Vocabulary · คำศัพท์ the three axes every record hangs on, from the wichaa vault
Class · หมวด — is anyone home?
| พระเครื่อง phra khrueang · Buddhist amulet | A votive Buddha image or famous-monk amulet. Power = the barami of the maker plus the consecration (ปลุกเสก). No occupant. Its provenance question is purely one of authenticity and market value, never of spiritual safety. resident none · upkeep none · provenance low |
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| วัตถุมงคล (ยันต์) wattu mongkhon · blessed/inscribed object | Takrut, yantra cloth, blessed medallions — power in the inscription and the rite. Impersonal. resident none · upkeep none · provenance low |
| เครื่องรางธรรมชาติ khrueang rang thammachat · natural talisman | Power inherent in a rare natural object rather than conferred by rite: เหล็กไหล (leklai, a living metal), กะลาตาเดียว (a one-eyed coconut), certain woods, stones and animal parts. Impersonal but NOT consecration-based — a third thing, neither Buddha-amulet nor spirit-vessel. resident none · upkeep none · provenance low |
| เทพ / เทวดา thep / thewada · deva-tier resident | A celestial or Hindu-derived being is venerated through the object — Thao Wessuwan, Garuda (พญาครุฑ), Rahu, arguably Nang Kwak. Receives offerings and respect but is not a raised ghost; the relationship is closer to worship than to parenting. The "cleanest" spirit-bearing tier. resident deva · upkeep veneration · provenance medium |
| กุมารทอง kuman thong · raised child-spirit | A child-spirit bound to an effigy and RAISED — fed sweet red drink, rice and toys, named, spoken to, asked for help as a member of the household. A reciprocal, parental bond. Neglect is the failure mode: a hungry, ignored kuman turns mischievous or leaves. Not "dark" in itself, but a bound spirit of the dead, and its history — who raised it, what it was taught — travels with it. resident raised_spirit · upkeep feeding · provenance high |
| พราย prai · necromantic ghost-object | Houses or is rendered from the ghost of a violent or untimely death, classically a woman dead in childbirth (แม่นางพราย) — น้ำมันพราย (prai oil), นางพราย, some ลูกกรอก. The most powerful and most hazardous tier: hungry, coercive, and requiring both feeding AND correct closing when set down. THE class the tradition cautions hardest against acquiring without full history, and the one to keep out of the hands of a buyer who does not know how to keep it. resident ghost · upkeep feeding_and_closing · provenance high |
| หุ่นพยนต์ hun phayon · animated effigy / servant-golem | An effigy — figure, cloth, or metal — ANIMATED by yantra and spell to act as a servant or guardian. The occupant is a compelled animation rather than a named ghost or venerated deva, which is what makes it its own class. Ms 6983 gives the recipe outright: ตำราสร้างหุ่นพยนต์ แบบที่ ๑ / ๒, beside the ritual knife (มีดหมอ) used to make it. The courtroom Hanuman — held in the mouth, given commands — is one of these. resident animated · upkeep veneration · provenance medium |
Material · เนื้อ — the first thing a sian names
| เนื้อผง nuea phong · sacred-powder paste | Consecrated powder bound with a binder (traditionally banana sap, lime, oil) and pressed. The material of the พระสมเด็จ and of most temple issues since. Because the recipe is reproducible and the mould is copyable, this is the most heavily reproduced material in the trade — which is precisely why the reference literature on it is the deepest. family phong · dating signal surface_crust · counterfeit pressure high |
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| ผงพุทธคุณ phong phuttakhun · powder of the Buddha's qualities | Powder produced by writing and erasing sacred formulae on a slate, the chalk dust collected and re-written many times. The named powders — ปถมัง, อิทธิเจ, ตรีนิสิงเห, มหาราช, พุทธคุณ — are distinguished by which formula was written. A listing that says only "ผงพุทธคุณ" is naming a family, not a recipe. family phong · dating signal surface_crust · counterfeit pressure high |
