AYUTTHAYA HISTORICAL RESEARCH



POM SATTAKOP





Pom Sattakop, or the Fort Behind the Frog, was one of the sixteen forts (1) along the city walls of Ayutthaya. Sattakop Fort guarded the northwestern part of the city. The fort was situated near the present military barracks and stood at Hua Laem (spearhead, sharp point), a cape formed at the confluence of the Chao Phraya River (before the Bang Kaeo River) and Khlong Mueang (before the Lopburi River).
Prince Damrong situates the construction of Pom Sattakop and Pom Phet (a fortress in the south-east of the city, just opposite Bang Kraja) during the reign of King Maha Chakkraphat (1548-1569 CE), shortly after the first attack of Ayutthaya by the Burmese in 1549 CE. [1]


King Chakkraphat realised that Ayutthaya had entered the age of gunpowder and large guns came to dominate the war theatre and thus strengthened the defences of the city by a series of construction works: city walls were reinforced and redone in brick (brick does not shatter on impact from a cannonball as stone does) a new northern moat was dug to protect the northern part of the city - the Maha Nak Canal (2) and walled fortresses were built along the city wall, mostly at waterway intersections. [2]


The Sattakop Fort played a role during the Burmese invasion of 1760 CE. After the Siamese were defeated on the Ta Rang Plains in Suphanburi by King Alaungpaya (reign 1752-1760 CE), the Burmese descended south. They established a camp at Ban Kum, north of Ayutthaya. The advanced forces set up their camps in the Pho Sam Ton Fields. The Chinese of Luang Aphai Phiphat tried to dislodge them but failed, and the Burmese came down to the Phaniat (Elephant Kraal) and Wat Sam Wihan area. From there, they continued further south along the banks of the Lopburi River towards Hua Laem, where they came under fire from the Sattakop Fort.


"When it was ____ day, the fourteenth day of the waning moon in the fifth month, the Burmese brought up great guns, positioned them at the Monastery of the Royal Tree (Wat Ratcha Phli) and at the Monastery of the Hermitage of the Ruler (Wat Kasatra), and fired them on into the Holy Metropolis, hitting buildings and wounding and killing people. His Majesty the Supreme Holy Younger Brother of the King thereupon rode the premier bull elephant Defeater of a Hundred Thousand Troops around [the perimeters] of the Holy Metropolis to look with His [own] holy eyes and inspect each and every position and to give specific instructions to all the lords of the positions to make them vigorously careful and watchful and to prevent carelessness. Then the King commanded the lords of the positions in the Monastery of the Crown Garden of the Corpses of Heaven (Wat Suan Luang Sop Sawan) and in the Fort to the Rear of the Frog and the Fort of Grand Victory to fire their great guns in volleys at the Burmese on the banks on the far side [of the river]." [3]





(Detail of a 19th-century map. Courtesy of the Sam Chao Phraya Museum. Remark: the map is orientated south.)



Pom Sattakop is named in the Royal Chronicles of Ayutthaya as the ‘Fort behind the Frogs.’ The Burmese occupied in 1766 CE positions at Ban Pom and Wat Ka Rong and established a stockade at Wat Phukhao Thong. Phraya Sri Suriyapaht, who commanded the Sattakop Fortress, had a large gun called the Grand Black King of Death, prepared to shoot at the new Burmese position. The King of Death was loaded with a double charge of gunpowder and two cannon balls. Only one round was fired and the large gun was temporarily disabled. Afterwards, the Siamese managed to use the cannon again and sank two Burmese fighting boats.


“One day later on Phra Si Suriyaphaha, who was the lord of the positions defending the Fort Behind the Frogs, thereupon had the gun Holy Grand King of Time and Death loaded with two charges [of gunpowder] and two cannonballs and fired at the Burmese stockade at the Monastery of the Gold Mountain. Now they were able to fire [just] one round forth [before] the gun accordingly cracked.” [4]


The fort stood at the mouth of Khlong Fang on its north bank. It overviewed the confluence of the waters coming from the northwest (old Bang Kaeo River and Maha Phram Canal) and the Lopburi River. The Sattakop fort was a single bastion, a bulwark outward from the city wall.


Presumably, after the Burmese attack in 1760 CE, a new bastion was built north of Fort Sattakop. The new fort is named Supharat Fort in the ‘Description of Ayutthaya’, a lengthy description of the city covering walls, forts, gates, ferries, roads, bridges, checkpoints, customs posts, markets, craft settlements, temples, and palaces, probably compiled in the early Bangkok period. The reason for the construction of this extra fort is unknown to me.


The Supharot Fort is found on the 19th-century map and Phraya Boran Ratchathanin’s map of 1926 CE. On the 1974 CE Fine Arts Department map, it becomes part of a large fort with two bastions connected by a curtain with battlements. The Sattakop Gate was situated between the two bastions. Wat Khok was located behind the fortification. On the road in front of the Sattakop Gate, there was a fresh market. [5]


Most parts of the wall and the fortresses were dismantled in the reign of King Rama I, who had the bricks taken to construct the new capital in Bangkok. [6]





(Iron cannon, 2 m long, found in the Chao Phraya River - Chao Sam Phraya Museum)



Footnotes:


(1) Not considered the fortresses surrounding the Grand Palace.

(2) Khlong Maha Nak is situated off Ayutthaya's city island in the northern area, in the Phukhao Thong Sub-district. The canal was dug during the Siamese-Burmese war of 1563-1564 CE called the "White Elephant War". The Maha Nak Canal ran from Wat Pa Phlu towards Khlong Phukhao Thong.

(3) Khlong Fang, or the Rice Straw Canal, is a defunct canal in the Pratu Chai Sub-district. The east-west running canal had its mouth at the old Lopburi River near Hua Laem and linked up with Khlong Pak Tho. The canal pierced the fortified city wall at the Khlong Fang Gate, a large water gate between Wat Sing and the Sattakop Fortress. The canal has been filled up somewhere after the fall of Ayutthaya (1767 CE), and no traces of the waterway are left today, except for a part of the moat of Wat Worachettharam. Khlong Fang extended as a small ditch into the Grand Palace grounds, feeding Sra Kaeo (Crystal Pond).


References:


[1] Rajanubhap, Damrong (Prince) (1917). Our Wars with the Burmese. White Lotus, Bangkok (2000). p. 66.

[2] Wood, William, A.R. (1924). A History of Siam. Chalermnit Press. p. 114.

[3] Cushman, Richard D. & Wyatt, David K. (2006). The Royal Chronicles of Ayutthaya. Bangkok: The Siam Society. pp. 482-3.

[4] Ibid. p. 512.

[5] Baker, Chris (2011). Before Ayutthaya Fell: Economic Life in an Industrious Society. Markets and Production in the City of Ayutthaya before 1767: Translation and Analysis of Part of the Description of Ayutthaya. Journal of the Siam Society. Vol. 99. p. 65.

[6] Wood, William, A.R. (1924). A History of Siam. Chalermnit Press. p. 273.



MAPS



Map 1 – Detail of the Plan d'Ajuthia of the Commission Archéologique de l'Indochine 1912 CE.
Map 2 - Detail of Phraya Boran Ratchathanin's map 1926 CE. Wat Suwandararam, Ayutthaya.
Map 3 - Detail of a 1957 CE Fine Arts Department map. Amatyakul, Tri (1957). Guide to Ayudhya and Bang-Pa-In. Bangkok, Prachandra Press.
Map 4 - Detail of a 1974 CE Fine Arts Department map. Courtesy Dr Surat Lertlum, Chulachomklao Royal Military Academy.



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HISTORY OF AYUTTHAYA



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