Ayutthaya Awaits Constintine, The Greek SailorPrepared by Harold Stephens
Travel Correspondent for Thai Airways International
In my book For he Love of Siam I try to portray what it was like to travel the Chao Phraya River in days of old to Ayutthaya, the capital Siam, and I also attempted to draw a picture of what the old capital looked like. The descriptions come from chronicles, letters and diaries of those foreigners who had actually been there at the time---British, Dutch, Portuguese, French and Japanese. As Ayutthaya has been completely sacked and burned a century after King Narai's death by the Burmese, all local records where lost. Constantine, the Greek sailor, played an important role in the story but he had been banned from returning to Ayutthaya. In this final feature I tell how it was arranged for his return.
We are at George White’s home. Home in Ayutthaya. Richard Barnaby has just arrived to work for the East India Company and White has invited the local establishment to come and meet him.
Others from the East India Company came and went in the line of duty making brief appearances to meet Burnaby. Most were traders, Arabs and Jews, Portuguese and Dutch. A few Asians appeared, one a dark Japanese gentleman in a naval uniform, but, as White said when he was gone, he was an interloper and not an officer in any navy.
The lunch was European, to White's liking, and served in the garden. In a lull in their conversation, Burnaby was asked how was the voyage from India to Melaka.
"Most interesting," Burnaby replied, and then remembering a promise he had made to the Greek gunner, he turned to White. “I met an interesting chap and he asked me to give you his regards."
"And who might that be?" White asked.
"A Greek. We called him gunner, a good man, but his name—"
"Gerakis," White interrupted. “What do you know, he’s still with the company. Great guy, great seaman, good with weapons and good with his fists—"
"And good with languages. He can speak half a dozen languages."
"Lucky he's alive. Could have lost his head had it not been for the governor turning soft . . . And Where is he now?"
Burnaby told how he and Gerakis had met, and that Gerakis was now waiting in Mergui for the monsoon to change so that he could ship back to India. Then he added, "I could make use of someone like him, with all his skills and his languages."
White didn't respond . . . He was thinking about Gerakis . . . "You say you could use someone like him . . . Then why don’t we bring him here?"
"He's banished from the kingdom."
"A shipwrecked seaman who dared look at the king is banished. It shouldn't have happened! I saw him when they were loading him aboard that frigate to take him away. He was a pathetic looking fool. There was nothing anyone could do. You don't break rules when it comes to royalty. Anyway Ayutthaya is full of derelicts, outcasts, white men, drunkards, swindlers, henchmen, just name it, men with a price on their head, men who would sell their souls for a pittance. What was to separate him from all the other riffraff ? . . . .
"Getting him here might be the problem," Burnaby said. "No problem," White said . . . "We would have no difficulty smuggling the Greek back into Ayutthaya . . . I know Muslim merchants operating in the south. The Greek can cross the peninsula with them, on one of their smuggling trips to Songkau where the Greek can ship aboard one of my vessels sailing to Ayutthaya."
It was decided by all, Gunner Gerakis would come to Ayutthaya, but not as Gerakis. They would give him a new identity. "Constantine Gerakis, his name in English, translates to ‘falcon,’” McManus said. "Another spelling for falcon is phaulkon."
"That's it," said White jubilantly. "That's it. His name henceforth is Phaulkon. That's it—Phaulkon. Never again shall the name Gerakis be mentioned. It's Constantine Phaulkon. I'll draw up the papers and dispatch a message to Mergui." The manservant uncorked another bottle of East India rum.
That was Old Ayutthaya in the 17th with a mention how the Greek sailor arrived. 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. | 
