DVARAVATI FROM THE RESEARCH OF ANCIENT CHARACTERS

Abstract

Dvaravati was an ancient kingdom in Thailand before the Sukhothai period approximately the 12^th-16^th Buddhist century. The villagers have started to create the common culture, religion and language which many archaeologists discovered it from antiques, ancient monuments and inscriptions in the area. The most important evidences in historical and archaeological research are the inscriptions which have been inscribed on the archaeological sites and objects. The letters on inscriptions have been modeled from the original Palwa alphabets brought together with the local language and gradually became specific characters which was the ancient Mon alphabets and ancient Khmer alphabets. Moreover, there was an adoption of the language patterns of Indian, for example, Pali was used for Buddhist stories, Sanskrit was used for stories about Brahmin-Hinduism. The language was chosen to be a tool for communication for the majority of people therefore it is appeared in many inscriptions.