxes, domesttc sal~s taxes on consumer goods, etc." (p. 302). Thus
Marz.ou~ appears, Wtth some qualifications, (mentioned elsewhere), to be
advocatmg free trade (although this is hard to reconcile with his proposal
on pp. 250-1 to reduce import duties on finished goods and raise them on
raw materials and capital goods), but the argument becomes murky
indeed for he then advocates the use of exchange rate policy to bring the
market prices of domestic factors into line with their shadow prices
saying that the easiest way to do this is "to adjust the market exchange
rate to conform to the shadow exchange rate defined as equal to the value
of ~he marginal products of factors of production, mainly labor and
capital." (p. 302).
Unfortunately, as anyone familiar with trade theory will realize,
there are several alternative versions of the shadow price of foreign
exchange, differing not only in their underlying theoretical assumptions .
but also (ordinarily) in their resulting empirical magnitudes in any
particular application. None of the alternatives would (or could) be
equal to the value of the marginal products of factors of production.
Marzouk never lets us know which version he is employing and when he
concedes that measuring the shadow price for Thailand is difficult and
beyond the scope of his study, we are left in the dark as to what it is that
he isn't measuring. If he had argued that the baht is overvalued because
of high tariffs on imports and that a movement to free trade (which he
nt times appears to be advocating) would necessitate a devaluation to
maintain the trade balance, .the confusion would be ended because the
concept of the shadow exchange rate here is that exchange rate which
would maintain the trade balance given the elimination of all trade taxes.
Jnsteud he argues that "the Thai cu,rrency is overvalued in the sense that
the shadow wages are lower than the actual market rates and thus,
considering the importance of labour as a factor of production, the
shadow exchange rate for foreign currenctes in terms of baht is substantially
higher than the marke.t rate" (pp. 302-3). Despite what appears
to be considerable seasonal fluctuations in employment and unemployment
rates in Thailand, I know of no evidence that shows that market
wages overstate the real costs of labor inpl!LS. Marzouk provides no
such evidence.
341

f(nl.,ibk lh ~~~~lhl• lht ·r !mi cn•m1m) up h» I
exumim~ the implu:.Hiun~ ~.;mt:m~ i!f'~'"" lh fillll:'~• tlll
irn:~:slrm:nl Ho m.;hsc\c the !h
;md V!Ch\CCU
H"ijUU

REVIEWS 343
~hakril Noranitipadungkarn and A. Clarke Hagensick, Modernizing
Chiengnwi: • A . Study of Com mumty · E/' 1tes m · Urban Development (Bangkok:
Natmnal Instttute of Development Administration Research Center
1973), vii + 120. ' '
The picture which emerges from social science research on Southeast
Asia tends to leave the impression that the people of the area live either
in small villages or in large "primate" cities. Secondary cities, such as
Penang, Mandalay, Medan, and Chiang Mai, as well as small towns
have ~eceived .very lit~le ~itention ind~ed. One welcomes, then, a stud;
of Chtang Mat, for thts ctty holds partwular interest not only because of
its place as the second largest City in Thailand but also because of its
long history as a pre-modern city. The authors of the book under review
are interested specifically in the changes which Chiang Mai has undergone
and still is experiencing. In their study they attempt to determine the
roles which the "elite" of Chiang Mai city have played and are playing
in the "modernization" of the city. Although the book does contain some
useful information, it is conceptually and methodologically inadequate
in its treatment of the city of Chiang Maias a social entity, in its treatment
of the composition and roles of the elites, :and in its treatment of the
process of modernization.
The question of what the city of Chiang Mai, as a social entity
located in space, actually comprises is never directly confronted by the
authors. At times, the legal entity-the municipality (thetsaban) of
Chiang Mai-is specified; but at other times the referent becomes the
municipality plus the sanitation district (sukhaphiban) of Chang Phuak,
the municipality plus some undefined suburbs, the whole of Mvang
district Chiang Mai, and even the whole of the province. The problem
of what areas are 'included within Chiang Mai bas important implications
fo policy affecting the city. One would have wished, in this connection,
th:t the authors could have elaborated upon_the; political factors inherent
· .l d · 1· on made by the Ministry of In tenor m 1970 to place suburban
m t 1e ects . . . · d h h ·
areas contiguous to the city in a samtat10n dtstnct un er t e. aut onty
of the District Officer rather than to expand the boundanes of the
municipality. ·
· d · · n does reveal the relative powerlessness of the local
Th1s ects1o .
1 . h 1· 1 • the political sphere. The authors provtde a number
e 1te w en ac mg
0
· 1 of the extraordinary degree to wh1ch · even sma 11
of other examp es e. b · · · ·
. · t' the city of Chiang Mai are made y mmtstnes m
dectstons affec mg

344 REVIEWS
Bangkok or their local representatives rather than by the people most
concerned with the outcomes of these decisions. Not only does the City
Council have to request special funds from the Department of Local
Administration in the Ministry of Interior for any major development
projects such as bridge or road building, but it also has to obtain the
I
Department's permission to use the funds which, by law, belong to the
municipality. In the same vein, the current plan for the development of
Chiang Mai, was drawn up by the Town and Country Planning
Department of the Ministry of Interior rather than by the municipality
of Chiang Mai itself.
The power of the central government in determining local affairs
explains why high-ranking government officials are considered by the
authors as important members of the Chiang Mai elite. This group
constitutes what the authors call the "bureaucratic elite", a group which
also includes, for reasons which are not clear, the manager of one of the
private banks. In determining the composition of the "non-bureaucratic
elite", the authors identified representatives of other local interests,
namely "persons who own or operate large and modern economic and
social projects in the city" (p. 3). This idea of the elite consisting of
those who are representatives of interests or leaders of interest groups
was, unfortunately, not pursued consistently and was diluted by
introducing prestige or popularity as additional criteria.
Whether the 49 persons identified as being elite are considered to
be a sample or to be the totality of the Chiang Mai elite is not made
clear. If the latter, and this seems to be the author's position, then there
are definite lacunae. For example only one monk is included and be is
neither the Provincial Ecclesiastical Chief nor tne abbot of the important
wats of PhraSing or Cbedi Luang. This despite the fact that the Sangha
obviously has vested interests in Chiang Mai city, not the least of which
are the large land holdings. Similarly, no person was included in the
elite because of his prominence in the Church of Christ in Thailand
despite the fact that the Church of Christ also has large land holdings
and controls two important private schools.
The question of recruitment to the elite and the social backgrounds
of the elite are dealt with rather superficially. The authors allude to
the fact that some of the elite are Chinese in origin or have Christian
backgrounds, but they do not discuss ethnic or religious factors systematically.
Moreover, in a scholarly study it is not suffici~nt to say that 29

REVIEWS
bt\ the 3o non-bureaucratic elite are "cousins and intimate friends". The
authors do point out the importance of northern originandofmembership
in one of the local aristocratic or prominent families for those who are
members of the non-bureaucratic elite. However, they do not discuss
why some members of aristocratic families are among the elite and others
definitely are not, nor do they discuss how prominent ndn-aristocratic
families achieved their prominence.
The roles which the elites have played in the "modernization'' of
Chiang Mai are classified according to whether they bring development
in one of four spheres of activity: governmental, physical and
environmental, economic, or social. While a number of interesting
activities are discussed under these rubrics, the analysis is limited by the
conceptual haziness regarding what is meant by "modernization".
Whatever modernization might be taken to mean, it must needs
imply some sort of change from a state in the past. The historical
background provided by the authors is sketchy to the point of inaccuracy
and provides no clear picture of Chiang Mai or its elite in pre-modern
· times. The authors also use the terms "modern'', "modernization",
'modernizing" to mean a number of different and sometimes contradictory
things. While the term "development" is often used as a synonym for
"modernizing", the authors assert (p. 3) that the two are distinct. Elsewhere,
"modern" seems to mean "new", "Western" (as, at p. 58, where
"modern" and Chinese tea are distinguished), or simply "change".
Towards the end of the book, an attempt is made to assess the "sophistication"
(apparently another synonym for "modernity") of the elite.
The criteria for determining sophistication are ad hoc at best and range
from degree of formal training to participation in the "status sport"
of golf.
Those who are members of the local elite in Chiang Mai most certainly
hold different conceptions of Chiang Mai as a city than did the local
aristocrats and monks who made up most of the elite of Chiang Mai
prior to the implementation of reforms which centralized power and
religious organization in Thailand early in this century. Unfortunately,
this study failed to elicit what the conceptions of the present-day elite
are, substituting instead the dubious assumption that tbe Chiang Mai
elite possess "modern" attitudes (p. 3) which inform actions directed
towards producing a "better city". A conceptually and methodologically
adequate study of the roles of the local elite in effecting, and responding
to, change in Chiang Mai has yet to be made.
Charles F. Keyes
University of Washington

Chai-Anan Samudvanija, Sethaporn Cusripituck, and Sawaeng Ratanamongkolmas,
editors, Sat Kan Muang ( flw~mu~a~) (Thai Wattana Panich,
Bangkok, 1971), pp. 317.
This work is a collection of articles by eight authors dealing with
aspects of modern Thai political life. The arrangement is ro\Jghly
chronological, beginning with developments under the absolute monarchy
which foreshadowed the introduction of a democratic system of
government, and proceeding to the 1932 coup, subsequent coups and
rebellions, the membership of the National Assembly, political parties
and pressure groups, and finally the present state of Thai democracy and
its projected future as of 1971. At the time of publication the three
editors were all members of the faculty of the National Institute of
Development Administration, while the other five authors held positions
ranging from graduate student to journalist to deputy nai amphoe.
Although not discussed explicitly except in the final article, the underlying
assumption shared by all the authors is that the establishment of a
genuinely democratic system of government in Thailand is both desirable
and at least in considerable measure feasible, and hence much of the
analysis is devoted to the perceived failings of the past forty years-what
went wrong and how a democratic system can be made to work in the
Thai social, economic, and political setting.
A foreword gives a useful summary of the contents of each article,
and is followed by yet another, briefer, summary of the contents with
biographical data on the authors. The book concludes with a substantial
bibliography (pp. 306-317), which lists more than a hundred books and
articles in Thai, forty in English, and a like number of references to Thai
documentary materials and newspapers.
* * *
An excellent lead article, by Chai-Anan Samudvanija, discusses
steps toward representative government initiated by the absolute
monarchs. After dealing briefly with the Fifth Reign (which the author
bas treated elsewhere) and the Sixth Reign, the author describes in
greater detail the efforts of King Prajadbipok to prepare Siam for

democratic government, and in particular the creation of the Committee
of the Privy Council in 1927. Appendices give the text of King ,Prajadhipok's
message to the inaugural session of the Privy Council Committee,
the text of the 1927 Privy Council Committee Act, an (incomplete) list
of the members of the first Privy Council Committee, and the text of
King Prajadhipok's 1935 abdication statement, with one paragraph
missing.
This article is of particular importance because it is the first
published research to make substantial use of the National Archives
records of the Seven~h Reign, and it clearly demonstrates the value of
these materials. Nonetheless Dr. Chai-Anan's handling of the archival
material is open to question on some points. Several important
documents, concerning both the King's aims in establishing the Privy
Council Committee and other aspects of his plans for political reform in
Siam, are not used at all, and in some of the documents that are used
significant points are passed over. Thus there is a paragraph on Prince
Sithiporn's proposal to give the Privy Council Committee slightly
broader powers, but no discussion of the arguments presented at the
crucial 20 June 1927 meeting when a 'liberal' majority headed by Prince
Boripha t and Prince Sithiporn prevailed over a more conservative group.
And the passage which follows quotes a memorat?-dum on the problem of
choosing members of the proposed Privy Council Committee without
indicating that the memorandum was drafted by the King himself
(pp. 16-17).1
There is also confusion in the chronology. According to Dr.
Chai-Anan's account {pp. 12-13) King Prajadhipok had considered
granting a constitution from the beginning of the reign, but when
Raymond B. Stevens and Phya Sri Wisarn Waja were asked to study
the question of constitutional change they recommended delay, and the
King accepted their opinion and began .to lay the foundations for a
democratic system by promoting local self-government, and on the
national level by establishing the Privy Council Committee. But in fact
1) The relevant documents are in National Archives, ·Seventh Reign, Royal Secretariat,
6/ 3,4. (Because of the revision of the National Archives' classification
system these references do not correspond to those given by Dr. Chai-Anan.)

the Privy Council Committee dates from 1927 (a year before Phya sri
Wisarn Waja was raised to the rank of Phaya), while the episode
involving Stevens and Phya Sri Wisarn Waja took place early in 1932.2
On the basis of the minutes of meetings it also seems reasonable to
question Dr. Chai-Anan's rather optimistic evaluation {pp. 14, 24) of
the effectiveness and importance of the Privy Council Committee in its
four and a half years' existence. And Dr. Chai-Anan asserts {p. 23)
that Prince Sithiporn was an important leader of a developing 'opposition'
party in the Privy Council Committee. While it is true that Prince.
Sithiporn was an outspoken critic of a number of government policies,
it is unlikely that he played an active role in any 'opposition'. During
the period Prince Sithiporn lived at the farm at Bangberd, and despite
his important role in the establishment of the Privy Council Committee
he had the worst attendance record of any member, being present at
only three meetings in the first four years.* For this reason Prince
Sithiporn was not included in the second group of members named in
1931; ironically, no sooner had he been dropped from membership than
he showed up at a meeting, leading to a minor debate over whether
or not be should be allowed to listen to the proceedings.
There are also several minor factual errors, including the dates of
the first meeting of the Privy Council Committee (p. 18) and of the new
government taxes {p. 10), and also in the figures for the increases in
government revenue and expenditure cited on p. 8, where the percentages
given ~hould apply to the whole period in question and not, as Dr.
Chai-Anan indicates, per year. On the whole, however, this is a valuable
piece of research on a period that has been very little studied, and there·
are good grounds for Dr. Chai-Anan's favorable assessment of King
Prajadbipok, and his conclusion that to date King Prajadhipok bas
received considerably less than fair treatment from history (pp. 28-29).
The second article is a detailed account of the 1932 coup by
Kiatichai Pongpanicb, discussing its background and causes, its execution,
. 2) There is a brief summary of the relevant documents by the present reviewer in
Jozwnal of the Siam Society, July 1973, pp. 190-191.
*National Archives, Seventh Reign, Royal Secretariat (1. 7, 'l'.ll.), 6/6,23.

REVIEWS 349
and its consequences. This is a useful summary but based on well-known
sources and offering little that is new, and it is rather surprising to see
secondary Western works like Virginia Thompson cited for factual
references. On p. 72 there is a list of pre-1945 confrontations between
the executive and legislative branches of the government resulting in the
resignation of the cabinet or the dissolution of the Assembly. In every
one of the four cases-the crisis of April 1933 followed by the •second
coup' in June, the rubber agreement controversy of 1934, the royal lands
scandal of 1937, and the fall of the Phibun government in 1944-there
are inaccuracies in the dates given, and, more importantly, there is no
mention at all of the September 1938 controversy over budgeting
procedures, which resulted in the resignation of the government, the
proroguing of the Assembly, the calling of new national elections, and
ultimately the retirement of Phahon and the elevation of Phibun to the
office of Prime Minister.
The third article, by Wichai Suwanarat, catalogues the nine major
coups and rebellions from 1933 to 1958, in each case analyzing the causes.
The conclusions reached are that modern Thai politics has been
characterized by a lack of ideals or principles, and that further political
upheavals are to be expected (p. 130). As in the case of the second
article the sources used are for the most part well-known, and the author
goes so far as to warn in the introduction (p. 85) that as many of the
sources are questionable his account may be less than accurate. One
important point raised (p. 84) is the failure thus far to solve the problem
of the peaceful transfer of political power; this is evidenced by the fact
that with the exception of Phya Phahon and a few civilians who served
as heads of short-lived caretaker regimes, every Thai Prime Minister
has died in office or eventually found himself in exile abroad.
The fourth article is 4 very interesting study by Sethaporn
Cusripituck of the backgrounds of the elected members of the National
Assembly. The article begins with a survey of the eleven national
elections (two of which involved less than the total number of changwat's)
held from 1933 to 1969, and then gives data on successful candidates in
terms of age group, educational level, o:cup~tion, sex, and prior p?litical
expe~iepce. This information is presented lll the form of a vanety of

350 REVIEWS
tables, charts, and graphs (some of which appear to be inconsistent; cf.
graph 7, p. 161, and table 3, p. 159).,
In some categories, such as
education, there are significant gaps in the data for the earlier groups,
and in the category of prior political experience data is given only for
the group elected in 1969.
An interesting finding is the very high
percentage of Assembly members having formerly served at various
levels of local government.
Little information is provided about sex,
other than the fact that in the 1969 election six female candidates were
elected from among 32 who sought office, which was a higher rate of
success than that of male candidates.
surprisingly few discernible trends.
inst~bility
On the whole the data shows
The fifth article, by Aphinya Charunporn, analyzes the ch~onic
of Thai political parties. The original 'People's Pfrty' is
discussed, all the various parties which have participated in postwar
elections are listed, and then the causes of their rather ephemeral
existences analyzed in terms of internal and external factors.
author concludes that the major internal factor leading to instability
and ineffectiveness has been that Thai political parties have been based
on personalities rather than political principles, and the major external
factor has been the frequency of coups by the military and bans on
political activity.
The
Whether or not one agrees with all the author's
conclusions, the data given on postwar parties and their leaders is of
considerable interest.
Some might question whether, at least at the time,
of writing, Sri Lanka and the Philippines were really examples of oneparty
systems, and the account of the February 1957 elections (p. 193)
confuses the results for the Prachathipat and the Tharnmathipat parties
(cf. the correct figures on p. 141). Also, all of the postwar parties are
lumped together in the discussion and analysis; there would seem to be
justification for some separate treatment of the Pracbathipat (Democratic)
Party, as its relatively long existence, coherent, ideology, ability to
survive the deaths of top leaders, and enduring hold on the Bangkok
electorate would appear to mark it as significantly differept from the
other parties.

REVIEWS 351
The sixth article is Sawaeng Ratanamongkolmas' study of pressure
groups in Thai politics, based in large part on the author's earlier work
on Chinese groups in Thai society.
After a summary of the theoretical
role of pressure or i!fterest groups in a democratic system, the author
analyzes the present Thai situation and concludes that to date the only
really effective pressure groups have been ethnically Chinese. However,
as the assimilation of Chinese into Thai society continues these associations
based on Chinese linguistic or cultural ties will inevitably disappear,
and the author sees Thai business and professional associations as the
most likely to take their place as genuine pressure groups.
But the
author believes that the groups most in need of encouragement are
agricultural groups, both because they concern greater numbers and
because they are less likely to develop on their own, and there is a lengthy
and in parts less than convincing discussion of the past and possible
future of Thai agricultural organizations. In view of recent events, the
mention (p. 231) of student groups and their potential for developing
into politically active pressure groups is of particular interest. One
point which could well be discussed at greater length is the mechanics
of just how Thai pressure groups might make their influence felt on
government policy and its implementation.
'
The seventh article, by Prachaya Klaphachan, examines the state
of democracy in Thailand. It begins with a long survey of political
theory and political systems, and goes on to discuss the Thai case,
dealing with such topics as interest groups, the weakness of local selfgoverning
institutions, the domination of the legislative and judicial
branches by the executive branch, and the likelihood of a military coup
overturning the then in force 1968 constitution. One questionable point
is the claim that the Thai of the Sukhothai kingdom lived in a 'democracy'
(p. 247). The evidence cited (lines III/17-19 of the Ram Khamhaeng
Inscription, to the effect that King Ram Khambaeng discussed affairs of
state with princes and nobles) hardly supports the assertion, and certainly
the Sukhothai political system would not meet the various definitions of
'democratic' given throughout the volume under review.

