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BRIEF HISTORY
The rudimentary structures of a
multiethnic state existed before the founding of the Kingdom of Lan Xang
in the thirteenth century. These prethirteenth-century structures
consisted of small confederative communities in river valleys and among
the mountain peoples, who found security away from the well-traveled
rivers and overland tracks where the institutions and customs of the
Laotian people were gradually forged in contact with other peoples of
the region. During these centuries, the stirring of migrations as well
as religious conflict and syncretism went on more or less continuously.
Laos's shortlived vassalage to foreign empires such as the Cham, Khmer,
and Sukhothai did nothing to discourage this process of cultural
identification and, in fact, favored its shaping. |
LAOTIAN KINGDOM
The earliest inhabitants of Laos were
migrants from southern China. From the 11th century
onward, parts of Laos fell under the Khmer Empire, and later under
Siamese influence from the Sukhothai dynasty. The history of Laos
truly begins the first unified kingdom to be established by Fa Ngun,
a Lao prince who brought up in the court of Angkor Wat. As the Khmer
Empire crumbled, Fa Ngum welded together a new empire, which he
modestly christened ‘Lan Xang’ – the Land of a Million Elephants.
Lan Xang covered the whole of present-day Laos plus most of Issan
(northeast Thailand). Fa Ngum declared himself king of the realm in
1353. Fa Ngum was unable to subdue the unruly highlanders of the
northeast regions; these remained independent of Lan Xang Rule. Upon
Fa Ngum’s marriage to a Cambodian princess, the Khmer court gave the
Lao king a sacred gold Buddha called Pra Bang. Fa Ngum made Buddhism
the state religion, and Pra Bang became the protector of the Lao
kingdom. Nobility pledged allegiance to the king before the statue.
Named after Pra Bang was the city of Luang Prabang, the cradle of
Lao culture and the centre of the Lao state for the next 200
years.Fa Ngum’s son, Samsenthai, who reigned 1373-1416, consolidated
the royal administration, developing Luang Prabang as a trading and
religious center. His death was followed by unrest under a swift
succession of lackluster monarchs. Luang Prabang came under
increasing threat from incursions by the Vietnamese and later the
Burmese. In 1563, King Settathirat declared Vientiane the capital of
Lan Xang, and built Wat Pra Keo to house the Emerald Buddha, a gift
from the king of Ceylon, as a new talisman for the kingdom.
Settathirat is revered as one of the great Lao kings because he
protected the nation from foreign subjugation. When he disappeared
in 1574 on a military campaign, the kingdom rapidly declined and was
subject to Burmese invasion. There was a quick and lackluster
succession of kings after Settathirat. King Souligna Vongsa, who
ruled 1633-94, brought stability and peace back to the kingdom – a
period regarded as Lan Xang’s golden age.
SIAMESE SATELLITE
The kingdom initially prospered, but
internal divisions and pressure from neighbours caused it to split
in the 17th century into three warring kingdoms centred on Luang
Prabang, Vieng Chan (Vientiane) and Champasak. The seventeenth
century saw the new kingdom enter its golden age with European
traders exclaiming the capital, Vientiane, to be one of the most
beautiful cities in southeast Asia. However, this was all to come to
an end in less than a century as feudal lords fought over an empty
throne and eventually brought about the kingdom's downfall. An
unstable three way division of the kingdom, into Luang Prabang,
Vieng Chan, and Champasak, left none with sufficient power to repel
the ambitions of the new Siamese kingdom of King Thaksin. Luang
Prabang fell to Siamese rule and Vientiane and Champasak were
reduced to vassal status. After years of paying vassalage to the
Siamese kings, an ill-fated war against their rule in 1820 was the
undoing of both these kingdoms, and also brought about the total
destruction of the once beautiful city of Vientiane.
COLONIAL TIMES
European ambitions in the region, at
the end of the nineteenth century, were of serious concern to the
Siamese kings for many years. In 1893, to guarantee that the French
colonialists would not challenge the country's sovereignty, Siam
gave them Laos. The French - soon realising that the colony was not
quite the grand acquisition they had hoped, and that the Mekong
River's potential as a backdoor trade route into China had been
vastly over estimated - made Laos a protectorate and left much of
the running of the country to the Lao people.
The fall of France to Germany and the
Japanese occupation of Indochina during World War II, helped to
foment a new breed of nationalism among the Lao people. The
situation was exacerbated when Japanese troops forced the pro-French
King Sisavang Vong to declare independence from the French in the
waning months of the war. With the August 14 1945 surrender of
Japan, a power vacuum was left in Laos that the French were at that
time unable to refill. For a little over six months Laos was
independent, but, with the help of British and Pro-French Lao
forces, the colonialists were able to re-occupy Vientiane in April
1946. However, the seeds of liberty had already been sown. In
October 1953, the French - their resources already seriously
stretched by the war in Vietnam - finally ceded full independence to
Laos.
The political situation, however, was
to remain unstable for many years, eventually leading to civil war
between the North Vietnamese backed Pathet Lao (Land of the Lao) and
the US-financed Royalist forces.
The January 1973 Paris Accords - which
saw the end of US involvement in the Vietnam conflict was followed a
month later by a cessation of hostilities between the opposing Lao
factions, leading at last to the formation of a coalition
government. It was not to last.
INDEPENDENCE
With the fall of Phnom Penh and Saigon
to Communist forces in April 1975, many Royalists saw the eventual
takeover of the country by the Pathet Lao as a forgone conclusion
and fled to France. That August, in a symbolic gesture, a force of
fifty female Pathet Lao soldiers marched into and liberated
Vientiane. The Lao People's Democratic Republic was born on December
2, 1975.
Laos entered a period of isolation
throughout the rest of the seventies, maintaining diplomatic and
economic relations with only Vietnam and the USSR. After failing to
establish a successful socialist state modeled on Eastern Bloc
collectivization, the Lao government moved towards a more flexible
form of socialism - dismantling agricultural co-operatives in 1979,
and installing economic reforms in 1986 that opened the way for the
introduction of a market economy.
In the last few years, Laos has made
further strides towards international acceptance and integration
into the global economy. The 1994 opening of the Australian-financed
Friendship Bridge - linking Vientiane with Nong Khai in Thailand -
and the country's 1997 ASEAN membership are both seen as positive
moves towards this goal.
