Tensions and Experimentations of Kingship
King Narai and his Response to Missionary Overtures in the 1680s
Abstract
Following a piece published in the previous issue of this journal analysing the nature of sacred kingship in 17th century Ayutthaya, this article proceeds to show how these tensions in the performance of royal office shaped King Narai’s response to Christian proselytism in the 1680s. This involves a consideration of his increasing residence in Lopburi; his fractious relationship with the Buddhist monastic order; his desire to innovate in the field of astrology and chronicle writing; the appeal of French culture and monarchical grandeur; and the possibility that his metaphysical worldview underwent a significant shift towards deism. With the exception of the latter, for which the evidence is dubious, all these themes helped stimulate hopes among the French that his conversion was indeed a real possibility. This was largely an illusion: while Narai chafed within the confines of his role, and remained curious and cosmopolitan in his tastes, there was no great structural crisis which the French could take advantage of, and nor were they able to precipitate one.
References
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Sahlins, Marshall. 1985. Islands of History. Chicago.
Smithies, Michael, ed. 1986. The Discourses at Versailles of the First Siamese Ambassadors to France. Bangkok.
Smithies, Michael, ed., tr. 1997. Aspects of the Embassy to Siam 1685. Chiang Mai.
Smithies, Michael, 2002. Mission Made Impossible. Chiang Mai.
Smithies, Michael. 2003a. ‘Eclipses in Siam 1685 and 1688, and their Representation’, JSS 91.
Smithies, Michael. 2003b. ‘An Anonymous Pamphlet of 1690 concerning Events in Siam in 1688’ in The Siam Society, Dedications to Her Royal Highness Princess Galyani Vadhana Krom Luang Naradhiwas Rajanagarindra on her 80th birthday. Bangkok.
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Strathern, Alan. 2007. Kingship and Conversion in Sixteenth Century Sri Lanka: Portuguese Imperialism in a Buddhist Land. Cambridge.
Strathern, Alan. 2019a, ‘Sacred Kingship under King Narai of Ayutthaya (1656-88): Divinisation and Righteousness’, JSS 107, 1.
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Tachard, Guy. 1686. Voyage de Siam des Pères Jésuites Envoyez par le Roy aux Indes & à la Chine: avex leurs Observations, Astronomiques, et leurs Remarques de Physique, de Géographie, d’Hydrographie, & d’Histoire. Paris.
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Trakulhun, Sven. 1997. ‘The view from the outside: Nicolas Gervaise, Simon de la Loubère and the Perception of Seventeenth Century Siamese Government and Society’, JSS 85.
Tun Aung Chain, ed. 2005. Chronicle of Ayutthaya: A translation of the Yodaya Yazawin. Yangon.
Turpin, François-Henri. 1771. Histoire civile et naturelle du Royaume de Siam et des Révolutions qui lui ont bouleversé cet Empire jusqu’en 1770. Paris. 2 vols.
Van der Cruysse, Dirk. 2002. Siam and the West, 1500-1700, translated by Michael Smithies. Chiang Mai.
Vollant des Verquains, Jean. 1691. Histoire de la révolution de Siam arrivée en l’année 1688. Lille.
Whitmarsh, Tim. 2016. Battling the Gods: Atheism in the Ancient World. London.
Wyatt, David. 2001. Thailand: A Short History. Chiang Mai.
Baker, Chris and Pasuk Phongpaichit. 2016. The Palace Law of Ayutthaya and the Thammasat:Law and Kingship in Siam. Ithaca, NY.
Baker, Chris and Pasuk Phongpaichit. 2017. A History of Ayutthaya: Siam in the Early Modern World. Cambridge.
Betts, C.J. 1984. Early Deism in France: From the so-called ‘déistes’ of Lyon (1564) to Voltaire’s ‘Lettres philosophiques’ (1734). The Hague.
Bèze, Claude de. 1947. Mémoire du Pere de Beze sur la vie de Constance Phaulkon, premier minister du roi de Siam Phra Narai et sa triste fin, ed. Jean Drans and Henri Bernard. Tokyo.
Bhawan Ruangsilp. 2007. Dutch East India Company Merchants at the Court of Ayutthaya: Dutch Perceptions of the Thai Kingdom, ca. 1604-1765. Leiden and Boston.
Boxer, C.R. 1951. The Christian Century in Japan. Berkeley, CA.
Busayakul, Visudh, trans. 2002. The Diary of Kosa Pan (Thai Ambassador to France. June-July 1686), introduced by Dirk Van der Cruysse, and edited by Michael Smithies. Chiang Mai.
Céberet, Claude. 1992. Étude historique et critique du Journal du voyage de Siam de Claude Céberet, Envoyé extraordinaire du Roi en 1687 et 1688, ed. Michel Jacq-Hergoualc’h. Paris.
