In 1888, a French government official named Charles-Marie David de Mayréna was sent into the highlands of what is now Vietnam to negotiate treaties with local tribes. Instead, he convinced the tribes to crown him king. He took the name Marie the First, established a capital at the village of Kon Gung, and declared the Kingdom of Sedang on 3 June 1888.
Mayréna then offered to cede his new kingdom to the French Third Republic in exchange for monopoly trade rights, and hinted that the Prussians were interested if the French were not. When France declined and Britain rebuffed him in Hong Kong, he traveled to Belgium, where a financier offered arms and money in exchange for mineral rights. The French Navy blocked his return by seizing his weapons at Singapore.
Mayréna died on 11 November 1890 at Tioman, Malaya — with various reports claiming poisoning, snakebite, or a lost duel.
