From the reception of the embassy of Chevalier de Chaumont, envoy of Louis XIV, on October 18, 1685, in Ayutthaya, then capital of Siam, by King Narai, to the visit of the French president to Bangkok on November 17 and 18, 2022, the author notably depicts the relations between Siam, whose views on neighboring Laos and Cambodia were difficult to reconcile with its troublesome neighbor, the colonial empire of Indochina, protector of these countries. These relations would foreshadow the continuation of a long and friendly partnership throughout the last 120 years.

After studying literature and linguistics, enriched by a diploma in Vietnamese at the "langues O", Jean Michel Kauffmann began a long career with the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs, which took him to Vietnam, Nigeria, Haiti and Ghana. He went on to manage several Alliances Françaises, including the one in Islamabad, Pakistan. His two passions, education and Asia, took him to Thailand, where he taught French and history-geography until his current thebaid. His free time was divided between the study of the kingdom's culture and history. Nothing could have seduced him more, and he modestly wrote a historical column for a local French-language monthly magazine. His enthusiasm then led him to cover and relate, from an original point of view, the entire history of this marvellous country which was once called Siam and which today, under the name of Thailand, still fascinates by its irreducible identity.