It is of a solid reddish-brown copper colored short-haired coat, and was described in a class of historical Thai manuscripts known as the Treatise on Cats or Tamra Maew.

According to TIMBA, the Suphalak is a natural breed and should not be confused with the sable Burmese cat, an established American and European created breed which expresses the colorpoint Burmese gene (cb) that results in a dark points on the extremities such as the ears, feet and tail as well as a dark mask on the face.

[1] Both a description and depiction of the Suphalak first appears in a collection of ancient manuscripts called the Tamra Maew (the Cat-Book Poems)[2] thought to originate from the Ayutthaya Kingdom (AD 1351 to 1767).

When the capital city of Ayutthaya was sacked on 7 April 1767 at the end of the Burmese-Siamese War, the Burmese army burned everything in sight and returned to Burma taking Siamese noblemen and royal family members with them as captives.

[8][9] Throughout the past several decades, many breeders in Thailand have bred Thong Daeng (translated as 'copper') cats with dark points and considered them to be Suphalaks.

Secondly, the solid copper chocolate Suphalak was so scarce that few people had ever seen one and even if they did, they would not know that there was anything special about it, so there was no concerted effort to preserve these cats and they never entered a breeding program until recently.

Prior to 2013 there was only one Suphalak in a breeding program, a male named Samsen who lives at the Thai Cat Preservation Center in Ampawa, Thailand.

Samsen belongs to Kamnan Preecha Pukkabut, a breeder renowned for his life effort to preserve the Thai cats described in the Tamra Maew.

Later that year, Thonga was officially recorded as a Suphalak by the government export authorities of Thailand and imported by Lisa Young on September 29, 2013, to the United States where she remains in a breeding program at Thai Dee Maew Cattery in Waterford, Michigan.

Due to the scarcity of Suphalaks in the world, ACA acceptable crosses are any cat of Thai origin including, but not limited to: Korats, Khao Manee, Konja or Siamese (shorthaired or longhaired).

Both Thonga and her older daughter have entered a breeding program where they are not only set to reproduce more Suphalaks, but also Tibetans and Traditional Orientals.

Breeders in Thailand today often compare the coat color to the pulp of the tamarind fruit pod, a common ingredient used in Thai cuisine.