As Thai society was based on the idea of animism, it is believed that there are good and evil spirits existing in all objects and places, in woods, for example. Hence the major purpose of having a San Phra Phum is to provide the Phra Phum aka Phumi Dhevada, the guardian spirit, with a residence, so that he can protect all family members from evil spirits and bad fortune. Apart from the shelter and daily food offerings we give them in exchange, an annual ritual is also needed. Performed during Thai New Year or Songkran, the ceremony features gifts of spicy shrimp and fish salads with lemon grass and mint placed in a specific banana leaf basket called a Budplee.
Although sharing the animist spiritual belief, the San Phra Phum is not popular among Lanna people since they believe that their ancestral spirits have protected them already and so there is no need to build a shrine for other spirits.
A story behind it
If you look carefully, inside the spirit house there are tiny dolls. One holds a sword in his left hand and a book in the other while the others share a similar appearance. Who are they? Of course, it's easy to guess that the first one is the guardian spirit. However, there's a tale about this. Once upon a time in Plee city, King Tossaraj assigned his nine sons to guard different places in his territory including households, the city's gates, fortresses, granaries, rice fields, woods and rivers. The prince Phra Chaimongkol who carried a sword in his left hand and a book in the other was responsible for guarding the households and had a three-man entourage.
The San Phra Phum is usually set in the front part of households or places of business. Having a Hindu influence, the spirit house must be built on a platform in an outdoor area either on the ground floor or on the roof-deck. It must be distant from the toilet and placed slightly higher than eye level. Before construction starts, holy water called Nammon Toraneesarn is sprinkled over the area in order to evict the demons.
Certainly, we are now living in a modern age in which one sees the world through scientific lenses and the idea of San Phra Phum represents the wisdom of people in the old days and how they coped with their fear of supernatural phenomena. Nevertheless, the existence of this tiny spirit shrine demonstrates that the universal idea of psychological insecurity in the human psyche will not always be solved by science.
