Rev. Mr. Gutstarr’s Remarks on the Siamese Language. 293 
KupuM, and even blending and forming their own words according to this 
model. ; 
The kingdom of Cambojia being ruled by wise princes, who cherished 
learning and encouraged authors, it very soon became the model from which 
the petty neighbouring princes copied. From the time of Caaou Manarar, 
the Cambojian legislator, not only the laws and customs of Cambojia, but 
also their literature, became objects of imitation to the Siamese. Since that 
time many Cambojian words have been adopted into the Siamese language, 
instead of equivalent Siamese words which previously existed: but while the 
Siamese honoured the language of foreigners, by using it as a medium of 
communication at court, they debased their own by making it exclusively 
the language of the common people. 
The conquest of Siam, by different neighbouring nations, seems to have 
influenced the language very little. It is even rather more probable that the 
conquered, filled with hatred against their oppressors, refused to adopt a 
common medium of communication familiar to their enemies, and kept 
tenaciously to their own language. 
Religion operates very strongly upon the modification of a language. 
When, at the close of the seventeenth century, the king of Golconda sent a 
copy of the Kordn beautifully written, to the King of Siam, and by his 
emissaries refuted the arguments of the Siamese priests in presence of the 
king, there was a great probability that the Pal‘ language would have lost 
its ascendancy over the Siamese. CoNSTANTINE Puautcon, then a man of 
great importance in Siam, dispelled this cloud, by disputing with the Ma- 
hommedan priests, and by shewing that their arguments were as fallacious 
as those of their antagonists; but at the same time he insinuated the 
religion of which he was a votary, véz. the Roman Catholic. When by his 
endeavours several very able Roman Catholic missionaries, under the pro- 
tection of a fresh embassy, appeared, and shewed their superiority, the palm 
of victory for the Palt was again contested ; but the Latin, which would 
have been substituted in the place of the Palé if the Roman Catholic 
religion had prevailed, was never permitted to assume the garb of’ a sacred 
language. ; 
Intercourse with strangers has not tended to influence the Siamese lan- 
guage. The language of the Portuguese, who settled there at so early a 
period, and left traces of their visits there, as everywhere else, has been 
maintained amongst a small number of their own descendants alone. ‘The 
