Night Entertainment In Siam In 1617
An excerpt from a book¹ written over a century ago examines 17th Century documents from the British East India Company, to include personal letters that had been archived by the Company. The below quote is from discussions of problems the Company was having in Pattani in the year 1617, and infers considerable nighttime entertainment was available even then.
"This vice (gambling), however was not the only foible of those days, as is amply proved by references to lewdness, nameless diseases, drunkenness, and bastard children, now and again cropping up in the correspondence of the Company's (British East India Company) servants. Morality may have had a lower standard in those days than it has now, but, apart from any such consideration, the isolation of these Englishmen in their exile, their surroundings so different from those encompassing their lives in an English home, and the novel temptations to which they were exposed, lead charity to be merciful in judging them."
¹ English Intercourse With Siam In The 17th Century, by John Anderson, M.D., 1889
