JESH 054 The Burden of Owning Land: Habitat in Pre-Modern and Early-Modern Thailand

© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2011 DOI: 10.1163/156852011X611346

Journal of the Economic and

Social History of the Orient 54 (2011) 497-519 brill.nl/jesh

The Burden of Owning Land:Habitat in Pre-Modern and Early-Modern Thailand

Barend Jan Terwiel*

Abstract

From time immemorial until the decree of 7 April 1861, all land belonged to the Thai king.

This paper explores what this meant in practice, over time. In pre-modern times, land

ideally could be inherited, but this could be overruled by the king. Taking and exploiting a

piece of land meant that the owner would be registered and taxed. In the Chaophraya

Delta, where waterways were the dominant means of water transport, two separate types of

housing developed: the house-boat and houses on rafts. The latter form of high-density

living on the water was only abandoned in the second half of the nineteenth century.

Finally, the question of occupying land is looked at from the perspective of the commoner.

Keywords

Property rights, inheritance, taxation, corvée, house-boats

For the Tai-speaking ethnic groups that came to dominate the country that is now called Thailand, pre-modern time is defined as the period begin-ning with the establishment of small city states in the thirteenth century, progressing through a complex process of competing larger regional cen-ters, of which Ayutthaya ended up as the dominating regional power; it was, in its turn, conquered during the sixteenth century by the Burmese. The early modern period for what was then called the Kingdom of Siam may be taken approximately as the time between 1600 and 1850. This region provides an interesting study of the relationship between humans and the surface of the earth, not least because the administration of land exploitation developed mainly through indigenous interactions and initia-tives, basically without European interference. The main difficulty with

*) Professor Emeritus, Asia-Afrika-Institut, Hamburg University. Möckernstrasse 70,

10965 Berlin. E-mail [email protected].

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498 B. J. Terwiel / JESHO 54 (2011) 497-519

the topic is a paucity of historical sources that yield detailed information on the relationship between the users of the land and the earth from which they drew the means of their existence. Even though relevant information is incomplete and widely scattered, a careful search yields some insight into environmental history.

A Semantic Introduction

In the Thai language there is a clear distinction between the general con-cept “earth” and the more specific concept of “cultivated ground.” The general Thai word for land in the meaning of “earth” or “soil” is din (ดนิ), as in the expression phaen din (แผ่นดนิ), “kingdom, realm” (lit. “flat land surface”). A particular piece of land is called thi din (ท่ีดนิ). Parts of the earth’s surface that have been transformed to yield a crop are given various names that will be discussed below.

In the oldest dated Thai document, the late thirteenth-century Ram Khamhaeng inscription, there are several references to land and the uses of land.1 Quite frequently it mentions plantations (coconuts, sugar palms, mango, tamarind, jackfruit, areca palms, and betel vines) and invariably the word for plantation is, somewhat surprisingly, the Thai word pa (ป่า). The two meanings of the word pa given in the Handbook of Comparative Tai are “meadow” and “wilderness.”2 In modern Thai, it is used primarily in the sense of “forest,” “thicket,” or “wild nature.” The word pa is also used in the meaning of “plantation” in other inscriptions. At an unknown time, probably in the early modern period, it was replaced by the old Thai word suan (สวน), “garden, plantation,” whose meaning is evident in the expres-sions suan phonlamai, “orchard,” and suan khrua, “kitchen garden.”

The word suan also occurs in the expression rüak suan rai na (เรอืกสวนไร่นา), meaning “fields and gardens,” in which suan rai na (สวนไร่นา) are the basic distinct types of cultivated earth. The three terms constitute a series of increasing human involvement. A suan (garden) requires relatively little human energy before its owner can gather its pro-duce; a rai (upland field) has to be cleared of its natural cover before a crop

1) B.J. Terwiel, The Ram Khamhaeng Inscription: The Fake That Did not Come True

(Gossenberg: Ostasien Verlag, 2010).2) Li, Fang Kuei, A Handbook of Comparative Tai (University Press of Hawaii, 1977): 61.

Cf. J.N. Cushing, A Shan and English Dictionary (Rangoon: American Baptist Mission

Press, 1914): 393.


The Burden of Owning Land 499

can be sown; a na (lowland field) often requires a major investment of energy before it yields a crop, because it has to be levelled and surrounded with bunds (embankments), plowed, harrowed, weeded, and irrigated. In the Ram Khamhaeng inscription, the expression mi rai mi na (มไีร่มนีา) means “there are upland fields and irrigated rice fields.” Throughout the more than seven hundred years since the Ram Khamhaeng inscription was made, both parts of this expression have retained their original meaning. The two categories are still used in pairs in modern Thai: the expression for “farms” in general is thi rai thi na (ท่ีไร่ท่ีนา lit., “rai and na places”) and for cultivated fields of all kinds is thong rai thong na (ท้องไร่ท้องนา lit., rai and na areas”).

The word rai (ไร่) has two distinct meanings, both related to land. Its primary meaning is “a farm producing something other than wet rice.” Thus, rai is land which has been cleared and where seeds are planted with-out plowing the soil and without constructing bunds or digging ditches. After one or more years, when the yield diminishes, rai land was tradition-ally left to revert to forest. On rai land a variety of crops could be raised, such as cotton and peppers, as well as upland (non-irrigated) rice. The second meaning of rai is that of the standard surface measure of land, equal to 1600 square meters. Rai and na lands are both measured in rai.