| ผงใบลาน phong bai lan · burnt palm-leaf manuscript ash | Paste incorporating the ash of burnt palm-leaf manuscripts — scripture that has been consumed and re-embodied as an object of veneration. This is the seam between the two corpora made literal: the same ใบลาน this archive catalogues as text appears in the market as material. Where a listing names a specific manuscript or temple source, that is a provenance claim worth recording separately. family phong · dating signal surface_crust · counterfeit pressure medium |
| เนื้อดิน nuea din · clay body | Clay pressed in a mould and fired. The body of พระรอด, พระนางพญา and พระผงสุพรรณ — the last of which is named ผง but is fired earth, a naming trap worth knowing. Fire colour ranges widely within a single kiln load, so colour alone settles nothing. family din · dating signal shrinkage · counterfeit pressure high |
| เนื้อชิน nuea chin · tin-lead alloy | A tin-lead alloy cast or pressed into votive tablets, characteristic of pieces recovered from กรุ (stupa deposits). Conventionally divided by patina into ชินเงิน (silvery), ชินตะกั่ว (lead-heavy) and ชินสนิมแดง (red-rust). family chin · dating signal patina · counterfeit pressure high |
| สนิมแดง sanim daeng · red rust patina | The red lead-oxide crust that forms on ชิน over long burial. Named as a material in the market but functioning as an age claim — which is why it is both prized and reproduced. Recorded here as a surface state, not as a verdict on age. family chin · dating signal patina · counterfeit pressure high |
| ตะกั่ว takua · lead | Lead, used both as an alloy component in ชิน and on its own — most visibly as the sheet rolled into ตะกรุด. Soft enough to take an inscription with a stylus, which is the whole reason it is used for rolled amulets. family chin · dating signal patina · counterfeit pressure medium |
| นวโลหะ nawaloha · nine-metal alloy | An alloy of nine metals cast to a prescribed recipe, each metal contributed for its own quality. Highly regarded, and the claim cannot be read off the finished object — which makes the record of the casting (which foundry, which ceremony, which year) the actual asset. A register entry is worth more here than a photograph. family loha · dating signal patina · counterfeit pressure high |
| เนื้อโลหะ nuea loha · metal (unspecified) | Metal, unspecified. Common in listings precisely because it commits to nothing. Recorded as its own term rather than resolved, because the vagueness is itself the datum — a seller who can name the alloy usually does. family loha · dating signal patina · counterfeit pressure medium |
| สัมฤทธิ์ samrit · bronze | Bronze. The body of most พระบูชา (altar images) as distinct from the small worn amulet. Spelled both สัมฤทธิ์ and สำริด in the market. family loha · dating signal patina · counterfeit pressure medium |
| ทองเหลือง thonglueang · brass | Brass. The most-named metal in the corpus by a wide margin — the everyday material of altar goods, pendant frames and mass issues. High occurrence here reflects volume at the low end of the market, not regard. family loha · dating signal patina · counterfeit pressure low |
| ทองแดง thongdaeng · copper | Copper. Common as the base metal of struck เหรียญ (medal-form amulets), where the issue is often distinguished by which metals the same die was struck in. family loha · dating signal patina · counterfeit pressure low |
| เนื้อเงิน nuea ngoen · silver | Silver. Usually the middle tier of a struck issue — a รุ่น commonly runs ทองแดง, เงิน, ทองคำ from the same die, in descending quantity and ascending regard. family loha · dating signal patina · counterfeit pressure medium |
| เนื้อทองคำ nuea thongkham · gold | Gold. Thin in this corpus — 93 of 13,020 listings, and most of those name it for a frame or a plating rather than for the body of the piece. Gold issues are not rare in the tradition; they do not circulate on an open retail platform. That thinness measures what this corpus can and cannot see, and is among the clearest arguments for seeding the register from competition and association records rather than from listings. **Correction of record:** an earlier draft put this at 1 occurrence, having searched only the compound เนื้อทองคำ. The bare term is the one the market uses. family loha · dating signal none · counterfeit pressure high |
