title: History of Thailand

text: Having firmly established his power at Thonburi, King Taksin set out to reunify the old kingdom, crushing regional rivals. After a temporary repulse by the Governor of Phitsanulok, he concentrated on the defeat of the weakest one first. Prince Teppipit of Phimai was quelled and executed in 1768. Chao Narasuriyawongse, one of Taksin's nephews, was substituted for him as governor. The last so-called ruler who still challenged the King was the Prince of Sawangburi or Chao Pra Fang, as he had just annexed Phitsanulok on the death of its Governor. King Taksin himself led an expedition against him and took it, but the prince disappeared and could not be found again. In dealing with the Prince of Nakhon Si Thammarat, who was taken prisoner by the loyal Governor of Pattani, the king not only pardoned him but also favoured him with a residence at Thonburi.


title: History of Thailand

text: In Thonburi period, the beginning of the Chinese mass immigration fell to Siam. Through the availability of Chinese workers, trade, agriculture and craftsmen flourished. However, the first Chinese rebellions had to be suppressed. However, later due to stress and many factors, King Taksin went mad. After a coup d'état removing Taksin from power was restored by General Chakri (later becoming Rama I), Taksin was sentenced to death on Wednesday, 10 April 1782.


title: History of Thailand

text: A noble of Mon descent, General Chakri succeeded Taksin in 1782 as Rama I, the first king of the Chakri dynasty. In the same year he founded a new capital city across the Chao Phraya River in an area known as Rattanakosin Island. (While settlements on both banks were commonly called Bangkok, both the and the refer to the capital as the City of Sia-Yut'hia.) In the 1790s, Burma was defeated and driven out of Siam, as it was then called. Lan Na also became free of Burmese occupation, but was reduced to the Kingdom of Chiang Mai. The king of the new dynasty was installed as a tributary ruler of the Chakri monarch.


title: History of Thailand

text: After the coup of removing Taksin, it is probable that Chakri and his family had planned the ascent to the throne already during his predecessor Taksin. After his coronation, he operated a systematic bloody extermination of the followers of Taksin, which corresponds to the typical approach of the usurpers in Thai history.


title: History of Thailand

text: The new dynasty moved the capital of Thonburi to Rattanakosin, today's Bangkok. Bangkok had previously been a small settlement with a fort, but it was strategically located on the eastern shores of the Chao Phraya river and was known among the foreign traders as the 'key to Siam'. New palaces and temples were built. The Emerald Buddha and Wat Phra Kaeo were founded. The king's goal was to transfer the old splendor of Ayutthaya to the new capital. In his new capital, Rama I crowned himself in 1785 in a splendid ceremony.


title: History of Thailand

text: During the reign of Rama I, the foreign policy was still focused on the threat represented by Burma. Burma's new king Bodawpaya ordered the nine Burmese armies in a surprise attack against Siam, while in 1786 the Burmese army invaded the Three Pagoda Pass. It came to the "Nine Armies' Wars". In all cases, the Siamese remained victorious after the fighting. In 1805 Lanna (North Thailand) was largely brought under control of Bangkok. Rama I also attempted unsuccessfully to conquer the important trading ports of Tenasserim.


title: History of Thailand

text: At the time of Rama I, Cambodia was practically administered as a province of Siam, as rival Vietnam had to deal with internal problems. Only when the new Vietnamese emperor Gia Long had ascended to the throne was the influence of Siam in Cambodia again contested. Relations with Vietnam took on a prominent place in this epoch. There were no significant relations with the European colonial powers during the reign of Rama I.


title: History of Thailand

text: One of the most important achievements of Rama I was the codification of all the country's laws into a work of 1,700 pages called the Three Seals Law. This law remained valid in its basic traits until the beginning of the twentieth century.


title: History of Thailand

text: Siam also had a high level of cultural achievement. The Buddhist canon (Pāli Canon) was collected and reformulated within the framework of a Grand Council. The arts were promoted, as well as the construction of new palaces and temples in the capital. Literature and theatre also thrived; in this epoch were produced works such as the important, 3,000-page Ramakian. Works from Chinese, Mon, Javanese, Persian, and Indian languages were translated into Thai.


title: History of Thailand

text: Rama I, the first king of the Chakri dynasty, continued the traditions of Ayutthaya in many respects. However, the new empire was still more tightly centralised than its predecessors. A particularly important innovation was the stronger emphasis on rationality in the relationship between the monarch and his subjects. Rama I was the first king in the history of the country who justified his decisions before the highest officials.


title: History of Thailand

text: King Rama II (Phra Phutthaloetla) was the son of Rama I. His accession to the throne was accompanied by a plot, during which 40 people were killed. The calmness of the interior and the exterior, which during the reign of Rama II and his successor Rama III (Phra Nang Klao), prevailed mainly through giving in to conflicts and building good relations with influential clans in the country.


title: History of Thailand

text: During Rama II's reign, the kingdom saw a cultural renaissance after the massive wars that plagued his predecessor's reign; particularly in the fields of arts and literature. Poets employed by Rama II included Sunthorn Phu the drunken writer ("Phra Aphai Mani") and Narin Dhibet ("Nirat Narin").


title: History of Thailand

text: Foreign relations were initially dominated by relations with the neighbouring states, while those with European colonial powers started to enter in the background. In Cambodia and Laos, Vietnam gained the supremacy, a fact which Rama II initially accepted. When a rebellion broke out in Vietnam under Rama III in 1833–34, he tried to subdue the Vietnamese militarily, but this led to a costly defeat for the Siamese troops. In the 1840s, however, the Khmer themselves succeeded in expelling the Vietnamese, which subsequently led to the greater influence of Siam in Cambodia. At the same time, Siam kept sending tribute to China.


title: History of Thailand

text: There was a serious touch with British colonial interests when Siam conquered the Sultanate Kedah on the Malay Peninsula in 1821. Kedah belonged to the sphere of interest of Great Britain. In the following year, Siam had to recognise the pre-conquest status after tough negotiations with the British envoy John Crawfurd. There was also the cautious resumption of trade and missionary activity in this epoch. In particular, British traders such as Robert Hunter ("discoverer" of the conjoined brothers Chang and Eng, the original "Siamese twins") or James Hayes, but also missionaries from Europe and the United States like Jacob Tomlin, Karl Gützlaff, Dan Beach Bradley and Jean-Baptiste Pallegoix became active in Siam. In 1825 an agreement was signed with British emissary Henry Burney; Siam recognised British colonial possessions on the Malay Peninsula and made commercial concessions. This agreement was due not least to the rapid British success in the First Anglo-Burmese War.


title: History of Thailand

text: A potentially dangerous event occurred with the Anouvong's Rebellion in 1827, when the troops of the tributary King Anouvong of the Kingdom of Vientiane advanced towards Bangkok. They were, however, destroyed, which strengthened the position of Siam in Laos. The Lao-population of the areas west of the Mekong were relocated to Thai provinces in Isan.


title: History of Thailand

text: Under Rama II and Rama III, culture, dance, poetry and above all the theatre reached a climax. The temple Wat Pho was built by Rama III, known as the first university of the country.


title: History of Thailand

text: The reign of Rama III. was finally marked by a division of the aristocracy with regard to foreign policy. A small group of advocates of the takeover of Western technologies and other achievements were opposed by conservative circles, which proposed a stronger isolation instead. Since the kings Rama II and Rama III, the conservative-religious circles largely stuck with their isolationist tendency.


title: History of Thailand

text: The death of Rama III in 1851 also signified the end of the old traditional Siamese monarchy: there were already clear signs of profound changes, which were implemented by the two successors of the king.


title: History of Thailand

text: When King Mongkut ascended the Siamese throne, he was severely threatened by the neighbouring states. The colonial powers of Britain and France had already advanced into territories which originally belonged to the Siamese sphere of influence. Mongkut and his successor Chulalongkorn (Rama V) recognised this situation and tried to strengthen the defence forces of Siam by modernisation, to absorb Western scientific and technical achievements, thus avoiding colonisation.


title: History of Thailand

text: The two monarchs, who ruled in this epoch, were the first with Western formation. King Mongkut had lived 26 years as a wandering monk and later as an abbot of Wat Bowonniwet Vihara. He was not only skilled in the traditional culture and Buddhist sciences of Siam, but he had also dealt extensively with modern western science, drawing on the knowledge of European missionaries and his correspondence with Western leaders and the Pope. He was the first Siamese monarch to speak English.


title: History of Thailand

text: The colonial encroachment in the 1880s in Burma to the West by the British Empire and Indochina to the East by the French caused anxiety amongst the Siamese elites including the British-educated Prince Prisdang who put forward a proposal alongside eleven other senior dignitaries to King Chulalongkorn to strengthen Siamese institutions following the European model. Some of these reforms reflect need to keep up with European convention of liberal statecraft and justice to maintain legitimacy. Prisdang suggested that the following reforms should be carried out:


title: History of Thailand

text: As early as 1855, John Bowring, the British governor in Hong Kong, appeared on a warship at the mouth of the Chao Phraya River. Under the influence of Britain's achievements in neighbouring Burma, King Mongkut signed the so-called "Bowring Treaty", which abolished the royal foreign trade monopoly, abolished import duties, and granted Britain a most favourable clause. The Bowring Treaty meant the integration of Siam into the world economy, but at the same time, the royal house lost its most important sources of income. Similar treaties were concluded with all Western powers in the following years, such as in 1862 with Prussia and 1869 with Austria-Hungary. From the Prussian emissary Count Friedrich Albrecht zu Eulenburg comes a much-respected travel report about Siam. The survival diplomacy, which Siam had cultivated abroad for a long time, reached its climax in this epoch.


title: History of Thailand

text: The integration into the global economy meant to Siam that it became a sales market for Western industrial goods and an investment for Western capital. The export of agricultural and mineral raw materials began, including the three products rice, pewter and teakwood, which were used to produce 90% of the export turnover. King Mongkut actively promoted the expansion of agricultural land by tax incentives, while the construction of traffic routes (canals, roads and later also railways) and the influx of Chinese immigrants allowed the agricultural development of new regions. Subsistence farming in the Lower Menam Valley developed into farmers actually earning money with their produce.


title: History of Thailand

text: Mongkut's son, Chulalongkorn (Rama V), ascended to the throne in 1868. He was the first Siamese king to have a full Western education, having been taught by a British governess, Anna Leonowens, whose place in Siamese history has been fictionalised as "The King and I". At first Rama V's reign was dominated by the conservative regent, Somdet Chaophraya Sri Suriwongse, but when the king came of age in 1873 he soon took control. He created a Privy Council and a Council of State, a formal court system and budget office. He announced that slavery would be gradually abolished and debt-bondage restricted.