Na (นา) means “wet rice fields.” It is used in this sense in the Ram Khamhaeng inscription: nai na mi khao (ในนามข้ีาว), “there is rice in the wet-rice fields.” The word is culturally highly relevant, as can be seen in the multitude of important concepts expressed using the word na: Chao na (เจ้านา lit. “owner of rice fields”) means “farmer”; Tham na (ทำนา) means “to prepare a rice field” (cf. tham suan (ทำสวน), “to work on a plantation” and tham rai (ทำไร่), “to work on an upland farm”); Na khu kho (นาคู่โค) is “bunded land worked with a pair of cattle” (and taxed by area); Na fang loi (นาฟางลอย) is naturally flooded land, of which only the part on which an actual harvest has been made is subject to tax; Na rang (นาร้าง) is unused paddy land; Na wan is paddy land that is sown broadcast (not with trans-planted seedlings); and na pa (นาป่า) is unoccupied wild lowlands that can be cultivated.

Perhaps the most interesting expression employing the word na is sakti na (ศักดนิา), literally “rank according to fields.” This refers to the tradi-tional system of rank, expressed by area of land (in rai, 1600 square meters). Throughout early modern times all subjects of the Thai king had a position on the sakti na scale: a beggar or slave would be counted as worth five rai, the poorest commoner stood at ten, a freeman who was head of a household


500 B. J. Terwiel / JESHO 54 (2011) 497-519

was worth 20, a skilled worker 25, a ship’s carpenter 50, a captain of a ship with a beam ranging from six to eight meters two hundred.3 The scale rose in fixed increments to 10,000 rai, which was the highest rank a person outside the royal family could attain and which was reserved for some ministers of state. Although this ranking system counted a person’s status in units of land, there is no evidence that it evolved from a real measure of landholding. Instead, it must be seen as an ideal norm, devised to rank all subjects. The laws of compensation were also linked to sakti na: the higher a claimant stood on the scale, the greater the compensation.

Ownership

The question of land ownership in pre- and early-modern times has so far received little attention. In particular, we should ask to what extent owner-ship of land was limited and whether there were limitations or specific rights and duties attached to landownership. An early mention of land exploitation can be found in the Ram Khamhaeng inscription of 1292, in which outsiders are invited to come to Sukhothai and establish an estate. It is specified several times that anyone establishing plantations “gets them for himself.”4 It is also promised that when a person dies his property is left entirely to his children. Among the items specified as property to be inher-ited are areca and betel plantations ( pa mak pa phlu ปาหมากปาพลู).5

Ram Khamhaeng’s proclamation has hitherto been seen as specifically designed to attract wealthy persons. It is often thought that the statement that the ruler will not take a share of the inheritance savors of propaganda. It advertises the fact that in Sukhothai the living conditions were better than in other towns and that the ruler proclaimed special concessions that were designed to attract wealthy immigrants.

However, Ram Khamhaeng’s statement that he will refrain from even taking a share of a person’s inheritance accords with the basic rules of inheritance that have been recorded in traditional law texts of the genre called Mangraiyasat (the Laws of Mangrai).6 Also, in the Mon Dhammasat

3) Yoneo Ishii, “History and Rice Growing, ” in Yoneo Ishii (ed.), Thailand: A Rice-Growing

Society (trans. Peter and Stephanie Hawkes). Honolulu: University Press of Hawaii, 1975: 30.4) Terwiel 2010: 98.5) Ibid.6) King Mangrai reputedly was a contemporary of Ram Khamhaeng, who defeated the

Mon kingdom of Hariphunchai and founded the city of Chiangmai. There are at least eight



texts a person’s inheritance is divided among the heirs without the central authorities taking a share.7 In inscription no. 5, written in the second half of the fourteenth century, the virtues of King Lithai are enumerated, among them that he did not covet the wealth of his subjects: when a father dies, the estate is left to the son, when an elder brother dies, it goes to the younger.

Notwithstanding these categorical statements, the Mangraiyasat and Dhammasat texts probably refer to the inheritance of the ordinary freemen and slaves and to the fact that the ruler really did occasionally take a share after the demise of a wealthy person. This may be extrapolated, for exam-ple, from parts of one of the Thai Mangraiyasat texts. In Article 5 of the version that was published by Griswold and Prasert we read that when a courtier dies honorably in battle, his property shall not be forfeited to the king’s treasury.8 In Article 8 it is stipulated that, if a wealthy official who has faithfully served the king dies of natural causes, leaving a will disposing of his goods, the provisions of the will should be carried out. Thus far, this is in agreement with the principle of complete inheritance, but if the faith-ful official leaves no will, half his property shall go to the royal treasury.9 Both cited cases concern officials to whom the ruler is beholden. It is prob-able, however, that any official who displeases the king may at any time be dispossessed and might forfeit all his assets, including all claims to land. This apparently pertained during the early modern period. Nicolas Ger-vaise, who lived for several years in Ayutthaya in the 1680s reports:

Sometimes he [the king] takes all when the memory of the deceased is burdened with

a strong suspicion of malfeasance during his period of service, but sometimes when he

is perfectly satisfied with his conduct he takes nothing, and he leaves the whole inher-

itance to his legitimate heirs.10

distinct versions of these collections of laws known, two of them translated into English.

