Thailand's world Heritage Sites from Ancient City to Jungle Escapes (Part Two)Prepared by Harold Stephens
Travel Correspondent for Thai Airways International
Last week in Weekly Travel Feature we saw four of UNESCO’s World Heritage Sites in Thailand—Ban Chiang, Sukhothai, Si Satchanalai and Kamphaeng Phet. Now we come to Ayutthaya and Thung Yai Naresuan & Huai Kha Khaeng Wildlife Sanctuaries.
First, Ayutthaya, the ancient capital of Siam. Before I begin telling readers about this lost city—it was lost for two hundreds years—let me tell of an old drawing of Ayutthaya made by a French artist in 1688. It shows Royal Barges of the court of King Narai in the wide expanse of the Chao Phraya River. There are a dozen of these beautifully crafted boats shown in the print. In the background is a wall, and a gate of sorts, and beyond that a skyline of temples.
I first saw that print many years ago and, without exaggeration, I have been to Ayutthaya a hundred times. When friends come to town, it’s one place I want to take them and preferably by boat. But in all those trips and all those years I had never been able to identify that print, try as I did. I often wondered if it was not merely the imagination of the artist who created it. Then just a short while ago, I was travelling the waterways around Ayutthaya by boat, with photographer Robert Stedman, gathering material for a book we are doing on the river. We had the boatman stop for a few minutes and, when I turned to look back from where we had come, there it was, that very same view. I was astounded beyond words.
Of course, most of the wall is gone, as are most of the temples (the Burmese saw to that), but the gate and part of the wall are still there. We had the boatman take us ashore and what came was a feeling that sent chills down my spine. I could not help thinking, and imagining, here on this very same spot, all the great powers of Europe had once focused their attention. They all wanted a piece of this very same ground. While all the other nations of Southeast Asia fell to Western powers, Siam, through shrewd political maneuvers, managed to remain free. And here on this very same spot where I stood marked the entrance to one of the greatest cities the world has ever known and, to put it into the words of those who were there, “. . . greater than Venice and Genoa of its time.” What a splendid discovery. In an instant, for me, Ayutthaya became alive. Let me tell you about that kingdom.
When Paris and London were little more than backwater villages, and the New World was only a conjecture of cartographers, there was in the Far East a great, magnificent city, a kingdom, in fact, and it was called Sukhothai. It was mighty, powerful and rich but in time it was overrun by a warring kingdom called Ayutthaya. Ayutthaya became even mightier and greater than Sukhothai. The Kingdom lasted for over four hundred years until the Burmese invaded, some two hundred years ago. The Burmese were eventually driven back by a Siamese general but, rather than rebuild Ayutthaya where it had once stood, the general moved his capital down river to Thonburi. After his death, the Chakri Dynasty came into power and the new king, Rama I, moved the capital from Thonburi across the river to a little but prosperous village known as Krungthep which, in English, is Bangkok. Later, after World War II, the name Siam was changed to Thailand.
That’s a brief sketch of Ayutthaya. In reality the city reigned as the political, economic and cultural center of Thailand from 1350 until conquered by the Burmese in 1767. Set with hundreds of temples and palaces surrounded by rivers and canals, Ayutthaya was described by European traders as among the largest and most prosperous cities in the East. European travellers told that below the city, anchored in the center of the river, was an assortment of sea-going vessels: Chinese junks, Arabian dhows, Indian lighters, Macassar schooners and European square-riggers. They formed a line that stretched for dozens of kilometres. Imagine my delight to have found this very same stretch of river and to go ashore and stand where history once played such a vital role, and how it was forgotten, and perhaps only a lone fisherman cast a lazy line out into the empty waterway. I thought about Ayutthaya’s great past.
Those first settlements near Ayutthaya were Khmer military and trading camps established as far back as the 11th century, as outposts for their distant Khmer empire. The city was founded in 1350 when a Thai prince named Ramathibodi transferred his capital from U-Thong to Ayutthaya to escape a smallpox plague and to provide greater military security from Burmese invaders. The site was carefully chosen at the point where the Lopburi and the Prasak Rivers flowed into the Chao Phraya River. With the creation of additional canals, the city became an island fortress that could be better defended from outside attack. Ramathibodi named his new city after the mythical kingdom of Ayodhya (meaning undefeated in Sanskrit) in the Hindu Ramayana epic and constructed royal palaces and temples.
Until its fall, Ayutthaya was ruled by a succession of 33 kings of various dynasties. In time it became the most powerful military empire in Southeast Asia. By the end of the 15th century, Ayutthaya controlled Southeast Asia from Vientiane in the north to Malacca halfway down the Malay Peninsula in the south and from Angkor in the east to Burma in the west.
The mid-16th century marked the arrival of one of Ayutthaya's greatest rulers, King Naresuan the Great (1555-1605). Under his rule and subsequent kings, Ayutthaya became an important commercial center. First on the scene were the Portuguese, followed by the Dutch, the French and the British. Dazzled by the city's gilded opulence and grandeur, King Louis XIV of France dispatched emissaries in 1685, and other astonished European visitors compared the river kingdom to Venice. Others still, reported Ayutthaya to be larger and more magnificent than contemporary London or Paris. So startling is this period of history that I had to put it all down, as I felt it, in my book “For the Love of Siam."
