Louis XIV and the Kingdom of Siam: The Development and Failure of a Particular Example of Diplomatic and Intercultural Relations in the Colonial Era

Abstract

This chapter looks at the Kingdom of Siam and its relations to the French Kingdom under Louis XIV in the seventeenth century. Despite the geographic distance, these relations were characterised by an increasing intensity as well as by the unmistakable fascination which the French had for Siam. In 1688, however, these relations ended abruptly and were halted for most of the following 150 years. By means of contemporary sources such as the Histoire naturelle et politique du royaume de Siam by Nicolas Gervaise (1688), the chapter analyses both the processes of these unique diplomatic and cultural relations as well as the reasons for their failure. It discusses how differences in culturally conditioned expectations, processes of intercultural communications as well as power politics had a decisive influence on the abrupt breaking off of the relations. In arguing that even failed relations offer a basis for the production of knowledge and intercultural transfer, Lüsebrink offers a reading of this episode in French-Siamese history that works against a teleological or colonial understanding of failure and success in intercultural relations.