Journal of the Siam Society [XVII]

Citation preview

·THE

JOURNAL 01!' THE

SIA·M SOCIETY

VOLlJJ\II~

X.V I I

( PA.R':r l)

BANGKOK 1923. Tssnnrl to :\Tom lwrR nf tlw April

.

8o to be seen there. These old cities may have been Camb~dian fortresseR dating from a period long before the present town o£ KhorU.t was built. In Khorii.t yon mu,y stay at the railway station or better, if you can arrange so with. the French Legation in B:tngkok, at U1e unoccupied consulate building which is not fnr from the station a11d quite a comfortahle place at tl~ 'l'he town itself is not very inte1·esting nor picturesque being too dirty

.

(

5

)

uud itH rt)ttr, when· this-for sume few mcmLh>~ uvmy yu,tr-hegin~ t.ln We find t1ccornmodation in a rest,honst• hdonging to tlu• i\1 fin ri Vt'l' Nn.vign.tion Comptt;ty. \VhilL~ tho seenel',V hdwcr·n Kltur:l.t at11l 'l'i~ Chi1ng is open eonutry dotted with villagu~ awl rtl>onnrling in i)J'(J:td paddyfields, it is not. ~;u hctwe\m TiL Chiiug and Pltinmi ... wlwre it mostly is ltigh forest-covered ln,ncl: indued we. piLH:'l tlu.·oug·!t Ll11.~ udgceing the many old cities, some built in squares, and others in rings, but tlmt is another story. 'l'he second clay a£Ler tt l'ide of 1:3 kilometres we stop in the village of N ong 1'ayoi, where we get our tiflin under the splendid shady mango trees in t,he \Vat. In the aftemoon, luwing done another 13 kilometres, we leave the "ta,ng luang" and, turning N. E. for a short distance, halt :1t Bn.n Noug Krastng, where we mtwp outside the vVttt at the edge of the Nong. We h:.tve now only 11 kilometre1:1 left to reach Phimai. In t,he enrly morning of the third dn.y we trob through the dew dripping bamboo jn11gle, startling nmnbcrH ol' junglefowls and crow phcasttnts which n.bound here, and :sucldeuly we rncct the t,elegraph line running Eastwtnds from Khorat to Ubon. We follow this for sometime but soou afterwarclfl tum directly North and having crossed a lot of more o1· lesfl clcla.pidated wooden bridges Rpanning a number ol' suu.tlt streams, we now see the ancient city of Phinu1i looming np against the sky with its r111nparb8 and t;t\l treEJR. We enter through tho Southern gate-Prat-.n Ulmi-built of sandstone ttncl just sufficiently high to let a howdtth'd elephant pl}SS through. 'l'ho gnte is an exact, copy of thoRo in Angkor tho Grmtt. We pass along a long ttnd straight street lined on both Hides with the hotulos und ganlen8 of: bhe inhabitants, besides several rather uninteresting wttts. lUght at, the end or the street you sec the Southern Gopnm or entrance to the great temple with its terrace in front, 8. W. of which is seen a building called "Phra Klang" or the "trear-mry" built of sn,ndstonn blocks or blocks mn.dc of "silaleng" this wellknown n:.ttural sort of cement. This building is ce{:'ttLinly of Khmer origin and w11s prob:.tbly uc;ed for flecubr purposes. \Ve do not enter tho temple at once but. W ki mi phU

"' !Ufl

1tl 1:nVl:w~ 1tl1:A

Tiger

Po ki

Vi!l

!"lll

Bear

The

'Ul'l

Horlle

Yisi

n:u'il

Elephant

'1.-

:Wl '1.-

'lll~

A

~.J.

).

,.

IUchh8

(

,Vl~

)

English

IJ.Jl!!!l9ll I

~

Ill~

85

Karen

Rhinoceros

Du

!'lllA'Jli.J

t.l ::'WV'i'\.HJ ,l.

Bufl'alo's horn

Pa nino'

!~!Jl!:l-fl

l 'Vlf1:1~tl

Oat's claw

'l'ho ka mo'

vnnu..n

,l. ~~n::m~

Dog's tail

'rhui kami

u~:~lll:!!:J.J:

Wild boar's tusk Te mi tame

.!:

I

,,

l'l!m VI~!Jl ttwindawgyi "). Finally, I beg to point out a misprint in the n.bove cited notes on the tra,mllation ot' PhrnJ Phetehabun's paper, namely on p. 48, where some Kha OhiaNai ttre mentioned; the correct name is OhittHtLi.