title: History of Thailand

text: Two kings, Mongkut and Chulalongkorn, witnessed the expansion of both France and Great Britain to increase their colonial territories in Southeast Asia and encircle Siam. From the west, the British conquered India, Burma and Malaya, and from the east, the French conquered South Vietnam, Vietnam and claimed to be "protecting" Cambodia, while Siam lost its extraterritorial rights in these areas to the new conquerors.


title: History of Thailand

text: The construction of Kra Isthmus Canal, planned by a group of entrepreneurs led by the engineer Ferdinand de Lesseps, was not constructed after the British conquered Kongbaung-ruled Burma in the Third Anglo-Burmese War in 1885. A major event was the Paknam incident, when, on 13 July 1893, French cannon boats entered the Chao Phraya River toward Bangkok and were fired upon from a Siamese coastal fort, leading to the Franco-Siamese War. In the same year, Siam was compelled to conclude a treaty with France, in which the territory of Laos, located east of the Mekong, was annexed to French Indochina. The French forced Siam to refrain from any influence on its former vassal state. In 1887, the Indo-Chinese Union was founded. In 1896, British and French concluded a treaty which made a border between their colonies, with Siam defined as a buffer state.


title: History of Thailand

text: After the Franco-Siamese War of 1893, King Chulalongkorn realised the threat of the western colonial powers, and accelerated extensive reforms in the administration, military, economy and society of Siam, completing the development of the nation from a traditional feudalist structure based on personal domination and dependencies, whose peripheral areas were only indirectly bound to the central power (the King), to a centrally-governed national state with established borders and modern political institutions.


title: History of Thailand

text: The Entente Cordiale of 8 April 1904 ended the rivalry between Great Britain and France over Siam. French and British zones of influence in Siam, were outlined, with the eastern territories, adjacent to French Indochina, becoming a French zone, and the western, adjacent to Burmese Tenasserim, a British zone. The British recognised a French sphere of influence to the east of the River Menam's basin; in turn, the French recognised British influence over the territory to the west of the Menam basin. Both parties disclaimed any idea of annexing Siamese territory.


title: History of Thailand

text: The Anglo-Siamese Treaty of 1909 defined the modern border between Siam and British Malaya. The treaty stated that Siam relinquished their claims over Kelantan, Terengganu, Kedah and Perlis to Great Britain, which were previously part of the semi-independent Malay sultanates of Pattani and Kedah. A series of treaties with France fixed the country's current eastern border with Laos and Cambodia.


title: History of Thailand

text: In 1904, 1907 and 1909, there were new border corrections in favour of France and Great Britain. When King Chulalongkorn died in 1910, Siam had achieved the borders of today's Thailand. In 1910 he was peacefully succeeded by his son Vajiravudh, who reigned as Rama VI. He had been educated at Royal Military Academy Sandhurst and University of Oxford and was an anglicised Edwardian gentleman. Indeed, one of Siam's problems was the widening gap between the Westernised royal family and upper aristocracy and the rest of the country. It took another 20 years for Western education to extend to the rest of the bureaucracy and the army.


title: History of Thailand

text: The successor of King Chulalongkorn was King Rama VI in October 1910, better known as Vajiravudh. He had studied law and history at the University of Oxford as the Siamese crown prince in Great Britain. After his ascension to the throne, he forgave important officials for his devoted friends, who were not part of the nobility, and even less qualified than their predecessors, an action which had hitherto been unprecedented in Siam. In his reign (1910–1925) many changes were made, which brought Siam closer to modern countries. For example, the Gregorian Calendar was introduced, all the citizens of his country had to accept Family names, women were encouraged to wear skirts and long hair fringements and a citizenship law, Principle of the "Ius sanguinis" was adopted. In 1917 the Chulalongkorn University was founded and school education was introduced for all 7 to 14-year-olds.


title: History of Thailand

text: King Vajiravudh was a favour of literature, theatre, he translated many foreign literatures into Thai. He created the spiritual foundation for a kind of Thai nationalism, a phenomenon unknown in Siam. He was based on the unity of nation, Buddhism, and kingship, and demanded loyalty from his subjects to all these three institutions. King Vajiravudh also took refuge in an irrational and contradictory anti-Sinicism. As a result of the mass immigration, in contrast to previous immigration waves from China, women and entire families had also come into the country, which meant that the Chinese were less assimilated and retained their cultural independence. In an article published by King Vajiravudh under a pseudonym, he described the Chinese minority as "Jews of the East".


title: History of Thailand

text: King Vajiravudh also created some new social associations, for example, the Wild Tiger Corps (1911), a kind of Scout movement.


title: History of Thailand

text: In 1912, a Palace revolt, plotted by young military officers, tried unsuccessfully to overthrow and replace the king. Their goals were to change the system of government, overthrowing the ancien régime and replacing it with a modern, Westernised constitutional system, and perhaps to replace Rama VI with a prince more sympathetic to their beliefs., but the king went against the conspirators, and sentenced many of them to long prison sentences. The members of the conspiracy consisted of military and the navy, the status of the monarchy, had become challenged.


title: History of Thailand

text: In 1917 Siam declared war on German Empire and Austria-Hungary, mainly to gain favour with the British and the French. Siam's token participation in World War I secured it a seat at the Versailles Peace Conference, and Foreign Minister Devawongse used this opportunity to argue for the repeal of the 19th-century unequal treaties and the restoration of full Siamese sovereignty. The United States obliged in 1920, while France and Britain followed in 1925. This victory gained the king some popularity, but it was soon undercut by discontent over other issues, such as his extravagance, which became more noticeable when a sharp postwar recession hit Siam in 1919. There was also the fact that the king had no son. He obviously preferred the company of men to women (a matter which of itself did not much concern Siamese opinion, but which did undermine the stability of the monarchy due to the absence of heirs).


title: History of Thailand

text: Thus when Rama VI died suddenly in 1925, aged only 44, the monarchy was already in a weakened state. He was succeeded by his younger brother Prajadhipok.


title: History of Thailand

text: A small circle from the rising bourgeoisie of former students (all of whom had completed their studies in Europe – mostly Paris), supported by some military men, seized power from the absolute monarchy on 24 June 1932 in an almost nonviolent revolution. This was also called the "Siamese Revolution". The group, which called themselves "Khana Ratsadon" or "sponsors", gathered officers, intellectuals and bureaucrats, who represented the idea of the refusal of the absolute monarchy.


title: History of Thailand

text: The Khana Ratsadon installed a constitutional monarchy with Prajadhipok as king at the top – a corresponding constitution was proclaimed on 10 December of the year. On the same day, the experienced and rather conservative lawyer Phraya Manopakorn Nititada, was appointed as first Siamese Prime Minister. By selecting a non-party head of government, the Khana Ratsadon wanted to avoid the suspicion that the coup had only been carried out in order to come to power itself. However, the overthrow of the monarchy did not lead to free elections, and political unions were forbidden. Bureaucracy and the military shared the power in the National Assembly. The constitution was annexed to the monarchist ideology ("nation, religion, king") as a fourth pillar.


title: History of Thailand

text: In the following period it became clear how heterogeneous the group of Khana Ratsadon was, and it fell into several rival wings, especially those of the high officers, the younger officers and the civilians. From the liberal and civilian wing, Pridi Phanomyong sought a profound transformation of the country's social and economic system. To this end, he presented an economic plan in January 1933, which became known as a "Yellow Cover Dossier" (). Among other things, he proposed the nationalisation of farmland, industrialization through public companies, universal healthcare and pension insurance. The King, the rather conservative Prime Minister Phraya Manopakorn, and the high-ranking officers in the Khana Ratsadon around Phraya Songsuradet and even Pridi's friend and co-worker Prayun Phamonmontri, opposed the plan.


title: History of Thailand

text: Fearing that Pridi's liberal wing, who had the majority in the National Assembly, would decide to take action, Phraya Manopakorn dissolved the parliament in April, imposed an emergency, and rescinded the constitution, which had not yet been a year old. He imposed a law against Communist activities, which was directed not so much against the almost insignificant Communist Party of Thailand, but rather against the alleged Communist projects of Pridi. However, the younger officers of the Khana Ratsadon resisted and countered the actions of Phraya Manopakorn in another coup d'état only one year later, in June 1933, resulting in the appointment of Phraya Phahon as Siam's second prime minister.


title: History of Thailand

text: After the fall of Phraya Manopakorn, Phraya Phahon became the new Prime Minister. Pridi Phanomyong was expelled from the charge of communism, but his economic plan was largely ignored. Only a few of his ideas, such as the expansion of primary schools and industrialisation with state enterprises, were gradually implemented. In 1933, Pridis founded the Thammasat University in Bangkok, which with its liberal self-image has remained a symbol of freedom and democracy. At the same time, the nationalist group led by Phibunsongkhram strengthened in the People's Party, oriented to the totalitarian ideas of Italy, Germany, Japan, but also the "young Turks" (Kemal Atatürk).


title: History of Thailand

text: The many unsettled constitutional roles of the crown and the dissatisfaction with Khana Ratsadon, especially Pridi's post in the new government, culminated in October 1933 in a reactionary Boworadet Rebellion staged by royalist factions. The royalists were led by Prince Boworadet, Prajadhipok's minister of defence. His forces who mobilised from provincial garrisons captured the Don Muang Aerodrome and led Siam into small-scale civil War. After heavy fighting in the outskirts of Bangkok, the royalists were finally defeated and Prince Boworadet left for exile in French Indochina.


title: History of Thailand

text: After the Boworadet rebellion and some other disagreements with Khana Khana Ratsadon thereafter, King Prajadhipok abdicated the throne and exiled himself. He was replaced as king by his nine-year-old nephew Prince Ananda Mahidol (King Rama VIII), who at that time was attending school in Lausanne, Switzerland. Plaek Phibunsongkhram's popularity increased from his role in leading anti-rebellion forces.


title: History of Thailand

text: During this time, Pridi played an important role in modernising Thai public administration: completed Thai legal codes, created the local government system.


title: History of Thailand

text: When Phibulsonggram succeeded Phraya Phahon as Prime Minister in September 1938, the military and civilian wings of Khana Ratsadon diverged even further, and military domination became more overt. Phibunsongkhram began moving the government towards militarism, and totalitarianism, as well as building personality cult around himself.


