Siam through the eyes of a Russian diplomat (investigating Georgiy Planson's personal diaries)

The following paper is based on an investigation of the personal diary notes of a Russian diplomat Georgiy Planson (1859-?) that were taken during the period from 1910 to 1913. Planson served as Charge d’Affaires and Consul General in Siam between 1910 and 1916. The relevancy of the research arises from the fact that these diaries, as well as multiple other private information sources belonging to other members of the Russian diplomatic mission, have been scarcely if ever studied or analyzed so far. The contents of Planson’s diaries can be divided into four main topics: relationships between Siam and the Russian Empire, international life in Bangkok, leisure and recreation of the diplomatic mission members, and the incoming/outgoing correspondence registration. The performed analysis enabled to easily determine the overall impression the Kingdom of Siam made on a Russian diplomat, as well as to trace overall tendencies and attitudes within the diplomatic circles of Bangkok in the 1910s. Microhistorical research methodology was applied in the current paper.