Perhaps the most famous Western trader and interloper, one whom I wrote about, was Constantine Phaulkon, a colorful Greek adventurer who became advisor to King Narai and eventually his Foreign Minister, the highest office ever held by a foreigner. When the King became ill and lay dying, word was spread that Phaulkon was attempting to convert the King to Christianity, which he wasn’t. He was taken prisoner, tried, convicted and executed. Westerners were expelled and Ayutthaya remained isolated for the next 150 years.
After four centuries of rule, Ayutthaya went into an economic and military decline. In early 1763, an enormous Burmese army overran Chiang Mai and massed for a final assault on Ayutthaya. After two years of siege, the city capitulated and most of the citizens were either murdered or marched off to Burma as slave labor. Ayutthaya was burned to the ground. Tremendous art treasures, museums, countless temples, priceless libraries, and historical archives were all destroyed—an act that still upsets the Thais.
We can only imagine how grand Ayutthaya was at its height. As you walk among the ruins, try to picture the city with more than one million people, and a city that boasted over 1,700 temples, 30,000 priests, and more than 4,000 images of Buddha, all of them gold or gilt.
When you enter one of Ayutthaya's museums—there are three good museums—you will find some of these treasures that have been preserved. There are also about 30 temples in various stages of reconstruction and renovation. Monuments are widely scattered and only the central temples near the present town are within walking distance. On our last visit, other than renting a boat, Robert and I hired a Budget car and drove around the city. I had never realized there were so many ruins, all still magnificent in their decay.
Monuments and sites near the city centre include the Chandra Kasem Museum, Wat Rajaburana, Wat Mahathat, Rama Lake, Wat Pra Ram, Sam Praya Museum, Viharn Pra Mongkol Bopit, Wat Pra Sri Samphet, and Wat Na Praman. These are the region's most important monuments.
Now a word about Thailand’s Wildlife Sanctuaries: UNESCO Natural World Heritage Site of Thung Yai Naresuan and Huai Kha Khaeng.
Together they join up to make the kingdom's largest protected land parcel, as well as being one of the most important and most expansive conservation areas in Southeast Asia. Situated in Thailand's western Kanchanaburi and Tak provinces, along the border with Myanmar and located at the southern tip of the Dawna Range, this pristine Asian rainforest is a colossal 320,000 hectares in size.
The spectacular terrain is marked with many outstanding natural features, which are home to a stunning variety of flora and fauna. As with any self-contained ecosystem, water is a vital source for life within this hilly region spawning four major rivers, gushing waterfalls, pretty fresh streams like Huai Kha Khaeng, and rocky ravines. Steaming hot springs are a unique resource that visitors find fascinating to discover.
This continual flow of unpolluted water gives life to schools of fish as well as forming small lakes, ponds and swamp areas that have become important habitats for an abundance of colourful wildlife. Three different species of otter frolic openly in such waterways, as well as rare herds of larger cattle including gaur, banteng, and the only wild water buffalo in the whole of Thailand.
Thung Yai thrives with a diversity of trees and shrubs. From dense evergreen to bamboo forests, the sanctuary is endowed with a staggering 1,000 vertebrate species, including 153 mammal species, 490 bird species, 41 reptiles and over 100 species of fish. Many of these timid, protected creatures are rarely spotted outside the sanctuary environment but on a good day you might be lucky to see tapping woodpeckers, hornbills, and redheaded vultures flying in the skies above.
Meanwhile on the ground there is the hope of an encounter with a rare Sumatran or Javan rhinoceros, herds of lumbering wild elephants, as well as several endangered carnivores, such as tigers, bears, and clouded leopards.
Aside from close ups of the animal kingdom, Thung Yai contains several remote sites of great archaeological interest, which reputedly date back thousands of years to early humans. While stone artifacts have been unearthed, there has been little research conducted to date, making the area ripe for an Indiana Jones style archaeological adventure.
An adventurous journey to Thung Yai Naresuan offers visitors the privilege of being able to visit one of the few remaining virgin forest canopies remaining in the world. The sanctuary is only open to small groups and it's advised to obtain a visitor's permit from the Wildlife Conservation Division of the Royal Forest Department in Bangkok, or from the chief of the sanctuary. QUESTIONS & ANSWERSQ. Dear Mr. Stephens. I understand the Thais have their own calendar making the dates of the years somewhat different. Which one will we be using when we travel to Thailand. Gertrude Allison.
Sydney
A. Dear Ms. Allison. You will be using the western calendar.
Harold Stephens
Bangkok
E-mail: ROH Weekly Travel (booking@inet.co.th)
Note: The article is the personal view of the writer and does not necessarily reflect the view of Thai Airways International Public Company Limited. | 
