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The Thai and Khmer Era
The concurrent Khmer conquests of the 7th to 11th centuries brought Khmer cultural influence in the form of art, language and religion. Some of the Sanskrit terms in Mon-Thai vocabulary entered the language during the Khmer or Lopburi period between the 11th and 13th centuries. Monuments from this period located in Kanchanaburi, Lopburi and many other Northeastern towns were constructed in the Khmer style and compare favorably with architecture in Angkor. Elements of Brahmanism, Theravada Buddhism and Mahayana Buddhism were intermixed as Lopburi became a religions center, and some of each religious Buddhist school, along with Brahmanism remains to this day in Thai religious and court ceremonies. A number of Thais became mercenaries for the Khmer armies in the early 12th century, as depicted on the walls of Angkor Wat. The Khmers called the Thais 'Syam', possibly from the Sanskrit Shyama meaning 'golden' or 'swarthy', because of their relatively deeper skin colour at the time. Another theory claims the word means 'free'. Whatever the meaning, this was how the Thai kingdom eventually came to be called Syam or Sayam. In northwestern Thailand and Myanmar the pronunciation of Syam became 'Shan'. English trader James Lancaster penned the first known English transliteration of the name as 'Siam' in1592. Meanwhile southern Thailand-the upper Malay peninsular was under the control of the Srivijaya empire, the headquarters of which may have been in Palembang, Sumatra, between the 8th and 13th centuries. The regional center for Srivijaya was Chaiya, near the mordern town of Surat Thani. Srivijaya art remains can still be seen in Chiya and its surrounding.