Thawathotsamat
Thawathotsamat (, ; ) is a poem of 1,042 lines in Thai, probably composed in the late fifteenth century CE. The title is a Thai adaptation of the Pali-Sanskrit words "dvā dasa māsa", two ten months. The male speaker laments over a lost lover through the course of one year, drawing on the seasonal weather for similes of his emotions. Both the speaker and beloved are addressed with royal forms. A late verse declares that the poem was written by a "young-king" with the help of three court poets. The work has sometimes been mistakenly classified as a treatise on  Siamese royal ceremonies. The work is less studied and less well-known than other early works of Thai literature, partly because of the obscurity of its archaic language, and partly because of conservative concerns over its erotic passages. A new annotated Thai edition appeared in 2017. Dating and authorship. Early attempts to date the work ranged from the fifteenth to seventeenth century, but there is now a rough consensus that it was written in or around the reign of King Trailokanat (1448–?1488). Verse 258 states that a "yaowarat" (), "young-king" composed the whole work with the help of three men  whose titles suggest they were official court poets. <poem></poem> <poem>the cantos of this verse by one sole poet were composed the young-king who's beside three worlds illustrious Khun Phrom-montri, Si Kawirat and San Prasoet helped polish up the verse </poem> Forms of address used throughout the poem confirm that the author was royal. The phrase "three worlds" may be a reference to King Trailokanat, whose name means "refuge of the three worlds." Around 1463 CE, he moved to Phitsanulok to conduct wars against Lan Na, and elevated a relative to  rule in Ayutthaya with the title Boromracha. Trongjai Hutangkura and Winai Pongsripian propose that the author was this Boromracha, probably a younger brother of King Trailokanat, who succeeded him as king in 1488 CE. Gilles Delouche proposes that the author was an unnamed son of King Trailokanat who appears in the poem "Yuan Phai" traveling to Sri Lanka to invite Sinhalese monks to attend his father's ordination as a Buddhist monk. According to Chinese records, King Trailokanat, abdicated around 1480-1482 and elevated a son named Intharacha as king. This son may have been the author. Texts, publications and  translations. The National Library of Thailand holds nine manuscript versions of "Thawathotsamat" in the form of "samut thai" or "samut khoi" accordion books, of which only three are complete. All appear to stem from a single original, though there is a great deal of minor variation that has probably arisen in the process of copying. In 1904, a text of "Thawathotsamat" was printed in "Vajirañāṇa" ("Wachirayan"), the journal of the Vajirañāṇa Library, and reprinted as a booklet in 1904 or 1905. This printing used an incomplete manuscript, omitting from v. 230 onwards. In 1925, "Thawathotsamat" was printed as a cremation  book with a preface by Prince Damrong Rajanubhab and the seal of the Vajirañāṇa Library on the title page. This and all subsequent printings used the complete text. In 1962, Chulalongkorn University printed the text of "Thawathotsamat" under a policy "to print books of literature, which have not been widely printed and distributed, for use in the Faculty of Arts," using a text prepared by Prince Sommot Amoraphan (1860-1915), with no annotations. In 1969, an annotated edition by Chanthit Krasaesin () was printed by Trimit Press. In 2017, an annotated edition prepared by a team including Trongjai Hutangkura, Winai Pongsripian  and Samoe Bunma was published by the Princess Maha Chakri Sirindhorn Anthropology Centre. Under an ASEAN literature project, Maneepin Phromsuthirak published an edition with a version in modern Thai in 1996, and an English translation (done with Panit Boonyavatana) in 1999. Winai Pongsripian contributed an English translation to the 2017 edition by Trongjai Hutangkura. Structure and themes. The poem is set in Ayutthaya, the old capital of Siam. The speaker laments over a lost lover through a calendar year. The beloved is also of royal status. She is addressed with royal forms, and named as Si Julalak (, Sanskrit: śrī cuḷalakṣana ), the official title of one of the king's four primary consorts according to the Three Seals Law. The poem begins and ends with invocations of the gods and the king, a convention found in much old Thai poetry. The opening invocation calls on the main Hindu gods but makes no mention of the Buddha. The third section mentions couples in six other literary works with a theme of love lost and regained. The couples are: Rama and Sita; Aniruddha and Usa; Samuddaghosa and Vindumati; Sudhana and Manohara; Pacitta and Arabimba; and Sudhanu and Cirappa. Similar passages are found in  other works, including "Nirat Hariphunchai". After the invocations, the speaker recalls their lovemaking in the past. This is the most erotic passage of the poem. The main portion of the poem is structured over a calendar year, beginning in the fifth month of the old Thai calendar, equivalent to March-April. Each month serves as a canto with an opening and sometimes a closing verse. The weather is used as metaphor and simile for the speaker's emotions. The poem begins in the hot season with images of fierce sunlight, searing heat, parched land, and withered vegetation. The image of  the fire which incinerates the universe at the end of a Buddhist era appears repeatedly throughout the work. From the second month, the monsoon storms, lowering skies, and rumbling thunder are metaphors for his turmoil and tears. The brightening of the sky at the close of the rains parallels the easing of his distress. The speaker compares his beloved to the moon, its beauty, purity, and inconstancy. He notes, "you crossed sky's rim and failed to rise again" (v.94). The speaker accuses many gods of having abducted his beloved. The gods named include Indra, Brahma, Yama, Surya, Kama (the  god of love), Vayu (wind), Varuna (rain), and Phaisop (the spirit of rice). He offers the gods a bribe of "a hundred thousand maidens" for her return (v.77). In the second month (December-January), the speaker describes a firework display. The sights and sounds of the fireworks serve as a metaphor for his inner turmoil. The ephemeral nature of the fireworks, the intensity of sound and color that is so startling and then so quickly gone, seems to mirror the intensity of their love followed by the finality of his loss. The speaker is visited by graphic memories of her  body and illusions of seeing her in the present day. The speaker repeatedly wonders whether his separation from the beloved is the working of karma, the result of bad deeds in a former life (v. 76, 80, 100, 163). The absence of the beloved is never explained. Perhaps she has died. Yama, the god of death, is one of the deities accused of taking her away. The speaker makes merit and shares the merit with her (v. 137, 228), a practice for assisting the passage of a deceased to a future life. He wishes to be reunited with her in  a future life (v.228). After the close of the calendar year, there is a retrospect which summarizes the main themes of the poem, and ends on a note of reconciliation and optimism (v. 259): <poem>