|
Part of the daily record of Brother De’ sersi and La lu-Bear who visited Thailand in the period of King Narai (1685-1686), mentioned about the performance of a Chinese comedy, or ‘Comedie a la Chinoise ans Une Tragedia Chinoise’ (Chinese opera). This evidence showed that Chinese opera was present in Thai society during the Ayudhya period.
In the era of Rama I, in the Emerald Buddha welcoming festival, there were many kinds of Thai entertainments and also Chinese opera. The Chinese opera was from time to time mentioned in the Thai literatures as in I-now (อิเหนา) in the part of a wedding ceremony of the four princesses, and Kon-Chang-Kon-Plan (ขุนช้างขุนแผน), in the part of the funeral of One-thong.
After the death of Empress Dowager Tz’u-his and King Kong Su, a number of Chinese opera troupes migrated abroad. Chinese opera became famous in Thailand, and there was new acceptance by the Thai governors who were patrons of Chinese opera. And the famous dialect used to perform was Taechew, because most of the Chinese in Thailand were Taechew.
|
|
