Arms and Armour

Ayutthaya Kingdom

The Ayutthaya Kingdom or the Empire of Ayutthaya was a Thai kingdom that existed in Southeast Asia from 1351 to 1767, centered around the city of Ayutthaya, in Siam, or present-day Thailand. European travellers in the early 16th century called Ayutthaya one of the three great powers of Asia alongside Vijayanagara and Ming China. Ayutthaya is considered the precursor of modern Thailand. The name derives from the Sanskrit Ayodhya, by way of the Ramakien, Thailand's national epic. The kingdom emerged in the late 13th and 14th centuries from a mandala of four maritime city-states in the lower Chao Phraya valley, including Ayodhya, Lavo, Phrip Phri, and Suphannaphum. The early kingdom was a maritime confederation oriented to post-Srivijaya maritime Southeast Asia, raiding it and drawing tribute from it. Two centuries of organization from the Northern Cities and a shift to a hinterland state followed, after which Ayutthaya centralized. From 1569 to 1584 it was a vassal of Toungoo Burma, then regained independence. In the 17th and 18th centuries it became a centre of international trade and its culture flourished. Under Narai (r. 1657–1688) Persian and then European influence was strong, and an embassy went to the court of Louis XIV in 1686. The late period saw the French and English leave and the Chinese rise, and has been called a "golden age" of Siamese culture, with Chinese trade and the introduction of capitalism into Siam continuing to grow in the centuries after the kingdom fell. Ayutthaya's failure to settle a peaceful order of succession, and the arrival of capitalism, undermined the organization of its elite and the bonds of labour control on which its army and administration rested. In the mid-18th century, the Burmese Konbaung invaded Ayutthaya in 1759–1760 and 1765–1767. In April 1767, after a 14-month siege, the city fell and was destroyed, ending the 417-year-old kingdom. Siam recovered quickly, and within fifteen years the seat of authority had moved to Thonburi and Bangkok.

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See also

• ▸Battle of St. John's
• ▸1980s
• ▸Client kingdoms in ancient Rome

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Text from Wikipedia; plate via Wikimedia Commons. Text CC BY-SA 4.0; plate freely licensed (see Commons). Source record. Images and catalogue data are reproduced from open-access collections.