1 Owen Lattimore was a pioneer on the Asian scene, demonstrating that the establishment of fixed property rights among the Mongols emerged as the result of their exposure to Tibetan Buddhism, and that these developments, in turn, gave rise to forms of territorial delineation. Refer to Lattimore, Owen, The Mongols of Manchuria (New York: John Day, 1934), pp. 86–97Google Scholar.

2 Cambodia's current borders are roughly as follows:

Ian Baird gives a detailed account of the current state of play. Ian G. Baird, ‘Different views of history: Shades of irredentism along the Laos-Cambodia Border’, Journal of Southeast Asian Studies, 41, 2 (2010): 187–213:

A Treaty between the Kingdom of Cambodia and the Socialist Republic of Vietnam to delimit the border was ratified in 1985 and work is expected to be completed by 2012 (Nhan Dan News, 22 Aug. 2009).

3 For an analysis of the ICJ ruling and its impact, see Cuasay, P., ‘Borders on the fantastic: Mimesis, violence, and landscape at the temple of Preah Vihear’, Modern Asian Studies, 32, 4 (1998): 849–90CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

4 Amer, Ramses, ‘Vietnam and its neighbours: The border dispute dimension’, Contemporary Southeast Asia, 17, 3 (1995): 299CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

5 Sarin Chhak, Les frontières du Cambodge (Paris: Dalloz, 1966).

6 Amer, ‘Vietnam and its neighbours’, p. 300.

7 Voix du Kampuchea Démocratique, Les preuves irréfutables des activités stratégiques d'aggression de l'ennemi vietnamien, avaleur de territoire (Phnom Penh, 23 Jan. 1978), p. 1.

8 Slocomb, Margaret, The People's Republic of Kampuchea, 1979-1989 (Chiang Mai: Silkworm, 2003), p. 229Google Scholar.

9 St John, The land boundaries of Indochina, p. 44.

10 The activities of the SNCBA seriously annoyed Prime Minister Hun Sen when it became apparent that King Sihamoni had appointed the King-Father Norodom Sihanouk to be Council President. This is one of the elements underlying Hun Sen's recent and oft-repeated threat to oust the monarchy and establish a republic.

11 K.I., 25 Aug. 2005. On initial scrutiny this may appear a typical display of histrionics but it is worth noting that this appears to have been the Cambodian king's duty before the imposition of legislated European-style law (satzungsrecht) on the country towards the end of the nineteenth century. The king has a duty to protect border markers. Thus a Royal Ordinance (kram montiro bal) propagated by King Norodom in 1875, states that if anyone uproots or destroys a stone marking the border he should be punished in one of three ways: decapitation and confiscation of goods, 50 lashes and amputation of a hand or foot, or a quadruple fine. He must also restore it (Article 164 – in Leclère, Adhémard, Les codes Cambodgiens (Paris: E. Leroux, 1898), vol. 1, p. 217Google Scholar.

On Cambodia's transition from unsystematised folk-justice (volksrecht) to satzungsrecht, see Harris, Ian, ‘Onslaught on beings: A Cambodian Buddhist perspective on crimes committed in the Democratic Kampuchea period’, in Awaiting justice: Essays on Khmer Rouge accountability, ed. Abrams, Jason, van Schaak, Beth and Ramji, Jaya (Lewiston: Mellon Press, 2005), p. 76Google Scholar.

12 See http://www.norodomsihanouk.info (last accessed 2 Feb. 2010).

13 ‘Letter to the Editor’, Cambodia Daily, 14–15 Nov. 2009, p. 18.

14 The uprooting incident occurred at Koh Kban Kandal village, Samraong commune, Chantrea district. Sam Rainsy's letter to the king, and the latter's responses to Hun Sen, Chea Sim and Heng Samrin may be found at http://tinyurl.com/yec3hw5 (last accessed 2 Feb. 2010).

15 Prince Norodom Sirivudh, personal communication, 2 Oct. 2009.

16 See http://wms.khmer-mchas-srok.org/kms (last accessed 3 Oct. 2009).

17 See http://www.khmerintelligence.org (last accessed 25 Sept. 2009).

18 Carl Schmidtt, Political theology: Four chapters on the concept of sovereignty (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2005).

19 Kratochwil, Friedrich, ‘Of systems, boundaries, and territoriality: An inquiry into the formation of the state system’, World Politics, 39, 1 (1986): 115CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

20 See, for example, Huxley, Andrew, ‘The kurudhamma: From ethics to statecraft’, Journal of Buddhist Ethics, 2 (1995): 191–203Google Scholar and ‘Rajadhamma confronts Leviathan: Burmese political theory in the 1870s’, in Buddhism, power and political order, ed. Ian Harris (London and New York: Routledge, 2007), pp. 26–51.

21 Reynolds, Craig J., ‘Power’, in Critical terms for the study of Buddhism, ed. Lopez, Donald S. Jr. (Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press, 2005), p. 225Google Scholar.