The first of these (The Laws of King Mangrai (Mangrayathammasart), trans. and ed. Aroon-

rut Wichienkeeo and Gehan Wijeyewardene, Canberra: Australian National University,

1968) makes no reference to landownership. The second is cited in the following footnote. 7) See Eleven Mon Dhammasat Texts, collected and translated by Nai Pan Hla (Tokyo: Toyo

Bunko, 1992): 543-4, 589, 597-8. 8) A.B. Griswold and Prasert na Nagara, “The Judgments of King Man Ray,” in Epigraphic

and Historical Studies (Bangkok: Historical Society, hereafter EHS): 688. 9) Ibid., 689.10) . . . “quelquefois il prend tout quand la memoire du deffunt se trouve chargée d’un soup-

çon violent de malversation dans ses Emplois, mais quelquefois aussi quand il est parfaite-

ment satisfait de sa conduite il ne retient rien, & il abandonne toute sa succession à ses


502 B. J. Terwiel / JESHO 54 (2011) 497-519

The Availability of Land

An important factor in determining the basic attitude to land throughout the period studied here was that it was perceived to be abundantly availa-ble. Anybody who wished to clear a piece of forest was free to do so. After clearing the land and planting it with fruit trees or making it suitable for rice growing, a person obtained the exclusive right to cultivate that land. According to Anthony Reid, this right of permanent utilization was the closest Southeast Asian societies came to full personal property rights in land.11 Probably a better description of the system of landholding is that of Feeny, who finds that it was essentially a private usufruct right.12 In this contribution it will be shown that this right was but a mixed blessing.

The rule that the opening up of an uncultivated area, by draining the soil or cutting the forest, automatically entitled a person to own that land found its way into some legal texts. For example the Shans, who share their cultural background with the Thais, state specifically: “A man who first wields . . . the chopper or knife with a broad blade (dha ma u cha) shall pos-sess the plot of land that he reclaims from the forest.”13

It is not stated explicitly in our sources, but it seems likely that land that once had been cleared but which lies fallow (and thus from which nobody reaps produce) would, after some time, automatically revert to the category of wild lands that could be claimed by a new owner. Whether or not that was the case, it is clear that traditionally one who left his land fallow did not have to pay a tax on that land. During the reign of King Narai (1656-88), this situation was changed. In order to encourage people to raise more crops, the king decided to impose an annual tax of one salüng สลึง (the salüng is one-fourth of a baht, or a piece of silver weighing 7½ grams)—one may assume that this was assessed per rai—on all lands that had been owned for a certain period of time, regardless of whether the land was cultivated. He managed to enforce this new law only in those regions

héritiers légitimes.” Nicolas Gervaise. 1688. Histoire naturelle et politique du royaume de

Siam (Paris: chez Claude Barbin, 1688): 144.11) Anthony Reid, Southeast Asia in the Age of Commerce, 1450-1680, vol. 1, The Lands

below the Winds (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1988): 25.12) D. Feeny, “The Coevolution of Property Rights Regimes for Land, Men, and Forests in

Thailand, 1790-1990,” in J.F. Richards, Land, Property and the Environment (Oakland: ICS

Press, 2002): 179-183.13) Sai Aung Tun, “Hkamti Shans and their Traditional Laws,” in Selected Writings of U Sai

Aung Tun (Yangon: Myanmar Historical Commission, 2004): 81. Sai Aung Tun adds here

that the same rule applied to Myanmar cultivators and that the land was inheritable.



where he ruled with absolute authority. Narai apparently made it his policy to encourage settlers to cultivate wasteland, by providing uncultivated land and even the animals needed to cultivate it.14

Probably the earliest detailed and informative description of Siam was written in 1621 by Cornelis van Nijenrode, the director of the Dutch trade centre in Ayutthaya, who had lived in the country for almost five years. He refers to the widespread distribution of land:

Villages and towns are populous, filled with the clamor and bustle of men, women,

and children, most of them fishermen and tillers of land. For everyone, even when he

is of high status, cultivates and owns his own land and engages in fishing, notably land

to cultivate the grain called rice, also excellent businessmen and traders so that every-

body earns his own food in abundance and peacefully.15

Jan Struys, who visited Siam in February 1649, makes a similar statement on property rights:

The Kingdom of Siam, tho vast, yet is Populous, proportionably to its greatness. The

Natives are good-natur’d, witty and industrious. All the Artificers are very dexterous;

and tho they be of all sorts, most part of ’em however are either Fishermen or Hus-

bandmen, because very few but have their Lands in Property, or certain Places of Riv-

ers and other waters, where they have the Right of Fishing, which suffices them for

their subsistence.16

14) Simon de La Loubère, The Kingdom of Siam (Singapore: Oxford University Press, 1969

[1693|): 93. The original French text is a little clearer than the English version on the latter

point. “Il n’aimerait rien tant que de voir des étrangers venir s’établir dans ses états pour y

travailler ces grands espaces incultes qui en sont sans comparaison la plus considérable

partie; il serait libéral, en ce cas-là, de terres en friche, et de bêtes pour les cultiver, quand

elles auraient été défrichées.” M. Jacq-Hergoualc’h, Étude historique et critique du livre de

Simon de La Loubère, Du royaume de Siam (Paris: Editions Recherche sur les Civilisations,

1987): 328.15) “[D]e steden ende dorpen sijn soo voll volcken dat se grimelen ende wemelen van mans /

wijffs / ende kinderen / visschers ende lantbouwers aldermeest / want een ijeder t zy oock

hoe groot van state hij sij bouwt / ende hebben eygen lant / ende visserijen / insonderheijt

rijs ofte coorn-lant / mitsgaeders seer treffelijcke cooplieden ende negotianten / daer ijeder

sijn cost ende nootdruft seer rijck ende vredelicken mede wint”. Cornelis van Nijenrode,

“Remonstrantie ende verthoninge der gelegentheyt des coninckrijx van Siam,” Utrechts

Archief, fol. 10, received 14 October 1622. I thank Han ten Brummelhuis for making

available a draft edition he has prepared of this manuscript.16) From the travels of Jan Struys, as translated by W. Glanius, A New Voyage to the East-

Indies (London: Printed for H. Rodes, 1682): 109-10.