352 REVIEWS
The final article, by Manut Wattanakomen on Thai political
development,3 also begins with a lengthy recapitulation of Western
political theory. The question of whether a democratic system is suited
to developing countries is discussed, and Thai development measured in
terms of progress in education, medicine, and law enforcement. The
percentages of those voting in national and local elections are compared.
Among a variety of recommendations are that the Prime Minister be
directly elected by popular vote, that he hold the position of supreme
commander of the armed forces, which would become a civilian post,
and that officials on active duty, both civilian and military, be barred
from politics. The author suggests that more political history and
thought be taught in Thai schools, citing specifically such documents as
King Prajadhipok's 1935 abdication statement and the American
Dectaration of Independence, with the goal of creating a generation of
cpolitical animals' (the sat kan muang of the title). He advocates the
development of local government, political parties, and interest groupsespecially
in agriculture. The farm problems emphasized are income
and land tenure, and there is the usual moral attack on the rice premium
(p. 299). Unfortunately, also as usual, it would appear that the author
has an incomplete understanding of the economic rationale or conse"
quences of the premium. The rice premium question is a very complex
one and in recent years the supporters of the premium have been
considerably less eloquent and persuasive than its critics, but the
experience of the last several years of low premiums suggests that the
whole question deserves further study.
As a whole the volume provides valuable information and analysis
on most aspects of modern Thai politics, and the articles on the Privy
Council Committee, the backgrounds of elected members of the National
3) There is some question about the title. In both the text an4 the table of con·
tent the first part of the title is Kan Patthana Muang Thai (the development
of Thailand), while twice in the introduction it appears as Kan Patthana Kan
Muang Thai {the development of Thai politic~). From the content it would
appear that the latter ls corrc::ct.

ht:vmws 353
Assembly, and,pressure groups in Thai politics are important contributions
of original research. Topics which might well have been treated more
explicitly or at greater length include the historical roles of the military
and the civilian bureaucracy in Thai politics; the role of the National
Assembly (as distinct from its membership) in various periods since 1932,
the role of the judicial branch, which is scarcely mentioned at all, the
role of the monarchy, and the role of the Buddhist religion. As noted
above, there are occasional factual errors, including wrong dates fol'
such well-known events as the 1932 coup (p. 248) and the June 1933
'second coup' (p. 190). The long discussions of political theory use
concepts like 'interest articulation and aggregation', 'politics of primitive
unification', 'societal reference', and 'disguised authoritarianism', which
when rendered in Thai are usually even lengthier and more obscure than
in English. Readers who are not political scientists, and particularly
those who are not Thai, may prefer a less rigorous introduction to Thai
politics in the form of the many primary sources available for the
constitutional period. An important recent contribution in English is
Jayanta K. Ray's ·Portraits of Thai Politics, containing the political
memoirs of Thawee Bunyaket, M.R. Seni Pramoj, and Thanphuyfng
La-iad Phibun Songkhram.
Finally, it should be. noted that the work under review was published
before the events ofNovember 1971 and October 1973. The'revolution'
of November 1971 fits easily into the patterns described in Sat Kan Muang,
and in fact was all but predicted by several of the authors. However
the more recent events are a very different matter involving a number
of elements unprecedented in Thai political history; future editions of
Sat Kan Muang or similar works will need substantial revisions and
additions to take these new developments into account.
I
Benjamin A. Batson
Cornell University

3s4
imvn~ws
Visakha Puja B.E. 2517, edited by Sulak Sivaraksa, (annual pubiic~tion
of the Buddhist Association of Thailand under royal patronage,
Thai Watana Panich Press, Bangkok, 1974), pp. 163.
As he says in the Editorial Note, it is now the eleventh year that
the present editor and his staff have undertaken the publication of
Visakha Puja. The difference between the present issue and those of the
last ten years is that while the past ten publications came out in time
for the auspicious occasion of the Holy Day, the present one was
published late in time. This was, according to the Editor himself, due
to the fact that the Editor had expected a change in the editorial policy
and had tendered his resignation to the President of the Buddhist
Association, expecting that a new editor would be appointed to replace
him. However, it so happened that, as a result of the October upheaval,
the President of the Association was appointed Prime Minister and
became overwhelmed by the affairs of state, nothing was done to carry
out the task and, when the time drew very near to the Holy Day, the
present editor was requested to undertake the job again. Due to this
delay and the paucity of time to seek articles for publication, the Editor
was afraid that the quality of the present edition might not be on the
level of the previous issues. But with even a cursory reading, readers will
find that the present issue is of no less value to the study of the Dhamma
than the previous ones.
The first two articles are two sermons by two late Supreme
Patriarchs of Thailand. The first of the two, "the Buddhist Attitude
towards National Defence and Administration" by His Holiness Prince
Vajiral:U'iqa, was a special allocution on the auspicious occasion of the
Anniversary of the Natal Day of His Majesty King Vajiravudh in 1916;
while the second short sermon by H.R.H. Prince Jinavara was delivered
in memoriam of King Edward VII and Emperor Nicholas II and is
reprinted to enable the younger generation to compare it with another
of the same kind delivered on September 25, 1973 in commemoration of
His Late Majesty King Gustav Adolf VI of Sweden.
Two articles are directly drawn from Pali scriptures, both of which
are translations by Bhikkhu Khantipalo, a well-khown and competent
hand on the Buddha-Dhamma. One, "The Tathagata, 0 Bhikkhus", is

Hs
ll seiected sayings of the Buddha, dealing with many aspects of the
Buddha's t~aching, probably collected to form part of a larger collection.
The o~her IS a Jat.aka story called Kumbhai-Jataka (No. 312) which tells
how hquor was discovered and why its use should be avoided.
"~Talk on Dhamma•:by ~en. Acariya Maha Boowa Nii!fasampanno
deals w1th the gradual realizatiOn of the Eightfold Path in the progress
of a monk-disciple from the moment of his ordination till be secures the
spiritual wealth of Vimutti or Nibbana. Those interested in spiritual
development, whether monks or laymen, besides finding it helpful to
their practice of the Dhamma, may also use it as a review of the basic
principles of Buddhism.
An advanced student of Buddhism should find much interest in
Bhikkbu Vimalo's "Awakening to the Truth", where an attempt has been
made to show that the study of the Mahayana and the writings of great
mystics of other religions may help to clarify the meaning of some
important and difficult terms such as Papafica, Non-dual Gnosis, Pabhassara
Citta, Jbana, and Relative and Absolute Truth.
Readers who are interested in social aspects of Buddhism and the
roles it is playing or is expected to play in the modern world should find
Visakha Puja 2517 especially interesting as the subject is treated in
various articles from different standpoints. In Bhikkhu Ratnasara's
''Call for a Positive Role of Bhikkhus in the National Leadership",
Buddhist monks are expected to be encouraged by the Discourses of the
Buddha and the ample examples of the past to be active in playing their
roles as leaders of the community and of the nation. Suggestions are
also made to answer the question how best can the Bhikkbu-leadership
be made use of in the development of Sri Lanka. Though all historical
evidence cited and suggestions 'made are confined to the case of Sri
Lanka, good lessons can be learnt by other Southeast Asian countries or,
to be more specific, Thailand. · Turning from Sri Lanka to Vietnam,
more lessons can be learnt from Thich Nhat Hanh's "Listening to a
Poplar Tree". In this article the writer tells what the poplar tree
teaches him about the concepts of violence and non-violence. Besides
ideas and concepts, the reader may find that he understands better the
situation in Vietnam and the Vietnamese people, especially the Buddhists,
what they feel and think, what they need and want, and why
their monks burnt themselves to death.

REVIi£Ws
In her "Stages of Spiritual Development", Miss Ruth-Inge Heinz~
tries to explain the stages of spiritual development of the Thai people
through sociological approach. Words from the Pali Canon are also
quoted at various places to support her ideas. Some of the concepts,
such as the "silent agreements" and "patron-client relationships" are
really worthy of study.
As the title indicates, Professor Hewage's "A Middle Path
Approach towards World Community" is an attempt to show that the
most effective way to develop a world community is to follow the Middle
Path. In his own words, "Here there is no problem of a conflict between
ends and means, and the ends justifying the means, because both ends
and means are equally desirable here". According to the writer, one is
following the Middle Path when he is "avoiding the two extremes and
trying to follow a moderate way applicable and appropriate to (him), in
responding to the environment". However, his interpretation seems to
be a spiritual and intellectual one. Some may find more practical ideas
to bridge the gap between theory and practice in Dr. Puey Ungphakorn's
"The Role of Ethics and Religion in National Development", although
in this article (comprising three Sinclaire Thompson Memorial Lectures
delivered at the Thailand Theological Seminary, Chiengmai) the scope
of the subject is limited to the national level and it is seen from an
agnostic's viewpoints. The writer (in reality 1 the lecturer) says he is not
fully satisfied with the Buddhist Eightfold Path as the means to attain
the ideals in life and suggests the Buddha's four kinds of strength instead.
But, in my opinion, the two principles are the same, the four kinds of
strength being only a restatement of the Eightfold Path applied to a
specific problem for a given purpose. As there is a synthesis of
Christianity and Buddhism here, the article should also interest Christians
and students of comparative religion.
The Editor himself has his ideas expressed in "Some Aspects of
Youth in Asia", which appears to be an attempt to explain, with ~eference
to the values and attitudes differently held by the younger and the older
generations in Asia and in the West, the why and wherefore of the roles
played by the students in this changing world of frequent social and
political protests. Suggestions are also made on how to review, refine
and strengthen the role of young people in the creation of a new and

REVIEWS 357
di~erent w?rld, and on what roles religious leaders should play to achieve
thts, that ts to say, to choose between the priestly and the prophetic
roles. For Thai society, Buddhism is, to be sure still turned to as a final
resort for the meaningful answer.
'
The Visakha Puja 2517 contains two articles on personages and
their activities. One is "The Reformer of Chaiya" by Eldon R. Hay and
the other, "Buddhism in the West" by H.H. Jastram. In the former the
. '
wnter tells how he came to meet, had a talk, and became impressed by
the Ven. Bhikkhu Buddhadasa, his personality, his monastery, his work
and all his followers. On reading the latter, many readers would at
first find it nearly unbelievable that they are reading of a very hard form
of Dhutanga or austere practice being followed by U.S. citizens in their
own country. It is reported that Bhiksu Heng Ju, aged 28, accompanied
and protected by Bhiksu Heng Yo, is on a one-thousand-mile journey of
Dhutanga from San Francisco to Seattle, Washington. The monk, an
American with a Chinese name, has taken a vow to make a formal bow
to the Buddha and to all benevolent spiritual beings, with his head,
elbows, and knees to the ground, every third step of his never-lying-down
journey which started on October 16, 1973 and is expected to end a whole
year after that. There is also mystical belief among some Americans in
the supernatural power of his practice. Of course, the monks belong to
the Mahayana school of Buddhism, and, for many Theravada Buddhists,
this vow of theirs would be regarded as a modified form of Dhutanga
practice. Some may admire the sincerity of their vow while others may
find it a peculiar or even a queer practice. But everyone would get
surprised and admit that the monks are doing very hard things. Besides
the report of the two monks' journey, readers are also informed of the
activities of the Golden Mountain Monastery, the place from which the
monks started.
Also included in this V;sakha number are a poem, ccself-portrait",
by Kha, and book reviews in which ten titles are pre~ented. .
The picture of Sundari Vat}i on the front cove~ 1s not only a bea~tlf
1 decoration but has deeper meanings. It is ev1dence of symbolism
e~er used in Thai Buddhism and from it one can also trac~ the i~fluence
of Mahayana Buddhism in Thailand. The back cover wh1ch.dep1cts the
golden urn containing the body of the late Supreme Patn_arch, Lord
Abbot of Wat Bodbi, cherishes the memory of a_ personality a?d an
important event in Thai history, which adds specml value to V1sakha
Puja 2517.
Mahachula Buddhist Academy,
W at. M~hadhatu
Phra Rajavaramu11i

358 REVIEWS
Toward The Truth, by Bhikkhu Buddhadasa, edited by Donald K.
Swearer (Westminster Press, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, 1971 ), pp. 189.
As it seems to be pointed out by the editor, the present book is an
attempt to present Southeast Asian Buddhism from the perspective of
its own understanding, and to counter the argument that modern
Theravada Buddhism has not produced any noteworthy intellectuals and
the contention that Theravada monks offer no significant interpretations
of traditional doctrinal formulations. The fact that works of Buddhadasa
are chosen for this purpose can be taken as an evidence of the wide
acclamation of this personality as Thailand's most provocative intellectual
in the Sangha.
Among the voluminous works of Buddhadasa, four are included in
the present volume to form four of the five chapters of the book. They
are expected to represent his ideas and his interpretation of the Buddba­
Dhamma, and to "make a contribution toward meeting an obvious need
in the area of Buddhist studies", though "some of his most important,
longer works remains to be translated".
The four works are separate translations by various hands
previously published in Thailand, namely,
• • 1 h • "\~ I oJ '\ )
1. Toward The Truth, (ongma T m: 'Jflllll~n171'1l11H~t'lllll1UJ , previously
translated by Bbikkhu Nagasena by the title, 'Toward
Buddba-Dbamma'.
2. Everyday Language and Dhamma Language, (original Thai:
f11:W1f11-l-fi1H11lHlJ), previously translated by Bhikkhu Ariyananda.
3. No Religion, (original Thai: ,~i}fl1~1-11), previously translated
4.
by Bhikkbu Punno.
Handbook for ~~nkind, (original Thai: fitimJuHt), previously
. '
translated by Bhikkhu Ariyananda.
The task of Dr. Swearer in this connection was only "to delete,
revise, and edit where necessary, but only for the purposes of clarity and
coherence". The success of the editor, which adds value to the original
translations, lies in his ability to make them clear and coherent in a more
readable language. This, in turn, depends firstly on his understanding of

REVIEWS 359
Buddhadasa both as a thinker and a writer and as a person, both through
the works and through personal contact, and secondly on the fact that
the editor is a Western scholar of Buddhism. As a scholar of Buddhism
and now a professor in Buddhist Studies at an American university with
years of direct experience of Buddhism in Thailand and other Asian
countries, he is in a position to represent Buddhism, Thai Buddhism in
particular, to a somewhat reasonable degree, while, as a western scholar,
he can act as a good medium in presenting this understanding to western
people, a task few Buddhists can do.
As the four works selected are separate writings with different titles,
the title of the one forming the first of the four chapters (i.e., Chapter II
of the book) has been ~aken for the title of the whole volume. This may
be due to the fact that it is the title of the first work to be selected and
included in the book and to the compJ;ehensiveness of the title itself
which may cover all concepts and ideas presented in all the other
chapters.
The review of the four selected works can be found in the Introduction
of the book itself, which "draws not only on the translations included
but on several other of Buddhadasa's writings". The Introduction,
which forms Chapter I and provides the only space where the editor can
freely present himself, is not only a review of the four following chapters
of selected works and som~ other of Buddhadasa's writings, but also
included are some interesting facts and descriptions of Bhikkhu Buddhadasa:
a sketch of his life-story, his personality, his ideas and teachings,
and an evaluation of his work and works.
·From Dr. Swearer's viewpoint, Buddhadasa is seen as a religious
genious whose mission is a prophetic one and whose approach is synthetic,
"to bridge the old and the new, to synthesize traditional formulations
of doctrine with fresh insights derived from personal experience".
"Buddhadasa, in his unique way, sees himself as a servant
of the Lord Buddha not in a narrow, sectarian manner but as a
vehicle through which the universal truths of the Buddha's teachings
might reach man. His service, then is not simply to the Lord
Buddha but to mankind."

360 REVIEWS
"In general he is critical of anything standing in the way of
the fulfillment of the primary soteriological purpose of religion."
"The primary concern of Buddhadasa, however, is not to
exposit traditional teachings but to revitalize the tradition in such
a manner that it becomes a vehicle rather than a block to the realization
of Truth, or Buddha-Dhamma."
"They (some of the greatest spirits in any religious tradition)
have, nevertheless, infused into the tradition a new life and a new
light, summoning those around them to a reexamination of their
religion and themselves. Buddhadasa is performing this function
today in Thailand. As such, he is one of the most important monks
not only in that country but in Buddhist Asia as a whole. Indeed,
he summons. not only Buddhists but all of us to reexamine our faith
in the light of Dhamma, that is to say, Buddha-Dhamma."
The above-quoted sentences may serve as a good representation of
Bhikkhu Buddhadasa, his personality, ideas and mission, at least as seen
by a Western scholar of Buddhism. Now, it is left for the reader either
to prove the exactitude of Dr. Swearer's view and evaluation of Buddbadasa,
or merely to make a further contribution to their own understanding
of the Buddha-Dhamma. Either of these will be achieved when he reads
the other four chapters of the book. For those unfamiliar with Pali
terms and Buddhist concepts, the "Glossary of Pali Terms" appended at
the end of the chapters will be a good help.
Phra Rajavaramrmi
Mahachula Buddhist Academy,
W at Mahadhatu

REViEWs
j(it
Thciiiand in Transition : The Church in a Buddhist Country (Pro Mundi
Vita, Brussels, Belgium, 1973); pp. 36.
This monograph was published by Pro Mundi Vita International
Research and Information Center in its bimonthly Bulletin series. The
objective of the PMV Center is to analyze in a scientific manner the
socio-cultural framework of local societies in order to better facilitate
the work of the Catholic Church. The monograph under teview, in its
opening pages, outlines, in brief summary form, the geography and
history of Thailand as well as the educational, economic and political
systems. It is understandable that such brief descriptions are naturally
subject to errors of omission and commission and oversimplification.
But the material of intellectual interest and challenge is not in this
initial section but rather in those dealing with the Sangha and its contemporary
response to the pressures of modernization and the status and
role of the Catholic Church in Thailand historically and in present day
society.
Thai Buddhists would find the discussion of the Sangha's response
to the challenge of urbanization and modernization both enlightening
and productive. The authors describe with much insight the increasing
alienation of modern urban society from the Sangha. A f.ew individual
monks, such as Buddhadasa Bhikkhu, are shown to be concerned with
the problem of making Buddhism relevant to modern day society.
Educational reform within the two Buddhist Universitie·s, directed
at modernizing their curriculum and including lay subjects, is described
as well .as the community service leadership role the graduates of these
Universities play in rural Thailand. The officialdom of these Buddhist
Universities is obviously committed to achieving a creative tension
between religious tradition on the one hand and innovation and
reform associated with modernization on the other. Buddhism, as other
religions throughout the world, is facing th~ problem, of relevancy. How
the Sangha responds to this challenge, bow it draws the laity into a
more pervasive arid meaningful symbiotic relationship will determine
how strong and lasting Buddhism as a religious force will be.
The last half of this monograph presents a concise and objective
analysis of the structure, status and role of the Catholic Church. Detailed
statistical information on the Church in Thailand is given. The

authors describe how historically the Church came to be identified with
ethnic minorities and the cultural isolation of the Church that resulted
and still persists today. It is noted, with regret, that, except in the
sphere of education, the Church has had little impact on Thai national
life intellectually, culturally, politically, economically and, for Christians
far more disturbing, spiritually. The traditional education system for
local clergy is outlined and the conflicts and tensions between the younger
and older generations of local clergy and between local clergy and
foreign missionaries described. The authors reach the interesting
conclusion that today Catholic nuns represent by far the richest resource
for new creativity within the Church of Thailand. Female religious
community service initiatives in both the rural and urban areas are
noted. Although such Church initiated action programs as the credit
union movement and student centers are described, the authors are
critical of the rigid strictures of conservatism that bind the church and
make it less responsive to the liberalizing influences as exemplified in
Vatican II.
The authors decry the lack of a meaningful dialogue and encounter
between the Church and Buddhism. Both sides, with a few notable
exceptions, at:e faulted for their lack of initiative. An eloquent plea
is made to understand and to some extent share each other's religious
experiences with a view to overcoming mutual suspicion and distrust
The Church of Thailand is also urged to move beyond sacramental routines
and evangelistic fervor and become more socially conscious and
responsive to the needs and pressures of the fast changing society. At
the same time, the Church is enjoined to take a moral stand against
encroachments on man's liberty from either the political right or left and
seek a wider loyalty in the brotherhood of man.
This monogra.ph discusses with much clarity, insight and compassion
issues that are crucial to the survival of religious forces in Asia as
in the rest of the world. Buddhist and Christians alike should find this
study intellectually challenging and provocative.
Asia Foundation,
Bangkok
William J. K/allsllel'

