Uthong II

Uthong II () was a ruler of Xiān from around 1204/05 to 1253 in the reconstruction of early Siamese history drawn from Thai chronicle tradition. He is described as of mixed Siamese, Mon, Chinese and Cham descent, the son of Pra Poa Noome Thele Seri, ruler of Phrip Phri. The name Uthong is borne by several distinct figures in the traditions, which frequently conflate them.

His reign began at Chen Li Fu. He has been identified with Mahidharavarman, the Se-li-Mo-hsi-t'o-pa-lo-hung of Chinese records who acceded there in 1204/05 and sent that polity's last recorded embassy to the Song court in 1205, after which Chen Li Fu disappears from the Chinese record. The chronicle traditions have an epidemic at Indaprasthanagara prompt a move southward to Ayodhya, where he came to the throne following the death of his father-in-law, Dhammikaraja, who left only a daughter, Phummawadi Thewi, whom Uthong II had married. He was succeeded upon his death by Jayasena, his son-in-law and a younger prince of .

Ayodhya's authority is said to have reached west to Tanintharyi, north to the Phraek Si Racha region his father had held, and east met Lavapura under Angkorian administration. To the north the Xiān rulers at Sukhothai ceased paying tribute to Indaprasthanagara and defeated its forces, gaining de facto independence, while commercial relations with Đại Việt, established in 1149, continued into his reign. The dating of the reign is not secure: the Phra Aiyakan Betset, a legal manuscript carrying an internal date of 1224, gives the regnal name of Dhammikaraja rather than his own.

Name and titles

The name Uthong () is borne by several distinct figures in the traditions, including Uthong I, the present ruler, and Uthong V (Ramathibodi I), and the chronicles frequently conflate them. Chit Phumisak argued that the repetition was a family practice, comparable to the use of Intharacha in the Suphannaphum house, rather than a confusion in the records. Uthong is a personal name meaning "golden cradle", derived from u, an old Thai and Lao word for a cradle, and one lineage may therefore have included a grandfather, grandson, and even great-grandson bearing the same name. On this reading, the surviving traditions preserve several distinct Uthongs and need not be reduced to a single figure.

He also appears as Sri Mahidharavarman of Indaprastha–Ayodhya, from the Chinese transcription Se-li-Mo-hsi-t'o-pa-lo-hung. That Indic form is itself a reconstruction. The transcription was first read as Sri Mahendravarman, and Mahīdhara follows a proposal of Cœdès that 13th-century inscriptions use that element more often.

Family

Parentage

The sources disagree about his mother. The Ayutthaya Testimonies make him the son of the queen consort Mani Mala (). The instead states that Pra Poa Noome Thele Seri, king of Phrip Phri, who prospered through maritime trade with China, married Chandradevi (), a daughter of the Chinese emperor by the Cham princess Chandramouli, and that their son Uthong subsequently took the throne of Ayodhya. Both women are recorded as consorts of Pra Poa Noome Thele Seri, and the question is unresolved.

Two further accounts describe his accession without naming his mother. The records that the king of Kampoch (Ayodhya), probably Dhammikaraja, died without a male heir, after which the throne was offered to a wealthy noble named Uthong, who moved the capital southward in response to epidemic outbreaks. The , which mixes the traditions of the three Uthongs, similarly has a wealthy merchant's son named Uthong become ruler of Ayodhya.

The chronicle traditions agree that an epidemic in the old capital prompted the move southward to Ayodhya, where in 1205 he and the population are said to have founded a new settlement on the island of present-day Ayutthaya.

Consort and children

According to the Northern Chronicle he had three sons and a daughter. The eldest, Ai (), was made governor of Mueang Nakhon (, "the nagara city" or "the capital"), which some scholars identify with Nakhon Si Thammarat in Tambralinga. Nakhon Si Thammarat was at that time held by descendants of Sri Dharmasokaraja II, so the chronicle more probably means the former capital at Indaprasthanagara. The second son, Yi (), was sent to Tanintharyi in the far west, and the youngest, Sam (), succeeded his uncle Thonglanraj () at Phrip Phri.

His daughter Rajadevi is said to have entered a clandestine relationship with Jayadatta (), eldest son of the king of Phichai Chiang Mai, and to have borne a son, Suvarnaraja, who reigned at Ayodhya from 1289 to 1301.

Reign

Indaprasthanagara and the move to Ayodhya

Charnvit dates his marriage, mentioned in the Northern Chronicle, to around 1203. The chronicle states that he married into a family whose only surviving heir was a daughter. The earliest available version of the Northern Chronicle, published in 1869, further states that after seven years of his reign, around 1211–1212, Indaprasthanagara was struck by a severe plague. He subsequently left the city and moved southward to Ayodhya. The chronicle also gives a rough indication of Indaprasthanagara's location, placing it about 15 days' journey north of Ayodhya.

Modern scholars have proposed that his reign at Ayodhya began in 1205. This, however, conflicts with the contemporary text Phra Aiyakan Betset, which states that in 1224 his father-in-law Dhammikaraja was still exercising juridical authority.

