Every student of Southeast Asian culture is bound to become aware of a kind of empty chapter that is nevertheless pregnant with meaning and substance. This is the story of the Mons, perhaps not so much a historic nation or a geographical notion, but an entire "civilization." This is how Emmanuel Guillon characterizes them and rightly so.
Guillon, a French scholar who spent four years as professor of French in Yangon, developed a special interest in the Mons and he has become an authority on the subject. Apart from this voluminous (over 350 pages) monograph, he has written a few dozen scholarly papers, dedicated to things Burmese and Mon and Buddhist.
Ten years after the first edition, he was fortunate enough to have an equally respected scholar translate and edit his work in English, under the publications program of the Siam Society of Bangkok. It is doubtful whether any other scholar could have combined the dedication, knowledge, talent and exhausting scrutiny of terms in Mon, Burmese, Thai, Chinese, French and English as does James V. Di Crocco, a longtime resident in Thailand and former editor of the Siam Society's Journal.