Indianisation & Funan

Indianisation & Funan

The early Indianisation of Cambodia probably occurred via trading settlements that sprang up from the 1st century AD on the coastline of what is now southern Vietnam Such settlements served as ports of call for boats following the trading route from the Bay of Bengal to the southern provinces of China. The largest of these was known as Funan, close to contemporary Oc-Eo in Kien Giang Province of southern Vietnam.

   Funan is a Chinese name, and it may be a transliteration of the ancient Khmer name for mountain: bnam. Although very little is known about Funan, much has been made of its importance as an early South-East Asian center of power despite there being little evidence to support this.
   It is most likely that between the 1st and 8th centuries Cambodia was a collection of small states, each with its own elites that sometimes strategically intermarried and sometimes went to war with one another. Funan no doubt one of these states, and as a major sea port was undoubtedly pivotal in the transmission of Indian culture into the interior of Cambodia.
   What the historians do know about Funan they have mostly gleaned from Chinese sources. These report that Funan-period Cambodia (1st to 6th centuries AD) embraced the worship of the Hindu deities Shiva a d Vishnu and at the same time Buddhism. The lingam, a phallic totem, appears to have been the focus of ritual and an emblem of kingly might, a feature that was to evolve further in the Angkorian cult of the god king. The people practised primitive irrigation, which enabled the cultivation of rice, and traded raw commodities such as spices with China and India.

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