22 Nichiren had left the term imprecisely defined but his followers have interpreted it in a variety of ways. To some it is merely a physical platform, but to others such as the Soka Gakkai movement it is co-extensive with the Japanese state. See Stone, Jacqueline, ‘Japanese lotus millenarianism: From militant nationalism to contemporary peace movements’, in Millenialism, persecution and violence: Historical cases, ed. Wessinger, Catherine (Syracuse: Syracuse University Press, 2000), pp. 261–80Google Scholar.

Originally there seems to have been only one kaidan, for the entire nation, at the Todaiji (built 745) in Nara as the headquarters of the Kegon sect. According to legend it was constructed with soil brought from the great monastic university of Nalanda in northeastern India. Unfortunately we have no reliable contemporary sources for the configuration of the structure. Refer to McRae, John R., ‘Daoxuan's vision of Jetavana: The ordination platform movement in medieval Chinese Buddhism’, in Going forth: Visions of Buddhist Vinaya — Essays presented in honor of Professor Stanley Weinstein, ed. Bodiford, William M. (Honolulu: Kuroda Institute and University of Hawai'i Press, 2005), p. 99Google Scholar.

23 Winichakul, Thongchai, Siam mapped: A history of the geo-body of a nation (Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1994)Google Scholar.

24 It traditionally takes place during the months of pisakh, ches or assath (May–July). See Leclère, Adhemard, Le buddhisme au Cambodge (Paris: E. Leroux, 1899), p. 370Google Scholar.

25 Indorf, Pinna, ‘The precinct of the Thai uposatha hall (bōt)’, Journal of the Siam Society, 82, 1 (1994), p. 22Google Scholar.

26 According to tradition, the Buddha authorised offerings to the nāga Kroṅ Bāli when a Buddha image is dedicated or when sīmā-root stones are buried. See Giteau, Madeleine, Le bornage rituel des temples bouddhiques au Cambodge (Paris: EFEO, 1969), p. 25Google Scholar.

27 The majority of such stones are still supplied by craftsmen from Batheay district, Kompong Cham (ibid., p. 12). The ovoid / spherical nimitta of the indakhīla is generally larger than the other eight.

28 Ibid., p. 44.

Despite the thoughtless destruction of many older monastic structures, sloek sema often remain undamaged and abandoned in an unregarded corner of more modern monasteries. King Monivong (1927–41) seems to have been so concerned by this that he ordered unused markers in the province of Pursat to be collected and deposited safely at Prasat Bakan. See Giteau, Madeleine, Iconographie du Cambodge post-Angkorien (Paris: EFEO, 1975), p. 17Google Scholar.

29 For a detailed study of what these sources say on the topic of the sīmā, see Kieffer-Pülz, Petra, Die sīmā: Vorschriften zur regelung der buddhistischen gemeindegrenze in älteren buddhistischen Texten (Berlin: Dietrich Reimer, 1992)Google Scholar.

30 This is also the case in certain parts of contemporary Thailand. Refer to Indorf, ‘The precinct’, p. 22.

In Sri Lanka also there is a tendency to conflate the indakhīla with the sacrificial post (yūpa) of the Vedic ritual. See DeSilva, Lily, ‘The symbolism of the indrakīla in the parittamandapa’, in Senarat Paranavitana commemoration volume, ed. Prematilleke, Leelananda, Indrapala, Karthigesu and van Lohuizen-de Leeuw, J.E. (Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1978), p. 244Google Scholar.

31 Nang Thoranee is the principal guardian of the Buddha and his teachings. She also retains an earlier function connected with the sphere of fertility. See Harris, Ian, ‘Magician as environmentalist: Fertility elements in South and Southeast Asian Buddhism’, Eastern Buddhist (Kyoto) 32, 2 (2000): 140Google Scholar.

Her distinctive iconography, in which she is depicted wringing water out of a thick braid of hair soaked with water libations made in testimony of the Buddha's liberality in previous lives, cannot be traced to Indian or Sri Lankan sources but seems to be based on the Pali Paţhamasambodhi, an anthology of biographical accounts of the Buddha's life known only in Southeast Asia.

32 For a stimulating discussion of the connection between Buddhist sacred space and sacrificial ritual in the Thai context, see Wright, Michael, ‘Sacrifice and the underworld: Death and fertility in Siamese myth and ritual’, Journal of the Siam Society, 78, 1 (1990): 43–54Google Scholar.

33 Mus, Paul, ‘Cultes indiens et indigènes au Champa’, Bulletin de l'École française d'Extrême-Orient, 33 (1933): 367–410CrossRefGoogle Scholar. English translation by Mabbett, Ian in India seen from the East: Indian and indigenous cults in Champa, ed. Mabbett, I.W. and Chandler, D.P. (Clayton: Monash University, Centre of Southeast Asian Studies, 1975)Google Scholar.

34 Giteau, Le bornage rituel, pp. 3–4.

35 Cœdès, Georges, Inscriptions du Cambodge (Paris, EFEO, 1939–66)Google Scholar, vol. 5, p. 105, v. 13.

36 McRae, ‘Daoxuan's vision’, pp. 81–2.

37 Wijeyewardene, Gehan, Place and emotion in northern Thai ritual behaviour (Bangkok: Pandora, 1986), p. 96Google Scholar.