REViEWS
The Asian iournal of Thomas Merton, edited by N. Burton eta!. (New
Directions, New York, 1973), pp. 4451-Xxx, illustrated.
Thomas Merton was perhaps the most well known Catholic monk
of this century. During his "lay" life, he un~ertook varied literary and
intellectual persuits. He was more or less "converted" to seek a deeper
spiritual meaning of life by becoming a Trappist monk. Yet he managed
to maintain a lively interest in worldly events. He kept in touch with
political issues, commented on them, signed various petitions and protests,
apart from writing prefaces, articles and books, some of which are
very popular among the younger generation, especially Conjectures of a
Guilty Bystander and The Seven Story Mountain.
·Someone asked Kr'ishnamurti whether he regarded anyone in the
contemporary world as having attained enlightenment. He mentioned
Thomas Merton and Daisetz T. Suzuki. In fact, Merton had corresponded
with Suzuki for years and they met when the latter visited America.
Their correspondence bas in fact been published in Zen and the Birds
of Appetite. Although Merton did not know Chinese, The Way of
Chuang Tsu and his correspondence with Suzuki as well as his article on
"The Significance of the Bhagavad-Gita" show that he was one of the
few Westerners who really understood the spiritual depth of the East.
Yet be had never been to Asia until he undertook the Asian journey,
which began from California on 15 October and ended by his passing
away in Bangkok on 10 December 1968. On this journey he told an
Indian Catholic priest that Zen Buddhism was the last of God's revelations.
Indeed there was rumour that he was going to become a Buddhist
monk. His biography, The Man in Sycamore Tree by Edward Rice, also
mentions the conflict he had with his· abbey at Gethsemane, Kentucky,
U.S.A. There were also rumours that the electrocution at Sawanganiwas
near Bangkok was actually a suicide, as he could no longer sta11d the
tragedy of mankind.
In a way, The Asian Joumal was edited to show that Merton would,
however, remain a Christian monk, would go back to spend his last
days at his "home" monastery ;.and his death was entirely accidental.
Besides, The Asian Journal is a superb doc.ument, relying on three separate
note books : (a) the public journal, which the author intended for publication,
(b) the private journal, which contains an occasional intimate
note of conscience or spiritual self-analysis, and (c) the pocket notebook
for his immediate notes during conversations, drafts for suddenly-inspired
poems, etc. All of these blends into Part I of the book, which took the

364
author to Calcutta (vfa Bangkok), New Delpi, the Himalayas, Madni§,
Ceylon and back to Bangkok (via Singapore). His encounter with
the Dalai Lama and Tibetan gurus are wonderful pieces of spiritual
insight, since these people were all on "the fringe of enlightenment",
and their conversations were so simple and straight-forward.
In Bangkok, he met the Abbot of Wat Bovornives and Bhikkhu
Khantipalo, who also wrote, in Appendix II, 'On Mindfulness'. He had
a chance to read and make notes of the Ven. Phra Maha Boowa
Nanasampanno's 'Wisdom Develop Samadbi' (which bas now been
collected and published with other articles of his by the Sathirakoses­
Nagapradipa Foundation as Forest Dhamma). His talk at Sawanganiwas
on the day of his death 'Marxism and Monastic Perspectives' in Appendix
VII, is also very relevant to our Buddhist brotherhood. There are a few
spelling mistakes of Thai names, which are inevitable, since his band
writing was not easy to decipher, and the editors did not know much
about this country. Yet they did their job thoroughly, supplying notes
on almost everything he wrote.
Part II consisting of Merton's Complementary Reading helps us
to understand the tnan much better, especially towards the last phase
of his life. The books he read mostly came from the contemplative
tradition of Buddhism, Christianity, Hinduism and Isla.m. Whatever
name one gives to the Real and whatever paths one tread upon, they,
seem one and all to lead to the same goal.
It is a great loss to us that Merton's life carne to such an abrupt
end, for it would have been of great interest to the spiritual and the
learned world to have been able to follow his further spiritual explorations.
Thomas Merton, the monk, E.F. Schoeinaucher, the economist, and
Eric Fromm, the psychologist, are a few leading personalities from the
West who have tried, in their own disciplines, to show that Buddhism
bas something. really unique to offer the modern world, if man wants to
survive on this planet earth. Those of us who are familiar with Buddhism
in this country may need the farang to convince us before we take
our own religion seriously, especially when the contemplative part of
our culture is very much lacking in this day and age. If we do, we should
also learn other l:!piritual traditions thoroughly, as Merton has shown us
in The Asian Journal; i.e. books help, but books alone cannot h~lp us all
that much.
S. Si.varaksa

REVIEWS 365
Wat B~iJw

in the Buddh~~~
•'htccbi~:~Fttaph}
ntCinlhi),
in i
finn ~pp;r.1intmrnh 1o
depri\'t!i. U!> the
thcfe,;!i, ll fC\!ClltiO);
The
hill
ftl}"ill nunily dunng ~ht'
·:tajin•rl'llll dc11Uncd 111
tempenurnmt and v,,-lml
at did tbc innuem:t: (lf f)r. fltlcr
whate rm:.!lence hcliM:d
\\ iB~th «be reader
Hi11 own
H:! thi11 end,
phy!!iehm
~~ ~
~~dncd rrom C.ZifliC¥' 1 "~1.1ddi)'" jt~M U he ~pprttlUlcd the
value of' IUCb eUrifl!iil: "~WmJdJy" fiZWl:lfdl!l il!ll Which
allowed monk1 to dt) !.he \1\.'t:Uk \.If Huddbi~J~·tfl. 'lhc tone t:lf the Au:oblD·
grophy fiU,Igt:IU.t t.tuu he w:u1 mthudol in puu::tit:.t. bul not piou1:
strict, but not ~elf'~ris,hu.totu~. Hifl cnudor i~ t(lfr~!l.hina He even '« 1 Crtted
the occa!lional eomplai.nt.
Deta ifed comparil!on of tltiu· cedition of the .ifufr:1hioJJNJph:y with the
Kburusapba Press edition of 196 r di~ef~et lluH a munbe.r of misp.rlots
have been corrected. More iruporta.nlly. il few it:mlenee fragments,
omitted in the Kburll!lpba edition. have: been re11torcd. evidently after

367
a rereading of the origin:ll manuscript. These fragments make reference
to other monks, but hardly in a way which could be construed as indis~
erect. No editorial comment explains the earlier omission or declares
the t.ext finally intact.
The companion item in the volume, Chon YQtserani's Biography,
is the most comprehensive study of the prince's life in print. Like other
biographies, it relies on the Autobiography for the early years but then
makes good use of the Royal Thai Go~>ernment Gazelte and Announcements
t1/ Sangha Allair.r [Thalaeng kan khana song}, a periodical which is almost
impossible to consult in the West.
To illustrate the comprehensiveness

find M:\'(tt~l
other
\Vhich hnd di\idcd !he
~>tiU being n::;oh·cd in
material fHuridc~ '!.llllliC' ~.:~Hlh:xt
from lhc
let the decrees ;wd
1mmthl~
ft!f
c>:umples of appoinum.•rH
teric:. publi~>hcd in Hli s. ~~ wn.k
best uvailnbit inuudt.H;1iun h~
SOUTCCb.
primary
One rcaMm the
voluminou;, after l!IHI i~
tbe Cmmcil of lhcrn, 1:1
berate nutUer!l i'ifctliu~
Y ct the burgeoning
reflecting not l'lignifi~.:iUU
prooedurc!l implioo in the l
it11elf a c

369
M.R.W. Saengsom kasemsri and Wimol Phongphiphat, History of the
Ratanakosin Period, First through Third Reigns (B.E. 2325-2394) (Thai
History Revision Committee, Bangkok, 1972), pp. 283, maps, plates;
bibliography.
i
01\ Co\ tfq, ., J Q..l"" . r1 "" ..., .r:r ""\ a
Jh::U/P!7£1PrUIJJI'lnJ V'JPIU t fJflUWl
IJ. 'l'. 'J. !!'tH ffiJ !fil!IIJA1 11m: 'HH\ W~f!Wl'H'lltl
... .ct ~ """ ..-! 0 ~ t r!
'j'Jffl7{111 Gl f/V'J'lfnum "'(rl.fl. knrolmr:t-kamlfc() (m~IJn11'll1'l'~th~'Hlfl1~1llliVJtJ, m~-
U1W'1 '
1
lm&&),
This book, compiled by the authors in their capacity as members
of the Thai History Revision Committee, was originally published in
sections in the journai thalaengngan prawatsat ekkasan borankhadi (Notices
on History, Documents, and Archaeology) during a period from 1967
through 1970. For greater convenience to students and other interested
persons the authors published the book as one volume in 1972. The
appearance of this work ought to be a welcome event, since there has
thus far been no comprehensive survey of the first three reigns of the
Bangkok period in one volume, but unfortunately this particular work
is something of a disappointment. The book consists of nine chapters,
dealing respectively with the founda.tion of Bangkok, wars with Burma,
relations with Cambodia and Vietnam, expansion of the kingdom,
government and administration, improvements to the country (which
simply lists the construction of forts, digging of canals in Bangkok,
building of ships and casting of cannon), arts and literature, patronage
of Buddhism, and foreign relations (i.e. with China, Portugal, Britain
and the United States).
Since this book does not pretend to be a work of original research,
all the information contained within it is readily available elsewhere and
would as a matter of course be consulted in the original by any scholar
doing research on the period. Thus the purpose of a book such as this
should be one of synthesis and analysis in order to give the student and
general reader a cohesive and integrated survey of the history of the
period about which the book is concerned. Unfortunately, it is precisely
in the area of successful synthesis and imaginative analysis that the book
falls down. The book is essentially a collection of paraphrases of accounts
taken from other works strung together with very little new added, either
factually or by way of analysis. The amount of coverage which the authors
choose to give to any particular topic seems to be based not on the relative
importance of the topic but on the amount of information on that topic

370
that is both readily uvnilttble and easily utilized. Thus, fur example, the
entire chapter on gt>Vcrnmenl and udministmtion for the whole period
consists of only seven £Htges whereas more than ten pages are deVtJted to a
minutely detailed account of relations with Portugal. Almost no consideration
is given to the social nnd ecorwmic history of the period. In
u book designed as a text for university students this could be considered
u serious defect. Except for the last chapter, dealing with foreign
relations, by far the longest chapter is the forty-eight puge blow by blow
account of the wars with Burmu. The constant warfure or threat of war
with Burma is indeed an important factor in the hiswry of this period
but since detailed accounts of the military aspects of this subject are
available elsewhere perhaps u more useful approach for a lxlOk such as
this might have been for the authors to summarize the military trends
while giving more consideration to an analysis of the effect of this
constant military threat on Thai governmcntul policies both internally
and externally, or the effect of the need for constant mobilization on the
social and economic life of the country and so forth. Similar criticisms
of too much de tnil Hlld not enough analysis might be made 'of the bopk's
treatment of the Tluti· Vietnamese conflict over Cambodia or the
expansion of Thai suzerainty into border arcus. Where analysis is
present its value is qucsticmuble, such as the authors' categorical
assertion that in spite of Cluw Anu's revolt Bangkok's suzerainty in the
Northe~ull and Laos was never in any dnngcr throughout this period.
The authors' whole approach, of course, is that of the "trudit.ional"
school c>f Thai historiography, which leads one tu P"se the question of
whether traditionalistic histtlrio,graphy has declined into unimaginativeness.
On any potentially sensitive or controversial issues the authors are
either reticent or defensive. A final criticism is that in preparing the book
for publication as one volume the authors apparently did little or no
revision in light of recent Thai scholarship. r am thinking in particular
of the authors' apparen l unawareness of well~accepted recent opinion on
the authorship of the chronicle ()f Ayutbia originnlly known as the ••twovolume11
edition. This book does serve a useful purpose, however, in
that it provides a convenient summary of tbis period from a traditional
viewpoint. It is a pity that it does not provide more intellectual
stimulation.
Contell University
Lorraine M. Gesick

Fine Arts Department, New Acquisltions of three Bronus from Burtram
(tln:~ll101HJ~l11'1~tllnn t1u1mJ\l1nll~,jJ~) (Bangkok, 1973), pp. 80 ('fhai &
'
English), 20 pp. plates.
This little book was published on the occasion of an exhibiti

312
Non Song (1umH), Khorflt Province. B~m TanM is the northernmost of
the three sites a"t which bronzes have been found. Il was tt while before
this Bodhisattva became generally kno\vll: it is illustntted in Jean
Boisselier's Le Cambodge (pl. LVII, 1). which appeared in 1966, und was
the subject of an extended analysis in an article by the same au thor
which appeared in Artibus Asiae in 1967 (vol. XXIX, 4). Meanwhile,
however, it::; various parts were sent from the Kht11·ftt Museum to France
for restoration, and the head came back to Bangkok looking, as someone
put it, like a Rodin, though bcuuti ful nonetheless. The restored head
has since toured the U.S. and has as a result b~cume widely known
(Bowie, cd., The Sculpture of Thailand, If lOb).
Boisselier's Artibus A~·iae article of 1967 also included photographs
of four bronzes said to come from Prakhonchai, which is the name of a
district in the southern part of Buriram Province, an area through which
a traveler from B{tn TuMt to the great cities of ancient Cambodia would
have passed. This was not the first publication of "Prakhonchai"
bronzes, however, l'or an Avalokite~vara ilLustrated by Bc)isselier and
now in San Francisco had earlier uppeared with twQ other irr,ages in
The lllustrated London New.r of August 28, 1965. Beside the photographs
was the announcement of ~t "startling discovery made on the borders of
Cambodia and Thailand". The three illustrated images, it said, "were
acquired by Adrian Maynard of Spink and Sons, and are now being
shown to the public for the first time at their Lcmdon galleries. The
discovery was made by two Cambodian villagers whcl were scouring the
overgrown ruins of a derelict temple. They came upon a hole in the
soil which had been softened by heavy rain; inside they found a buried
chamber covered in brick dust from the temple ruins. An archaeologist
was called in to secure[!] tbe recovery of the statues". The discovery
was made in 1964, and in the ten years since then the "archaeologist"
in question has not come forward with more precise informution about
where on "the borders" the bronzes were found or about how many-or
what-pieces the cache in fact consisted of. ~
About these extraordinary images there bas indeed been some
helpfulli terature, to which the Fine Arts Department>s booklet is the
latest addition, yet uncertainty about both the number of images and

REVIEWS 373
their place of discovery has not been dispelled. First the number. In
an article ("Pre-Angkor Period Bronzes from Pra Kon Chai") in the
1971-72 Archives of Asian Art, Emma C. Bunker wrote that the "original
group consisted of ten large figures, some over three feet high, and
innumerable small ones, varying in height from three to eighteen inches."
Mrs. Bunker's article is primarily an admirable piece of detective work;
with the aid of the dealers whose help she acknowledges (Robert Ellsworth,
Ben Heller, and Adrian Maynard), she was able to assemble a list of
twenty-four Prakhonchai bronzes now in the West. After the purchase
from Spink and Sons of one of these-a Maitreya-by the_Musee Guimet,
Albert Le Bonheur described the board as consisting of nearly three
hundred bronzes (in "Un bronze d'epoque preangkorienne representant
Maitreya," Arts Asiatiques XXV [1972]). Now even if these estimates,
"innumerable" or close to "three hundred", both of which can probably
be traced to Adrian Maynard, are considerably inflated, as they may
well be, a certain number of bronzes in the hoard are unaccounted for.
And if Mrs. Bunker's detective work is as acute as it seems, it would
appear that many of the missing bronzes should be sought in Thailand
rather than in the West. Two fine bronzes from the board, both in the
collection of H.R.H. Prince Bhanubandhu Yugala, are not unknown,
for they were exhibited at the National Museum in 1968 and have been
published in Masterpieces from Private Collections (Bangkok, 1970, figs.
18 & 19) by M.C. Subhadradis Diskul. A third bronze, probably from
the hoard, a small Maitreya whiCh was donated to the r;:aculty of
Archaeology, Silpakorn University, was exhibited at the National
Museum in 1970 and published in the catalogue called Mqradok thtmg
watthanatham phaendin thai . . . . Finally for the exhibition of October
and November, 1973, which this booklet accompanied, nine bronzes
were borrowed from three additional private collections. But the book
does not make it clear (the English and Thai texts differ) whether these
bronzes did indeed belong to the "Prakhonchai" cache. Only two are
illustrated, Maitreyas 19.5 and 21 ems. in height in the collection of
Phra Khru Khananam Samanachan (Phorian Pao); the rest are not even
described. From the point of view of scholarship (putting aside
questions of legality and justice), what seems to be needed, therefore,
is an attempt to survey the Prakhonchai bronzes remaining in Thailand,
after the model of Mrs. Bunker's survey of those in the West.

374
At the same time, of course, an investigation into the circumstances
of the discovery would be desirable. In Mrs. Bunker's article there
appear three photographs of the "temple precinct at Pra Kon Chai."
These photographs were given to Mrs. Bunker (who is here thanked for
this information) by one of her dealer-informMts, and she made no
attempt to be more precise in her identification of the temple. Meanwhile,
Boisselicr, according t() I.e Bonhcur's article (p. 133n.), had
suggested thnt the temple in question was Prf!sfn Lorn Thorn, which lies
in the eastern part of the district of Prukhonchai. Prtlsat Lorn Thorn
was missed altogether in the Fine Arts Department's survey of 1960-61
(Report of the Survey and l~xcavations of Ancient Monuments in Northeastern
Thailand, fi, Bangkok, 1967) nnd for information about the
temple it is necessary to consult Lunctde Lajonyuiere's inventory of 1907
( lnvenraire descriptlf des monuments du Cam hodge, Ir, pp. 201 ~203).
There can be found a ground plan of the temple and a short description.
From these alone il is impossible to determine with certainty whether
the photographs published by Mrs. Bunker are in fact views of Prasflt Lorn
Thorn; Lajonquicre mentions sandstone false doors, for instance, while
Mrs. Bunker's photographs show only ones of brick.
The treatment of the issue of the exact provenience of the
11
Prakhonchai 11 bronzes, ten years after their discovery, is the most
dismaying aspect of the Fine Arts Department's book. Mr. Pises
writes.1 that the bronzes came from uu chamber underneath a pre~
Angkorian temple called Prfisat Lorn Thorn or La Lom Thorn, which is
situated in village of Kh8k Rawia'' (p. 15, reviewer's translation). But
Mr. Pises provides no clue as to how he has acquired this information.
Miss Uraisri says in a note that "Professor Boisselier thinks the temple
where they were discovered ... may be the Prasat Lorn Thorn described
by Lajonquiere ...." She does not tell us that Mr. Pises or any other
Fine Arts Department official has confirmed the identification on the
spot. Finally, among the illustrations, one of Mrs. Bunker's photographs
of the temple is reproduced but is said to have been copied from
Lajonquiere's Inventaire, which is false, and to be a view of Prt!s1H Lorn
Thom, which may or ma.y not be correct.

