History
always begins with legends. Here an Indian Brahmin named Kaundinya
married Soma, the Funan queen and that was the beginning of the
dynasties of the Funanese kings. The name Funan derives from the Chinese
rendition of the old Khmer word bnam (meaning mountain). It is unknown
until today what the Funanese called themselves.
Harder facts
come from the first century B.C. when some city states likely with an
austro-asiatic Mon population allied. The new kingdom centered in the
lower Mekong delta. Its capital city Vyadharapura (town of the hunters)
has not been found until today. We know about the strong Indian
influences in language, law and religion at that time. Funan was an
important station on the ocean routes and it regulated the sea trade
between India and China by its efficient navy. Oc Eo was the most
greatest seaport. The earliest facts date to the mid-3rd century A.C.
(comp.: Chinese accounts). At that time Funan reached its furthest
extent under the rule of king Fan Shi Man. Nearly all the neighbour
states in Thailand, Malaysia and southern Burma collapsed. Only the
giant Chinese Empire had the strength to act as political
counterbalance.
Funan collapsed in the sixth century and was
replaced by the Chenla kingdom. The cradle of Chenla laid in the region
of Wat Phu in the south of Laos with its capital city Bhavapura. The
last Funanese king Bhavavarman married a princess from the royal family
of Chenla and they became the founders of the first Khmer empire.
In the mid-3rd century A.D. two chinese
traders, Kang Tai and Zhu Ying, visited Vyadharapura (town of the
hunters), the legendary capital of the Funan kingdom. Their account
became part of the Chinese Empirical Records:
The Liang Shu
account from Chinese Empirical Records
Ed. note.: There was no translation of the original text up to now. The
chinese text was published by Wheatley, P., The Golden Khersonese,
University of Malaya Press, 1966. We thank Yun from China History Forum
for the execellent English translation and Wolfgang Wintermeier for the
German translation.
The kingdom of Funan is south of Rinan
prefecture (in northern Vietnam), in a big bay on the west of the sea.
It is 7,000 li from Rinan, and over 3,000 li southwest of Linyi
(Champa). The capital is 500 li from the sea. There is a big river 10 li
across, which flows from the northwest and enters the sea in the east.
The kingdom has a diameter of over 3,000 li, and its land is low-lying
and flat. Its climate and customs are generally similar to Linyi. It
produces gold, silver, bronze, tin, lakawood, ivory, jadeite, and
five-coloured parrots.
(Omitted: descriptions of neigbouring
kingdoms of Dunsun, Piqian and Zhubo)
The people of the Funan kingdom originally had the custom of going
naked, tattooing their bodies and letting their hair hang down. Their
ruler was a woman named Liuye (Willow Leaf, called Soma in a Cham
version). She was young and muscular, like a man. In the south there was
the kingdom of Ji, where there was a priest of spirits and gods named
Huntian (Kaundinya). He dreamt that a god gave him a bow, and that he
sailed to sea in a merchant ship. In the morning he got up and went to
the temple, and found the bow under a sacred tree. He thus followed the
dream and sailed to sea on a ship, reaching the outer areas of Funan.
Liuye and her followers saw the ship approaching and wanted to capture
it. Huntian then drew his bow and shot Liuye's ship, piercing its side
and hitting one of the servants. Liuye was terrified and surrendered to
Huntian with all her people. Huntian taught Liuye to make a hole in a
piece of cloth and put her head through it, using it as clothing to
cover her body. He then ruled over the kingdom and took Liuye as his
wife. They had seven sons who were each made king of a region. Later,
the king Hun Pankuang used cunning to cause dissension between the
regions, making them suspect and obstruct each other. He then used his
army to attack and conquer them all, and sent his own children and
grandchildren to rule the various regions, with the title of Lesser
King.
Pankuang died in his 90s, and his middle son Panpan was
made king. Affairs of state were entrusted to the general Fan Man.
Panpan died after 3 years as king, and the people then appointed Fan Man
as king. Fan Man was a brave warrior and skilled in strategy, and used
his military strength to attack neighbouring kingdoms and make them all
submit. He gave himself the title of Great King of Funan. He built large
ships and sent them across the sea to attack more than ten kingdoms
including Qudukun, Jiuzhi, Diansun, extending his territory by 5,000 to
6,000 li. Next, he planned to attack the Jinling kingdom, but fell ill
and sent his crown prince Jinsheng to lead the attack in his stead. Fan
Man's nephew Zhan was a general leading 2,000 men, and usurped Fan Man's
throne. He sent men to trick Jinsheng and kill him. When Fan Man died,
he had an infant son named Chang living among the people. When Chang
reached tha age of 20, he made friends with brave men in the kingdom and
attacked and killed Zhan, but Zhan's general Fan Xun then killed Chang
and made himself king.
Fan Xun governed the kingdom well and
built viewing pavilions for his leisure, where from dawn to noon, he
would receive three or four guests. The people gave sugarcane, tortoises
and birds to each other as gifts. The law of the kingdom did not
include prisons. Those who were charged with a crime first fasted for 3
days, and then an axe was heated until it was red-hot and the accused
was made to carry it for seven steps. Also, golden rings and chicken
eggs were thrown into boiling soup and the accused had to fish them out.
