Comments by "Grand Wonder" (@grandwonder5858) on "Knowledgia"
channel.
-
68
-
@CNX625 Because what you considered as "Thailand" today was actually part of the Khmer Empire, which also consisted of the entire landmass of today's Cambodia, South Vietnam, nearly all of "Thailand," and a small part of Myanmar. Both the Thais and Vietnamese were invaders from southern China approximately 800-900 years ago as they were two minority groups that flee Chinese domination and invaded the Kingdom of the Khmers. Both the Thais and the Vietnamese were more heavily influenced by the Chinese than the Khmers and they looked more similar to the Chinese than the Khmers did as well. The Khmer people have lived in their their present-day location for over 4000 years, the Thais and the Vietnamese were relatively new to their present-day location. Here, take a look at the maps of the Khmer Empire to see for yourself how the map used to look like before the invasion of the Thais and the Vietnamese into Khmer Empire: https://khmerkromngo.org/map/khmerEmpire.htm
The Thais even adopted many Khmer customs as their own, such as their writing, architectures, dance, food, and court customs. However, most westerners are easily fooled by the Thais' shameless claim that the Khmers "stole' their customs, which is the complete opposite since the Khmer civilization has been around in the Indochina Peninsula a lot longer and has been more dominant in the Indochina Peninsula for a longer period of time as well. Just as today's Thai people like to name everything as being their own, such "Thai Basil, Thai Chili, Thai Noodle, Thai Eggplant, Thai Curry, Thai Celery, Thai Spring Roll, Pad Thai, etc as if they have invented these foods and herbs despite the fact that most of the food were started in China, India, Cambodia, and all of the herbs that they have named after themselves were found in all of southeastern Asia and even all of southern Asia from India to Indonesia for that matter!
Indeed, even Muay Thai, a martial art widely considered as being invented by the Thais are influenced by the Khmers' Pradal Serey ( Khmer martial art), Muay Lao (Traditional Laotian martial art, and Musti-Yuddha (Indian martial art), but like everything else the Thais take full credit for "inventing' this martial art despite the fact that they have taken martial arts from many other cultures in order to form the Muay Thai that we know today.
The contention that I would like to make is the fact that while the Khmers are never afraid to admit that they are heavily influenced by the Indians and the Chinese. The Thais; however, are well known for denying that any other cultures could have influenced their culture in any way and are always eager to name everything after themselves by placing the word "Thai" before many things that they named (Thai Basil, for example). They even named their country "Thailand" as a way to trick the world that the land that they are currently occupying, and have stolen from the Khmers, is actually their own since the existence of their people, which isn't true!
7