Ayodhyapura or Ayojjhapura ( or ) was an ancient settlement in central Thailand. It existed before the 14th century and is mentioned in the or The Chronicle of the Emerald Buddha written in Pali by Brahmarājaprajña in the 15th century and in another Pali chronicle Jinakalamali. Where it stood is disputed. It has been identified with Si Thep in present-day Phetchabun province, central Thailand.
The settlement is thought to have declined from about the middle of the 10th century, and to have been abandoned or heavily depopulated by the 13th, a collapse that Thai scholars have attributed to climate and epidemic disease. Its people are said to have moved to Lavapura and to Ayodhya, the two towns that later joined to form the Ayutthaya Kingdom.
The name outlived the place. The Jinakalamali applies Ayojjhapura to Ayutthaya itself in the Sukhothai and Ayutthaya periods, and Burmese sources sometimes call Ayutthaya Dvaravati.
History Ayodhyapura is believed to have entered a period of decline by the mid-10th century. A Khmer inscription dated to 946 CE records that the Angkorian king Rajendravarman II subdued Rāmaññadesa () and Champa.Hall, Kenneth R. “Khmer Commercial Development and Foreign Contacts under Sūryavarman I.” Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient, vol. 18, no. 3, 1975, pp. 318–336. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/3632140. Accessed 3 June 2020. Subsequently, in 949 CE, he appointed a member of his lineage, Vap Upendra, as governor of Rāmaññadesa.
Earlier sources, such as the , recount a conflict between Ayodhyapura, under Adītaraj, and Yaśodharapura over the possession of the Emerald Buddha during the late 9th or early 10th century. Hostilities between the two may have begun much earlier. Jayavarman II established Kambujadesa and moved the capital north to Yaśodharapura in the mid-9th century. On Hiram Woodward's reading he may have allied with city-states in the Mun-Chi basin, including Wen Dan, against the power of Si Thep in the Pa Sak River basin to the west.
Ayodhyapura is believed to have been abandoned or severely depopulated around the 13th century. Several Thai scholars attribute its decline to climatic changes and widespread epidemics. Following this period of collapse, the inhabitants are thought to have sought refuge in Lavapura of Lavo (Luó hú) and Ayodhya of Xiān. These two settlements subsequently amalgamated to form the Ayutthaya Kingdom (Xiānluó hú; ) in the 14th century. During the Sukhothai and Ayutthaya periods, the Jinakalamali also referred to Ayutthaya as Ayojjhapura, while Burmese sources occasionally identified Ayutthaya with Dvaravati.
Location and interpretation
The , which mixes fact with fable and varies the story, has the Emerald Buddha brought from Pataliputra to Inthapatnakhon (, Yaśodharapura) in present-day Cambodia by way of Lankadvipa (Sri Lanka). Pataliputra is today's Patna in India, although Ligor was also known by that name during the reign of Tambralinga's Chandrabhanu. It was then brought to "Ayodhyapura" before to Vajiraprakarapura (Kamphaeng Phet), Chiang Rai and Lampang. Ayodhyapura as described in the text was ruled by the great king Adītaraj () and was said to be located on the north of Lavo's Lavapura.
The Jinakalamali also mentions Ayodhyapura as a big city Mahā-nagara located in Rāmaññadesa. Its king, the greatest of all kings, had five Buddha images made from precious black stone. One was installed in Ayodhyapura, one given to Lavapura, one to Thuwunnabumi, and the other two enshrined in the far Rāmaññadesa.
As per the location given in the text, Thai scholar Pensupa Sukkata speculated that Ayodhyapura is potentially the present-Si Thep, the early center of the Dvaravati civilization, which flourished from the 6th to 11th century. Haripuñjaya Study scholar, Akrin Phongphanthacha, agrees with the mentioned theory and additionally asserts that:
Two other readings have been proposed. Some interpretations place the city in present-day northern Thailand, although its precise location remains indeterminate. Others identify it with Lavapura, the principal urban center of Lavo, an identification generally regarded as the least plausible, since the text itself treats the two as distinct and separate places.
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