The word silk or pra pai is nearly synonymous with Thailand, however legend holds that the Chinese Empress Si Ling Chi discovered the mythic material while sipping tea underneath a royal mulberry tree. A cocoon fell into her cup and the empress became enthralled by her unraveling of the fine thread, thus creating China’s famed silk industry. How the silkworms came to Thailand is a mystery, since the Chinese banned the smuggling of silkworm eggs, cocoons, and mulberry seeds under punishment of death, although some historians say that a Chinese princess promised to a Thai prince concealed silkworm eggs in her hair as part of her dowry. Silk threads dating back some 3000 years have been found in the ruins of Baan Chiang, lending credence to the agelessness of this myth.
Few people understand the process of transforming silkworm cocoons into silk. Cultivators feed hordes of caterpillars on mulberry leaves through four shredding of their skin before they actually begin to weave the valued cocoons in thousands of triangular-shaped figure eights from the liquid silk filling their bodies in a 4-5 days process. Afterwards the cocoons are placed in a vat of boiling water and the Isaan silk farmers love their part of the procedure as they find the broiled pupa especially tasty, saying it tastes like corn.