Chaumont, Alexandre de. 1733 [1686]. Relation de l’ambassade de Monsieur le chevalier de Chaumont à la Cour du Roy de Siam, avec ce qui s’est passé de plus remarquable durant son voyage. Paris.
Choisy, François-Timoléon de. 1687. Journal du voyage de Siam fait en 1685 et 1686. Paris.
Choisy, François-Timoléon de. 1995. Journal du Voyage de Siam, ed. Dirk van de Cruysse. Paris [This includes the ‘Mémoire sur le commerce des Indes Orientales’ and the ‘Mémoire pour server à l’histoire de Louis XIV’].
Curtius Rufus, Quintus. 1976. History of Alexander. Trans. J. C. Rolffe. Cambridge, MA.
Davies, Jason P. 2004. Rome’s Religious History. Livy, Tacitus and Ammianus on their Gods. Cambridge.
Dew, Nicholas. 2009. Orientalism in Louis XIV’s France. Oxford.
Dhiravat na Pombejra. 1984. ‘A Political History of Siam Under the Prasatthong Dynasty: 1629-1688’. PhD. thesis, University of London.
Dhiravat na Pombejra and Michael Smithies. 2011. ‘The Instructions given to the Siamese envoys sent to Portugal’ in Smithies 2011. Bangkok.
Dhiravat na Pombejra, tr. 2015. ‘Khlong chaloem phrakiat somdet phra narai’ [Eulogy of King Narai], pp. 61-140 in Winai Pongsripian and Trongjai Hutangkura, Moradok khwam songjam haeng nopaburi si lawotayapura wa duai khlong chaloemphrakiat somdet phra narai lae jaruek boran haeng mueang lawo [Legacy of Nopaburi Si Lawotayapura in the eulogy of King Narai and ancient inscriptions of Lawo]. Bangkok.
Forbin, Claude de. 1991 [1729]. Le voyage du comte de Forbin à Siam, 1685-8. Paris.
Forest, Alain. 1998. Les missionnaires francais au Tonkin at au Siam (XVIIe-XVIIe siècles). Analyse comparée d’un relatif succès et d’un échec total. 3 vols, Paris.
Gervaise, Nicolas. 1688. Histoire naturelle et politique du Royaume du Siam. Paris.
Halikowski Smith, Stefan C.A. 2011. ‘Floating European Clergy in Siam during the Years Immediately Prior to the National Revolution of 1688: The Letters of Giovanni Battista Morelli, O.F.M.’ in Reinterpreting Indian Ocean Worlds: Essays in Honour of Kirti N. Chaudhuri, ed. Stefan C. A. Halikowski Smith. Newcastle upon Tyne.
Hodges, Ian. 1999. ‘Time in Transition: King Narai and the Luang Prasoet Chronicle of Ayutthaya’, JSS 87.
Hsia, Florence C. 2009. Sojourners in a Strange Land: Jesuits and Their Scientific Missions in Late Imperial China. Chicago.
Hutchinson, E.W. 1940. Adventurers in Siam in the Seventeenth Century. London.
Irving, David R.M. 2012. ‘Lully in Siam: music and diplomacy in French–Siamese cultural exchanges, 1680–1690’, Early Music 40. 393-40.
Jacq-Hergoualc’h, Michel. 1993. L’Europe et le Siam du XVIe au XVIIIe siècle: apports culturels. Paris.
Julispong, Chularatna. 2017. ‘Indo-Persian Influence on Late Ayutthaya Art, Architecture, and Design’, JSS 105.
Kemp, Jeremy. 1969. Aspects of Siamese Kingship in the Seventeenth Century. Bangkok.
Lane Fox, Robin. 1973. Alexander the Great. London.
Launay, Adrien, ed. 1920. Histoire de la Mission de Siam. Documents historiques, Vol I. Paris.
Le Blanc, Marcel. 1692. Histoire de la révolution du royaume de Siam , arrivée en l’année 1688. Lyon. 2 volumes.
Loubère, Simon de La. 1987 [1691]. Étude historique et critique du livre de Simon de La Loubère ‘Du Royaume de Siam’, ed. Michel Jacq-Hergoualc’h. Paris.
Love, Ronald S. 1999. ‘Monarchs, Merchants, and Missionaries in Early Modern Asia: The Missions Étrangères in Siam, 1662-1684’, International History Review, XXI/1.
Love, Ronald S. 2006. ‘Royal Protocol and Cultural Synthesis in the Preparations for the Chevalier de Chaumont’s Embassy to Siam in 1685’, Proceedings of the Western Society for French History, 34.
Muhammad Rabi, Ibn Muhammad Ibrahim. 1972. The Ship of Sulaiman, translated from the Persian by John O’Kane. London.
