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Mainland South-East Asia has a considerable number of ancient cultural centres which are increasingly visited and appreciated by overseas travellers. This volume brings together the most important sites in Burma, Thailand, and Cambodia. Each is described and its salient features noted andplaced in the general context of the country and the region.

This account of Kosa Pan's journal describes in great detail the arrival in Brest in 1686 of the first full Siamese embassy to reach France. This fragment is apparently all that survives of a massive report of the activities of the embassy written for King Narai. It was discovered in Paris in the early 1980s, was published in Thai in 1984, and appears here in English for the first time. Dirk Van der Cruysse is professor of French culture and literature at the University of Antwerp. Michael Smithies is former editor of the Journal of the Siam Society.

"Francois Martin, from his unique viewpoint as director of the French trading outpost at Pondichery, provides a careful analysis of the motives of the persons involved in the French colonizing venture. He describes the growth of French involvement from its small missionary and trade beginnings, as well as the Makassar uprising in Bangkok and the Mergui massacre of the English. He objectively details the intrigues of Phaulkon, the flow of embassies to and from France, the Greek's death and that of King Narai after the Lopburi coup d'etat, the subsequent disasters of the French withdrawal and the fruitless expedition to Phuket led by the incompetent General Desfarges."--BOOK JACKET.

A fascinating account of the genetic, archaeological and demographic evidence for the peopling of the New World.

Account of envoy sent by Nārāi, King of Siam, 1632-1688, to court of Louis XIV, King of France, 1638-1715, in 1686; hitherto unpublished, probably based on lost French translation.

Formal relations between Siam and the Vatican date to 1669 when Pope Clement IX sent a papal brief to King Narai. Informal relations began earlier with the arrival of the Portuguese and their priests. King Narai responded to the overtures of the Holy See with two missions to Rome but only the second arrived at the end of 1688. The dramatic events behind these missions are related by well-known historian, Michael Smithies, assisted by the former Apostolic Nuncio of Bangkok, Mgr. Bressan, now Archbishop of Trento. 91 colour illustrations

"Bangkok, the City of Angels, to the uninitiated now seems more like Los Angeles than the Venice of the East by which name it was known to early visitors. Michael Smithies, who first came to work in the city in 1960, has written a sympathetic and stimulating book evoking the early days of the capital, founded in 1782, and its expansion in the nineteenth century. He describes the principal buildings which still survive, the temples and palaces, and corners and crafts which remain relatively unchanged. The second edition has been brought up to date to include such recent additions to the Bangkok scene as the so-called 'skytrain' (soon to be supplemented by an underground line). However, the old buildings, traditions, and trades of early Bangkok retain their charm and character, and in spite of its occasional brashness and impulsive modernization, the Thai capital retains a vibrancy in its anarchic orderliness which makes it one of the more endearing if sometimes confusing cities in South-East Asia."--BOOK JACKET.