The country has always been called ''Mueang Thai'' by its citizens. By outsiders, prior to 1949, it was usually known by the exonym ''Siam'' ( , , also spelled ''Siem'', ''Syâm'', or ''Syâma''). The word ''Siam'' may have originated from Pali (''suvaṇṇabhūmi'', 'land of gold') or Sanskrit श्याम (''śyāma'', 'dark') or Mon ရာမည(''rhmañña'', 'stranger'). The names ''Shan'' and ''A-hom'' seem to be variants of the same word. The word ''Śyâma'' is possibly not its origin, but a learned and artificial distortion. Another theory is the name derives from Chinese: "Ayutthaya emerged as a dominant centre in the late 14th century. The Chinese called this region Xian, which the Portuguese converted into Siam." A further possibility is that Mon-speaking peoples migrating south called themselves ''syem'' as do the autochthonous Mon-Khmer-speaking inhabitants of the Malay Peninsula.