Thailand: The History Of The Kingdom Of Thailand

The Thai kingdoms have played an important role in the politics for centuries of Southeast Asia. Located at Sukhothai ( 13th-14th century), at Ayutthaya ( 1350-1767), and at the present capital, Bangkok (since 1782), the essentially city-states of the Thai held sway at different times from Singapore to the border of China and from the mouth of the Irrawaddy to the lower reaches of the Mekong River. Therefore, this domain could provide the resources of men and food necessary to maintain the intricate system of plunder, threat, conquest, and elaborate ceremonial, which was traditional kingship -- the political form of much of ancient Southeast Asia particularly in Burma, Laos, Cambodia, Malaya, and Indonesia as well as Thailand. During many centuries, these regions, with the exception of the mouth of the Mekong, have come to be inhabited by Thai-speaking people: the Shan, the Lao, and the Siamese proper.

The official name for the present kingdom of Thailand was Siam until 1939 and from 1946 to 1949. In 1939 and again in 1949 it changed to Thailand, a name that carries a certain note of nationalism and irredentism. Thailand of the present day is in the center of the Southeast Asia peninsula between the fifth and 21st north parallels and the 97th and 106th east meridians. Four topographically distinct regions are generally recognized within Thailand's borders. The watershed of the Čhao Phraya River, which is entirely in Thailand, makes up two regions -- first, the northern highlands which are constituted by the valleys of the Ping, Wang, Yom, and Nan rivers, the major tributaries of the Čhao Phraya, and, second, the central region, a broad alluvial plain and delta. Thailand bordered by Cambodia on the east, Laos on the east and nor...

... middle of paper ...

...entral Plain of what is now Thailand was neither not nearly as populous nor as densely settled as it is today. Where now there are rice-fields in every direction, back then there was still lush forest, much wildlife like elephants and even tigers, and few buildings to interrupt the skyline. Much of the southern part of the plain - which we will here call by its ancient name, Siam - was then still inundated much of the year, either by the sea or by overflowing rivers that rushed down from the north laden with the silt that ultimately would make it among the most productive rice-plains in the world. Human habitation was concentrated around the fringes of the plain, from Ratburi, Phetburi, Nakhon Chaisi and Suphanburi on the west; Although this area was similar to the important areas that lay beyond it in all directions, it also had a distinctive identity of its own.