Royal Barge Procession          Though the royal barges of Thailand are the last of their kind, the spectacular pagent on water can still be seen in Thailan. And this legendary procession seems to have orignated in the capital of Sukhothai kingdom,probably as in the 13th century.          The earliest historical evidence concerning royal barges dates from the Sukhothai period, which mentions briefly some names of royal vessels participated in certain waterborne state ceremonies. The names of barges mantioned are Rua Prathinang Prahat Saeng Chan (Toyal Barge for Appreciation of Moon - light), Rua Pratinang Chai Chalerm Tharanin (Royal Barge of Victory Over the Land); and Rua Prathinang Chai Sinthuphiman (Royal Barge of Victory on the Celestia River).          From the later historical evidences, we learn that in the subsequent Ayutthaya period, the magnificent processions included a large fleet of royal barges aligned on the rivers and canals at the island capital of Ayatthaya. During this period the most inprotant royal barge processions had been organized for the royal Kathin ceremony. Once a year at the end of the rainy season the Ayutthaya kings went to their royal monasteries to offer robes and other monastic paraptermalia to the monks. Towaeds the end of the period, it seems that the royal barge processions had also been held for other purposes than the Kathin ceremony. The kings then visited Saraburi once a years to pay homage to the newly discovered foot - prints of the Buddha. The earliest detailed account on the royal barge procession handed down to us was complied during the reign of King Prasat Thong (1630-1655) in the late Ayutthaya period, which mentions that a number of new barges were constructed particularly for the King's Kathin ceremony. In the following reign of King Narai the Great (1656-1688), the monarch had his court scribes to make specified records on royal processions both on water and on land. This particular document is entiled "The Royal Processions of King Narai the Great's Reign". It is interesting to notice that this literary descrptions are almost alike with the procession scenes illustrated in the murals at Wat Yom in Ayutthaya. The original murals have since been deteriorated, but their copy on Khoi manuscript made in the beginning of our century still exists in the National Archives.          According to many other records, several of which were made by European missionaries, traders and envoys, we can conclude the the Royal Barge Procession in the reign of King Narai the Great had spectacular, in accordance with the prosperity of the Kingdom at the time. The procession continued on to the last reign of the Ayutthaya period, but was in much smaller scale. Many of the remaining barges deteriorated gradually.          During the war which brought about the fall of Ayutthaya in 1767, the royal barges were lost along with other treasures and the records of the Kingdom.          When King Rama I ascended the throne in 1782, to become the first king of the present Chakri Dynasty, he considered the renewal of national arts and craft and maintenance of tradition, an early. This included construction of new royal barges. So the royal barge procession survives and has occasionally been performed since then up to today. National Museum of Royal Barges          On April 1932 King Rama VII crossed the lower span of the Memorial Bridge and embarked on the barge Suphanahong to travel by barge procession to the Grand Palace to mark the 150th Anniversary Celebration of the Chakri Dynasty and Bangkok as the capital city. That was the last Royal Barge Procession of an absolute Monarch of Siam, for the following June a coup d'etat changed the government from an absolute to a constitutional monarchy. The barges were then kept at the dry dock on the Bangkok Noi Canal under the care of Royal Household and Royal Navy.          The barge sustained severe damage during bombing of Bangkok in World War ll, soon after his return from school in Europe, the present king, H.M.King Bhumibol Adylvadej went to see the barges in their dock. Noting their deterotiatiom, His Majesty ordered their restoration; and decided to revive the ancient tradition of the Royal Barge Procession for auspicious occasions. Artists under the direction of the Fine Arts Department spent more than a year repairing the damage. In 1972 this dock was then renovated and established by the Fine Arts Department as the National Museum of Royal Barges.