Phra Bat Somdet Phra Poramenthra Maha Mongkut Phra Chom Klao Chao Yu Hua

(พระบาทสมเด็จพระปรเมนทรมหามงกุฎ พระจอมเกล้าเจ้าอยู่หัว)

Or Rama IV, known in English-speaking countries as King Mongkut (18 October 1804 – 1 October 1868), was the fourth monarch of Siam (Thailand) under the House of Chakri, ruling from 1851 to 1868.

Reign as king

Accounts vary about Nangklao’s intentions regarding the succession. It is recorded that Nangklao verbally dismissed the royal princes from succession for various reasons; Prince Mongkut was dismissed for encouraging monks to dress in the Mon style. Nangklao wished his throne to be passed to his son, Prince Annop, and that he gave his bracelet which had been passed down from Phutthayotfa Chulalok to the prince. However, Dis Bunnak switched the bracelet for a forged one, thus preventing Annop from inheriting the throne. Prince Mongkut was indeed supported by a pro-British, Dis Bunnak, the Samuha Kalahom, or Armed Force Department’s president, the most powerful noble during the reign of Rama III. Also some British merchants who were fearful of the anti-West feeling growing during the previous reign, seeing the ‘prince monk’, Mongkut, who the ‘champion’ of European civilization among the royal elite, as their new hope.

Cultural reforms

Accompanying the influx of Western visitors to Siam was the notion of a round earth. By many Siamese, this was difficult to accept, particularly by religious standards, because Buddhist scripture described the earth as being flat. The Traiphum, which was a geo-astrological map created before the arrival of Westerners, described “…a path between two mountain ranges through which the stars, planets, moon and sun pass.” Religious scholars usually concluded that Buddhist scriptures “…were meant to be taken literally only when it came to matters of spiritual truth; details of natural science are revealed figuratively and allegorically.” Mongkut claimed to have abandoned the Traiphum cosmology before 1836. He claimed that he already knew of the round state of earth 15 years before the arrival of American missionaries, but the debate about Earth’s shape remained an issue for Siamese intellectuals throughout the 1800s.