504 B. J. Terwiel / JESHO 54 (2011) 497-519

This means that almost all artisans were also farmers or fishermen having land property or fishing rights sufficient for them to live on.

Thus, for the period studied here, landholdings remained relatively small, and there are no signs of absentee-landlordism. In the Mangraiyasat there is a decree designed to discourage the proliferation of absentee landlords:

if any person, arrogantly relying on his rank, offers money to the lord of the district to

whom that land is subject, in order to get it away from the man who has built it up,

that person shall not be allowed to do so, for he is an evildoer. Let him have no

increase in rank or power, lest lazy men ruin the land, which would cause the kingdom

to decline.17

In general, it seems that landownership did not exceed the area that a householder and his dependents could actually work. Wealth was meas-ured primarily in the number of slaves a person possessed and servants he employed. A wealthy household might thus include many people and thus work many parcels of land.

It was only in the second half of the nineteenth century, when the Thai elite, inspired by European models, was convinced of the need for reform that King Mongkut formally renounced ownership of all land and recog-nized the principle of private ownership of land.18 It was also then, after a massive reclamation of land for rice cultivation in the lower Chaophraya Delta, that King Mongkut decided to reserve for his sons and daughters large parcels of land adjoining newly dug canals.19 High-ranking officials soon followed suit and acquired large tracts of valuable land that was settled with personal retainers or leased to others.20

Boat People

If the citations in the previous section taken from Nijenrode and Struys leave the impression that, because land was freely available, virtually

17) EHS, 690.18) Royal decree 7 April 7 1861. See Chatthip Nartsupha and Suthy Prasartset, ed., The

Political Economy of Siam, 1851-1910 (Bangkok: Social Science Association of Thailand,

1981): 291-6.19) See the proclamation of 10 October 1861 as published in ibid.: 297-9.20) Shigeharu Tanabe, “Land Reclamation in the Chao Phraya Delta,” in Ishii, Thailand:

A Rice-Growing Society: 40-82.



everybody owned land, a close look at the sources provides a more nuanced picture. There were thousands of inhabitants who made a living from trade or artisanship and who did not grow crops. This is clearly stated by Nijen-rode himself. His description may be taken as valid for at least the central region of the Chaophraya Delta, where trade and manufacture had appar-ently developed to a considerable degree along the waterways, providing a living for large numbers of people. Nijenrode mentions carpenters, ship-wrights, sculptors, gold- and silversmiths, masons, goldbeaters, stone cut-ters, painters, tinkers, metalworkers, weavers, plumbers, coppersmiths, turners, brick-makers, potters, sawyers of planks and beams, chest- and cabinetmakers, minters, and thousands of pedlars of linen and general goods. In addition there are barbers, doctors, scribes, legal advisers, and thousands of merchants peddling victuals and cloth. The latter live year after year on their boats.

Nijenrode’s account is supported by the journal of Gijsbert Heeck, who travelled from the mouth of the Chaophraya River to Ayutthaya in 1655 and who left the most detailed description of the approximately one hun-dred kilometres of the river.21 Heeck describes various landscapes, such as the mosquito-infested swamps near the mouth of the river, the orchards around Bangkok (including many coconut plantations), and—where the influence of brackish tidewater ended—the appearance of land used solely to raise a rice crop. Farmers apparently had trouble with multitudes of birds attacking the ripening crop. He also mentions farms where horses, cows, buffaloes, pigs, chickens, and ducks are raised and assumes that the livestock had to be protected from tigers. He tells us of men employed to perform menial work for a daily wage and of cloth dyers. He describes lively markets, where most goods are bought and sold on board boats. Some of the villages he passed specialized in boat-building, in the cutting of firewood, in pottery, or in coffin making.

Like Nijenrode, Heeck draws our attention to those he calls the “river folk,” people who live most of the time in covered boats with their whole family. They take their women and children along, and they cook in these boats as if they were in a house; he could see very little difference in house-hold belongings. When they have enough of boating they stick a mooring stake in the ground and remain in place, whereupon they all eat or sleep

21) Large parts of this journal were published in S.P.L’Honoré Naber, “De Derde Voyagie

van Gijsbert Heecq naar Oost Indijen,” Marineblad 25: 193-231, 289-317, 422-452,

533-563.


506 B. J. Terwiel / JESHO 54 (2011) 497-519

for as long as they like, from which he gained the impression that these inhabitants had a lazy, easy life and that they were well fed. The first accu-rate drawings of such house-boats were made on 22 June 1690, by Engel-bert Kaempfer.22

In addition to houseboats, some visitors to the Chaophraya noted a multitude of houses on bamboo rafts. The first to do so was probably Gaspero Balbi, in about 1583:

there are many houses of poore people made upon great plankes with edifices of wood

or great canes built on them, which they guide whither they will, to buy or sell any sort

of merchandise, which is exercised by women, who when a ship comes to that place,

doe not unlade it, but goe themselves upon these Rafts to negotiate, buy and sell.23

22) See Engelbert Kaempfer, Heutiges Japan, ed. Wolfgang Michel and Barend J. Terwiel

(Munich: Iudicium, 2001): 520, 524; and Barend Jan Terwiel, ed., Engelbert Kaempfer in

Siam (Munich: Iudicium, 2003): 124.23) Gaspero Balbi, “Voyage to Pegu, and Observations There, circa 1583,” SOAS Bulletin of

Burma Research 1(2) (2003): 33.

