Love and Death of King Ananda Mahidol of Thailand by Pavin Chachavalpongpun

Author:Pavin Chachavalpongpun
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9789811652899
Publisher: Springer Singapore

The connection between religion and marriage is profound. Kings are obliged to marry Buddhist women. Under this condition, religion was a determinant of royal matrimony, before race and nation. The case of King Vajiravudh proved this assertion. King Vajiravudh wedded a Khmer descendant of the family ruling Battambang province in Cambodia.33 Vajiravudh met the Khmer woman, Krueakaew Abhaiwongse in a stage play in which they both acted. After the marriage, Krueakaew was renamed Princess Suvadhana and promoted to the rank of consort. Suvadhna’s great aunt, Khun Chom Lem Busba, was the wife of King Norodom I of Cambodia. Although a Khmer, Suvadhana was not considered “foreign” because she was Buddhist. At the time, the king desperately needed to produce an heir apparent amidst chatter in high society that he was a homosexual.34 Maneephan Charudol asserted that Vajiravudh only slept with his wife on certain days deemed auspicious for “making a baby.” Otherwise, he argued, the king spent time with male friends and courtiers.35 The promotion of Suvadhana to the position of a royal consort was part of an arrangement to welcome the royal baby who would be dressed with the full celestial title.36 In 1925, Suvadhana gave birth to Princess Bejaratana Rajasuda, just one day before Vajiravudh passed away.37

During the reigns of Kings Vajiravudh and Prajadhipok, each failed to produce a male heir apparent. The Palace Law of Succession was vital in determining the next heir to the throne, particularly since Prajadhipok did not designate his successor. Therefore, the crown was to go to one of his father’s other sons in a hierarchical manner. Prajadhipok remarked, “This sounds straightforward enough, but a complication arises here owing to the habit of polygamy .” The law specified that the next king was to be chosen according to the rank of the mother, the queen. But there were four ranks of queen, and this arrangement was complicated by the fact that the rank of a queen could either be raised or lowered according to the whims of the king.38 Despite all of his children, Chulalongkorn’s bloodline was in danger of drying up; this was particularly so since Vajiravudh produced no heir to the throne. Therefore, the palace had to decide the order of succession from Chulalongkorn’s four queens and then, because he had extremely few grandsons, decide the successor. Finally, the palace chose the Mahidol line at the expense of Prince Chula Chakrabongse whose mother was a Westerner. When the throne was eventually passed on to Ananda, the royal court’s restriction against marriage with Westerners collided with his possible wish for a Swiss bride. Marileine was not only an outsider to the Thai royal family, but also a Westerner who, according to the Succession Law, was not eligible to marry the king.

It is worthwhile to mention the case of British King Edward VIII who abdicated in order to wed Wallis Simpson , a twice-married American divorcee. Wallis was viewed as a danger to the British throne and the religious faith.39 In another instance,

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.