38 Giteau, Le bornage rituel, pp. 4–5.

39 McRae, ‘Daoxuan's vision’, pp. 81–2.

40 Kieffer-Pülz, Petra, ‘Rules for the sima regulation in the Vinaya and its commentaries and their application in Thailand’, Journal of the International Association of Buddhist Studies, 20, 2 (1997): 147–8Google Scholar.

41 Harris, Ian, Cambodian Buddhism: History and practice (Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 2005), p. 49Google Scholar.

In Thailand it is the custom for the king to cede this space to the sangha. See Paknam, No Na, The Buddhist boundary markers of Thailand (Bangkok: Muang Boran, 1981), p. 57Google Scholar.

In Burma a sīmā can only be established on land released (Burmese: lhwat) from the taxable sphere by a king through the performance of the correct rituals. See Aung-Thwin, Michael, ‘The role of sasana reform in Burmese history: Economic dimensions of a religious purification’, Journal of Asian Studies, 38, 4 (1979): 680Google Scholar.

Kings did not claim ownership of the territory of Cambodia. Instead they consumed it. For the Burmese equivalent of consuming (myosa) territory, see Leach, Edmund, ‘The frontiers of “Burma”’, Comparative Studies in Society and History, 3 (1960–61): 57CrossRefGoogle Scholar. The connection between governance and food also applied in Thailand where the king was said to ‘eat the royal treasure’ and governors, on taking office, started to ‘eat the city’ (kin muang). Refer to Bunnag, Teg, The provincial administration of Siam (1892–1915) (Kuala Lumpur: Oxford University Press, 1977), p. 22Google Scholar.

42 Turton, Andrew, ‘Architectural and political space in Thailand’, in Natural symbols in South East Asia, ed. Milner, G.B. (London: SOAS, 1978), p. 125Google Scholar.

43 Giteau, Le bornage rituel, p. 48 and Fuchs, Paul, Fêtes et cérémonies royals au Cambodge d'hier (Paris: l'Harmattan, 1991), pp. 102–15Google Scholar.

There are parallels here with the Mahapirit ceremony in Sri Lanka in which monks gather at a special pavilion furnished with an indakhīla, specifically associated with the king's protective qualities, to engage in lengthy recitation of protective verses (paritta). Refer to Kariyawasam, A.G.S., Buddhist ceremonies and rituals of Sri Lanka (Kandy: Buddhist Publication Society, 1995), pp. 32–41Google Scholar.

44 Mayer, Rob, ‘Tibetan phur-pas and Indian kīlas’, Tibet Journal, 15, 1 (1990): 8Google Scholar.

45 For Daoxuan the ordination platform is specifically scaled to match the dimensions of the Buddha's own body. McRae, ‘Daoxuan's vision’, p. 80.

46 Porée-Maspero, Éveline, ‘Kron Pali et rites de la maison’, Anthropos, 56 (1961): 179–251Google Scholar, 548–628 and 883–928.

The Tai of Vietnam also associate the indakhīla of their houses with a subterranean abode. See Turton, ‘Architectural and political space’, p. 129.

47 Wolters, O.W., History, culture and region in Southeast Asian perspectives, revd edn (Ithaca: SEAP in cooperation with ISEAS, 1999), pp. 27–57Google Scholar, and Tambiah, Stanley J., ‘The galactic polity: The structure of traditional kingdoms in Southeast Asia’, Annals of New York Academy of Sciences, 293 (1977): 69CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

48 This notion is developed by Christine Hawixbrock who argues that the overarching religious symbolism of the monuments constructed during the reign of Jayavarman VII expressed the king's status as righteous ruler (cakravartin) in the classical Buddhist mould. See Hawixbrock, Christine, ‘Jayavarman VII ou le renouveau d'Angkor, entre tradition et modernité’, Bulletin de l'École française d'Extrême-Orient, 85 (1998): 76–8CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

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50 Ibid., pp. 66–7.

51 Stuart-Fox, Martin, ‘Conflicting conceptions of the state: Siam, France and Vietnam in the late nineteenth century’, Journal of the Siam Society, 82, 2 (1994): 136Google Scholar.

James Scott possibly overstates the case when he suggests that even, ‘the most robust [Southeast Asian] kingdom … shrank virtually to the ramparts of its palace walls once the monsoon rains began in earnest’. See Scott, James C., The art of not being governed: An anarchist history of upland Southeast Asia (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2009), p. 61Google ScholarPubMed.

52 Jernald, Randi and Rigg, Jonathan, ‘Making space in Laos: constructing a national identity in a “forgotten” country’, Political Geography, 17 (1998): 814Google Scholar.

Wolters has suggested that the maṇḍala reflected a network of personal relations between men of prowess not a geo-political territory. See Wolters, History, culture and region, p. 25.