Extract from Kaempfer’s journal, British Library, Sloane Collection, MS Sl. 2921, p. 22, as published in Terwiel 2003: 124.

FPO



The Danish botanist J.G. Koenig noted in 1779 in the Bangkok region that all along the river there were what he called “swimming houses,” inhabited mostly by Chinese shopkeepers, shoemakers, pewterers, color-merchants,24 and others. Such a swimming house is built on big bamboos, that are enclosed by strong beams, and nearly all have two roofs. The first roof covers the shop or work room, the second is smaller and lower. The room behind is where the family lives. At both ends there are additional rooms, one for the kitchen, one for the servants. When such a building is new it floats about one foot above the water, but it cannot last longer than four years at most, after which it has to be demolished and rebuilt on new bamboo poles.25

Notwithstanding the short lifespan of these structures, this type of living remained popular. Finlayson remarked in 1822—after having described the multitude of vessels plying the river—that the most singular feature in the busy scene was the appearance of these houses floating on the water in rows eight, ten, or more deep along the bank. They struck him as being peculiarly neat, built of boards and of an oblong shape. On the side toward the river they were provided with a covered platform on which numerous articles of merchandise were displayed.26 There is a sketch of this remarkable scene made by F.A. Neale, an English visitor in 1841, showing a long double (and in some places triple) row of neatly and tastefully painted wooden cabins, floating on thick bamboo rafts and linked to each other by chains fastened to huge poles driven into the bed of the river. The visitor estimated no fewer than 70,000 floating houses or shops in Bang-kok alone.27

Neale was told that the frequent recurrence of cholera had caused one of the kings in the past to induce the inhabitants of Bangkok to live upon the water. This remark must be assessed with some caution. In the first place, the houses on rafts were there in large numbers long before 1820, when cholera reached Bangkok. It is possible, however, that people were encour-aged to occupy houses on rafts so as to avoid unsanitary, densely built-up areas. In Bangkok a large percentage of the population continued living at

24) Probably dyers of cloth.25) Jean Gerard Koenig, “Journal of a Voyage from India to Siam and Malacca in 1779,”

Journal of the Straits Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society, January 1894: 158.26) George Finlayson, The Mission to Siam and Hué, 1821-1822 (Singapore: Oxford Uni-

versity Press, 1988 [1826]): 115.27) Fred. Arthur Neale, Narrative of a Residence at the Capital of the Kingdom of Siam (Lon-

don: Office of the National Illustrated Library, 1852): 29-30.


508 B. J. Terwiel / JESHO 54 (2011) 497-519

the river banks and it was not until the Fourth Reign (1851-68) that major roads were built in Bangkok, that large-scale commercial premises were established and the riverine community dwindled.28

The Consequences of Occupying Land

In Article 11 of the Judgments of King Mangrai, the opening of new agricultural land is encouraged by the proclamation of a temporary tax exemption:

If a citizen is industrious enough to convert waste or derelict land into ricefields, gar-

dens, or dwelling places, he shall have the [entire] revenue for three years; after that he

shall pay taxes.29

28) Charoen Krung (New Road), with shops on both sides, was laid down in 1862. See

Chula Chakrabongse, Lords of Life (London: Redman, 1960): 207.29) “The Judgments,” EHS, 690.

F.A. Neale’s sketch (1841), as published in Neale, 1852: 30.

FPO



Although the edict appears generous at first sight, owning a plot of land and harvesting produce from it sooner or later resulted in a number of liabilities. From time to time Thai rulers ordered a census of all people permanently settled in their realm. The size of all rice fields was noted and whether they were dependent on rainfall alone or could be irrigated. A fixed share of the produce (or its equivalent in money) had to be paid to the state on various classes of rice land. Jeremias Van Vliet wrote in 1638 that there was a tax of one-eighth of a baht on each plow, and, on rice fields, a tenth, an eighth, or a seventh of the paddy was claimed by the king, in proportion to the fertility of the fields.30

The Persian Muhammad Ibrahim, who visited the court of King Narai in the 1680s, assesses the king’s portion much higher:

Every piece of land in Siam is considered the property of the government, and if any-

one wishes to undertake farming, he is obliged to pay one-third to two-thirds of the

produce to the king. . . . Aside from the rice crop and the small amount of produce

from gardens and vineyards, no other food is collected for the royal estates.31

There is a dramatic difference between the statements of Van Vliet and Ibrahim. While it is theoretically possible that the tax burden had been dramatically increased in the 47 years between the two accounts, Ibrahim’s statement is vague, the inclusion of vineyards is obviously wrong, and the amount of taxation (from one-third to two-thirds of the crop) seems exces-sive. It is probably a poetic exaggeration, designed to impress and excite his readers.

