Sampot

Sampot (Khmer: សំពត់, romanized: saṃba't) is a modern Khmer term^[4] that refers to "cloth",^[5][6][4] "woman's skirt",^[5] and "a piece of cloth used as a lower garment, specifically the Khmer sarong."^[6][4] It is derived from several terms, including "saṃbata, sambata, saṃbūta, saṃmbuta, sambattha, and sabvata,"^[6] which can be found in groups of the Inscription Modern Angkor Wat (IMA) from the 16th and 17th centuries CE, during the middle Khmer period.^[6] The root of the word sampot is ba't^[6] and ba'ta,^[4] which mean "to encircle, surround."^[6][4] The terms *sbat^[6] and 'sba'ta^[4] are derived from this root and mean "to gird, wrap, or envelop (the body)."^[4]

Indian scholar Ramanlal Nagarji Mehta suggests that the Khmer word sampat-hol for textiles may date back to the Sanskrit word sam-patola^[7] (Sanskrit: सम्-पटोल), meaning "like a Patola."^[7] It is highly likely that the fabric and technique were brought by Hindu immigrants in the 3rd or 4th centuries CE, if the Khmer word is derived from Sanskrit.^[7]

The term "Sampot" also entered the Thai court as sompak^[8] (Thai: สมปัก) and song pak.^[9] (Thai: สองปัก) According to historical records, "An official letter from the Dutch East India Company (VOC) in Ayutthaya to an official in Surat", dated 2 December 1662,^[10] during the 16th and 17th centuries of the Ayutthaya period, the Siam court ordered textiles from India and Cambodia known as "pha poom, sompak poom (pha sompak puum), and sompak lai."^[11][8] These textiles were later narrowed down by the Siamese court as the traditional attire worn by Siamese nobles that was bestowed upon Siamese nobles by the King of Siam.^[8]

The sampot dates back to the Funan era when a Cambodian king ordered the people of his kingdom to wear the sampot at the request of Chinese envoys.^[12] It is similar to the lungi and dhoti worn in the Indian subcontinent.^[13] Inscriptions, bas-reliefs, and Zhou Daguan's report have shown that backstrap looms were used to weave since ancient times.^[14] The ancient bas-reliefs however provide a complete look at what fabrics were like, down to patterns and pleats. Silk woven sampots are used in weddings and funerals.^[15]

Male and female deities in the pre-Angkor era are depicted in short and longer free-hanging "skirt cloth" sampots, respectively, that are knotted at the waist.^[16] “Skirt cloth” (or free hanging, non-chong kben style) sampots are depicted in bas-reliefs and sculpture only on women starting at about the 900s. With it emerged styles retained by Cambodians to this day: the first entails pleating edge panels of the sampot into a bundle that hangs forward then is fastened with a belt. The second style is simple: the sampot is wrapped around and casually tucked into the waist. Then, into the late 12th-early 13th century, we see the sampot’s central field pattern pushed back into a fold on itself and secured with a belt. The contrast this method creates between the central field and the patterned end panels displays the intricately patterned sampot very well.^[17]

Two even more intricate styles during this time include first the refined sampot fashion of the apsaras seen on Angkor Wat. Pieces of fabric sweep out from the waist of the sampot, from a chong kben undergarment, permitting the panels to cascade elegantly over and down the sampot skirt cloth. The central field of both pieces of fabric bear floral patterns and “weft-oriented bands” on the end sections.^[18] The elaborate sampot counterpart for male depictions is a chong kben richly adorned with added lengths of fabric. A pendant sash, or pamn muk, hangs front and center. During the pre-Angkor era, unadorned or plain “warp-striped” pieces of fabric were used. By the Baphuon period in the 11th century, pleated cloth was popular. ^[19] “Random or ordered” floral patterns for the sampot’s central field became fashionable by the 12th and 13th century.^[20]

Silk weaving was an important part of Cambodia's cultural past. People from Takéo Province have woven silk since the Funan era. Complex methods and intricate patterns have been developed to make the cloth, one of which is the hol method which involves the uneven twill technique. The reason they adopted such an unusual method remains unclear.^[21][22]

In 1858–1860, Henri Mouhot, a French naturalist and explorer, embarked on a journey to mainland Southeast Asia (Indochinese Peninsula) where he had the opportunity to meet the king of the Khmer court. In his diary, Travels in the Central Parts of Indo-China (Siam), Cambodia, and Laos, during the years 1858, 1859, and 1860, Mouhot described the attire of the Cambodian king during his encounter:

