Hans Penth was born in Berlin/Germany on May 6, 1937. Later in 1964, he became Dr. Hans Penth at Frankfurt University in “Languages and History of Southeast Asia” having Chinese and Ethnology as side subjects. His thesis was a translation and cultural-historical analysis of a part of the Sumatra chronicle of Hikajat Atjeh, printed in German as a book in 1969. Soon after, he went to Thailand.

Starting in 1965 until 1970, Hans studied old Lan Na Thai chronicles under the abbot of Wat Phan Tao in Chiang Mai. As a philologist-historian, who specialised in Northern Thai History, he settled down in Chiang Mai and married a Thai professor from the French Language Department of Chiang Mai University.

From 1970 until 1980, Hans has been working as a researcher on Lan Na Thai history documents at the Faculty of Social Sciences, Chiang Mai University. From 1981 until 1997, he became “Foreign Expert” at the newly established Social Research Institute, Archive of Lan Na Thai Inscriptions.

Dr. Hans Penth has to his credit over one hundred scholarly publications, including the Jinakalamali index. In his lectures and writings, he emphasised culture and everyday life in Lan Na Thai.

Dr. Hans Penth retired at the age of 60 years and was nominated “Honorary Member” of the Siam Society at Bangkok in 1997, being a close associate of Her Royal Highness Princess Galyani Vadhana, the elder sister of His Majesty the King of Thailand.

Needless to say, Hans continued to work as a “temporary employee” and was charged with work on Lan Na Thai History, in particular the publication of microfilmed inscriptions. Actually, Lan Na Thai is the name of a conglomerate of city-states that covered roughly the area of modern North Thailand between the thirteenth and sixteenth centuries. Mostly under the leadership of the city-state of Chiang Mai, Lan Na’s influence reached far into the neighboring regions, covering parts of present Myanmar, Lao PDR, and the southern part of China.

After such hard work that sadly was never fully recognised in the ivory tower of Thai Studies in Germany, Hans succumbed to brain cancer after a long struggle at the Suan Dok Hospital in Chiang Mai. He has passed away on Wednesday, June 17, 2009. Buddhist funeral ceremonies were held every evening at Wat Suan Dok, Chiang Mai. The cremation was on Sunday, June 21 in the afternoon. His wife and married son Bernhard survived him. May Hans rest in peace!