{"id":166,"date":"2017-10-02T16:40:11","date_gmt":"2017-10-02T13:40:11","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/disco.teak.fi\/asia\/?p=166"},"modified":"2026-05-13T17:51:46","modified_gmt":"2026-05-13T14:51:46","slug":"phra-lak-phra-lam-the-localised-ramayana","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/disco.teak.fi\/asia\/phra-lak-phra-lam-the-localised-ramayana\/","title":{"rendered":"<em>Phra Lak Phra Lam<\/em>, the Localised <em>Ramayana<\/em>"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Like its Theravada Buddhist neighbours, Thailand, Myanmar, and Cambodia, Laos also has its own version of the originally Indian epic <em><a href=\".\/the-ramayana\/\">Ramayana<\/a><\/em>. In fact, there exist two versions of it, <em>Khvay Thurapi<\/em> and the better-known <em>Phra Lak Phra Lam<\/em>. The title of the latter combines the names of the two epic heroes, Laksmana (Pha Lak) and Rama (Pha Lam).<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">It is believed that the <em>Ramayana<\/em> was gradually adopted through the Khmers and through Siam. It was quickly localised in verse form similar to the Buddhist <a href=\".\/jataka-tales\/\"><em>Jataka<\/em> stories<\/a>. It is only loosely based on the <em>Ramayana<\/em> and there are several emphases not found, for example, in the Thai version of the epic, the <em><a href=\".\/early-periods#ramakien\">Ramakien<\/a><\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full is-resized\"><a href=\"https:\/\/disco.teak.fi\/asia\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/10\/lao04.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"602\" height=\"400\" src=\"https:\/\/disco.teak.fi\/asia\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/10\/lao04.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-582\" style=\"width:736px\"\/><\/a><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">Ravana or Raphanasuan, the demon king of the Phra Lak Phra Lam <span>Jukka O. Miettinen<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">In the Lao version, the role of Ravana (Raphanasuan) is more dominating than the roles of the main heroes, Rama or Phra Lam, and the magic monkey Hanuman assumes a human form at the end of the epic. As often in the localisation process of literary works, the <em>Phra Lak Phra Ram<\/em> has also been given a local flavour by means of setting it in the Lao milieu.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Like its Theravada Buddhist neighbours, Thailand, Myanmar, and Cambodia, Laos also has its own version [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2448,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-166","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-laos"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/disco.teak.fi\/asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/166","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/disco.teak.fi\/asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/disco.teak.fi\/asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/disco.teak.fi\/asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/disco.teak.fi\/asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=166"}],"version-history":[{"count":13,"href":"https:\/\/disco.teak.fi\/asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/166\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4823,"href":"https:\/\/disco.teak.fi\/asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/166\/revisions\/4823"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/disco.teak.fi\/asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2448"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/disco.teak.fi\/asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=166"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/disco.teak.fi\/asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=166"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/disco.teak.fi\/asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=166"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}