10;)

)

Notices of Books.

CoMM'l'. EmK SEIDENFADEN.-Uol\IPLEMEN~r A r)INVEN'l'AlltE DE!:lOHlPl'IF nw; MoNmlEN'l'R nn CAlllBOIKlE PoUR LES t~UA'l'ltE PIWVlNOES JJU SIAl\l OmENTAL. (Hanoi, 1922).

Sous ce titre, lc Oommt. E. Seideufadeu vient de puhliet· dans Je f3ulletin de l'Ecole fmnc;ai:-;e d'Extreme-Orieut (vol. XXII) une importante contribution l'archeologie 11U Siam. O'est des::;ein que je dis: archeologie du Siam, et non archeologie · siamoi:-:H3, car lo memoire du Oommt. Seidenfanden traite exclusivement des monuments khmers des provinces d'Ubou, de Hoi Et, d'Udon et de Nakhon Rajasima. L'inventaire des ruines khmeres de cett.e region avait deja ete etabli par le Oommt. Lunet de LajOIHIUiere et publie par les soins de l'Ecole franc;aise d' Extreme-Orient en 1907. Cet iuventtdre avait lni-merne ete precede par leH tl'UVUUX arc}u~Ologique::; de M.. Aylllouier (Le CU'mbotlge, vol. JI, PttriH, · HJOl), ma1" il reHtttit encore bcaucoup !\ gl11ner ttpres cm; deux explorateur~::~.

a

a

Pendant le sejour de ouze m1s qu'il iit dans le SiMu Oriental au service de la C.lend.:~rmet'ie ::;imuoi~::~e, le Connnt. Seideufadeu snt mettre profit. SCS }ougues toUrlleOS d'inspuctiou, et HOll interet pour les etudes historii!UCS et archeoJogii!UO,'l lui 11 penni::; de l't\COI!lla}tre U.n certain uombre de lliOIHllll(\lltfl qui avaieut eclutppe it, SCS devauciers. "On verra, dit-il au debut de ::;on article, que j'ai recouuu 26 nouveaux sanctuu,ire~::~, dont llll temple taille dans le roc, un gmnd chaitya, 4 vieilles cit6s, 7 inscriptions, et .enlin 18 locttliteH 01\ se trouvent des sttttuet~, autcl~::~ et autreH objets present

CJl?l

~

rlt!U -~

'1l1tl

_II .!!J u "" I mw w1 CJU fi'lfljj vt:r'fJ u:r:::L wru UtJJJ

""

ul v 1

1t?lL~U

flU liil'W

u tl'EJ mm. m.m VIm

91W~n

L1tllJ ''

...,

nu

r.fl ~tl~

L

2.1

l?l'fJ~

nu 1u th.

ljl,

!ill u:r:::Ln'lll. 2.1

m

G',J

urm Luw '1l1tJ y

~'fJU l~'"l'U

J llvlr.fj~

fl~l:W rorr~ [7]1Jj ~ 1rc>J1flUflcil~ vn L~U fl

LUW

~u 1(7]fl~llJ ~~

mfi>J~lLmJ U~L~j] u~

i~ll lu fllli~ flU L~tl~ flU ~'tllDlJ1lf}l2) 1rnu lrn

L1~

- LD u LL~

d

'

lf}lW"l~ L~U

d\11 ' Jj

Q.)

.!!.

I

ufu lu. ~.

,I

d.

•

Lwn:: Lfir:J lJlfl ~ u~

m~1! 'f]~a ~r:JlU urn~ tmtl

~ul~ 1l?i'fl~l:W

\llV vm .d.· Vl nr.:vil Lrn

"ilr:J~ •J

llll '

d.

9.)

L"ill :w :w

LL~:; :Wfl

.I

""

luU ~Urn

m .!!.

