Thais III

1351-1569 CE

From 1351 to 1569 CE, the Thais built Ayutthaya into Southeast Asia's greatest trading kingdom — thirty-three kings ruling from an island capital where Chinese junks and Portuguese carracks anchored beside royal barges, their courts absorbing Khmer ceremony and their armies pushing borders toward Angkor's ruins. Trailok codified law and rank; Naresuan would later break Burmese vassalage. But in 1569, Bayinnaung's armies proved that greatness was no guarantee of survival.