R!i:VIEWS 375
An apparent absence of ancient material remains at Ban Tanat
and the lack of controlled archaeological exploration in that area mean
that it is not known precisely why fragments of the colossal Bodhisa_ttva
should have been found where they were. About the "Prakhonchai"
hoard, there are of course much greater uncertainties. The three
bronzes from Ban Fai acquired by the National Museum have, in
contrast, both a fixed and a much more meaningful archaeological
setting, one that may some day tell us a good deal about the culture of
the region and about its relationship to the civilizations of central
Thailand and of Cambodia. Ban Fai (or Ban Miiang Fai) is a village
in the Lam Plai Mat District of Buriram Province. In ancient times,
when it was a town, a traveler from the Prakhonchai area would
probably have passed through it on his way to Ban Tan6t. Apparently
the place marked "Kuk Fai" on Lajonquiere's map of 1911, Ban Fai was
nicely described, and shown on a map, in an article by Pises Jiajanpong
in Bbdl.nkhad~ Nakht?n Ratchas'ima, a special publication of the Faculty
of Archaeology that appeared in February, 1969. In its plan, the
ancient town looks much like a Dvaravati town of central Thailand.
The evidence of sculpture also suggests Dvaravati contacts, and a stone
Naga-protected Buddha from Ban Fai has been analyzed in an article by
Prince Subhadradis (M. C. Subhadradis Diskul, "The Buddha and the
Snake King," Hemisphere, May, 1971 ). The three lovely bronzes
acquired by the museum were found accidentally by a villager. The
book does not tell us when. But it is known exactly where in the
ancient town the bronzes were found, and perhaps some day more
about their cultural setting will be revealed by archaeological investigation,
removed, it might be hoped, from the pressures of the international
art market. For this possibility and for the enrichment of the National
Museum, .;,e must thank Mr. Santi Nakhintharachat, who found the
bronzes, and the Fine Arts Department, who presented a reward to Mr.
Sano. The profits from their legal actions will be lasting ones.
Hiram W. Woodwtll'd Jr.
l\1ichigan University

376 REVIEWS
Piriya Krairiksh, Buddhist Folk Tales Depicted at Chula Pathon Cedi (In
Thai and English, Bangkok, 1974), pp. 45,44, ill., 5 pls.*
Mr. Krairiksh's study is a detailed and sophisticated interpretation
of the Buddhist birth-tale reliefs found during a road building project in
1968, on the base of a Dvaravati period stupa at Chulapathon near
Nakhon Pathom. Religious structures .surviving from the Dvaravati
period are exceedingly rare, and as the author points out, the Chulapathon
relief panels of terra cotta and stucco would have long since
disappeared if they had not been covered over and thus preserved during
alterations to the stupa at some early stage in its history. Dupont's
1939-40 excavations of the site did not discover the birth-tale reliefs.
The panels as they survive today are not of very fine workmanship,
and offer little in the way of detail to help in their identification. But
by comparative means, Mr. Krairiksh has made admirable identifications
of eight of these apparently obscure reliefs through· comparison with
other birth-tale representations in Asian art-at Ajanta, Kizil, Borobudur,
Pagan, and on boundary stones from Kalasin province in Thailand. For
example, a seemingly quite obscure scene of two figures in a boat
(figure 12) is fairly convincingly connected with the story of Suparaga,
an old and nearly blind mariner who saves a disastrous voyage by
performing an Act of Truth. Although the evidence offered by the
Chulapathon panel is reduced and schematic, with oniy two figures
representing the boat full of merchants, in the context of other representations
such as the one at Borobudur, it seems fairly likely that the story
of Suparaga is being shown. The author's main point here, and with
all the panels at Chulapathon, is that their textual sources lie not in the
Pali birth-tales (jataka) but in Sanskrit language birth-tales (avadana)
belonging to the Sarvastivadin scbool of Hinayana Buddhism. This
thesis is a reasonable and viable one, but numerous problems arise in
the course of trying to prove it. In the case of the tale of Suparaga for
instance, the Borobudur representation of a boat full of voyagers with
Suparaga at the bow holding a jug in both hands, is offered as evidence
of a version based on a Pali text, for the Pali indeed mentions a "full
bowl of water in both hands." In point of fact the Borobudur reliefs show
a considerable fidelity to, as well as some variance from, the Sanskrit
Jatakamala, whose order and main contents they preserve in the first
*This monograph was published for free distribution on the occasion of the sixtieth
birthday anniversary of the author's father. A limited number of copies is now on
sale at the Siam Society at 40 bahts each. Ed.

HEVJE\\'S 377
thirty-four tales depicted in the upper series of reliefs on the balustrade
of the first gallery. With the Chulapathon illustration of this story on
the other hand, Mr. Krairiksh, who wants to link it to the Jatakamala
version, where the hero kneels on the deck to utter his Act of Truth, is
obliged to ignore the standing posture of the figure who would be
Suparaga and the object clearly held in his upraised arm which does not
relate to anything in the Jatakamala version.
The author's case for Sanskrit versions as the source for the
Chulapathon birth-tale panels is more successfully illustrated in the
remaining seven identified tales. Heavy weight is put upon the
interesting fact that all these particular seven stories are included, often
in a like form, in the wall paintings at Kizil in Central Asia where
Sanskrit Hinayana Buddhism flourished. At a remove of 2000 miles,
this correspondence is a valuable point of information but it may not
truly constitute evidence of the transmission of birth-tale representatio.ns
to central Thailand. The story of Maitrakanyaka is particularly close
in its representations at Chulapatbon and Kizil, differing sharply from
the scene used at Pagan for this story which relates to the Pali version.
It makes a strong case for the author's principal argument. In the story
of Syamaka it is not mentioned that the hero appears to be carrying a
pole on his shoulders in figures 29 and 30, which is absent from the
Chulapathon version (figure 25). This may represent his fetching
of water for his blind parents, but so prominent a prop ought to have a
major and explicable bearing on the story.
This study meticulously summarizes the entire range of known
textual versions of the stories identified at CJ:mlapathon, versions from
India, Khotan, Tibet, and China. Yet it remains a regrettable fact that
inexplicable disparities frequently exist between the representations in
art of such stories and their known texts. In the detailed depictions of
birth-tales at Borobudur for example this widespread disparity has
forced scholars to postulate the existence of lost texts, or of variant local
versions which were preferred to the Indian language texts, or even that
the designers of the reliefs introduced their own arbitrary variations into
the depiction of a story either out of ignorance or caprice. P. Jaini has
expertly shown in "The Story of Sudbana and Manohara: an analysis of
the texts and the B'orobudur reliefs" (Bulletin of the School of Oriental
and African Studies, XXIX, Part 3, 1966) how the surviving textual
sources are insufficient to explain the Borobudur depiction of the story
of Sudbana. Meanwhile until an explanation is found for these disparities
we must be extremely grateful for studies like Mr. Krairiksh's, offering
excellent analysis of the existing evidence at a particular site.
Henry D. Ginsburg
British Museum

378 REVIEWS
Prince Damrong Rajanubhab, Monuments of the Buddha in Siam. Translated
by Sulak Sivaraksa and A.B. Griswold with footnotes by Prince
Subbadradis Diskul and A. B. Griswold. Monograph No. II (revised)
(The Siam Society, Bangkok, 1973), pp. ix, 60, illus.
The latter. part of Prince Damrong's pioneering Thai study of
Buddhist "monuments" first published as Tamnan phraphutthachedi, was
translated into English by Sulak Sivaraksa in 1962. This translation,
now extensively revised and newly edited with profuse footnotes, is
available again as the joint work of the original translator in collaboration
with A.B. Griswold and Prince Subhadradis Diskul. Prince Damrong's
original Thai work was a difficult introduction for the beginner interested
in learning about Thai Buddhist art. For one thing, its treatment of the
early periods was necessarily based upon the very limited body of
knowledge available at that time. An unsatisfactorily vague historical
framework serves for the discussion of the periods prior to the fourteenth
century. Moreover, the very title of the work is misleading, for the
word "monument'' (Thai chedi, Pali cetiya) quite reasonably leads one to
expect a discussion of buildings or constructions, i.e. stu pas, temples, or
the like. But in fact the word is interpreted in a very wide sense and
embraces many different types of memorials of the Buddha, including
official Buddhist writings, plantings of the holy bodhi tree, sculptural
representations of the Buddha, etc. in addition to the expected structural
monuments, mainly in the form of stu pas. These various "monuments"
are discussed under four Pali headings conforming to a traditional
Buddhist division. The English title has been altered in this revised
translation in the hope of clarifying its sense, from A History of Buddhist
Monuments in Siam ( 1962) to Monuments of the Buddha in Siam, but
without much success.
The revised translation aims to please the scholar rather than the
general re~der. The introduction of Indic transliteration can only be a
headache for all but readers of Sanskrit. They may indeed quite possibly

REVIEWS 379
be a trial for the latter as well when words like ph a nom (from Cambodian
for 'mountain') appear in such varying forms as in Dhatu Bnam and Pnom
PlOng, in accordance with doubtlessly logical but highly obscure rules
of precedence of transliterating systems. In fact the 'scholarly' transliteration
is probably of no use to a scholar who knows Thai well, as he
will already know how to spell the words, so it must then be intended for
the Indic scholar who does not know Thai. This raises the question of
whether books really ought to aim for the narrowest possible audience,
putting off the largest possible number of readers. Surely the solution
to the difficult problem of transliteration is to favor phonetic spelling,
while providing accurate versions of the spelling in a glossary or in
parentheses.
These matters aside, this is a most fascinating edition of a work
of great interest. A.B. Griswold's excellent introduction lucidly explains
the viewpoint and organization of the text, indicating its strong and
weak points, with some notes bn. the nature of copying in Buddhist art. ·
The very exhaustive footnotes elucidate and update almost all of the
obscure points in the original text, even though many of these are still
far from settled or fixed. But the footnotes admirably sum up the present
state of knowledge, and they are a pleasure to use. The text's discussion
of the Ayutthaya and Bangkok periods is highly authoritative and
thorough in its original form. From the Sukhothai period the text
includes a convenient summary of the Pali sources mentioned in the
Traibhiimi. The illustrations in the new edition have been amplified
and in some cases replaced, but the general quality of reproduction
remains rather disappointing.
Henry D. Ginsburg
British Museum

380 HEVJEWS
P.L. Amin Sweeney, The Ramayana and the Malay Shadow-Play (The
National University of Malaysia Press, Kuala Lumpur, 1972), xiii, pp.
464, 2 maps, 2 illustrations, diagrams, notes, glossary, index.
If a reviewer describes Amin Sweeney's Malay Shadow Puppets!
published by the British Museum earlier in the same year as "a finely
cut gem"2 the book under review should be lauded as "an emerald necklace",
(as green is Rama's colour). While the former is a condensation
of the latter and aimed to give general readers introductory information
on the Malay Wayaug Siam complete with 36 fine illustrations in colour,.
and black and white, the latter is an intensive scholarly piece of research
fo~ a Ph.D. thesis submitted to and examined by the University of London
in June 1970 under the original title, The Rama Tree in the Wayang
Siam.
As the title in its. original and present forms indicates, the thesis
concerns two interwoven subjects: the Ramayana, and the Malay shadowth~atre
(despite its misleading name, the Wayang Siam is Malay), both
of which receive full treatment, leaving very little for further questioning.
It is true that there have been numerous works of different approaches
to the Ramayana.
In the comparative study of the Ramayana, Jacobi3,
Stutterheim4, Zieseniss 5 , and Hooykass6 are foremost authorities who
offer points of departure for later scholars. Among less ambitious works,
which have appeared during this decade, areS. Singaravelu's A Campara-
1) A min Sweeney, Malay Shadow Puppets: The \Vayang Siam of Kelantcm, The
British Museum. London, 1972.
2) Derek Brereton, Review of Amin Sweeney, Malay Shadow Puppets, JSS, January
1974, Volume 62, Part I, p. 272.
3) H. Jacobi, Das Rami:iyana, Geschichte und Inhalt nebst Concordanz der gedrucldcn
Rezemionen, Bonn, 1893.
4) W. Stutterheim, Riima-Legcnden zmd Rama-Reliefs in Indonesia, 2 vols., Munich,
1925.
5) A. Zieseniss, Die Rama Sage unte1· den lv!alaien, ihre Herlwnft uncl Gestaltung,
Hamburg, 1928. (English translation by P.W. Burch, The Rama Saga in Malaysia,
Singapore, 1963).
6) C. Hooykass, "The Old-Ja'Oanese Ramayana, an exemplary kakavJin as to form and
content", Verhandelingen der Koninklijke Nederlandse Akademie van Wetenschappen,
1958.

HEVIEWS 381
live Study of the Sanskrit, Tamil, Thai, and Malay Versions of the Story of
Rama ( 1967)7 and Juan R. Francisco's Maharadia Lawanas (1969). In
the very near future, we expect to receive a significant contribution
from Dr. V. Raghavan when his Ramayana Versions: A Comparative
Study and Evaluation appears in print sometime this year. All these
works, however, concentrate only on the literary texts of the great epic.
Few works have been written on the popular and oral versions, and very
little indeed, to say the least, on the relationship between the Ramayana
and the Malay shadow-theatre. This present thesis opens a gate-way to
a virgin territory in which academic explorers still have great opportunities
to discover invaluable treasures.
The book is conveniently divided into three parts, each dealing
with different aspects of the two above-mentioned subjects. The three
parts are distinct from one another in content and approach. In the
meticulous treatment of the subjects, the author is able to give a complete
coverage of the Ramayana and the Wayang Siam, encompassing
literature, drama, art, culture, as well as socio-anthropological aspects.
Both the traditional methods of comparative philology and literature and
the scientific process of observation, investigation, and analysis are
employed to great advantage.
Part I (72 pages) is a socio-anthropological study of "The Vehicle­
Wayang Siam. The Introduction, offers enough general background
information about the four types of Wayang Kulit (shadow-play) found
in Malaya and Malay-speaking Southern Thailand: Wayang Siam
(popular, Malay), Wayang Jawa (aristocratic, Malay), Wayang Gedek or
Nang Talung {popular, Thai), and Wayang Kulit Jawa or Wayang Purwa
(Javanese)., The author also points out the common and variant characteristics
in the basic repertoires, puppets, musical instruments and
accompaniment, and dramatic presentations. However, one would wish
that he had elaborated more on these.
i}"s.si~-garavelu, A Comparative Study of the Srmskrit, Tamil, Thai, and iialay
Vcrsio 11 s of the Story of Rama, JSS, 1968, Vol. 56, Pt. 11. pp. 137-186.
8
) Juan R. Francisco, Maharadia Lawana, Asian Studies, Vol. VII, No. 2, August
1969, pp. 186-249.

382 REVIEWS
On the historical aspects, Sweeney briefly describes the cross-cultural
routes in South-East Asia between Java, Siam, Malaya, and Cambodia.
While ruling out the possibility of discovering the true origin of the
wayang as being "largely a futile task" (p. 22), he reaffirms,
"Similarity of technique, coinciding areas of distribution and
language similarity indicate that both Wayang Jawa and Wayang
Siam possess a common origin. The Wayang Siam portrays
Thai influence and the Wayang Jawa exhibits recent Javanese
influence." (p. 25)
Against the opinions of previous scholars namely, Jacob 9 , Goslings, to
and Cuisiniertl, he raises an argument that
"the presence of foreign influences in puppets, repertoire or
music does not in itself prove that the technique originates
from the same source as these influences. ·Thus, for example,
the Wayang Siam exhibits Thai influence in both puppets and
repertoire but there is no evidence that the technique is Thai."
(P: 22)
A further discussion on these influences would be most valuable to
scholars of comparative theatre arts.
Mlle. Cuisinier's works on Danses Magiques de Kelantan (Paris
1936) and Le the'atre d'ombres a Kelantan (Gallimard, 1957), in particular,
are strongly criticized by Sweeney as being weak in theories due to lack
of actual investigation and concrete evidences. Other earlier works of
Winstedt12, Hilli3, and Rentsei4 are acknowledged for their general
9) G. Jacob, Geschic!zte des Schattentheaters, im Morge11 und Abendland, Hanover,
1925.
10) B.M. Goslings, De Wajang op .Java en Bali, Amsterdam, 1939.
11) Jeanne Cuisinier,Danses Magiques de Kelcmtan, Paris, 1936.
------, Le thMtre d'ombres a Kelantan, Gallimard, Paris, 1957.
12) Sir Richard 0. Winstedt, "A Patani Version of the Ramayana", Feestbundel
uitgegeveu door het Koninklijk Bataviaasch Genootscbap van Kunsten en
Wetenschappen bij Gelegenheid van zijn 150 jarig bestaan 1778-1928, 2 vo!s.,
Batavia, 1929.
----,''A Panji Tale from Kelantan", JMBRAS, xxii, (1949), pp. 53-60.
----,"A History of Classical Malay Literature". JMBRAS, xxxi, 3,
195 8, {second edition).
13) A.H. Hill, "Wayang Kulit Stories from Trengganu", JMBRAS, XVI, 3, (1949),
pp. 85-105.
14) Anker Rentse, "The Kelantan Shadou;-Play", JMBRAS, XIV, 3(1936) pp. 283·
301.