53 Hemery, Daniel, ‘Vietnam – Cambodge – Chine: La guerre des frontières’, in Frontières: Problèmes de frontiers dans le tiers-monde (Paris: L'Harmattan, 1982), p. 96Google Scholar.

54 Edwards, Penny, Cambodge: The cultivation of a nation, 1860-1945 (Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 2007), p. 170Google Scholar.

55 On the historical and conceptual differences between these two categories of space, see Peter Vandergeest and Nancy Peluso, Lee, ‘Territorialization and state power in Thailand’, Theory and Society, 24, 4 (1995): 388Google Scholar. There are clear parallels here to Dumont's notion that the basic direction of modernity is from ‘lineage’ to ‘territory’.

56 Grabowsky, Volker, ‘Lao and Khmer perceptions of national survival: The legacy of the early nineteenth century’, in Nationalism and cultural renewal in Southeast Asia: Perspectives from the centre and the region, ed. Kuhnt-Saptodewo, Sri, Grabowsky, Volker and Grossheim, Martin (Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 1997), p. 152Google Scholar.

57 Sunait Chutintaranond, ‘Cakravartin: The ideology of traditional warfare in Siam and Burma, 1548–1605’ (Ph.D. diss., Cornell University, 1990), p. 232.

58 Pollock, Sheldon, ‘The Sanskrit cosmopolis, 300–1300: Transculturation, vernacularization and the question of ideology’, in Ideology and the status of Sanskrit: Contributions to the history of the Sanskrit language, ed. Houben, Jan E.M. (Leiden, E.J. Brill, 1996), pp. 230–2Google Scholar.

59 Dolias, Jacques, Viśvakarman: un exemple d'adaptation des mythes indiens en pays khmer’, Cahiers de l'Asie du Sud-Est, 28 (1990): 123Google Scholar.

60 The Bayon, Jayavarman VII's pantheon at nearby Angkor Thom, is also homologised with vejayanta. See Saveros, Pou, ‘Indra et Brahma au Cambodge’, Orientalia Lovaniensia Periodica, 26 (1995): 152Google Scholar.

The final elements of the Pali-derived name of Bangkok, Krungthep Mahanakhorn Amornrattanakosin Mahintharayutthaya Mahadilok Phop Noppharat Ratchathaniburirom Udomratchaniwet Mahasathan Amornphiman Awatanasathit Sakkathattiya Witsanukamprasit (italicised) tell us that it is an ‘heavenly abode where reigns the reincarnated god, a city given by Sakka and built by Viśvakarman’.

61 Aung-Thwin, Michael, ‘Divinity, spirit, and human: Conceptions of classical Burmese kingship’, in Centers, symbols and hierarchies: Essays on the classical states of Southeast Asia, ed. Gesick, Lorraine (Princeton: Yale University Southeast Asia Series, 1983), p. 68Google Scholar.

62 Sunait Chutintaranond, ‘Cakravartin’, p. 195.

63 Wijeyewardene, Gehan, ‘The frontiers of Thailand’, in National identity and its defenders: Thailand 1939-1989, ed. Reynolds, Craig J. (Clayton: Monash University, 1991), p. 162Google Scholar.

64 Malalasekera, G.P., Dictionary of Pāli proper names (London: Pali Text Society, 1974), vol. 1, p. 85Google Scholar.

65 Terwiel, B.J., ‘The origin and meaning of the Thai “City Pillar”’, Journal of the Siam Society, 66 (1978): 161–5Google Scholar.

66 Shigeharu, Tanabe, ‘Autochthony and the inthakhin cult of Chiang Mai’, in Civility and savagery: Social identity in the Thai states, ed. Turton, Andrew (Richmond: Curzon, 2000), pp. 299–300Google Scholar.

67 Turton, ‘Architectural and political space’, p. 126.

68 Malalasekera, Dictionary, vol. 2, p. 915.

69 Hinton, Alexander Laban, Why did they kill? Cambodia in the shadow of genocide (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2005), p. 215Google Scholar. Also, Peang-Meth, Abdulgaffar, ‘Understanding the Khmer: Social-cultural observations’, Asian Survey 31, 5 (1991): 442–55CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

70 Jernald and Rigg, ‘Making space in Laos’, p. 816. For the way in which Chulalongkorn transformed his maṇḍala into the bounded space of the nation (prathet siam), see Sunait Chutintaranond, ‘Cakravartin’, p. 296.

71 For a detailed discussion of the spatial arrangement of the Longvek and Oudong region, see Mikaelian, Grégory, La royauté d'Oudong: Réformes des institutions et crise di pouvoir dans le royaume khmer du XVIIe siècle (Paris: Presses de l'Université Paris-Sorbonne, 2009), pp. 193–263Google Scholar.

72 IMA = Inscriptions Modernes d'Angkor. See Lewitz, Saveros, ‘Inscriptions modernes d'Angkor 35, 36, 37 et 39’, Bulletin de l'École française d'Extrême-Orient, 61 (1974), p. 314Google Scholar.