title: History of Thailand

text: The defeat of France in the Battle of France was the catalyst for the Thai leadership to begin an attack on French Indochina. This began with smaller conflicts in 1940 and resulted in the Franco-Thai War in 1941. It suffered a heavy defeat in the sea battle of Ko Chang, but it dominated on land and in the air. The Empire of Japan, already the dominant power in the Southeast Asian region, took over the role of mediator. The negotiations ended the conflict with Thai territorial gains in the French colonies of Laos and Cambodia.


title: History of Thailand

text: By 1942, he had issued a series of cultural decrees ("ratthaniyom") or Thai cultural mandates, which reflected the desire for social modernisation, but also an authoritarian and exaggerated nationalist spirit. First, in 1939, he changed the country's name of Siam to Thailand "(Prathet Thai)" (). This is based on the idea of a "Thai race", a Pan-Thai nationalism whose program is the integration of the Shan, the Lao and other Tai peoples, such as those in Vietnam, Burma and South China, into a "Great Kingdom of Thailand" (). Other decrees urged the citizens to embrace Western-style modernisation.


title: History of Thailand

text: After the Franco-Thai war ended, the Thai government declared neutrality. When the Japanese invaded Thailand on 8 December 1941, a few hours after the attack on Pearl Harbor, Japan demanded the right to move troops across Thailand to the Malayan frontier. Phibun accepted Japanese demands after a brief resistance. The government improved relations with Japan by signing a military alliance in December 1941. Japanese armies used the country as a base for their invasions of Burma and Malaya. Hesitancy, however, gave way to enthusiasm after the Japanese rolled their way through Malaya in a "Bicycle Blitzkrieg" with surprisingly little resistance. The following month, Phibun declared war on Britain and the United States. South Africa and New Zealand declared war on Thailand on the same day. Australia followed soon after. All who opposed the Japanese alliance were sacked from his government. Pridi Phanomyong was appointed acting regent for the absent King Ananda Mahidol, while Direk Jayanama, the prominent foreign minister who had advocated continued resistance against the Japanese, was later sent to Tokyo as an ambassador. The United States considered Thailand to be a puppet of Japan and refused to declare war. When the allies were victorious, the United States blocked British efforts to impose a punitive peace.


title: History of Thailand

text: The Thais and Japanese agreed that Shan State and Kayah State were to be under Thai control. On 10 May 1942, the Thai Phayap Army entered Burma's eastern Shan State, the Thai Burma Area Army entered Kayah State and some parts of central Burma. Three Thai infantry and one cavalry division, spearheaded by armoured reconnaissance groups and supported by the air force, engaged the retreating Chinese 93rd Division. Kengtung, the main objective, was captured on 27 May. Renewed offensives in June and November saw the Chinese retreat into Yunnan. The area containing the Shan States and Kayah State was annexed by Thailand in 1942. They would be ceded back to Burma in 1945.


title: History of Thailand

text: The Seri Thai (Free Thai Movement) was an underground resistance movement against Japan founded by Seni Pramoj, the Thai ambassador in Washington. Led from within Thailand from the office of the regent Pridi, it operated freely, often with support from members of the royal family such as Prince Chula Chakrabongse, and members of the government. As Japan neared defeat and the underground anti-Japanese resistance Seri Thai steadily grew in strength, the National Assembly forced out Phibun. His six-year reign as the military commander-in-chief was at an end. His resignation was partly forced by his two grandiose plans gone awry. One was to relocate the capital from Bangkok to a remote site in the jungle near Phetchabun in north-central Thailand. The other was to build a "Buddhist city" near Saraburi. Announced at a time of severe economic difficulty, these ideas turned many government officers against him.


title: History of Thailand

text: At war's end, Phibun was put on trial at Allied insistence on charges of having committed war crimes, mainly that of collaborating with the Axis powers. However, he was acquitted amid intense public pressure. Public opinion was still favourable to Phibun, as he was thought to have done his best to protect Thai interests, specifically using alliance with Japan to support the expansion of Thai territory in Malaya and Burma.


title: History of Thailand

text: After Japan's defeat in 1945, British, Indian troops, and US observers landed in September, and during their brief occupation of parts of the country disarmed the Japanese troops. After repatriating them, the British left in March 1946. US support for Thailand blunted Allied demands, although the British demanded reparations in the form of rice sent to Malaya, and the French the return of territories lost in the Franco-Thai War. In exchange for supporting Thailand's admission to the United Nations, the Soviet Union demanded the repeal of the anti-communist legislation. Former British POWs erected a monument expressing gratitude to the citizens of Ubon Ratchathani for their kindnesses.


title: History of Thailand

text: In early September the leading elements of Major General Geoffrey Charles Evans's Indian 7th Infantry Division landed, accompanied by Edwina Mountbatten. Later that month Seni Pramoj returned from Washington to succeed Tawee as prime minister. It was the first time in over a decade that the government had been controlled by civilians. But the ensuing factional scramble for power in late 1945 created political divisions in the ranks of the civilian leaders that destroyed their potential for making a common stand against the resurgent political force of the military in the post-war years.


title: History of Thailand

text: Following the signature by Thailand of the Washington Accord of 1946, the territories that had been annexed after the Franco-Thai War, which included Phibunsongkhram Province, Nakhon Champassak Province, Phra Tabong Province, Koh Kong Province and Lan Chang Province, were returned to Cambodia and Laos.


title: History of Thailand

text: Moreover, the post-war accommodations with the Allies weakened the civilian government. As a result of the contributions made to the Allied war effort by the Free Thai Movement, the United States, which unlike the other Allies had never officially been at war with Thailand, refrained from dealing with Thailand as an enemy country in post-war peace negotiations. Before signing a peace treaty, however, Britain demanded war reparations in the form of rice shipments to Malaya. An Anglo-Thai Peace Treaty was signed on 1 January 1946, and an Australian–Thai Peace Treaty on 3 April. France refused to permit admission of Thailand to the United Nations until Indochinese territories annexed during the war were returned. The Soviet Union insisted on the repeal of anti-communist legislation.


title: History of Thailand

text: Elections were held in January 1946. These were the first elections in which political parties were legal, and Pridi's People's Party and its allies won a majority. In March 1946 Pridi became Siam's first democratically elected prime minister. In 1946, after he agreed to hand back the Indochinese territories occupied in 1941 as the price for admission to the United Nations, all wartime claims against Siam were dropped and substantial US aid was received.


title: History of Thailand

text: In December 1945, the young king Ananda Mahidol had returned to Siam from Europe, but in June 1946 he was found shot dead in his bed, under mysterious circumstances. Three palace servants were tried and executed for his murder, although there are significant doubts as to their guilt and the case remains both murky and a highly sensitive topic in Thailand today. The king was succeeded by his younger brother, Bhumibol Adulyadej. In August Pridi was forced to resign amid suspicion that he had been involved in the regicide. Without his leadership, the civilian government foundered, and in November 1947 the army, its confidence restored after the debacle of 1945, seized power. After an interim Khuang-headed government, in April 1948 the army brought Phibun back from exile and made him prime minister. Pridi, in turn, was driven into exile, eventually settling in Beijing as a guest of the PRC.


title: History of Thailand

text: Phibun's return to power coincided with the onset of the Cold War and the establishment of a communist regime in North Vietnam. He soon won the support of the United Nations. Once again political opponents were arrested and tried, and some were executed. During this time, several of the key figures in the wartime Free Thai underground, including Thawin Udom, Thawi Thawethikul, Chan Bunnak, and Tiang Sirikhanth, were eliminated in extra-legal fashion by the Thai police, run by Phibun's ruthless associate Phao Sriyanond. There were attempted counter-coups by Pridi supporters in 1948, 1949, and 1951, the second leading to heavy fighting between the army and navy before Phibun emerged victorious. In the navy's 1951 attempt, popularly known as the Manhattan Coup, Phibun was nearly killed when the ship where he was held hostage was bombed by the pro-government air force.


title: History of Thailand

text: Although nominally a constitutional monarchy, Thailand was ruled by a series of military governments, most prominently led by Phibun, interspersed with brief periods of democracy. Thailand took part in the Korean War. Communist Party of Thailand guerrilla forces operated inside the country from the early-1960s to 1987. They included 12,000 full-time fighters at the peak of movement, but never posed a serious threat to the state.


title: History of Thailand

text: By 1955 Phibun was losing his leading position in the army to younger rivals led by Field Marshal Sarit Thanarat and General Thanom Kittikachorn, the Sarit's army staged a bloodless coup on 17 September 1957, ending Phibun's career for good. The coup beginning a long tradition of US-backed military regimes in Thailand. Thanom became prime minister until 1958, then yielded his place to Sarit, the real head of the regime. Sarit held power until his death in 1963, when Thanom again took the lead.


title: History of Thailand

text: The regimes of Sarit and Thanom were strongly supported by the US. Thailand had formally become a US ally in 1954 with the formation of the SEATO While the war in Indochina was being fought between the Vietnamese and the French, Thailand (disliking both equally) stayed aloof, but once it became a war between the US and the Vietnamese communists, Thailand committed itself strongly to the US side, concluding a secret agreement with the US in 1961, sending troops to Vietnam and Laos, and allowing the US to use airbases in the east of the country to conduct its bombing war against North Vietnam. The Vietnamese retaliated by supporting the Communist Party of Thailand's insurgency in the north, northeast, and sometimes in the south, where guerrillas co-operated with local discontented Muslims. In the postwar period, Thailand had close relations with the US, which it saw as a protector from communist revolutions in neighbouring countries. The Seventh and Thirteenth US Air Forces were headquartered at Udon Royal Thai Air Force Base.


title: History of Thailand

text: Agent Orange, a herbicide and defoliant chemical used by the U.S. military as part of its herbicidal warfare program, Operation Ranch Hand, was tested by the United States in Thailand during the war in Southeast Asia. Buried drums were uncovered and confirmed to be Agent Orange in 1999. Workers who uncovered the drums fell ill while upgrading the airport near Hua Hin District, 100 km south of Bangkok.


title: History of Thailand

text: US Vietnam-era veterans whose service involved duty on or near the perimeters of military bases in Thailand anytime between 28 February 1961, and 7 May 1975, may have been exposed to herbicides and may qualify for VA benefits.


title: History of Thailand

text: A declassified US Department of Defense report written in 1973 suggests that there was a significant use of herbicides on the fenced-in perimeters of military bases in Thailand to remove foliage that provided cover for enemy forces.


