|
History and art aside, perhaps the most practical and long-lasting contribution Sukothai made to the Thai people came in the form of langauge. Sukothai's second king, Ramkhamhaeng, is usually credited with the development of Thai script; he is thought to have drawn from the old Mon and Khmer alphabets to create one for Thai.
After Ramkhamhaeng, Sukothai's kings had problems maintaining his empire. Ramkhamhaeng, like his father, had been a warrior; his successors were religious holy men. King Mahathammaracha Lithai, for example, is thought to have compiled the Tribhumikatha, an Thai book on the Buddhist cosmology.
It was not lack of leadership, though, that marked the end of Sukothai. It was instead the rise to power of Thai states in the south that ended Sukothai's dominance. Ayutthaya was eventually able to deny Sukothai access to southern Thailand (and perhaps to the sea); the economy of Sukothai - an economy based in part on trade with China, Indonesia and the Philippines - suffered.
Sukothai did not die quickly. It became a tributary state to Ayutthaya in 1378, but it was another half century or more before it was incorporated into that kingdom as a province.