Historical figure
Ang Chan II
Ang Chan II was king of Cambodia in the early 19th century, a period when Siam and Vietnam competed for control of the kingdom.[1][2] The historian Lawrence Palmer Briggs dates his reign from 1806 to 1834.[1] Nhim Sotheavin, writing for Sophia University, gives the dates of Chan II as 1797 to 1835.[3]
Between Siam and Vietnam
Chan was the son of King Ang Eng, who died in 1796.[4] Chan was crowned in Bangkok in 1806, and in 1807 the Vietnamese emperor Gia Long sent an embassy to Oudong to invest him, as a first act of suzerainty over Cambodia.[2] Briggs writes that Chan tried to play Siam and Vietnam against each other: Siam had put him on the throne, but when he also paid homage to Vietnam, Siam encouraged his brothers to remove him.[1]
In 1812 an army led by his brother Ang Snguon and backed by Siam advanced on the capital. Chan, his family and some of his officials fled down the Mekong with a Vietnamese force to Saigon. His two other brothers, Ang Im and Ang Duong, left the party on the way and joined Snguon.[2] Gia Long put Chan back on the throne in 1813.[1] At the request of the Vietnamese commander Le Van Duyet, Chan then moved his capital to Phnom Penh, where he and his officials, in Vietnamese court dress, bowed twice a month to a tablet standing for the authority of the emperor in Hue.[2] Theam Bun Srun describes him in these years as close to a prisoner of the Vietnamese in his own kingdom.[2]
Briggs writes that Siam forced him from the throne a second time some twenty years on, and that Vietnam restored him in 1833.[1] Briggs writes that Siam had taken control of the provinces of Battambang and Angkor in 1795, and took Melu Prey, Tonle Repu and Stung Treng in 1815.[1]
Death and succession
Briggs writes that Chan died in 1834.[1] The Vietnamese then had his daughter Ang Mei (Briggs writes Ang Mey) chosen as ruler, renamed the capital Nam Viang and reorganized the country under Vietnamese officials.[1] A Siamese army later put his brother Ang Duong on the throne at Oudong in 1842.[1]
References 4
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 1.4 1.5 1.6 1.7 1.8 Lawrence Palmer Briggs, A Sketch of Cambodian History, The Far Eastern Quarterly 6(4) (August 1947)
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 2.3 2.4 Australian National University (PDF via Angkor Database), Bun Srun Theam, Cambodia in the Mid-Nineteenth Century: A Quest for Survival, 1840-1863 (master's thesis, 1981)
- ↑ Institute of Asian Culture, Sophia University, Nhim Sotheavin, Factors that Led to the Change of the Khmer Capitals from the 15th to 17th century (undated)
- ↑ Encyclopaedia Britannica, Chan II (undated)
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