title: History of Thailand

text: Between 1962 and 1965, 350 Thai nationals underwent an eight-month training course in North Vietnam. In the first half of 1965, the rebels smuggled approximately 3,000 US-made weapons and 90,000 rounds of ammunition from Laos.


title: History of Thailand

text: Between 1961 and 1965, insurgents carried out 17 political assassinations. They avoided full scale guerrilla warfare until the summer of 1965, when militants began engaging Thai security forces. A total of 13 clashes were recorded during that period. The second half of 1965 was marked by a further 25 violent incidents, and starting in November 1965, Communist Party of Thailand insurgents began undertaking more elaborate operations.


title: History of Thailand

text: The insurgency spread to other parts of Thailand in 1966, although 90 percent of insurgency-related incidents occurred in the northeast of the country. On 14 January 1966, a spokesman representing the Thai Patriotic Front called for the start of a "people's war" in Thailand. The statement marked an escalation of violence in the conflict. The insurgency had come to an end only by 1983.


title: History of Thailand

text: The Vietnam War hastened the modernisation and Westernisation of Thai society. The American presence and the exposure to Western culture that came with it had an effect on almost every aspect of Thai life. Before the late 1960s, full access to Western culture was limited to a highly educated elite in society, but the Vietnam War brought the outside world face to face with large segments of the Thai society as never before. With US dollars pumping up the economy, the service, transportation, and construction industries grew phenomenally as did drug abuse and prostitution, which using Thailand as a "Rest and Recreation" facility by US forces. The traditional rural family unit was broken down as more and more rural Thais moved to the city to find new jobs. This led to a clash of cultures as Thais were exposed to Western ideas about fashion, music, values, and moral standards.


title: History of Thailand

text: The population began to grow explosively as the standard of living rose, and a flood of people began to move from the villages to the cities, and above all to Bangkok. Thailand had 30 million people in 1965, while by the end of the 20th century the population had doubled. Bangkok's population had grown tenfold since 1945 and had tripled since 1970.


title: History of Thailand

text: Educational opportunities and exposure to mass media increased during the Vietnam War years. Bright university students learned more about ideas related to Thailand's economic and political systems, resulting in a revival of student activism. The Vietnam War period also saw the growth of the Thai middle class which gradually developed its own identity and consciousness.


title: History of Thailand

text: Economic development did not bring prosperity to all. During the 1960s many of the rural poor felt increasingly dissatisfied with their condition in society and disillusioned by their treatment by the central government in Bangkok. Efforts by the Thai government to develop poor rural regions often did not have the desired effect in that they contributed to the farmers' awareness of how bad off they really were. It was not always the poorest of the poor who joined the anti-government insurgency. Increased government presence in the rural villages did little to improve the situation. Villagers became subject to increased military and police harassment and bureaucratic corruption. Villagers often felt betrayed when government promises of development were frequently not fulfilled. By the early 1970s rural discontent had manifested itself into a peasant's activist movement.


title: History of Thailand

text: In 1972, hundreds of peasants, perhaps more than 3,000, suspected of supporting the communist rebellion, were massacred by the armed forces in Phattalung province in southern Thailand. Until then, communist suspects arrested by the army were usually shot and their bodies left behind. This time, the "red barrel" method was introduced to eliminate any possible evidence. Suspects were beaten into semi-consciousness before being thrown into barrels containing gasoline and burned alive.


title: History of Thailand

text: With the dissatisfaction of pro-US policies of Military administration that allowed the US forces for using the country as a military bases, the high rate of prostitution problems, the freedom of press and speech were limited and influx of the corruption that lead to inequality of social classes. Student demonstrations had started in 1968 and grew in size and numbers in the early 1970s despite the continued ban on political meetings. In June 1973, nine Ramkhamhaeng University students were expelled for publishing an article in a student newspaper that was critical of the government. Shortly after, thousands of students held a protest at the Democracy Monument demanding the re-enrolment of the nine students. The government ordered the universities to shut, but shortly afterwards allowed the students to be re-enrolled.


title: History of Thailand

text: In October another 13 students were arrested on charges of conspiracy to overthrow the government. This time the student protesters were joined by workers, businessmen, and other ordinary citizens. The demonstrations swelled to several hundred thousand and the issue broadened from the release of the arrested students to demands for a new constitution and the replacement of the current government.


title: History of Thailand

text: On 13 October, the government released the detainees. Leaders of the demonstrations, among them Seksan Prasertkul, called off the march in accordance with the wishes of the king who was publicly against the democracy movement. In a speech to graduating students, he criticised the pro-democracy movement by telling students to concentrate on their studies and leave politics to their elders [military government].


title: History of Thailand

text: As the crowds were breaking up the next day, on 14 October, many students found themselves unable to leave because the police blocked the southern route to Rajavithi Road. Cornered and overwhelmed by the hostile crowd, the police responded with teargas and gunfire.


title: History of Thailand

text: The military was called in, and tanks rolled down Ratchadamnoen Avenue and helicopters fired down at Thammasat University. A number of students commandeered buses and fire engines in an attempt to halt the progress of the tanks by ramming into them. With chaos on the streets, King Bhumibol opened the gates of Chitralada Palace to the students who were being gunned down by the army. Despite orders from Thanom that the military action be intensified, army commander Kris Sivara had the army withdrawn from the streets.


title: History of Thailand

text: The king condemned the government's inability to handle the demonstrations and ordered Thanom, Praphas, and Narong to leave the country, and notably condemned the students' supposed role as well. At 18:10 Field Marshal Thanom Kittikachorn resigned from his post as prime minister. An hour later, the king appeared on national television, asking for calm, and announcing that Field Marshal Thanom Kittikachorn had been replaced with Dr. Sanya Dharmasakti, a respected law professor, as prime minister.


title: History of Thailand

text: 1973 Uprising brought about the most free era in Thai recent history, called "Age when democracy blossom" and "Democratic experiment," which ended in Thammasat University massacre and a coup on 6 October 1976.


title: History of Thailand

text: Post-1973 has been marked by a struggle to define the political contours of the state. It was won by the king and General Prem Tinsulanonda, who favoured a monarchial constitutional order.


title: History of Thailand

text: The post-1973 years have seen a difficult and sometimes bloody transition from military to civilian rule, with several reversals along the way. The revolution of 1973 inaugurated a brief, unstable period of democracy, with military rule being reimposed after the 6 October 1976 Massacre. For most of the 1980s, Thailand was ruled by Prem Tinsulanonda, a democratically inclined strongman who restored parliamentary politics. Thereafter the country remained a democracy apart from a brief period of military rule from the 1991 Thai coup d'état for two years.


title: History of Thailand

text: The populist Thai Rak Thai party, led by Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, came to power in 2001. He was popular with the urban, suburban, and rural poor for his populist social programs. His rule came under attack from elites who saw danger in his "parliamentary dictatorship". In mid-2005, Sondhi Limthongkul, a well-known media tycoon, became the foremost Thaksin critic. Eventually, Sondhi and his allies developed the movement into a mass protest and later unified under the name of People's Alliance for Democracy (PAD).


title: History of Thailand

text: On 19 September 2006, after the dissolution of parliament, Thaksin became head of a provisional government. While he was in New York for a meeting of the UN, Army Commander-in-Chief Lieutenant General Sonthi Boonyaratglin launched the bloodless September 2006 Thailand military coup d'état supported by anti-Thaksin elements in civil society and the Democrat Party. A general election on 23 December 2007 restored a civilian government, led by Samak Sundaravej of the People's Power Party, as a successor to Thai Rak Thai.


title: History of Thailand

text: Without meeting much resistance, a military junta overthrew the interim government of Thaksin Shinawatra on 19 September 2006. The junta abrogated the constitution, dissolved Parliament and the Constitutional Court, detained and later removed several members of the government, declared martial law, and appointed one of the king's Privy Counselors, General Surayud Chulanont, as the Prime Minister. On 1 October 2006, Surayud Chulanont, the former head of Thailand’s army, was sworn in as interim prime minister. The junta later wrote a highly abbreviated interim constitution and appointed a panel to draft a new permanent constitution. The junta also appointed a 250-member legislature, called by some critics a "chamber of generals" while others claimed that it lacks representatives from the poor majority.


title: History of Thailand

text: In this interim constitution draft, the head of the junta was allowed to remove the prime minister at any time. The legislature was not allowed to hold a vote of confidence against the cabinet and the public was not allowed to file comments on bills. This interim constitution was later surpassed by the permanent constitution on 24 August 2007. Martial law was partially revoked in January 2007. The ban on political activities was lifted in July 2007, following the 30 May dissolution of the Thai Rak Thai party. The new constitution was approved by referendum on 19 August, which led to a return to a democratic general election on 23 December 2007. Š


title: History of Thailand

text: The People's Power Party (Thailand) (PPP), led by Samak Sundaravej formed a government with five smaller parties. Following several court rulings against him in a variety of scandals, and surviving a vote of no confidence, and protesters blockading government buildings and airports, in September 2008, Sundaravej was found guilty of conflict of interest by the Constitutional Court of Thailand (due to being host of a TV cooking program), and thus, ended his term in office.


title: History of Thailand

text: He was replaced by PPP member Somchai Wongsawat. As of October 2008, Wongsawat was unable to gain access to his offices, which were occupied by protesters from the People's Alliance for Democracy. On 2 December 2008, Thailand's Constitutional Court in a highly controversial ruling found the Peoples Power Party (PPP) guilty of electoral fraud, which led to the dissolution of the party according to the law. It was later alleged in media reports that at least one member of the judiciary had a telephone conversation with officials working for the Office of the Privy Council and one other person. The phone call was taped and has since circulated on the Internet. In it, the callers discuss finding a way to ensure the ruling PPP party would be disbanded. Accusations of judicial interference were levelled in the media but the recorded call was dismissed as a hoax. However, in June 2010, supporters of the eventually disbanded PPP were charged with tapping a judge's phone.


title: History of Thailand

text: Immediately following what many media described as a "judicial coup", a senior member of the armed forces met with factions of the governing coalition to get their members to join the opposition and the Democrat Party was able to form a government, a first for the party since 2001. The leader of the Democrat Party, and former leader of the opposition, Abhisit Vejjajiva was appointed and sworn in as the 27th Prime Minister, together with a new cabinet, on 17 December 2008.