REVIEWS 383
descriptions and summaries of the Wayang Siam repertoire.
Rentse,
however, is criticized for showing several inaccurate and misleading
illustrations of the puppets. Ironically, Sweeney offers orily two in this
present volume of 464 pages! one full plate in colour featuring Seri Ram a
and another small one in black and white showing a female head-dress.
This is the main weakness of the book. The author half-heartedly
explains that a large number of illustrations are not included since they
already appear in his earlier publication, Malay Shadow Puppets (British
Museum, 1972). This i~ hardly an adequate excuse. Many who have
no access to both copies at the same time, which is more likely to happen
than not, will be deprived of full enjoyment or will have to strain their
imagination in trying to visualize the puppets and performances.
Even
the 'savants' will find it difficult to compare the puppets out of memory.
The author tries to avoid ~s much as possible comparisons of their physical
appearances which he could do much more effectively in the earlier
illustrated work. Instead; he concentrates more on the delivery and
presentation of thenpertoire, the language, and the variation of voices
to represent each type of characters. For examples, refined princes, dew a
(demi-gods), and women have a nasal, somewhat effeminate mode of
speech; coarse princes, apes, raksasa (ogres), andpatih (officers, ministers)
have a deeper, louder and more masculine voice. (It is interesting to
note that government officials should be classified with the second group
of mainly villainous characters.)
However, there are comparisons of
puppets and sections on rituals, manipulation and movements of the
puppets which are definitely in great need of illustrations. To borrow
Professor Hooykass' words, the reviewer wishes that ccthe managers of
learnedness'' (who in this publication are the National University of
Malaysia Press) would be wiser "in their use of manpower and money".
An extension of funds would bring this already accomplished scholarly
work to perfection.
The following four chapters in this first part deal with the cultural
context: economic and social aspects of 'dalangship', teacher-pupil relationship,
methods of instruction, rituals, religious beliefs, the delivery

384 REVIEWS
and presentation of the repertoire, and the language of the Wayang Siam,
including geographic distributions. Using Kelantan as his home-base,
the author spent sixteen months in field research in five regions: Kelantan,
Trengganu, Patani, Perak, and Kedah. His remarkable fluency in
the Kelantanese dialect as well as the Malay language in general, plus
his close, personal relationship through marriage with the Kelantanese
artistic milieu, made it possible for him to investigate the subjects, more
deeply, while other foreign researchers would have to be content.with
second-band information or mere speculations.
Sweeney remains very precise and straightforward in the rendering
of his materials, avoids making vague hypothesis which often mar the
works of western scholars indulging in superficial romanticism about the
East. Through such an objective and scientific approach, he is able to
give us realistic insights into the public and private lives of the da/angs:
their family structure, social status, income group, marital practices,
education, literacy and illiteracy, political involvement, etc. To cite a
few interesting examples:
In private life, the dalangs receive little respect and are often criticized
as having loose morals due to their polygamous practice and 'Don
Juan' behaviour.
"It is not rare for a dalang of 25 years old to have had five
wives, and the champion, as far as I know, is Jambul, aged 72
who has had thirty official wives." (p. 34)
The dalangs usually have a dual role in society: they are primarily
entertainers and frequently spirit media or soothers of cares. For their
practices of magic, superstition, and polytheism, they are often
condemned by the Muslim conservatives. However, they argue that
these rituals are done in the name of Allah, for at the beginning of each,
one or more short Koranic verses are usually recited, after which they
make offerings to dewa (gods), infidel jins and ghosts, or perform trancedancing
and possession by jembalang or spirits of the puppets. In the
menyemah ritual, the dalang symbolizes the collective aspirations of the
villagers and wards off the threat of cholera by the propitiation of local
spirits.

3ss
the reviewer wishes to note here that these magico-religious
practices are also common among Southern Thai dalangs and dancers.
Famous Nora (Manohra dance-drama) dancers, such as Khzm Uppatam.:.
roengnon, are highly respected both as artists and shatnans. The
reviewer has witnessed spirit possession and trance-dancing in the Nora
'Wai Kru' {worship of teachers' spirits) ceremony in Pattalung (a southern
Thai province). On the same occasion, Khun Uppatam performed the
curing of a skin disease by placing his foot on the face of a child
patient. ·
As Islamic practices are found in the Malay Wayang Siam, Buddhist
rites are conveniently incorporated into the rituals connected with Thai
dance, drama, and shadow-play, both in the classical and popular forms.
Bhikkus will chant blessings appropriate to each special occasion and
perform religious functions at the beginning of the ceremonies. A
Buddha statue is placed on the highest altar above the 'Kru' idols. Masks
and head-dresses for purposes of worship are usually placed on a different
altar.
In many instances in this book, Thai influences on the Wayang
Siam are noted. Aside from the motifs and episodes borrowed from the
Ramakien in the repertoire, magic formulae obtained from Nora teachers
are· used in the Wayang Siam rituals. The genealogy of Kelantanese
dalangs even traces back to a Siamese woman, Mak Erok, who, according
to some dalangs, introduced the Wayang Gedek (Nang Talung) which then
became malay-ized and was called the Wayang Siam. Others believe
that she invented the wayang "using mango leaves to make puppets"
(p. 47): The Kelantanese Prologue consists firstly of a semi-ritual performance
of a sage reciting Thai invocations (p. 59).
Part II (220 pages) constitutes the main 'trunk' of the study which
will be more valuable to specialists in the field than to general readers.
Here, Sweeney shows his painstaking efforts in transmitting the key text
of the Wayang Siam repertoire, the Cherita Mahraja Wana or the life of
Ravana from his birth to his death {the roots, trunk, and main branches

REVIEWS
of the Rama Tree), from its oral narrative form to a written form,
through the time-consuming process of numerous and continuous taperecordings
of actual performances, with the help of one of the oldest and
most famous, still very popular and active, dalangs. Excerpts of the
text appear in the original Malay form in Part III. In this second part,
it is summarized in English and compared with other literary versions,
principally, the Malay Hikayat Seri Rama (HSR) and the Thai Ramakien
(RK). Unfortunately, but understandably, the author had to rely on the
English summary of the Thai version by Swami Satyananda Puri and
Charoen Sarahiran (Bangkok, 1948)1 5 • The text of HSR used as basis
for comparison are romanized transcriptions of the original manuscripts
and analyses by previous western scholarst 6 • Other non-Malay versions:
Javanese, Khmer, and Lao are examined i~ relation to HRS, RK and
Wayang Siam versions in the chapter: Comparison with Local Literary
Versions.
A very interesting part is the comparison of 24 versions narrated
by dalangs of different age groups, teachers and students, representatives
of the five regions: Kelantan (10), Trengganu (2), Patani (5), Perak (3),
and Kedah (4). Kelantanese versions receive more attention (thirty
versions had originally been recorded from the area alone, out of which
ten were chosen) for the simple reasons that Kelantan is the author's
choice as the center of his study and that "they provide a representative
sample of the state of the Cherita Mahraja Wana in Kelantan today."
(p. 79)
While many western scholars tend to make vague generalizations
or dangerously embark upon metaphysical interpretations and analyses
of Asian cultures an~ arts, Swee~ey maintains his objectivity throughout.
15) Swami Satyananda Puri and Charoen Sarahiran, The Ramaldrti (Ramakien) or
the Thai version of the Ramayana, (second edition), Birla Oriental Series, Bangkok,
1948.
16) (a) W.O. Shellabear, "Hikayat Seri Rama," JMBRAS, 71, 1915.
(b) Hikayat Seri Rama, Raffles Malay Manuscript No. 22, Royal Asiatic
Society, (romanized transcription by Mr. E. C.G. Barrett.)
(c) Hikayat Sed Rama, Cambridge University Add. 3756.

REVIEWS 3&1
1l. Ulbricht in his Wayang Purwa: Shadow of the Past (Oxford, 1972)17
attempts to give esoteric and metaphysical analysis of the Javanese puppets
in that they are "visible interpretation of non-material forces" of
evolution, mystical media between man and his creator. Ambiguous and
questionable statements are the main faults that often obstruct rather
than serve his ambition. Sweeney's detailed descriptions of the puppets,
repertoire, and rituals leave more room for the readers to exercise their
intellect and imagination. His final observations and remarks at the end
of the comparisons are very precise and enlightening especially on the
frame of the plot, motifs, and characterization.
One interesting point that comes out of these comparisons of the
oral and written versions is that confusions and contradictions in the
Wayang Siam versions are, in most cases, due not only to the creative
inventiveness of the dalangs, but more so to their illiteracy and lack of
knowledge of the literary texts, either in Malay or Thai. These prevent
them from preserving the accurate story-line. In a way, these diversions
and deviations are entertaining to popular audiences.
Moral qualities of the characters in the Ramayana repertoire are
often changed to suit the dalai1gs' personalities, their likes and dislikes,
as well as to please the local public. For examples, Seri Rama in the
Wayang Siam is in general more effeminate, petulant, harsh and lacks
resource, depending more than in HSR and RK on his followers". (p. 258)
By contrast, Laksmana is made a hermaphrodite and gifted with second
sight. He has great wisdom and is a moderating influence on Seri Rama.
In some versions, he manifests the powers of a shaman. This reminds
the reviewer of Laksmana in a Bengali version who, maintaining his vow
not to look at a woman's face for fourteen years is endowed with
a special sight. He is thus able to see the invisible Indrajit and kill
him.
Mahraja Wana Ravana and his followers in the Wayang Siam are
"reduced to the level of 'all-purpose baddies• and few dalangs ever feel
sympathy for them." (p. 258) In modern political environment, Mahraja
17) H. Ulbricht, W ayang Purwa: Shadow of the Past, Oxford in Asia Paperbacks,
Kuala Lumpur, 1972. (Reviewed by Bonnie and Derek Brereton, .JSS, July
1972, Vol. 60, Pt. 2, pp. 338-342).

388
Wana is sometimes described as "a cruel dictator suppressing his subjects
and allowing them no freedom." (p. 40) To the reviewer's knowledge,
this practice is also common in Indonesia where he is cast as an jmperialist
or a capitalist. In the Ramakien on the contrary, Tosakanth (Ravana)
is portrayed with nobility and dignity. In general, Thai audiences while
watching the Khon (classical mask-dance-drama) have great sympathy
for this highly cultivated villain in his tragic feats and his great courage
in the face of death. Many even prefer him to the weak, effeminate, and
indecisive Pra Ram (Rama). Great Khan dancers are usually those
performing the role of Tosakanth, which they will duly treat with high
respect.
In the comparison of "ranting" or twig-tales of the Malay Rama
tree, many show definite influence of the Panji cycle.
Seri Rama, given
Panji's personality, is a great lover who cannot resist women. In some
episodes, he even becomes a dalang and performs the first wayang; while
Siti Dewi (Sita) becomes a man, defeats rivals, and marries princesses.
In a few tales she is a penjurit agung (robber).
Part lJl (122 pages) is dedicated to the Malay texts in both narrative
and dramatic forms.
Students of Malay will profit from two
excerpts of the key text of the Cherita Mahraja Wana. The first relates
events up to the birth of Sert Rama, and the second, the story of the mad
buffalo1 8 and the death of Raja Bali (Vali). In the last chapter, the
author compares the transcribed Malay texts of two performances of the
same episodes. These are preceded by prologues. Tunes, melodies,
musical instruments, special sound effects, and stage directions are given
throughout. In the juxtaposition of these texts, one can easily see
similarities and differences of content, style, motif language, and performance.
The comparative study of literary texts and repertoires in these
three parts demonstrates that much of Malay HSR resembles Thai RK,
and consequently, the elder Khmer version (as seen from Ankor Wat
bas-reliefs which show much similarity to RK but preceded the Thai
·version by many centuries), and the later Javanese recensions as found in
18) Baba Sapi's son (Torapi in the Ramakien).

REVIEWS 389
the serat kandas and the Rama Keling. The content of the Wayang Siam
is half-way between HSR and RK. These similarities found in all South­
East Asian versions lead the author to reaffirm Stutterheim's theory in
concluding that the popular Rama sagas of South.East Asia fall into a
distinct group belonging to the same streams of oral tradition, quite
separate from the Sanskrit current of Valmiki's Ramayana. Prince
Dhani in his article, The Ram a Jataka strongly supports the theory:
"I do not by any means commit myself to the opinion-still
clung in many quarters-that the Ramayana (of Valmiki) is the
source of any of these versions of the story of Rama. , ..... .
Nevertheless there can be no denial that of all the descendants
of the old story of Rama in India that survive either in the
motherland or its neighbours, the Ramayana of Valmiki will
have to be looked upon as the proper heir to the ancient
beritage."l9
To conclude this rather lengthy review, the writer wishes to express
her deep appreciation to Dr. Sweeney for having made it possible, in this
impressive work, for his colleagues to take a 3tep forward in this special
area of research. The author deserves applause from academic quarters
as well as from readers interested in South-Bast Asian literature and
dramatic culture. The reviewer cannot agree more with Prefessor
Hooykass in his Foreword that Sweeney "is to be congratulated with his·
subject which brings him in relation with most other countries of continental
and insular South East Asia". (pp. vii-viii) Despite its inadequate
illustrations, the thesis is definitely a passport which will take him
far ahead of his contemporaries for at least a decade.
Mattani Rutni11
Liberal Arts Faculty,
Thammasat V~liversity
19) Prince Dhani Nivat, "The Rama .latalw: A Lao Version of the Story of the
Story of Rama",JSS, Vol. 36, Pt. I, 1946, pp. 1-22.

390 REVIEWS
Vimolphan Peetatbawatcbai, Twelve Festivals (Mahachon Press, Bangkok,
1973), pp. 116,20 illustrations, 7 colored plates .
.q, ~ (II Ill ..::( .t:!t "' J
'l:IJiH~1'HlJ U\ll!l'J'll'lltJ, fJP1f1VtiCH (1HI'IlJWlJ111'llW, f1HLVIW'1, J..&.,h) .
.
Khun Vimolphan merely whetted our intellectual appetites in
Isarn Cloth Design, while this latest offering provides a veritable feast of
information and insight into the cultural world of northeast Thailand.
In the Twelve Festivals, the author describes twelve traditional village
festivals, one for each month of year. Several of these such as Bun Khfio
Jee (RoastedGlutinousRice Festival), Bun Bang Fai (Skyrocket Festival),
Bun Samba (Expel Evil Influences Festival), Bun Khaw Padap Din
(Decorate the Earth with Rice Festival) are indigenous to the northeast.
Others such as the Songkran Festival, Bun Pawaed (Bun Mahachat in
central Thai dialect) and the Kathin Festival while basically similar to
their counterparts in central Thailand nevertheless evidence significant
local variations.
For each festival, the author outlines its origin and purpose including
historicai references to the Dhammabod and describes in detail the
preparations involved.
A word picture of the festival itself is given
describing how the monks and villagers carry out their assigned roles.
Of particular academic value are the verbatim records of selected chants
and songs associated with certain of these festivals. The author is able
to bring the festivals to life for the reader with her accurate and sensitive
audio-visual recording.
The reviewe~ has made meritorious offerings of Khun Vimolpban's
book to many northeastern monks and they have all remarked favorably
on her descriptive powers and complimented her for verisimilitude.
One cannot help but regret that the author has not had the benefit
of academic training in the discipline of anthropology. Such training
would have enabled her to provide· interpretative insights necessary to
view the festivals as an integral part of the village social and cultural

setting.
REVIEWS 391
We would then understand the Bfing Fai festival as not only a
propitiatory rite to seek bountiful rain but as an accepted institutionalized
channel-albeit restricted in time-which sanctions the release of
repressed sexual inhibitions and normally frowned upon aggressive antisocial
behavior. The salacious and bawdy sexual antics associated with
this festival are symbols of fertility which, by sympathetic magic, will
bring about rain and abundant crops.
But the sexual license displayed
in crude forms in both word and motion-including quite realistic
"sexually active" puppets-can also be interpreted as a necessary psychological
safety-valve for a village society that is basically quite
Victorian in its attitude to overt expressions of sexual behavior.
Khun Vimolphan has enabled us to see the intertwining threads of
Buddhism, Brahmanism and animism as they are woven into the festival
mosaic.
She has given to the reader an appreciation of the rich
uniqueness of northeast Thai cultural traditions and thus has broadened
the reader's understanding of Thai culture as a whole.
Somdej PhraMaha Virawong's interesting introductory essay places
Khun Vimolphan's description of northeast cultural traditions in historical
perspective and the delicate and evocative drawings of Khun Pao ·add
measurably to our enjoyment of this valuable addition to writings on
Thai culture. . Regrettably the author has not expressed appreciation to
the artist nor given the reader his full name.
The reviewer looks forward to further revelations of northeast life
and customs by this northeastern author who approaches her subject
with such dedication and love.
Asia Fowzdatio11,
Bangkok·
William J, Kla11S11er

392 REVIEWS
A. Thomas Kirsch, Feasting and Social Oscillation : Religion and Society
in Upland Southeast Asia (Data Paper No. 92, Southeast Asia Program,
Dept. of Asian Studies, Cornell University, Ithaca, N.Y. July 1973),
viii+ 49.
When reviewing a publication for this journal, I assume that I do
so not as an anthropologist for the benefit (or to the despair) of my
professional colleagues, but as a student of "Things Siamese" for others
similarly inclined. If this is indeed my task, then I must say first that
Kirsch's essay-despite its alluring subtitle-is not meant for those
seeking a general account of religion and society in the Thai uplands.
Kirsch's avowed aim is to stimulate discussion of certain problems
of anthropological theory and of the ethnography of Southeast Asia; his
essay is neither a layman's book nor one of immediate relevance to
Thailand. Indeed it requires a particular enthusiasm for anthropological
theory to cope with the author's inelegant prose, not to mention
the social scientist's predilection for esoteric jargon: And as Kirsch
himself points out, he does not here tackle all upland societies in
Southeast Asia. With one exception his ethnographic examples come
entirely from the nor}h Burma-Assam area. This not only excludes all
the upland peoples represented in Thailand but also, as I hope to show,
seriously reduces the relevance of the analysis for those whose first
concern is with Thailand's hill peoples.
Yet in all justice I must say that this is a stimulating essay. Kirsch
·first wrote it in 1964 as a pre-fieldwork study, taking as his starting point
Professor Edmund Leach's study of the political organization of the
Kacbin people of Upper Burma. Leach, in a major theoretical breakthrough,
bad identified two contrasted ideal mod.els of Kachin political
organization between which real Kachin groups were continually oscillating
(hence Kirsch's essay title). One pole was the autocratic system
called gumsa, based on the model of the Shan principality, and the
opposite pole was the democratic gumlao system. Both these ideal
types, Leach showed, were unstable: as individuals manipulated the
system in their struggle for political power, the gumlao democracy
tended to develop into a gumsa-type autocracy, while the autocracy
broke down into a democracy. Individuals who achieved personal

power in democratic societies would establish themsdves as autocratic
chiefs, while in autocratic societies people struggling to increase their
own power would repudiate the traditional chief's authority and lead
their communities towards the democratic ideal.
Extending this analysis to other upland peoples of Southeast Asia,
Kirsch like Leach maintains that the various social systems of "hill tribes
society" are not static, existing in a given form for all time in equilibrium,
but are constantly in flux. He retains Leach's categories of
"autocratic" and ''democratic" as the poles of oscillation, insisting that
they are not specific to the Kachin but are of widespread analytical value
in upland Southeast Asia. But Kirsch views the dynamics of oscillation
in terws of religious rather than political factors. He invites us to
examine the proposition that individual hillmen or household units are
striving not so much for political power as for religious "efficacy" or
''potency", i.e. for enhanced ritual rather than political status. Indeed
he argues that political and economic structures are "embedded" in
the religious system. This shift in emphasis, Kirsch maintains, enables
him to explain the oscillation between autocratic and democratic ideals
in terms of the internal tensions of upland culture, where Leach in
emphasizing politics was compelled to introduce an external factor,
the autocratic ideal derived from the political organization of the
lowland-dwelling Shan.
For his ethnographic base Kirsch examines five Naga groups, the
Central Chin, the Kachin and the Laotian Lamet. All of these, he arg~
ues, Hconform to a single analytical model." Specifically they share a
common mountain habitat, the "swidden" form of agriculture, a system
of religious feasting, and the feature of "oscillation" between autocratic
and democratic forms of organization. Linking these characteristics,
Kirsch focuses on the "feast of merit", a particularly important aspect
of the religious life of all these societies. Feasts are sponsored by a
household and involve a conspicuous display of generosity. The sponsori11g
household must provide the community with a large amount of
meat in the. form of sacrificial animals and a quantity of grain, mainly
in the form of liquor. In return, the community rewards the sponsoring
household in a number of ways. The_ members are permitted to wear

394 REVIEWS
or otherwise display special decorations; they obtain a larger share of
the feasts offered by others; they get a better share of village farming
lands; and they command greater respect in village councils. But,
Kirsch insists, the real basis of their enhanced status is the public
recognition of their religious potency, an innate attribute made manifest
by successfully sponsoring a feast. It is some such quality as "potency"
or "fertility" that Kirsch finds to be the chief product (in economic
terms) or focus (in religious terms) of hill tribes society; the whole
society, he suggests, is oriented to "maximizing" this quality, a.nd those
people or households who demonstrate it are the ones who become
powerful. Having gained prestige through successful competitive
feasting, household units consolidate and enhance their status through
advantageous marriages; thus Kirsch explains the developm~nt of aristocratic
lineages with a "monopoly" on religious potency.
It is Kirsch's emphasis on the feasting complex, so important in
the societies be discusses,· that decreases the relevance of his analysis
for those of us whose primary interest is in the upland communities of
Thailand. Here religious feasting seems to be of a very different nature
from that found among Kirsch's sample. So far as I know, the idea of
competition between households through ritual feasting is absent among
the hill peoples in Thailand. Among the people with whom I am most
familiar, the Lahu, a feast is provided either as a surety against future
trouble or, and much more frequently, in order to alleviate present misfortune.
A household which sponsors many feasts is to be pitied not
praised,, fora succession of feasts must indicate a particularly bad patch
of misfortune. (It was to prevent confusion between this Labu concept
of feasting and the "feasts of merit" of the Nagas and others that, in a
recent article in this journal, 1 I wrote of Lahu "blessing feasts" despite
the fact that in other contexts the translation· "merit", in the Buddhist
sense, is preferable to "blessing".)
Kirsch argues that coinpetitive ritual feasting bas developed in
response to the particular ecological setting of hill tribes society. "To
ensure that the exigencies of climate, ecology and technology are overt
"Blessing Feasts and Ancestor Propitiation among the Lahu Nyi (Red Labu)",
JSS LX Part 1, 345-73.

