The Very First References to Panpan, As We Said in the Preceding Chapter
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CHAPTER FIVE PANPAN FROM THE 5m TO THE gm CENTURY: HISTORY AND BRAHMANICAL RELIGIOUS REMAINS A. HISTORIC REFERENCES TO PANPAN IN THE ASIAN CONTEXT The very first references to Panpan, as we said in the preceding chapter, are contained in that part of the Liangshu that is devoted to Funan, and follow the sections taken from the account of Kang Tai and Zhu Ying describing Fanshiman's conquests in the Malay Peninsula; it is in connection with these that G. H. Luce speculated that this period might have been the time of the foundation of the city-state itself. If this were the case, it would mean that Funan was named after its reigning sovereign at this moment in the beginning of the third century. Such a connection would at least have the merit of giving to the region a certain historic veneer, something that is in general sorely lacking for the political entities of the Malay Peninsula. Beyond the account in Chapter Four of the arrival of the Brahman Kaui:icjinya in the Peninsula, which, as it happens, is very uncertainly dated (to the end of the fourth century or the beginning of the fifth), we possess very little precise information about Panpan. It is questionable whether Panpan could have been a vassal state of Funan, other than nominally, perhaps. New assessments of the geopolitical reality of this entity and of its successor, Zhenla (see above, Chapter Four), now make it clear that throughout its history except at rare moments like the period of Fanshiman's conquests-it was an aggregate of rival kingdoms and principalities which occa sional rare sovereigns succeeded in bringing together under their authority for the duration of one reign, rather than the centralized kingdom many were pleased to invent on the model of the Chinese account, but which never existed. It wasn't until the end of the fifth century, which in other respects, according to our Chinese histories, seems to have been relatively uneventful, that a king of Funan called Jayavarman appeared in the History ofthe Southern Qi. These annals record his quarrels with the 108 CHAPTER FIVE neighbouring kingdom of Linyi, ancestor of Campa, and of the help he solicited from China-but never received-in the hope of bringing an end to his troubles. Evidently Jayavarman's relationship with the Middle Kingdom did not suffer from this episode, because in their description of the mission he sent there in 503, the Chinese texts make much of the Emperor's great respect for the ruler of the faraway country of the Southern Seas, upon whom-with a panache equal to the ignorance and vanity of the Chinese of the day-he bestowed the title "General of the Pacified South, King of Funan." This brilliant sovereign ( according to the Chinese) died in 514; his son Rudravarman, born of a concubine, succeeded him, having arranged for the assassination of the legitimate heir. Rudravarman apparently maintained relations with China, since at some point between 535 and 557 the Chinese, in the person of the sovereign Wudi of the Liang dynasty (502-557), who succeeded the Qi (479- 502), even asked to have Buddhist texts and Buddhist masters sent to them from Funan; the request was granted. It was during the sixth century, however, that the political situa tion in Funan took a negative turn, and that Zhenla, the ancestor of Cambodia, appears in Chinese history, in the Suishu. This political entity, which we have good reason to believe was initially centred in the southern part of present-day Laos (the region of Vat Phu), periodically imposed its rule on disparate territories that included the Karat plateau as well as the northern part of the former Funan which were eventually totally subjugated under the rule of sover eigns named Bhavavarman and Citrasena-Mahendravarman; the names of these kings appear on various inscriptions. The second ruler was still reigning at the beginning of the seventh century, and his successors were of his own lineage. His son Isanavarman I left inscriptions mentioning his 'vassal kings', and describing them as "the sole support of these creeping vines, [ ... ] the other kings," which, as C. Jacques ( 1986: 70) wrote: corresponds to the idea we might have of the ancient Khmer country, largely broken up, of which a greater or lesser number of kingdoms might from time to time be brought under the domination of one of their more powerful kings, only to divide up again as soon as they had the opportunity. This splitting up into small political units reached its critical point at the beginning of the eighth century, because even the Chinese are .