title: History of Thailand

text: In April 2009, protests by the National United Front of Democracy Against Dictatorship (UDD, or "Red Shirts") forced the cancellation of the Fourth East Asia Summit after protesters stormed the Royal Cliff Hotel venue in Pattaya, smashing the glass doors of the venue to gain entry, and a blockade prevented the Chinese premier at the time, Wen Jiabao, from attending.


title: History of Thailand

text: About a year later, a set of new Red Shirts protests resulted in 87 deaths (mostly civilian and some military) and 1,378 injured. When the army tried to disperse protesters on 10 April 2010, the army was met with automatic gunfire, grenades, and fire bombs from an opposition faction in the army. This resulted in the army returning fire with rubber bullets and some live ammunition. During the time of the Red Shirt protests against the government, there were numerous grenade and bomb attacks against government offices and the homes of government officials. Gas grenades were fired at Yellow Shirt protesters who were protesting against the Red Shirts and in favour of the government, by unknown gunmen killing one pro-government protester, the government stated that the Red Shirts were firing the weapons at civilians. Red Shirts continued to hold a position in the business district of Bangkok and it was shut down for several weeks.


title: History of Thailand

text: On 3 July 2011, the opposition Pheu Thai Party, led by Yingluck Shinawatra (the youngest sister of Thaksin Shinawatra), won the general election by a landslide (265 seats in the House of Representatives, out of 500). She had never previously been involved in politics, Pheu Thai campaigning for her with the slogan "Thaksin thinks, Pheu Thai acts". Yingluck was the nation's first female prime minister and her role was officially endorsed in a ceremony presided over by King Bhumibol Adulyadej. The Pheu Thai Party is a continuation of Thaksin's Thai Rak Thai party.


title: History of Thailand

text: Protests recommenced in late 2013, as a broad alliance of protesters, led by former opposition deputy leader Suthep Thaugsuban, demanded an end to the Thaksin regime. A blanket amnesty for people involved in the 2010 protests, altered at the last minute to include all political crimes, including all convictions against Thaksin, triggered a mass show of discontent, with numbers variously estimated between 98,500 (the police) and 400,000 (an aerial photo survey done by the "Bangkok Post"), taking to the streets. The Senate was urged to reject the bill to quell the reaction, but the measure failed. A newly named group, the People's Democratic Reform Committee (PDRC) along with allied groups, escalated the pressure, with the opposition Democrat party resigning en masse to create a parliamentary vacuum. Protesters demand variously evolved as the movement's numbers grew, extending a number of deadlines and demands that became increasingly unreasonable or unrealistic, yet attracting a groundswell of support. They called for the establishment of an indirectly elected "people's council", in place of Yingluck's government, that would cleanse Thai politics and eradicate the Thaksin regime.


title: History of Thailand

text: In response to the protests, Yingluck dissolved parliament on 9 December 2013 and proposed a new election for 2 February 2014, a date that was later approved by the election commission. The PDRC insisted that the prime minister stand down within 24 hours, regardless of her actions, with 160,000 protesters in attendance at Government House on 9 December. Yingluck insisted that she would continue her duties until the scheduled election in February 2014, urging the protesters to accept her proposal: "Now that the government has dissolved parliament, I ask that you stop protesting and that all sides work towards elections. I have backed down to the point where I don't know how to back down any further."


title: History of Thailand

text: In response to the Electoral Commission (EC)'s registration process for party-list candidates—for the scheduled election in February 2014—anti-government protesters marched to the Thai-Japanese sports stadium, the venue of the registration process, on 22 December 2013. Suthep and the PDRC led the protest, which security forces claimed that approximately 270,000 protesters joined. Yingluck and the Pheu Thai Party reiterated their election plan and anticipated presenting a list of 125 party-list candidates to the EC.


title: History of Thailand

text: On 7 May 2014, the Constitutional Court ruled that Yingluck would have to step down as the prime minister as she was deemed to have abused her power in transferring a high-level government official. On 21 August 2014 she was replaced by army chief General Prayut Chan-o-cha.


title: History of Thailand

text: On 20 May 2014 the Thai army declared martial law and began to deploy troops in the capital, denying that it was a coup attempt. On 22 May, the army admitted that it was a coup and that it was taking control of the country and suspending the country's constitution. On the same day, the military imposed a curfew between the hours of 22:00–05:00, ordering citizens and visitors to remain indoors during this period. On 21 August 2014 the National Assembly of Thailand elected the army chief, General Prayut Chan-o-cha, as prime minister. Martial law was declared formally ended on 1 April 2015. "Uniformed or ex-military men have led Thailand for 55 of the 83 years since absolute monarchy was overthrown in 1932..." observed one journalist in 2015.


title: History of Thailand

text: The rise of fascism in Thailand began around the coup, first coined by James Taylor of University of Adelaide in 2011, after the junta took control, academics and political commentators started to identify a political system by fascism. Pithaya Pookaman and James Taylor called it 'New Right' consisting of ultraconservatives, reactionaries, semi-fascists, pseudo-intellectuals and former leftists. John Draper, an academic and political commentator, noted that the rise of fascism in Thailand began in 2014. The King's sufficient economy was mentioned that it serves as one of the ideological foundations of the military regime, and reminiscent of fascist regimes in Europe in the 1930s.


title: History of Thailand

text: The ruling junta led by Prayuth Chan-o-cha promised to hold new elections, but wants to enact a new constitution before the elections are held. An initial draft constitution was rejected by government officials in 2015. A national referendum, the first since the 2014 coup, on a newly drafted constitution was held on 7 August 2016. There was a 55% turnout of which around 61% voted in favour of the constitution. Under the new constitution an unelected person other than a member of parliament can be appointed as Prime Minister, which would open the post to a military official. The new constitution also gives the National Council for Peace and Order the authority to make all the appointments to the 250-member Senate in the next government.


title: History of Thailand

text: On 13 October 2016, King Bhumibol Adulyadej of Thailand died at the age of 89, in Siriraj Hospital in Bangkok. On the night of 1 December 2016, the fiftieth day after the death of Bhumibol, Regent Prem Tinsulanonda led the heads of the country's three branches of government to an audience with Vajiralongkorn to invite him to ascend to the throne as the tenth king of the Chakri dynasty. In April 2017, King Vajiralongkorn signs the new constitution which will aid in the return to democracy.


title: History of Thailand

text: In May 2017, Bangkok hospital was bombed, wounding 24 people on the third anniversary of the military coup of 2014.


title: History of Thailand

text: In June 2019, both houses of Thailand's parliament elected Prayuth Chan-ocha, retired general and former military junta leader, as the country's next prime minister. The vote officially restored civilian rule in Thailand. The opposition complained of voting irregularities in the March 24 elections.


title: History of Thailand

text: In February 2020, pro-democracy party Future Forward, the third largest party in the parliament with 80 seats, was disbanded. The ruling was made by the Constitutional Court, because of a donation the party's founder,Thanathorn Juangroongruangkit, made for the party.


title: History of Thailand

text: In September 2022, Thailand's Constitutional Court ruled that Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha can stay in office. The opposition had challenged him, because the new constitution limits the term for prime minister as a total period of eight years in office. The Constitutional Court's ruling was that his term in office began in April 2017, simultaneously with the new constitution, although General Prayuth had ruled as the leader of the government since the 2014 military coup.


title: Monica Vitti

text: Monica Vitti (born Maria Luisa Ceciarelli; 3 November 1931 – 2 February 2022) was an Italian actress who starred in several award-winning films directed by Michelangelo Antonioni during the 1960s. After working with Antonioni, Vitti changed focus and began making comedies, working with director Mario Monicelli on many other films. She appeared with Marcello Mastroianni, Alain Delon, Richard Harris, Terence Stamp, and Dirk Bogarde. On her death, Italian culture minister Dario Franceschini called her "the Queen of Italian cinema".


title: Monica Vitti

text: Vitti won five David di Donatello Awards for Best Actress, seven Italian Golden Globes for Best Actress, the Career Golden Globe, and the Venice Film Festival Career Golden Lion Award.


title: Monica Vitti

text: Born Maria Luisa Ceciarelli in Rome on 3 November 1931 to Adele (née Vittiglia) and Angelo Ceciarelli. She took her stage name from her mother's maiden name. Vitti acted in amateur productions as a teenager, then trained as an actress at Rome's National Academy of Dramatic Arts (graduating in 1953) and at Pittman's College, where she played a teen in a charity performance of Dario Niccodemi's "La nemica". She toured Germany with an Italian acting troupe, and her first stage appearance in Rome was for a production of Niccolò Machiavelli's "La Mandragola".


title: Monica Vitti

text: Vitti's first film role was an uncredited bit part in Edoardo Anton's "Laugh! Laugh! Laugh!" (1954). She was in "Adriana Lecouvreur" (1955), the TV series "" (1956) and the TV movies "Questi ragazzi" (1956) and "Il tunnel" (1958). She did an episode of the television series "" (1958) and dubbed Rossana Rory's voice in "Big Deal on Madonna Street" (1958).


title: Monica Vitti

text: Vitti's first widely noted performance was at 26, in Mario Amendola's "" (1958) with Franco Fabrizi. She was in the TV movie "Il borghese gentiluomo" (1959).


title: Monica Vitti

text: In 1957 she joined Michelangelo Antonioni's "Teatro Nuovo di Milano" and dubbed the voice of Dorian Gray in the director's "Il Grido" ("The Cry", 1957). Over the next several years in several "intense portraits of alienation she became the perfect mouthpiece for Antonioni himself". She played a leading role in Antonioni's internationally praised film "L'Avventura" (1960) as a detached and cool protagonist drifting into a relationship with the lover of her missing girlfriend. Giving a screen presence that has been described as "stunning", she is also credited with helping Antonioni raise money for the production and sticking with him through daunting location shooting. "L'Avventura" made Vitti an international star. Her image later appeared on an Italian postage stamp commemorating the film. According to "The New York Times", Vitti's "air of disenchantment perfectly conveys the unreal aura of her heroines."


title: Monica Vitti

text: Vitti received critical praise for her starring roles in the Antonioni film "La Notte" ("Night", 1961), with Jeanne Moreau and Marcello Mastroianni. Vitti starred in a TV movie "Le notti bianche" (1962), then did a third with Antonioni, "L'Eclisse" (1962) with Alain Delon.