If he was lying about his innocence, his hand would be scalded, and if
he was telling the truth, it would not. They also kept crocodiles in the
moat of the capital, and also a pen of fierce beasts outside the gate.
Those accused of crimes would be fed to the beasts or crocodiles, and if
they were not eaten within 3 days they were considered innocent and
released. The larger crocodiles are more than 2 zhang long, and resemble
the Yangzi alligator, with four legs, and snouts six to seven chi long
with teeth on either side that are sharp as swords. They usually eat
fish but also swallow river deer and people if they come across them.
There are crocodiles south of Cangwu prefecture and in the foreign
countries (to the south).
In the time of the Wu state (Three
Kingdoms period), Guard Commander Kang Tai and Xuanhua Operations
Officer Zhu Ying were sent as envoys to Fan Xun's kingdom. The people
there were still naked, except for women who wore a cloth with a hole
for their head. Kang Tai and Zhu Ying said, "This is a fine kingdom, but
it is not desirable for the people to be exposed like that." So for the
first time, men in the kingdom were commanded to wear hengfu. The
hengfu is what is now called the ganman (i.e. sarong). The rich made
their hengfu out of cotton, but the poor used only simple (hemp) cloth.
In the Taikang reign of Jin Wudi (280-289 AD), Funan sent its first
tribute mission. In the first year of Shengping of Jin Mudi (357), the
king Zhuzhantan sent a tamed elephant as tribute. The emperor Mudi
issued an edict saying, "This animal is troublesome to transport, you
need not send any more." Later, there was king Qiaochenru who was
originally a Brahmin from India. A god told him "you will be king of
Funan", and he was pleased in his heart and travelled to the kingdom of
Panpan. The people of Funan heard about it and all welcomed him happily
and made him king. He changed the institutions of the country to follow
the Indian laws.
After Qiaochenru's death, there was king
Chilituobamo. In the reign of Song Wudi (420-422), he sent his local
produce as tribute. In the Yongming reign of Southern Qi (483-493), king
Sheyebamo (Jayavarman?) sent an envoy with tribute.
In the second
year of the Tianjian reign (of Liang Wudi, 503), Sheyebamo again sent
tribute in the form of a Buddha statue made of coral, as well as local
produce. The emperor issued an edict saying, "The king of Funan
Qiaochenru Sheyebamo lives on the edge of the sea and his kingdom has
been our vassal in the south for generations. His sincerity is known far
abroad, and he places much value on translating the sutras and offering
tributes of treasures. It is good to accept and reward him, and confer
titles of prestige on him. He may be honoured as General Pacifying the
South and King of Funan."
The people of this kingdom are all
ugly and dark, with curly hair. They do not dig wells where they live,
and several tens of households share one pool to fetch water from. They
worship the god of heaven, as an icon of bronze with two faces and four
arms, or four faces and eight arms. Each hand is holding something - a
child, or a bird or beast, or a sun or moon. The king goes in and out of
his palace riding an elephant, and so do the concubines. The king sits
with one (right) knee upright and the left knee hanging to the ground,
and a white dish is placed before him on which is set a golden basin
with an incense burner. The custom of the kingdom is that in mourning
one shaves his moustache, beard and hair. The dead are buried in four
ways: by water, thrown into rivers; by fire, burned into ashes; by
earth, buried in the ground; and by birds, left out in the wild (for
birds to eat). The people are greedy and stingy, without propriety, and
the men and women form relationships without restrictions.
In
the 10th and 13th year (of Tianjian, 511 and 514), Sheyebamo sent
tribute. That year (514) he died, and his son by a concubine, Liutuobamo
(Rudravarman?) killed his younger brother, the son of the queen, and
made himself king. In the 16th year (517) he sent the envoy
Zhudangbaolao with tribute. In the 18th year (519) he again sent an
envoy with an Indian sacred statue made of sandalwood, leaves of the
Poluo tree, and various types of incense including Huoqizhu, Yujin, and
Suhe. In the first year of Putong (520), the second year of Zhongdatong
(528), and the first year of Datong (535), envoys were sent bearing
tribute. In the 5th year (of Datong, 539), an envoy was sent with a live
rhinoceros. It was also said that the kingdom had a hair of the Buddha,
1 zhang and 2 chi long, and the emperor (Liang Wudi) sent the monk Shi
Yunbao to return with the envoy to bring it (to China).
Vishnu - Narayana
Phnom Da - Funan (6th - 7th century)
Origin: Dong Thap Province, Viet Nam
Size: inches 23.23 (59 cm)
Provenance: Private Collection Neuchâtel, Swizerland
The style of the earliest religious sculptures of Cambodia is referred
to as "Pre-Angkor". This figurative style is relatively naturalistic
with well observed forms and carefully considered harmoniously flowing
volumes. The shape of the mitre (kiritamukuta), the pronounced ear
lobes, the round face, and the outlined eyes, are all typical stylistic
traits. The sensuous mouth with full lower lip reveals the influence of
the Indian Gupta period. This physiognomy is also encountered in a
number of figures known from Phnom Da. Here we present two statues
(comp.: Durga) which are stylistically identical and of the same size.
