Mae Nak Phra Khanong

Every Thai child knows the story of Mae Nak. In the reign of King Mongkut (Rama IV, 1851–1868), a beautiful young woman named Nak lived beside the Phra Khanong canal, then a rural district east of Bangkok. When her husband Mak was conscripted and sent to war, she was pregnant. Nak and her baby died in childbirth – but when Mak came home, she was waiting for him with their child. Neighbours who tried to warn him met with misfortune. Then one day, while making chilli paste, Nak dropped a lime through the floorboards and stretched her arm impossibly far to pick it up. Mak saw, understood, and fled, hiding behind a nat (Blumea) bush that ghosts are said to fear and taking refuge in the grounds of Wat Mahabut.

In most versions Nak’s grief turns to rage against the village, until a monk subdues her – sealing her in an earthen jar thrown into the canal, or binding her spirit in a piece of her forehead bone. Some tellings say the famous monk Somdet To of Wat Rakhang calmed her by promising she would be reunited with Mak in a future life. The story’s lasting appeal lies less in fear than in devotion: Nak is a ghost who refuses to let death end her marriage.

There may be a real woman behind the legend. The Thai historian Anek Nawikamul found an article in the newspaper Siam Prabhet, dated 10 March 1899, in which the writer K. S. R. Kulap said the tale was based on Amdaeng Nak, daughter of a local headman named Khun Si, who died while pregnant. According to Kulap, her son spread the ghost story – dressing as a woman and throwing stones at passing boats – to discourage his father, whose real name was Chum, from remarrying and dividing the inheritance.

Nak is now honoured at a shrine at Wat Mahabut, off Sukhumvit Soi 77 near the canal. Devotees – many of them women hoping for a safe birth, and young men hoping to avoid the military draft – bring lengths of coloured cloth to wrap around the trees, dresses, toys for her baby, flowers and incense, and many come before lottery draws. For visitors, this is first a place of worship: Mae Nak is treated with affection and respect, not as a fright.

In the legend, Nak appears as a living wife and mother, revealed by her impossibly long arm, and later haunts the canal-side village. Today’s reports are devotional rather than frightening: worshippers say their prayers for safe childbirth, exemption from conscription or lottery luck have been answered.

The shrine stands beside the Phra Khanong canal in the grounds of Wat Mahabut, On Nut, Bangkok. Offerings are also made at the canal’s edge, where devotees release fish.

Mae Nak is the subject of more than twenty Thai films – including Nang Nak (1999) and Pee Mak (2013) – plus TV series, comics and Somtow Sucharitkul’s opera Mae Naak (2003). Her shrine at Wat Mahabut is one of Bangkok’s most visited folk shrines.