Rudravarman ( km, រុទ្រវម៌្ម, ) was the last king of
Funan
Funan (; km, ហ៊្វូណន, ; vi, Phù Nam, Chữ Hán: ) was the name given by Chinese cartographers, geographers and writers to an ancient Indianized state—or, rather a loose network of states ''(Mandala)''—located in mainla ...
, as mentioned by the Chinese annals.
He was the eldest son of
Jayavarman Kaundinya
Jayavarman Kaundinya ( km, កៅណ្ឌិន្យជ័យវរ្ម័ន, ) was a ruler of Funan. He died in 514.
Biography
According to the Chinese annals, he reigned over a prosperous kingdom influenced by Shaivism, but at the same ...
and was born of a concubine. After the death of his father, he murdered the legitimate heir, his half-brother Gunavarman, and seized the throne in the year 514. Until at least 517 he was involved in a power struggle with his step mother, Queen
Kulaprabhavati Kulaprabhavati ( km, កុលប្រភាវតី, ALA-LC: ; 6th-century CE) was a queen regnant of Funan (in present-day Cambodia from 514 to 517.
She was the first queen in Cambodia noted to have been an autonomous wielder of the ultimate po ...
, who was supported by his opponents.
[Jacobsen, Trudy, Lost goddesses: the denial of female power in Cambodian history, NIAS Press, Copenhagen, 2008]
He subsequently sent embassies in
China
China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. It is the world's most populous country, with a population exceeding 1.4 billion, slightly ahead of India. China spans the equivalent of five time zones and ...
in the years 517, 519, 520, 530, 535 and 539. He even proposed to give a hair of the Buddha to the Emperor of China, if the sovereign agreed to send the monk
Che Yun Pao to Funan.
References
Sources
*Bruno Dagens, Khmer, publishing company Les Belles Lettres, January 2003, 335 p. ( ), chap. I ("The Khmer Country, History"), p. 24-25
*(in) George Cœdès and Walter F. Vella ( eds. ) ( Trans. From French by Susan Brown Cowing) The Indianized States of Southeast Asia, University of Hawaii Press, May 1970, 424 p. ( ), p. 56-60
*Paul Pelliot, " The Funan ," Bulletin of the French School of the Far East, vol. 3, n o 1,1903, p. 270-271 ( ISSN 1760-737X, DOI 10.3406 / befeo.1903.1216 )
6th-century Cambodian monarchs
Funan
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