Gervaise notes that high officials paid the ruler eight füang (equivalent to one baht silver) annually for occupying a farm an arpent in area.32 La Loubère, relying largely on the long-term observations of Bishop Louis Laneau, tells us that on 40 fathoms square of cultivated lands—in Thai terms, four rai—one salüng had to be paid annually. We assume that La Loubère refers here to prime irrigated rice land and that this tax would be

30) Chris Baker et al., Van Vliet’s Siam (Chiang Mai: Silkworm, 2005): 121.31) J. O’Kane, trans., The Ship of Sulaiman (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1972): 149-

50. The reference to vineyards may have been a standard Persian expression for agricultural

lands, or the author may have made a mistake.32) The arpent is an old French measure of surface area, of a size varying between 2000 and

5000 square metres, averaging about 0,85 acres. The füang was equivalent to a little less

than 2 grams of silver; this was, at the time, the daily wage for an unskilled worker. Ger-

vaise, Histoire naturelle, 144-5.


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collected only in regions that were under the direct control of the central administration, not in outlying provinces.

On plantations, all fruit trees were counted and recorded as to type; each type of tree had its own tax, regardless of whether the tree bears fruit. If the tree died, the owner was obliged to plant a new one and keep paying its tax. For a durian tree, for example, one had to pay, at the time that Gervaise lived there (between 1682 and 1686), an annual tax of two füang.33 La Loubère provides us with some further details, that, if true, show that only a few years later the tax burden had increased dramatically. In 1688 the owner of a durian tree had to pay one baht annually (four times the rate reported by Gervaise), and on every areca palm one baht plus six areca nuts in kind were due (this had previously been three nuts per palm tree). On a coconut tree half a baht had to be paid annually. Every orange tree, mango tree, mangustan, or capsicum was taxed at one baht per year. When a local governor exacted this money, La Loubère tells us, he was entitled to a share. The discrepancy between the accounts of Gervaise and La Loubère may, however, relate, on the one hand, to the fact that neither author had access to complete information, often relying on hearsay and on unreliable informants, and, on the other hand, to the complexity of the Siamese tax-ation system.

The Range of Natural Resources

The Thai attitude toward land rights was to a large extent determined by the state’s system of exploitation of natural resources. The king’s officers supervised the building and maintenance of canals. They did so not to open up agricultural resources but primarily for military reasons, to facili-tate trade, and to collect taxes.34 The state attempted, with varying success, to monopolize trade by controlling the extraction of its natural resources.

A special register was kept of the high-yielding lands near the chief riv-ers, which could be easily irrigated. Such lands brought high yields when diligently worked and under good climatic conditions, so the state exacted high taxes on these lands, to be paid in cash or in paddy. This central reg-ister of rice fields distinguished between land in bunds35 and fields that

33) Ibid.: 128, 150.34) Tanabe, “Land Reclamation”: 47-8.35) The category na khu kho, mentioned above.



would be naturally flooded.36 There was also a special register of orchards, together with an administrative apparatus to collect taxes. The registration of fields and produce-bearing trees was extremely complex, a full count being made occasionally, often at the beginning of a new reign. In the tree register, each type of plantation was recorded, with the number of mature trees, and for every type of tree a particular tax was levied.

The southwest produced sugar from the palmyra palm,37 and state offi-cials taxed the product assiduously in various stages, from plantation to market. Around the mouth of the Thachin River, much salt was produced by evaporation of sea water. The western mountain ridges were the source of many forest products, the most important being sappan wood and vari-ous species of deer. In the north there were iron mines, and further inland lac was produced from forests near Phitsanulok, Sukhotai, and Chiang-mai. In addition, the north was the source of a seemingly inexhaustible supply of teak and deer hides. The northeast, where the Mun and Chi riv-ers flowed, was a vast reservoir of people, who could be called upon in time of war. Most communities had been registered, and in peacetime they were to deliver tribute, such as ramie,38 cardamom, beeswax, and silk. Between the Prachin Valley and the southeastern coastline much of the terrain was a wilderness, where the rhinoceros, among others, was hunted, and forest products, such as cardamom, were collected.39 The southeastern coast became the kingdom’s chief pepper-growing region.

There was a distinction between older plantations in the lowlands (con-taining areca palms, coconut palms, betel vines, mango trees, maprang40 trees, durian trees, mangosteen, and langsat41 trees), which were registered only in a general registration, and plantations in higher regions that were assessed every year. The latter comprised orchards with fruit trees, such as citrus, breadfruit, guava, rambutan, and pineapple. Also subject to annual registration were tamarind and banana trees and pepper and cinnamon plants. La Loubère adds that no tax was assessed on pepper during Narai’s

36) The category na fang loi, mentioned above.37) Borassus flabellifer. See Guy Lubeight, “Une civilisation du palmier à sucre en Asie,” Le

Courier du CNRS 44, 1982: 24-35.38) Fiber obtained from the Boehmeria nivea (family Urticaceae).39) Crawfurd, 1987 [1828]: 430 reports that in 1822 a thousand rhinoceros horns were

exported annually to China.40) Bouea burmanica (Anacardiaceae), a tree with edible fruit.41) Lansium domesticum (Mediaceae), a small tree bearing a highly esteemed fruit.


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reign, in order to encourage people to produce this product,42 a clear sign of direct policy intervention by the state, with consequences for the Siamese landscape.43

Human Capital

A key to maintaining a regular supply of trade products was the control of manpower. To this end a record was made, from time to time, of all able-bodied men over the age of fifteen, and this became the basis for establish-ing the number of corvée workers who could be assigned manual tasks. In the earliest accounts every registered freeman had to serve the state six months per year, leaving only six months to pursue private activities.44 In principle, women did not have to perform corvée labor, but, as will be seen below, this depended upon whether the labor that was exacted was suitable to be performed by women.