73 Leclère, Les codes Cambodgiens, vol. 1, p. 61. The situation also seems to have been much the same in the Thai Sukhothai and Ayutthaya periods. Refer to Vickery, Michael, ‘The Khmer inscriptions of Tenasserim: A reinterpretation’, Journal of the Siam Society, 61, 1 (1973): 67Google Scholar, n. 48.

Stanley Tambiah, quoting the seventeeth-century Simon de la Loubère, maintains that in the Ayutthya period the term sangharat was reserved for a head monk of a maung, not the supreme patriarch of the state. The latter usage was a Bangkok period innovation. See Tambiah, Stanley J., World conqueror and world renouncer: A study of Buddhism and polity in Thailand against a historical background (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1976), p. 181CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Andrew Huxley (personal communication; 27 Sept. 2005) has noted a similar arrangement in Burma where eight sangharajas dwelt in monasteries configured in the cardinal and intercardinal directions around the city.

74 In his Cambodian dictionary Chuon Nath describes 32 hierarchically stratified monastic placeholders, all appointed by the palace and organised into four separate apanages. Nath, Chuon, 1938 and 1943. Vacanānukram Khmaer (Cambodian Dictionary), 2 vols. (Phnom Penh: Buddhist Institute, 1938 and 1943), pp. 1275–6Google Scholar, cited by Mikaelian, Grégory, ‘Note sur une chronique monastique du delta du Mékong (XVIIIe siècle)’, in Programme vent d'est 1997-2007: Perspectives et travaux sur le Vietnam méridional (Hanoi: Ambassade de France au Vietnam, 2007). p. 125Google Scholar.

75 Leclère, Le buddhisme, 391 and 396.

76 For Burmese parallels, see Schober, Juliane, ‘The Theravada Buddhist engagement with modernity in Southeast Asia: Whither the social paradigm of the galactic polity?’, Journal of Southeast Asian Studies, 26, 2 (1995): 313CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Admittedly, some revolts in Laos and Northeast Siam had taken place a little earlier in the century in response to the imposition of French and Bangkok influence respectively.

77 Subsequently modified on 26 May 1948. The situation had previously been somewhat confused since it contained elements of the old apanage system, an arrangement that had theoretically come to an end with the Royal Ordinance of 24 Nov. 1904, existing alongside more recent ad hoc attempts at reform.

78 Dhirasekera, Jotiya, Buddhist monastic discipline (Colombo: Ministry of Higher Education, 1982), pp. 171–2Google Scholar.

79 Kieffer-Pülz, ‘Rules for the sima’, p. 148.

80 Wijeyewardene, Place and emotion, p. 91.

81 On the way in which a traditional ‘tyranny of distance’ was replaced by a ‘tyranny of proximity’ in modern Cambodia, see Edwards, Penny, ‘The tyranny of proximity: Power and mobility in colonial Cambodia, 1863–1954’, Journal of Southeast Asian Studies, 37, 3 (2006): 427CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

82 Harris, Cambodian Buddhism, pp. 115f.

83 There is a standard list of 13 such practices such as wearing robes made from rags collected in cemeteries, living beneath a tree, etc. (Thag vv. 842–65).

84 Kassapa was a highly ascetic early follower of the Buddha. For an informative study, see Silk, Jonathan A., ‘Dressed for success: The monk Kāśyapa and strategies of legitimation in earlier Mahāyāna Buddhist scriptures’, Journal Asiatique, 291, 1 (2003): 173–219CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

85 Suphapha, Sangba. Chiwit lae ngan Khruba Siwichai (Life and Work of Khruba Siwichai) (Bangkok: Khlangwitthaya, 1956)Google Scholar, pp. ix–xi – quoted by Keyes, Charles F., ‘The death of two Buddhist saints’, Journal of the American Academy of Religion: Thematic Studies, 4, 3–4 (1982): 156Google Scholar.

86 From our perspective one of the more interesting reforms was a decision that underlines the centrality of the sīmā to modern state-building. Article 9 of the Siamese Sangha Act (1902) restricted the establishment of new sīmā within commoner monasteries. From this point on this could only be done with royal permission and Prince Wachirayān, son of King Mongkut and supreme patriarch of Buddhism for the last eleven years of his life, warned that such permission would not be secured by ‘return of post’. Refer to Yoneo, Ishii, Sangha, state and society: Thai Buddhism in history (Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1986), p. 74Google Scholar.

87 Tat, Huot, ‘Tourné d'inspection dans les pagodes cambodgiennes de Sud-oeust de la Cochinchine’, Kambuja Surya, 2 (1929): 39–62Google Scholar. Also see, Chroniques du BEFEO for the period 1925–30. We learn that many monks from Cochinchina came to Phnom Penh to consult Buddhist literature. This was so extensive that it was decided that an outpost of the Bibliothèque Royale would be created in Preah Trapeang (Viet: Trà Vinh). See Mikaelian, ‘Note sur une chronique monastique’.

88 Secktī rāykār ţaṃṇịṅ sāsanā rāl' khae (Monthly Report of Religious Information), 4 Aug. 1934, pp. 3–13 on the creation of a sīmā at Wat Pathamavānikārām, Phnom Banteay Rolong, Chhlong Leu district, Kratie province.