title: Monica Vitti

text: Vitti was one of many stars in an anthology movie, "Three Fables of Love" (1962). She had a cameo in "Sweet and Sour" (1963) and played the lead in a comedy for Roger Vadim, "Nutty, Naughty Chateau" (1963). Vitti was then in another anthology film "High Infidelity" (1964) and made a fourth with Antonioni, "Il Deserto Rosso" ("Red Desert", 1964), with Richard Harris. The director said Vitti "certainly inspires me, because I like to watch and direct her, but the parts I give her are a long way from her own character." After Vitti's relationship with Antonioni ended, the two did not work together again until "Il mistero di Oberwald" (1980).


title: Monica Vitti

text: Vitti starred in a comedy for Tinto Brass, "The Flying Saucer" (1964), and appeared in the anthology, "The Dolls" (1964).


title: Monica Vitti

text: Vitti's first English-language film was "Modesty Blaise" (1966), a mod James Bond spy spoof that co-starred Terence Stamp and Dirk Bogarde and was directed by Joseph Losey, it had only mixed success and received harsh critical reviews.


title: Monica Vitti

text: She performed in the anthology movie "The Queens" (1966), a television series "Les fables de La Fontaine" (1966), "Kill Me Quick, I'm Cold" (1967) with Jean Sorel, and "I Married You for Fun" (1967).


title: Monica Vitti

text: Vitti appeared in "On My Way to the Crusades, I Met a Girl Who..." (1967) with Tony Curtis, "The Girl with a Pistol" (1968) with Stanley Baker, "The Bitch Wants Blood" (1969) with Maurice Ronet, and "Help Me, My Love" (1969) with Alberto Sordi.


title: Monica Vitti

text: Vitti starred with Marcello Mastroianni in Ettore Scola's highly successful romantic comedy, "Dramma della gelosia" ("The Pizza Triangle", 1970). She followed it with "Ninì Tirabusciò, la donna che inventò la mossa" (1970), "Le coppie" (1970) with Sordi, "The Pacifist" (1970), "La supertestimone" (1971), "That's How We Women Are" (1971), and "Orders Are Orders" (1972).


title: Monica Vitti

text: Vitti was in a version of "La Tosca" (1973) and in several comedies directed by Carlo Di Palma, who was her partner for several years in the 1970s, beginning with"Teresa the Thief" (1973). She made "Polvere di stelle" (1973), directed by Alberto Sordi, for which she won the 1974 David di Donatello award for Best Actress.


title: Monica Vitti

text: Vitti played a key part in one of vignettes in Luis Buñuel's "The Phantom of Liberty" (1974). She did two films with Claudia Cardinale, "The Immortal Bachelor" (1975) and "Blonde in Black Leather" (1975).


title: Monica Vitti

text: She was in "Duck in Orange Sauce" (1975), "Mimì Bluette... fiore del mio giardino" (1976), "Basta che non si sappia in giro!.." (1977), "L'altra metà del cielo" (1977), "State Reasons" (1978), "Il cilindro" (1978, for television), "Per vivere meglio, divertitevi con noi" (1978), "Amori miei" (1978), and "Tigers in Lipstick" (1979) (with Ursula Andress).


title: Monica Vitti

text: Vitti's second English-language film was "An Almost Perfect Affair" (1979), directed by Michael Ritchie and co-starring Keith Carradine, which was set during the Cannes Film Festival. A "New York Times" article from that period reported Vitti had resisted starring in American films as she did not like long travel, especially by air, and believed that her English was not of a high enough standard. Indeed, such was her aversion to travelling from Europe that Paramount Pictures was apparently forced to cancel the first leg of a publicity tour organised in the US to promote the release of "An Almost Perfect Affair".


title: Monica Vitti

text: Vitti reunited with Antonioni in "The Mystery of Oberwald" ("Il mistero di Oberwald", 1980). She followed it with "I Don't Understand You Anymore" (1980), "Camera d'albergo" (1981), "Tango of Jealousy" (1981), "I Know That You Know That I Know" (1982) with Sordi, "Scusa se è poco" (1982), "Flirt" (1983), and "" (1986). She also co-wrote the last two films. In 1984, France awarded her the Order of Arts and Letters. French Culture Minister Jack Lang praised her for helping spur a renewal of Italian films: "We need Italian cinema to find its health again so that French cinema will not remain an island in the middle of other European countries," Lang said. On 26 January 1995, she was raised to the rank of Commander of that Order. By 1986, Vitti had returned to the theatre as an actress and teacher.


title: Monica Vitti

text: In 1989, Vitti tried writing and directing and created "Scandalo Segreto" (1990), in which she also starred alongside Elliott Gould. The film was unsuccessful and she then retired from cinema. During the 1990s, she did television work, acting in the television miniseries "" (1992).


title: Monica Vitti

text: In 1993, Vitti was awarded the Festival Tribute at the Créteil International Women's Film Festival in France.


title: Monica Vitti

text: Antonioni and Vitti met in the late 1950s, and their relationship grew stronger after "L'Avventura" was made, because it had shaped both their careers. However, by the late 1960s, they ceased working on films, making the relationship strained until it officially ended. In a later interview, Vitti stated that Antonioni ended their relationship.


title: Monica Vitti

text: For several years in the 1970s her partner was Carlo Di Palma, best known as a cinematographer though she started in three films he directed.


title: Monica Vitti

text: In 2000, Vitti married Roberto Russo, with whom she had been in a relationship since 1973. She made her last public appearance in 2002 when she attended the Paris premiere of the stage musical "Notre-Dame de Paris". In 2011, it was disclosed that Alzheimer's disease had "removed her from the public gaze for the last 15 years". In 2018, her husband confirmed she was still living at home with him in Rome and that he looked after her with the assistance of a caregiver.


title: Pope Innocent III

text: Pope Innocent III (; 1160 or 1161 – 16 July 1216), born Lotario dei Conti di Segni (anglicized as Lothar of Segni), was the head of the Catholic Church and ruler of the Papal States from 8 January 1198 to his death in 16 July 1216.


title: Pope Innocent III

text: Pope Innocent was one of the most powerful and influential of the medieval popes. He exerted a wide influence over the Christian states of Europe, claiming supremacy over all of Europe's kings. He was central in supporting the Catholic Church's reforms of ecclesiastical affairs through his decretals and the Fourth Lateran Council. This resulted in a considerable refinement of Western canon law. He is furthermore notable for using interdict and other censures to compel princes to obey his decisions, although these measures were not uniformly successful.


title: Pope Innocent III

text: Innocent greatly extended the scope of the Crusades, directing crusades against Muslim Iberia and the Holy Land as well as the Albigensian Crusade against the Cathars in southern France.


title: Pope Innocent III

text: He organized the Fourth Crusade of 1202–1204, which ended in the sack of Constantinople. Although the attack on Constantinople went against his explicit orders, and the Crusaders were subsequently excommunicated, Innocent reluctantly accepted this result, seeing it as the will of God to reunite the Latin and Eastern Orthodox Churches. In the event, the sack of Constantinople and the subsequent period of "Frankokratia" heightened the hostility between the Latin and Greek churches. (The Byzantine Empire was restored in 1261, albeit much weaker.)


title: Pope Innocent III

text: Lotario de' Conti was born in Gavignano, Italy, near Anagni. His father, Count Trasimondo of Segni, was a member of a famous house, the Conti di Segni (Counts of Segni), which produced nine popes, including Gregory IX, Alexander IV and Innocent XIII. Lotario was the nephew of Pope Clement III; his mother, Clarissa Scotti (Romani de Scotti), was from the same noble Roman family.


title: Pope Innocent III

text: Lotario received his early education in Rome, probably at the Benedictine abbey of St Andrea al Celio, under Peter Ismael; he studied theology in Paris under the theologians Peter of Poitiers, Melior of Pisa, and Peter of Corbeil, and (possibly) jurisprudence in Bologna, according to the "Gesta" (between 1187 and 1189). As pope, Lotario was to play a major role in the shaping of canon law through conciliar canons and decretal letters.


title: Pope Innocent III

text: Shortly after the death of Alexander III (30 August 1181) Lotario returned to Rome and held various ecclesiastical offices during the short reigns of Lucius III, Urban III, Gregory VIII, and Clement III, being ordained a Subdeacon by Gregory VIII and reaching the rank of Cardinal-Priest under Clement III in 1191.


title: Pope Innocent III

text: As a cardinal, Lotario wrote "De miseria humanae conditionis" (On the Misery of the Human Condition). The work was very popular for centuries, surviving in more than 700 manuscripts. Although he never returned to the complementary work he intended to write, "On the Dignity of Human Nature", Bartolomeo Facio (1400–1457) took up the task writing "De excellentia ac praestantia hominis".


title: Pope Innocent III

text: Celestine III died on 8 January 1198. Before his death he had urged the College of Cardinals to elect Giovanni di San Paolo as his successor, but Lotario de' Conti was elected pope in the ruins of the ancient Septizodium, near the Circus Maximus in Rome after only two ballots on the very day on which Celestine III died. He was only thirty-seven years old at the time. He took the name Innocent III, maybe as a reference to his predecessor Innocent II (1130–1143), who had succeeded in asserting the papacy's authority over the emperor (in contrast with Celestine III's recent policy).


title: Pope Innocent III

text: As pope, Innocent III began with a very wide sense of his responsibility and of his authority. During Innocent III's reign, the papacy was at the height of its powers. He was considered to be the most powerful person in Europe at the time. In 1198, Innocent wrote to the prefect Acerbius and the nobles of Tuscany expressing his support of the medieval political theory of the sun and the moon. His papacy asserted the absolute spiritual authority of his office, while still respecting the temporal authority of kings.


title: Pope Innocent III

text: There was scarcely a country in Europe over which Innocent III did not in some way or other assert the supremacy which he claimed for the papacy. He excommunicated Alfonso IX of Leon, for marrying a near relative, Berengaria, a daughter of Alfonso VIII, contrary to the laws of the Church, and effected their separation in 1204. For similar reasons he annulled, in 1208, the marriage of the crown-prince, Alfonso of Portugal, with Urraca, daughter of Alfonso of Castile. From Pedro II of Aragon he received that kingdom in vassalage and crowned him king at Rome in 1204.


title: Pope Innocent III

text: The Muslim recapture of Jerusalem in 1187 was to him a divine judgment on the moral lapses of Christian princes. He was also determined to protect what he called "the liberty of the Church" from inroads by secular princes. This determination meant, among other things, that princes should not be involved in the selection of bishops, and it was focused especially on the "patrimonium" of the papacy, the section of central Italy claimed by the popes and later called the Papal States. The patrimonium was routinely threatened by Hohenstaufen German kings who, as Roman emperors, claimed it for themselves. Emperor Henry VI expected his infant son Frederick to bring Germany, Italy, and Sicily under a single ruler, which would leave the Papal States exceedingly vulnerable.


