Recovered from oblivion since the
1830
s by King Mongkut’santiquarian pursuits, the kingdom of Sukhothai was by the
1920
sfirmly established as modern Thailand’s golden age: a place anda time when emancipation from Khmer rule was matched by theinvention of the Thai alphabet and the creation of unparalleled works of art inspired by Theravada Buddhism—the ‘national’ faith.This myth of foundation had, moreover, a twin in the myth of theThai adroitness at appropriating and inventively adapting foreignknowledge, as remarked by Prince Damrong: ‘The Tai knew how topick and choose. When they saw some good feature in the