REVIEWS
C6me, there must be some mechanism which will motivate persons to
strive as hard as they can to produce ... [and] there must also be some
sort of mechanism which will distribute any surplus production equitably
throughout the group" (p. 10). Both the motivation and the distributive
mechanism, he says, are supplied by the religious system, which emphasizes
fertility, and in particular by the feasting complex. An interesting
idea, but similar ecological conditions and identical swidden (slashand-burn)
agricultural techniques have failed to produce in upland
Thailand a feasting complex on the Naga or Chin model. A possible
reason, I suggest, is that the religious and economic energies of
Thailand's hill peoples have been channeled in other directions (cash
crops, wage labour, lowland markets, Buddhist and popular Chinese
religious ideas) by their close association with lowland Thai and, for
some of them (Meo and Yao in particular), a former close association
with Chinese civilization.
But if Kirsch's emphasis on competitive feasting lessens the comparative
value of his work, his essay is nonetheless full of stimulating
ideas relevant to the study of upland society in Thailand. Here I must
limit myself to listing a few of these. Kirsch's emphasis on religion
enables us to see how, as he puts it, "technical acts are embedded in a
matrix of religious ritual, i.e., for the hill tribes technical acts and ritual
acts are necessarily aspects of same action" (p. 12). Again, I find
interesting his explanation of the hillmen's oft-reported lack of concern
or imagination regarding the afterlife. Some have tried to explain this
characteristic in terms of a basic indifference to matters religious, but
Kirsch suggests that the hillman's overriding concern for the present
telescopes his view of past and future time. This, not his lack of religious
perception, accounts for the vag.ueness of his views on the afterlife. I
am particularly fascinated by the Idea that the complex lowland societies
of Southeast Asia manipulate their social institutions to fit their mythology
(consider the position of the king, the layout of the royal capital, etc.)
while in upland societies "myth is constantly being reconstituted in .order
to conform to the actual contemporary structure of the society" (p. 17).
Kirsch concludes, in keeping with his emphasis on internal cultural
dynamics, with an invitation to us to view the hill peoples of upland

REVIEWS
Southeast Asia as "sharing a single generalized culture". Individual
groups, he suggests, may be seen as "playing out the internalized values
and norms defined by this generalized culture" of hill tribes society (p.
36). Again this is a valuable idea but, I suggest, is to be treated with
caution by those of us concerned with the upland peoples of Thailand,
whose adaptation to "external" lowland forces seems much greater than
the Naga, Chin and other western groups discussed by Kirsch. Meo and
Yao, for example, might equally well be seen as playing out in a hill
environment the values and norms defined by Chinese culture, rather than
by a generalized hill culture.
And perhaps I should not leave unchallenged Kirsch's remark that
intensive fieldwork may be ill-adapted to an approach which insists on
wide geographical and historical scope. If he means that the anthropologist
who has studied intensively a single Southeast Asian hill society is
ill-equipped to generalize about upland society in this part of the world,
nobody can quarrel with him. But professional competence in anthropology
has long been recognized as requiring both intensive field
experience and a wide-ranging knowledge of the work of other scholars
in related areas and disciplines. Without the detailed reports of fieldworkers
who have taken pains to learn the languages and study the
lifestyles of single upland societies, Kirsch could never have produced
this valuable essay.
In any account, Professor Kirsch and the Department of Asian
Studies of Cornell University are to be thanked for making this "working
paper" widely available. It is a pity _that the text was not more carefully
proofed; such howlers as "Ariya and the golden Buddha" for Stern's
article "Ariya and the golden book" should have been detected, as well
as numerous typos that are merely irksome. But this is a small price
to pay for having the essay readily available on one's bookshelf.
Antlw11y R. W a/ker
School of Comparative Social Sciences,
Universiti Sains Malaysia,
Penang

ANNUAL REPORT
Minutes of the Annual General Meeting
of the Siam Society Under Royal Patronage
March 28, 1973. 8.00 p.m.
* *
The Annual General Meeting, terminating the Council year 1972
was held on Wednesday, March 28, 1973 at 8.00 p.m. at the Society's
home, 131 Soi Asoke, Sukhumvit 21, Bangkok.
The meeting was attended by about sixty members and guests and
the following members of the outgoing Council were present:
H.R.H. Prince Naradhip Bongsprabandb
M.R. Patanachai Jayant
M.R. Pimsai Amranand
Mrs. Nisa Sheanakul
Miss Elizabeth Lyons'
Dr. Tern Smitinand
Mr. Kim Atkinson
Mrs. Katherine Buri
Mr. Francis Martin
Mr. Irving Sablosky
Mr. Sulak Sivaraksa
H.E. Leonard Unger
Mrs. Elizabeth Wray
Mr. Graham Lucas
1. Adoption of the Minutes of the Annual General Meeting, March 1972
The President proposed that the Minutes be adopted. M.R. Pimsai
Amranand seconded the motion and the minutes were adopted.
2. Presentation of the Annual Report for 1972
The President proposed that the Annual Report be passed. M.R.
Pata.nachai Jayant seconded the motion and the report was passed.
3, Presentation of the Financial Statement
M.R. Patanachai Jayant presented the financial statement reporting
that the Society's financial position was SO\}nd: although income had
decreased, assets had risen. The President proposed that the financial

398 ANNUAL REPORT
statement be passed. M.R. Pimsai Amranand seconded the motion and
it was passed.
The President called on Mr. Francis Martin to take the meeting for
the next 3 items.
4. Election of Honorary Auditor
The outgoing Council proposed that Mr. Yukta Na Tbalang be
re-elected as Honorary Auditor and this was unanimously approved.
5. Election of Honorary Members
The outgoing Council proposed the election of Dr. Sood Sangvichien
and this was unanimously approved.
6. Election of Council for 1973
The outgoing· Council proposed the following as officers of the
Society:
President
Senior Vice President
2nd Vice President
3rd Vice President
Honorary Secretary
Honorary Treasurer
Honorary Librarian
Honorary Editor
H.R.H. Prince Na1:adhip Bongsprabandh
Mr. Sukich Nimmanhaeminda
H.S.H. Prince Subhadradis Diskul
M.R. Patanachai Jayant
M.R. Pimsai Amranand
M.R. Patanachai Jayant
Miss Elizabeth Lyons
Dr. Tej Bunnag
Leader of the Natural History
Section (ex-officio) Dr. Tern Smitinand
The above were all elected.
The outgoing Council nominated the following as ordinary members
of Council:
1. .Mr. Kim Atkinson
2. Mrs. Katherine Buri
3. Mr. Dusit Banijbatana
4. H.E. A.W. Konigsfeldt
5. Mr. Graham Lucas
6. Mr. Francis Martin
7. Mrs. Mattani Rutnin

ANNUAL REPoin
8. Mrs. Nisa Sheanakul
9. Mr. Trevor Rutter
10. Mr. Irving Sablosky
11. Mrs. Edwin Stanton
12. Mr. Sulak Sivaraksa
13. H.E. Leonard Unger
14. Mrs. Elizabeth Wray_
Mr. Martin called for further nominations.
15. Mr. Winton Lane
proposed by Mr. Graham Lucas
seconded by Mr. Pansak Vinyaratn.
16. M.L. Manij Jumsai
proposed by Mr. Dumnern Garden
seconded by Mr. Pansak Vinyaratn
There was a vote by ballot, Mr. Martin, Mrs. Nisa and the
Administrative Secretary being scrutineers, and the following were
declared elected to the Council :
·1.. Mr. Kim Atkinson
2. Mrs. Katherine Buri
3. Mr. Dusit Banijbatana
4. H.E. A.W. Konigsfeldt
5. Mr. Graham Lucas
6. Mr. Francis Martin
7. Mrs. Mattani Rutnin
8. Mrs. Nisa Sheanakul
9. Mr. Trevor Rutter
10. Mr. Irving Sablosky
11. Mrs. Edwin Stanton
12. Mr. Sulak Sivaraksa
13. H.E. Leonard Unger
14. Mrs. Elizabeth Wray
15. M.L. Manij Jumsai
7. Any Other Business
There being no other business, the President adjourned the meeting.
A film "Meo Year" was then shown by courtesy of the Australian
Embassy, Bangkok.

ANNUAL REPORT OF THE FINANCIAL COMMITTEE
We are pleased to report that we have been able to show, once
again, a surplus of income over expenditure in the balance sheet for 1973.
This favourable balance, however, would not have been possible without
the following contributions to the Society for specific projects.
Asia Foundation Baht 30,000
Thai Military Bank Ltd. , 3,000
Osathanugroh Foundation , 56,000
Breezewood Foundation , 20,475
Books and accounts of the Society have been examined and audited
by our Honorary Auditor, Mr. Yukta Na Thalang and his colleagues at
Sycip, Gorres, Velayo, Na Thalang & Co. The committee would like to
take this opportunity to express its gratitude and appreciation to all of
them for their excellent services rendered.
The Committee Members were:
M.R. Patanachai Jayant Chairman
Mrs. Katherine Buri
M.R. Kasemsiribhand Kasemsri

HONORARY AUDITOR'S REPORt
We have examined the statement of assets and liabilities of th~
Siam Society (Under Royal Patronage) as at December 31, 1973 and the
related statement of revenues and expenses for the year then ended.
Our examination was made in accordance with generally accepted
auditing standards and accordingly included such tests of the accounting
records and such other auditing procedures as we considered necessary
in the circumstances.
The accounts of the Society are maintained, and the accompanying
financial statements have been prepared, on the basis of cash receipts
and disbursements, with adjustments to give effect to unsold publications
and the inclusion of the provision for depreciation.
In our opinion, the accompanying statements present fairly the
assets and liabilities of the Siam Society (Under Royal Patronage) at
December 31, 1973 and its revenues and expenses for the year then
ended on the basis indicated in the preceding paragraph, which basis is
consistent with that of the preceding year.
March 22, 1974
YUKTA NA THALANG
C.P.A. (THAILAND)

ANNUAL REPORT OF THE ADMINISTRATION COMMITTEE
Staff & Office
One typewriter disappeared which resulted in the hiring of a new
watchman and a new messenger. Fortunately the insurance on equipment
and furniture in the office and the library had already been increased.
Building and Grounds
Early in the year the Housewives Voluntary Foundation rented the
Hall and Grounds for a very successful exhibition of Antiques with
refreshments served in the garden. An exhibition of paintings and
prints was held in the Hall as part of the Society programme.
The Eisenhower Fellows rented the Kamthieng House garden for
a dinner party and the American Women's Club for a luncheon party.
The Society held two very successful meetings in the garden-the
North-Eastern Evening and the Northern Evening-when dinner was
served and there was a programme of music and dancing.
Society Publications
We finally received back from Martinus Nijhoff our publications
wl1ich we had asked for.
'
Acquisitions
Dr. Peter Kundstadter donated to the Society a Banchieng pot and
bronze ornaments. USIS repaired and made 2 copies of the films "King
Prajadhipok's Coronation", "The Opening of Rama VI Bridge", and
"A visit to Prince Sithiporn's Farm".
General
The Council decided that a room for seminars and small meetings
was needed. At first plans were drawn up to convert the shed filled
with wood carvings but these plans were dropped. Instead it was
decided to convert the gallery of the Hall. Funds for the conversion and

406 ANNUAL REPORT
decoration were donated by the Svasti Ostanukroh Foundation and the
Bangkok Bank. The room was called the Prince Dhani Room and was
opened by Prince Dhani himself on November 9, 1973.* It has been
used for two seminars.
The rare books were put into the small room next to the office.
The Asia Foundation donated funds for its decoration. The room is called
The Prince Wan Room and opened on February 26, 1974 by the President
himself as part of the celebrations for the Society's 70th Anniversary.*
Two airconditioners for these rooms were donated by the Thai
Dhanu Bank Ltd.
Once again the Committee would like to thank Mr. Euayporn
Kerdcboua y for his continued very fine work as Administrative
Secretary.
Committee members
M.R. Pimsai Amranand
Mrs. Nisa Sheanakul
Mr. Francis Martin
Mr. Sirichai Narumitr
Mr. Euayporn Kerdchouay
Chairman
*On both auspicious occasions, Members of Council and Society members
present signed Thai-style accordion-pleated (fflJ~11HJ) books and presented
them to His Highness the Honorary President and His Royal Highness
the President. The texts are as follows:
m1rJYrJ"::1'J'"l\lML1Hl nJ3JV\~u~vwmn~~~rJ1n-.r

ANNUAL REPORT 407
.J "' !\1
fl1'1Ylt:l~lfl3J'1JVU'J!:'Yl1U V'U qJ lWJ
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,
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408 ANNUAL REPORT
ut-t m~ 1 ~ Yl'J~ V'l'd: Ln 'l!ldJ~l 11 'll
tb:;L Ylf1"1fl~;1J~EJ LJ
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'!AI'J::~IV!ln'l!lmrJLL~::U 1U 1JJU 'l!lr!U nl'J Lll/l'J"Jfnlt'JU uaJl'il'UVl 'Jl1JL 'Yl1'Yln1 ml
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'IJ
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Ylt'l\lft \lEltll\l L 'J:IJ11J1\l 'Yl'J\l flU L flj 1::'Vl1JJ'Jf]J tH1l 'IJ 1-t 'Yl1\l1 'lfl nl'J JJ1 L1JU
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tJj::m"J 1~ LL~::~Ii-1li'YlrJ1t'l..,tJ~l\ll V'l1n..,un11t~rh~u1 ClJClJlJJlnuEJm ~EJ\l1r~ ·
hmnu1VIwllu\l1t

ANNUAL REPORT 409
"'\4""1 d I ']

ANNUAL REPORT OF THE LIBRARY COMMITTEE
The collection has been expanded in all fields and now comprises a
little over 11,000 volumes. The Asia Foundation has generously
contr_ibuted two large bookshelves to hold the increased number of
books.
Requests filed by members have been fulfilled whenever possible,
and have contributed to the general usefulness of the library.
An increase in use of the library, particularly by students, has made
it necessary to add more desk space, but it is still insufficient.
The Prince Wan Room. The small room adjoining the main collection
and containing 11 number of rare books, maps, and photographs was
previously known as the Rare Books Room. Thanks to a contribution
by the Asia Foundation, it has been air-conditioned and pleasantly
refurnished. It bas now been re-named in honor of Prince Wan and was
inaugurated by him on February 26, 1974.
Presentations. Prince Dhani contributed to the Society's collection a
manuscript by Prince Bidhyalongkorn. The Japanese Embassy gave
several handsome volumes on the Arts of Japan. Mr. Van Kuyk presented
valuable works on Chinese history. Other. individuals, Mr. Sulak
Sivaraksa, M.L. Manich Jumsai, Dr. Tej Bunnag, Dr. Charnvit Kasetsiri,
Mr. William. Klausner, Mr. Hans Penth, Mr. Piriya Krairiksh, presented
books; Mr. Dusit Banijbatana donated a table for the use of the library.
The Stanton Fund now stands at 31,374.36 baht. The interest bas
been used this year to buy three rare or expensive works.
Library Committee:
Miss Elizabeth Lyons
M.L. Manich Jumsai
Mr. Irving Sablosky

ANNUAL REPORT OF THE PUBLICATIONS COMMITTEE
1973-1974
1. Following a meeting of the Ad Hoc Committee in August 1973, it
was decided to' set up a new editorial and publications committee
which would be called simply the Publications Committee. Mr.
William J. Klausner kindly agreed to serve as the Committee's
Chairman with Mr. Sulak Sivaraksa and Dr. Tej Bunnag as Members.
Dr. Tej continued as Honorary Editor of the JSS and also served as
the representative of the Committee on the Council.
The Committee held several meetings during the year on an
informal basis, namely, over lunch in the Grill Room at the Royal
Hotel on Rajdamnoen A venue. A programme of publications and
reprints was drawn up as follows.
2. Publications ·and Reprints Programme
2.1 Publications It was agreed to make all efforts possible to
print the manucripts already accepted in principle for publication.
Readers would be asked to complete their tasks and funds would be
sought for the printing. The works involved are:
Meo."
1935.
i. Nusit Cbindarsi's Thesis, "The Religion of the Blue
ii. R.H. Hickling, The Codification of Siamese Law 1897-
iii. LuangPisith Markvitarn, Postage Stamps of Thailand.
iv. David K. Wyatt's edition in English translation and
Old Dutch of Van Vliet's History of the Kings of Ayuthya.
Other publications under consideration are Dr. Koso! Srisang's
Thesis, "Dhammacracy in Thailand: A study in Social Ethics as a
Hermeneutic of Dhamma;" and editions of religious manuscripts
and folk-tales of the Northeast as compiled by Chao Khun Ari of
Mahasarakham.
2.2 Reprints Council has approved reprint of the following
Society publications which will be financed by our own funds.

412 ANNUAL REPORT
i. Gordon Young, The Hill Tribes of Northern Thailand.
ii. Pimsai Amranand, Gardening in Bangkok.
iii. John Black, The Lofty Sanctuary of Khao Phra Viham.
iv. Mattani Rutnin, ed. An anthology of articles on Thai
Drama taken from the JSS.
In August 1973, the second edition, revised, of Prince Damrong
Rajanubhab's A History of Buddhist Monuments in Siam ( 1962) under
the new title of Monuments of the Buddha in Siam finally appeared.
Much hard work had been put into the revision by Sulak Sivaraksa,
A.B. Griswold, Prince Subhadradis Diskul and Hiram W. Woodward
Jr. Nanda Charoenpan did the handsome art work which was ably
executed by the Sompong Press.
3. Journal of the Siam Society
The two numbers published in 1973-1974 together came to
554 pages. The number of pages were deliberately curtailed due to
the high cost of paper.
Mr. Alexander B. Griswold's generous contributions towards
printing costs with grants from the Breezewood Foundation were even
more gratefully appreciated this year.
There was a fall in advertisements which is unlikely to recover
in the immediate fuiure when the general economic situation is
considered.
Finally, the Honorary Editor wishes to express his thanks to
the following from whom he sought much-needed advice and cooperation
over the year: A.B. Griswold, Breezewood Foundation,
Hiram W. Woodward Jr., Michigan University, Prof. Saneh Chamarik,
Faculty of Political Science, Thammasat University, Dr. Charnvit
Kasetsiri, Liberal Arts Faculty, Thammasat University, and Dr.
Lawrence D. Stifel, Rockefeller Foundation, New York.