Like his subjects, he generally wears nothing but the langouti, the native dress. His was composed of yellow silk, confined at the waist by a magnificent belt of gold studded with precious stones.^[23]

In George Groslier's Recherches sur les Cambodgiens (1921), a French director of Cambodia Arts during the French protectorate of Cambodia, observed the sampot:

The word sampot must be a very old word, as old as the garment because it means: "cloth" and not a special part of the Khmer costume. Originally, it was a fabric tunic like this horizontal strip of cloth in Chinese texts, and therefore a garment tunic. From cotton, it became silk, and was decorated with polychrome designs as we studied at the beginning of this chapter. At first glance, it is nothing other than the widened belt and is draped much like it. Until the 12th century it seems narrower than the current sampot and is only worn by men and certain sacred dancers (?). Women wear a sarong and we know that the fashion for the sampot common to both sexes is modern and probably a Siamese innovation.^{[24][note 1]}

In 1936, Harriet Winifred Ponder, a British traveller who journeyed through Southeast Asia and the South Pacific, documented her experiences in Cambodia. In her writings, Cambodian Glory, she described the traditional Cambodian attire:

The true national dress of Cambodia was the 'langouti', a sort of skirt, like the Javanese sarong, worn by both men and women. The 'sampot', a similar garment, but with one end pulled through between the legs to give the effect of a baggy pair of knickers, is a fashion imported from Siam.^[26]

In Angkor Empire (1955) by George Benjamin Walker, recorded the origin of the modern sampot, which was compiled from these historian authorities: R. C. Majumdar, Reginald Le May, Kalidas Nag, Horace Geoffrey Quaritch Wales, George Charles Brodrick, Lawrence Palmer Briggs, Cedric Dover, and French scholars of the French School of the Far East:

Her dress is the sampot. Authorities say it is from Siam. Why, no one can guess. Authorities tell us all sorts of curious things on the strength of their knowledge of the ancient texts and the historians' histories. It requires no knowledge of mediaeval Siamese history to see plentiful evidence of the sampot in the bas-reliefs, which preceded Siamese influences by centuries. The sampot is like the Indian lungi or the Malayan sarong; a length of cloth, often gaily coloured, tied around the waist and hanging down like a skirt. Sometimes it is caught up between the legs and fixed behind like a dhoti, in the fashion of the women of Maharashtra.^[27]

In her 2003 book Traditional Textiles of Cambodia, art historian Gillian Green relays that in 1856, Siamese King Mongkut gifted US President Franklin Pierce three woven pairs of silk sampot chong kben in hol pattern, in addition to “a similarly-patterned silk shoulder cloth.” She notes the “sophistication” of hol and its uneven twill, pointing out its not only specific to Khmers, which “strongly asserts the origin of the weavers," but has continued among Khmer weavers into present day Cambodia.^[28]

In the run-up to the 1993 Cambodian general election, Khmer leader Son Sann in a heated debate called for a sampot test to be used to establish whether or not women could vote or not in the election; walking a few yards in a tight sampot would be a sign of true Khmer identity, in contrast with the Vietnamese women who would usually wear pants under the áo dài.^[29]

Chong kiet refers to the Khmer ikat technique. For patterns, weavers first tie-dye portions of weft yarn before weaving.^[30]

Hol is a textile that utilizes uneven twill ground weave, yielding single or two-color fabrics produced by weaving three threads. The result is that the "color of one thread dominates on one side of the fabric, while the two others determine the color on the reverse side."^[31] From this comes sampot hol and hol pidan (temple hanging).^[32] Khmer people living in the eastern part of present-day Thailand also utilize this uneven twill, unlike the Thais who weave hol in plain weave, demonstrating a practice learned long before modern borders.^[33] Traditionally, five colors are used, predominantly red, yellow, green, blue and black.^{[citation needed]}

Phamuong សំពត់ផាមួង /pʰaa muəŋ/ ^[34] are single colored and twill woven.^{[citation needed]} There are currently 52 colors used in phamuong.^{[citation needed]} The phamuong chorabap is a luxurious fabric using up to 22 needles to create.^{[citation needed]} Phamuong variation are rabak, chorcung, anlounh, kaneiv and bantok.^{[citation needed]} It usually uses floral and geometric motifs. The most valued silk used to create the phamuong is Cambodian yellow silk, known for its fine quality in the region.^{[citation needed]} New designs draw inspiration from ancient patterns on old silk.^{[citation needed]}