LJ''tl~

,I v

rc>J::

ut'llJ

d.

d

:w n

LWJ'l~

tf Ut'lfl du "il'ltl L~'El w~n ~u ~u :rv ~1ll?i' wu ~~ "illtl rlu u u ll1fl ~~ Wl w~n lU urill Ltll 1flTWtl ~~ t~u'l~ ~u MLUU rc>J"1WU lliJu ~ ~rn Uflflfi "illW)fl y

1

?

· ~1t~9::

d11~ ~ L~u A1t?l

LWrl~ u~1JJLfltJ 1l7i''ll11

LV1Wly ~1~ lfltl

MLWJ'l~ w~fl udu ~u 1~ f~~ ~ 1 LAu VJm6 ( wu ) "il'tl~ r1u ~~ W~n tf LWJ'l~ flU ~~W~n fll~lf}lvLMU Vl:rwtf l~v~ rnu ~1r:Jl~vnu

m:r uffiJ

·

n

~~ "il:: L'El1lU ~fl ~'CJU i.~v~ lf}l lfw vl~ ~ lm f. y ' u m~rn.

~1 ffiu ~mJ ,1fltllfl:U

n.

m:r

~1l71 L~uu l~ LU u

"il.

fllj'

~~n

LLn::

~u 111'1 LUU flU m~ LLvi LUU rc>J'lu~u 1-illu.

( 148

.!.

.!.

L~tl~ ~~

L~tl~

u

vn~

'

LL~ m~

.d

111

)

L~l 9~

A LFlttl~

:uA

A

,!!,

!711-Jl?l:r vt:rtl

~ A

:u~m:r

~

uu

rt ~lL~- Lrum:; 1u ~u u1 r1w 1~ d~ L~1 u\J ~u 11~1-n~ m~ :w~1vt:rr1W rn~ i1 vi1 LWt'l~

'Zl.

i1 Llt'l

rt m:r 1°1 flU :r~~ Lwm m:r

:r'1J~ LWm lwlLL~!71~ l~tl L~t'll rt !71'U~1

rm J'l ~ LLD~n

Lll?i n1J' i1

1'112)~tl ~'El ft~ lJftl!71l~ l?llll "D1

"Dtl~

L"Dl Ltl'U

Llt'l~ Lvru 1lf lrn

LL~ 1u L~~l ~tl ~ltl '111tl '

.,!

""'

tl~ w~n vtu~

'

1t~u d1 vtitJ ~~q ~ 111°1

.,!

VliJJ~ u~ w~n vtu~

rn 1r;:r jlJ 1~ l~ L~U LLW

jlJ nu

n1J'

ttlu flt'lll 1

L~U tl~l~ ~'U Utln 91fl tl l~

~ tl~ lJ'.

ntJu 111 n. 9~ d

1v

LVlt'll Vl flt'lll til~ J'l'J 1:wvu\J

L~u 1m ~fl

, tlUI~

~

d

liJ • .!.

FllJ

v

Llt'l~

n

1vl!J v

Lll?l L"Dl lJ 'JTI · '11 Lll LLl?i. n ttl 'ElU

iJ

lU tl~l~l!712)1'112)Vlfl1lf "D. e ttml when working consists of a pair of Chinese tt·ouserH coming down to just below the knee, and a coat with sleeves which stop jt1Ht nbove tho wriHb:l, hoth garments coloured indigo-blue. 'rhe coat is cut to the shape of 11 "sUa krabok" (blohse) without buttons, open at the neck like a sailor's blouse, and the border of this opeuing iH muhroiderod with reel and white silk m· cotton t;hretLd. Whon worn, the front of tlw blouse is arntnged in two cro:->swisu folrls which are pnlllld tightly downwards to the waist; the trousers, the upper lJlLJ:t o[ which is worn outside the blonse, are then clounou, a,nd Hw1lly tt blttck 1mu white striped scad is wrapped tightly ronll(l tho wttiHt giving the women ttn t1ppearance of being ve1·y slim-wtLiHtod. ~rho hlottHu or cottt, when worn in this way, only covers tho stomach (tmtl sltouhlet·.'l), leaving 11 portion of the' che:->t visible. Smuotiuws, in ILlldition, the women wear two pieces of indigo-coloured cloth, 12 inches (0.25m) wide 11nd just reaching down to the lower l'im of tho trousor:-:>. ]3oth pieces are fastened at the waist, one falling down in front and the other behind (a kind of front and bttck apreu-ohi" or. "ohio.'' is a term of contempt given to the Meo, as to ttll other non-Ohinese,·by the Chinese, signifying "barbarian". (2)

