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Thai silk is produced from the cocoons of Thai silkworms. Thai weavers, mainly from the Khorat Plateau in the northeast region of Thailand, raise the caterpillars on a steady diet of mulberry leaves. Khorat is the center of the silk industry in Thailand and a steady supplier of rose Thai silk for many generations.〔(About Thai silk )〕 Today, Thai silk is famous for its special qualities produced through unparalleled manufacturing processes, bearing unique patterns and colors. ==Origin== After silk originated in ancient China and India where the practice of weaving silk began around 2,640 BCE, Chinese merchants spread the use of silk to different regions throughout Asia through trade. Some accounts indicate that archaeologists found the first fibers of silk in Thailand to be over 3,000 years old in the ruins of Baan Chiang, the site is considered by many to be Southeast Asia's oldest civilization.〔(Who discovered silk ) from World of Thai Silk (commercial)〕 However, the silk produced on the Khorat plateau was generally only used for private consumption, with the Thai court preferring to purchase Chinese silk imports. There was an attempt in the early twentieth century to develop the industry, with the help of a Japanese sericulture expert, Kametaro Toyama. But these attempts failed due to a lack of interest locally to produce for a larger market.〔Ian Brown, ‘Government Initiative and Peasant Response in the Siamese Silk Industry, 1901 - 1913’, Journal of the Siam Society, Vol. 68, Part 2, July 1980, 34〕 However, after World War II, an American OSS officer called Jim Thompson decided that silk would be popular back at home in America and through his connections in New York began marketing the product as a traditional Siamese material. In fact, the material he created had little relationship to what had previously been produced in the country. But through clever branding and by developing a range of 'Thai' patterns, he managed to establish Thai Silk as a recognizable brand.〔Joshua Kurlantzick, The Ideal Man: The tragedy of Jim Thompson and the American Way of War (Wiley, 2011)〕 Writing in the Bangkok Post in 1949, Alexander MacDonald described that 'out of a number of scattered remains of history, from cultures borrowed from Siam's neighbors, and from colonies of fat and lazy Siamese silk worms, Jim Thompson is trying to build a modest business.'〔The Postman Says, Bangkok Post, January 13 1949〕 Throughout the 1950s Thais remained little interested in Thai Silk, considering it generally suitable only for fancy dress. Rather, it was American tourists that sustained the local development of a silk industry in Thailand. In 1951, the King and I opened on broadway, featuring a depiction of the Thai court in the mid-19th century in which the costumes were all made using Thai silk. Created by Irene Sharaff, the production served to promote the material to the American audience, and fuelled interest in the country. 〔() Christine Klein, Cold War Orientalism: Asia in the Middlebrow Imagination, California: University of California Press, 2003〕 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Thai silk」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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