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*''Dates: [[1350]]-[[1767]]''
*''Dates: [[1351]]-[[1767]]''
Ayutthaya was a Siamese kingdom known by the name of its capital city. In the 16th to early 17th centuries, Ayutthaya was one of the most powerful and prominent polities in Southeast Asia, and the most prominent Southeast Asian trading partner with Japan and the [[Ryukyu Kingdom|Ryûkyû Kingdom]]. Its capital was also home to the largest ''[[Nihonmachi]]'' (Japantown) of the era; the community housed as many as 1,500 Japanese at its peak in the 1620s,<ref name=gunn222>Geoffrey Gunn, ''History Without Borders: The Making of an Asian World Region, 1000-1800'', Hong Kong University Press (2011), 222-223.</ref> including some six hundred warriors, and four hundred Japanese Christians,<ref name=pol23>Cesare Polenghi, ''Samurai of Ayutthaya: Yamada Nagamasa, Japanese warrior and merchant in early seventeenth-century Siam''. Bangkok: White Lotus Press (2009), 23-24.</ref> while the city of Ayutthaya as a whole boasted a population over 100,000. A small number of Siamese ships, officially under the name of either the king or one of the royal princes, traveled to [[Nagasaki]] over the course of the 16th-18th centuries. Despite [[kaikin|maritime restrictions]] against trade with most outside powers, Nagasaki accepted these Siamese ships under the category of "Dutch ships," given their Western-style construction.
Ayutthaya was a Siamese kingdom known by the name of its capital city. In the 16th to early 17th centuries, Ayutthaya was one of the most powerful and prominent polities in Southeast Asia, and the most prominent Southeast Asian trading partner with Japan and the [[Ryukyu Kingdom|Ryûkyû Kingdom]]. Its capital was also home to the largest ''[[Nihonmachi]]'' (Japantown) of the era; the community housed as many as 1,500 Japanese at its peak in the 1620s,<ref name=gunn222>Geoffrey Gunn, ''History Without Borders: The Making of an Asian World Region, 1000-1800'', Hong Kong University Press (2011), 222-223.</ref> including some six hundred warriors, and four hundred Japanese Christians,<ref name=pol23>Cesare Polenghi, ''Samurai of Ayutthaya: Yamada Nagamasa, Japanese warrior and merchant in early seventeenth-century Siam''. Bangkok: White Lotus Press (2009), 23-24.</ref> while the city of Ayutthaya as a whole boasted a population over 100,000. A small number of Siamese ships, officially under the name of either the king or one of the royal princes, traveled to [[Nagasaki]] over the course of the 16th-18th centuries. Despite [[kaikin|maritime restrictions]] against trade with most outside powers, Nagasaki accepted these Siamese ships under the category of "Dutch ships," given their Western-style construction.
==Origins==
The kingdom was founded in [[1351]] by U Thong, also known as King Ramathibodi I, who may have been from a local Chinese diaspora merchant family. The kingdom was visited by [[Zheng He]] twice, in [[1408]] and [[1421]]. Its chief products were rice, raw cotton, rhino horn, deer hides, elephant teeth, and a variety of forest products, and some of its chief imports were Indian textiles and Chinese [[porcelain]]s.<ref name=lock240>Craig Lockard, “‘The Sea Common to All’: Maritime Frontiers, Port Cities, and Chinese Traders in the Southeast Asian Age of Commerce, Ca. 1400–1750.” ''Journal of World History'' 21, no. 2 (2010): 239-240.</ref>
Ayutthaya was a major [[tribute|tributary]] to the [[Ming Dynasty]] in the 14th-15th centuries, sending 68 tribute missions between [[1369]] and [[1439]]. These missions were more numerous, and carried a greater variety of goods, than those sent to China by any other tributary.<ref name=lock240/>
==Early Modern Period==
The city grew in strength after [[1511]], when the Portuguese conquest of [[Malacca]] drove many Chinese and Southeast Asian merchants to relocate, and to operate out of Ayutthaya instead. The city was destroyed by Burmese invaders in the 1560s (as it would be again in the 1760s), but it recovered to become perhaps the largest city in Southeast Asia by 1600.<ref name=lock240/>
Ayutthaya was one of the most distant polities - culturally, at least, insofar as Siam is an Indic culture, not a Sinic one - to maintain regular relations with the [[Ming Dynasty|Ming]] court. The kingdom fought off attacks by [[Ming Dynasty|Ming]] Chinese armies in the 1580s-1590s, but also engaged in regular [[tribute]] trade, sending missions to China once every few years, and receiving investiture in return. In [[1575]], Ayutthaya sent envoys to Ming to request a new royal seal to replace one destroyed in fighting with the Burmese, and in [[1592]] King [[Naresuan]] offered to send his navy to help the Ming defeat [[Toyotomi Hideyoshi|Toyotomi Hideyoshi's]] attempts to [[Korean Invasions|conquer Korea]],<ref>David C. Kang, “Hierarchy in Asian International Relations: 1300-1900.” ''Asian Security'' 1, no. 1 (2005): 62. </ref> though the offer was formally rejected the following year.<ref>Polenghi, 14.</ref>
Ayutthaya was one of the most distant polities - culturally, at least, insofar as Siam is an Indic culture, not a Sinic one - to maintain regular relations with the [[Ming Dynasty|Ming]] court. The kingdom fought off attacks by [[Ming Dynasty|Ming]] Chinese armies in the 1580s-1590s, but also engaged in regular [[tribute]] trade, sending missions to China once every few years, and receiving investiture in return. In [[1575]], Ayutthaya sent envoys to Ming to request a new royal seal to replace one destroyed in fighting with the Burmese, and in [[1592]] King [[Naresuan]] offered to send his navy to help the Ming defeat [[Toyotomi Hideyoshi|Toyotomi Hideyoshi's]] attempts to [[Korean Invasions|conquer Korea]],<ref>David C. Kang, “Hierarchy in Asian International Relations: 1300-1900.” ''Asian Security'' 1, no. 1 (2005): 62. </ref> though the offer was formally rejected the following year.<ref>Polenghi, 14.</ref>