89 This process may have been at work at a very much earlier period in Burma where an inscription of 1429 tells of a forest monk called Pitū Sangharājā from Samantarac monastery. After clearing 5,000 acres of previously cultivated land demarcated by boundary posts and digging a long canal for irrigation he handed the whole parcel over to King Muiñan Sataīw. See, Tun, Than, ‘Mahākassapa and his tradition’, in Essays on the History and Buddhism of Burma, ed. Strachan, Paul (Whiting Bay, Isle of Arran: Kiscadale Publications, 1988), pp. 93–7Google Scholar.

90 Tāt, Huot, Visuddhivaṅs, Braḥ, Sīmāvinicchăy saṅkhep (Summary of opinions on the sīmā) (Phnom Penh: Palais Royal, 1932)Google Scholar.

91 Although there is an Indakhīla Sutta (S.v.443f) which merely construes the indakhīla as a metaphor for unshakableness of the sort found in a monk well established in the Buddhist path.

92 Giteau, Le bornage rituel, pp. 6 and 50.

93 Schober, ‘The Theravada Buddhist engagement’, p. 325.

94 Khieu Chum appears to have absorbed French attitudes about the ‘lotus eating’ Cambodians. His concern about their lack of perseverance and poorly developed work ethic is nicely illustrated by a sermon of the 1950s in which he reworked a traditional poem about weaving to make the weaver start his work early in the morning rather than the ‘cool afternoon’ mentioned in the original. See Sam, Yang, Khmer Buddhism and politics from 1954 to 1984 (Newington, CT: Khmer Studies Institute, 1987), p. 43Google Scholar.

95 In Vietnam the French authorities were concerned about the liberal and leftist attitudes of some members of the EFEO and the impact this outlook might have on the native protégés. Paul Mus, for example, had regarded the functioning of the king as a form of ‘inefficient causality’ in the sense that he never initiated progressive change but merely ensured fixed regularity based on the principle of dhamma.

The same considerations may also have been the case for the research institutes, such as the Burma Research Society, set up by the British in Burma. See DeFrancis, John, Colonialism and language policy in Viet Nam (The Hague: Mouton, 1977), p. 170Google Scholar and Day, Tony and Reynolds, Craig J., ‘Cosmologies, truth regimes, and the state in Southeast Asia’, Modern Asian Studies, 34, 1 (2000): 23–4CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

96 For a study of Khieu Chum and the history of Theravada anti-monarchic thought, see my forthcoming essay ‘The monk and the king: Khieu Chum and regime change in Cambodia’, Udaya: Journal of Khmer Studies, 9 (2008).

97 Manifesto of the Committee of Intellectuals for the Support of the Salvation Government, 18 Mar. 1970.

98 In Thailand the modern emergence of state-defined Buddhism has also significantly eroded the significance of the inthakin, especially in Khon Müang tradition; see Tanabe, ‘Autochthony and the inthakhin cult of Chiang Mai’, p. 309. But there are some definite signs of resurgence in recent years (Craig Reynolds, personal communication, 16 Sept. 2009).

99 In order to protect Phnom Penh from Khmer Rouge attack Lon Nol ordered specially blessed sand to be sprinkled around its perimeter by helicopter as a protective sīmā. He interpreted his battle with the Viet Cong and Khmer Rouge in apocalyptic terms and on 11 May 1970 declared that, ‘the current war in Cambodia is a religious war’. See Corfield, Justin, Khmers stand up! A history of the Cambodian government, 1970-1975 (Clayton, Victoria: Centre for Southeast Asian Studies, Monash University, 1994), pp. 101 and 130Google Scholar.

100 Steve Heder (personal communication, 8 Nov. 2005) points out that in the 1947–54 period the communists had a policy of evacuating towns in Northern Vietnam. The Viet Cong also forcibly removed populations from enemy territory to liberated zones for tactical reasons in the late 1960s. This, in a general sense, supports his thesis that the evacuation of Phnom Penh may be modelled on Vietnamese precedents or, indeed, on the population movements of pre-colonial times. But I do not feel that it satisfactorily engages with the unique character of Phnom Penh as the capital of the Cambodian state in which the royal palace has pride of place.

101 Sher, Sacha, ‘Le parallèle éminemment douteux entre l'angkar révolutionnaire et Angkor’, Aséanie, 11 (2003): 27CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

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103 Quoted by Bayly, Susan, ‘French anthropology and the Durkheimians in colonial Indochina’, Modern Asian Studies, 34, 3 (2000): 616Google Scholar. Similar links between Nepalese Maoism and Nepal's Hindu and Buddhist heritage have been made by Ramirez, Philippe, ‘Pour une anthropologie religieuse du Maoïsme Népalais’, Archives des sciences socials des religions, 99 (1997): 47–68CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

104 François Ponchaud appears to have been the first commentator to highlight the ‘religious’ character of Khmer Rouge thought and practice. Refer to Ponchaud, François, ‘Social change in the vortex of revolution’, in Cambodia, 1975-1978: Rendezvous with death, ed. Jackson, Karl D. (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1989), pp. 151–77Google Scholar. For a detailed unpacking of the initial insight, see Harris, Ian, Buddhism under Pol Pot (Phnom Penh: Documentary Center of Cambodia, 2007)Google Scholar.

