Rama V and Queen Sunandha
Rama V married Princess Sunandha when she was still a teenager. Together they had a daughter, Princess Karnabhorn Bejraratana. When the queen consort was 19, she was pregnant again and believed the child would be a boy. As a male, he would stand to inherit the throne of Siam. While she was pregnant, she went on a trip to visit the royal family’s summer residence, Bang Pa-In, which lay outside of Bangkok. The king had spared no expense in ensuring that it remained a magnificent place for the family to find respite from the challenges of running a country.
In order to reach the palace, the queen consort and her daughter had to cross the capricious and tumultuous Chao Phraya River, which is the largest one in Siam. The guards that accompanied them put them into a separate boat, presumably because their status was so high that they could not travel in the regular boat, which was dragged by a bigger boat across the river. However, strong currents — not at all uncommon to the river — rose up, seemingly out of nowhere, and caused the royal vessel to capsize. Both the pregnant queen consort and the two-year-old princess were thrown into the river.
The story might not have ended there if it were not for this no-touching rule. In fact, some sufficient onlookers saw the horrifying event and could have swum into the water to save the lives of the queen consort and princess. However, the guards accompanying them actually forbade anyone from getting into the water, upon penalty of death. The law against touching royalty would be upheld, even if it meant that three members of the royal family – Sunandha, her daughter, and her unborn child – would perish.
One common challenge in applying laws to practical, everyday situations is whether the spirit of the law or the letter of the law should be followed. The letter of the law means that the codified policy must be followed precisely, no matter the consequences. The spirit of the law says that there may be exceptions, given that the law’s original intent is to understand. In the unfortunate case of Queen Sunandha, the letter of the law was upheld.
However, King Rama disagreed with the guards’ application of the law and had them imprisoned for causing the death of his favorite wife, daughter, and unborn child. In his grief, he arranged and funeral procession that would be one of the most expensive and elaborate in history; it cost over half a million dollars. He had the two lost children embalmed so that they sat upright on gold thrones, surrounded and adorned with gold and costly jewels as if they were still alive with their rightful places as children of the king.
The king waited for a full seven months before he could bear to have Sunandha’s body cremated; during this time, he had new buildings constructed for the cremation ceremonies. The ceremony lasted for twelve days; even after it was over, the king did not lay her ashes to rest for nearly another year. He also completed the summer palace which the queen and her daughter had been traveling to when the fateful accident occurred. Marble monuments were constructed to honor her. Today, it still stands as a legacy to the queen and the law that ultimately cost her and her children their lives.
Fortunately, after that fateful day, the law that forbade anyone from touching a Siamese royal was repealed.
Where did we find this stuff? Here are our sources:
“The Thai queen who couldn’t be saved because an ancient law said it was forbidden to touch a royal,” by Stefan Andrews. The Vintage News. April 30, 2018.
“The Tragic Death of a Thai Queen.” FactsForever. September 14, 2018.
“Tragic Death of a Beauty Queen.” Thai examiner. Joseph O’ Connor. February 16, 2021.
“She Drowned Because Law Forbade Touching a Royal”. Aima Tariq. History of Yesterday. Jul 15, 2020.