Territorial extent

Ayodhya's authority is said to have reached west to Tanintharyi in present-day southern Myanmar. To the north, the Phraek Si Racha region was left without a ruler between 1249 and 1299. It had been the seat of Chen Li Fu, held by his father from 1180 to 1204. To the east met Lavapura in Lavo, administered by Nripendravarman, a prince serving under the Angkorian monarch Jayavarman VII and later enthroned as Indravarman II.

That no conflict is recorded at his accession at Ayodhya, which modern scholars place in 1205, in territory previously associated with Chen Li Fu, has been read as evidence of continuity rather than conquest, and as part of a pattern of dynastic accommodation between the Siamese houses and the Angkorian sphere. Walailak Songsiri offers a mechanism for that continuity, proposing that after the first half of the 13th century the Chen Li Fu towns developed into Suphannabhum, which on her account took in settlements on the Khwae Noi and Khwae Yai, part of the Mae Klong, part of Phraek Si Racha and part of Chainat at the mouth of the Noi.

To the southeast, the extent of his domain is not recorded. His name, however, appears in the Chonburi legend Tamnan Chao Mae Laem Tian (), which identifies him as a son of Phraya Kreak, also called Phraya Phraek, a title traditionally held by the ruler of Phraek Si Racha and retained into the late Ayutthaya period. The name also survives in place names across eastern Thailand, including Wat U Thong () in Ban Na–Krasae Bon subdistrict, Klaeng District, Rayong Province, and Wat Thao U Thong () in Khok Mai Lai subdistrict, Prachin Buri Province. During this century, Xian also expanded its maritime reach southward to the Malay Peninsula and Sumatra.

Conflicts with the northern Xian polities

Before his son came to the throne, Phanom Thale Sri, who originated from Phraek Si Racha/Indaprasthanagara, had previously left Sukhothai–Nakhon Thai and moved southward. Afterward, Candraraja, a son of Suryaraja, moved northward from Kamphaeng Phet and established his authority at Sukhothai. The Ayutthaya Testimonies, however, still describe Sukhothai as a tributary polity of Indaprasthanagara.

During Candraraja's reign, his son Si Inthrathit urged him to cease paying tribute to Indaprasthanagara. This reportedly triggered a war between the two polities. Indaprasthanagara's forces, led by the crown prince, were defeated by Sukhothai's forces under Si Inthrathit. Sukhothai subsequently gained de facto independence, while the king of Indaprasthanagara instructed his crown prince not to intervene in Sukhothai's affairs, reportedly on the grounds that the two ruling houses belonged to the same family.

Another possible conflict involving him can be inferred from a chain of scholarly identifications. Chit Phumisak proposed that the legendary king Saen Pom of Suphannaphum was probably the youngest son of Uthong II. Saen Pom has subsequently been identified by another scholar with Khom Sabat Khlon Lamphong on the basis of an onomastic reinterpretation. According to this interpretation, Khom Sabat Khlon Lamphong seized the throne of Sukhothai–Si Satchanalai from the northern Xian monarch and ruled there from the early 13th century until 1238, during the same period as Uthong II. He was subsequently overthrown by a coalition of northern Xian monarchs and Tai chieftains led by Si Inthrathit and Pha Mueang.

Relations with Đại Việt

Commercial relations with Đại Việt, established in 1149, continued into his reign. The Đại Việt sử ký toàn thư records that in 1241 a merchant mission from Xiān arrived at Yún tún (, modern Vân Đồn) to seek authorisation to trade and to procure goods.

The Phra Aiyakan Betset

Early legal manuscripts suggest that Siamese legal tradition predates the formal foundation of the Ayutthaya Kingdom in 1351. Among the earliest is the Phra Aiyakan Betset ( or , ), which carries an internal date of Shaka era 1146 (1224 CE). Its language and phrasing are markedly archaic beside other surviving pre-Ayutthayan legal texts, with features recalling the Sukhothai Ram Khamhaeng Inscription.

The regnal name in the manuscript is that of Dhammikaraja, not Uthong II, which has been taken to indicate that his father-in-law continued to exercise juridical authority into the 1220s, overlapping with the proposed reign of Uthong II.

The legal texts associated with the reign of Ramathibodi I (r. 1351–1369) point the same way. Framed as the work of a new kingdom, they are developed enough to imply a longer history behind them. Comparative analyses, including those following Chit Phumisak and Robert Lingat, hold that this legal consciousness must have evolved within earlier societies of the Chao Phraya basin before Ayutthaya emerged as a centralised polity.

The manuscript has been transcribed into modern Thai script as follows.

The decree is dated to the fifth day of the waxing moon, a Sunday, in the fourth lunar month of Shaka 1146, a year of the goat, and is issued from the Mangala Phisek hall of the great palace, the king seated facing east. It is addressed to provincial governors, officials and those adjudicating accusations of chamob, jakala, krasue and krahang, categories of malevolent spirit or witch in Thai belief. It directs that even where such an accusation is found to be true, local governors and officials must not put the accused to death themselves, but are to report the case and send the person to the capital, holding them outside the customs post for examination. A governor or official who executes an accused person and reports the matter only afterwards is himself liable to the death penalty.

See also

• Pra Poa Noome Thele Seri
• Chen Li Fu
• Xiān