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106 ‘Minutes of CPK Standing Committee meeting’, 1 June 1976; quoted by Short, Philip, Pol Pot: The history of a nightmare (London: John Murray, 2004), p. 324Google Scholar.

107 Hinton, Why did they kill?, pp. 49–50.

108 Forest, Alain, Le Cambodge et la colonisation Française: Histoire d'une colonisation sans heurts (1897–1920) (Paris: l'Harmattan, 1980), p. 57Google Scholar.

109 Locard, Henri, Le ‘Petit Livre Rouge’ de Pol Pot ou les paroles de l'Angkar (Paris: L'Harmattan, 1996), p. 34Google Scholar.

110 Alexander Laban Hinton, ‘Cambodia's shadow: An examination of the cultural origins of genocide’ (Ph.D. diss., Emory University, 1997), p. 20, and ‘Purity and contamination in the Cambodian genocide’, in Cambodia emerges from the past: Eight essays, ed. Judy Ledgerwood (DeKalb, IL: Center for Southeast Asian Studies, Northern Illinois University, 2002), p. 84.

111 Hinton, Why did they kill?, pp. 194–97.

112 Those who enjoyed beer were referred to as ‘CIA drinkers’. See Heder, Stephen and Tittemore, Brian D., Seven candidates for prosecution: Accountability for the crimes of the Khmer Rouge (War Crimes Research Office, Washington College of Law, American University and Coalition for International Justice. Republished with a new Preface, in Cooperation with the Documentation Center of Cambodia, Phnom Penh, 2004), p. 43Google Scholar.

113 Hinton, Why did they kill?, p. 193.

114 Picq, Laurence, Beyond the horizon: Five years with the Khmer Rouge (trans. from the French, Au-delà du ciel: Cinq ans chez les Khmers rouges, by Norland, Patricia) (New York: St. Martin's, 1989), p. 48Google Scholar.

115 Foreign Broadcast Information Service – Asia Pacific, 6 Jan. 1975: 1–9.

116 Marston, John, ‘The Cambodian hospital for monks’, in Buddhism, power and political order, ed. Harris, Ian (Abingdon: Routledge, 2007), p. 109Google Scholar.

117 Harris, Cambodian Buddhism, pp. 95–104.

118 Davidson, Ronald M., Indian esoteric Buddhism: A social history of the tantric movement (New York: Columbia University Press, 2004), p. 115Google Scholar.

119 It is also a remote possibility that some revolutionaries would have been familiar with the themes of Kaminita, a popular Thai Buddhist love story set within a Mahayanist pure land context. Refer to Suchitra Chongstitvatana, ‘Kamanita: imagination and authenticity’, paper delivered at XIVth Conference of the International Association of Buddhist Studies, School of Oriental and African Studies, London, 29 Aug.–3 Sept. 2005.

120 Giteau, Le bornage rituel, p. 44. Ritual suicide and probable human sacrifice were linked to goddess cults practised in the 7–9^th-century Indian Pallava kingdom. It is possible that such rites were exported to Cambodia, for the last human sacrifice in the country took place at Ba Phnom in April or May 1877 when two prisoners-of-war were beheaded during a royally sponsored ceremony of ‘raising up the ancestors’ (loeṅ neak tā), a festival still held in a highly modified form at the beginning of each growing season. It is significant that the rite occurred in pisakh, the month sacred to Kālī, the brahmanical deity most particularly associated with neak tā Me Sa, the white mother of Ba Phnom. See Chandler, David P., ‘Royally sponsored human sacrifices in nineteenth century Cambodia: The cult of neak tā Me Sa (Mahisasuramardini) at Ba Phnom’, Journal of the Siam Society, 62, 2 (1974), pp. 207–22Google Scholar.

The human sacrifice of a criminal seems to have occurred annually at a site on the northeastern slope of the mountain. Evidence also suggests that Buddhist monks based at nearby Wat Vihear Thom were involved in a number of unspecified prayer rituals, including prayers for the dead, during the first few days of the rite. However, they withdrew some time before the coup de grâce on the final day, a Saturday. The direction that blood spurted from the severed neck was used to predict the nature of the coming rains. Ritual decapitation is also attested to in two other nineteenth-century Cambodian locations, Thboung Khmum and Kompong Svay, where apanage chiefs (sdach tranh) established their initial authority through the performance of a human sacrifice. Refer to Adhémard Leclère, Recherches sur le droit public des Cambodgiens (Paris: Augustin Challamel, 1894), p. 194, and Éveline Porée-Maspero, Étude sur les rites agraires des Cambodgiens (Paris: Mouton.1962), pp. 246–8.