title: Pope Innocent III

text: Henry's early death left his 3-year-old son, Frederick, as king of Sicily. Henry VI's widow, Constance of Sicily, ruled over Sicily for her young son before he reached the age of majority. She was as eager to remove German power from the kingdom of Sicily as was Innocent III. Before her death in 1198, she named Innocent as guardian of the young Frederick until he reached his maturity. In exchange, Innocent was also able to recover papal rights in Sicily that had been surrendered decades earlier to King William I of Sicily by Pope Adrian IV. The Pope invested the young Frederick II as King of Sicily in November 1198. He also later induced Frederick II to marry Constance of Aragon, the widow of King Emeric of Hungary, in 1209.


title: Pope Innocent III

text: Innocent was concerned that the marriage of Henry VI and Constance of Sicily gave the Hohenstaufens a claim to all the Italian peninsula with the exception of the Papal States, which would be surrounded by Imperial territory.


title: Pope Innocent III

text: After the death of Emperor Henry VI, who had recently also conquered the Kingdom of Sicily, the succession became disputed: as Henry's son Frederick was still a small child, the partisans of the Staufen dynasty elected Henry's brother, Philip, Duke of Swabia, king in March 1198, whereas the princes opposed to the Staufen dynasty elected Otto, Duke of Brunswick, of the House of Welf. King Philip II of France supported Philip's claim, whereas King Richard I of England supported his nephew Otto.


title: Pope Innocent III

text: In 1201, the pope openly espoused the side of Otto IV, whose family had always been opposed to the house of Hohenstaufen.


title: Pope Innocent III

text: It is the business of the pope to look after the interests of the Roman empire, since the empire derives its origin and its final authority from the papacy; its origin, because it was originally transferred from Greece by and for the sake of the papacy; ... its final authority, because the emperor is raised to his position by the pope who blesses him, crowns him and invests him with the empire. ...Therefore, since three persons have lately been elected king by different parties, namely the youth [Frederick, son of Henry VI], Philip [of Hohenstaufen, brother of Henry VI], and Otto [of Brunswick, of the Welf family], so also three things must be taken into account in regard to each one, namely: the legality, the suitability and the expediency of his election. ...Far be it from us that we should defer to man rather than to God, or that we should fear the countenance of the powerful. ...On the foregoing grounds, then, we decide that the youth should not at present be given the empire; we utterly reject Philip for his manifest unfitness and we order his usurpation to be resisted by all ... since Otto is not only himself devoted to the church, but comes from devout ancestors on both sides, ... therefore we decree that he ought to be accepted and supported as king, and ought to be given the crown of empire, after the rights of the Roman church have been secured. "Papal Decree on the choice of a German King, 1201"


title: Pope Innocent III

text: The confusion in the Empire allowed Innocent to drive out the imperial feudal lords from Ancona, Spoleto and Perugia, who had been installed by Emperor Henry VI. On 3 July 1201, the papal legate, Cardinal-Bishop Guido of Palestrina, announced to the people, in the cathedral of Cologne, that Otto IV had been approved by the pope as Roman king and threatened with excommunication all those who refused to acknowledge him. At the same time, Innocent encouraged the cities in Tuscany to form a league called the League of San Genesio against German imperial interests in Italy, and they placed themselves under Innocent's protection.


title: Pope Innocent III

text: In May 1202, Innocent issued the decree "Venerabilem", addressed to the Duke of Zähringen, in which he explained his thinking on the relation between the papacy and the Empire. This decree was afterwards embodied in the "Corpus Juris Canonici" and contained the following items:


title: Pope Innocent III

text: Despite papal support, Otto could not oust his rival Philip until the latter was murdered in a private feud. His rule now undisputed, Otto reneged on his earlier promises and set his sights on reestablishing Imperial power in Italy and claiming even the Kingdom of Sicily. Given the papal interest to keep Germany and Sicily apart, Innocent now supported his ward, King Frederick of Sicily, to resist Otto's advances and restore the Staufen dynasty to the Holy Roman Empire. Frederick was duly elected by the Staufen partisans.


title: Pope Innocent III

text: The conflict was decided by the Battle of Bouvines on 27 July 1214, which pitted Otto, allied to King John of England against Philip II Augustus. Otto was defeated by the French and thereafter lost all influence. He died on 19 May 1218, leaving Frederick II the undisputed emperor. Meanwhile, King John was forced to acknowledge the Pope as his feudal lord and accept Stephen Langton as Archbishop of Canterbury. In his turn, Frederick II would later become a bitter opponent of the papacy once his empire was secure.


title: Pope Innocent III

text: Innocent III played further roles in the politics of Norway, France, Sweden, Bulgaria, Spain and England. At the request of England's King John, Pope Innocent III declared the Magna Carta annulled, which resulted in a rebellion by the English barons who rejected the disenfranchisement.


title: Pope Innocent III

text: Pope Innocent III was also a zealous protector of the Catholic faith and a strenuous opponent of heresy. His chief activity was turned against the Albigenses who had become so numerous and aggressive that they were no longer satisfied with just being adherents of heretical doctrines but even endeavoured to spread their heresy by force. They were especially numerous in a few cities of Northern and Southern France. During the first year of his pontificate, Innocent sent the two Cistercian monks Rainer and Guido to the Albigenses in France to preach to them the true doctrines of the Catholic faith and dispute with them on controverted topics of religion. The two Cistercian missionaries were soon followed by Diego, Bishop of Osma, then by Saint Dominic and the two papal legates. Peter of Castelnau and Raoul.


title: Pope Innocent III

text: When, however, these missionaries were ridiculed and despised by the Albigenses, and the papal legate Castelnau was assassinated in 1208, Innocent resorted to force. He ordered the bishops of Southern France to put under interdict the participants in the murder and all the towns that gave shelter to them. He was especially incensed against Count Raymond of Toulouse who had previously been excommunicated by the murdered legate and whom the pope suspected as the instigator of the murder. The count protested his innocence and submitted to the pope but the pope placed no further trust in him. He called upon the King of France, Philip II to raise an army for the suppression of the Albigenses. Under the leadership of Simon of Montfort a cruel campaign ensued against the Albigenses which, despite the protest of Innocent, soon turned into a war of conquest. During the siege of Béziers, the leader of the crusader assault famously declared upon being asked how to distinguish Cathars from Catholics at the besieged town "Caedite eos. Novit enim Dominus qui sunt eius", which translates as: "Slay them all, God will recognize his own." This statement is often cited as "Kill them all and let God sort them out."


title: Pope Innocent III

text: The Albigensian Crusade led to the deaths of approximately 20,000 men, women and children, Cathar and Catholic alike, decimating the number of practising Cathars and diminishing the region's distinct culture. The conflict took on a political flavor, directed not only against the heretics, but also the nobility of Toulouse and vassals of the Crown of Aragon, and finally brought the region firmly under the control of the king of France. King Peter II of Aragon, Count of Barcelona, was directly involved in the conflict, and was killed in the course of the Battle of Muret in 1213. The conflict largely ended with the Treaty of Paris of 1229, in which the integration of the Occitan territory in the French crown was agreed upon.


title: Pope Innocent III

text: Pope Innocent III spent a majority of his tenure as Pope (1198–1216) preparing for a great crusade on the Holy Land. His first attempt was the Fourth Crusade (1202–1204) which he decreed by the papal bull "Post miserabile" in 1198. Unlike past popes, Innocent III displayed interest in leading the crusade himself, rather than simply instigating it and allowing secular leaders to organize the expedition according to their own aspirations.


title: Pope Innocent III

text: Innocent III's first order of business in preaching the crusade was to send missionaries to every Catholic state to endorse the campaign. He sent Peter of Capua to the kings of France and England with specific instructions to convince them to settle their differences, resulting in a truce of five years between the two nations, beginning in 1199. The intent of the truce was not to allow the two kings to lead the crusade, but rather to free their resources to assist the Crusade. For the army's leadership, Innocent aimed his pleas at the knights and nobles of Europe, succeeding in France, where many lords answered the pope's call, including the army's two eventual leaders, Theobald of Champagne and Boniface, marquis of Montferrat. The pope's calls to action were not received with as much enthusiasm in England or Germany, and the expedition became mainly a French affair.


title: Pope Innocent III

text: The Fourth Crusade was an expensive endeavor. Innocent III chose to raise funds with a new approach: requiring all clergy to donate one fortieth of their income. This marked the first time a pope ever imposed a direct tax on the clergy. He faced many difficulties in collecting this tax, including corrupt tax collectors and disregard in England. He also sent envoys to King John of England and King Philip of France, who pledged to contribute to the campaign, and John also declared his support for the clerical tax in his kingdom. The crusaders too contributed funds: Innocent declared that those who took the crusader's vow, but could no longer fulfill it, could be released by a contribution of funds. The pope put Archbishop Hubert Walter in charge of collecting these dues.


title: Pope Innocent III

text: At the onset of the crusade, the intended destination was Egypt, as the Christians and Muslims were under a truce at the time. An agreement was made between the French Crusaders and the Venetians. The Venetians would supply vessels and supplies for the crusaders and in return the crusaders would pay 85,000 marks (£200,000). Innocent gave his approval of this agreement under two conditions: a representative of the pope must accompany the crusade, and the attack on any other Christians was strictly forbidden. The French failed to raise sufficient funds for payment of the Venetians. As a result, the Crusaders diverted the crusade to the Christian city of Zadar at the will of the Venetians, to subsidize the debt. This diversion was adopted without the consent of Innocent III, who threatened excommunication to any who took part in the attack. A majority of the French ignored the threat and attacked Zadar, and were excommunicated by Innocent III, but soon were forgiven so as to continue the crusade. A second diversion then occurred when the crusaders decided to conquer Constantinople, the capital of the Byzantine Empire, at the behest of the exiled Byzantine prince Alexios IV. This diversion was taken without any knowledge by Innocent III, and he did not learn of it until after the city had been captured.


title: Pope Innocent III

text: Innocent III was heavily opposed to the attack on Constantinople and sent many letters warning the crusaders to not sack the city. Innocent III excommunicated the crusaders who attacked Byzantine cities, but was unable to physically halt or overturn their actions. The attack on Constantinople led to the start of the Latin Empire's rule of Constantinople, which lasted for the next sixty years.