In early modern times the administration of corvée was a complex affair. Those who were registered as the king’s subjects ( phrai luang ไพร่หลวง) served the king for one month and were free to pursue their own business the next. Those who were employed in wealthy private households in prin-ciple also had to serve the king. Gervaise reports that, in the 1670s, the private retainers ( phrai som ไพร่สม) were sent once a year to serve the king for the full six months. It was possible to pay a sum of money to hire a substitute; in Gervaise’s time this was an annual sum of fifteen baht.

La Loubère describes large parts of the complex state system for raising revenue. Anyone who was not a slave had in principle to serve the state for six months of the year. In practice, this corvée was satisfied in various ways. Some paid a quantity of rice and thus gained exemption. Other people, living in an area that produced valuable resources, had to deliver a fixed amount of that resource, such as sappan wood, aloes, saltpetre, elephants, or deer hides. Others paid cash to obtain exemption: La Loubère tell us that formerly this was one baht per month, but during Narais reign this was doubled to two baht (a year’s exemption thus costing twelve baht).45 Here again, the accounts of Gervaise and La Loubère differ, for reasons we

42) La Loubère, The Kingdom of Siam: 94.43) A lengthy account of all forms of taxation in Siam in the year 1863 can be found in

A. Bastian, Reisen in Siam im Jahre 1863 (Jena: Hermann Costenoble, 1867): 446-9.44) Ibid., 78.45) Gervaise, Histoire Naturelle: 148.



have described above. In the eighteenth century, when Ayutthaya was nearing the end of its supremacy, the corvée burden was reduced, first to four months per year and later to three.46

While a person could, in times of peace, free himself of the burden of corvée by paying a fixed amount of money, in many more remote regions (as mentioned above) the corvée burden was collected differently: it had been changed to a form of taxation in kind, called suai (ส่วย). What exactly was exacted in lieu of corvée depended on the natural wealth of the outly-ing region. If the region had a salt mine, the local people paid salt. If the region had valuable wood, tin, or saltpetre, the people were taxed in these products. Each governor was charged with delivering an amount of speci-fied suai tax that was based on the number of able-bodied subjects regis-tered in his area. A vast correspondence between the capital and provincial centers developed around this subject. In the National Library there are several thousand documents from the early Bangkok Period, many of which are reminders from the central authorities warning a governor that particular suai payments were still outstanding or letters from governors explaining why they could not reach their quota and asking for leniency. This highly organized state system functioned for hundreds of years, until the middle of the nineteenth century. In the early-nineteenth-century Thai archival records we can still find many details on the functioning of this system, in particular, how it coerced large numbers of people to deliver trading goods.47

The famous poet Sunthon Phu (1786-1855) wrote, in the first decade of the nineteenth century, an account of his difficult voyage to the village of Ban Kram, some 350 kilometers southeast of Bangkok. Even that far from the capital, the power of the central government was strongly felt. The poet everywhere saw women weaving mats, their hands—and, as Sunthon Phu wittily inserted, also their mouths—never resting. They wove inces-santly, until they could no longer stretch their cramped fingers. These mats

46) H.G. Quaritch Wales, Ancient Siamese Government and Administration (New York:

Paragon Book Reprint, 1965 [1934]): 61.47) Nijenrode, in 1621, says that each governor had to render his accounts every three years.

Parts of this correspondence have been studied by Constance M. Wilson. See, for example,

“The Nai Kong in Thai Administration, 1824-68”, Contributions to Asian Studies 15 (1980):

41-57 and “Revenue Farming, Economic Development and Government Policy in Thai-

land, 1830-1910,” paper presented at the Conference on Revenue Farming and Southeast

Asian Transitions, Canberra, 1988.


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constituted the suai tax of the village. All villagers, young and old, knew how to weave mats.48

Legal Disputes

The ready availability of land and the heavy burdens of working the land have meant that, among the cases of litigation and conflicts concerning property, land disputes are rare. In the early-modern copy of the Judg-ments of King Mangrai, it is stipulated that the person developing the land should be protected from rich and powerful people trying to dispossess him.49 Legal issues concerning property are overwhelmingly concerned with movable objects, such as plows or weapons, and with the ownership of people and cattle. This may reflect the fact that arable land was not scarce and was generally available to those willing to work it.

In one of the Mon Dhammasat texts, disputes over access to irrigation water, damage to cultivated land, and boundaries are mentioned. In all these cases, evidence has to be produced and judgment rendered by elders, monks, or Brahmans.50

Ideal Ownership

In order to understand fully the rules of land ownership in this part of the world, it is useful to distinguish between actual and ideal ownership. In ideal terms the cultivator “borrows” in perpetuity from the Lord of the Land (Chao Mueang เจ้าเมอืง). This also constitutes the ultimate justifica-tion for the ruler being able to exact from each farmer or plantation owner a tax, in produce or in cash. These taxes were sometimes waived for an initial period (as indicated above) or during times of extreme hardship, when the crops had failed. In principle, however, the system of taxation rested upon the ideal that the king owns all the land. This is reflected in the most common traditional Thai expression for the king: phra chao phaen din (พระเจ้าแผ่นดนิ), literally, “the exalted Lord Owner of the Territory.”

48) For the Thai text, see H. Hundius, Das Nirat Müang Kläng von Sunthon Phu, Analyse

und Übersetzung eines thailändisches Reisegedichts (Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 1976): 137.49) “The Judgments,” EHS: 690.50) Eleven Mon Dhammasat Texts: 581.