The aspect of Vishnu most frequently represented in freestanding
sculpture is that of the goal as cakravartin (universal ruler) the chief
Deity of the Hindu pantheon. In the Upanishads it is written that the
four arms (caturbhuja) are the characteristic manifestation of his
universal atman (world soul). Since the Vedic times there is a close
connection between Vishnu and the sun. Thus he is always shown with the
disk (chakra) symbolizing the sun. The conch is the sign of his
connection to the ocean of milk (ksirabdhi) and in his form as Narayana
he eternally rules over the water. The lower right hand holds a ball of
earth (mahi), the lower left hand grasps a club (gada) symbolizing his
role as protector of the world. The upper left hand holds the conch
(sankha). Vishnu’s mitre (kiritamukata) is tall, signifying royal
command. His stance is frontal, commanding and hieratic. He wears the
katisutra, the hip-belt, and a long sampot, the upper hem of which is
twisted into a knot with the median fold falling in front. Statues in a
similar position from the seventh century were painted and wore real
jewels. The restrained treatment of the slender body and the subtle
indication of the sampot show the same composition we know from the
sculptures which are preserved from this early epoch. The square base
Vishnu stands on is the symbol of the world created and ordered by him.
Lakshmi
Phnom Da - Funan (6th - 7th century)
Origin: Dong Thap Province, Viet Nam
Size: inches 16.54 (41 cm)
Provenance: Private Collection, Neuchâtel,
The statue’s fragmentary condition provides no distinct indication
whether it depicts the goddess Durga or Lakshmi, Vishnu’s wife. The
statues of both deities normally have four arms (caturbhuja). The
emphasis on the physical form of the deity’s feminity perhaps remembers
more on Lakshmi, the personification of beauty. She is the consort of
Vishnu who possesses all wealth and so Lakhsmi likewise manifests in the
one who presides over the sources of wealth. The Indian art shows
Lakshmi with eight arms also. Then she holds Vishnu’s weapons: the disk
(chakra), the conch shell (sankha) which was winded to disturb the
enemies, the staff of mace ( gada) and the trident (trisula). Thus she
manifests in mahalakshmi (the Great Lakshmi), an aspect of the Durga
herself.
The lack of ringlets peering from under the mitre
(kiritamukata) and the typical drapery of the loop which fixes the
sarong are explicit criterions of an art style which is definitely older
than all we know from the Phom Da style. The assured origin from
today’s Viet Nam allows assigning the statue to the Funan period. The
earliest statues of this art style come from the late 5th century A.D.
The light head’s slope and the accentuation of the right leg as
supporting leg make a break with the traditional design allowed by the
rules of a static iconography. These distinct tendencies of
individualization and the perfect technical work make this sculpture a
real remarkable find of the Funan art.
This sculpture
corresponds stylistically very tight with the Vishnu and the Lakshmi
statues shown here so that it can be assumed that the statues come from
one and the same time. Here there is no visible difference in the colour
of the breakages at the arms and the rest of the surface. The grey
hardstone seems a bit more greenish than the colour of the Vishnu’s
stone.
Vishnu (Phnom Da)
At about 1930 an aerial photographer, Pierre
Paris, identified an enormous network of canals in Oc Eo an
archaeological site in the lower Mekong River Delta in Viet Nam. Here
Louis Maleret, a French archaeologist, excavated in 1940 and he found
public buildings, a central place and evidence of a coastal trading
port. He discovered rectangular moats (22 m wide) and ramparts around
the town of Oc Eo measures 2 miles x 1 mile. His work (Malleret 1959,
1960, 1962) is the only monograph for decades. Similar constructions of
the Oc Eo type were found in Angkor Borei in Cambodia near the Mekong.
Angkor Borei is, for the most part, a moated settlement, surrounded by a
wall that is approximately 3.7 miles long. The wall is composed of a
brick foundation with packed earth over the top of the bricks. In 1996
the University of Hawai started the “Lower Mekong Archaeological Project
(LOMAP)” to undertake systematic field researches in Vietnam. Meanwhile
especially Vietnamese archaeologists found dozens of “Oc Eo places” in
the lower Mekong region. The most we know about early period archaeology
in the region comes from the Vietnamese side of the Mekong delta.
Nearly all we know about the early Funan culture derives from Chinese
accounts. Some years ago, in 2003, James C. M. Khoo published the first
fundamental monograph about art and archaeology in Funan. Since 1994
there are field researches in Vietnam by the German "Deutsches
Archäologisches Institut".
The new excavations show that there
are more differences than expected to the early “Pre-Khmer style”,
normally named Phnom Da style. Khoo suggests an independent Funan style.
Comparing the known statues of Phnom Da with those found in Funan
published in his monograph and with the exhibits shown here we tend to
agree. As the recalibrated radiocarbon dates (C14) show it is rather
certain that many the sculptures of the Funan style have to be dated
some time before the Phnom Da A style.
