Khun Borom

Khun Borom is the primal ancestral lord of the Tai origin narrative, sent down from heaven by Then to govern mankind. After the flood, humanity is reborn at Mường Then—Muang Thaeng, the plain of Điện Biên in the Black Tai heartland—where a great gourd (nam tao) is pierced and the ancestors of the Tai, Lao and neighboring peoples issue forth; Khun Borom's sons then disperse to found the several Tai lordships. The tradition is shared across the Tai world and appears in Buddhist Lao form as the Nithan Khun Borom; sources differ on the extent to which the Black Tai telling is independent of, or colored by, that Lao chronicle, but the gourd's placement at Mường Then anchors the myth firmly in Tai Dam territory.

Parentage

• paternal: Then Luông

Domains

• ancestry origins
• kingship

Powers

• fathers the Tai peoples from the gourd
• sends his sons out to found the mương

Epithets

• Pú Khun — the ancestral lordJames R. Chamberlain, Thao Hung or Cheuang, Mon-Khmer Studies 18–19 (1992) (secondary)

Relations

• child: Then LuôngSent down from heaven by the sky-lord Then.Charles Archaimbault, La naissance du monde selon les traditions lao (Seuil, 1959) (secondary)

Sources

• Khun Borom is the heaven-sent primal ancestor of the Tai peoples, associated with the gourd-origin at Mường Then (Muang Thaeng, the Điện Biên basin in the Black Tai heartland), whence humankind emerged and his sons dispersed to found the Tai and Lao lordships.: Charles Archaimbault, La naissance du monde selon les traditions lao: le mythe de Khun Bulom, Sources Orientales I (Seuil, Paris, 1959) (secondary); James R. Chamberlain, Thao Hung or Cheuang: A Tai Epic Poem, Mon-Khmer Studies 18–19 (1992) (secondary)
• The gourd-origin narrative is localized at Mường Then, in the Black Tai / Tai country, a placement recognized across the wider Tai world.: Jean Michaud, Historical Dictionary of the Peoples of the Southeast Asian Massif (Scarecrow Press, 2006), 'Muang Thaeng / Dien Bien' and 'Khun Borom' (secondary)