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The Treaty of March 23, 1907 between France and Siam and the Return of Battambang and Angkor to Cambodia

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 March 2011

Lawrence Palmer Briggs
Lawrence Palmer Briggs
Affiliation:
Maroon, Michigan
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Extract

To have a proper appreciation of the return of the territory of Battambang and Angkor to Cambodia as a consequence of the treaty of March 23, 1907 between France and Siam, it is necessary to know something of the history of the ancient Khmer Empire or at least that of the peoples of the Mékong and Ménam valleys since the appearance of the so-called Tai people in the middle Ménam in the eartly part of the twelfth century.

Type
Articles
Information
The Journal of Asian Studies , Volume 5 , Issue 4 , August 1946 , pp. 439 - 454
Copyright
Copyright © The Association for Asian Studies, Inc. 1946

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References

1 Georges Maspero has attempted to show the limits of the Khmer Empire in 960 A.D. (Etudes Asktiqucs [Hanoi, 1925], vol. 2, pp. 79–125), but he thought the Mon kingdom of Haripunjai was Khmer.

2 Some of these monuments are described in Larry [L. P.] Briggs, , A pilgrimage to Angkor (Oakland, Calif., 1943)Google Scholar, which also gives a short treatise on the sources of our knowledge of the ancient Khmer Empire.

3 Briggs, Lawrence Palmer, “Dvāravatī, the most ancient kingdom of Siam,” Journal of the American Oriental society, 65 (April-June 1945), 105–106CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

4 Briggs, A pilgrimage to Angkor, p. 84; Coedès, George, “Les bas-reliefs d'Angkor Vat,” Bulletin de la commission archtologique Indochinoisc (1911), 170–220Google Scholar; E. Aymonier, Le Cambodge (1903), vol. 3, pp. 262–263. Syam, Çyama or Sayyam is said to mean dark brown or black in several languages of Southeast Asia.

5 [Editor's note. Hsien or Hsien-lo is the standard Wade-Giles romanization of the Chinese characters for Siam.]

6 Before Sukhothai was absorbed by Ayuthia.

7 For the founding of the Laotian kingdom of Lan Chang, see Boulanger, Paul Le, Histaire du Laos françaisc (Paris, 1931)Google Scholar.

8 For the Burmese invasions of Siam, see Harvey, G. E., History of Burma (London, 1925)Google Scholar.

9 Moura, J., Le royaume du Cambodge (Paris, 1883), vol. 2, pp. 90–97Google Scholar; Leclere, A., Histoire du Cambodge (Paris, 1914), pp. 401–402.Google Scholar

10 Moura, op. cit., pp. 104–105; Leclere, op. cit., pp. 411–412.

11 Gamier, F., Voyages d'exploration en Indochme (Paris, 1873), vol. 1, pp. 247–262Google Scholar.

12 Moura, op. cit., pp. 111–120; Leclere, op. cit., pp. 419–430.

13 Moura, op. cit., pp. 136–164; Leclere, op. cit., pp. 443–459; Villemeseuil, A. de, Explorations et missions de Doudart de Lagree…. Extraits de sus manuscrits (Paris, 1883), pp. 112–114Google Scholar, 116, 443–449. See also articles by R. Stanley Thompson in the Far Eastern Quarterly, 4 (Aug. 1945), 313–340 and 5 (Nov. 1945), 28–46.

14 Le Boulanger, op. cit., pp. 149–151, 166–179, 192–204; Pelacot, Capitaine de, “Le Tran-ninh historique,” Revue Indo-Chinois (Hanoi, 1906), 755–56Google Scholar.

15 Tai is the generic name of a people residing in south China, Burma, Siam, Laos and Tonkin. Thai, in its strictest sense, includes only the Tai of the Ménam-Méklong valley proper and adjacent coasts. But there are other conceptions of the meaning of Thai. A speech from the throne, said to have been made by King Chulalongkorn on September 21, 1884, and his expedition in 1885 to seize Laos and Tai country in Tonkin, indicate that Pan-Thaism had a broader conception of the meaning of Thai (See Col. Bernard, F., A l'école des diplomates [Paris, 1935], p. 92Google Scholar).

16 Reinach, L. de, Reueil des traitès conclus par la France au Extrême-Orient (Paris, 1902, 1907), vol. 1, pp. 315–317Google Scholar; Bulletin de la comité de l'Asie française (Paris, Jan. 1902), 13–16Google Scholar. Hereafter referred to as BCAF.

17 Reinach, op. cit., vol. 1, pp. 338–340.

18 BCAF (Jan. 1902), 13.

19 Livre jaune. Affaire de Siam, 1893–1902 (Paris, 1902), pp. 8–9.

20 According to the Annuaire generate de 1921 (p. 300), Cambodians constitute about 90% of the inhabitants of these provinces, while there were no Siamese inhabitants there at all.

21 Berjoin, A., Le Siam et Us accords franco-siamois (Paris, 1927), pp. 119–120Google Scholar.

22 Robert de Caix was editor of BCAF.

23 BCAF (1907), 113–114.

24 Garnier, op. cit., vol. I, pp. 234–235.

25 Questions diplomatiques it coloniales (Paris, March 16, 1907), 615.

26 F. Bernard, op. cit., pp. 138–139; Berjoin, op. cit., p. 83.

27 Reinach, op. cit., vol. 1, pp. 439–442.

28 Bernard, op. cit., p. 161; BCAF (1907), 113–114.

29 British and foreign state papers (1904), vol. 97, pp. 961–965.

30 BCAF (Jan. 1902), 16.

31 Lawrence Palmer Briggs, “The codification of the laws of Siam (1897–1924) and its effect on the extinction of extraterritorial jurisdiction,” American journal of international law, to appear in the near future.

32 Villemeseuil, op. cit., p. 116.

33 Bernard, op. cit., pp. 203–204.

34 Ibid., pp. 188–189.

35 Ibid., Appendix.

36 Outrey, E., “Un nouveau traité franco-siamois,” Revue politique et parliamentaire, 121 (Paris, Oct. 1924), 113–116Google Scholar.

37 Frances B. Sayre, also of Harvard and one of Dr. Srrobel's successors as Foreign Adviser to the King of Siam, in an article in the American journal of international law (January 1928) says that “large tracts of French Indo-China were carved at different times out of Siam” (p. 77) and speaks of “Siam's cession to France of further Siamese territory; i.e., the territory of Battambang, Siem Reap and Sisophon” (p. 97), unmindful of the fact that the two Frenchmen most concerned with the return of this territory give almost complete credit for its return to one of Dr. Sayre's illustrious. American predecessors, Dr. Edward H. Strobel.

38 The italics are mine.

39 Sisophon was formed out of Battambang. Siemreap is a name sometimes given to the province of Angkor.

40 BCAF (1907), 151.

41 E. Lunct de Lajonquiere, “Les provinces recouvrés du Cambodge,” BCAF (1907), 159.

42 E. Outrey, op. cit., pp. 113–116.

43 BCAF (1907), 113–114.

44 The writer has been unable to find a copy of this publication of this date t o verify this state.

45 British and foreign state papers (1909), vol. 102, pp. 126–128.

46 Padoux, G., Code penal du royaume de Siam. Promulgué le l juin, 1908 (Paris, 1909)Google Scholar; Guyon, R., L'Oeuvre de codification au Siam (Paris, 1919)Google Scholar; Briggs, “The codification of the laws of Siam …,” cited in note 31.