title: Pope Innocent III

text: In 1209, Francis of Assisi led his first eleven followers to Rome to seek permission from Pope Innocent III to found a new religious order which was ultimately granted. Upon entry to Rome, the brothers encountered Bishop Guido of Assisi, who had in his company Giovanni di San Paolo, the Cardinal-Bishop of Sabina. The cardinal, who was the confessor of Pope Innocent III, was immediately sympathetic to Francis and agreed to represent Francis to the pope. Reluctantly, Pope Innocent agreed to meet with Francis and the brothers the next day. After several days, the pope agreed to admit the group informally, adding that when God increased the group in grace and number, they could return for an official admittance. The group was tonsured. This was important in part because it recognized Church authority and protected his followers from possible accusations of heresy, as had happened to the Waldensians decades earlier. Though Pope Innocent initially had his doubts, following a dream in which he saw Francis holding up the Basilica of St. John Lateran (the cathedral of Rome, thus the 'home church' of all Christendom), he decided to endorse Francis's order. This occurred, according to tradition, on 16 April 1210, and constituted the official founding of the Franciscan Order. The group, then the "Lesser Brothers" ("Order of Friars Minor" also known as the "Franciscan Order"), preached on the streets and had no possessions. They were centered in Porziuncola and preached first in Umbria, before expanding throughout Italy.


title: Pope Innocent III

text: The lesser religious orders which Pope Innocent III approved are the Hospitallers of the Holy Ghost on 23 April 1198, the Trinitarians on 17 December 1198, and the Humiliati, in June, 1201.


title: Pope Innocent III

text: On 15 November 1215, Pope Innocent III convened the Fourth Lateran Council which was considered to be the most important Church council of the Middle Ages. By its conclusion, it issued seventy reformatory decrees. Among other things, it encouraged creating schools and holding clergy to a higher standard than the laity. Canon 18 forbade clergymen to participate in the practice of the judicial ordeal, effectively banning its use.


title: Pope Innocent III

text: In order to define fundamental doctrines, the council reviewed the nature of the Holy Eucharist, the ordered annual confession of sins, and prescribed detailed procedures for the election of bishops. The council also mandated a strict lifestyle for clergy. Canon 68 states: Jews and Muslims shall wear a special dress to enable them to be distinguished from Christians so that no Christian shall come to marry them ignorant of who they are. Canon 69 forbade "that Jews be given preferment in public office since this offers them the pretext to vent their wrath against the Christians." It assumes that Jews blaspheme Christ, and therefore, as it would be "too absurd for a blasphemer of Christ to exercise power over Christians", Jews should not be appointed to public offices.


title: Pope Innocent III

text: The Council had set the beginning of the Fifth Crusade for 1217, under the direct leadership of the Church. After the Council, in the spring of 1216, Innocent moved to northern Italy in an attempt to reconcile the maritime cities of Pisa and Genoa by removing the excommunication cast over Pisa by his predecessor Celestine III and concluding a pact with Genoa.


title: Pope Innocent III

text: Innocent III, however, died suddenly at Perugia on 16 July 1216. He was buried in the cathedral of Perugia, where his body remained until Pope Leo XIII had it transferred to the Lateran in December 1891.


title: Pope Innocent III

text: Innocent is one of two popes (the other being Gregory IX) among the 23 historical figures depicted in marble relief portraits above the gallery doors of the U.S. House of Representatives in honor of their influence on the development of American law.


title: Pope Innocent III

text: His Latin works include "De miseria humanae conditionis", a tract on asceticism that Innocent III wrote before becoming pope, and "De sacro altaris mysterio", a description and exegesis of the liturgy.


title: Chris McKenna (writer)

text: Chris McKenna is an American television writer, film producer, screenwriter, and television producer. He has written for "American Dad!", "Community", and "The Mindy Project", and part of the first Marvel Cinematic Universe "Spider-Man" trilogy (2017–2021).


title: Chris McKenna (writer)

text: McKenna was an uncredited writer on the 2004 film "The Girl Next Door", having developed the screenplay with director Luke Greenfield. He was denied credit by the WGA arbitration process.


title: Chris McKenna (writer)

text: McKenna wrote some of "Community"s most critically acclaimed episodes, including "Paradigms of Human Memory", "Conspiracy Theories and Interior Design", and the Emmy- and Hugo-nominated "Remedial Chaos Theory". He also co-wrote (along with his brother Matt McKenna) one of the most acclaimed episodes of "American Dad!", "Rapture's Delight".


title: Chris McKenna (writer)

text: During his time as a writer for "American Dad", he met Erik Sommers, who would later become his writing partner. Together they have since written for "The Lego Batman Movie" (2017), co-writing "" (2017) and its sequels, "" (2019) and "" (2021), along with "" (2017) and "Ant-Man and the Wasp" (2018).


title: Chris McKenna (writer)

text: Having worked with the Russo brothers on the sitcom "Community", McKenna contributed to the script of "" (2014) by writing jokes for the film.


title: The Bonfire of the Vanities

text: The Bonfire of the Vanities is a 1987 novel by Tom Wolfe. The story is a drama about ambition, racism, social class, politics, and greed in 1980s New York City, and centers on three main characters: WASP bond trader Sherman McCoy, Jewish assistant district attorney Larry Kramer, and British expatriate journalist Peter Fallow.


title: The Bonfire of the Vanities

text: The novel was originally conceived as a serial in the style of Charles Dickens' writings: it ran in 27 installments in "Rolling Stone" starting in 1984. Wolfe heavily revised it before it was published in book form. The novel was a bestseller and a phenomenal success, even in comparison with Wolfe's other books. It has often been called the quintessential novel of the 1980s, and in 1990 was adapted into a critically maligned film of the same name by Brian De Palma.


title: The Bonfire of the Vanities

text: The title is a reference to the historical Bonfire of the Vanities, which happened in 1497 in Florence, Italy, when the city was under the sway of the Dominican priest Girolamo Savonarola, who ordered the burning of objects that church authorities considered sinful, such as cosmetics, mirrors, books, and art.


title: The Bonfire of the Vanities

text: Beneath Wall Street's success, the city was a hotbed of racial and cultural tension. The city was polarized by several high-profile incidents of racism, particularly the murders—in white neighborhoods—of two black men: Willie Turks, who was murdered in the Gravesend section of Brooklyn in 1982, and Michael Griffith who was killed in Howard Beach, Queens, in 1986. In another episode that received much attention from the news media, Bernhard Goetz became something of a folk-hero in the city for shooting a group of young black men who tried to rob him in the subway in 1984.


title: The Bonfire of the Vanities

text: Burton B. Roberts, a Bronx judge known for his no-nonsense, imperious handling of cases in his courtroom, was the model for the character of Myron Kovitsky in the book.


title: The Bonfire of the Vanities

text: Wolfe began researching the novel by observing cases at the Manhattan Criminal Court and shadowing members of the Bronx homicide squad. To overcome a case of writer's block, Wolfe wrote to Jann Wenner, editor of "Rolling Stone", to propose an idea drawn from Charles Dickens and Thackeray. These Victorian writers, whom Wolfe viewed as his models, had often written their novels in serial installments. Wenner offered Wolfe around $200,000 to serialize his work. The deadline pressure gave him the motivation he had hoped for, and from July 1984 to August 1985 each biweekly issue of "Rolling Stone" contained a new installment. Wolfe was not happy with his "very public first draft," and thoroughly revised his work. Even Sherman McCoy, the central character of the novel, changed—originally a writer, in the book version he is cast as a bond salesman. (Wolfe came up with the revised occupation after spending a day on the government-bond desk of Salomon Brothers, with many of the traders who later founded the notorious hedge fund Long-Term Capital Management.) Wolfe researched and revised for two years. "The Bonfire of the Vanities" appeared in 1987. The book was a commercial and critical success, spending weeks on bestseller lists and earning praise from much of the literary establishment on which Wolfe had long heaped scorn.


title: The Bonfire of the Vanities

text: The story centers on Sherman McCoy, a successful New York City bond trader. His $3 million Park Avenue co-op apartment, combined with his wife's extravagances and other expenses required to keep up appearances are depleting his great income, or as McCoy calls it, a "hemorrhaging of money." McCoy's secure life as a self-regarded "Master of The Universe" on Wall Street is gradually destroyed when he and his mistress, Maria Ruskin, accidentally enter the Bronx at night while they are driving back to Manhattan from Kennedy Airport. Finding the ramp back to the highway blocked by trash cans and a tire, McCoy exits the car to clear the way. Approached by two black men whom they perceive—uncertainly, in McCoy's case—as predators, McCoy and Ruskin flee. After Ruskin takes the wheel of the car to race away, it fishtails, apparently striking one of the two would-be assailants—a "skinny boy."


title: The Bonfire of the Vanities

text: Peter Fallow, a has-been, alcoholic journalist for the tabloid "City Light", is soon given the opportunity of a lifetime when he is persuaded to write a series of articles about Henry Lamb, a black youth who has said he been the victim of a hit and run by a wealthy white driver. Fallow cynically tolerates the manipulations of Reverend Bacon, a Harlem religious and political leader who sees the hospitalized youth as a projects success story gone wrong. Fallow's articles on the matter ignite a series of protests and media coverage of the Lamb case.


title: The Bonfire of the Vanities

text: Up for re-election and accused of foot-dragging in the Lamb case, the media-obsessed Bronx County District Attorney Abe Weiss pushes for McCoy's arrest. The evidence includes McCoy's car (which matches the description of the vehicle involved in the alleged hit and run), plus McCoy's evasive response to police questioning. The arrest all but ruins McCoy; distraction at work causes him to flub on finding an investor for a $600 million bond on which he had pegged all his hopes of paying the loan on his home and covering his family costs. While McCoy is getting a dressing down from his boss for failing to sell the bond, his lawyer, Tommy Killian, calls to tell him of his upcoming arrest, forcing him to admit his legal problems to his boss, who forces him to take a leave of absence as a result. McCoy's upper class friends ostracize him, and his wife leaves him and takes their daughter Campbell (McCoy's only source of genuine family love) to live with his parents.


title: The Bonfire of the Vanities

text: Hoping to impress his boss as well as an attractive former juror, Shelly Thomas, Assistant District Attorney Larry Kramer aggressively prosecutes the case, opening with an unsuccessful bid to set McCoy's bail at $250,000. Released on $10,000 bail, McCoy is besieged by demonstrators who are protesting outside his home.