(3) Both the 6gures for the Lao~ States as well as for Tohkin must be taken as approximate, tts the French ''Annuaire" the Meo are often nuinbere4 togethel' with other tribes.

in

(

194

ber· altogether 364 persons. He adds that his Meo do not live in actual villages, but in groups of 4 or· 5 houses. Figures for the other Meo, who live in Siam, have not been obtn,inable. In China the principal home of these people is in the Province of Kweichow, a high-lying labyrinth of hills and valleys mostly void of tree-vegetation. Of the surface of this country barely one fifth is cultivated or even arable. Some very large fresh-water lakes are also found there, like the Weining Lake which is 50 miles long and in some places 20 miles broad. 'l'he population of Kweichow is, according to thl) Rev. Clarke, between 7 and 10 1!1illions, Hay 8 millions, of whom about one half are ChineHe (mostly emigrn~nt~ from Szechwrm or an older stock consisting of Chinese soldier-colonists originally married to Meo or Thai wives), while the other half is made up of Meo, Chung chi~ (Thai), and I-Chiu,. As the Chung chia are as numerous as the Meo and I-chia together, and the Meo aga_in are much more munerous than the I-chia, we may t1ssmne, as fairly correct, the figure of two millions for the Thai, one and a half million foe the Meo and half a million for the I-chia. But to the above must .be added the lYleo living in the provinces of. Yunnan, Hunan and Kwangsi, in which last province, according to Arch. Little, they number one half of the population, or about four millions. (I am inclined to think that Mr. Little is not correct here, hut that .'most of the socalled Meo in Kwangsi are 1'hai ). On the above basis we should thus ttrri ve at a figure exceeding 8 millions for the whole Meo race. 1l'he Chinese census is, however, manifestly unreliable, and I do not think that rtny further calculations would be profitable; suHice it to say that ' the Mea arc still very nmneruml, and that their disappear11nce is a1:1 yet far oft: Authorities on Lhc Meo race arc not t1S yet agreed about its place in the human fatnily. Anthropologically speaking, there oa,n be hardly ltny doubt that the .Moo belong to the Mongol race. The Rev. Clarke, whose study of the :M:co (of whmi1, in 1912, more than 50,000 had been converted to

ChriBtianit.)~)

cxtem1B over more than, 30 years,

( 195 ) maintains that their language appears to be more like Mandarin Chinese than those spoken by the Chungchia, I-chia or Keh-Lao, and that this point to a· common origin with the Chinese. Father Savinn. wisely their

origin;

refrtdns from any speculations with regard to not so, however,

Mnjor

Davies,

who boldly

places the Meo (and Yao) language among those of the ManKhmer pe9ple, and gives a comparative list of "capital " words by which he tries to prove his theory. :Bnt is he as stue of his anthropological data?. There are admittedly many similarities between •the languages of the Mon-Khmer g1;onp ancl that o£ the Meo, but these similarities may be due to borrowings from Mon-Khmer people, who formerly occupied the land now held by the Meo.

The

Meo admit readily that the province of Kweichow was inhabited by a people called Keh-Lao (who, by the way, are mot connectecl with the Lao of Siam or French territory), before they entered and conquered it, but state that, n.t that time, they almost exterminated the Keh-Lao, of whom only 200,000 fn.milies and numerous "tumuli" (known n.s the tombs of the Keh-Lao) now form the sad remnants. The Rev. Clarke says that the Keh-Lao resemble .the Meo physically, but that their language is very different from the Meo and other languages spoken in the province 0£ K wei-Chow.

