Explorer, Oriental scholar and diplomat, Pierre Lefèvre-Pontalis (1864-1938) was a member of the Pavie Mission to Laos in the 1890s and participated in drawing up the borders between French Indochina and independent Siam, as well as those which divided French territories from the British Indian empire. Two decades later he was appointed Minister Plenipotentiary to the Kingdom of Siam, which was then in the process of transforming into a modern nation state.

Before taking up his ambassadorial duties, Pontalis journeyed in Siam and Burma from October to December 1912, during which time he wrote copious notes covering more than 500 pages in small notebooks. These unknown texts found in Pontalis private archives were edited by Olivier Évrard (anthropologist) and Aurore Candier (historian), completed by an introduction and other notes as well as photographs and maps, and published by River Books in January 2025.

In this illustrated talk, Olivier Évrard will introduce the book and explain why it provides a window to the colonial mindset in the period before the First World War but also to the deep political and sociological transformations that were occurring at that time in Siam.