First Photographic image of Muay Thai in history, 1865 | THAILAND 🇹🇭

In 2014, the Cambodian government made an application to UNESCO (The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization) for inscribing Kun L’bokkator (No.00980) on the List of Intangible Cultural Heritage in Need of Urgent Conservation.

That is, in short, the inclusion of the supposedly ancient Khmer boxing art, on the list of recognized World Heritage, which is an honor and prestige to any nation

With due respect to the Cambodian martial arts community, the initiative, in the author’s view, was dishonest and seriously lacked credence.

 

The author adores Cambodian boxing culture, and in fact, had done some in-depth studies into its origin, past history, and is profoundly sympathetic to the trauma suffered by her people in the harsh days of the Khmer Rouge.

It had revolved around one man, grandmaster Sean Kim San, who returned to Cambodia after years in exile in the United States, where he made a living as a musician in Chicago and taught Hapkido in his free time.

 

It was never clear whether he had taken refuge in America (immediately prior to the Vietnamese incursion 1975) was attributable to a clandestine relationship with a foreign power, or that he had been considered a threat to his own government.

 

I met master Seam Kim San with his associates in 2001, during one of my several discovery trips to Cambodia. I have roamed around Phnom Penh for information on Boxe Libre and made investigations at the National Sports Stadium Cambodian Boxing authorities on boxing development. I also toured the army camp in Siem Reap, when they had the best fighters.

I consider my investigations to be as comprehensive, thorough, and objective as possible….. but the name L’bokkator only emerged once, merely mentioned as an old-time weapon drill, that no one knew anything about.

 

Two years hence, the name Bokator became a national drive and made it to news headlines. and what I was dismayed about was the overt animosity against Muaythai. Those contemplating revival of Kun Khmer went overboard to blame the Thai for stealing their boxing art – after the destruction of Angkor. The acrimony was partly history.

 

However, such hostile sentiments were never explicit in the old journalistic reports on Boxe Libre in the late ’60s to 1974, when Cambodian boxers fought often against their Thai, Lao, and Vietnamese counterparts. They never had much success against the Thai (only second graders)… that is all on record.

 

As far as evidence on documents is concerned, L’bokkator, for whatever it might have been in centuries gone by, was virtually dead.

 

Thus, it came as a shock to me that in around 2003, all of a sudden, Bokator had emerged as a national heritage of Cambodia, with some 300-plus moves and tactics collected from old-timers! That was indeed nothing short of sorcery!

The annoying part was that in the process of the revival movement, they slandered Thai culture, and misused, shamelessly, doctored images of muaythai and muay boran, to represent their long-forgotten art. It was such an outrageous fraud in broad daylight.

One photographic image (from a friendly source) misused in the Cambodian drive is posted here to illustrate the point. It was an image seen in many Thai publications on her culture and heritage. The caption invariable was “Siamese boxing, circa 1900”……in the Thai references.

 

It had taken me many years to date this photo and discover its significance of it.

 

Previously, I proposed to date the photo at 1872, for that was the time King Rama V. (Chulalongkorn) promoted Khun Yo Tanulok to head the Royal Boxing Contingent (Krom Muay Luang), and in those old days, at the very dawn of photography in Siam, only the most important or special persona had the privilege of being captured on camera.

 

It was very much to my pleasure, and gratitude, that our friend Kevin Aamlid (Euro-Thai from Cholburi), has referred to me his proud discovery: That photo was in fact presented in an album by John Thomson, a fabulous photographer, whose extensive coverage of life and landscapes in Siam, Cambodia, and China in around 1866, has made him one most celebrated cameramen in history.

 

That photo, on Siamese boxing, was in his Album dated 1865-66, kept as image No. 5 in box 4, among ten boxes totaling a collection of 97 images.

 

The caption I propose for the photo is Siamese boxing in about 1865. The hefty boxer in the background to the left is believed to be Khun Yo Thanuraks (On), the number one fighter of Siam at the time.

 

The Royal Gazette from the reign of King Rama V. recorded that in 1872, the premier fighter Khun Yo Thanuraks (On) was promoted to Luang Chaiyachoke-Chokjana, to take charge as Chief of Royal Guards (Taharn Luek), Right Lance Brigade. His title was later advanced to Phra, or Lord.

 

The photo, by any reckoning, is the first-ever photographic image of Muaythai boxers in history.

The acrimony may be seen as an ugly page in Cambodian cultural history. The inscription effort for UNESCO recognition proved futile, and quite rightly so.

 

But over a decade since, it is heartening to see youthful Cambodian artists are now maturing with their “revived” old fighting traditions. The government and its martial arts community have been awakened by the movement. There is something positive coming out of what had actually begun in a scandalous delusion.