The written word has a long history in Thailand, dating back to the 11th or 12th century when the first Thai script was fashioned from an older Mon alphabet. The first known work of literature to be writer in Thai is thought to have been composed by Sukhothat’s Phaya Lithai in 1345. This was Traiphum Phra Ruang, a treatise that described the three realms of existence according to a Hindu-Buddhist cosmology. According to contemporary scholars, this work and its symbolism was, and continues to be, of considerable influence on Thailand’s artistic and cultural universe.