The history of Siam prior to the fourteenth century A.D. is chiefly
known from a hodgepodge of disconnected stories and fragments known as
the "Pongsawadon Mu'ang Nu'a" ("Annals of the North Country"),
compiled at different periods from such of the official records of
various cities and kingdoms as had escaped the destruction which at
intervals overtook the communities to which they referred. With the
omission of the numerous supernatural happenings there recorded and
comparative study of the chronicles of neighboring countries, scholars
have been able to draw a rough picture of the condition of Siam at the
dawn of historical time.
Their researches show a country inhabited by primitive people of
Mon-Khmer stock among whom had settled groups of their more civilized
cousins from Cambodia, who had brought with them the religion and
customs acquired by contact with colonists from India. These
communities grew from villages into cities and at the same time sent
out offshoots in all directions, which in time became the capitals of
small states, the chiefs of which constantly made war on each other
and against the Lao-Tai tribes at their borders and now and again rose
to sufficient strength to repudiate the vague suzerainty claimed over
them all by the empire of Cambodia.
Contemporary records of the period subsequent to the fourteenth
century A.D. are easily available. The most important is the
"Pongsawadon Krung Kao" ("Annals of the Old Capital" or "Annals of
Ayuthia"), which contains a complete and fairly accurate account,
compiled in successive reigns, of the history of the country from A.D.
1349 to 1765. The seventeenth and later centuries have also seen the
production of numerous works, by European travelers and missionaries,
which deal wholly or partly with Siam.