Chenla is the Chinese designation for the successor polity of the kingdom of Funan preceding the Khmer Empire that existed from around the late sixth to the early ninth century in Indochina. Most of the Chinese recordings on Chenla, including that of Chenla conquering Funan have been contested since the 1970s as they are generally based on single remarks in the Chinese annals.^[15] The History of the Chinese Sui dynasty contains entries of a state called Chenla, a vassal of the Kingdom of Funan, which had sent an embassy to China in 616 or 617,^[16] yet under its ruler, Citrasena Mahendravarman, conquered Funan after Chenla had gained independence.^[17]

Like its predecessor Funan, Chenla occupied a strategic position where the maritime trade routes of the Indosphere and the East Asian cultural sphere converged, resulting in prolonged socio-economic and cultural influence and the adoption of the epigraphic system of the south Indian Pallava dynasty and Chalukya dynasty.^[18] The number of inscriptions declined sharply during the eighth century. However, some theorists, who have examined the Chinese transcripts, claim that Chenla started falling during the 700s as a result of both internal divisions and external attacks by the Shailendra dynasty of Java, who eventually took over and joined under the Angkor kingdom of Jayavarman II. Individually, historians reject a classical decline scenario, arguing there was no Chenla to begin with, rather a geographic region had been subject to prolonged periods of contested rule, with turbulent successions and an obvious incapability to establish a lasting centre of gravity. Historiography ends this era of nameless upheaval only in the year 802, when Jayavarman II established the appropriately named Khmer Empire.