Nidhi Eoseewong. 2005. Pen and sail: literature and history in early Bangkok. Chiang Mai.
Pieris, Paul, tr. 1908. Religious intercourse between Ceylon and Siam in the eighteenth century. Bangkok.
Reid, Anthony. 1993. Southeast Asia in the Age of Commerce, 1450-1680, Volume II: Expansion and Crisis. New Haven.
Relation des Missions et des voyages des Evesques Vicaires Aposostoliques et de leurs Ecclesiastiques és années 1672, 1673, 1674 & 1675. 1680. Paris.
Relation des Missions et des Voyages des Evesques Vicaires Apostoliques et de leurs ecclèsiastiques és années 1676 et 1677. 1680. Paris.
Ribadeneira, Marcelo de. 1970. History of the Philippines and other Kingdoms [1601], Volume 1, trans. Pacita Fernandez. Manila.
Riello, Georgio. 2017. ‘With Great Pomp and Magnificence: Royal Gifts and the Embassies between Siam and France in the 1680s’ in Global Gifts: The Material Culture of Diplomacy in Early Modern Eurasia, eds. Giorgio Riello, Zoltán Biedermann, Anne Gerritsen. Cambridge. 235-65.
RCA: The Royal Chronicles of Ayutthaya. 2000. Editor, David K. Wyatt. Translated by Richard D. Cushman. 2nd Edition, Bangkok.
Rubiés, Joan-Pau. 2019. ‘Comparing Cultures in the Early Modern World: Hierarchies, Genealogies and the idea of European Modernity’ in R. Gagné, S. Goldhill, G.E.R. Lloyd, eds. Regimes of Comparatism: Frameworks of Comparison in History, Religion and Anthropology. Leiden. 116-176.
Sahlins, Marshall. 1985. Islands of History. Chicago.
Smithies, Michael, ed. 1986. The Discourses at Versailles of the First Siamese Ambassadors to France. Bangkok.
Smithies, Michael, ed., tr. 1997. Aspects of the Embassy to Siam 1685. Chiang Mai.
Smithies, Michael, 2002. Mission Made Impossible. Chiang Mai.
Smithies, Michael. 2003a. ‘Eclipses in Siam 1685 and 1688, and their Representation’, JSS 91.
Smithies, Michael. 2003b. ‘An Anonymous Pamphlet of 1690 concerning Events in Siam in 1688’ in The Siam Society, Dedications to Her Royal Highness Princess Galyani Vadhana Krom Luang Naradhiwas Rajanagarindra on her 80th birthday. Bangkok.
Smithies, Michael, ed. 2011. Five Hundred Years of Thai-Portuguese Relations: A Festschrift. Bangkok.
Strathern, Alan. 2007. Kingship and Conversion in Sixteenth Century Sri Lanka: Portuguese Imperialism in a Buddhist Land. Cambridge.
Strathern, Alan. 2019a, ‘Sacred Kingship under King Narai of Ayutthaya (1656-88): Divinisation and Righteousness’, JSS 107, 1.
Strathern, Alan. 2019b. Unearthly Powers: Religious and Political Change in World History. Cambridge.
Strathern, Alan. Forthcoming. Converting Kings: Kongo, Japan, Thailand, and Hawaii Compared 1450-1850. Cambridge.
Tachard, Guy. 1686. Voyage de Siam des Pères Jésuites Envoyez par le Roy aux Indes & à la Chine: avex leurs Observations, Astronomiques, et leurs Remarques de Physique, de Géographie, d’Hydrographie, & d’Histoire. Paris.
Tachard, Guy. 1689. Seconde Voyage du Père Tachard et des Jésuites envoyez par le Roy au Royaume de Siam. Contenant diverses remarques d’Histoire, de Physique, de Géographie, & d’ Astronomie. Paris. Tokyo Bunko MS 48, 77.
Trakulhun, Sven. 1997. ‘The view from the outside: Nicolas Gervaise, Simon de la Loubère and the Perception of Seventeenth Century Siamese Government and Society’, JSS 85.
Tun Aung Chain, ed. 2005. Chronicle of Ayutthaya: A translation of the Yodaya Yazawin. Yangon.
Turpin, François-Henri. 1771. Histoire civile et naturelle du Royaume de Siam et des Révolutions qui lui ont bouleversé cet Empire jusqu’en 1770. Paris. 2 vols.
Van der Cruysse, Dirk. 2002. Siam and the West, 1500-1700, translated by Michael Smithies. Chiang Mai.
Vollant des Verquains, Jean. 1691. Histoire de la révolution de Siam arrivée en l’année 1688. Lille.
Whitmarsh, Tim. 2016. Battling the Gods: Atheism in the Ancient World. London.
Wyatt, David. 2001. Thailand: A Short History. Chiang Mai.