| เนื้อนาค nuea naak · copper-gold alloy (rose gold) | A copper-and-gold alloy of reddish cast, ranked in the treatises alongside gold and silver as one of the sheets a yantra may be inscribed on — the corpus phrase is แผ่นทอง แผ่นเงิน แผ่นนาค. Added to this axis *because of* that passage, not from the market: the compound forms return zero listings, so this is a material the treatises name and the retail corpus does not carry. **Carried only in unambiguous compounds.** Bare นาค returns 553 pages and 132 listings, but nearly all of those are the naga serpent — a being, not an alloy — which belongs to the class and motif axes. Scanning the bare term here would import a bestiary into a materials list. family loha · dating signal patina · counterfeit pressure medium |
| เมฆพัด mekphat · alchemical dark alloy | A dark, near-black alloy produced by a repeated smelting-and-quenching process treated as an alchemical operation rather than a metallurgical one. One occurrence in the corpus. Kept at low confidence and low count because the tradition names it clearly even where the market does not carry it — the same reason ถ้อยความ is kept on the function axis. family loha · dating signal patina · counterfeit pressure high |
| เนื้อว่าน nuea waan · sacred-herb paste | Paste of ว่าน — the sacred tubers and herbs gathered under prescribed conditions. Northern practice is particularly rich here. Ages by drying and shrinking rather than by patina. The manuscripts carry ว่าน heavily — คาถาเสกว่าน, formulae for consecrating the herb — so this term joins the two corpora directly, once the กว่าน collision is excluded. family organic · dating signal shrinkage · counterfeit pressure medium |
| กะลา kala · coconut shell | Coconut shell, most often the single-eyed shell (กะลาตาเดียว) carved and inscribed. High occurrence in the corpus. Note that many กะลา hits are the carved ปลัดขิก form — cross-check the class axis, which deliberately leaves ปลัดขิก unassigned. family organic · dating signal wear · counterfeit pressure low |
| งาช้าง nga chang · elephant ivory | Elephant ivory. Recorded because the tradition uses it and the corpus contains it. **Legal caution, not a value judgement:** ivory is regulated in Thailand under the Elephant Ivory Act B.E. 2558 and internationally under CITES. Any register entry naming this material should carry that notice, and the register should never facilitate its movement across a border. family organic · dating signal wear · counterfeit pressure medium |
| เขาสัตว์ khao sat · horn | Horn, most often buffalo — เขาควาย, and in the strongest form เขาควายเผือก (albino buffalo horn), gathered under conditions that are themselves part of the claim. family organic · dating signal wear · counterfeit pressure low |
| เกศา kesa · hair of the master | Hair of a named monk, incorporated into a paste or sealed into the piece. The material is unremarkable; the attribution is everything. Unverifiable from the object, which makes the temple's own issue record the only thing that could ever support it — exactly the record a register should hold. family relic · dating signal none · counterfeit pressure high |
| จีวร chiwon · robe cloth | A fragment of a monk's robe, set into or behind the piece. As with เกศา, the claim rests entirely on the issue record. family relic · dating signal none · counterfeit pressure high |
| ผ้ายันต์ pha yan · inscribed cloth | Cloth bearing a drawn or stamped yantra. Strictly a form rather than a material, kept on this axis because the market names it in the material slot and a reader looking for "what is it made of" will look here. Cross-reference the motif axis for the yantra itself. family relic · dating signal wear · counterfeit pressure medium |
Function · คุณ — what it is for