The fact that all land remained vested in the king seems to have had a strong effect upon the marketability of land. It was a “hot commodity,” as La Loubère noted:

no person among them [the Siamese] thinking it safe to purchase Land of another; the

Prince [i.e., the king] gives, or sells thereof, to whoever would have it. But the real

Property remaining always in him, is the reason that none in this Country does care to

purchase much Land, nor to meliorate it, for fear of exciting a desire of it in one more

powerful than himself.51

This ideal ownership is reflected also in the common perception that among the great deeds of a monarch (as recounted in the fourteenth-century inscription no. 8) is counted the fact that he ordered the digging of an irrigation canal to water upland and lowland farms, so that people could plant areca palms and other fruit trees.52 In all the northern Thai valleys the construction of irrigation canals (muang ม่วง) and small dams ( fai ฝาย) created the ideal conditions for growing a rice crop, and a major task of the local ruler was to make certain that his subjects kept the canals from silting up and that a damaged fai dam was promptly repaired.53

On another level, all cultivators were aware of the fact that their long-term occupation of a plot of land was possible also because unseen powers had been propitiated to obtain their agreement. Before a dwelling was erected, for example, a complex ritual appeasing the spirit of the soil had to be conducted; the digging of the hole for the first pole of a house was subject to strict rules.54 Every house had a shrine dedicated to the spirit of the soil (san phra phum ศาลพระภูม)ิ, and major events, such as changes in occupant, had to be reported to this spirit. These rules were observed for all buildings that were built on the ground.

51) La Loubère, The Kingdom of Siam: 71.52) “The Epigraphy of Mahadharmaraja I of Sukhodaya,” EHS: 564. For further references

to rulers who are praised for establishing or restoring irrigation canals, see Ishii, “History

and Rice-Growing”: 25.53) The lower Chaophraya basin could not be managed with the relatively simple tech-

niques that were developed in the northern valleys. The lower Chaophraya was the major

highway for communication and trade. Until the middle of the nineteenth century most of

the lower delta remained useless for agriculture. Irrigation water was tapped along the

upper Chaophraya and from tributaries such as the Pasak and the Nan River, and it is in

such areas that the chief towns were established.54) B.J. Terwiel, Monks and Magic (Bangkok: White Lotus, 1994): 137-60.


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Agricultural rituals differed, in that the primary occupation did not require a ceremony: it was only the wet-rice production that had to be accompanied by ritual. A pregnant Mother Rice (Mae Phosop) was the personification of the ripening of the crop, and small offerings were made to her during the months when the ears grew heavy. An elaborate cere-mony was conducted before and during the threshing of the ears.

Types of Monastery Lands

Land could be given away, as witnessed in inscription no. 2, where it is recounted that Sisattha donated rice fields to a monastery.55 A clear distinc-tion should be made between lands given to a monastery as its wealth and land donated to establish a monastery. While the former type was a resource, to be exploited for the benefit of the sangha (clergy), under super-vision of a monastery committee, the latter category caused a plot of land to be removed from secular use in perpetuity. In case a monastery was abandoned, the former type of land would return to waste land that could be reassigned, the latter would remain sangha land.

It was for this reason that a pious Buddhist, in 1334, requested permis-sion of the king of Sukhothai to use a piece of land of about 78 by 90 meters for the purpose of establishing a Buddhist monastery (the per-mission was apparently obtained). It may be assumed that the particular plot of land already was part of the property of the donor. The special per-mission was needed because such a donation could not be reversed, and the plot of land would remain in the care of the Buddhist order forever.

Conclusion

When looking at land occupation from the point of view of the adminis-tration, all land being controlled by the central authority was regularly assessed for its exploitation value. Wild forests were outside direct control. The state could stimulate exploitation by buying materials such as hides, honey, or lac, or by assigning groups of people to enter the woods and extract specifically identified goods from the forests. Upland farms were easier to control, because changes in the land could not be hidden from inspection. The difficulty was to find enough people willing to invest in

55) EHS: 389, and cf. 653-4.



clearing the land and raising a crop. Lowland agricultural land was the most valuable; in good years a rich rice crop could be harvested. The basic problem was to find enough people to work diligently in forests, on plan-tations, and on farms.

It is worth looking at the situation from the perspective of a phrai. The forests were above all the domain of people living on the margins of the state. Hunters and gatherers maintained their own life style—they lived in a separate world, engaging only occasionally in clearly circumscribed situ-ations in which they were able to exchange goods with representatives of the central state. All phrai who lived in outer provinces were registered and forced to work half the year for the state, and they had to pay taxes on many of the materials needed to make a living. Those who occupied fertile rice lands in the central area were even more heavily taxed. From this per-spective, the idea of land ownership loses much of its attraction. When a diligent person worked hard to transform a plot of wasteland into good farm land, he and his dependents were automatically and permanently snared in taxation and duties. The gratifying feeling of owning land was more than offset by subsequent state interventions. For this reason, many phrai decided to sell themselves, becoming fiduciary slaves to a trusted master.

In our sources we have noted several proclamations intended to entice people to open up agricultural land. It was Chinese immigrants who seemed to have profited most from these opportunities. Taking advantage of exemptions from corvée, during the first half of the nineteenth century the Chinese accepted the enticement of owning land in a manner unheard of in China. These new immigrants, who invested massively in opening up plantations and transformed the landscape with plantations, soon came to dominate economic life in Siam.

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JESH 054 The Burden of Owning Land: Habitat in Pre-Modern and Early-Modern Thailand

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Transcript of JESH 054 The Burden of Owning Land: Habitat in Pre-Modern and Early-Modern Thailand