|
History of Khmer Krom People in
Vietnam
The world in general is still ignorant about what is
Kampuchea Krom. Today, the origin of Kampuchea Krom is being
systematically effaced from the world history by the Vietnamese
colonialist government and its supporters. Kampuchea Krom history, its
geography, its people, its culture, and its people identity are now being
questioned by even the scholars. According to the July 12-25, 1996
issue of Phnom Penh Post which cover the "Angkor Borei: The Cradle of
Cambodia ? " It said:" Vietnamese scholars are quoted as saying
:" The Funan (Nokor Phnom) empire existed before Khmer ethnicity
arose.
Linguistic evidence that these people were indeed Khmer is simply lacking." Supporting this statement was an American scholar, Miriam
Stark, who said: "There is no question that the people of Angkor
empire were Khmer. But as to Funan (Nokor Phnom), we don't know what
language they spoke, though we can fin out how old the site is (Angkor
Borei), What agriculture was engaged in, what the demographic
potential of the site was.
We can learn bow they lived, and what they did.
But whether they were Khmer is perhaps an unanswering question." As a child of the Khmer
Krom, the indigenous people of this
land which known to us as Kampuchea Krom., when I learned from these above
quotations, they hurt very, very deeply. I would like therefore to
demonstrate facts and evidences of the existences of my people, the Khmer
Krom, to the world and our rightful ownership to this land, the ancient
Nokor Phnom (Funan) or the current Kampuchea Krom.
Kampuchea Krom is an
un-official Khmer name for the Mekong delta region, comprised the entire
southern part of Vietnam. Its territory measures up to 65,000 square
kilometers. The indigenous people of Kampuchea Krom as Nokor
Phnom (or Funan, in the corrupt Chinese translation). As a
commercial power, Nokor Phnom was well know for its deep-sea city of O Keo
(historians also used the corrupt term, Oc-eo). It exact location is in
the Kramoun Sar (Rach Gia) province. O Keo was a trading center in
Southeast Asia where the Indian, the Arabs, the Roman, the Chines and
Japanese met.
Many Khmer and nonkhmer coins, including those of Rome have
been foung at O Keo in the suurounding provinces. Economically, the Khmer
of Nokor Phnom were geniuses in their own right as is shown by their
mastery of water management. One can still find hundreds if not thousands
of canals today in the Mekong delta of Kampuchea Krom. They were built by
the ancient Khmers of Nokor Phnom. In fact, Khmer Krom do not call their
water streams as "Stung " as the Khmer in Cambodia called them.
But they know only " Prek." for "Prek " means canal
and "Stung" means natural streams.
This
demonstrated that the Khmer Krom have their water management schemes being
built into their cultural psychology long ago. They were the masters of
the wet rice culture. During the Nokor Phnom period, Chinese and Indian
sources proved that " Buddhism in Kampuchea was old as Brahmanism,
" said Peter Gyallay-Pap, in Radical Conservatism, 1990.
Archaeologists discovered statutes of Buddha as well as Lokecsvara,
Vishnu, shiva, Harihara, and many others scattered throughout Kampuchea
Krom.
During the Khmer Empire, according to Malleret, in his La Minorite
Cambodgien de Chochine, hospitals bult by the thirteen century Khmer King
Jayavarman VII have been located near Prek Russey (today can Tho).
Histo-rically Nokor Phnom was the Khmer Em-pire's 1st state, that is
Kampuchea Krom today. Kampuchea Krom was part of the present Cambodia
until May 21, 1949, when the colonialist French ceded it illegally to
Vietnam. Thus today, Cambodia continues to have its legal rights over this
former terriory. The author of this article is also a Khmer Krom. Not long
ago, we Khmer children enjoyed singing a song then "den dei
Khmer pre tha Socannaphum " (Khmer nation means Sovannabhumi).
It was
a nationalistic song that touched our hearts very deeply. Our song evoked
in us a nostalgia for the glorious Khmer past. As children we had learned
that, the time of Buddha, 500 BC., Sovannaphum was what today is called
mainland Southeast Asia, and the Khmer Empire encompassed the main part of
that. We had also learned that evidence has been discovered showing that
the Khmer civilization can be found in Laos, in Thailand, and in Vietnam,
where millions of ethnic Khmer civilization to today's regional
geopolitical realities.
Westerners came to know the land of the
first Khmer state Nokor Phnom was in a sinonized term Funan. Later they
knew it was the " Lower Cochin-China " which the Khmer
Called it Kampuchea Krom (Lower Cambodia). In 1861, during which time the
Vietnamese invaded this Khmer land, French scholars Cortambert and de
Rosny in their Le Kamboge Annanmite, wrote: " Lower
Cochin-China, or Vietnam's Cambodia, which is the part of Cambodia which
had submitted to the Annamit Empire, is the southern most part of this
empire before the French conquest.
It is today (1861) almost in our hands.
It extends to the edge of " Cap de Kambodge (today Ca Mau) and swings
to the northeast with the rest of the Kingdom of Cambodia. we can compare
its extent with that of Britain. This country (Kampuchea Krom) is extremely
fertile, formed entirely of the Mekong delta, and it is watered by the
Dong Nai and the river of Prei Nokor (today Bo Chi Minh City). It is
a great place for commerce. It is the connection between Thailand,
Cambodia, Englsh India, the Malaka Strait, and Burma on one side, and so
the other side with Cochinchina proper (Annam), China, the Philippines,
and others (author's translation from French).
" Later, in 1940s,
French archaeologists such as Louis Malleret devoted his research to the
past history of Kampuchea Krom. According to Malleret, in the B.S.E.I.,
Vol.12, p.8, said: From the beginning of the first century to the
thirteenth century, Kampuchea Krom was then part of the Khmer Empire. One
map, Compiled with scientific proof in very recent years (1942) show about
two hundred Khmer sites scattered around the delta. This map reveled the
existence of the ancient canals, and the basins where today are the vast
rive fields. After the 6th century, Nokor Phnom joined its sister state of
Chen Lea (the known corrupt term is also Chenla) to form two Chen Lea (s):
Chen lea tuk (Chenla Water) and Chen lea kauk (Chenla Dru or land). This
union lasted for a brief period they were both being dominated by Java
until 802 when a united Khmer Empire emerged. It was the work of a Khmer
monarch Jayarman II (802-869). He was a Khmer prince who had been sent to
Java to study.
Upon his return, Jayavarman II brought home not only the
Javancese polity which he freed the Khmers from Javanese conquerors. And
the Khmer Empire was formed (9th to 13th century). Since then, Khmer
Empire flourished not only economically but culturally as recognized today
by the art and architecture of Angkor Wat which was built by the Khmer
King, Suriyavarman II (1113-11150).
The Khmer Kings were not only
followers of Hinduism (devaraja) but Mahayana Buddhism (Buddharaja),
including Suriyavarman (1050) and Jayavarman VII (d.1218?). By13th
century, the Khmer Empire began to crumble when faced with the newcomers
from the north. First were the Thai. John Cady, in his Thailand,
Burma, Laos, & Cambodia, 1966, said: "His reign (SuriyavarmanII) witness the beginning s of the infiltration of Thai-Laos people by
inclusion of Thai mercenary troops in the Cambodian army. "David
Steingberg, in his Cambodia: Is people, its society, its culture 1957,
also said: (to be continued)
Source: Indradevi Magazine, 25 Jan - 10 Feb 2001,
Issue No=57
wtoqz.com
#170 Norodom Blvd. Phnom Penh 12301, Cambodia
Tel: (855) 23 21-2004, Fax: (855) 23 21-2005, US Fax: (209)
828-3242, |
|