| คงกระพัน khong kraphan · invulnerability to blades | The body cannot be cut or pierced. Classically paired with ชาตรี in the martial compound คงกระพันชาตรี. Says nothing about firearms — that is มหาอุด. |
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| มหาอุด maha ut · stopping projectiles / misfire | Literally "greatly stopped-up". The gun jams, misfires, or the shot does not penetrate. The efficacy is located in the weapon, not the body. |
| แคล้วคลาด khlaeo khlat · evasion, narrow escape | Harm passes by — the accident happens to the next vehicle, the bullet goes wide, you left the building early. Distinct in kind from คงกระพัน: nothing strikes you at all, so nothing needs to be resisted. |
| เมตตามหานิยม metta maha niyom · loving-kindness and wide popularity | Broad social favour — people are well-disposed, superiors are lenient, customers return. Built on เมตตา, the Buddhist virtue, and respectable to carry and to sell. |
| มหาเสน่ห์ maha saneh · powerful attraction, allure | Personal and frequently erotic attraction, directed at a particular person rather than at a room. Overlaps the love-wax (สีผึ้ง) and น้ำมันพราย material tradition. |
| มหาละลวย maha laluai · infatuation, bewitchment | Stronger and more compelling than มหาเสน่ห์; the target is besotted. |
| โชคลาภ chok lap · luck and windfall | Fortune arriving from outside — lottery, gifts, unexpected gain. โชค is the luck, ลาภ the thing that turns up because of it. |
| ค้าขาย kha khai · trade, selling | Specifically commercial: custom comes to the shop, goods move. Distinguished from โชคลาภ because the gain is worked for rather than fallen into. |
| ถ้อยความ thoi khwam · legal dispute — made to retreat | The suit itself: literally the words of a dispute, the testimony. As a function it is always phrased as the dispute RETREATING — สรรพถ้อยความทั้งปวงก็ถอยไป, "all disputes whatsoever withdraw" — not as the bearer winning one. Ms 6983 places it, without comment, between going into battle and prize-fighting: a contest entered by someone who expects to be outmatched. The mechanism is not persuasion but silencing — the katha shuts the mouth, ears and eyes of the other side (ปิดปาก ปิดหู ปิดตา), after which "they cannot speak against you, and both plaintiff and judge greatly fear your power." |
| กำบัง kambang · concealment, going unseen | Not being perceived — passed over rather than literally transparent. In ms 6983 the same Hanuman, steeped in scented oil, makes a household unable to see, hear or speak to the bearer. |
| ล่องหน long hon · invisibility | Vanishing outright, as opposed to merely being overlooked. |
| สะกด sakot · subduing, binding, putting to sleep | Compelling another to stillness or sleep — the household that cannot wake, the pursuer who cannot follow. Applied to people and to animals. |
| จังงัง chang-ngang · stupefaction, being frozen | The target is rooted, dumbstruck, unable to act. |
| กันผี kan phi · warding spirits | Against ผี specifically — the dead, the hungry, the malicious — not against human violence. A different threat model from คงกระพัน entirely. |
| คุ้มครอง khum khrong · general protection, watching over | Unspecified guardianship. **A holding pen, not a category** — when a source says only คุ้มครอง it usually has not said which of the specific functions above it means. Treat its presence as a gap to close, not an answer. |
Regions · ถิ่น (open list)
- ภาคกลาง · Central Thailand (Bangkok, Ayutthaya basin) (th-central)
- ล้านนา · ภาคเหนือ · Lanna / Northern Thailand (th-north)
- ภาคใต้ · Southern Thailand (th-south)
- อีสาน · Northeastern Thailand (th-isan)
- ภาคตะวันออก · Eastern Thailand (th-east)
- ทั่วประเทศไทย · Thailand, not regionally specific (th)
- กัมพูชา · เขมร · Cambodia / Khmer tradition (kh)
- ลาว · Laos (la)
- พม่า · เมียนมา · Myanmar (mm)
- มาเลเซีย · Malaysia (my)
- สิงคโปร์ · Singapore (sg)
- อินโดนีเซีย · Indonesia (id)
- เวียดนาม · Vietnam (vn)
- ยูนนาน · สิบสองปันนา · Yunnan / Sipsongpanna (Tai Lue) (cn-yunnan)
- ไทใหญ่ · รัฐฉาน · Shan State (Tai Yai) (shan)
- ชุมชนไทยโพ้นทะเล · Overseas Thai / Chinese-Thai collector communities (diaspora)