It also seems that the Shrine of the Spirit of the City Pillar in Bangkok, the city's indakhīla, was initially activated by a human sacrifice. See Wales, H.G. Quaritch, Siamese state ceremonies: Their history and function with supplementary notes (Richmond: Curzon Press, 1992), p. 302Google Scholar. The same may apply to other Thai city pillars. See Indorf, ‘The precinct’, p. 30 and Terwiel, ‘The origin and meaning’, pp. 160–1. There is also a credible report that nine victims – seven convicts and two children – were sacrificed by government soldiers during a ceremony at Ho Mong Pagoda in Burma in April 2001. See http://www.shanland.org/articles/humanrights/2005/Burma-Army (last accessed 2 Feb. 2010) (Kate Crosby, personal communication, 8 Sept. 2005). King Mindon is also believed to have had slaves ritually slaughtered during the construction of his palace in Mandalay (Juliane Schober, personal communication, 8 Oct. 2005).

121 On the borders of state power: Frontiers in the greater Mekong sub-region, ed. Martin Gainsborough (London and New York: Routledge, 2009), p. 4.

122 Hughes, Caroline, ‘The politics of gifts: Tradition and regimentation in contemporary Cambodia’, Journal of Southeast Asian Studies, 37, 3 (2006): 473CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

123 Vietnamese tend to be termed yuon, a word possibly derived from the Sanskrit yavana, meaning ‘barbarian’ or yonaka, a toponymn defining a region to the north of India, plausibly Yunnan.

Didier Bertrand has suggested a fourfold categorization of the Vietnamese ‘threat’: 1. geopolitical – relating to the nibbling away of the border; 2. political – representing a fear that Vietnamese experts, spies, etc., are infiltrating high levels of the state apparatus; 3. economic – concerned with the loss through smuggling, etc., of valuable natural resources, such as fish, wood and rubber; 4. cultural – representing a belief that Vietnamese manners and customs, especially prostitution, are having a detrimental effect on Cambodian behaviour. Indeed, some politicians and monks have claimed that the current HIV / AIDS epidemic is a Vietnamese plot to destabilise the state. See Bertrand, Didier, ‘Les Vietnamiens au Cambodge: Analyse des représentations et des conditions d'une intégration’, Aséanie, 2 (1998): 28CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

124 Hinton, Alexander, ‘Khmerness and the Thai “other”: Violence, discourse and symbolism in the 2003 anti-Thai riots in Cambodia’, Journal of Southeast Asian Studies, 37, 3 (2006): 457CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

125 Chin Channa, personal communication, 2 Feb. 2003.

126 Dikötter, Frank, ‘Racial discourse in China: Continuities and permutations’, in The construction of racial identities in China and Japan: Historical and contemporary perspectives, ed. Dikötter, Frank (London: Hurst and Company, 1997), p. 14Google Scholar.

127 Walker, Andrew, ‘Conclusion: Are the Mekong frontiers sites of exception?’, in On the borders of state power: Frontiers in the greater Mekong sub-region, ed. Gainsborough, Martin (London and New York: Routledge, 2009), p. 101Google Scholar.

128 This is why the Bangkok court could not initially understand the colonial powers' desire for a clear demarcation of borders. The court had previously taken the attitude that ‘borders were the concern of the local inhabitants, not of the royal center’. See Thongchai Winichakul, Siam mapped, pp. 159–60.

129 For a similar criticism of Thongchai, see Larrson, Tomas, ‘Intertextual relations: The geopolitics of land rights in Thailand’, Political Geography, 26 (2007), p. 779Google Scholar. Penny Edwards repeats the Thongchai line in her otherwise excellent study of the origins of Cambodian nationhood. Refer to Edwards, Cambodge, p. 177.

130 For a specific take on the return of the galactic polity under the conditions of post-modernity, see Ong, Aihwa, Neoliberalism as exception: Mutations in citizenship and sovereignty (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2006), p. 78CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

131 It seems that the Burmese government presented the cleric with a golden crown to symbolise his promotion to the highest ecclesiastic rank in the country – atyatham – and he is depicted wearing said crown in photos sold to devotees. Refer to Cohen, Paul T., ‘A Buddha kingdom in the Golden Triangle: Buddhist revivalism and the charismatic monk Khruba Bunchum’, Australian Journal of Anthropology, 11, 2 (2000): 149–51CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

132 Davis, Sara, ‘Premodern flows in postmodern China: Globalization and the Sipsongpanna Tais’, Modern China, 29, 2 (2003): 198CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Davis has noticed some similarities between this situation and Sulak Sivaraksa's description of the traditional Tai political system as an Indra's net, a metaphor much employed in Buddhist literature to point up the mutual interpenetration of all entities.

133 The Vimativinodanī ţīkā is the first Pāli text to describe a technique for rendering unknown boundaries invalid. See Kieffer-Pülz, ‘Rules for the sima’, p. 145.

134 Similar reforms had occurred in Siam during the fourth and fifth Cakri reigns and in Burma under King Badon (1782–1819) without any major western influence.

135 Pollock, ‘The Sanskrit cosmopolis’, pp. 198–9 and 209.