Many tourists visiting Bangkok have been to Wat Saket and the nearby Golden Mount. But, how many know details of its gruesome past? In a later blog, I will tell you about the elaborate ceremonies for the funeral and cremation of Thai people. However, in the old days, for the poor people, there was no such ceremony. They were taken to Wat Saket which was built especially for the cremations that were prohibited inside the walled city. For example, people who died a violent death, by epidemics, by suicide or by accidents.
The following is a narrative of a visit to this temple by Carl Bock in a book called “Temples and Elephants” which was first published in 1884. A little word of warning, although I have abbreviated and toned down much of the grisly details, it might not be a good idea to read this while you are eating your breakfast!
The first time I visited Wat Saket, as I entered the grounds, I met two Siamese coolies, carrying, on a bamboo stretcher, the dead body of a native pauper or criminal, followed by a couple of dozen of Siamese, some of them monks.
One or two of the group were dressed in white clothes, the national colour of mourning, with heads completely shaven in token of grief. The bearers of the corpse and the monks were the only persons directly interested in the last scene of all in the unknown history of the dead man. But, high up in the air hovered a dark group of aerial beings, who were to take a very active part in the proceedings. Circling directly over the heads of the corpse-bearers was a flight of vultures, eagerly watching the scene. When the coolies reached the selected spot they cast the dead man’s body on the ground, and the next moment the air was darkened by the ghastly, greedy vultures, as they swooped down and stood in a semicircle around the body.
During a moment’s delay, while an official, after sharpening a huge knife, approached the body, the vultures became impatient, hustling and fighting each other for a front place; once or twice they came quite close to me, and I had to keep them off with my stick. Then the official stooped down and cut the body open. The sight of the blood and entrails was too much for the filthy vultures, which began to flap their wings. A monk then advanced and chanted a few words, holding a fan and pipe in his left hand, and in his right a piece of bamboo which he touched the body.
No sooner had he uttered his last words than the vultures seemed to know their time had come, and, with a frantic rush and a horrible scream, swept forward and hopped and fluttered round the mangled corpse, each trying to get his full share of the feast. Not more than ten minutes had been occupied in this horrible feast, when the vultures retired a few feet, and the human “butcher” came forward a second time and cut the back open, followed again by the monk who performed the same actions as before. There was then a second feast for the vultures.
Eight minutes later and little remained except the head and the bones, which were collected together by the attending friends, whom I left gathering a few sticks with which to burn them.
