Lan Xang
Origins

The geography Lan Xang would occupy had been originally settled by indigenous Austroasiatic-speaking tribes, such as Khmuic peoples and Vietic peoples which gave rise to the Bronze Age cultures in Ban Chiang (today part of Isan, Thailand) and the Đông Sơn culture as well as Iron Age peoples near Xiangkhoang Plateau on the Plain of Jars, Funan, and Chenla (near Vat Phou in Champasak Province).

The Han dynasty 's chronicles of the southward expansion of the Han dynasty provide the first written accounts of Tai–Kadai speaking peoples or Ai Lao who inhabited the areas of modern Yunnan and Guangxi, China. The Tai peoples migrated south in a series of waves beginning in the 7th century and accelerated following the Mongol conquest of Yunnan (1253–1256) into the northern reaches of what would become the kingdom of Lan Xang.

The fertile northern Mekong valleys were occupied by the Dvaravati culture of the Mon people and subsequently by the Khmer, where the principal city-state in the north was known then as Muang Sua and alternately as Xieng Dong Xieng Thong "The City of Flame Trees beside the River Dong", (modern city of Luang Prabang).

With the rise of the Sukhothai Kingdom the principal city-states of Muang Sua (Luang Prabang) and south to the twin cities of Vieng Chan Vieng Kham (Vientiane), came increasingly under Tai influence. Following the death of the Sukhothai king Ram Khamhaeng, and internal disputes within the kingdom of Lan Na, both Vieng Chan Vieng Kham (Vientiane) and Muang Sua (Luang Prabang) were independent Lao-Tai mandalas until the founding of Lan Xang in 1353.
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