The Palace Law of Ayutthaya and the Thammasat: Law and Kingship in Siam transed. by Chris Baker and Pasuk Phongpaichit (review)

For over two decades Chris Baker and Pasuk Phongpaichit have been the dominant figures in English-language scholarship on Thai history. Their work has ranged from charting Thailand's economic boom and bust, to accounting for the rise of Thaksin Shinawatra, to explaining the political and economic history of modern Thailand. In recent years, however, their attention has shifted to earlier historical periods, with a succession of publications including their monumental translation of the literary classic Khun Chang Khun Phaen (2010) and the recently published A History of Ayutthaya: Siam in the Early Modern World (2017). The Palace Law of Ayutthaya and the Thammasat: Law and Kingship in Siam is another work in their exploration of the history of the pre-modern Thai world.

As Baker and Pasuk point out, for a long time the historical study of Thailand's legal tradition has languished (p. xi). This book makes available for the first time in English translation two of the most important but linguistically difficult texts from pre-modern Thai law, the Thammasat and the Palace Law of Ayutthaya (Kot monthianban in Thai). Both legal texts are part of the famous Three Seals Code compiled by King Rama I in 1805, though their origins date to much earlier. Baker and Pasuk provide explanatory introductions to each of these texts, in which they discuss their estimated date of composition, give a summary of their contents, explain how they were used, and outline the historical context in which the laws were originally enacted.

The Thammasat "stands at the head of the Three Seals Code"(p. 13), conferring on its laws the aura of timeless religious authority. Ostensibly, it derives from the ancient Indic genre of texts on law and ethics known as dharmaśāstra, which influenced the legal traditions of Siam and other "Indianized" states of mainland Southeast Asia. The earliest tradition of compiling dhammasattha (the Pali term) texts appears to have been in the Mon and Burman territories, dating back perhaps to the mid-thirteenth century (p. 16). Previous scholars have claimed that Thailand's Thammasat tradition derived from this tradition.

Baker and Pasuk argue, however, that the place of the Thammasat in Thailand's legal history has been misunderstood, because of the tendency to assimilate Siam with the Indic tradition of the dharmaśāstra (p. x). The Thai Thammasat in fact differs markedly from both the Indic dharmaśāstra and that of the Mon. Whereas the latter is characterized by the importance given to customary law, by contrast the Thai Thammasat gives greatest emphasis to royal lawmaking; the role of customary law is "weak" (p. 28). The reference in the text's name to the dhammasattha tradition is not, therefore, because its laws derive from or are in conformity with this ancient Indic legal tradition but because that reference legitimizes a tradition of lawmaking by Thai kings. As the authors point out, "royal-made law was a distinctive feature of the Ayutthaya state" (p. ix). Here Baker and Pasuk challenge the influential interpretations of the French scholar Robert Lingat and of Prince Dhani Nivat — the latter a key figure in the reconstitution of royal authority in Thailand after the Second World War — who have long dominated the field of Thai legal history.

In recent years frequent reference has been made to the Palace Law of Ayutthaya in relation to the rules of royal succession. In fact, these rules are a recent (1924) addition to the Palace Law. The original text is much older, probably dating from the fifteenth century (p. ix), and was much broader in scope. The Palace Law of Ayutthaya set out the rules for managing the royal palace, and the government of Siam more generally. Baker and Pasuk call it "a constitution of royal absolutism" (p. x). It covers such topics as the kingdom's dependencies, regalia and insignia, protocol at royal audiences, the management of guard zones, royal travel, the use of horses and elephants, the conduct of warfare, discipline at royal audiences, punishments for...