Statue of King Taksin, general and ruler of Thonburi from AD 1770 to 1782, who is regarded as a Maha Raj or ‘Great King’, at Uthayaan Rachaphak (fig.). After the fall of Ayutthaya in 1767, he assembled an army and drove out the invading Burmese, and made Thonburi the new Siamese capital.