History of Phuket
Twelve Naksat satellite cities subordinating to Nakhon Si Thammarat, each assigned with a zodiac emblem, are Saiburi (Rat), Pattani (Ox), Kelantan (Tiger), Pahang (Rabbit), Kedah (Dragon), Phatthalung (Snake), Trang (Horse), Chumphon (Goat), Banthay Smoe (Monkey, theorized to be Krabi),[4] Sa U-Lau (Rooster), Takua Pa (Dog) and Kraburi (Pig).
Towns on the Andaman Coast were not mentioned in the list of peripheral cities in Phra Aiyakarn Tamnaeng Na Thaharn Huamueang, which was complied in under King Trailokkanat, which included Nakhon Si Thammarat, Chumphon, Chaiya and Phatthalung as Ayutthayan authority was concentrated on Gulf of Siam side of Malay peninsula.
According to Jeremias van Vliet's Chronicles of the Ayuthian Dynasty (1640), King Borommaracha III of Ayutthaya went on his leisure journey to "Tjongh Tjelungh" where he died, presumably in 1491.
Dutch East India Company (VOC) sought to make treaties with local Asian governments, either through diplomacy or forced naval blockade, to obtain tin export monopolies to their benefits.
The Dutch established VOC factory at Nakhon Si Thammarat or Ligor in 1642, primarily for acquiring tin for export and had earlier concluded a treaty with Kedah in 1642.
[1] Furthermore, any Dutch traders committing criminal offenses in Thalang and Bangkhli would not be subjected to native Siamese legal system but the opperhoofd from Ayutthaya would come to judge instead,[1] a partial form of extraterritoriality.
Ayutthaya struggles to control technically autonomous towns like Thalang and Bangkhli, which were under nominal authority of Nakhon Si Thammarat or Ligor, the Mueang Ek or first-level principal city of Southern Siam.
The Dutch soon found out that local authorities barely honored the treaties, as their competitors South Indian and Acehnese merchants continued to buy tin in these ports.
[9] In the seventeenth century, Ayutthayan government had been sending royal ships to bring Siamese products such as deerskin and sappanwood to trade at Nagasaki, port of Tokugawa Japan, as a major source of revenue.
King Narai ordered Okphra Phetkhiri the governor of Thalang to supply each of the three ports of Phuket with two large war prows, to arm and fortify the island against[1] possible Dutch attacks.
Phuket island was mostly uncultivated wilderness, with a plenty of wild animals including elephants, tigers and ferocious monkeys with large teeth, less than ten percent of the lands were put to use, according to Bowrey's estimation.
[16] These two governors soon alienated local officials and populace by installing a hundred[17] of their own fellow Muslim Indian traders to positions of influence and taking control of the tin export there.
[20] In 1649, Singgora and Pattani retaliated, attacking up north and capturing the Nakhon Si Thammarat or Ligor city itself,[19] the center of Ayutthayan administrative power in the south.
When Sultan Dziaddin Mukarram Shah refused to send tributes to Ayutthaya again in 1681 upon Siamese request, King Narai ordered the governor of Thalang or Phuket to bring naval forces to attack Kedah.
The Ligor governorship was, therefore, stripped of much of its powers in Southern Siam to "clip its wings"[2] as its satellite cities including Phatthalung and Songkhla reported directly to Ayutthaya.
During this visit, eight Malay men from Phuket and Langkawi, led by a certain Capitan China,[26] a Chinese person, attacked and plundered the Northumberland ship for its tin cargo.
The Capitan China, who was the ringleader of this robbery and the principal servant of the Siamese governor of Phuket according to Mackmath, personally stabbed the British chief mate of Northumberland to death.
[26] The Sultan of Kedah made a public declaration in 1760 that he had taken no parts in this Northumberland incident and criticized Mackmath for not being able to protect his cargo ship and his crew against just eight Malay men.
After 1776, King Taksin sent Chaophraya Inthawongsa to be the superintendent of Siamese tin-producing Andaman coastal region of the Malay peninsula including Phuket in order to procure tin for the Royal Warehouse to trade.
The new Bangkok regime was yet to pacify Southern Siam as there were Thonburi loyalists; Nakhon Nu the King of Ligor and Chaophraya Inthawongsa the superintendent of the Andaman Coast, both of them appointed by Taksin.
In 1784, Warren Hastings of the Bengal Government sent Thomas Forrest a country trader as a British envoy to secure a trading agreement with Raja Haji Fisabilillah the Crown Prince of Johor.
[2] Thomas Forrest called Phuket "Jan Sylan", saying that the island was divided from the continental promontory, where the harbor of Popra (Pak Phra) stood, by a narrow isthmus.
Maha Thiri Thihathu set sail from Mergui with 7,000 Burmese men and landed at Kraburi at the Kra Isthmus, crossing the peninsula to attack Chumphon.
In the turn of events, Phraya Thammatrailok was killed in the battle and the two other commissioners fled[2] as the Burmese ransacked as destroyed Takuapa and Takuathung, setting eyes on Phuket next.
[32] Lady Chan, her sister Mook and her relatives in the governor's council organized the defenses of Phuket in two strongholds[32] at Nangdak fields and Phra Nang Sang temple, each armed with a large cannon.
[27] The letter of Chaophraya Surinthraracha to Francis Light in April 1786 provided the account: "our soldiers of Thalang were enabled to fight and hold up the Burmese for a period of one month.
By March 1786, Prince Sura Singhanat of Front Palace, younger brother of King Rama I, had largely expelled the Burmese armies from Southern Siam, ending the war.
Lady Chan and her Thalang elite family were devastated economically by the Burmese War and found themselves eclipsed in power so they decided to seek favor from the royal court at Bangkok.
Ascension of Thian to the governorship of Thalang coincided with the campaign of King Rama I and his younger brother Prince Sura Singhanat of the Front Palace to reconquer Tenasserim from Burma (Burmese–Siamese War of 1792–1793).
Sultan Ahmad Tajuddin Halim Shah II of Kedah also sent Kedahan Malay fleet under the Laksamana[5][39] to join Siamese defenses under Phra Borirak Phubet the adoptive son of Ligor governor.