ANNUAL REPORT FOR THE PROGRAMME & TRAVEL COMMITTEE
1973~1974
During 1973-1974 the Programme and Travel Committee arranged
7 Excursions, 24 lectures, and 3 discussions. Increasing attention was
given to obtaining local lecturers and distinguished guest speakers from
neighbouring countries. The lectures on China and those who illustrated
their talks with slides proved as usual more popular than the purely
scholarly presentations. Since the opening of the Prince Dbani Room
in November 1973, quite a number of small and intimate gatherings of
scholars have been held in that room. The committee 'would welcome
any suggestion from members as to the further use of the Prince Dhani
Room. Indeed if groups are formed to study various aspects of Thai
culture, they are welcome to make use of this room as much as possible.
The Committee arranged a one-man painting exhibition by Mr.
Pricha Arjunka, a former grantee of the JDR III Fund and of the
Sathirakoses Nagapradipa Foundation. During the exhibition which
lasted from 24 January to 14 February, three discussions took place every
Saturday concerning the relevance of modern art to the education and
development of the country. They were attended mostly by students,
especially those from Silpakom University. The same was true of a discussion
in Thai on wildlife conservation which was held jointly with the
Wildlife Association. The cultural evening programmes which included
presentations of north and northeastern performing arts were well
attended. The same was true of our travel programme under which trips
were taken on the average of once a month. Then came the fuel shortage.
The Committee therefore decided that we ought to help the Government
by organizing fewer tours.* Nevertheless, we did manage to take 25
members to Luang Prabang on 24-28 January 1974. This was the first
timeforquiteanumber of years that the Committee was able to organize
a trip abroad. Thanks to Mr. Balzar, to our Foreign Ministry. and to
* His Royal Highness the President conveyed this decision to His Excellency the
Prime Minister who duly acknowledged the message. The texts are on pp. 418-420 ..

414 ANNUAL REPOI\T
the Royal Lao Government, the trip was managed to the satisfaction of
those who went with us.
The main events of the year were of course the
celebration of our 70th anniversary, the opening of the Prince Dhani
Room and the opening of the Prince Wari Rare Books Room. For each
event, we were kindly assisted financially by the Osathanukrob
Foundation, the Asia Foundation, the Bangkok Bank and the Thai
Military Bank. For all their generosity, we wish to thank them sincerely.
The Committee was first chaired by Mrs. Edwin F. Stanton, who
later on resigned, since she had to arrange programmes for the World
Fellowship of Buddhists, which opened its new headquarters near our
Society. Mr. Sulak Sivaraksa succeeded her, since he was a co-chairman
from the beginning. Committee members were Dr. Tej Bumiag and Mr.
William J. Klausner .. Mr. Euayporn Kerdchouay, as usual, was very
helpful in all our activities.
May 29
June 26
June 30
July 10
July 20
July 28
Lectures, Seminars and Excursions, 1973-1974
FILM SHOW. A film in Bengali, directed by the great
Indian director, Satyajit Ray, "CHARULATA", was
shown with the cooperation of the Indian Embassy.
Mrs. Mattani Rutnin, Thammasat University, The
Concept of Evil: A Comparative Study of Asian Drama.
Mr .. Euayporn Kerdchouay, Administrative Secretary,
Excursion to see little known temple paintings in Dhonburi
and Nondburi.
Mr. Barton Sensenig, Cornell University, Mai Ben Rai?:
Personality and Development in Chiengmai.
Mr. Piriya Krairiksb, Harvard University, Some Identifications
of Scenes from the Former Lives of The Buddha
in Dvaravati Art.
Mr. Sulak Sivaraksa, Member of the Council and Mr.
Euayporn Kerdchouay, Administrative Secretary, Ex cur~
sion to An[f-thonq Provine~.

415
'
August 7
August 14
Ausust 25
September 4
September 7
September 23
October 9
October 20
October 30
November 6
November 13
Mr. Kennon Breazeale, St. Antony's College, Oxford,
The Paknam Incident in the Context of Franco-Siamese
Relations, 1885-1907.
Prof. SanehChamarik, Tbammasat University, Questions
of Stability and Security in Thailand.
A tour of Dr. Sood Saengvicbien's Museum of Anthropology
at Siriraj Hospital and Mr. Griswold's house in
Dhonburi.
FILM SHOW. Mr. Karuna Kusalasaya, Thai-Bharat
Cultural Lodge, introduced the film, In the Footsteps of
The Buddha.
Prof. Heinz Bechert, Gottingen University, Recent
Development in Buddhist Studies in the Federal Republic
of Germany, (In co-operation with the German Cultural
Institute).
Mr. Sulak Sivaraksa, Member of the Gouncil and Mr.
Euayporn Kerdchouay, Administrative Secretary, Excursion
to' Samut Sakhon, Samut Songkram, Phet Buri, Kang
Krachan and Hua Hin.
Mr. Y. Tsurumi, International House of Japan, Tokyo,
Life on Mainland China Today.
Mr. Sulak Sivaraksa, Member of the Council and Mr.
Euayporn Kerdchouay, Administrative Secretary, Excursion
to see little known Dhonburi Wats and a Siamese
bamboo puppets s.how.
Dr. K0son Srisang, The Seminary, Chiengmai, The
Significance of Kingship in the Thai Social Order.
Mrs. Leela Harishwar Dayal, Classical dancer and
writer from India, Classical Dances of South India.
FILM SHOW. A film on the dancing of Southern Sri
Lanka, Kandyan Dances and Rhythms of the People (in
co-operation with tlie Embassy of Sri Lanka).

416
•1 NortheasterN C;IIIUral f:\•ening. A special perforrmmce
of Nortl1custern mu!iic und drmcing. The programme
wus introduced by Mr. Terry Miller and Klum Charoen~
chui. Nnrtheas(crn foud wus !iciety,
l!xcur.rion to Luang Phrabnng.
An Exhibilion of P~lintings and Prints by Mr. Pricha
Arjunka. This lasted until February 14, 1974.
Discussion. mhwn

417
February 2
February 4
February 5
February 9
February 26
February 27
March 12
March 19
March 24
March 26
Discussion uu'Jm~m:)lfiJ:J?PtfiVt111h::mf!t'I1CJ tlaih.J·mJ u1fl
o J J .I

418
• ' • ! • • • ' ' ~ ' 11
ANNUAL REPOR'l'
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ANNUAL REPORT OF THE NATURAL HISTORY SECTION
1. The committee of 10 members was approved by the Council, and
4 subcommittees were appointed, having the following members as
chairmen:-
1.1 Publications and Library: Dr. Tern Smitinand and Dr. H. Elliot
McClure as Co-editor.
1.2 Programme and Excursions: Dr. H. Elliot McClure
1.3 Conservation and Publicity: Dr. Dusit Banijbhatana
1.4 Finance: Mrs. Katherine B. Buri
Mrs. Nancy Green was appointed as Secretary of the Section,
but resigned owing to the pressure of work in other societies.
Mrs. Katherine B. Buri took over.
Dr. H. Elliot McClure tendered his resignation as the Chairman
of Programme and Excursions in November due to poor attendance
of fellow members to lectures.
2. One double-numbered issue of the Natural History Bulletin Volume
25, Nos. 1 & 2, 195 pages, 11 plates, was published containing 8 original
a~;ticles
on natural history at the cost of Baht 21,050. A sum of Baht
2,000 was received for advertisements from the Forest Industry
Organization and the Thai Plywood Factory. SEA TO Medical
Research Laboratory also kindly contributed a sum of Baht 6,025 for
the publication of the article, "The Avifauna! Complex of an Openbilled
Stork" in this issue.
3. Seven hikes and excursions were undertaken to the Phu Khae Botanic
Gardens, caves and waterfalls in Saraburi; K.hao Yai National Park;
Phu Kradung National Park. These hikes and excursions as arranged
brought in an income of Baht 23,697.25 which was handed over to
the Honorary Treasurer to share in tbe cost of printing the Natural
History Bulletin.

4. Ten ind()Uf meetings were held with 9 lectur

ANNUAL Rll~PORI OF 'l'HE KllAMTHIENG HC>USI!: COMMITTEE
During 1973~ 1974, the Committee continued to supervise the work
of rearranging and impnwing the exhibits of the Khamthieng House.
Mrs. Susan Riley prepared approximately forty explanatory labels
and photographs which 1vere framed and hung in the house with the
purpose of explaining the various objects on display in the house and in
the area below and around the house.
Two new glass cabinets \Vere built and installed in the house. These
are being used to display smne tlf the collection of textiles. Khun Nisa
has continued to purchase additional rare pieces of weaving and
embroidery.
The hill tribe collection was improved through the addition qf
explanatory labels and photographs, selected and prepared by Mrs.
Riley.
In December 1973, the self~guiding tour booklet was printed. It
was written by Mrs. Susan Riley and titled 11 Khamthieng House: A selfguided
tour". Before publicati(m it was read and edited by members oflhe
Khamthieng House Committee and by several members of the Council:
M.R. Pimsai Amranand, Dr. Tej Bunnag, Mr. Graham Lucas, und Mr.
Sulak Sivuraksa. The Council decided to sell euch copy for ten bnbt and
to abolish the admission fee to the Kbamthieng House.
In January, 1974, a Northern Thai Evening was held by the Society
at which Northern Thai music and c!Emces were presented and the Khamthieng
House was re-opened to the public.
There has been some newspaper publicity about the house, and
the number of visitors has increased.
Mrs. Ann Campbell has devoted considerable time to cataloguing
the collection of wood-carving. This work is nearly completed.

.,
Committee l\1embers:
Mr!>. Elizabeth Wray,
1\.ir~. Lindu Bigelow
Mrs. Ann Cam{lhell
Mrs. Susan Riley
il.ir~. Nisu Shc!HH1kul
Chairman

LIST OF MEMBERS
"'denotes life member
Mr. Mathias Abendroth
Mrs. Martha Abernathy
Mr. Abhai Chandavinmt'"
Mrs. H. Abeyseioern
Mr. David Paul Abotomey
Prof. Arthur S. Abramson •
Mr. L.J.L. Acheson
Mr. A.C.S. Adams*
Prof. David B.J. Adams
Mrs. V.T. Adloff"
Dr. Adul Wichiencharocn"
Mr. Paul Aiken
H.S.H. Prince Ajavadis Diskul"'
Mr. Osamu Akagi~
Mom Rttcbawong Akin Rabibhuduna
Mr. Aksern Sindhupramn
Miss Margaret Alcock
Mr. A. Alexander"'
Mr. P.J. Alexander*
Mrs. Robert W. Alford
Mr. Anvar T. Aliakbar•
H.E. Mr. Rebavum Amir
Dr. Ammar Siamwalla
Dr. F. Ammundsen"'
Mr. Amnuay Kbowanich
Khunying Amphora Meesook 111
Mr. Amorn Jndrakamhang
Dr. Herbert Amry
Dr. Jacques Amyot
Prof. An Nimmanahaeminda
Miss Marie A.R. Anania
Mr. Anant Wiriyapanij
Mr. Anda Sriuthairatsamitbep
Mr. Hans G. Andersen
Mr. Charles Anderson
Mr. David Anderson
Dr. Dole Anderson
Mr .. Hiroshi Ando'
Miss Mary Anglemyer'"
Mrs. Anong Mesprasart
Prof. Edward M. Anthony"'
Mr. Yoji Aoyogi*
Mr. Hnchiro Arai>~<
Mr. Charles Arcbaimbault
Mr. Aree Soothipunt
Mr. Brund Arens
Mr. Ariyanl Munjikul"'
Mrs. Judith Arndt
Dr. Joel B. Aronson
Dr. Arporna Sribhibhadh
Mrs. Marlena J. Arritoln
Phya Arthukariya Nibonda"'·
Mr. Charles D. Arthur*
Khunying Arun Kitiyakaru
Mr. James P. Ashby
Mr. Y.J.E. Assia*
Mr. Aswin Kongsiri
Mr. Kim Atkinson~~'
Mr. Tsuneo Ayabe*
Mr. Peter Aylen
Mr. Abrahim A. Azeez
Mr. Claude Bachmann
Miss Kathleen Badger
Dr. Gordon B. Bailey
Mr. Peter Bailey
Mr. Jack P. Bailhe
Mr. Jacques P. Bailhe, Jr.
Mr. Michael H. Baker*
Mrs. M.H. Bakker
Dr. R. Balakrishna'*
Mr. R.A. Baldwin
Miss Pamela Balow
Mr. Dieter-Maria Balzar
Miss Bancha Chittibbol

Mr. linnchu Lumsum
Mr. BandlOil!t Tcinsongru~mce
Miss Banchop Bandhumedhn""
Mr. Hu.lvor Bange
Prof. AI bert H. Banner
Prof. Ilugh S. Harbour
Mr. G
Mrs. Kt:mrnd Bekker
Miss Ulunche Y. Belitz
Mr. Peter F. Bell
Mr. R. Martin Bell
Mr!i. Benchuwan Sundurukul
Mr. Simmon Beniuns
Mrs. Putty Benjamin
Prof. E.-;nt BennatlHm
Mr. Stephen Bennett
Mr. Robert Bergin
Mr. John Wolf Berkey, Jr.
Mr. D.J.W. Berkoff
Mr. Georgio Bedingieri
Mrs. Marie Marthe Berlingieri
Mr. Mel T. Benmrd
Miss I .ois l'rt Berney
Mr. Robin Uerringwn
Mr. Hans Bcnbel
Mrs. Cynthia Beslcy
Mr. Prem K. Bbunduri
ll.R.ll. Prince Bhanubanch Yugalu•
Mr. M. V. Bhatavdckar
Mr. Bhichai Rattukul
Luang Bhisit Sukhumkam
Mr. Bhornchai Kunulai
Mrs. Linda C. Bigelow
Prof. Himaln Kalukichu
l'v1r. George Andrew Hinnew
Mr. B.A. Binning
l'vfrs. Pamela G. Bird
Phra Bisul Sukhumvit
Mr. Pnul Bixler
Miss lngu Bjorkroth
Mr. Otto Bjorlingq
Mr. J. Black•
Mr. Knud Rusmus Black
Miss Star llluck
Mr. Michael Hlucknwre
Mrs. Yuko Hlnir
Mrs. IJoroLhy E. Hm:llwriglH
Mr. Marcus Bock
Mr. J.J. Bcrelc$1•
Dr. Ernest Boesch
Pn>f. Jean Boisselicr"
Mr. T.L, Bolster
Mr. lloon Indrambtrrya
Miss Boonchan Sinprasert
Mr. Boonchuey Hiranprueck
Dr. Boonsong Lekagut•
Mr. Boonyasnk Jnijongkit
Prof. Boonyong Nikrodbanandn 11
Mr. William Booth
Luang Boribai Buribhandh
Luang Borihara Vanakhett*
Mr. Alexander Hay Borthwick

4::!7
Mrs. Marcelle Uo!ichun
Lt. Col. Jackson W. Bosley
Mr. Neil Wesley Boughner
Mr. Carroll G. Bo\veni\ll
Miss K!ltherine Howie
Mr. Richard C. Boylan
Dr. Philip A. Bradbeer
Dr. William L. Brudley
Mr. Heinz Braendli
Or. Nigel J. Brailey
Mrs. Betty R. Brunch
Mr. A. Brand
Mr. Peder Otto Brandt
Mr. German Brautigam
Mr. Kennon Breazeale•
Mr. M. Lyall Breckon
Mr. W.R. Brenchley
Miss P.A.C. Brider
Dr. W.S. Bristowc
Mrs. Bahia Britain
Dr. Collin M. Bri l ton
Mr. David Lee Brock
Mr. Warren Brockelman
Mr. Jean Claude Brodbeck
Mrs. Alvernn Brodecky
Mr. Jere Broh-Kahn'~~'
Dr. John F. Brohm
Miss Emmo R. Broisroan
Mr. P.D. Bronder
Mr. Bennet Bronson
Mr. Maurice Broughten
Mr. G. Broutigam
Mrs. Charlotte Brown
Mrs. Lorna M. Brown
Mr. Ian George Brown
Mr. Michael Brown
Mi.ss Roxanna M. Brown
Dr. Stuart Brown
Mr. R. Bruce
Mr. Willi Bruegger
Mr. Viggo Brun
Mr. Michel Bruneau
Mr. Eugene Bruns
Mr. C. Bryunt
Mr. Christian Buchli
Mrs. L.C. Edna Bulkley$!
Mr. Hinlock Bull, Jr.
Mr. Bunchana Atthakom!l<
Dr. Bunliang Tarnthai"'
Mr. Bunthin Atthakorn"'
Miss Mai Mui Burke
Prof. Robert Burnight
Dr. Alex C. Burr
Mr. William Spencer Burtenshaw•
Mr. John J.S. Burton
Mr. William R. Burton
Miss Busakorn Lailert
Miss Busuya Snnitwongsc
Mr. Noel F. Busch
Mom Rachawcmg Butri Viruvaidya
Mr. John W. Butt
Mr. Michnel J. Bux
Miss M. Cablusur
Mr. Juan Cadiz, Jr.
Mr. William Cadwallader
Miss Jacklyn A. Cahill
Mr. John Cairncross
Mr. M.M. Calavun
Mr. C.W. Callaway, Jr.*
Mr. SLUart C. Campbell
Capt. Donald J. Cunn
Mr. G.D. Carpenter*
Mr. Harry L. Carr
Mrs. E.M. Carrick
Mr. Richard A. Carrick
Miss A.F.M. Carter
Mrs. Carroll L. Cartwright•
Capt. T.P. Cassidy
Mr. Phillip E. Cast
Mr. Graham Catterwell
Mr. ChaiRuangsilp
Mr. Chai Sirisingh

Mr. Chninamng Indh!WHncesup
Mr. Chulermblmnd Srivikom
H.R.H. Princt) Chalermbol"'
Lt. Gen. Chalcrrnchui Churuvu!>tr
Miss Clwlermsri Dhamabutra
Rear-Admiral Chnlie Sindusopon
Mrs. Mury Challinor
Dr. James A. Chulmers
Dr. Chaloem PurlmmH.mdu•
Mr. Chnlong Soontruvunich
Mr. James Chamberlain
Mr. Theodore Chamberlain
Mr. Chamikorn Pun.tmtnanda•'
Mrs. Chamrwngsri Rutnin
Miss Cluunrieng Bhavichitru
Mt·. Chatchui Punanunon
Miss C'hum::hai Puckudhikom
Mrt>. Ch:.mcham Bunnug
Mr. Albert T. Cl!undler
Mr. David Chandler
Mr. Glen Clmndler
f'rof. K. Laurence Chung
Miss Ctmn:unru t Chiranupab
Mr. Churn C. Kunchanagum•
Mr. Clumwn Rucngvisesh
Mr. ChannJn Sibunruang
Mr. Chat Panyt.m.tchun
Mr. Cbuvalit Manjikul
Dr. Ranjil Rc)y Chaudhury
Mrs. Estrcll Chauls
Mr. Brinn G. Checlhum
Mr. Anthony Cheke
Mr. Chet Polpursi
Mr. ChctamL Nagavlijaru
Mr. Ponn Chhavann
Mr. J.M. Chiappe
Mr. Charles Chicarelli
Mr. Achille Chiesa
Miss Lucylee Chiles
Mr. Chin You-di
Mom Rachawong Chide Voravarn
Mr. Chitr Huubusuyu"
Mr. Chitrn Dunsuputra•
Mr. Chiui Tingsabudh
Mr. Chiumpnt Krairiksh
Mr. CIHi\\' Kwunyun~
Mr. Eugen!t Choy
Mr. Huns Chri&tensen
Dr. John J. Chri!>tiun
Mr. Raymond Christinger
Mr. Chudwrl Siriyakumpul
H.R.H. Princess ChumfXJt tlf N