There are many variations of the sampot; each is worn according to class. The typical regular sampot, known also as the sarong is typically worn by men and women of lower class. It measures approximately one and a half meters and both ends are sewn together. It is tied to secure it on the waist.^{[citation needed]}

• Sampot anlonh (Khmer: សំពត់អន្លូញ) refers to silk skirt cloth with a chequerboard design formed from two-colored weft and warp stripes over an undecorated groundweave. It is commonly worn by women in the countryside.^[35] The sampot anlonh is similar to the Burmese longyi.

• Sampot bot, which translates more or less to "folded skirt," refers to a sampot skirt form secured via a long, flat fold along the side. This method is said to have emerged in response to western influence.^[36][37]

• Sompot chong kben (Khmer: សំពត់ចងក្បិន) dates back to ancient Cambodia, when deities were said to wear it. Scholars consider it ultimately to derive from the Indian Dhoti.^[38] It is worn by wrapping it around the waist, stretching it away from the body and twisting the knot. The knot is then pulled between the legs and held by a belt.^[39]

• Sampot chang samluy (Khmer: សំពត់ចងសម្លុយ) is a long unisex daytime skirt. The word samloy initially referred to colour, which in ancient times was always black; now it is sometimes used for a thin, soft fabric with decoration and pattern similar to the sarong batik, although the garment may be smaller. This style of dress needs a knot to secure it, making it similar to the sampot chang kben. However, it also needs a fold at the left or right side, like a sarong. Another similar sampot, primarily worn by women and known as the samloy, was knotted in the middle and hitched at the knee to facilitate leg movement. Scholars consider this style of dress to derive from the Indian lungi.^{[citation needed]} The samloy was commonly worn in the post-Angkor era.^{[citation needed]}

• Sampot charobab, also spelled sarobab, or just sampot robab (Khmer: សំពត់ចរបាប់), is a long, brocaded silk skirt with metallic silver and gold thread. It is worn by ballerinas in Khmer classical dance, by royalty, and also for weddings or other formal events.^[40][41] It is usually draped in the fashion of sampot sarobap ka'at kbal neak, or "sampot folded like the head of a naga".^[42]
• Sampot rbauk (Khmer: សំពត់ល្បើក) is a long, silk, damask-pattern skirt. Patterns are described in animal and plant terms, and often worn for formal events.^[43][44]

• Sampot soeng (Khmer: សំពត់ស៊ឹង) is a monochromatic skirt with a band along the lower hem embroidered in gold or silver. Popular tradition in Laos, Cambodians embraced sampot soeng in the 1980s because it was affordable after emerging from war and then began weaving their own.^[45]

• Sampot tep apsara (Khmer: សំពត់ទេពអប្សរា) is a type of sampot from the Khmer Empire era associated with courtly apsaras. Its depiction can still be seen on the bas-reliefs of Angkor Wat.^[46] Generally, the sampot tep apsara is both knotted at the waist and secured with a belt. Long pleats are gathered at the front, running the full length to the wearer's ankles. The sampot tep apsara is actually knotted twice at the waist, one on the left and one on the right; the left knot is longer, while the right knot is more decorative. Scholars trace this garment to the sari of India.^{[citation needed]} Today, the sampot tep apsara is worn by traditional dancers in modern Cambodia.

The sampot is deeply rooted in Cambodian culture. Despite the French bringing a degree of westernisation to the country, Cambodians continued to wear the sampot. Royalty and government officials wore the sampot chang kben with a formal jacket. Cambodians still wear the sompot chong kben and sompot phamuong on special occasions today, and rural and poor Khmers still prefer them to western-style clothing for their comfort.^[47]

The material used by poor and rural Cambodians is not hand-woven silk but printed batik-patterned cloth imported from Indonesia. It is still popular with both men and women alike and is regarded by the people of Cambodia as their national garment.^{[48][AI-retrieved source]}

• Áo tứ thân
• Longyi
• Lungi
• Malong
• Patadyong
• Sarong
• Sinh
• Cambodian clothing
• Culture of Cambodia
• Sompot Samloy

• Gillian Green (2003). Traditional textiles of Cambodia. Bangkok: River Books. ISBN 974-8225-39-9.