Kingdom of Vientiane

The Kingdom of Vientiane emerged in 1707, when the long-united Lao kingdom of Lan Xang divided into competing principalities. Its first ruler, Setthathirath II, held the old capital on the Mekong, while Luang Prabang and later Champasak became separate kingdoms. Vientiane's position between Burma and Siam made it a client of stronger neighbours: it became a Burmese vassal from 1765, and after a Siamese campaign sacked the city and removed the Emerald Buddha in 1779 it passed under Bangkok's overlordship. Siamese kings installed and deposed its rulers, and the small kingdom remained an important centre of Lao Buddhism and of trade on the river route between the Khorat Plateau and the northern highlands. In 1805 Anouvong became king and prepared a revolt against Siam; in 1826 he sent an army of some ten thousand men across the Khorat Plateau, took Nakhon Ratchasima and briefly threatened Bangkok. The Siamese counter-attack drove him back, retook Vientiane in 1827 and destroyed the city, deporting most of its population; Anouvong was captured and died in captivity. Siam annexed the Khorat Plateau, divided the Lao lands into administrative regions and left only a fifth of the original population east of the Mekong. The kingdom was never restored; its memory survived in Lao religious and literary traditions, and Vientiane later became the capital of French Laos in 1899.