Mr. Dwight Cramer
Mrs. Noel Crosthwaite
Miss Margaret Crowley
Mrs. Elizabeth Croy
Mr. J.L. Culbertson•
Mr. William H. Cumming!>~
Mr. Miguel Angel Cuneo
Mr. Richard D. Cushman"
Dr. George F. Dales
Col. Damnern Leakhukul
Dr. Oamrong Bejrubhayu
Mr. Damrong Changtrukul~~<
Mr. Lance Dane·
Dr. Garfield W. Danenho\ver Ill
Miss Cassandra Daniels
Mr. Daroon Balusiri
Mr. Jon Darrah
Mr. BertcH D. Davis
Mr. Richard B. Davis
Mrs. R.M. Davis
Mr. Vance S. Davis
Mr. Wulter Dean
Dr. Deb Menasveta
Mr. N.L. de Bock
Mrs. Rens de Boer
M.L. Dej Snidwong~> 9
Mr. Scott C. Delancey
Mr. T.J. Dulaney
Mr. Frank Delong
Hon. Olcott H. Deming
Dr. Bend Dengler
Dr. Eugene Denis
Mom Rachawong Devadaya Devakul
Dr. J.L. de Vries
Mr. F.C. de Weger*
Mr. Dbarmadasa Banij~
Dr. Ohara Sukhvachana"'
Mr. Dhien Keawkhamsaeng
Mr. T. Bennett Dickerson
Mr. Michael M.H. Dicks
Mr. A.C. Dickson
Mr. J~m1es M. Dillard
Mr. Michael K. Dirks
Mr. John Dudds~~>
Rev. PaulS. Dodge'~
Capt. Jt,seph F. Doll, Jr.
Mr. W.A.M. Doll,.,
Mr. Nicholas Dolphin
Dr. Domnern Garden
Mrs. Nancy Dowdell
Mr. Thomas A. Dowc
Rev. Ray Downs
Mr. Svcnd H. Drachmann"
Miss Duangducn Pisalbutra"'
Mr. Jurgen Droge
Mr. Daniel Droulers
Mr. Ernest Duchamp
Mrs. Madeleine Duddck
Prof. Ducn Bunnag
Mr. Jacques du Guerny
Mr. William H. Duke
Mr. Robert M. Duncan
Mrs. Christine M. Dunster
Dr. Ines Durana
Mr. Dusit Banijbatana
Mr. Michael J. Dux
Mrs. Virginia Dwyre
Mr. William R. Eaton
Mr. Joseph Eazekas
Mrs. Elizabeth Echternacht
Mr. Bruce Edmands
Mr. Henri Eecke*
Prof. S¢ren Egerod
Miss Madeline Ehrman
Mrs. E. Eisenbofer"'
Mr. Robert E. Elbel
Mr. Gove G. Elder
Mrs. Fred J. Elizalde
Mr. G. Ellis
Mr. Timothy David Ely
Mr. G.C. Emerson
Miss Adele Epstein

do
Miss Ruth M. Erlandson
Mr. Mogens Buy Esbensen
Dr. l!gon A. Ettinger•
Miss. Conswncc Ettridge
Mr. Euaypnrn Kerddwuuy
Mrs. Anne Evans
Mr. F.M. Evers
Prof. H.D. Evers
Dr. R.H.B. Exell
Mr. James Faddis
Mrs. FJ(>rence E. Fuder
' Mr. Frank Farner
Mr. F. Jeffery Farrell
Mrs. Frnncinc Faulhaber
Mr. Jean-Jacques Favre
Mr. Joseph Fa:;rekus
Mrs. Hillury l;'eddcrsen
Mr. David Harold Feeny
Prof. David A. Feingold~
Mrs. Irene Feruldil>
Mr. Jnmes Ferguson
Mrs. Dorothy H. Fickle
Mr. David Filbcck
Mr. David R. Finch
Mrs. Patricia Finney
Mr. B. Dennis Finuf
Mr. ErnM H. Fischer
Mr. Patrie M. Fitzgerald
Dr. Gebhard FJutz
Mr. Hurke I; letcher
Mrs. Ctwdin Flood
Mr. Hury Fogliettu
Mr. Ivan M. f;omtchev
Mr. James R Funakur:.hi
Mr. Hcrnamn Funk
Mr. Louis Gubuude
Mr. Do Khin ~,tuung Gate•
Miss Gnnigar Chinachtltc
Dr. Riclutrd A. Gmd
Mr. Loui~l S. Gnrdner
Dr. John Kennedy Gudtmd
Mrs. M.H. Garmany
Mrs. Joy Gurney
Mr. Derick Gamier
Mr. John (Jurtner
Mr. G. Cutely
Prof. William Robert Geddes
Dr. William Gedney"'
Mr. Robert Geesink
Dr. Rene Gelber
Dr. I:I. Gerlach'*
Miss Lorraine Gesick
Mr. Thomas W. Gething"'

431
Mr. John r. Getz•
Mr. Daniel Ghig()
Mr. Hugh Gibb'~'
Mr. D.J.Gibson
Mr. Ronald Roy Gilliam
Mr. Henry Ginsburg
Dr. G.A.R. Giri
Mr. Ulf Glattkowski
Mr. Terence G. Goates
Mrs. Marilyn Goertsen
Mr. Jay Goldstein
Mr. S. G~:inge
Dr. Chester F. Gorman
Mrs. Elizabeth Gosling
Prof. Lee A. Peter Gosling
Mr. David C. Goss
Dr. Douglas Gould
Dr. Joseph S. Gould"'
Mr. Mark Graham
Mrs. Adrienne Grandi
Mrs. B. Gilliam Green
Mrs. Stephen Green
Mrs. Richard R. Greene
Mr. Victor Grenier
Mr. Herbert G. Grether
Dr. M.E. Griffith ...
Mr. A.B. Griswold*
Mr. James J. Gromly
Dr. B.P. Groslier*
Mrs. U.L. Gueblcr*
Mr. Gerd Gutscllow
Dr. GUnther Hausch
Mr. James Allan Hafner
Mr. Hiromitsu Hakari
Mr. J~rgen Hnge
Dr. Klaus Hablweg
Prof. D.G.E. Hall
Mr. William E. Hall
Mr. Parker Hallberg
Mr. DavidS. Hallmark
Mr. Heiner Hamann
Mr. James Hamff
Mr. Jnmes W. Hamilton
Prof. E. John Hamlin
Miss Deborah S. Hammond
Mr. John Hancock
H.E. Mons. Han Lih-Wu"'
Dr. Lucien M. Hanks Jr.~
Maj. Joe D. Hanna, Jr.
Mr. Bertel Hansen
Mr. Per Svane Hansen
Mr. Rene S. Hansen
Dr. Vagn Hansen
Mr. M. William Haratunian
Mrs. Barbara Ann Harding*
Mr. Edgar C. Harrell
Mr. Jimmy G. Harris
Miss M.J. Harris
Mr. Paul Hartig
Mrs. Adda M. Hartmann*
Mr. John F. Hartmann
Mr. Jack Douglas Hastings*
Miss Georgene Hawe
Mr. Charles S. Hazen
Mujc)J' Richard W. Healy
Mr. Laurin Hall Healy
Mr. Hanspetcr Heckendorn
Mr. Richard L. Hecks
Mr. John L. Hedges
Mr. F.L. Heider
Mr. Wieger Hellema
Mr. H.H. HelHn
Prof. Mel Helstien
Mr. V.F. Hemmingsen*
Miss E.J.A. Henderson
Miss Gilliam M. Hepworth
Mr. Max E. Herman*
Mrs. Eugenia Herr
Dr. Georg Heuser*
Dr. Takeo Hibino
Mr. Allison Hiler
Mr. Guy Hill
Dr. Paul Hinder ling

4Jl
Mr. W.t~.
l!inc!!t
Mr. Curl Hirlh
Mr. Drummond Hisloy
Mr. A. V. flitch
Mr. Hock Siew Suw"
Prof. I Ierman L. Huch
Dr. B

Dr. Allen Kan:.
Mom Rachuwong Kasemsidphan
Kasem:;ri
Mr. Kaset Pitakp~tivan*
Mr. Kasil Piromya
Mr. Kasin Suvatabandhu*
Mr. Hans J. Kass
Mrs. Katherine Buri
Prof. Hans E. Kauffmann*
Mr. Howard Kaufman*
Mr. Seihei Kawaguchi
Miss Cathy Kay
Dr. Harvey Kayman
Mrs. I.W. Kellogg*
Mrs. Anne Kelly
Mr. Robert M. Kelly
Mr. Jeremy Hugh Kemp
Mr. Vamusar Keng
Miss Jean Kennedy
Mr. V.H. Kennedy
Mr. Jack H. Kent
Mr. Wolfram Kerber
Prof. Allen D. Kerr
Prof. Charles F. Keyes*
Mr. Khaisung Sukhnvadhana.
Mr. Khamsing Srinawk
Dr. Khasem Pansrivongse
Dr. Robert W. Kickert
Mr. Mikio Kida
Mr. Sokichi Kimura
Mr. Christopher J. King
Mr. Douglas J. King
Mrs. Madeline King
Mr. G. Kingma*
Mr. Konrad Kingshill"'
Mr. JH. Kinoshita*
Mr. William R. Kintner
Mr. Cbarles W. Kirkwood
Prof. A. Thomas Kirsch
Mr. Kyuichi Kitatani
Mr. Kitcha Vadhanasindhu
Mr. William J. Klausner
Mr. M.M. Kliks
Mr. David Knapp
Wing Comd. Peter Knapton
Mr. Bruce Knarr
Dr. E.J. Knez
Mrs. Erika M. Knodel
Mr. R J. Knowles
Dr. Edgar C. Knowlton Jr.
Mr. Kazurnnsa Kobayashi
Morn K

Mist~ Mary Lnmhcrls
Mr. Pnul l.nmszit:s
Miss Diunn Lnncaster
Mr. Kermeth P. Landon
Mrs. RN. Landreth
Mrs. Vlinwn Lane
M~1g. Dietter Lange
Mr. Henry P. Lange
Mrs. Munikn Lange
Mr. Charles C. Lantz
Mrs. Juhn W. Lnrkin
Mr. F. (ieoffrey Larminie
Mr. Wil!ium Larrabt~e
Prof. Kai Lursen
Mr. Douglas A.J. Latchford•
Mrs. Mary Eakin Lnugesen
Mr. Olga Leary
Mr. Uwn-Wci Lee
Mr. John {). Lt:e
Mr. Lee Seng Tee*
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Mr. Roberl Le~strna
Mr. Puul Lefeune
Mr. H. Leedom Leffert, Jr.
Mr. Sven-Olof Legnelius
Mr. Puul Lejeune
Mr. Jncqt1es Leme1ine
Mr. Leng Srisomwcmg!ie
H.E. Muns. Rtlgcr Lescot
Mr. L.E .. C. Letts•
M1s~ A. Levy
Prof. Paul Levy
Mr. David J, Lewis
Dr. Roger. P. Lewis
Mr. T.A. Lewis
Mr. James Uberty
Miss Ulrike Lichti
Mr. P. Paul Lightfoot
Mr. Limin Lamsam
Mr. Phillip Lilienthal
Miss Anita K. Lindkog
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Mrs. Rvbtn !~. Linen
Mr. Herbert Link
1\ir. Harvey Leve
Mr. Denys Litak:
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Mr. Shewak T. Mahtani
Mil'is Mnlikn Vitjrathon
Miss Mulinee Dtlokw~mich
Mn.is Malmee Par1ponpochanapisuti"'
Mrs. Maly Manfredr-Curzt
MtMi Ann Mallery
Phya Mnnavu Rnja Sevi"'
Mrs. C. Mnngskuu'"'
Mrs. Mnni Strivorasarn 41
Mom Luang Manicb Jumsai
Mr. Aldo Manos
1-I.S.H. Princehs Marayat Diskul
Mr. Bevars D. Marby
Miss Margaret G. Marchant

Mrs. MargaretUngphakorn~
Mass D

Mr. Takau N:1kuynmt1.
Mbs Nulini Nunmunuhacminda
Mt£5 Nun~nme Prum~t1wunsiri
lUU:l Prmcc Wun Waithayulwrn,
Krcnmumm Nuradhip Hongspmbandh•
Mr. Nurin lndhewnl
Prof. Nallh Bhamnrupruvati
Mr. NnvMI
Mr. Rubert Nuhn
Mr. Num Yoonaitharma
Mrs. Sylvin Nyffclcr
Mr. Obus Vnlligtwkurtt
Dr. Tnry() Obuyashi
Mr. I. John Obermiller
Mr. !fans Geurg Oblunder'*
Mr. Sanley James O'Conner
Mrs. Jacqueline O'Dwyer
Dr. H.C. Ocrmann
Mr. Samuel C. Ogresby
Miss P.ll. Ohls

437
Mr. r,huyome l.ekhyammda
Mr. Phongsuk Phongtarnnont
M1ss f>hurnphun Chongvatana
Mr. Pilot Luuhakirti
Mrs. Jenny Pinslunovich
Mr. Ptchai Vu~anasoog*
Mr. Harry H. P!l:rson*
Ik Mtchaet Pietru!lewsky
Mr. Davis Pike
Miss Ptkul Malnsiddh
Mom Ruchawong Ptmsai Amranand 41
Mmn Luang Pm Mnlakul
Mr. Pipat Krairiksh*
Mr. Piriya Krairiksb
Luang Pisith Markwitban
Mrs. Sarah Pius
Mr. Piya Jittnhm*
H.S.H. Prince Piyarangsit Rangsit"'
Mr. Piyasvustri Arnrammd"'
Mom Luang Plaichumpol Kitiyakam*
Mr. Vagn G.A. Plenge
Mr. Raymond Plicm-Bernier
Mr. Pochana Snidvoogs*
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Dr. J,J. Poldy
Mom Luang Pongswnt Wushariwongse
Miss .Pornpen Huntrakul
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Mr. Robert L. Potts
Mr. Robert Poupart
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Mr. Thomas F. Power
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Mr. Prachitr Yossundura*
Dr. Prachoom Chomchai
Mr. Prakhan Namthip
Mrs. Prakhin Xumsai Na Ayudhaya
Mr. Pramude Buranasiri
Miss Prapar Bud*
Mr. Prapat Saengwanit
Mr. Praphote Paurohitya
Mr. Prasarn Bhiraj Buri"'
Mr. Prasat Panyarachun•
Prof. Prasert Na Nagurai$1
Dr. Prasen Sombuntbnm"'
tvfr. Prasit Buri*
Dr. Prasob Ratanakorn
Mr. Prasong Bunchocm
Mr. Pratecb Chuntakctta
Mr. Prateep Mahasuwan
Mr. Davis Pratt
H.H. Prince Prcm Puracbatra
Mr. Prceja Jumchai
Mr. Pncba Amatyukul"
Luang Promadhut
Mom Rachawong Prudhisan Jumbala
Mr. James B. Pruess
Mom Rachawong Puckpring Tongyai
Mr. Herbert C. Purnell"'
Miss Pussadee Limbasuta
Mr. Jcf'rey Race
Dr. Rachit Buri
Mr. H.W. Rock)
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Mr. Dacre F.A. Raikes
Mr. E. Rumault
Mr. N. Robert Ranaw
Dr. Rapeepongse Dhuvakum
Mrs. Rareun Netrayon Gurden
Gen. Rasmee Raja n iva l•
Mr. Haroon Rashid
Miss Ratrie Wanichalaksa
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Mrs. Gertrud Rebhan*
M r, Gene Reese
Mr. Philip A. Reeves
Mr. John M. Reid
Mrs. Anne Reilly
Miss Rekha Tongswasd
Mr. Ronald Renard
Mr. David E. Reuther
Mr. Graig J. Reynolds

438
Mr. Phillip J. Reynulds
Mrs. E.M.J. R idgeun
Mr. Huns A. Ries
Pwf. f;red W. Ril;lg~ 111
Mrs. Susan C. Riley•
Mr. Wtllmrn 1\,1. R1ley
Mr. Serge Rips•
Mr. Rtehurd F. Rivers
Mr. George H. Rtlbcrt, Jr.
Mr. Kenneth Roberts
Miss Michele Robens
Mrs. Eli:zubeth Rt>bmsun
Mrs. Helen A. Rocke
Dr. Robert R. R.ofcn
Miss Lucile Rger
Mrs. Pauline It Rogers
Miss Lucile Roger
Mr. A f~ollinson
Mr. Jcrr Romm
Prof. Rung Syamamtnda
Mr. James P. Rooney
Mom Ruchawong Rosalin Gagunnnga•
Dr. D.P. Ruse
Mr. Klaus Rtm;mberg
Mrs. C:Jnrc Rt>lH!fltield
Mrs. Saul R1.:~!>sicn
Mr. Peter ·r. Roth
Mr. Jason ltousl\OS
Mr. Ruchai Knnj.anavanit
Mr. Albert J. Rub
Mr. Dum1 W. Rus~>eW
Mr. Paul Rutter
Mr. 'fre~tor John RuLter
Dr. Rniko H. Ruzic
Mr. Kevin A. Ryon
Rev. Horace W. R)'burn
Mr. S!Htd Chaiwan
Mr. Sa-ard Boonkird
Mr. Irving Sablo:,ky
Mrs. Veena Sachdev
Mom Rachawong Saengsome Ka.semsd•
Mr. Williurn Sage
Suo SiuMong'
Mil'S Nancy Leiln Stidku
Mr. David Sublbtrg•
Mr. Waldt~mur Sailer
Mr. Tuk.eshi Sakumtll

439
Mr. Puut F. Scholln
Mr. Adrianus Schrama
Dr. E.P. Schrock•
Mr Martin Schulman
Mrs. Christine Schumann
Mr. Erwin Schurtenberger
Mr. Dale L. Schurter
Mr. Wayne Schutje,r
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Mr. Gunter Schweikle
Mrs. Miriam McNair Scott
Mr. Thomas Scovel
Lt Col. Thomas A. Seale
Dr. Harold W. See
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Mr. W.H.P. Seeger
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Miss S. Sena•
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Mr. Seri Suddhaphakti
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Mr. James 0. Sbaddy
Mr. Ram Chandra Sharma
Mrs. Sharon K. Vinyaratn
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Mr. Hume Shawcross
Prof. Yoshiro Shiratori
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H.S. H. Princess Sib pan Sonakul
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Prof. B.H.S. Simmonds
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Mr. Sulhep Suontuornpa>uch
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Miss Suwanna Sudjaw

111>1' llf '>!I'Mill'll!>
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lvfr. Tun Kim Huon
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11\ir. Pierre Tixier
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Mr. Vai Vathanakul
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Miss Vanna Lee Arxun
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Mr. J.D. van Ocnen
l'vk Edward Van Roy
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Khun Varunyuplm Snidvongl>'"
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Mr. Warren II. W

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Mr. Wiraj Nn Songkhla"
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