Re: Factual errors in an article titled "The Advent of Pali Literature in Thailand" (Ven. H. Saddhatissa)

In reply to L.C.,

  You seem to have mistaken my own "voice" for the quotations from
Saddhatissa --I am the one trying to refute S.-- thus, to begin with, I am
again put in the rather strange position of correcting you, but agreeing.
  After that, I move on to stridently disagreeing with you (re: the history
of ethnic & lingual change in the region), as I think you've made a few
generalizations about the history of Thailand that are fantastically false.

  The original article that I was responding to is here:
http://www.saigon.com/~anson/ebud/ebdha307.htm

> 2. There is no mention of Suva.n.nabhuumi in the inscriptions of
> Asoka.

  *Cough cough* --my reply quotes Saddhatissa's claim to the contrary.  I
stated at length that there were no S.E.A. toponyms in the Ashokan edicts;
however, Saddhatissa (like all the Thai National Museums) puts forward the
myth that the Ashokan edicts name some such place in modern Thailand or
Burma.  The Burmese (and, yes, the Mons) also have modern myths involving
the creative interpretation of the toponyms in the edicts.

  I am indeed aware that there are statements in the commentaries identifying
a place called Suvannabhumi as somewhere separated by "7 days' voyage at
sea" --however, what my brief message stated very clearly, is that this has
nothing to do with Ashoka, and was written more than a thousand years later
than him or his edicts.

> We need not doubt
> that the genetic makeup of Thailand today is largely the same as it
> was two thousand years ago.

That would be hilarious if this were a laughing matter.  You can pick up any
sociology textbook at a Thai University and take a look at the hard
demographics; the ethnic makeup of modern Thailand has *RADICALLY CHANGED*
in the past 200 years --not to mention the past 2000.  One of the most
obvious changes has been the massive influx of Chinese since the 19th
century; perhaps 30 million "modern Thai" are the products of Chinese
intermarriage, and about 12% of the population is Chinese "per se".  This
migration basically dates from the mid-Qing dynasty; and it has completely
transformed the ethnicity and culture of central Thailand.  The process of
this transformation has been much smoother than (e.g.) the settlement of
Chinese in Malaysia in the same period --but I've never met anyone in
Thailand who was unaware of the ethnic difference between "central Thais"
and the rest of the country that this history has produced.

This is only the most modern example, L.C.; anyone with a passing
familiarity with the history of Thai-Burmese relations will know that each
and every war between those two sides involved the forced relocation of
large populations (i.e., large relative to total population).  Land was not
scarce in this region; manpower was the scarce resource, and wars were
fought with the main prize being labour --both slaves and free persons--
brought back at the end of the war.  The dramatic effects of conflicts with
the burmese in establishing new population centers, and depopulating others,
as well as suddenly shifting the ethnic composition of different regions in
the North, is VERY WELL DOCUMENTED in the history of S.E.A.

I don't know nearly as much about demographic shifts in Southern Thailand;
however, in research on general demographics and population changes (for my
former employer) everything I read showed major, rapid changes in the past
200 years for just about all of Thailand --isolated mountian villages
notwithstanding.  In the North, one major catalyst for changes in the ethnic
composition of Thailand has always been the expansion of Han power (to the
exclusion of other ethnicities in China); the arrival of (e.g.) the Akha,
the Lu and the Hmong in Thailand were all forced by the expanding sphere of
Han Chinese racial hegemony.  If you don't think "racial hegemony" applies,
take a look at the history of "the Mien [= Hmong] rebellion" and the
genocidal campaign that followed it.  From the history written by the
Chinese themselves, we know that such genocidal campaigns have a long
history in the region; and we know that they commonly resulted in new ethnic
groups arriving in Thailand.

Colonialism and the railway increased the speed of change; but, unlike
Europe (in the Feudal period) pre-modern Thailand/S.E.A. was an area of
ethnic flux and ongoing changes.  The model of taking slaves and war
captives (often called "The Mandala system") ensured this to a large extent;
as did the absence of a European approach to ancient economies --i.e., trade
was not controlled by fixed frontiers.

> 3. Thai, Khmer and Mon are languages, not races.

That's about as accurate as to say (in the context of South Africa) that
"Afrikans Dutch" is "a language and not a race".  I suppose it is just a
coincidence that the white people attend school in Dutch --and that it is
the Dutch-language schools that are well funded by the rich.  Similarly, I
am not one to pretend that it is a coincidence that "the white people" of
Thailand speak "central Thai"; the ethnic difference between the Bangkok
Thais (who have inter-married with the Chinese at an impressive rate) and
the Issan, Mon, Khmer, Malayan, and other races that can be found in
Thailand is pretty obvious to the untrained eye.  In Surin, the people do
not look Thai, and they do not speak Thai; they are ethnically and lingually
Khmer.  If one of them stands in the middle of an upscale mall in Bangkok,
their ethnic difference from the crowd around them will be evident to all. 
The split between "central Thai" and so-called "Southern Thai" (i.e., Malay)
is very much in the newspapers at the moment; every few years there are race
riots in the North, too, when the "White people" decide to destroy a tribal
village, etc.  All of the tribal language distinctions in the north are very
closely related to ethnic distinctions; I don't think anyone could argue the
contrary.

Brief conclusion: contrary to L.C.'s statement that
> We need not doubt
> that the genetic makeup of Thailand today is largely the same as it
> was two thousand years ago.
One might instead say that we should indeed doubt that the ethnic
composition of Thailand has anything at all in common with 2,000 years ago. 
The same can be said of Nepal, Yunn, or even Egypt, and many other countries
around the world, where massive ethnic changes have transpired in the same
period.

E.M.

--
A saying of the Buddha from http://metta.lk/
View Streaming Dhamma Video http://dharmavahini.tv/
For as long as the slightest brushwood (of the passions) of man towards
women is not cut down, so long is his mind in bondage, like the calf to its
mother-cow.
Random Dhammapada Verse 284