In fact, in neighbouring Thailand, the Emerald Buddha is the national palladium. The Khmers and the Siamese (Khmer: "Siem") throughout their history had many wars with each other. The Siamese had sacked the Khmer's capital of Angkor. Later on, they attacked Longvek, another of Cambodia's capitals in the 16th century. After their successful capture of Angkor and Longvek, the Siamese brought many precious objects, jewels, statues, texts, learned men and many prisoners of war from Cambodia to their capital of Ayutthaya. The loss of these materials and human resources had a tremendous effect on the kingdom. The country had declined and lacked signs of progress in the later periods. After the fall of Lovek in 1594, it is believed that the "Legend of Preah Ko Preah Keo" began as an etiological myth to explain these historical events and to express the great sadness over the loss of these priceless resources. According to E. Porée-Maspero, the legend goes back to the rapt of the Preah Ko by the Thai soldiers. Preah Ko was a metal calf, in the womb of which a great collection of "pali" writings were treasured. Rubbed with mercury, after seven days, this statue could even walk. Another protecting divinity called Khuoc in the Khmer locality of Pisei was beheaded by the villagers. And in revenge, this "neak ta" gave the Siamese soldiers a banana log to capture Preah Ko, which they were seeking to capture as the Thai back then did not own any Pali scripts accordingly. Another version was recorded in 1870 from a brief oral tradition by ethnologist Gustave Janneau. As the King of Siam had failed many times with his army to capture Preah Ko and Preah Keo from Cambodia in order to enrich his kingdom, he ordered that the firearms of his soldiers be loaded with gold and silver which he shot into the Cambodian fortress. As the Khmer realized the valuable projectiles had fallen into the bamboo fields around their fortress, they decided to cut the bamboo forest down to pick the gold and silver from the ground. As soon as the field was barren, the Siamese king came hurriedly with his army and triumphed over the Cambodian army in disarray. They captured the two statues, opened them up to steal their valuable Pali manuscripts, which explains why the Siamese have dominated over the Khmer people ever since.