They may repre-

sent a branch of the Mon-Khmer people, but those elements in the Meo language, which resemble Mon-Khmer certainly did not come from the latter, as the Rev. Clarke's vocabulary shows, but from some other source. With regard to the history of the Meo, we have chiefly to rely on Chinese documents which are· anything but reliable; but it may be noted that the present General Vicomte d'Ollone; during his great expedition to the interior and partly unknown regions _of China from 1906 to 1909, claimed to h[we discovered, amongs other thingA, that the Meo clo posseBs a w1•itten language ancl records of their own. The fuct has been stoutly denied by all other authors, who at the utmost will only admit that the Meo have a tradition that they once possessed characters of their own, but that these have been lost. 'J:he

(

196 )

details of d'Ollone's discovery have probably been published ip the Rcientific editiop. of his narrative, to which I regret to say ·r have not had access. Luang :Boriphandh says, with regard to the religious belieffl of the Meo, that they do not worship any God or gods, and have no priests or temples (1); still the 1\f.eo do have traditions about a heaveqly king, the creation, and a deluge. They are undLubtedly animists, as are all the non-Buddhist people o£ Eastern Asia, but they believe in a soul and a future existence. The Rev. Clarke comJ>lains i11 his book about the sexual immoroJity of the 1\f.eo which, as far as can' be gathered, iA a special feature of their annual festivals. · Their festivals are celebrated with much dancing, music, revelry, and "promenades"· of the young people. I think that at least one o£ these festivals, that celebrated at springtime, must ·be the same as the spring-festival of the 1'ho (Thai) in 1'onkin, which is still celebrated every year, and is associated with much merriment and sex~al intercourse between the young fo,lk. (Lt. Colonel Bonifacy has written a very interesting article on the festival in the B. E. F .. E. 0.(2) ). 'rhe same subject has also been treated by Granet(3) in his description of the ancient festivals and songs of China, of which a masterly review by Profeseor H. Maspero appears in the B. E. F. E. 0.(4). 'rhese festivoJs, both at spring and autumn, had and still have a religious meaning; the sacrifice to the earth god, the dancing,

(I)

\Vith regard to temples, Dr. C. Hosseus, a Geq:nan botanist,

who trttvelled in Siam during the years 1904-1906, mentions, however, that he ;:aw a temple built by Mea 11t the foot of Doi Sncleb, nen,r Ohieng Mai (See 0. 0. Hossens, ''Dnrch IGnig Tschulalongkorns Reich", p. 81.). See Lt. Colonel A.. L. M. Houifacy, "Ln, fete Tay du Ho-Bo" in Bulletin do l'Ecole Fran~aise d'Extr•eme-Orient, val XV, part 3., p. 17--23. (2)

(3)

Granat, "Fetes et chansons anciennes de laChine'', 1919.

(4)

B. EJ. F. E. 0., vol;XIX, part 5. pp. 65-i~.

( 197

)

the pl11ying of g11m~s, n,pd finally the sexu11l union of the young people were all yiewed as necessary to prop~gate agric:ulture ar~q the whole well-being of the community. I~ is now geperally ~ccepted ~hap the OhineAe had just the same cqstoms a~d festivals i11 ancient times, and that these were later ~),polished when ideq,s morality

o£

beca.me mm:e strict, l)ut they still exist ~J.nd linger

11mon~

the 1UOre prh):).itive communitie~, as 111nong the Th!).t in 'l'onkin and our Meo. As Lt. Colonel · Boni£acy says, tlles~ customs take U8 back to the earlier days of Western Civilisation in SyriAt and Babylonia, to the rites and cult of Adonis p.nd Mylitta, and represent perhaps a common stage o£ human (3vol~tion. As for the Meo, who live in Siam, I do not think they can be considered a valuable asset .to the country, so long as they destroy the forests by their crude hill,cultivation and continue to be such opstinate opium smokers, for it has now been proved ~hat a great deQ,l of the illicit qpitpp. pqpstlmed in this co:untry ()omes fro)ll tpe hill-people i11 the North. The Rev. Oiarke also says that tht~ Meo are easy to gover11; they may be so perhaps in Siam, but not always in French territory, since in 1915 a small campaign had to be conducted against a Meo tribe in Mu'ang Sing, who, instigated by German agents fr,om China, rebelled and killed a French Commissioner. Whether t.hey are easy to govem or not, the Meo are said to be good fighters and to have opposed large Chinese armies bravely p.nd stubbornly in former times. Although the Meo language has u,lready been mentioned in connection with the origins of this people, a few words about its constru~tion will not be out of place here.

1'he vocabulary cop-

tributed by Luang J:loriphandh has'been translated according to the r!lles laid down in the "QuestLmuaire" of the Siam Society, n,nd ea~h indivi